“Decidedly Unmilitary”: The Roots of Social Order in the Union Army

A Thesis

Presented to

The Honors Tutorial College

Ohio University

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for Graduation from the Honors Tutorial College with the degree of

Bachelor of Arts in History by

Eric Michael Burke

April 2014

1 This thesis has been approved by

The Honors Tutorial College and the Department of History

______

Dr. Brian D. Schoen Professor, History Thesis Adviser

______

Dr. Miriam Shadis Honors Tutorial College, DOS History

______

Jeremy Webster Dean, Honors Tutorial College

2 Eric Michael Burke, History Honors Thesis

Dr. Brian D. Schoen, History, Thesis Adviser

“DECIDEDLY UNMILITARY” The Roots of Social Order in the Union Army

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION 4 - 35

CHAPTER I “I DEPEND UPON THIS REGIMENT” MOTIVATIONS AND CHALLENGES 36 - 63

CHAPTER II “THIS WAY OF USING DID NOT EXACTLY SUIT US” THE RE-ENLISTMENT OF THE FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS IN CONTEXT 64 – 122

Bibliography

3 Introduction

"The American of the North…learns in good time to recognize for himself the natural limits of his power; he does not expect by force to bend the wills of those opposed to his, and he knows that if he wants to get others to help him he must win their favor." Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, 18331

Twenty-nine suspenseful years elapsed between the conclusion of Alexis de

Tocqueville's tour of the American republic and the beginning of the conflict that tore the nation apart. On average, the volunteers that would later fill the ranks of the Union

Army would not be born for another three years following De Tocqueville's return to

France in February of 1832. But the model of social life he witnessed and dutifully recorded within his canonical Democracy in America did not drift far from its moorings during the intervening time. As De Tocqueville saw it, political and social life in America – especially the particular breed found in the free northern states - was founded upon the principle of voluntary association. Republican citizens came together by their own free will to achieve things otherwise impossible for the lone individual. “They come...to think of association as the universal, one might almost say the only, means by which men can attain their various aims,” he noted. Interestingly though, when limited by outside forces to “combine for certain purposes” only, “they regard association as a strange and unusual procedure and hardly consider the possibility thereof.” Americans clearly placed an overwhelming value on free choice, but De Tocqueville's failure to explain why exactly this might be the case, left a major

1 Alexis de Toqueville, Democracy in America, trans. George Lawrence, ed. J. P. Mayer (New York: Harper Perennial, 1969), 375.

4 gap in his description of American life. It was, in fact, the “various aims” of men, and the fact that they often differed from and contrasted each other so greatly that freedom of association – or, conversely, disassociation – remained so pivotal.2

Although De Tocqueville perceived that “the different parts of the Union have different interests,” he admitted to being unable to “discover any [interests] in which they are opposed to one another.” Less than three decades later, the full gravity of the

“different interests” that defined the political atmosphere of the entire Republic during the first half of the nineteenth century would become most painfully evident. In the late winter of 1860, disaffected Southerners, often metaphorically referring to the

Union as a kind of “association” itself, opted to depart from the nation due to perceptions of the new Lincoln administration as a threat to their own “various aims” of protecting slavery and extending it into the new western territories.3

Perhaps appropriately, maintaining a very small standing military prior to the rebellion, the Republic was forced to rely on the American tradition of voluntary association yet again in order to prevent the bonds of Union from being torn asunder.

By the end of the war in 1865, more than two million American men and boys had opted – the vast majority by free choice – to enlist in the volunteer Union Army, both to stem the tide of the rebellion and to achieve their own individual “various aims.”

Although the voluntary associational model had apparently been effective in ordering

American civil life, it very quickly seemed to fall short on the martial stage. Unlike the

2 Ibid., 522. 3 Ibid., 372.

5 voluntary associations that had dominated peacetime society, armies could not effectively allow for complete freedom of choice by their members. “Concert in action makes strength,” the leading contemporary treatise on military strategy and structure explained. “Order produces this concert, and discipline insures order; and without discipline and order no success is possible.” Unquestioning obedience, complete subordination, and dutiful cooperation with orders were perceived to be the trademarks of successful European militaries, and it seemed absolutely necessary to instill such virtues into the new volunteer army if victory was to be achieved and the

Union saved.4

Success in this endeavor though, was not immediately forthcoming. As many erstwhile enthusiastic volunteers gradually began to see the military institution as counter to the achievement of their unique “various aims” they instinctively reached for the same safety valve that had governed their involvement in civil voluntary associations – the free choice to associate or disassociate at will. Not surprisingly, it was nowhere to be found. The volunteer army was a very different kind of association, and many of the “boys in blue” learned it the hard way. While officers tried desperately to curb individualistic tendencies and foster order and discipline within the ranks adequate to the brutal task at hand, those disaffected acted out ceaselessly in an attempt to maintain whatever vestiges of individual freedom might still be secured.

The result quite often resembled anything but an army. As historian Steven Ramold

4 Bell Irvin Wiley, The Life of Billy Yank: The Common Soldier of the Union (Indianapolis: Bobbs- Merrill, 1952), 96; Baron De Jomini, The Art of War, trans. Capt. G. H. Mendell and Lieut. W. P. Craighill (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1862), 42.

6 has pointed out, an observer of “a typical Union army camp might characterize the assembled body of men as little more than a mass of hooligans, with a thin line of officers as all that kept the entire mob from unrestrained lawlessness.” Men refused orders outright, often abandoned camp or even battle on their own volition, and usually vehemently rejected any suggestion of subordination to men they considered their equals. Officers bickered, dueled, and sometimes even murdered each other, often due to social conflicts that mirrored the culturally fractious nature of diverse

Northern society before the war. Indeed, as De Tocqueville had pointed out, when forced to “combine for certain purposes” only, as the institution of the volunteer army had hoped to achieve, heterogeneous Americans were anything but compliant. Only voluntary associations that were structured in a way that allowed for all of the “various aims” of each unique member to be met vicariously and simultaneously through the achievement of the group's larger objectives could such an association succeed.5

Despite the fact that this reality forced the Union Army to appear nothing like a traditional military force, illustrating little of the supposedly vital disciplined characteristics thought to embody European armies, the volunteers were still successful – they did, after all, crush the rebellion. In order to achieve this feat, military leaders were forced to take into consideration the character and culture of the volunteer, adjusting their leadership philosophies accordingly. Instead of ordering around conscripted automatons as in Europe, successful officers were required at 5 Steven J. Ramold, Baring the Iron Hand: Discipline in the Union Army (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2010), 7; An enlightening discussion of how contentious an social environment existed within the ranks is available in Lorien Foote, The Gentlemen and the Roughs: Violence, Honor, and Manhood in the Union Army (New York: New York University Press, 2010).

7 every turn to view their men as free citizens, entered into association with each other

(and their superiors) on strictly voluntary and temporary terms. In order to understand what this meant for the resulting structure and social order of the army, as well as our understanding of what motivated the volunteer soldier, it is important that we temporarily suspend our own modern intuitive definitions of what it means or meant for an army to be an army. Instead, by examining the words and actions of Union soldiers themselves in light of the voluntarist worldview they carried with them into military service, we can begin to understand how they perceived the relationship between the army as a social institution and themselves. Further, we can uncover how shifting qualitative perceptions of this relationship affected the volunteer's motivations, willing subordination, and behavior both on and off the battlefield. Such an examination allows us to construct a much more complex understanding of the

Union Army not rooted in our own contemporary notions of what an army is or was supposed to be, but rather what its unique voluntary social order forced it to be.

This thesis will argue that the volunteer Union Army and the men who filled its ranks were products of their specific time and place in history. Free American citizens joined into voluntary association with one another upon enlistment, each in order to fulfill his own unique personal ambitions. Once associated, the volunteer mass provided a bountiful resource of willing manpower with which the Federal government was able to overwhelm the Southern Confederacy. Importantly though, the same personal calculus that governed voluntary association or disassociation in

8 American community and institutional life during the antebellum period continued to hold sway over motivations and behavior in uniform. This phenomenon seems to have been accentuated to an even greater extent in the Midwestern states – a region which owed its very population to the voluntary choice of migration. To illustrate these facts, this study will examine the men of a single volunteer regiment to show how the voluntarist worldview permeated the Union Army down to its most basic level.

Further, it will display how subtle components of regional culture helped to shape the resulting structure of volunteer regiments as the men who enlisted within them sought to recreate the forms of social order they were accustomed to at home.

First though, it is instructive to address recent historiographical attempts at understanding the Civil War soldier and volunteer armies that have undertaken a very different approach. Exploiting massive pools of primary sources, with the only major selection criteria apparently being service in either army during the war, these studies

– while boasting impressive source bases – tear the volunteer away from the cultural context found within his specific corner of the antebellum world. Instead, these historians have sought to identify what factors motivated all or most Union soldiers, or how all or most Confederate soldiers responded to certain events. While instructive, these studies often conveniently ignore the culturally diverse nation from which these soldiers sprung, thus enabling a general accumulation of their collective writings in hopes of identifying what elements seem to universally apply. Though scholars of the prewar Republic would perhaps be far more tentative in ascribing the same

9 motivations or behaviors to a Massachusetts banker and an Iowa corn farmer, or a

Missouri flat-boatman and a Prussian immigrant in New York, many seem to assume that the cultural and social paradigms that separated each of these individuals in civil life suddenly disappeared once the same men entered the Army. While this coincides with current notions of the modern American military as a great homogenizing force, the same did not necessarily apply to the volunteer Union Army.

HISTORIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION

In 1951, historian Bell Wiley wrote The Life of Billy Yank: The Common

Soldier of the Union. Wiley's was the first academic treatment of the “common” Union soldier, stepping away from the far more popular biographies of generals and politicians alongside “drums and guns” histories of dramatic battles and bloody campaigns. As he was moving in an altogether new direction, Wiley's work (and its preceding 1943 companion volume, The Life of Johnny Reb) had little historiography to either draw from or speak toward. Most of his evidence was rooted in published memoirs, unit histories, and collections of surviving letters and diaries. In fact, Wiley cited less than five secondary works in the entirety of his bibliographical notes, all of which served quite tangential roles in respect to the main thrust of his analysis. This gave the book less of an argumentative structure, instead making it simply a descriptive account of enlisted life as observed across the entire Union Army.6

6 Wiley, Life of Billy Yank, 438-446; Wiley's only discussion of secondary sources comprises two short paragraphs of his bibliographical essay on 445.

10 Billy Yank, in its essence, updated and revised Union veteran John Billings's

Hard Tack and Coffee, or the Unwritten Story of Army Life (1888) in which the non- veteran public was first, often comically, introduced to the less glamorous (but far more common) side of military affairs. Billings painted an image of a highly diverse

Union Army made up of a wide variety of colorful, strong-willed individuals with wide-ranging personalities and varying degrees of devotion to the cause. Wiley picked up on this reality with his own research. “The most striking thing about Union soldiers was their diversity,” he concluded. A time-traveling visitor would have been struck by the “many nationalities, races, creeds and occupations and observe great variations in dress, habits, temperament, education, wealth, and social status.” In fact, as he observed, “there was hardly a type or class of any conceivable kind that was not represented in the Northern ranks.”7

While Billy Yank and Johnny Reb both became immediate classics with numerous subsequent editions, Wiley did not immediately start a historiographical trend. The “Soldier Studies” genre, which aimed at understanding the experiences, motivations, and behaviors of Civil War soldiers, did not truly come into its own until the late 1980s. Within Embattled Courage: The Experience of Combat in the

American Civil War (1987), Gerald Linderman reintroduced the comprehensive analysis of soldier letters and diaries by investigating a factor largely ignored in

Wiley's work: the motivations of soldiers. Linderman sought to understand what

7 John David Billings, Hardtack and Coffee, or, the Unwritten Story of Army Life (Boston: George M. Smith & Co., 1888); Wiley, Life of Billy Yank, 296.

11 moved men to initially enlist in the beginning years of the conflict, what drove them repeatedly to risk their lives in combat, and also how their resolves were challenged by the experience of the war. Deriving conclusions that he felt were applicable to “some of the wars of our century,” Linderman identified “the gap between the expectation and the actuality” that seemed to define the sentiments of the largest majority of those he studied. Men went off to war fueled by notions of duty, honor, and most importantly, courage. Virtuous nineteenth century American society burdened them with weighty expectations of their bravery under fire, and they willingly entered into conflict with one another so as to prove themselves to those at home. The bloody reality of war soon checked notions of grandeur however, and converted motivated men into empty shells of shattered resolve and embittered hearts, filled with resentment for those that had not borne the battle themselves.

