by Kevin M. Burton, 2014
Wounded and dying on the hot and blood-drenched battlefield at Cold Harbor, John Ethan Rust cried out in desperation, “God, where are you?” After further reflecting in Libby Prison, John’s question was answered and he joined the Seventh-day Adventist Church a short time later.
At the commencement of the Civil War, in July 1861, John E. Rust has joined the 20th of Indiana, an infantry regiment organized under Major Thomas J. Wood.1 While serving the Union army, John witnessed some of the most significant events during the Civil War—and survived five of its bloodiest battles. Early in the war, after only one year of fighting, John realized that he had grown calloused toward death. On June 22, 1862, he commented to his wife, “Judith, it is no dread any more for me to see a dead man laying around anywhere because we are in a perfect graveyard all the time.”2 Two years later, however, John quickly re-acknowledged the dread of death as he realized his own life was near its end.
The Battle of the Ironclads
Before he lay dying on the Cold Harbor battleground, Rust witnessed history in the making. Between March 8-9, 1862, he observed the Battle of Hampton Roads. The memorable aspect of this battle came on Sunday, March 9, when two ironclad ships fought each other “like demons.” As the Confederate Merrimac and Federal Monitor lit into one another, John Rust and his company “gathered on the beach” and watched as 180-300 lb. shells hit the ships. Some of these shells simply bounced off the ironclads. On the previous day, as Federal ships fired on the Merrimac, John claimed that some of the cannon shot had glanced off the ironclad and traveled “a mile after striking her.” The Battle of Ironclads “lasted five hours ending by the rebels taking flight up the Elizabeth River” and the onlookers going after their dinner. Three days after watching this event from the shore, John wrote a detailed account of it to his wife, Judith.2
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1. G. Tom Carter, The 19th Century Odyssey of John and Judith: From the Battlefields of the Civil War to the Spiritual Battlefields on the Texas Frontier ([Silver Spring, MD: General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, Ministerial Association, 2007]), 10.
2. Ibid., 11.
3. John E. Rust to Judith Rust, March 12, 1862, McKee Library, Southern Adventist University.