No. 18 Four Brothers in the Civil War: Martin Coile - Union Soldier

Martin Harrison Coile was a brother to my great-great grandfather Lafayette Coile. Along with Lafayette, Martin and David Coile also served in the Union Army during the Civil War. We will highlight their military career as outlined by the Government Service Administration and based on the history of their respective military units. We will started with Martin Coile:

According to the 1850 Jefferson County Census Martin was 19 years old at the time. Accordingly he would have been born in 1831. He married in 1854 to Peggy (last name unknown). The muster roll shows that he was present with Battery E, 1st Tennessee Light Artillery as of March 1864. He would have been an old man of 33 years of age if he enlisted in 1864. We don't know whether he joined the service prior to this or not. His younger brother, David N. Coile, had enlisted in the same unit in November of 1863 when the battery formed. Based on our records, we can follow his involvement in the army after E Battery completed its assignment to North Central Kentucky (March-April 1864) and moved south to the Nashville and Bull Gap area. In August the unit composed part of a larger Union force sent forth by wartime Tennessee Governor Andrew Johnson to put an end to Confederate raids into East Tennessee. This Union force pursued Confederate raiders, moving through Strawberry Plains to Greenville, to Moshiem (Blue Springs), Park's Gap and back to Greenville. At Greenville E Battery performed well. General Alvan Gillem commended the commander of E Battery for his gallantry. It was at this battle that the famous Confederate General John Hunt Morgan was surrounded and killed. In these skirmishes and battles Martin Coile traveled back and forth through his own county on at least two or three occasions. This Union force continued to pursue the Confederate raiders throughout the region through March 1865. According to the 1st Battalion Order No. 5, Corporal Martin Coile was reduced in rank to Private on 1 February 1865. The records do not tell us why. In March 1865 they became a part of Stoneman's Expedition from East Tennessee into southwest Virginia and western North Carolina. During that expedition they moved through Wytheville and east to Martinsville, Va., then south to Mocksville, Salisbury, Morganton, Hendersonville, NC and into East Tennessee again. In June the Expedition was ordered to Nashville where E Battery, along with many others, were mustered out of service in July.

Martin would have returned to Jefferson County and to his work as a farmer. His military pension reveals that he had seven children, three born before he enlisted in the Union Army. His wife died 8 May 1896. His military pension indicates his date of death as 2 February 1903. I know nothing more about the life of Martin Harrison Coile. If one of his descendants reads this I would love to hear more.