Frederick Bliss was born Sept. 10, 1839 and was a cotton merchant in Savannah, Georgia. He left home and enlisted as First Lieutenant of Co. B, 8^th Georgia Volunteers and afterwards commanded the company. He was distinguished for his bravery and beloved by all who knew him. He died July 4, 1863 at Gettysburg, PA, from an amputation of his leg.

The Bliss family originally came out of Connecticut from a town called Lebanon. In the 1830s, one branch of Bliss people moved to Savannah, GA and the other to Durham, Maine. Frederick Bliss' grandfather and great-grandfather (Samuel Bliss and Elias Bliss, respectively) were veterans of the Revolutionary War.

In 1904, Frederick Bliss was mentioned in an address by George Hillyer of the 9^th Georgia Regiment. Before Gettysburg, Bliss was charged with leaving the ranks without permission in a previous battle. Hillyer was Judge Advocate at the trial (around January 21^st, 1863) and believed in Bliss' innocence, and that Bliss was gravely ill at the time. Hillyer called Bliss "a gentleman, gallant and brave."

Bliss came to see Hillyer before the charge at Gettysburg on July 2^nd, 1863. While waiting to attack someone posed the question:

"Suppose that, by divine revelation, it were made known in a manner that we all believed it, that if some one of us would walk across that valley and up to those batteries and be blown to atoms by one of those cannon, and thus sacrificing one life instead of many, the victory would be ours, is there one of us that could do it?"

Instantly Bliss rose up and pointing to the enemy's guns said:

"Yes, if I could do that I would walk straight across that valley and put my breast to one of the cannon and myself pull the lanyard."

Bliss was mortally wounded in the attack on July 2^nd. Before dying, he asked to be turned towards the battlefield, saying "I do not wish to die with my back towards the field of battle."

Bliss is buried in Savannah, Georgia.

[Source: "Battle of Gettysburg" by George Hillyer, Address before the Walton County, Georgia Confederate Veterans August 2, 1904. From the Walton Tribune]