* Last name is Deming by birth, Denning by service record
DOB/DOD: September 6, 1843 (Granby, CT) – February 8, 1865 (Salisbury, NC); 21 years old
MARITAL STATUS: Married Sarah J. Hubbard (1838-1906) on January 19, 1864, in New Britain, Connecticut.
CHILDREN: One daughter, Inez E.A. Deming Langley (1864-1941).
ENLISTMENT: September 8, 1864, two days after his 21st birthday. He died in prison five months later.
FAMILY: Born to Gideon (1803-1877) and Louisa Bidwell Deming (1805-1896). Three brothers, Lucius (1825-1850), James (1827-1890), and Julius (1841-1918). Three sisters, Martha Deming Drake (1829-1904), Mary S. Deming Stebbins (1839-1906), and Sarah A. (1846-1859).
MEDAL OF HONOR CITATION
AWARDED FOR ACTIONS DURING: Civil War
BRANCH OF SERVICE: Navy
ASSIGNED TO: U.S.S. Chicopee, U.S. Picket Boat #1
GENERAL ORDERS: War Department, General Orders No. 45 (December 31, 1864)
AGE ON THE DAY OF THE EVENT: 21
CITATION:
The President of the United States of America, in the name of Congress, takes pride in presenting the Medal of Honor (Posthumously) to Landsman Lorenzo Denning, United States Navy, for extraordinary heroism in action while serving on board the U.S. Picket Boat No. 1 in action near Plymouth, North Carolina, 27 October 1864, against the Confederate ram Albemarle which had resisted repeated attacks by our steamers and had kept a large force of vessels employed in watching her. The picket boat, equipped with a spar torpedo, succeeded in passing the enemy pickets within 20 yards without being discovered and then made for the Albemarle under a full head of steam. Immediately taken under fire by the ram, the small boat plunged on, jumped the log boom which encircled the target, and exploded its torpedo under the port bow of the ram. The picket boat was destroyed by enemy fire, and almost the entire crew was taken prisoner or lost.
From the Hartford Courant May 24, 1991
CIVIL WAR RECIPIENT OF MEDAL OF HONOR
NEW BRITAIN — A daring Civil War naval attack and bitter accusations of a wife’s infidelity resulted Thursday in a ceremony honoring Lorenzo Deming for winning the Medal of Honor.
At Fairview Cemetery, local veterans gathered with flags at the Deming family plot around a new marble stone commemorating Deming’s long-forgotten heroism.
Thomas F. Durning Jr. of North Haven, who researched Deming’s accomplishments and tracked him to New Britain through letters attacking the character of Deming’s wife, stood in a Civil War uniform and told the crowd what Deming did to earn the country’s highest military award.
In September 1864, just two days after his 21st birthday, Deming enlisted in the Navy in New Britain. He volunteered almost immediately for a hazardous mission to attack the Confederate ironclad ship Albemarle, Durning said.
Deming steamed down the Atlantic Coast from New York in one of three tiny open boats commanded by Lieutenant W.B. Cushing. Under cover of darkness, the little boat Deming was on rammed the Albemarle at full speed with a bomb attached to the end of a pole on its bow. The explosion sank the Albemarle.
Deming was captured and taken to a Confederate prison camp in Salisbury, North Carolina.
The troops lived in holes in the ground. They were starving,” Durning said. Deming died on February 5, 1865, one of 11,700 Union troops to die in the camp. His body was dumped into a mass grave.
Back in New Britain, Deming apparently was given no special honors, Durning said, and he is not sure why. Deming’s name was not even included on a Civil War memorial
possibly because, although his parents lived in the city, his last address was New Haven.
In 1985, Durning, secretary-treasurer of the Connecticut Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, began researching Civil War recipients of the Medal of Honor from Connecticut. He acted at the request of a national group trying to find recipients’ gravesites so the Veterans Administration could put markers on them.
