Encyclopedia of Connecticut biography, genealogical-memorial ...

the Union army, August 25, 1862. He
first entered the service as a private in
Company C, Twenty-third Regiment,
Connecticut Volunteer Infantry, recruited
in Fairfield and New Haven counties dur-
ing the months of August and September,
1862. He was mustered into the United
States service with his regiment at Camp
Terry, New Haven, Connecticut, Novem-
ber 14, 1862; C. E. L. Homes, colonel of
the regiment; David H. Miller, major;
Charles W. Worden, lieutenant-colonel
Julius Sanford, captain of Company C.
The Twenty-third left Connecticut, November
17, 1862, and joined General
Banks at Camp Buckingham, Long
Island, serving under the command of
General Franz Sigel. The regiment's
first service was in the Department of
the Gulf, in the defense of New Orleans,
and from December, 1862, was a part of
the Second Brigade, Second Division,
Nineteenth Army Corps, and from June,
1863, was stationed at Post of Brashear,
District of LaFouche, Defenses of New
Orleans, and Department of the Gulf.
Until taken prisoner at Bayou Boueff,
Louisiana, June 23, 1863, the experi-
ences of the regiment were those of Mr.
Peck, his army record being honorable
and meritorious. He was rated a cor-
poral, November 14, 1862, and after his
capture was paroled on July 3, and mustered
out of the service with honorable
discharge, August 31, 1863.
With the ending of his military career,
his active business life began, and now,
a half century later, he reviews a busi-
ness career of success and prosperity
most gratifying. In January, 1864, he
became a clerk in the general store of
Benedict, Merriman & Company, at Wa-
terbury, Connecticut, and after an experi-
ence of one year, entered the employ of
the Hartford, Providence & Fishkill Rail-
road as freight clerk at Hartford, soon
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIOGRAPHY
164
afterward being promoted agent in charge
of the Waterbury Station. Early in 1869
he became a partner with Chester Cur-
tis in the lumber business, but a year
later they dissolved, Mr. Peck continuing
the business alone on Meadow street until
1887, when he moved to Hartford, where
he has since resided. He continued his
lumber business in Waterbury until 1898,
then reorganized it as the Brass City
Lumber Company, retaining a controlling
interest and serving the corporation as
president. Prior to the organization of
that company, he formed the Big Rapids
Door and Blind Manufacturing Company
of Waterbury, Connecticut ; located the
mills of the company at Big Rapids, Michigan
; was the largest stockholder and
treasurer of the company, which con-
tinued in active successful operation until
its plant was totally destroyed by fire,
June 14, 1900.
Mr. Peck organized the Capital City
Lumber Company of Hartford, was its
first president, but later sold his interest
in that company and retired from its
management. Since then he has been an
active member of the Andrews & Peck
Company, is its treasurer, and deeply
interested in its successful operation.
The company manufactures doors, sash
and blinds, in fact, all the usual mill planing
mill output. This company was
formed in 1885, Horace Andrews, a salesman
in Mr. Peck's employ, at Waterbury,
becoming a partner and later becoming
its manager. Andrews & Peck continued
successfully as a firm until 1905, when
the business was incorporated with Mr.
Peck as its treasurer. There have been
no blank periods in Mr. Peck's life, from
the time he entered the army, a lad of
eighteen. He has labored with body and
brain and that he has achieved fortune
and prominence is not as a result of for-
tuitous circumstances, but of intelligent,