01/13/2026
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Captain Joseph Jonathan Davis, Company G, 47th Regiment N.C. Troops.
Joseph Jonathan Davis resided in Louisburg with his wife and three small children and practiced law in Franklin and Granville counties. He was an opponent of secession but nevertheless enlisted at Louisburg on March 5, 1862, and was appointed captain of a new company that was designated Company G, 47th Regiment N.C. Troops.
The 47th North Carolina saw very little action prior to the Battle of Gettysburg, where it fought on both July 1 and in the famous Pettigrew-Pickett Charge of July 3. Davis recollected that “My company was next to the extreme left of the regiment . . . and when not far from the enemy’s works, say not more than 100 yards, a sergeant of an adjoining regiment called my attention to the fact that the troops to the left had given way, but our supports were then advancing in admirable style. (Lane’s Brigade) . . .
And we advanced to the plank fence that ran alongside the lane just under the stone wall.” Unable to retreat, Davis (who was wounded in the arm and forehead) and the survivors with him were compelled to surrender. Losses in the 47th North Carolina at the Battle of Gettysburg amounted to 375 men, including ninety-three men killed or mortally wounded in action, 124 wounded in action, and 159 captured (of whom eighty-one were also wounded).
After brief stays at Fort McHenry, Maryland, and Fort Delaware, Davis was sent to the prison for Confederate officers at Johnson’s Island, Ohio. On February 25, 1865, he was cent to City Point and exchanged.
Following the war Davis served three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives (1875-1881), representing North Carolina’s Fourth Congressional District. He was appointed to the North Carolina Supreme County in 1887 and won a full term in the election of 1888.
Davis (April 13, 1828-August 7, 1892) is buried at Oakwood Cemetery, Louisburg, Franklin County.
(Following the Battle of Gettysburg command of Company G was assume by its first lieutenant, Pleasant P. Peace, whose image also appears on this page: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1268077150931253&set=pb.100031869412087.-2207520000&type=3 )
Image: Copy print in author’s possession.
Source Note: 1860 U. S. Census, Franklin County, North Carolina, population schedule, page 53, family 426, Joseph J. Davis household; Clark, Histories of the Several Regiments and Battalions, 5:153; Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, 2:36; Manarin et. al., North Carolina Troops, 11:315; Mast, “North Carolina Casualties”; service record files of Joseph J. Davis, 47th Regiment N.C. Troops, Compiled Service Records of Confederate Soldiers from the State of North Carolina (M270), RG109, NA; https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/8059802/joseph-jonathan-davis
--Greg Mast
