Harrison Jeffords

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Harrison Jeffords
August 21, 1834 – July 3, 1863
Harrison Jeffords
Place of birth	Dexter, Michigan
Place of death	Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
Allegiance	Union
Service/branch	infantry
Years of service	1861–1863
Rank	Colonel
Unit	4th Michigan Volunteer Infantry Regiment
Battles/wars	Battle of Gettysburg

Harrison Jeffords (August 21, 1834 – July 3, 1863) was the colonel of the 4th Michigan Volunteer Infantry Regiment in the Union Army of the Potomac during the American Civil War. He was noted for his heroism at the 1863 Battle of Gettysburg, in which he gave his life while protecting the United States flag.

Jeffords was born in Michigan and educated in the common schools. After the outbreak of the Civil War, he enlisted in the 4th Michigan and became captain of Company C. He later rose to the command of the regiment as its colonel. He saw action in several of the major battles in the Eastern Theater while serving in the Army of the Potomac.

While Colonel Jeffords was back in Michigan on a recruiting trip, the ladies of Monroe, Michigan, presented him with a new national flag to replace the regiment's original flag, which had been badly damaged in recent battles. Jeffords stated that he would defend the flag with his life.

During the second day at Gettysburg, the color-bearer of the regiment dropped this flag, and Jeffords advanced to retrieve it. He is reported to have shot a Confederate soldier who had seized the flag and grasped them himself. In the ensuing melee, another Confederate soldier bayonetted him, mortally wounding the 28-year-old officer. Soldiers in the regiment, including Lt. Michael Vreeland and Jeffords' brother, rushed to his service and successfully carried both the flag and their fallen commander out of the Wheatfield. As his life slowly drained away, his finally words were reportedly "Mother, mother, mother." Jeffords became the only commissioned officer in the Civil War to die of a bayonet wound.

After the war, the regiment erected its monument on the battlefield near the point at which the colonel fell. Despite a regulation against the representation of any individual soldier on regimental monuments, Harrison Jeffords is supposedly depicted on the side of the monument, holding the flag for which he died.