The sentence of the Court Martial on Corporal Geo. H. Burger, Company E. First Regiment S. C. Artillery, who was found guilty of an intention to desert and attempting to persuade others to desert with him, was carried into effect on Sullivan’s Island Thursday, precisely at 12 M. He was shot at that hour on the open space, about two hundred yards to the East of the Moultrie House, just beyond the Beauregard battery, in full view of the blockading fleet.
The execution took place in presence of the unfortunate man’s own Regiment, also Col. Keitt’s Regiment a portion of Col. Dunovant’s Regiment and the Provost Marshall’s Guard, composed of a detachment from the Forty sixth Georgia and the Charleston Batalion.
The proceedings were under the control of the Provost Marshall, Lieut. Col. Gaillard, and were marked by great solemnity and precision. The prisoner was brought out by the guard, accompanied by the Right Rev. Bishop Lynch, who administered to him the consolations of religion and offered up a last prayer previous to the execution. Although he seemed deeply impressed with the awfulness of the scene, as he marched inside the square to the stake, the band playing the dead march, the prisoner’s demeanor was perfectly composed and evidenced a calm resignation to his fate.
All the balls fired six in number, took effect in his body, and he fell perfectly insensible, although apparently alive for about five minutes afterwards.
The deceased was a native of Roundout, New York, where his parents now reside. He was but a few months over twenty-one years of age, and had been engaged previous to the war on several vessels trading between New York and Charleston. He was burryed in the soldier’s burying ground on Sullivan’s Island
The Camden Confederate, Camden, SC