Linderman's was a dark conclusion, likely influenced heavily by his own contact with returning veterans of the Vietnam conflict. The disillusionment that followed the experience of combat's true horror had challenged every soldier since the beginning of human conflict, and Linderman's thesis that the Civil War was no different was a logical one. “They were frustrated by what they had expected to do and could not do,” he wrote, “and horrified by what they were sure they would never do and then began to do.” War manipulated men in ways they could have never dreamed, crushed their ambitions, and converted them into veritable animals. Courage and virtue were quickly found to be dispensable.8

8 Gerald F. Linderman, Embattled Courage: The Experience of Combat in the American Civil War

12 Linderman began a long methodological tradition by drawing universal conclusions about the nature of Civil War soldiers based on the analysis of a wide array letters and diaries. Instead of speaking to Wiley's original acknowledgment of a widely diverse American soldiery, Linderman hoped to narrow his analysis down to factors that seemed to apply to each and every one of the volunteers. Inherent in his conclusion was that such disillusionment applied to all of those who served in Civil

War armies, and to a certain extent the value of the work seemed attached to its ability to speak for the motivations of such a massive number of individuals.

This methodology was destined to spark powerful criticism. A decade later, historian James McPherson composed his own canonical addition to the motivational debate with Cause and Comrades: Why Men Fought in The Civil War (1997). Drawing from an even larger sample of letters and diaries from across both armies, McPherson derived a conclusion he felt decisively disproved Linderman's thesis. By making a somewhat vague distinction between “fighting soldiers” and “conscripts, substitutes, and bounty men,” he claimed he had uncovered the true nature of seemingly endless bravery and persistence in Civil War soldiers. While he admitted that “the tone of some soldiers' letters as well as their behavior did take on a more negative, cynical, callous, even brutal quality as time went on,” as Linderman had posited, “this is not the whole story.” In fact, it was “not the most important part of the story.” In order to achieve a more accurate picture of what “made men fight” in the conflict, McPherson argued, one needed to select a sample of testimony that was weighted heavily toward

(New York: The Free Press, 1987), 3.

13 those who had enlisted early, served in considerable numbers of major engagements, and comprised what he considered the “core group” of the Army. These men, whom he identified as the most effective and important cohort on either side, displayed a very different trajectory of ideological motivation than Linderman's disillusioned sample. 9

“For the fighting soldiers who enlisted in 1861 and 1862,” McPherson wrote,

“the values of duty and honor remained a crucial component of their sustaining motivation to the end.” The language used to describe the value they placed in either concept “was the same in the war's last year as in its first.” Collective conceptions of honor and courage enjoyed the same longevity in the ranks. Even further, the “initial tenets” or motivators that had caused men to enlist in the first place, were still going strong by Appomattox. Patriotic notions and commitment to national war aims remained solid in the hearts of McPherson's “fighting soldiers,” come whatever may.10

Over subsequent years, as “Soldier Studies” historiography has enlarged to encompass many other facets of soldier life, most historians have opted to ally themselves with one or the other of these somewhat conflicting conclusions, with

McPherson's usually coming out on top. In the end, it is admittedly more romantic to believe in a stalwartly patriotic and ideologically-driven core of men fighting the war with unblemished reputations and proven honor. But alas, many of these studies suffer tremendously from attempting to generalize about the motivations of the more than three million individuals who served in some capacity during the war, just as 9 James M. McPherson, For Cause & Comrades: Why Men Fought in the Civil War (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), ix; Ibid., 168.; McPherson takes on Linderman most directly within Chapter 12: “The Same Holy Cause.” 10 Ibid., 168.

14 McPherson's and Linderman's did. Even when McPherson's ill-defined “fighting soldiers” are pulled out of such a voluminous number, that any universal commonality of purpose or even experience existed within such a massive and avowedly “diverse” group of human beings seems unlikely. Further, there is no reason to believe that individuals exhibiting both Linderman's and McPherson's identified characteristics could not or did not fight alongside each other. Indeed, to suggest that even both models comprise all the possible variations of motivational sources or trajectories is far too simplistic a conclusion.11

A more authentic conclusion cannot be derived from yet another exhaustive perusal of thousands of different memoirs, letters, and diaries. Instead, by shrinking the breadth of our examination and zeroing in on a single body of volunteers, we can begin to uncover the truly wide array of diverse individual motivations in a Union regiment as well as how they fluidly shifted over time due to both external and internal influences. Such a study allows us to begin to understand what such a multiplicity of purpose meant for the resulting structure of the larger volunteer force. The results can provide us with new answers to the now decades old “motivational debate” - answers which, as we shall see, are not so different from the models of social order scholars

11 While Lorien Foote in The Gentlemen and the Roughs: Violence, Honor, and Manhood in the Union Army (New York: New York University Press, 2010) and Earl J. Hess in The Union Soldier in Battle: Enduring the Ordeal of Combat (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1997) both largely embrace McPherson's motivational model, other scholars have been more reluctant to accept his results completely. Steven Ramold's efforts to outline discipline in the Union Army within Baring the Iron Hand: Discipline in the Union Army (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2010) as well as in his study of Union soldiers' opinions of Northern civilians in Across the Divide: Union Soldiers View the Northern Home Front (New York: New York University Press, 2013) are built upon a much more complicated and nuanced understanding of motivation in the ranks. Ramold paints the picture of an internally divided and highly diverse volunteer force which embraces a wide array of opinions and motivations. His analysis drifts much closer to that of Wiley.

15 have already defined as the bedrock of many culturally heterogeneous antebellum communities – also entertaining a similar lack of common purpose.

Relatedly, without coming to terms with the distinct pre-war social patterns found in the specific regions that gave birth to Union regiments, we cannot understand the culture volunteers constructed for themselves once in uniform. By focusing on a single body of men, we are provided with new windows into the unique sociocultural dynamics that governed the particular regions that produced each unit under consideration. This allows regiments to serve as unique samples and cross-sections of the many different Northern cultures that thrived in the free states immediately before and during the conflict. The worldviews embraced by each of these cultures were carried into the army by the volunteers who had lived within them for their entire lives. Even after attempts at “militarization,” these cultural precepts would continue to govern their lives, deaths, discipline, motivation, and obedience in the army in dynamic and important ways. What follows is a concentrated study of one of these regiments – the Fifty-fifth Illinois Volunteer Infantry, contextually situated within the bounds of the cultural precepts that structured the worldview of the men who comprised it; a worldview they developed long before they donned the Federal blue.

THE FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS AND THE “WESTERN” WORLDVIEW

Disparate parts of what would eventually become the Fifty-fifth Illinois

Volunteer Infantry Regiment assembled from all across northern Illinois during the

16 late fall and winter of 1861 and coalesced at Camp Douglas in Chicago. Twenty-two years after the end of the war, Lucius Crooker, a junior officer in Company B, reflected back on what he called the “character” of the regiment. Due to its composition of men hailing from more than eleven separate Illinois counties and multiple adjoining states, the regiment could never claim the title of an “especial object of neighborhood sympathy.” It had “no local historians to embalm its deeds in the florid newspaper,” and “represented no one county or district.” When the smoke had finally cleared from the battlefield, “there were scarce any two sorrowing mothers at home near enough together to mingle their tears.”12

Though Crooker cited these characteristics as being unique to the regiment, in truth – within Illinois at least – they were not. Of the forty-eight volunteer infantry regiments raised in the state of Illinois prior to the Fifty-fifth, three-eighths had been drawn from at least ten different counties. In fact, only two were comprised of men from less than six. The Thirty-Second Illinois had men from at least thirteen separate counties, while the Twenty-First Illinois contained residents of at least fifteen. On average, the regiments already in the field had drawn recruits from close to nine separate counties apiece, hardly making them “especial objects” of any one locale. 13

12 Lucien B. Crooker, Henry S. Nourse, and John G. Brown, The Story of the Fifty-Fifth Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry in the Civil War, 1861-1865 (Clinton, Mass: Printed by W.J. Coulter, 1887), 36. 13 Statistics here are derived from the author's analysis of data concerning Illinois regiments provided within the Civil War Centennial Commission of Illinois' Illinois Military Units in the Civil War (Springfield: Civil War Centennial Commission of Illinois, 1961). Although the report lists only the counties providing the bulk of recruits comprising each regiment, a more thorough analysis of recruit residences prior to enlistment would be possible via an exhaustive search of the original Muster and Descriptive Rolls of Illinois Volunteers (RS 301.020) compiled by (and available through) the Adjutant General's Office of Illinois.

17 Though increasing dramatically over the course of the preceding decade, by

1860 the state of Illinois had a population density of about thirty-one individuals per square mile, making it slightly less dense than modern day Utah. Moreover, if the statistician selects only for white males of traditional military age, the number falls to less than seven per square mile. This factor, when applied to a fiercely competitive, highly mobile, and culturally fractious society, made accruing the necessary strength for the official formation of a volunteer regiment all but impossible in any single county. By law, each regiment, prior to receiving official recognition by the War

Department, would contain eight-hundred volunteers divided into ten companies of eighty men each. Ideally, the entirety of each of these companies would have been recruited by a single or small group of individuals, and would have come from the same local area. Instead, most companies initially formed from the consolidation of much smaller groups of volunteers rallied around several ambitious and influential young men eager for company commands. Each of these was typically drawn from a separate locale and referred to as a “quasi” or “embryo” company.14

The inevitable consolidation of these clannish elements often resulted in a contentious mixture of boisterous young recruits and crestfallen would-be captains robbed of their laurels by the necessity of investing company command in no more

14 Statistics concerning population density were derived utilizing the University of Virginia's Historical Census Browser [http://mapserver.lib.virginia.edu], dividing the state population as revealed in the 1860 United States Federal Census across the 57,915 sq. mi. land area of the state. The military age white male population was derived by selecting for all white males between the ages of 15 and 39, leaving plenty of room for error and consideration of in and out-migration immediately before and during the war; A more thorough discussion of the process involved in raising “embryo” companies is made by Lieutenant Crooker in Fifty-Fifth Regiment, 18-19.

18 than three officers. It was not uncommon for such defeated ambition to cause a swift departure from military service, often followed by subsequent desertion of each man's volunteer retinue. In the Fifty-fifth, as Crooker recalled, though several did quit the

Army, or at least depart to try their luck in another regiment, the unification of erstwhile atomistic groups from all across northern Illinois “was followed by no unhappy results.” Those who did not aspire for high command maintained an

“excellent disposition” he remembered, and were “looking anxiously for a chance to go to the front.” But relatively smooth transition from locally-rooted social organization to a much more heterogeneous one indicated more than eagerness for battle. It also belied a tendency toward a lack of geographically-centric identity embraced by the members of each embryo company. Instead, I argue that the volunteers seem to have embodied a peculiar “Western” identity, tied not to any single community or locale but rather to the principles of voluntary association, pragmatic individualism, and a state of geographic fluidity bordering on nomadism which were all definitive characteristics of the new state's ambitious inhabitants at mid-century. 15

The West – loosely defined as the states now largely referred to as the

“Midwest” – was a world in constant motion. Eliminating stereotypes of shiftless rural antebellum communities filled with intimately familiar neighbors and friends, recent studies of nineteenth-century American demographics suggest a much more fluid society. While the historian's and geographer's ability to identify precisely how much human movement was taking place at any given moment is limited, enough extant

15 Ibid., 28.

19 demographic data survives to paint a rough outline with a substantial downward bias.

By analyzing the appearance and re-appearance of family groups within the Sixth

(1840), Seventh (1850), and Eighth (1860) United States Censuses, geographers

Jeremy Atack and Fred Bateman have been able to evaluate the frequency of interstate movements engaged in by American families at mid-century. Remarkably, their results reveal that the vast majority – nearly 75% of Americans in 1860 – were living in a state or territory other than that of their birth. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the researchers found that close to 84% of those living in the Western states had picked up and moved at least once in the course of their lifetime. Sightly more than 13% had moved twice.

These numbers, which both authors suggest are likely to be significantly lower than in actuality, are most illustrative when compared with Americans living along the eastern seaboard in the same year. Only a quarter of northeastern Americans had migrated away from their state of birth by 1860. Further, less than 4% had moved twice. To be sure, none of these numbers includes individuals re-locating within either the state of their birth or their adopted domain. A closer examination of individual families suggests that intra-state moves of up to five or six iterations were not uncommon in the West.16

If the West was indeed a world in constant motion, then Illinois was its capital.