Deming’s name was misspelled in federal records, and he was listed as coming from New York. But Durning learned Deming had been born in East Granby.
After a few lucky breaks, Durning obtained in federal archives copies of letters that Deming’s relatives in the city had written, asking the government to reduce the pension to Deming’s widow, Sarah. The letters said Sarah had had a child by another man but claimed it was Deming’s to get more money.
Durning had the marker installed this spring in the Deming family plot, between the graves of Deming’s mother and sister. “It looks like they just left that space open for him,” he said.
From Beyer, W. F., & Keydel, O. F. (2000). Deeds of Valor: How America’s Civil War Heroes Won The Congressional Medal of Honor. Smithmark Publishers.
THE BLOWING UP OF THE ALBEMARLE
While Admiral Porter was fitting out the fleet which he was to command in the intended attack on Fort Fisher in the fall of 1864, the Navy Department was greatly troubled on account of the Confederate ram Albemarle, repairing at Plymouth, N. C. The reputation the Albemarle had gained in the North by her sinking the Southfield, disabling the Miami, and her engagement with the “double ender” squadron of Captain Melanchthon Smith in Albemarle Sound in the spring of this same year was the cause of this alarm.
Admiral Porter, having been apprised of the views of the department in this matter, suggested a plan to blow up the Albemarle with steam launches and by means of torpedoes. The plan was approved, and details were arranged forthwith for the building of three steam launches by Naval Engineers Wood and Lay.
Lieutenant Porter selected the young and indefatigable lieutenant, William D. Cushing, for the command of this hazardous expedition. Cushing accepted rejoicingly and started with the three launches about the middle of October from the New York Navy Yard for Hampton Roads. Here, he arrived on the 24th with one badly battered launch; he and his crew were utterly exhausted from the week’s trip. Of the other two launches, one had foundered shortly after leaving New York, and the second had run ashore on account of a terrible storm in Chesapeake Bay and surrendered to the Confederates. Cushing alone, storm or no storm, pushed ahead and reached his destination. Admiral Porter ordered Cushing and his men to rest while the battered launch was put in ship-shape again.
Just at that time, the admiral was ordered to prefer charges against Cushing for the supposed violation of some neutral rights while in command of a vessel in those waters. Cushing felt greatly distressed about this, but the admiral, after a brief investigation, reported the young officer free from blame, and at the designated time, Cushing, in his launch, started on his forlorn-hope trip, jubilant at having so fortunately, slipped off from a possible court-martial. Passing through the Dismal Swamp Canal, Cushing, on the 27th of October, reached the Roanoke River in Albemarle Sound and reported to Captain Macomb on the flagship Shamrock.
This same night, he completed his arrangements and started up the Roanoke to find his prey. It was said that at the wreck of the Southfield, about seven miles up the river, there was a guard of armed schooners. So, Cushing took with him against them, in case they should discover him, an armed boat from the Shamrock. His own launch carried fourteen volunteers, officers, and enlisted men from Captain Macomb’s squadron, mainly from Picket Boat No. 1. The Albemarle was made fast to a wharf about a mile above where the Southfield lay. The attackers knew that her crew and all the pickets along the banks of the Roanoke kept a sharp lookout against any surprises, for an unsuccessful torpedo attack had been made against the ram on the 25th of May by a party of daring men from the Wyalusing.
The weapon Cushing intended to use was a boom torpedo. When the daring party shoved off from the Shamrock, all of its members, as well as those in the squadron, were convinced that the Albemarle would be destroyed or they would never return. Such was the reputation of young Cushing’s unbending and daring nature.
The launch with the Shamrock’s boat in tow proceeded up the river unmolested, although the infantry pickets had a good many fires burning on the banks, which were hardly 200 yards apart. The Southfield was reached and passed without disturbing or rousing anybody.
