Career
He was honored with the award on 17 August 1894. Cadwell was born in 1836 and enlisted into the 2nd New York Veteran Cavalry. On September 20, 1864 Cadwell along with another soldier, Albert Westinghouse, swam across the 150 foot Alabama Bayou near New Orleans in order to retrieve a small boat which his company used to gain access to a Confederate camp stationed on an island in the middle of the Bayou and destroy buildings, supplies, artillery and capture Confederate forces.