Confederate Army Deserters Hanged in Corpus Christi
Corpus Christi, Nueces County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The hanging of two Confederate Army deserters at Corpus Christi in May of 1862 was the only military execution to take place in Nueces County during the Civil War. At that time, the Texas coast from Matagorda to Corpus Christi was blockaded by the Arthur, a union ship commanded by Acting Lieutenant John W. Kittredge. A nearby Confederate outpost on Shell Bank Island, Camp Aransas, was garrisoned by Captain Benjamin Neal’s artillery battery and Captain James Morgan’s Company D of the 3rd Texas Infantry Regiment. The May 21, 1862 issue of the Galveston Weekly News reported that four enlisted men at Camp Aransas tried to desert by stealing a launch to reach the Arthur. One was fatally shot, two were captured and one escaped. The two captured, both reportedly from New York, were promptly court martialed, hanged and unceremoniously buried at the site of the hanging, in the vicinity of Mesquite Street and Upper Broadway. The sentence was carried out by Captain John Ireland, a future governor of Texas. Given the increasing rate of desertions at the time due to conscription and the ongoing pressure from the blockade, these executions would have served as a warning to potential deserters. Local unionists were forced at gunpoint to view the bodies and placards on them reading “traitors take warning” and “union men beware.” As a result, many Corpus Christi unionists fled with their families to Matamoros, Mexico. Confederate military records reveal that actually three deserters, not one, were shot “while trying to escape.” Whether they were deliberately murdered or actually tried to escape custody is not known.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
In May 1862, with the Union warship Arthur blockading the Texas coast, enlisted men tried to desert the Confederate outpost at Camp Aransas by stealing a launch to reach the blockaders. Two captured men, both said to be from New York, were quickly court-martialed and hanged near Mesquite Street and Upper Broadway, the only military execution in Nueces County during the Civil War. Local Unionists were forced at gunpoint to view the bodies, marked with placards warning "traitors take warning," and many fled with their families to Matamoros, Mexico.
Why it matters
The hangings lay bare the divided loyalties of Civil War Texas, where conscription, blockade, and coercion turned neighbors against a Confederate cause many never embraced.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
By the spring of 1862, the Civil War had reached the Texas coast. The Union navy was tightening its blockade of the Confederacy, and the stretch of shoreline from Matagorda down to Corpus Christi lay under the guns of the USS Arthur, commanded by Acting Lieutenant John W. Kittredge. For a small coastal community, the war was not a distant abstraction — it was a warship on the horizon and the constant question of which side one's neighbors truly favored.
Texas had voted to join the Confederacy, but its loyalties were far from unanimous. Pockets of Unionists lived throughout the state, and the introduction of Confederate conscription in 1862 forced many reluctant men into uniform. Along the coast, the combination of an ever-present blockade and unwilling soldiers created a volatile mix. Desertion rose, and with it the Confederate command's determination to stamp it out.
Into this setting sat a modest Confederate outpost — Camp Aransas on Shell Bank Island — garrisoned by Captain Benjamin Neal's artillery battery and Captain James Morgan's Company D of the 3rd Texas Infantry. It was the kind of isolated, blockade-pressed post where morale frayed easily and the temptation to slip across the water to the Union ship must have been powerful.
People & events
In May 1862, according to the Galveston Weekly News of May 21, four enlisted men at Camp Aransas tried to desert by stealing a launch and rowing for the Arthur. It went badly. One man was shot dead, two were captured, and one got away. The two who were caught — both reportedly from New York — were promptly court-martialed, hanged, and buried without ceremony near what is now the vicinity of Mesquite Street and Upper Broadway. It was the only military execution in Nueces County during the entire war.
The man who carried out the sentence was Captain John Ireland — a name worth remembering, because he would one day become governor of Texas. The hangings were meant as a warning in a season of rising desertion, and the Confederate command made sure the message was unmistakable. Local Unionists were rounded up at gunpoint and forced to look at the bodies, which bore placards reading "traitors take warning" and "union men beware." The intimidation worked in a terrible way: many Corpus Christi Unionists gathered their families and fled south to Matamoros, Mexico.
The marker is honest about a discrepancy that complicates the tidy official story. Confederate military records indicate that three deserters, not one, were actually shot "while trying to escape." Whether those men were deliberately killed or genuinely died attempting to flee custody is not known — an uncertainty the historical record simply cannot resolve, and one worth sitting with rather than smoothing over.
Its place in the American story
This small, grim episode opens a window onto a truth that the grand narrative of the Civil War often obscures: the Confederacy was never a united people marching as one. Conscription forced unwilling men into its armies, blockade squeezed its coasts, and internal dissent had to be suppressed by force. The hangings at Corpus Christi are a local instance of a national pattern of coerced loyalty.
The detail that the executed men were reportedly from New York adds another dimension. The Civil War scrambled geography and allegiance in ways we tend to forget; Northern-born men found themselves in Confederate ranks, and Southern Unionists found themselves treated as traitors in their own towns. The forced viewing of the bodies and the flight of families to Mexico show how the war turned neighbors into enemies and made the border a refuge.
And the marker's refusal to resolve the contradiction in the records — one man shot, or three — models something important about how history should be told. The honest acknowledgment that we do not know whether these were escapes or executions is not a weakness of the story. It is the story: a reminder that behind official reports lie human beings whose fates were sometimes decided in ways no document fully captures.
If you visit
There is no battlefield here, no monument to a famous charge — just a marker in the modern streetscape near Mesquite Street and Upper Broadway, marking ground where something quiet and brutal happened. That plainness is part of its power. You have to stop and read to understand that people were executed and buried on this spot without ceremony.
Stand for a moment and let the setting do its work. Picture the coast under blockade, a Union warship offshore, and a handful of frightened men deciding whether to risk everything on a stolen launch. Then picture the townspeople marched out at gunpoint to look at the consequences. This is a place to feel the war's coercion rather than its glory.
If you're traveling the Texas coast with an eye for Civil War history, this marker pairs naturally with the broader story of the Gulf blockade and the divided loyalties of the region. It's a sobering counterpoint to the war's more celebrated sites — a reminder that the conflict was fought in small towns, against neighbors, and that the record of what truly happened here remains, in part, unresolved.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · John W. Kittredge
- · John Ireland
- · Benjamin Neal
Themes & tags
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