Soon, a dark object loomed up before the anxious men, who kept the keenest lookout. It was the Albemarle. Cushing cast loose the armed boat, with instructions to take care of armed hostile boats which might come to interfere with him, and then made for the ram. When within twenty yards of her, he saw that she was protected against a torpedo attack by a boom of logs extending about ten yards from her sides. At this moment, a sentry from aboard hailed them.
Cushing, standing ready at the torpedo boom, which was raised, started his launch at full speed against the obstruction. The sentry gave the alarm. In a moment, the deck of the ram swarmed with men. Two field guns discharged a hail of grapes at the launch. Sharpshooters also opened a hot fire. But while the launch was pushing the logs under and Cushing was lowering the torpedo boom, he had his 12-pound howitzer in the bow of his boat fire canister into the human mass on board, which drove them for a moment under shelter. In the next second, there was a tremendous roar, and a huge column of water rose high in the air, lifting the Albemarle several feet. Then, the ram settled in a sinking condition from a fatal wound in her side. The little launch was swamped by the falling water and drifted down the river with some of her crew still on board while others, among them Cushing, were struggling in the water, trying to get beyond the light of the fires and the reach of the rifles of the infantrymen.
The following men composed Cushing’s crew: From picket boat No. 1 – William Howarth, master’s mate; William Stotesbury, assistant engineer; Bernard Harley, Edward Houghton, William Smith, seamen; R. H. King, Lorenzo Demming, Henry Wilkes, landsmen; Samuel Higgins, fireman; R Hamilton, coalheaver. From Otsego – T.S. Gay, master’s mate; C. S. Steever, assistant engineer; F. Swan, assistant paymaster. From Commodore Hull – John Woodman, master’s mate.
Cushing, Woodman, and Higgins left the launch or were hurled out of her. The rest of the crew, with the exception of Houghton, some of them wounded, were picked up by the Confederates and taken prisoners. Cushing himself had been wounded in the wrist. He drifted in the icy cold water until his strength nearly gave out. He came across Master’s Mate Woodman, who was crying for help. Cushing’s strength, although he tried to save the man, failed, and Woodman was drowned. Fireman Higgins, too, lost his life in the river. The bodies were afterward found washed on shore and buried by the Confederates.
Finally managing to reach the bank, Cushing hid in a dense swamp half a mile below Plymouth. Here, his hiding place being near a path leading alongside the river bank, he heard two passing rebel officers talking about the sinking of the Albemarle, whose smokestack only remained visible above the water. The exhausted man remained in the swamp until the next evening, when, having obtained some reliable information from a faithful old negro, he continued his toilsome wandering down the river, coming finally to a small creek, where he found an empty boat. He took it, and, pulling, exhausted as he was, all the following day until late into the night, he came towards 11 o’clock within hailing distance of a Federal gunboat. It proved to be the Valley City. He called for help and collapsed unconscious in the boat. It took some time for the suspicious crew of the Valley City to overcome their distrust and sent a boat down to the drifting object. Somebody recognized Cushing, and he was saved. Soon afterward, he was able to make his way back to his admiral’s flagship at Hampton Roads and report the details of his daring achievement. Cushing and Houghton were the only two members of the expedition who escaped imprisonment or death.
Cushing was promoted to Lieutenant Commander for this most heroic act. From his men, the following, all of Picket Boat No. 1, were awarded the Medal of Honor: Bernard Harley, William Smith, Edward J. Houghton, seamen; Lorenzo Demming, Henry Wilkes, R. H. King, landsmen; R. Hamilton, coalheaver. These formed the original crew which had brought the boat from New York.
Landsman Demming was captured at the destruction of the rebel iron-clad ship Albermarle on November 27, 1864, and was taken to Salisbury National Cemetery, where he died.
Artist’s rendering of Salisbury Prison
Lorenzo Deming was buried along with 11,700 unknowns in long trenches in Salisbury National Cemetery, 501 Statesville Boulevard, Salisbury, North Carolina.
“In Memory Of” marker in the family plot in Fairview Cemetery, 120 Smalley Street, New Britain, Connecticut; Section 3.
END