Up for auction a RARE! “Medal of Honor” Hubert Dilger Hand Signed Check Dated 1876. This item is authenticated By Todd
Mueller Autographs and comes with their certificate of authenticity.
ES-7452E
Hubert
Anton Casimir Dilger (March
5, 1836 – May 4, 1911) was a German-American who became a decorated artillerist in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He was
noted as one of the finest artillerists in the Army of the Potomac and
received the Medal of Honor for
his valiant work at the 1863 Battle of Chancellorsville.
Dilger was born in Engen in the Black Forest region in Germany and educated in the Karlsruhe Military Academy. He served as a lieutenant in the Grand Duke's Horse Artillery at military posts in Gottesau,
Karlsruhe, and Rastatt. He developed several innovative
theories on artillery tactics and drill. When news came of the
outbreak of the American Civil War, Dilger received a leave of absence and sailed to
the United States.
After relocating to Cincinnati, Ohio,
he became the captain of Battery I,
1st Ohio Light Artillery and fought at several battles of the
Army of the Potomac, including under fellow German native Major General Carl Schurz at the Second Battle of Bull Run.
On May 2, 1863, Dilger fought in the rearguard of the retreating Union XI Corps during the
disastrous Battle of Chancellorsville, for which he eventually was awarded the
nation's highest decoration in 1893. He unlimbered his battery of six 12-pounder Napoleon smoothbore cannon as a
last-ditch defense against a large portion of Stonewall Jackson's entire corps,
which had pushed back XI Corps and was threatening to roll up the Union line. Dilger
also received high praise in the Official Records of the Battle of Gettysburg and
for his work in the 1864 Atlanta Campaign during which his battery fired the
rounds that killed Lt. General Leonidas Polk. Late in the war, he was on garrison duty. From
1869 to 1873, he was Adjutant-General
for the State of Illinois. After the war, Dilger prospered in Ohio
and eventually purchased a sprawling horse farm in the Shenandoah Valley near Front Royal, Virginia,
where he raised his family. After his death, a portion of his farm was
purchased by the US Army as part of the creation of the Front Royal Remount
Quartermaster Depot. Buried in Rock Creek Cemetery, Washington, DC