Embracing the most mobile population in the Union, less than 7% of the Illinois population in 1860 had been born in the Prairie State. Moreover, as cheap land became

16 Jeremy Atack and Fred Bateman, To Their Own Soil: Agriculture in the Antebellum North (Ames: Iowa State University Press, 1987), 83; 1840 United States Federal Census; 1850 United States Federal Census; 1860 United States Federal Census; 1870 United States Federal Census

20 available further west in the frontier states and territories of Iowa, Kansas, and

Nebraska, much of the first generation of native Illinoisans would depart the state without leaving much of a mark. As if any increase in instability was necessary,

Illinois also contained one of the most diverse populations as well. No single state in the Union had provided more than a small majority (New York, with 36%) to the

Prairie State's ranks by 1860. While newcomers often attempted to transplant demographic and cultural patterns that mirrored those they had left behind, as the railroad opened up ever more vast areas of land to settlement, the ability to remain culturally compartmentalized became much more difficult to accomplish. 17

Historians Drew Cayton and Peter Onuf have identified how the resulting cultural landscape of the West unfolded more like a checkerboard than a melting pot.

In effect, this was caused by settlers attempting – with greater or lesser levels of success – to transplant the social orders and cultural traditions of their original homes onto the frontier. Once the diversifying effects of the railroad had entered the mix however, such traditions were forced into slight modification designed to cope with the realities of the frontier. Still, when combined with the importance of curbing immigration costs by planting the same crops cultivated in their previous location, this phenomenon created identifiable cultural bands that cut across antebellum Illinois from north to south. In the southernmost portions of the state dwelled predominately

Upland Southern migrants from the nearby slave states of Kentucky and Tennessee.

Further north, in the wide swaths of prairie that swept central Illinois, immigrants from

17 Atack, To Their Own Soil, 71.

21 the same latitudinal band in the mid-Atlantic free states tended to settle. Finally, in the northernmost reaches of the state, as a general rule, one might find the largest proportion of foreign and New England settlers – resting along roughly the same latitude as Massachusetts and therefore allowing easy transplantation of New England agricultural methods.18

Raised from counties resting on the border of central and northern Illinois, the resulting demography of the Fifty-fifth Illinois was dominated by immigrants from the mid-Atlantic and New England states, with a considerable number of foreigners mixed within. Historical geographer D. W. Meinig has identified this “midland” cultural band as having been dominated by its “marked diversity of people” - a characteristic shared with its eastern parent region. As diversity was indeed the order of the day across the entirety of antebellum Illinois as well, the same challenges that migrants from the more homogeneous cultures of New England and the Upland South confronted were likely met with less difficulty by the already culturally heterogeneous mid-Atlantic populations. While the former two butted heads almost immediately and at almost every turn in the state's history, Meinig's “midlanders” provided a sort of middle ground – transplanting with them a social order rooted in individualism which had played an integral role in securing social stability in the mid-Atlantic. 19

This midland social order and subsequent frontier politics were rooted, most

18 Drew Cayton and Peter Onuf. The Midwest and the Nation: Rethinking the History of an American Region. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990), 26-27; D. W. Meinig, The Shaping of America: A Geographical Perspective on 500 Years of History, Volume 2, Continental America, 1800-1867. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1988), 283; Atack, To Their Own Soil, 77. 19 Meinig, Shaping of America, 281.

22 directly, in an acknowledgement of the profound importance of individual goals, private ambitions, and the unique motivations that drove every member of the diverse society – each in different ways and directions. This necessitated a system of order that emphasized local governments and political factions as “a kind of marketplace, with politicians as brokers mediating among contending interests – and taking their fee,” Meinig explained. The popular political parties that had grown up in the midlands around these “individualistic” principles were forced, once in the rapidly diversifying West, to adapt even further in the direction of embracing individualism.

“Political parties [were] viewed not as instruments of ideology but more as business corporations working to ensure the 'profits' of the principal investors,” Meinig wrote.

“It was a practical politics, designed to deal with diversity and contention by means of compromise and trade-offs.” In the end, Western politics and the society which gave it life, was structured around the party structured most like “a loose coalition, with an easy tolerance of sociocultural variety.”20

All of this movement, impermanence, individualism, and cultural diversity made the development of lasting communities increasingly challenging and necessitated the construction of an underlying social order markedly unique from that of the American northeast. One of the most instructive analyses of this resulting social order has been accomplished by historian Don Harrison Doyle with his The Social

Order of a Frontier Community: Jacksonville, Illinois, 1825-70 (1978). The study of an upstart frontier community attempting to survive the tumultuous early statehood

20 Ibid., 280-281.

23 period, Doyle's Jacksonville, though resting in central Illinois, faced the same developmental hurdles as most of the towns and villages that eventually gave rise to the Fifty-fifth Illinois. For this reason, his careful social analysis of the town's turbulent infancy provides an important window into the social world familiar to the volunteers prior to their entrance into the Union Army. As the population of Illinois swelled from south to north across the first half of the century, Jacksonville was settled several decades before the railroad villages of the northern regions of the state.

Therefore, it behooves us to examine the earliest era of Jacksonville's settlement, when friction and faction were at their most potent.21

Above all else, the challenges faced by any frontier upstart community were those derived from two major factors: (1) the profound extent of geographical mobility and population flux present in the new state, and (2) the extreme diversity of heterogeneous cultures colliding with each other on the frontier, each in search of its own success. “The unsettled nature of the new community, produced by the continual influx of newcomers and the clash of strangers,” Doyle explained, “created a more acute need to define some form of social order as a prerequisite for growth and progress.” Instead of a unification of ideology and a collectively embraced philosophy of progress, Doyle instead found evidence of an “absence of any preconceived

21 Although dated, perhaps the best single volume history of Illinois' experience in the sectional crisis and war years is available within Arthur Charles Cole's The Era of the Civil War: 1848-1870 (Springfield: Illinois Centennial Commission, 1919) within the Centennial History of Illinois (Vol. III). Coles takes time to discuss the dynamics of antebellum Illinois society, politics, and agriculture, before diving straight into the war years. A more recent geographical study of demographic expansion across the state's frontier years is found within geographer Douglas K. Meyer's Making the Heartland Quilt: A Geographical History of Settlement and Migration in Early-Nineteenth- Century Illinois (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2000).

24 structure of political or social authority.” Migrants, by and large, had come to

Jacksonville “to improve their economic and social status, and they usually brought with them high expectations of success.” Unfortunately, however, the enormous cultural diversity they found on the frontier “provided fuel for a multitude of conflict situations,” which Doyle went so far as to call a “Hobbesian jungle of violent social discord.” The new Illinoisans had left their homes and relatives to venture west into a supposed land of opportunity and promise, but had instead found a cauldron of boiling social conflict and self-centered competition where each individual was forced to look out for his own good at the expense of others. How then, in the face of such resistance, did a productive and cohesive community arise?22

At the crux of Doyle's explanation is the fact that, unlike the well-established cities and towns of the American northeast, all of the inhabitants of frontier

Jacksonville had migrated to and stayed in the community by their own free choice.

Migrants had myriad options upon arrival to the Prairie State, and decisions regarding where to settle were complicated and dynamic in nature. Within To Their Own Soil:

Agriculture in the Antebellum North (1987), Atack and Bateman posit a few of the most salient considerations taken by Northern immigrant upstarts in the free states

(including ease of crop transplantation, price of lands, and proximity to familiar cultures from home). They also offer perhaps the clearest explanation for westward expansion in the first place. “Realization of the agrarian dream often demanded

22 Don Harrison Doyle, The Social Order of a Frontier Community: Jacksonville, Illinois, 1825-1870 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1983), 5-11.

25 geographic mobility,” the authors explained. “The reward for those who took the risk was a chance for improved economic and social mobility gained from the acquisition of physical capital rather than through family lineage.” To be sure, land was the way to social mobility. “But since land grew relatively more abundant westward,” they wrote,

“movement through the economic classes was often inseparable from physical relocation.” Westerners were inherently movers. When opportunities arose, they were quick to pack up and go in search of new promise. Rare were those who opted to stay in one place for a lengthy period of time, and it was up to those who did to convince others to do the same. In essence, in order for stable communities to be born,

Westerners had to be convinced that (1) the particular village in question was conducive to their individual motivations for westward migration in the first place, (2) that the resulting cultural community could be conducive to their individual beliefs and concerns, and perhaps most importantly (3) that remaining in the community instead of uprooting to follow the next wave of opportunity further westward was in their best possible interest. While this endeavor has been referred to as “boosterism” in much of the historical and sociological literature dealing with the era, Doyle argues that the bulk of booster historiography fails to capture the true complexity of early village social structure.23

23 Ibid., 13.; Atack, To Their Own Soil, 71; The authors wield an impressive array of migration data derived from non-population agricultural and Federal censuses throughout Chapter Five in an effort to illustrate Northern migration patterns and uncover likely motivations; Doyle, within Social Order, engages in an exhaustive summary of frontier historiography within his Introduction (1-17). After addressing the shortcomings of multiple historians, geographers, and sociologists – to include Elkins and McKitrick (1954) and Daniel Boorstin (1965) – he finally seizes on the notion of “a community of limited liability” outlined by sociologist Morris Janowitz, who had originally applied the model of voluntary associative communities to urban neighborhoods. Janowitz's theory – which underlies

26 The fulfillment of the above three requirements was a monumental challenge to the “stayers” of Jacksonville. Added to this was the need for engendering social order and a respect for law in a nascent village of disagreeing neighbors and volatile passersby. Fortunately, the culture of voluntary institutional life that thrived at the roots of antebellum Northern society aided in cutting across partisan and cultural boundaries on many levels to produce at least passingly amicable relations within the community. But even churches, political parties, and social institutions like the

Freemasons and temperance unions were not powerful enough to forestall the out- migration of individuals who no longer perceived Jacksonville as being the best location for fulfilling their dreams and ambitions. In fact, paradoxically, the nationalization of many of these associations had the opposite effect by allowing individual migrants to conveniently pick up where they left off in institutional life wherever they might geographically drift. Still, each of these institutions also functioned only to the extent that it could cope with the same challenges confronted by the village at large. “Voluntarism ruled the individual's decision to join or leave these institutions,” Doyle related, “but as a member one was subject to the discipline of the fellowship.” Voluntary members were willing to relinquish a moderate amount of independence and freedom if it meant that their individual interests would benefit by the association or institution in question. Sometimes this benefit amounted to social

the crux of Doyle's argument as well as much of my own understanding of antebellum Illinois – is found within Morris Janowitz, The Community Press in an Urban Setting: The Social Elements of Urbanism, 2nd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967), 210-13. Though the antebellum West might seem an unlikely ally for Janowitz's urban theory, Doyle succeeds admirably at illustrating the similarities between the two.

27 influence, other times it was equated with religious salvation, and with others, as with local and national political parties, it led to a sense of belonging and emergent nationalism. Either way, each of these voluntary associations was forced to contend for the allegiance of members by framing itself in a manner conducive to each individual's wide array of interests.24

In the same way, it was up to the town fathers to create a community environment that catered to the heterogeneous interests and motivations that the

“stayers” acknowledged as present across their population. In the end, the community that invested in its own diversity to the greatest extent would be most successful in attracting the largest proportion of future “stayers.” While Jacksonville was nominally successful in this over the short term, the fact that the town eventually failed to capture the proportion of migrants necessary to transform it into a major city on the frontier demonstrates the ultimate consequences of a vastly mobile western society. Westerners were almost impossible to corral into a static lifestyle when opportunity called elsewhere. Freedom of geographic mobility quickly became the very basis of life in the West, and it formed the bedrock of the Western worldview. While movement for movement's sake was costly and rare, the same depth of community involvement and sense of local belonging northeastern Americans seem to have enjoyed was muted to a considerable extent in the western states. Erstwhile atomistic individuals associated with one another, usually near a natural geographic crossroads or resource base useful 24 Doyle, Social Order, 14.; To understand completely the dynamics of boosterism as they were embraced by Jacksonville's “stayers,” see Doyle's chapter “Citizens and Strangers,” 92-118; The complex web of religious, political, and secular voluntary institutions that held together the delicate social order of the town is discussed in “The Voluntary Community,”156-193.

