Charles Edward Goldsborough

"DR. CHARLES EDWARD GOLDSBOROUGH, Hunterstown, was born December 16, 1834, at Graceham, Frederick Co., Md., and studied medicine in this father’s office and at the University of Maryland. His family on the father’s side were Anglo- Saxon, and on his mother’s Scotch. His paternal ancestors were seated at Goldsborough Hall, near Knaresborough, Yorkshire, England, on several cates of land granted to the head of the family by William the Conqueror. The head of the family in America was an officer in the British Army, who settled near Cambridge, Dorchester Co., Md., in early colonial times. Robert Goldsborough, the great-grandfather of the subject of this sketch, was a distinguished black- letter lawyer, and although educated at the Middle Temple, in London, and married there Miss Sarah Yerbury, he headed the Maryland Delegation in the First and Second Continental Congresses that met in Carpenter’s Hall, Philadelphia, in 1774-76, against the mother country. He supported and voted for Richard Henry Lee’s resolution, July 2, and also the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776; but as the Declaration was ordered to be engrossed and was not signed until August 2, following, a sickness, that soon after proved fatal, prevented his being present at that time, and it was signed by Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, who succeeded him, but was not a member when the bill was passed, July 4. His son William, also a lawyer by profession, married Miss Sallie Worthington, of Annapolis, Md., and located at Frederick City after the Revolutionary war, where, in May, 1804, Leander W., his youngest son, was born, who married Sarah Ann, daughter of Capt. Perry Dunkin, who for many years sailed from Baltimore, and was finally lost in the ship “Cervantes.” From this marriage six sons and one daughter were born, Charles Edward being the third child. After crossing the plains with an ox-team, during the immigration to California, in 1853, he returned via Cape Horn, in 1854, and commenced the practice of medicine in Hunterstown, Adams Co., Penn., in 1855. March 4, 1857, he married Mary McC. Neely, daughter of the late Capt. John Neely, by whom he had two daughters: Grace Annie, born January 8, 1858, and now married to James F. Bell, and Mary McConaughy, born March 4, 1860, and died August 31, 1860. His wife dying March 10, 1860, he entered the United States Army at Frederick City, Md., soon after the battle of Ball’s Bluff, and assisted in establishing the United States General Hospital at that place. Upon the invasion of Maryland by Gen. Lee he was captured, September 6, 1862, but, upon Lee evacuating the city, was released and did efficient service after the battle of Antietam, as executive officer, in establishing hospitals for the wounded at Frederick. At the battle of Winchester, Va., June 15, 1863, he was again captured on the field at Carter’s Woods, by his brother, William, who was serving as major of the Second Maryland Infantry, Confederate States Army, and sent to Libby prison, where he was confined a prisoner until November following, when he received the following parole:

Richmond, October 20, 1863. “Dr. Charles E. Goldsborough has permission to go North, upon his giving his parole to honor to return to Richmond, Va., within forty days, if he does not secure the acquiescence of the Federal authorities in the following propositions, to wit: That all surgeons on both sides shall be unconditionally released, except such as have charges preferred against them. Such proposition is to be understood as embracing not only those already in captivity, but all surgeons who may hereafter be captured.”
Ro. Ould,
“Agent of Exchange.”

(Indorsed.) “I accept the conditions proposed in the above instrument of writing, and hereby give my parole of honor to comply with its requirements.”
C. E. Goldsborough,
“First Assistant Surgeon Fifth Regiment Maryland Infantry.”