Dedicated: July 25, 1882.
Location: Wheatfield Road. Located at the north end of the Wheatfield adjacent to the Wheatfield Road. Harry Pfanz in Gettysburg: The Second Day states the monument is misplaced; Pfanz claims Zook’s actual wounding site would be properly located to the south of this monument.
Description: Marble shaft with apex cap. Inscription is cut into north face of the monument.
About Brevet Major General Samuel Zook
Samuel Kurtz Zook was born on March 27, 1821 in Tredyffrin, Chester County, Pennsylvania. He was superintendent of the Washington and New York Telegraph Company before the War.
Zook raised the 57th New York Infantry and served as its colonel. He fought in the Seven Days battles and later at Fredericksburg under General Hancock. Their division was the first to assault Maryes Heights.
He rejoined his brigade after a brief leave for an attack of rheumatism on the march to Gettysburg. Sent to the Wheatfield, mounted on his horse, Zook made a prominent target for the oncoming men of Kershaw’s South Carolina Brigade. He was struck by rifle fire in the shoulder, chest, and abdomen, and taken behind the lines for medical treatment at a toll house on the Baltimore Pike. He died on July 3 and is buried in the same cemetery as General Hancock in Norristown, Pennsylvania. Zook was one of three of four brigade commanders lost in Caldwell’s Division on July 2 (Colonel Cross was also mortally wounded and General Brooke was wounded; only Colonel Kelly of the Irish Brigade survived the action unscathed.) He was brevetted to major general for his services at Gettysburg.
Of Zook, a soldier recalled, “a born soldier, quick of intellect, and absolutely without fear.”