Prior to the war Joseph Periam was a real estate investor and the 2nd richest man in Winona. The 1860 census records him as being a real estate agent, born in New Jersey, who had a net worth of $15,000.

Periam enlisted on April 29, 1861. He was a good friend of Mathew Marvin, who also served in Company K. He received a commission as a 2nd lieutenant in Company K, which was made up primarily of men from the Winona area. On November 15, 1861, he was promoted to 1st lieutenant. On Sept 17, 1862, became its captain; the third commander of Company K, replacing Gustavus Holtzborn, who had been killed at Antietam.

Beginning in July of 1862, Periam began having stomach problems. He had an attack of typho-malarial fever. The pain and irritation became quite severe. At one point he received a leave of absence from the surgeon to allow for recovery and this had to be extended.

At the time of the of Fredericksburg campaign his tent mate was Captain Coates of Company A.

At Gettysburg, early on in the charge of the First Minnesota on July 2, 1863, Captain Periam was hit. It occurred just before Col Colvill gave the order for a bayonet charge, about 100 feet from the brook. Lt Lochren of Company K was next to him and saw him fall with a bullet hole in the side of his head. He assumed him to be dead and continued on into the charge.

Company K's 1st Sergeant Mathew Marvin wrote about the charge, "I was laying by my Capt (Periam) who was wounded in the head, the ball entering at the nose & came out back of the left ear. In taking care of him I got pretty well covered with blood as he bled a good deal. He wanted to go back to the front so I had to hold him most of the time….The ambulances soon came & took us about 2 miles to the rear where they had established the hospital in a hollow near a creek…we were all right at last."

A note in the National Archives file states: "Captain Joseph Periam Co K 1st Minnesota Volunteers was wounded at the battle of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, July 1-3, 1863 by a gunshot missile which entered the nose and emerged back of the ear. He was admitted into Seminary Hospital, Gettysburg, where simple dressings were applied. Death occurred on July 6, 1863."

The Winona Republican said "Goddard reported that Periam spent his last few days in "semi-conscious delirium", ordering his men to stand & asking about the outcome of the battle."

From the Mathew Marvin papers we learn that Captain Heffelfinger was the first person to reach Periam after the charge. He removed his belongings but failed to find a tobacco box that his sister asked for in a later letter.

A final note posted in the Winona Republican on August 5, 1863, bears reading.

The Late Capt. Periam.—Among the papers of the late Capt. Joseph Periam, left in the hands of his agent here, was recently discovered the following, which bore date May 20, 1861. It appears that upon entering the service of the Republic—which he was among the very first to do—Mr. Periam was strongly impressed with the idea he would not survive the war. This presentiment of death clung to him through all his two years [of] dangerous and difficult campaigning in Virginia and Maryland. A few months ago, while on a brief visit to Winona, he stated in a conversation with the writer of this paragraph that he never expected to return—a remark which we attributed to the feeling of uncertainty which must be engendered to the minds of all who are exposed to danger, rather than to the fixed and unconquerable foreboding from which it sprang.The extract from his papers is as follows:

"I am fully content that I shall never return from this war, and I am entering the lists with this conviction fully impressed upon my mind. I am indeed proud of the privilege afforded me of offering up my life in defense of my beloved country."

Joseph Periam

Captain Joseph Periam died at the age of 30 and was buried with his comrades and later reinterred at the Gettysburg National Cemetery, Section B, Grave 9.

Sources:

Minneapolis Tribune, 1897.

National Archives military service records.

The St Paul Pioneer, July 29, 1863.

Family Tree Maker CD351, Roll of Honor: Union Soldiers, Volume XVI, National Cemetery, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.