28 to all, predominately for the sake of personal gain. The necessaries for such personal gain were unique to each individual. Should the benefits of involvement in the community continue to outweigh the possible opportunities elsewhere, Westerners were content to stay. But if the opposite were perceived, almost nothing could keep them still. The boosterism of the youngest communities as well as the memberships of the voluntary associations and institutions that held such communities together, necessarily relied on the whim of the particular individual calculus of self-interest that every Westerner engaged in on a regular basis.25

A closer examination of the home territory of the Fifty-fifth Illinois supports

Doyle's conclusions. Though an accurate statistical analysis of the entire regiment would be challenging and likely inconclusive, a more accurate picture might be gleaned from a close examination of one of the ten companies. Rallying in Winnebago

County prior to departing for Chicago, the embryo companies that would comprise

Company C were perhaps somewhat unique in the regiment as they were largely derived from men currently abiding within the same county. Most of the regiment's companies had been drawn from much larger geographic areas. For this reason, the following demographic patterns were probably amplified across the rest of the unit.

Though the company's first captain, Rhenodyne A. Bird, had been forced to canvas the county in order to find embryo companies and willing volunteers, the large bulk were drawn from the infant railroad villages of Durand, Harrison, and Burritt.

25 Jacksonville's failure to achieve the hopes and dreams of its most fervent booster “stayers” is outlined in Doyle, Social Order, 255-259.

29 Among these, the largest share came from Durand – a nondescript shanty town named for an undistinguished railroad official. Though a handful of pioneers had been living in the area since 1837, the inchoate village itself was less than seven years old in 1861.

Due to the recent explosion of immigration into the very recently unpopulated northern portion of the state however, Durand could have served as a stand-in for almost any of the numerous infant depot villages that dotted the Prairie State countryside.26

The majority of the Company C enlistees were drawn from the most geographically mobile portion of the small local population. Of recruits claiming the village as their place of residence, more than three-quarters cannot be found living anywhere in Winnebago County within the 1860 census schedules. Of the twelve who were, only six were living in Durand. Similarly, in Company F, only six of the nineteen living in the county in which they claimed residence (McDonough) had lived there since 1860. This suggests that, on average, close to 70% of the men in the regiment had immigrated from other counties, states, or even nations, as recently as the previous year. Even more striking, of those positively ascertained as living within either county in 1860, less than 20% had been living there since 1850. By 1870, fewer than 23% remained.27

A closer examination is warranted of the twelve men joining Company C in

26 Bird, The Story of the Fifty-fifth, 478; H. F. Kett & Co., The History of Winnebago County, Ill., Its Past and Present (Chicago: H. F. Kett & Co., 1877), 451. 27 Muster and Descriptive Rolls of Illinois Volunteers. RS 301.020. Adjutant General, Springfield, Illinois.; 1850 United States Federal Census; 1860 United States Federal Census; 1870 United States Federal Census

30 Durand who had in fact lived in Winnebago County for at least a year. Of the six men who identified themselves as farmers by occupation, none worked land of their own.

James Garner, Philip Pitts, and Earl Goodwin, all under the age of twenty-two, lived on their fathers’ farms and helped with the harvest. Joseph Austin, Jacob Simcox, and

Richard Westbrook, ranging in age from nineteen to thirty, all boarded as laborers on some of the more affluent farms in the area. Simcox, the only married man in the group, boarded together with his wife and maintained $100 of property to his name.

He was the only member of this group to achieve this level of relative wealth.28

Unskilled laborers like these men have been identified by Doyle as existing in a state of almost perpetual migration in “the pursuit of individual opportunity.”

Periodic short-term jobs in farm work or railroad and building construction probably prompted occasional increased presence of this group in Durand. Each of these men sought gainful employment on a day to day basis. “When the demand for construction crews and day labor flagged at the end of harvest and the onset of winter,” most village economies (even those as large as Jacksonville’s) simply were “neither large enough nor diverse enough to absorb many of these workers, and they moved on to new jobs elsewhere.” In his Jacksonville study, Doyle identified less than 13% that remained in the town for over a decade. Still, though very few of the same individuals remained stationary, the amount of the total mobile population describing itself in these terms - Doyle argues somewhere between one-fifth and one-third of the whole - belies how common these men were in the antebellum West. Upon the outbreak of the 28 1860 United States Federal Census

31 war in the spring and summer of 1861, these men, unattached as they were, naturally comprised the large majority of the first wave of willing recruits for the Army – the same wave that filled the Fifty-fifth Illinois.29

Artisans and skilled laborers who did not or had not yet advanced to mercantile proprietorship fared similarly. “Though they brought more skills to the marketplace, these men were also hired by others and subject to the seasonal fluctuations of work,”

Doyle explained. “Skilled laborers in the building trades (carpenters, masons, and plasterers) probably came and went with the ebb and flow of spring and summer construction projects.” All skilled laborers enlisting in Durand were engaged in carpentry with the exception of one, James Frazier, a stone mason. These men, all married, averaged about thirty-seven years of age and a little under four children apiece; none were childless. They averaged $260 in real estate (two owned none) and

$110 in personal property. Like their itinerant “farmer” brothers, the lives of these men centered upon the ability to govern their own self-interest via the freedom of geographic mobility. Personal motivations, unique to each individual, were regularly weighed against pending and current opportunities and occupational challenges to determine the next best course of action. This was, in its very essence, the “Western” worldview of most military-aged white men of Illinois and much of the free West.30

29 1860 United States Federal Census; Doyle, Social Order, 100. 30 1860 United States Federal Census; Doyle, Social Order, 100.

32 CONCLUSION & OBJECTIVES

Like Doyle's Jacksonville inhabitants, the men who would eventually comprise the ranks of the Fifty-fifth Illinois were part of this Western world of constant motion.

That motion was constantly and regularly governed by principles of voluntarism guided by a personal calculus of individual self-interest and pragmatic opportunism.

The very communities from which the men sprang to the call of arms had imbued them with this worldview from the moment of their birth, and it is unlikely that a simple donning of blue wool stripped them of such deeply laid convictions. Though

Army life must have indeed been quite alien, even from the beginning, the men and boys who volunteered their services maintained a sense of normality by continuing to view the world in the same terms of voluntary association. Enlistment in the volunteer force could serve the same self-serving purposes that choosing to dwell in a particular community or joining a particular voluntary institution could. Moreover, as we shall see, the same challenges faced by the boosters of nascent frontier communities as well as the leaders of Western voluntary institutions would be faced by professional military officers unaccustomed to such independently-minded soldiers.

Historians like Joseph Glatthaar, Reid Mitchell, and Lorien Foote have identified antebellum civil life as the foundation of wartime military culture. Each argues that to ignore antebellum social order is to pass up a resource invaluable to uncovering and understanding the resulting structure of the volunteer army. By examining the experience of the men in the Fifty-fifth Illinois Volunteer Infantry

33 Regiment, now armed with a basic understanding of the social order that governed their antebellum lives, we might begin to see the tired “motivational debate” in a new light.31

Having established above the cultural worldview of voluntary community and self-interested association which governed antebellum northern Illinois, the following chapters will illustrate how an understanding of this worldview might inform the otherwise often “unmilitary” behavior of the officers and men of the Fifty-fifth Illinois over the course of the war. The first chapter will outline what motivated several of the men to volunteer for military service to begin with; how they perceived the relationship between their own personal motivations and the expectations of the military hierarchy; how these motivations shifted over time; and how the same personal calculus of self-interest that governed their life in the antebellum period continued to drive their thoughts and actions in uniform. The second chapter will turn to a particularly illustrative moment in the regiment's history at the end of each man's initial service term, when each volunteer was forced to deliberate over whether or not he might re-enlist for another three years of danger and strife. This event allows us to interrogate directly the point at which the expectations of each man intersected with

31 Joseph Glatthaar, in General Lee's Army: From Victory to Collapse (New York: Free Press, 2008), argues that the culture of Lee's Army of Northern Virginia is impossible to understand without first coming to terms with the social roots of each man in a slave society. Reid Mitchell, with The Vacant Chair: The Northern Soldier Leaves Home (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), illustrates how local social constructs affected how Union soldiers conceived of larger political concepts. Lorien Foote, in The Gentlemen and the Roughs: Violence, Honor and Manhood in the Union Army (New York: New York University Press, 2010) explains how deep cultural divisions in the understanding of manhood and gendered social expectations in the antebellum North caused serious friction in the Union ranks.

34 the needs of the larger voluntary institution: the Union Army. In the winter of 1863, the men of the Fifty-fifth Illinois were forced to make a critical judgment of the volunteer army's conduciveness to their own self-interest. Still, as we shall see, such a consideration was not a rare one, but rather one made constantly by each man over the entire course of the war in many of the same ways it had been at home prior to enlistment.

Lastly, a note on sources is in order. So as to represent the experiences of these men under arms to the best of my ability, I have engaged in a close examination of hundreds of unpublished letters several of them sent home while in the Army.

Remembrances and memoirs after the war have also been invaluable in alerting me to pertinent episodes during the regiment's colorful history, but I have attempted to restrict my use of post-war memories to only episodes which could be corroborated by sources generated during or very shortly after the event in question. Beyond this, I have collected and tabulated an enormous amount of demographic data concerning the entire regiment, drawn from the individual descriptive rolls which were filled out by mustering officers for each volunteer upon enlistment. These rolls left nothing to chance, including everything from the recruit's name, age, and place of residence, to his nativity, occupation, and even complexion and hair and eye color. Though the real fruits of this statistical tabulation become evident within the final chapter, the results have aided in informing my analysis of the regiment throughout the project.

35 CHAPTER I “I DEPEND UPON THIS REGIMENT” MOTIVATIONS AND CHALLENGES

“VARIOUS AIMS” OF VOLUNTEER OFFICERS

By all accounts, the trial went well for David Stuart. Though press reporters took note of his “evidently nervous state of feeling” upon entry into the chamber, by the end of his testimony the same men were left greatly impressed by his “wonted self- possession, his graceful bearing and polished manner,” and noted how he “left the stand with the triumphant air of victorious virtue.” Suspected, among others, of adulterous activity with the wife of one of Chicago's most prominent businessmen,

Stuart – a United States Congressman turned railroad lawyer – knew his entire public reputation had been on the line. Therefore, when the prosecution's interrogation tended to fall in his favor, he had good reason to be pleased with the results.

But the “Burch Divorce Case,” as it came to be known in the annals of Chicago and American judicial history, did not end for David Stuart when the court adjourned on November 30, 1860. Though having successfully expunged accusations of his being an adulterer and philanderer, Stuart could not escape the fact that nearly everyone in the quickly expanding boom town and indeed the country at large connected his name with the trial. As with all matters of intense jurisprudential intrigue, the public mind had craved the most juicy details of the proceedings, devouring the transcripts as related by court reporters in the popular press. Readers all came to their own private conclusions as to the authenticity of the final verdict. Many

36 were not so quick to let Stuart off the hook.32

Gone were the days when such a matter could be dealt with quickly and quietly. By 1860, Chicago was on the cusp of becoming one of the most connected cities in America. It follows, therefore, that its most exciting news was not seen to be parochial in nature. In fact, the most thorough coverage was that of the New York

Times, over eight hundred miles away. Had Stuart's supposed dalliance taken place a decade earlier, in a still very infant Chicago, things would have likely turned out very different. As it was, even after official negation of the charges, Stuart's name, reputation, and indeed his way of life, were still very much on the line.33

Fortunately for him, 1860 was an election year. With the fracture of his beloved Democratic Party at the National Convention in Charleston, the secession of the Southern states, and the onset of the Rebellion, Stuart saw not a national catastrophe, but an opportunity. As he maintained close ties to Washington, he had little trouble securing authority from the scrambling War Department to raise two regiments of Illinois volunteers the following year. Announcing his intention throughout the local press in hopes of attracting embryo companies to the rendezvous camp in Chicago - which he christened after his beloved late Stephen Douglas – Stuart

32 “Biography of David Stuart,.” Accessed March 12, 2014, http://elmwoodhistoriccemetery.org/biographies/david-stuart. “The Burch Divorce Case,” The New York Times, December 5, 1860. Accessed February 20, 2014. http://www.nytimes.com/1860/12/05/news/burch-divorce-case-stuart-alleged-adulterer- witness- stand-he-positively-solemnly.html 33 The most thorough discussion of Chicago's growth in this period is found within William Cronon's Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West (New York: W. W. Norton, 1991), which does a fantastic job of not only re-telling the narrative of Chicago's rapid expansion, but also its pivotal role in the the economy of the region during the era.

