Sam Bloomer Way
Who was Sam Bloomer?
Street names in Stillwater are sometimes named for individuals important in the community's past. Running along the levee is Sam Bloomer Way, named for one of Stillwater's best-known Civil War veterans.
Bloomer was born in Switzerland in 1835. He came to the United States with his family in 1846 and settled in St. Louis. Two years later, the Bloomers came to Stillwater.
When the Civil War broke out, Minnesota Governor Alexander Ramsey was in Washington D.C. Ramsey went to President Lincoln and volunteered 1,000 Minnesotans, or one regiment, to defend the North. Minnesota, who had only been a state for three years, was the first to answer Lincoln's call for volunteers.
Of that First Minnesota Regiment, Company B was from the Stillwater area—mainly from the local militia called the “Stillwater Guards.” Among the approximately one hundred men in Company B was Sam Bloomer.
After the Battle of Fair Oaks, Bloomer was detailed as one of the regiment's color guards. He was promoted from corporal to color sergeant and carried the colors [regimental flag] through the following engagements: Savage Station; Glendale; White Oak Swamp; Malvern Hill; South Mountain; and Antietam.
Bloomer was wounded twice during the war. The first time was at the first Battle of Bull Run, in which he was shot in the head, but only a grazing blow. The second time was when he was carrying the colors at Antietam. He was shot in the leg, and he laid on the battlefield for three nights, two of them behind enemy lines. When he was discovered, he was taken to a field hospital where surgeons removed his leg.
After his injury, Bloomer was discharged on December 6, 1862. However, on August 1, 1863, President Lincoln appointed him lieutenant in the Veteran's Reserve Corps, also known as the "invalid corps." He served there until mustered out on September 19, 1866.
Bloomer married twice. First in Evansville, Indiana on December 12, 1863. In his first marriage, he had four children: Alice, Charles, Grace and Ernest. After divorcing his first wife, Bloomer married Nellie Presnell of Stillwater on October 7, 1882.
After the war, Bloomer returned to Stillwater. He worked as a wall guard at the state prison, and then was elected Washington County Treasurer in 1888, and served six years in the courthouse on Zion’s Hill. Bloomer also became an inventor, receiving a patent for his "Cloth Holder" on February 15, 1898.
On June 14, 1905, Sam Bloomer once again carried the colors for the First Minnesota regiment—this time, from the old capitol building to the new one on Constitution Avenue in St. Paul. The flags remain the capitol's rotunda for all Minnesotans to see.
Bloomer was very active in the Grand Army of the Republic, or G.A.R., an influential veterans' organization. He worked hard to create a monument on the courthouse lawn that would remind people of those from this area who fought in the Civil War. Even though his health was failing, Bloomer was chosen as the person to turn the first shovel full of sod from the site of the monument. When the monument was unveiled on April 27, 1917, it was Bloomer who did the unveiling.
On October 4, 1917, one of Stillwater's bravest soldiers died at his home in Mahtomedi. Bloomer had served his community, his county, and his nation without fail.
In the summer of 1993, as Stillwater celebrated its 150th anniversary, the city renamed Levee Road to Sam Bloomer Way.
—Brent Peterson
Brent Peterson is Executive Director of the Washington County Historical Society