Chronicling history of the Civil War, town by town
With the recent publication of his 10th book, “Upton’s Civil War Service: History and Roster,” historian Tom A. C. Ellis Jr. has now recounted the trials and tribulations of the 16th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, the Massachusetts Andrew Sharpshooters, and the Civil War histories of Framingham, Wakefield, Bellingham, Dover, Marlborough, Hudson, Natick, Hopkinton, Medway, and Millis.
Yet like the men and women who contributed to the war effort, the Medway resident is not aiming for fame or fortune.
“My goal is not to sell a lot of books,” said Ellis, 77, “but to honor those who sacrificed so much to hold this country together.”
Published in April by Damianos Publishing of Framingham, the 360-page book chronicles the history of Upton’s contributions to the Civil War as a municipality; the roles of men and women of African descent; the grass-roots abolitionist group that ran two local Underground Railroad stations, and a detailed biographical sketch of each soldier from the town, which is about 38 miles southeast of Boston.
Ellis, who grew up in Wakefield, said his own military service was inspired by two major historical events. On Jan. 20, 1961, John F. Kennedy delivered a stirring inaugural address in which he challenged his fellow Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.” Less than a year later, mankind teetered on the brink of nuclear war during the 13-day Cuban Missile Crisis between the United States and the Soviet Union.
“It looked like we were going to war, so I went down and signed up,” said Ellis, who was just 17 when he enlisted in the Army. He spent the majority of his three-year service as an air defense artilleryman in Germany.
After being discharged in November 1963, Ellis took business classes while working for General Motors in Massachusetts and Maryland. He returned to the Commonwealth permanently around 1972 and launched Tom Ellis Construction in Framingham.
Noting that “You can’t just take; you’ve got to give back,” the custom home builder volunteered at the Veterans Outreach Center and as a member of the Framingham Celebration Committee, which at the time hosted a parade and ceremony in honor of Flag Day, which commemorates the adoption of the flag of the United States on June 14, 1777. Yet he credits his son with inspiring his interest in Civil War history.
“Dean was 11 or 12 when he asked me to do [Civil War encampment] reenactments with him. I figured we’d be camping out every weekend all summer long, and as a parent, I couldn’t pass up that opportunity,” Ellis said. “Also, I knew I’d learn a lot from the other reenactors.”
By the time Dean’s enthusiasm waned a few years later, however, Ellis said he had been “bitten by the history bug.” He spent the next decade organizing living histories and other events as adjutant general of the Union and Confederate Volunteers of New England.
“I faded out of that,” he said, “and into researching local towns’ Civil War histories.”
Ellis typically invests a year and a half plus $1,000 in travel expenses while researching the Library of Congress, regiment histories, and a myriad of other sources for each book. In addition to recording histories that can support genealogists’ research, he said he feels good about “exposing their honors to today’s and future generations.”
“If we didn’t have the Civil War,” he said, “we wouldn’t have this great nation today.”