37 waited and hoped. Many presses, most notably the Chicago Tribune, were reluctant to aid in any way the efforts of a man they still half condemned. The Burch trial hung like a pall over the railroad lawyer's head. Only military glory, he posited, could strike his involvement in the affair from the public's mind, and re-cast his image in the form of a gallant hero – perhaps even one that could again hold political office.34

Stuart was also painfully aware of the other major hurdle to success in his design. As it was, he had absolutely no military experience whatsoever, nor had he any command of military strategy, martial life, or leadership methods. He was, by his own admission, a “politician” heart and soul, and would therefore require a soldier to do his dirty work. He found such a soldier in Oscar Malmborg, an exacting immigrant

Swedish military officer with a fiery – if often hard to understand – tongue.

Malmborg, Stuart hoped, would be able to teach the volunteers who had already begun pouring into the camp's gates that fall how to fight. It would thus be left to Stuart simply to foster and harvest the glory.35

Stuart seems to have taken few steps to hide his intentions from either

Malmborg or the men themselves. After the first of the two regiments Stuart managed to raise at the War Department's bidding departed for the front, he opted to remain with the second – what would become the Fifty-fifth Illinois – as its colonel. Almost from the very beginning, his overblown and ostentatious behavior as well as his fiery speeches, given at such volume that they might be heard clearly by passersby or

34 Crooker, Fifty-fifth, 21; Ibid., 36. 35 Ibid., 21.

38 listening reporters, tipped off his recruits to his true objectives. Stuart made a point of infusing the life of the regiment with as much visible pomp and circumstance as possible when in the public eye, often to the profound irritation of the rough-edged

Illinois farm boys that filled the ranks. Enlisted men resented Malmborg's heavy- handed disciplinarian policies, his acid-tongued leadership style, and even his foreign roots. But most of all, they resented the slowly growing realization that they themselves, due to constant drill and private study, seemed to know more about military tactics and strategy than their own colonel.36

Stuart “took little part in actually drilling the regiment,” Lieutenant Lucius

Crooker later commented, “and it may be justly remarked in passing that herein was his first mistake.” By ignoring his martial responsibilities and leaving such matters up to Malmborg and his junior officers – whom he hand-selected in the fashion of

Jacksonian political appointments – Stuart “failed to keep abreast or ahead of the rank and file in the acquirement of a knowledge of tactics.” Moreover, “when on occasion he sought publicly to exercise the functions of his high office, his lack of technical training generated a species of contempt always fatal to the respect due to a field officer.”37

Perhaps perceiving that the men, and especially many of the junior officers, were well aware of his true single motivation for military service, Stuart opted one night to divulge the truth to the Orderly Sergeants that served as the highest ranking

36 Ibid., 48-51; Ibid., 58-62. 37 Ibid., 27.

39 non-commissioned officers in each of the ten companies. Calling the men to a quiet meeting by candlelight in his own tent that night, Stuart explained how, “I am a man of somewhat damaged reputation, as you all well know.” By his own admission, he

“came into the army solely to retrieve that reputation; and I depend upon this regiment to do it.”38

Stuart's admission of self-serving purposes for military service seems to have surprised no one present. The fact that their Colonel entertained no grandiose patriotic or deeply moral motivations for preserving the Union or redeeming the Nation's honor apparently came as little surprise. Moreover, what criticism Stuart did receive came primarily from the junior officers who had suffered most at the hands of his very unconventional appointment of company-grade commands. To be sure, the cohort of the discontented reached nearly one-third of the total officers in the regiment prior to the Battle of Shiloh – almost all of whom would resign before the unit saw its first engagement. While these men, most of whom had been passed over in promotion or other accolades, heaped scorn upon Stuart for his apparently corrupt and self-serving leadership methods, they themselves belied their own concern with self-interest upon resignation. By refusing to serve in any but the most prestigious positions, these men uncovered their own primary motivation for military service: glorified public reputation – precisely the same condemnation they heaped upon Stuart's shoulders.39

Other officers were much more open about their non-patriotic motivations to

38 Ibid., 50. 39 Ibid., 54-55.

40 enter into commissioned contract with the volunteer army. Shortly after enlistment,

Captain Milton Haney (later to become Regimental Chaplain) of Company F marched his men away from camp one afternoon to give a brief informal oration. An itinerant

Methodist preacher by trade, Haney admitted to having entered the Army “for the sole purpose of alleviating and whispering the voice of Peace into the ear of the soldier

[and] if possible to make himself more efficient in being an humble instrument in winning souls to God.” Having already devoted himself entirely to God's mission on

Earth, Haney saw no separation between that, his goal in antebellum civil life, and his decision to enter the Army.40

Still others did seem to embrace more stalwartly patriotic motives. Captain

William Presson, a fellow Methodist preacher and close companion of Haney's, was among the officers who opted to resign from Stuart's regiment in the early spring of

1862. While irritated with Malmborg's leadership style and Stuart's aloofness from command, Presson apparently saw his presence in the regiment not as potentially damaging to any hope of winning glory in the public eye, but rather as an encumbrance to his primary mission to aid directly and effectively in preserving the

Union. This too, though it might have been a much more selfless one in form, was a motivation founded in individual pragmatic self-interest. Unlike most of his brother officers who chose to give up Army blue, Presson would go on to re-enter the army shortly thereafter with a new command. As a Major in the Seventy-Third Illinois,

40 Walker, A. J. Letter to Parents. December 20, 1861. David Holmes Papers, 1861-1865. Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library, Springfield, Illinois. [Referred to as Holmes Papers hereafter]

41 Presson was said to “awaken” the regiment and allow it to “take on a new life under the skillful handling which the major was able to give it.” Commanding the regiment alone on the field at Perryville later that year, Presson was wounded in battle only to absorb the blow and return swiftly back to the fight a mere three months later. The preacher's motivational resolve was firm.41

Although men like Stuart, Haney, and Presson appear to have unshifting motivations however, it would be erroneous to suggest that all the men within the

Fifty-fifth maintained invariable interests. A close look at the correspondence of two enlisted men – one in Company F, another in Company C – provides a glimpse into the dynamic world of constantly shifting enlisted motivations governed by the same pragmatic self-interested calculus that had driven their lives in the antebellum world.

“VARIOUS AIMS” OF PRIVATE DAVID NEWTON HOLMES

At eighteen, Private David Newton Holmes's awareness of complex political events was necessarily limited. Outside of a single mention of his interest in

“sustaining the old flag,” the young man's correspondence home to his parents is void of any explicit expression of his initial motivations to enlist in the Army. But given his youth, it required considerably less than deeply reasoned ideological conviction to stir his heart. Living and working at home on his father's farm prior to enlistment, Holmes

41 Patricia B. Burnette, James F. Jaquess: Scholar, Soldier and Private Agent for President Lincoln (Jefferson: MacFarland & Company, Inc., 2013), 68.

42 likely knew the next stage of his life would involve itinerant farm labor in the community – the same fate as the majority of his peers in Mercer County. The war offered a way around this. Shortly after his enlistment in early October of 1861, he wrote home to his parents to inform them that he was enjoying army life so thoroughly that “you could not hire me to leave.” Likely his first foray away from the protection and guidance of his parents, Holmes was anxious to start on his own path in life. A quick survey of the “lively boys” with whom he shared the regiment suggested that his case was not unusual. “David Sullivan is in our Company as Drummer,” he wrote of a neighborhood friend. “He says his folks told him if he ever intended to go to go now so he started Wednesday evening.” All across northern Illinois, young men between the ages of sixteen and eighteen opted to begin their adult lives, not in the customary fashion of striking out to earn a living, but under arms in the service of Uncle Sam.

Having not yet entered the public sphere as independent young men, Holmes and his adolescent comrades were less concerned with their honorable public reputation.

Instead, it was their maturity and independence – in sum, their coming of age – that they most hoped to reap from military service.42

Like most things, this was a process. The achievement of manly and adult independence was not something gained overnight, but instead was forged over the course of time and worldly experience. One did not achieve maturity by simply donning a resplendent blue uniform – although Holmes bragged regularly about his

42 Holmes, David. Letter to Parents. February 24, 1863, Holmes Papers; Ibid., October 14, 1861; Ibid., October 25, 1861; Data concerning Holmes's place of residence was derived from the 1860 United States Federal Census.

43 own. Though the Army, in the end, proved to be a supportive environment for

Holmes's staged entrance into adulthood, just as in more peaceable versions of the coming of age experience, it was not without its trials and tribulations. Like the rest of his comrades, many factors assailed Holmes's ability to maintain his motivations and forced him to constantly question the Army's ability to fulfill his needs and aid in the achievement of his personal objectives.

Chief among these challenges was the experience of combat. The transformation of identity and worldview that immediately followed the witnessing of battle was the first step in converting Holmes from boy to man. “When we first commenced fighting I felt a little scared,” he wrote home shortly after his baptism by fire at Shiloh, “but after I fired a few rou[nds] I come two [sic] as the saying is.”

Holmes's Company F was badly mauled in the fight, losing a number of its officers and men. Still, the fight-or-flight response of his body both surprised and steeled him through the battle. “I never worked so hard in all of my life as I did last Sunday,” he remembered. “You may think it funny but it is all true the sweat just run off of me.”

Even so, watching many of his less fortunate friends fall in the smoke made an indelible impression. Though by no means a “shirker,” he learned quickly to appreciate turns of fate and circumstance. Not exactly upset at his relegation to guarding the ammunition wagons during the regiment's next foray, Holmes admitted that “I ain't very anxious for them to shoot at me now.”43

There were also moments outside of combat when the still younger version of

43 Ibid., April 13, 1862; Ibid., January 8, 1863.

44 Holmes was floored by the insensitivity and chaos of war. During a foraging expedition in the winter of 1861, he witnessed “something I shall remember as long as

I live.” When word filtered into the regiment's camp that a Federal soldier had been found in the yard of a nearby estate, “nearly cut to peaces [sic]” by Rebel partisans, the men were armed and enroute to the location in very little time. “The boys went in the house and pulled the bed out from under the woman and took her out & burned three beds, 20 bushels of apples, a cider press [and] throwed out flower, [and] sugar,

[and] all the furniture was either burned or carried off,” he remembered. As the woman watched in anguish and the dwelling itself was lit aflame, the “officer of the day...[sat] on his horse till it was nearly all over,” doing nothing to control the unruly men. Though apparently unwilling to admit his full emotion openly, Holmes's letter suggests he was deeply affected by the event.44

A much more potent challenge to Holmes's motivation was the death of close friends. During the regiment's assault on the works at Vicksburg in the early summer of 1863, David Sullivan, his young neighborhood friend who had left home with his parent's reluctant approval, was shot dead through the breast. Later that year, an even closer comrade, his best friend Private Edward Bruner, lost his battle with camp fever.

