Sergeant George Uhri
Light Battery F, 5th U.S. Army Artillery
Union Army
Sergeant George Uhri and two other soldiers saved a field gun from capture at White Oak Swamp Bridge on June 30, 1862 during the Battle of Glendale or Frayser's Farm. The field gun had been deserted by another battery. The recovery was made while heavy fire was being delivered by advancing enemy forces. Sergeant Uhri won a medal of honor for his heroic action.
The Union Army rearguard under Major General William Franklin stopped the advance of Major General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson's divisions at the White Oak Bridge crossing during the Union Army's Peninsula Campaign to capture Richmond, Virginia. Sergeant Uhri also fought in many other major battle. These included the Battles of Malvern Hill, Fredericksburg, South Mountain, Antietam, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, and Petersburg.
George Uhri was born on October 21, 1838 in Baden, Germany and immigrated to the United States in 1855. He enlisted in the U. S. Army on February 9, 1856. He served in the Seminole Indian War in Florida and against the Crows and Sioux in Minnesota. He became a citizen on December 15, 1860. Sergeant Uhri served in the Union Army for the full term of the Civil War, and he retired from the army on December 31, 1886. He married Caroline (Lena) Ernst on October 8, 1866, and they had at least four sons. George Uhri served in the police Department of the City of New York for eleven years and retired on February 11, 1904. He died on September 28, 1911. He is buried in the Lutheran Cemetery in Middle Village, New York.
Gail Hawthorne