Charles D. Ennis

Turned captured guns against Confederate defenders

Private Charles D. Ennis served in Company G, 1st Rhode Island Light Artillery, during the Civil War. At Petersburg, Virginia, before dawn on 2 April 1865, his battery supplied selected artillerymen to accompany an infantry assault against the Confederate works. The Union infantry and gunners advanced under heavy fire toward an earthen fortification. After the defenders were driven from the position, two captured Confederate howitzers were reversed and fired back at the retreating enemy. Ennis was one of the picked artillerymen who volunteered for the assault and helped turn the captured guns against their former owners. The breakthrough helped open the way into Petersburg and hastened the collapse of the Confederate lines around Richmond.

Ennis was born in Stonington, Connecticut, on 8 August 1843. The Medal of Honor was presented to him on 28 June 1892, decades after the Petersburg assault. He died in Potter Hill, Rhode Island, on 29 December 1930, and was buried at White Brook Cemetery.

### Medal of Honor citation

“Was one of a detachment of 20 picked artillerymen who voluntarily accompanied an infantry assaulting party and who turned upon the enemy the guns captured in the assault.”