“Edward has left me and gone to that land from which none return,” he wrote somberly home. “Little did I think a week ago to day as he sat where I now sit that he would so soon leave me almost alone among strangers as he did.”45

44 Ibid., December 12, 1861. 45 Ibid., May 26, 1863; Ibid., September 13, 1863.

45 The emotional dips caused by personal loss were often amplified by defeat and perceptions of pending failure of the Northern war effort. Holmes often questioned the soundness of the conciliatory strategies embraced by Federal authorities during the first years of the war. “'The rebbels [sic] are gaining ground every day and just so long as we continue to protect rebble [sic] property they will gain ground,” he reasoned in the late summer of 1862. “We must have powerfull [sic] armies in the field soon and we must strike quick & severe blows,” he argued, lest “we may suffer the worst of consequences.” Holmes often bolstered his own opinions by acknowledging popular avowal of the same thinking amongst his comrades. Statements like “this is the opinion of all who I have heard speak” and “this is becoming the daily talk of the soldiers” were commonplace in his letters. Much of this language dropped off over the course of the conflict, suggesting a growing tendency to make up his own mind on matters – an important facet of responsible adulthood. “I think our countrys [sic] future is dark and will continue so til we get a General that is not afraid of insulting a good Secesh,” he wrote later in the year. Holmes was irritated at the seeming inability of theater commanders to coordinate their offensives instead of “one fighting the enemy at a time.” Ironically predicting in January of 1863 the eventual winning strategy of the 1864 spring offensives, he wondered why “there can't be two Union armies in Motion at the same time.” “I think that is one reason why we have not done more towards whipping the rebles [sic],” he correctly reasoned.46

Holmes's discontent with the war effort peaked after the regiment's bloody

46 Ibid., August 7, 1862; Ibid., September 14, 1862; Ibid., November 5, 1862.

46 repulse at Chickasaw Bayou in the later winter of 1862. “There is a great many in the

Old regts that are dissatisfied and discouraged and there has got to be some thing did soon or our case is a tough one,” he wrote concernedly. “Things can not long be this way.” His zeal for victory temporarily ebbed, he even went so far as to suggest that

“all we lik [lack] now is some General that know[s] his Biz [business] to put a stop to this war.” Later, he wondered if “our Generals are only trying to see who can get to the bottom of [the] U. S. pocket first.” His comrades were “growing very tired of the war and the proceedings of some of our leading men,” and the result was “causeing a great many to desert.” Though he never intimated any inclination toward the same, he worried that political instability at home in Illinois might worsen the problem and

“demoralize the troops [so] that they won't be worth shucks.”47

Fortunately, his irritation was short lived and mostly inconsequential. “You say

I write like I was discouraged,” he replied in February of 1863 to a letter from his worried parents. “I must confess that I was a little down in the mouth after the battle there at Vicksburg [Chickasaw] but it was only on account of our Gen[era]l[s] not tending to their Biz [business].” Holmes was prepared to continue on in the effort to preserve the Republic, but “I still think that Our Government should watch more closely.”48

The increased importance Holmes placed in national affairs over time also illustrates how his own individual or personal goals of achieving manhood eventually

47 Ibid., January 8, 1863; Ibid., January 25, 1863; Ibid., February 2, 1863. 48 Ibid., February 24, 1863.

47 began to blend with national aims to preserve the Republic. This effect suggests that, at least for many younger men with a similar goal, the volunteer army as an institution was successful in achieving its larger mission by offering unique opportunities for self-interested individual aims to be simultaneously met. David Holmes was able to achieve his goal of earning respect as an independent adult in the Army, and in so doing provided his services to a nation in desperate need.

Beyond moving ever closer to manhood, there were also several other influential factors that helped to overcome many of these challenges, maintain his resolve, and work as sustaining motivators in his quest for manhood. Any lingering questions he might have entertained concerning his confidence under fire were regularly bolstered by the shameful behavior of a few of his less determined comrades, one of whom ran “like a white head” to the safety of the rear during the opening of the fight at Shiloh. Comparing himself to others of a lesser resolve became a major sustaining motivation for Holmes. The less than stalwart behavior of others in camp and on the battlefield gave him plentiful opportunities to display his own burgeoning manhood in vivid contrast. As the war drew on, he extended his pride to include not only coolness in battle but also his continued presence in the Army generally. By

1863, along with his comrades, he celebrated the advent of the Conscription Act primarily because it would likely bring lesser men into the ranks with whom he might compare himself even more advantageously. “All I have to say is bully for them let em come to the old 55th,” he wrote regarding the pending arrival of replacements. “We

48 will welcome them and show them things they never saw before.”49

Holmes's affinity for his fellow comrades in arms – most specifically his messmates – became another of his strongest sustaining motivations. “They are great company for me,” he wrote home to his parents. “We have a sociable chat frequently by ourselves which does us a great deal of good.” The feeling was mutual. Following

Holmes's severe wounding during the assault on Kenesaw Mountain in 1864, Private

Ahaz Wetzel wrote home to David's family on his behalf. “David and I are very intimate friends,” he related. “He appears as near to me almost as one of my nearest relatives.” In fact, camaraderie eventually ran so thickly through Holmes's blood that he opted, unlike many of his older comrades, to lend out his pay earnings to “boys who want it,” as opposed to sending it home to family or for savings to be used after the war.50

Even a growing interest in political affairs, likely as a result of his close contact with older and more vocal comrades, seems to have developed into a powerful impetus for Holmes's willing service. When the regiment was polled during the fall of

1864 pending the coming presidential election, he was pleased with the results. “Old

Abe 235 for McClellan 135,” he reported, “leavin Abe a majority of 100 votes.”

Holmes thought the result spoke “well for that Democratic regt,” apparently identifying most of his comrades as prewar Democrats. Though there had evidently been much talk surrounding the state's plan to send troops home on furlough to vote in

49 Ibid., April 13, 1862; Ibid., August 18, 1862. 50 Ibid., June 7, 1862; Wetzel to Holmes Family, June 27, 1864, Holmes Papers; Holmes to Parents, January 25, 1862, Holmes Papers.

49 the November elections, Holmes still had his doubts. “I think there is other Regiments that will do more good at home than they,” he predicted.51

That Holmes perceived his situation in the military as being conducive to his obtaining the independence of adulthood is easy to draw out of his words. Even before starting southward in the winter of 1861, he had begun to link military service with independence. Upset at the tardiness of incoming mail from friends and family, he wrote that “if they don't want to right [sic] to us they can let it alone [for] We are just as independent as a hog on ice.” Holmes knew that his descriptions of combat and hardship on campaign would impress his civilian parents, and he seems to have emphasized the details of his experiences in order to draw attention to his independent manhood. This was most powerfully visible in a brief scribbled note which he wrote home from a field hospital behind the Federal lines at Kenesaw Mountain following his serious wounding in the hip during the summer of 1864. “I would say for your satisfaction I am doing well,” he wrote calmly, “I don't want you to give yourselves any unnecessary uneasiness.” Holmes's ability to care for himself during this, the most trying injury of his lifetime, emphasized his mature separation from parental care. The assault itself had been “the Bloodiest for the time it lasted and the numbers engaged that I ever saw,” but now he was safe and hoped they might “rest easy as you can till you again hear from me.”52

In the end, Holmes's decision to enlist in the Army had successfully aided in

51 Ibid., October 1, 1864. 52 Ibid., December 25, 1861; Ibid., June 28, 1864; Ibid., July 3, 1864; Ibid., June 28, 1864; 1860 United States Federal Census.

50 his quest for independence and adulthood. With the support of a number of sustaining factors, he was able to overcome the many challenges that threatened his continued resolve, eventually leading to the accomplishment not only of his own goals but also, by his presence, the nation's as well. But Holmes's experience was by no means universal. Several of his older comrades, having already achieved their manhood and adult independence in civil life, had entered the Army under very different circumstances and were summarily confronted by very different challenges to their original motivations. Many of these men, perhaps even most, were eventually also able to conclude that their enlistment in the Army had in fact been a sound decision when evaluated along the lines of its ability to serve their individual needs and personal goals. Others were not so sure.

“VARIOUS AIMS” OF PRIVATE GEORGE RUSSELL

In the early months of 1862, Private George Russell of Company C was eager to try his mettle in combat. At twenty-three, though also living at home with his parents, he was at a very different stage in life than that of Holmes. Russell was ready to face the world on his own and secure his place in society. Volunteering for the Army seemed as sound a method as any to achieve this. Still, perhaps fortunately, illness kept him in Chicago when the regiment departed for the front and Russell was subsequently absent during the bloodbath at Shiloh. By the time he had recovered and paid the travel expenses out of his own pocket to return to the regiment, less than 40%

51 of Company C, the color company, remained in the ranks. Handed a terribly rusted and carbon-fouled musket, Russell worked night and day to restore the weapon to working order. “All I ask is to lead me to the field and let me try my hand at Shooting,” he remarked in a letter home to his sweetheart Elizabeth. Relating his experiences after a night on the picket line, Russell admitted that he had “never felt as anxious to shoot a chicken in my life as I was to see something in the Shape of a Man [to shoot].”

Searching the darkness for Rebel silhouettes to “live shoot...if [they] wore the wright kind of clothes,” he surprised himself with his thirst for Southern blood.53

Like many of his comrades, Russell's decision to enlist and early combat ambition was partly rooted in patriotic fervor and rage militaire. As far as he could tell, the Army's primary mission was “to wave the Banner which has so long been trodden under foot by a sect of people that had ought to be as Enlightened as ourselves.” Southern secession was not only traitorous, but also betrayed Southern ignorance of the virtues of “Freedom,” which he considered “one of the greatest blessings that can be enjoined to man's comforts.” Interestingly, Russell did not consider himself among “them who is blessed with so much knowledge” as to understand the more academic explanations of freedom's social value. Instead, he viewed himself merely as “a waiter,” bound to offer his services in defense of an idea he felt to be invaluable, even if he did not entirely understand its full complexity. 54

To be sure, though Russell repeatedly stated that “Freedom is what we are

53 Russell, George. Letter to Elizabeth Ann Bate. April 20, 1862. George Russell Papers, 1861-1865. Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library, Springfield, Illinois; Ibid., May 6, 1862. 54 Ibid., May 6, 1862.

52 fighting for,” it was specifically the freedom of white Americans he referred to. This was most likely an allusion to popular perceptions of the nation as being held hostage politically by the “slave interest” in the Southern states. Although he never explicitly argued against the emancipation of slaves within his letters home to Elizabeth, he maintained distinct opinions of the African American race throughout his service.

Even as he gazed with astonishment at what he perceived to be a lazy Southern culture where “their work is all Done by the Negroes,” he continually referred to contraband cooks and laborers as “Black Rascals.” “They have to do all of our cooking and all of the Labor no matter what with the exception of handling the Musket,” he wrote home in August of 1862. Russell was fervently against arming the ex-slaves. “I prefer to do that [fighting] myself and think that I am far more able to do that kind of work than they are,” he explained.55

A broader review of Russell's early correspondence suggests that a much stronger motivator was his concern over maintaining an honorable reputation as a

“true man” and “true Soldier.” Through faithful service to his country, he expected to

“sustain my reputation if not increase it,” and bragged ceaselessly to his future wife of his unyielding hardy and virtuous disposition. Though others may complain, he insisted that the austere conditions of campaign life were “good enough for a soldier,” and that Elizabeth should not be alarmed by his descriptions of hardship. Further, though vice had proven to be rampant in camp, “I am just the same now as when I first joined the Army,” he reported proudly, “at least the boys all say so.” The temptation of

55 Ibid., August 13, 1862; Ibid., August 28, 1862.

53 sin made regular assaults on his manly virtue, but he always managed to fend off the demons. If all went as planned, he intended “to leave the army and have it said that I left it equally as good in character as when first I wrote my name on the muster roll.” 56

Though easy enough in principle, sustaining such motivation proved difficult in practice. Apart from a brief and bloodless altercation with escaping prisoners,

Russell's baptism by fire came at Chickasaw Bayou in late December of 1862. After the grim repulse of the brigade from the bluffs fronting Vicksburg and the death of many in the regiment, Russell was forced to concede that “the Rebels has got the Best of it.” Notions of grandeur and easy victory flew from his mind, replaced with a much more pragmatic philosophy. During the battle itself, Russell admitted to Elizabeth that he “fired about 18 or 20 times But I guess that I hurt no one for I was very careful where I held my Gun.” Perhaps taking a cue from the Shiloh survivors, he was careful to keep a low profile. Even still, his limit for stomaching combat was reached. “I expect that there will be some noise about tomorrow morning,” he wrote the night following the assault. “But I am in hopes that they will keep us in the reserve from this time forward.”57

The bloody and sobering realities of combat and Russell's concern for the maintenance of his honorable public reputation ironically collided with his veneration of freedom. If the roar of battle and his longing for Elizabeth could be overcome, the lack of independence inherent in subordinated military life was almost more than he

56 Ibid., December 25, 1862; Ibid., May 16, 1862; Ibid., July 10, 1862; Ibid., July 20, 1862. 57 Ibid., December 31, 1862.

