Civil War Soldiering | House Divided

Union Army Camp Scene, Mathew Brady photograph, detail

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Events

Date	Event
05/21/1861	Union soldiers publish their own newspaper in the field
05/24/1861	Colonel Elmer Ellsworth, a former law student of President Lincoln, is killed in Alexandria, Virginia
05/26/1861	In Philadelphia, the Cooper Shop Volunteer Refreshment Saloon opens
05/27/1861	The Union Volunteer Refreshment Saloon opens in Philadelphia
06/03/1861	After Philippi, nineteen years old James Edward Hanger becomes the first amputee of the Civil War
06/03/1861	In western forces, Union and Confederate forces fight the first planned engagement of the war at Philippi
07/21/1861 to 07/22/1861	The first pitched battle of the war between armies results in a Union disaster at Bull Run
08/05/1861	The United States Army abolishes flogging as a punishment
08/10/1861	At Wilson's Creek in Missouri, a bold Union attack is thrown back and General Nathaniel Lyon killed
09/09/1861	Near New York City, the desertion of an entire company from the New York Rifles ends in a firefight
10/21/1861	Union troops suffer a heavy defeat at Ball's Bluff on the Virginia side of the Potomac
10/31/1861	Lieutenant General Winfield Scott retires from the Army after fifty-three years service, twenty as general-in-chief
11/11/1861	Confederate General Leonidas Polk hurt in artillery accident at Columbus, Kentucky, seven others killed
11/16/1861	The United States Christian Commission is set up at a conference in New York City
12/31/1861	As the year closes, the armed forces of the United States reach a strength of more than 680,000 men
01/06/1862	The second hanging of an Army of the Potomac soldier takes place north of Washington DC
01/29/1862	In Prince William's County, a night of entertainment ends in death for ten Texas cavalrymen
02/01/1862	Verses of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" published anonymously in the Atlantic Monthly
03/15/1862	In Dutchess County, New York, a troop train derailment kills five men of the 94th New York Volunteers
03/21/1862 to 03/22/1862	In western Virginia, Stonewall Jackson's infantry marches at a grueling pace towards Winchester
03/23/1862	In the Shenandoah Valley, Stonewall Jackson suffers his only defeat at the first Battle of Kernstown
03/29/1862	Pennsylvania troops reportedly use the machine gun in open combat for the first time in the war
04/16/1862	Confederate president Jefferson Davis signs the first Conscription Act in American history
05/05/1862	Union telegrapher dies in a Washington DC hospital of wounds from a booby-trap left in Yorktown
05/06/1862	William Stoker enters Company H of the 18th Texas Infantry in Jefferson, Texas
05/19/1862	Governor Yates of Illinois calls for recruits to fill up the state's depleted regiments
09/03/1862	The Eighteenth Texas Volunteer Infantry arrive in Little Rock, Arkansas
05/06/1863	Dozens of New Jersey infantrymen drown in Kentucky while crossing the Cumberland River
05/15/1863	President Lincoln commutes the death sentence of an Indiana private soldier caught sleeping on guard
05/15/1863	Court martial convicts General Joseph Revere, grandson of the patriot, for his retreat at Chancellorsville
05/15/1863	In Tennessee, Julius Mileke, Union Army deserter, is executed at a public crossroads outside Nashville
05/19/1863	Meeting in Washington DC demands protection for black Union prisoners of war
05/25/1863	In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, white soldiers smash up African-American dwellings and establishments
06/09/1863	The War Department bars the enlistment of men under eighteen without parental approval
06/19/1863	Three soldiers of the Union Army's XXII Corps are executed for desertion
06/24/1863	Iowa infantry officer dismissed from the Army for drunkenness and sleeping with a freed slave woman
06/24/1863	War Department sets generous cash bounties for veterans who reenlist in the Union Army
08/29/1863	In Virginia, five deserters from the 118th Pennsylvania are executed before the entire V Corps, Army of the Potomac
12/23/1863	In Philadelphia, the veterans of the 29th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry are welcomed home
01/24/1864 to 03/13/1864	William Stoker returns to Coffeeville, Texas on furlough
01/10/1866	In the U.S. Senate, Henry Wilson of Massachusetts proposes the size of the peacetime Army
06/30/1866	The War Department reports over a million Union dead re-interred in forty-one national cemeteries.

