Harry Clay Davis

He Took Their Battle Flag in the Chaos of Atlanta

Harry Clay Davis was born on February 5, 1841, in Franklin County, Ohio. He came of age during a period of increasing national tension that ultimately erupted into the American Civil War. When the conflict began, Harry Clay Davis entered military service with the United States Army and became a member of Company G, 46th Ohio Infantry. His wartime service would eventually carry him deep into the Western Theater and place him at the center of one of the most violent battles of the Atlanta Campaign.

The 46th Ohio Infantry became an experienced combat regiment during the Civil War. Its soldiers served in major operations across the Western Theater, including campaigns in Tennessee, Mississippi, Georgia, and the Carolinas. The regiment fought through demanding marches, sieges, and battlefield engagements as Union armies steadily moved deeper into Confederate territory.

By 1864, Harry Clay Davis and the 46th Ohio Infantry were involved in Major General William T. Sherman’s Atlanta Campaign. Atlanta was one of the Confederacy’s most important transportation and industrial centers, making its capture a major Union objective. Sherman’s armies spent months maneuvering and fighting their way through northern Georgia against the Confederate Army of Tennessee.

The campaign included hard fighting at Resaca, Dallas, New Hope Church, Kennesaw Mountain, and other positions as Confederate forces repeatedly withdrew toward Atlanta. By July 1864, Union troops had reached the outskirts of the city, but the Confederate army remained capable of launching powerful counterattacks.

On July 28, 1864, that danger became a reality at the Battle of Ezra Church.

Union forces were attempting to extend their position west of Atlanta and threaten the remaining Confederate railroad connections. Confederate commander General John Bell Hood responded by ordering an aggressive attack designed to strike the Union movement before it could become firmly established.

The result was a fierce battle near Ezra Church. Confederate infantry launched repeated assaults against Union positions, and the fighting became extremely intense as soldiers battled at close range around hastily prepared defenses.

Harry Clay Davis entered this battle as a Private in Company G of the 46th Ohio Infantry.

During the fighting, Harry Clay Davis encountered the battle flag of the 30th Louisiana Infantry.

Civil War battle flags were far more than ceremonial objects. In the smoke, noise, and confusion of combat, a regimental flag served as a visible reference point that helped soldiers locate their unit and rally around their officers. Because of this, the color bearer occupied one of the most dangerous positions on the battlefield.

Capturing an enemy flag required a soldier to move directly into the most heavily contested part of a formation. The colors were normally protected because losing them carried both practical and symbolic consequences. A captured flag represented the defeat or disruption of the enemy unit that had carried it.

During the Battle of Ezra Church, Harry Clay Davis captured the flag of the 30th Louisiana Infantry.

The official Medal of Honor citation later summarized Harry Clay Davis’s action in only a few words: the capture of the flag of the 30th Louisiana Infantry. The brief wording does not describe every movement surrounding the act, but it clearly establishes what Harry Clay Davis accomplished during the battle.

The capture took place during a Confederate attack that ultimately failed to break the Union position. Despite repeated assaults, the Union line held. The Battle of Ezra Church became another costly setback for Confederate attempts to prevent Sherman’s armies from tightening their hold around Atlanta.

For Harry Clay Davis, the action immediately distinguished him from thousands of other soldiers fighting that day. He had entered the battle as a Private and emerged carrying an enemy regimental flag taken in combat.

Recognition followed quickly.

On December 2, 1864, only a little more than four months after the battle, Harry Clay Davis was presented with the Medal of Honor.

The Medal of Honor had been established during the Civil War. Congress authorized the Army Medal of Honor in 1862, creating a national decoration for extraordinary military conduct. At that time, the United States Army did not have the broad system of valor decorations that would exist in later wars.

Decorations such as the Distinguished Service Cross and the later form of the Silver Star did not yet exist. For Civil War soldiers, the Medal of Honor therefore represented the principal national recognition for exceptional battlefield courage and distinguished military conduct.

Harry Clay Davis’s Medal of Honor belonged to the original Army Medal of Honor period. For the VictoriaCross.ca database, his decoration is represented as Medal of Honor 1862–1895 Army — 1864.

The year 1864 reflects the presentation year of Harry Clay Davis’s Medal of Honor. His heroic action occurred on July 28, 1864, and the decoration was presented on December 2 of the same year.

No additional clasp, bar, star, oak leaf cluster, or other device has been verified for Harry Clay Davis’s single Medal of Honor. His verified decoration therefore remains Medal of Honor 1862–1895 Army — 1864 — No device or clasp.

Harry Clay Davis continued serving after Ezra Church. The 46th Ohio Infantry remained involved in the campaigns that followed the fall of Atlanta. Union forces captured Atlanta in September 1864, delivering an important military and political victory for the United States.

The regiment subsequently participated in the campaigns that carried Sherman’s forces through Georgia and into the Carolinas. These operations represented the final stages of the war in the Western Theater as Union forces destroyed Confederate military infrastructure and reduced the ability of Southern armies to continue organized resistance.

Harry Clay Davis eventually advanced to Corporal, the highest verified rank associated with his military service. This distinction must remain separate from the rank he held during the Medal of Honor action. At Ezra Church, Harry Clay Davis was a Private. Corporal was the higher rank Harry Clay Davis later attained.

The Civil War ended in 1865, and Harry Clay Davis returned to civilian life after completing his military service. Compared with the surviving documentation of his Medal of Honor action, the details of Harry Clay Davis’s later civilian career are less extensively preserved in authoritative military records.

What is clear is that Harry Clay Davis lived for more than six decades after the end of the Civil War. Over that long period, the United States transformed dramatically, while the veterans of the conflict gradually became living links to an earlier generation.

Harry Clay Davis eventually moved west and spent the later years of his life in California. His longevity meant that Harry Clay Davis survived well into the twentieth century, long after the battlefield at Ezra Church had passed into history.

Harry Clay Davis died on July 9, 1929, in Pomona, California, at the age of eighty-eight. Harry Clay Davis was buried at Pomona Cemetery in Pomona, California.

By the time of his death, nearly sixty-five years had passed since the afternoon when Harry Clay Davis entered battle outside Atlanta as a Private in the 46th Ohio Infantry.

Yet one moment continued to define his military legacy.

On July 28, 1864, amid the violent Confederate attacks at Ezra Church, Harry Clay Davis captured the battle flag of the 30th Louisiana Infantry. Four months later, the United States formally recognized that act with the Medal of Honor 1862–1895 Army — 1864.

Harry Clay Davis’s story remains a powerful example of Civil War battlefield courage: a young Union infantryman who entered one of the decisive battles of the Atlanta Campaign, fought through the chaos of the engagement, seized an enemy regimental standard, and carried that achievement into American military history.