54 could take. Being ordered about by men he considered no better than himself contrasted with the beloved freedom he had enjoyed at home – the same freedom he claimed to be fighting for. “Being under the same Regulation that the Negro is is more than a white man can stand,” he wrote, comparing his lot with that of a slave. In fact, privates seemed “no more thought of than your Father thinks of the Rats that ransack his Barn,” he wrote to Elizabeth. The seeming lack of concern for the well-being of enlisted men enraged Russell and seems to have been a direct cause of his beginning to question his initial motivations to enlist. “Here it matters not how hot or how hard it rains,” he grumbled. “If they see fit they can drive you out and you cannot say a single word against it...[or] you are punished.” Eventually, Russell began to long “to Be free and work for who I am a mind to and not if I do not,” just as things had been back in

Illinois. “No man need ever try to get me to take the oath that I must obey all commanders lega[l]ly put over me,” he wrote rebelliously one day. “I do not think that

Uncle Sam nor any other uncle will ever [again] be smart enough to get me into a snap where I cannot get out whenever I want and work when [I] please,” he proclaimed,

“and if it rains [I will] go in the house and wait until it is over.”58

Russell's continual allusions to being “free” and “his own boss” are not unusual when compared with the correspondence of other Civil War soldiers. A hyper- democratic northern society had gone to war armed with young men entertaining an extremely heightened awareness of their freedoms and rights – a byproduct of post-

Jacksonian era white American society. Numerous historians have commented on how

58 Ibid., August 13, 1862; Ibid., May 16, 1862; Ibid., August 13, 1862.

55 this factor clashed with the expectations of military subordination, and this topic will be covered in more detail in the next chapter. But for now, it is important to acknowledge that personal “freedom” was more than just an expectation of George

Russell's. It was his primarily avowed reason for enlisting in the army to begin with and its defense comprised his perception of the purpose of the war. To the extent that

Russell's personal ideology and motivations connected with the national mission to defend the Union, personal freedom and the democratic liberties he enjoyed as a free white male were at the apex. Southern secession had been, for many northerners, a blatant attack on the only natural barrier to the destruction of those liberties: traditional respect for the law. Russell had been more than willing to offer up his life voluntarily in hopes of ensuring American liberty's continued survival and defense, and was even willing to subordinate himself to the extent he perceived absolutely necessary. But every man had his limit, and Russell's, being so intimately tied to the ideology of

“freedom,” was much closer than others.59

Russell apparently felt he had been tricked into volunteering for something that turned out to be much more structured than he had originally supposed. On Christmas of 1862 he explained to Elizabeth that, “there is a time coming when we shall meet and happy be and if that time does come and I get my freedom it will take a Man with a long head [to] ever git me into another scrape that I cannot get out of when I please.”

“I do not like the plan of Being Bound out,” he wrote. He would not be tricked again.

“I do not think I shall ever work so hard in the future as I use[d] to unless I am to work

59 Ibid., August 13, 1862.

56 for myself and then that makes a good deal of difference.” By 1863, Russell had begun to interpret his enlistment as a mistake, an uncalled-for surrender of his liberty for a cause he identified less with daily.60

Still, it was vitally important to him that his neighbors and friends continued to see him as a man of his word. “When I say any thing and say it in earnest I calculate that it is so,” he explained. “It is my Desire that people should look on me as one that if they heard me tell any thing that they need not hesitate in the least in believing [it] to be the truth.” Russell had agreed and affixed his signature to a binding legal contract which kept him in the ranks for three years time. Allowing the trials of combat and the demeaning attitudes of several of his superiors to push him to surrender his dependable reputation by deserting from duty was painful to contemplate. “Whether it [deserting] would not be a move that would [be] advisable to make is a question that I have studied considerable,” he confided to Elizabeth a few days following the repulse at Chickasaw. “It would not be any credit to one's character,” he admitted, “but whether it would not be more preferable to enjoy themselves hereafter a little with good health then to always be unable to help themselves,” seemed a more challenging question. In the end, it was not an easy decision, but he decided on a course and “gave them [the Army] until the first of April to settle [me] in and if I cannot see then [better] than at present I have thought a good many times about what I would do but never have said it.” By that point, he would have eighteen honorable months of service under his belt, he reasoned. Certainly this

60 Ibid., December 25, 1862; Ibid., July 29, 1864.

57 was more than enough to preserve at least a large part of his reputation in the eyes of those who served less time if any at all. Besides, after the horrors he had witnessed, he was “not quite as good a man now as I was [upon enlistment].” Perhaps his experiences could be blamed for such a devolution in principle.61

The deadline came and went with Russell continuing to answer morning roll call. But the transformations of war that were gradually altering his character as well as his outlook on life continued to play on him. “I remember of Saying that I was not quite as Brave as I was when I enlisted,” he mused in the fall of 1863. “I was not possessed of the wright [sic] kind of Bravery when I was at home...it was kind of a foolish Bravery.” Now, the experience of combat had wrought a new appreciation and fresh standards of courage in his mind. He had, “come to remoddle [sic] it and refine it,” he tried to explain. “I find that there is not but little of it But what there is of the

Pure kind,” and that seemed “just enough to stand me another Year faithfully.” Gone were ambitions to crush the perfidious foe through stalwart acts of personal bravery.

Instead, Russell wanted to survive his service term and return home to Burritt as swiftly as possible.62

Russell is only one of many soldiers that challenge McPherson's conclusion of persistent initial motivations in Civil War soldiers. While slightly more aligned with

Linderman's thesis, his experience suggests that the reality for many soldiers was more complicated than either theory has suggested. Far from continually steeling him for

61 Ibid., July 10, 1862; Ibid., January 18, 1863. 62 Ibid., September 2, 1863.

58 battle, his initial motivations to defend what he saw as an indirect attack on the survival of his liberties doubled back on themselves to sap his interest in continued subordination in the ranks. Many of his sustaining motivations eventually were overcome by the horrors of combat and the trials of military life that eventually became tedious and physically taxing. Even his own descriptions of his strong and robust disposition began to waver. “I had rather take one ride in the carriage than to carry my knapsack one 90000000000000000000000 part of an inch,” he wrote after a particularly grueling march, adding “(you can reckon it for yourself).”63

By 1863, George Russell wanted, above all else, to go home. Though evidently willing, if “an opportunity affords” to desert his regiment and reputation, he recognized that the only realistic option was to survive his three year term and earn an honorable discharge. Outside of desertion, the only possible way to blunt the longevity of his service was to crush the rebellion sooner – something he could not accomplish on his own. Realizing this, his annoyance over the lack of national progress and

Federal prosecution of the war grew tremendously. Simultaneously, as his friends and comrades perished around him, he wished adamantly for a way to victory that did not involve any more bloodshed. He was convinced the war “will never end By fighting,” and that those in power “might as well stop fighting now while there is a few men left.” To continue the conflict was to “fight on until there is not a man left to handle a musket.” As for himself, he wished “the Generals would contrive some way to carry on this war without me as I have seen fighting enough to suit me.” If the war was to go

63 Ibid., July 23, 1862.

59 on much longer, “it will be tempting for a good many to leave,” as he had planned,

“and let Generals fight it out amongst themselves.” Indeed, “the Generals” bore the brunt of Russell's rhetorical punishment, but administrators were not left unscathed. “I think that if it had not been for the love of Money that this war would have been at a close long before this,” he considered from a trench outside Vicksburg, “and many a truehearted Soldier that is lying Beneath the Sod would have been mingling with those at home who is near and Dear to him.” At the very least, it seemed imminently clear to him that “Uncle Sam has got to introduce a new method of fighting before he ever conquers.”64

That “Uncle Sam” continually failed to do this irritated Russell for one salient reason: it delayed his return home. For him, and likely for many others, eagerness for victory no longer meant patriotic zeal for the national cause. For most, and certainly for Russell himself, it bore very little if any connection to the abolition of slavery. It meant a long sought-after train ride back to Illinois, not for a brief furlough, but for good and all. “I think that if I had an opportunity [to] place my foot in old Illinois,” he wrote after the storming of Arkansas Post, “that it would take 2 men and a Boy to get me to come to the sunny South.” Just a few days later, his convictions had grown to an even higher pitch. “I do not know whether (if there should another War Break out),” he proclaimed, “there is men enough now in the Union to get me to enlist or not[,] I think it rather doubtful.” In fact, should they attempt such an act, “I should be tempted

[to] show them what I have learnt in the previous War and...shoot folks...and the first

64 Ibid., January 18, 1863; Ibid., April 4, 1863; Ibid., January 18, 1863.

60 man that asked me might be the first one to get shot.” His patriotism had expired. 65

Still, prodded on by any opportunity of earlier victory and discharge, Russell fought loyally on with the regiment throughout the Atlanta Campaign in the summer of 1864. This proved long enough to witness his best friend and closest comrade,

Corporal Oscar Johnson, being shot through the head in front of him at Ezra Church.

“Yes Oscar is gone,” he penned somberly to Elizabeth. “If I could see you it seems as if I could talk for a week[,] but now my pen fails to tell what [I] would like to tell.” By his own estimation, he had “said enough about war.” By August, Company C could field no more than fifteen active men on the line, and he worried that “two or three more fights will reduce the Regt to a mere Shadow.” The regiment was “played out,” and the boys were “so worked down that they are cross and no wonder for they get no sleep and plenty of work.”66

A short time after the fall of Atlanta, George Russell returned to Illinois and to his beloved Elizabeth, whom he would eventually marry. His honorable reputation was intact, and his unrealized meditations of desertion kept strictly confidential for the remainder of his life. But a retrospective return to his correspondence, when viewed through the same lens used upon Stuart, Haney, Presson, and Holmes, shows how motivations could operate in unique ways within each individual. Russell's initial motivations were far removed from those that drove him during the last year of the war, and the hopes that sustained him only occasionally coincided with the objectives

65 Ibid., January 15, 1863; Ibid., January 18, 1863. 66 Ibid., July 29, 1864; Ibid., August 2, 1864; Ibid., August 9, 1864.

61 of several of his comrades. In sum, the army had only barely met Russell's needs, and for that reason the institution only passively maintained his allegiance and participation. The extent to which this participation was moderated by Russell and other like-minded comrades is the subject of the next chapter.

CONCLUSIONS

Volunteers had chosen to be soldiers, many for widely different and even mutually conflicting reasons. For this reason, the shape of the emerging social order in the volunteer army closely resembled that of heterogeneous antebellum Illinois. This was no accident. Men and boys entered the volunteer service for the same reasons they made voluntary decisions in peacetime – to successfully fulfill diverse personal objectives and self-interested motivations. The dynamics of their antebellum worldview, founded in the principles of self-interested voluntarism and pragmatic opportunism, informed how they perceived their military service in important ways.

As our examination of the voluntary communities of their youth as well as the volunteer army itself suggests, the historiographical quest for omnipotent and universally held motivations is unnecessary if not completely in vain. So long as the same voluntary structure that created social order on the frontier was able to co-exist in the army with an ample amount of military efficiency, predominately self-interested men harboring vastly different motivations could still live together cohesively and find victory on the battlefield. As long as each volunteer saw his individual needs being

62 met by continued membership in the organization, they were inclined to provide their utmost cooperation in achieving institutional and national objectives – even unto death.

Conversely, if these individual needs were not met, men negotiated their own participation in working toward institutional objectives in powerful ways. Some of the most important of these will be addressed in the next chapter. This liberal behavior, seen by more traditionally-minded leaders as directly counter to the best interest of disciplined military operations, often brought this inherently transplanted “bottom-up” voluntary culture into competition with the “top-down” expectations of many professional officers. Once the “unmilitary” fruits of such a culture's existence were realized by such “martinets” - as the men often referred to them – many sought to eradicate such behavior entirely. Even though capital punishment awaited those who opted for desertion from the ranks, as historians have discovered in relation to other socially marginalized elements of the population during the era, total desertion was not the only recourse available to the discontented. Such officers' clear inability, at least initially, to recognize the importance of the nature of such an underlying diverse motivational structure is made most clear through an examination of one particular soldier.

63 CHAPTER II “THIS WAY OF USING DID NOT EXACTLY SUIT US” THE RE-ENLISTMENT OF THE FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS IN CONTEXT

LT. COL. OSCAR MALMBORG AND THE EXPECTATIONS OF TRADITION

By the winter of 1863-64, Oscar Malmborg had lost little of his foreign accent in either speech or style. The son of one of Sweden's most esteemed military families and a product of its equally prestigious officer academy, Malmborg immigrated to America in 1846 in search of glory. He found none of it immediately forthcoming. Upon his enlistment in an artillery battery at the outset of the Mexican War, Malmborg's egregious accent was later blamed for the Army's decision to keep him in a garrison role for the duration of the conflict. Almost overnight his dreams of living up to his father Captain Pehr Gustaf Malmborg's illustrious martial reputation seemed to have been dashed away due to an inability to “Americanize” himself and blend in with his new surroundings.

