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again at Spotsylvania Court House were they lost Lieutenant Thomas Johnston and thirteen enlisted men killed or mortally wounded, two officers and thirty-nine wounded, and another eighteen missing. They were part of the assault on the “Bloody Angle.” At North Anna River, they lost another two men killed, two wounded, and two missing. At Cold Harbor
in June, Colonel Morris was killed in action and another eight enlisted men were killed or mortally wounded along with seventeen wounded and 18 missing. At Petersburg, the unit again suffered losses, this time mainly via capture, including Hammell, five other officers, and forty-seven enlisted men. The unit is reported to have been reduced to only seventy men by the end of the assault.
After his capture on June 17, 1864, Hammell was taken to Charleston, South Carolina. His health suffered while in captivity, and an unnamed disease contracted at the time was blamed for his death less than a decade later. He was finally paroled on November 30, 1864, at Savannah, Georgia. He was briefly dishonorably discharged on March 2, 1865, for “leaving the Post at Annapolis, Maryland, in an irregular way, thereby absenting himself without leave, and attempting to
visit Washington, (in citizen’s clothes,) without authority from the War Department” but was restored to his office on March 21, 1865, in time to serve during the Appomattox Campaign during which they suffered three men killed or mortally wounded and another ten wounded. They were present for Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Court House and then traveled to Washington, D.C., where they participated in the Grand Review after which they reported for duty at Fort Richmond, in New York Harbor, which was placed under Hammell’s command. The men of the 66th were honorably discharged and mustered out on August 30, 1865. He held the brevet rank of brigadier general. Over the course of the war, the 66th lost nine officers and eighty-eight enlisted men killed or mortally wounded in action and four officers and one-hundred and twenty enlisted men to disease for a total loss of 221 men.
After the war he was a delegate for the solidiers’ convention in Chicago and then went to Helena, Montana, with a trading commission from General Hancock and also worked as the associate editor of the Helena Herald. He died while working as a trader at Camp Baker near Diamond City, Montana, apparently from the effects of disease contracted while a