People

Colwell, James Smith

Cuddy, John Taylor

Revere, Joseph Warren

Stoker, William Elisha

Documents

Date	Title
04/27/1861 to 04/28/1861	C. P. Kirkland, Jr.’s Letter, April 27-28, 1861
05/19/1861	New York Herald, “Letters for the Army,” May 19, 1861
05/23/1861	Ripley (OH) Bee, “One of the Volunteers,” May 23, 1861
06/01/1861	Atchison (KS) Freedom’s Champion, “News from the ‘All Hazard’ Boys,” June 1, 1861
06/16/1861	New York Times, “The Barbarians at Harper’s Ferry,” June 16, 1861
07/01/1861	Fayetteville (NC) Observer, “More Stealing in Pennsylvania,” July 1, 1861
07/04/1861	Boston (MA) Advertiser, “The Attacks Upon General Scott,” July 4, 1861
07/04/1861	James Colwell to Ann Colwell, July 4, 1861
07/08/1861	Fayetteville (NC) Observer, “Secretary Cameron,” July 8, 1861
07/15/1861	Cleveland (OH) Herald, “Military Printers Having Their Joke,” July 15, 1861
07/17/1861	Raleigh (NC) Register, “The Gallantry of Southern Men,” July 17, 1861
07/19/1861	Chicago (IL) Tribune, “A Good Idea,” July 19, 1861
07/20/1861	Atchison (KS) Freedom’s Champion, “Disgraced,” July 20, 1861
08/01/1861	Fayetteville (NC) Observer, “Gen. Scott Vanquished At Last,” August 1, 1861
08/03/1861	Atchison (KS) Freedom’s Champion, “Kansas and the War,” August 3, 1861
08/05/1861	Charleston (SC) Mercury, “The Loss of the Enemy,” August 5, 1861
08/08/1861	Memphis (TN) Appeal, “Clothing For Our Army,” August 8, 1861
08/10/1861	John P. Crawford to Abraham Lincoln, August 10, 1861
08/12/1861	Fayetteville (NC) Observer, “Lincoln’s Killed, Wounded and Prisoners,” August 12, 1861
08/19/1861	Fayetteville (NC) Observer, “Waking Up,” August 19, 1861
08/21/1861	Charleston (SC) Mercury, “Reform,” August 21, 1861
08/26/1861	Fayetteville (NC) Observer, “Impatience,” August 26, 1861
10/31/1861	Henry Bellows to William Seward, Report on Condition of Confederate prisoners in New York City, October 31, 1861
11/01/1861	United States Army Order Number 19 , Washington, D.C., November 1, 1861
11/02/1861	Gen. Frémont's farewell address to the Western Department Army, Springfield, Missouri, November 2, 1861
11/07/1861	Abraham Lincoln to Lorenzo Thomas, November 7, 1861
11/21/1861	Cleveland (OH) Herald, “North Carolina Dissatisfied,” November 21, 1861
11/27/1861	Colonel George D. Bayard, First Pennsylvania Cavalry, Report on Expedition to Dranesville, Virginia, November 27, 1861
11/27/1861	Major-General George McClellan, General Orders No. 48 on Chaplains and the Army, November 27, 1861
12/14/1861	Abraham Lincoln to Arnold Fischel, December 14, 1861
01/27/1862	Colonel Robert Latimer McCook to Brigadier-General George Henry Thomas, Report on Battle of Mill Springs, Kentucky, January 27, 1862
03/11/1862	Shreveport (LA) News, “A Pretty Severe Order,” March 11, 1862
08/15/1862	Shreveport (LA) News, “On the Wane,” August 15, 1862
12/12/1862	Fayetteville (NC) Observer, “Soldiers Frozen To Death,” December 15, 1862
05/26/1863	Abraham Lincoln to Isaac Newton Arnold, May 26, 1863
08/01/1863	Jefferson Finis Davis, Proclamation concerning Military Service, Richmond, Virginia, August 1, 1863
08/22/1864	Abraham Lincoln, Speech to the 166th Ohio Regiment, Washington, D.C., August 22, 1864