But all was not lost. Following honorable discharge from his less than dramatic career as a soldier, Malmborg was quick to snatch a job that would draw more directly upon his cultural background. As the new Illinois Central Railroad laid track and sought to populate its newly purchased lands quickly and inexpensively, it commissioned the young Swede to travel home again in order to seek out potential immigrants. Wandering from village to village in Sweden, Malmborg recruited families eager to depart for the opportunities and promises of the adolescent American

64 republic, and enjoyed considerable success in the endeavor. Journeying back and forth from Sweden to Illinois continued to comprise the majority of his new life until one fall day in 1861 he arrived on the wharves in Chicago to jarring news. The nation was at war, and it once again needed Oscar Malmborg.67

Though his initial connection to David Stuart is difficult to positively ascertain, it is likely that both men's connection to the Illinois Central played a key role in their meeting. Many of Malmborg's immediate supervisors probably knew Stuart well, and they later presented the Swedish officer with an ornate saber upon his embarkation for the front. The weapon served as an emblem of their deep confidence that the same prowess he had shown in drumming up Swedish settlers for the “Sucker State” of

Illinois would be redoubled in the recruitment of the state's bravest sons for war.

Either way, Malmborg quickly became everything Stuart could have ever hoped for.68

As mentioned in the previous chapter, in the total absence of any knowledge bearing on military matters, Stuart required a more practiced soldier as an executive officer. Rumors of Malmborg's esteemed soldier parentage, his prior experience in the

Mexican War, and perhaps even his foreign-sounding name, around which it was later written “hung a vague mystery of noble lineage and military glory,” suggested he was just the man for the position. Lieutenant Lucius Crooker was among the junior officers who witnessed Malmborg's initial entry into Camp Douglas at Chicago when the regiment was just beginning to coalesce. Looking upon the resplendent character, 67 Ernest Olson, The Swedish Element in Illinois: Survey of the Past Seven Decades (Chicago: Swedish-American Biographical Association Publishers, 1917), 101; Crooker, Fifty-fifth, 35.

68 Ibid., 31.

65 Crooker remembered how the recruits assumed Malmborg had “sprang from a race which gave to the world Gustavus Adolphus and Charles XII,” and therefore “was supposed to embody in his own proper person the combined military genius of those two great characters.” If the most martial of characteristics embodied in such heroes of the past took on a somewhat different form in Malmborg, they collectively reasoned, he most definitely “possessed more than all their infirmities of temper.”

From the very beginning, Malmborg was stalwart and unyielding in his efforts to mold the regiment. “Column py file!” he screamed over the parade ground every morning during drill. “Charge pea-nuts!” His accent made many of the commands difficult for the Illinoisans to understand at first, but they slowly began to make sense of his foreign tongue. Still, vehement cries like “What for your face mit your pack!” left most of them incredulous. “He had some tactical knowledge, then a rare acquirement,” Crooker remembered, “and considerable, though often misdirected energy.” Malmborg drilled and tested the men ceaselessly, even going so far as to attempt ambushing camp guards – armed with wooden cudgels in the absence of rifles

– while on their posts at night in hopes of ascertaining their level of constant alertness.

The historical record does not explicitly state what decision he drew after receiving a fearsome blow to the head by a startled guard's cudgel one night, knocking him immediately unconscious. The skilled historian can perhaps guess at his conclusion.69

Either way, Malmborg “was untiring in his efforts at drill and discipline,”

Crooker remembered, and for all that was to come, “although his zeal was often

69 Ibid., 21.

66 impracticable, there is no reason for denying to him the credit of industrious effort.”

To be sure, “at this stage, when continuance of position and power were not certain, the unreasoning tyranny which afterwards characterized him was not so manifest.” It was this “tyranny” that continued to plague the regiment even after two years time. 70

The rough-edged volunteers of the regiment were never anything like the tall, trim, men in high shakos that had adorned Malmborg's European military manuals, and this annoyed him to no end. His formal education at the hands of polished veterans of the Napoleonic campaigns had centered upon the traditional hierarchical relationship between superior and subordinate. Complete discipline and unquestioning deference to leaders was a trait expected and demanded of Swedish cadets, and

Malmborg expected the same from his recruits. Receiving constant backlash from fiercely democratic junior officers who felt they had been slighted either by his own flawed commands or by Stuart's controversial administration of the regiment's affairs,

Malmborg was often overcome with fury for what he saw as blatant insubordination in the ranks. Junior officers and men were not, by his estimation, supposed to offer up their opinions on orders. They were to do as commanded with complete and unyielding obedience.71

When his hair-trigger temper combined with his supposed fondness for alcohol, the full brunt of Malmborg's rage was often unleashed. As the men and officers of the regiment quickly found out, he was not above reproving junior officers in a loud and

70 Ibid., 25. 71 Åke Sandström, Överste Oscar Malmborg och det amerikanska inbördeskriget (Visby: Gottland University Press, 2012), 29.

67 sometimes even violent manner, even in front of their men. This behavior flew in the face not only of the popularly expected conduct of a gentleman, but also of established codes of American military discipline. On a march toward Raymond, Mississippi during Grant's flanking movement toward Vicksburg, Private Michael Cox of

Company A misunderstood one of Malmborg's commands, leading him to scream out that Cox was “a liar, God damn you. I have a mind to kill you right on this spot,” in the presence of most of the soldier's comrades. But his anger was not restricted to enlisted men. In June of 1863, during the Siege of Vicksburg, the Colonel entered into a shouting match with Major J. J. Heffernan in front of the entire regiment which included the threat: “Hold your tongue, God damn you, or I'll blow your brains out.”72

Such occurrences rapidly became more the norm than the exception. As the volunteers became ever increasingly more competent in the profession of arms, they started to take matters both in and out of combat into their own hands and out of

Malmborg's. Again, such behavior was inexplicable to the Old World indoctrinated

Swede who understood military social order in a very different way. On a particularly fiery and unforgiving explosion of irritation during a march in the late spring of 1863, a “slight disturbance in the ranks” elicited a shouted reprimand of the “damned rowdies” that comprised the regiment, as well as a threat “to cut in the face with his sword any one whom he should see speaking” on the march. “You are a set of damned imbeciles,” he screamed at the officers nearby, “unfit to command a squad of one man,

72 Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 264-265.

68 and [you] claim to be officers! Damned fools, that's what you are.”73

As he quickly became the eyes and ears of the often absent Stuart (a reality felt painfully by the men), he gradually became his voice as well. Following the development of a rumor concerning Stuart's pending promotion to Brigadier General, and thus away from the regiment in the late fall of 1862, several – in fact most – of the junior officers in the regiment felt strongly enough about Malmborg's acceding to control of the regiment that they jumped the chain of command and appealed directly to Governor Yates. Collectively they demanded “that we be not subjected to the tyranny and personal abuse which would inevitably be our daily portion” should

Malmborg advance to the Colonelcy. The Swede's appointment to his current position, they posited, had only been initially popularly accepted by the rank and file “because expediency seemed to demand it.” Malmborg had been “recommended to us for his knowledge of military tactics” but most definitely not “because of any liking or respect on our part.” The demanding officer's “disposition and personal ways,” they explained, had “made him peculiarly unpopular” with the men from the very beginning, and such “unpopularity has increased with time.” Indeed, the group felt comfortable asserting “that he has now no friends in the regiment, among officers or men, save those who are dependent upon him for place or privilege.” The idea that a military officer was required to have friends among his subordinates would have come as quite a shock to Malmborg, as it did to his loyal and dependent mouthpiece Stuart

73 Ibid.

69 upon his discovery of the letter's existence and delivery.74

Probably worried that Malmborg's censure, or worse, dismissal, would result in requiring him to learn something of the military trade himself, Stuart hastened a defensive reply to the Governor on the Swede's behalf. Indeed, he agreed in the officers's estimation of Malmborg as “a strict disciplinarian, an exacting officer,” and one who “demands from every officer the active and complete discharge of all his duties,” he wrote. Further, it was precisely “this vigilance, zeal and discipline, which has made this regiment in every regard today the best one in the army.” Proud as he was of the Illinoisans's accomplishments, Stuart was less than pleased with the demeanor of many of his officers. His opinions however, must be attributed predominately to Malmborg's own reports due to Stuart's reputation for having been nearly constantly absent from the regiment at almost every juncture.

“There are very few of them [junior officers] who do not feel pretty well contented with themselves when they somewhere near half perform their duties,”

Stuart wrote reprovingly of his own chosen leaders. Those falling short were “sternly and promptly reproved by him [Malmborg],” while also being “driven up and compelled to do their duty.” Accordingly, he supposed, such slackers “would like to get rid of him and have a slip-shod, easy-going time of it,” and this logic amply explained the arrival of such a damning letter to Yates's desk.

“There was scarcely an officer in this regiment who, when he entered it, knew

74 Letter from Officers of the Fifty-fifth Illinois to Richard Yates re-printed in Crooker, Fifty-fifth, 171- 172.

70 his facings,” Stuart explained. “They have learned here all they know (and with some of them the stock of knowledge on hand is not burdensome even now),” he continued, arguing that every officer in the regiment “ought to be grateful to Col. M[almborg] for what he has done for them, but vanity, selfishness, and that 'prurient ambition for fame not earned,'” made them less so. It was an ironic conviction coming from Stuart, but it probably fell with considerable weight in the political circles he and Yates both occupied either way. He closed with a warning. “Without him [Malmborg],” he foresaw the regiment headed “to obscurity” in no more than sixty days time. With him,

“it will be a pride to you and an honor to itself and its state.” Of the volunteer officers that comprised its ranks, none were more qualified to lead it into the fray. “There are but two or three of the captains who are even fit for lieutenants,” he wrote ashamedly,

“and few of the lieutenants could make first-rate sergeants.” In case the Governor might be confused at such a self-deprecating assessment of the author's own regiment,

Stuart explained again how “by dint of hard work and by doing their duty ourselves, or forcing them to do it,” he and Malmborg were able to “get along with them,” to the extent they had. “The simple fact is that I know better than he does how to get along with these men, make them do their duty, and still retain their personal regard,” he explained. “I have been a politician, and he is a soldier.”75

Though the first half of Stuart's concluding sentence we have seen to be a patent misperception, the last half was more insightful than he or Malmborg ever evidently realized. In contrast, Chaplain Milton Haney was not so slow to pick up on the

75 Letter from David Stuart to Richard Yates re-printed in Crooker, Fifty-fifth, 172-176.

71 importance of aiming to “retain their personal regard” in his dealings with the men, and it was for this reason that many of the men looked to him in the winter of 1863-64 to step into Malmborg's place at the first opportunity. If, when Oscar Malmborg looked out across the blue line, he saw (or hoped to see) intrepid and obedient servants, cowed into their proper places by the dual necessities of discipline and order,

Haney saw something very different.

CAPTAIN MILTON HANEY AND EFFECTIVE LEADERSHIP OF VOLUNTEERS

As a Methodist preacher, Haney was a communicator and facilitator par excellence. Perhaps no single voluntary institution played a larger role in welding together the culturally and geographically disparate parts of antebellum Illinois as did the Methodist Church. Historians Andrew Cayton and Peter Onuf have identified frontier Methodism's principal success as lying in its ability to “articulate a sense of community among widely dispersed people” who collectively could share in the same sermons and camp meetings, regardless of their ideological or spatial distance from one another. By catering to the individual needs and concerns of each unique member of a preacher's circuit, itinerant riders were able to personalize their attempts at salvation so that they might be more accessible to the lay individual. Historian T. Scott

Miyakawa has identified how such a strategy allowed the church to enforce a strict disciplinarian lifestyle on its adherents. The faith's tenets could be understood on a personal level and seemed to relate to individual goals and self-interested motivations

72 for salvation. As others far distant, ostensibly harboring their own unique sets of problems and self-interests, were expected to maintain the same uniform standards of discipline, individuals felt less like “lone individuals” and instead perceived themselves as disciplined parts of “an increasingly organized society.”76

To be sure, this willingness to enter into the constraints of a highly disciplined lifestyle was only effective because of its method of expansion. The itinerant preachers, commoners themselves, as the principal distributors of the religion, were

“essentially lay ministers and [did] not constitute a separate order even when they are paid,” Miyakawa notes. Methodist congregations or circuits were “not remote formal organizations imposed on the people from the outside, but intimate voluntary groups.”

Haney himself had known those on his circuit closely, not just as a preacher but as a friend. His understanding of their private troubles, challenges, and unique ambitions was both the key to their hearts and minds, as well as the glue that bound all of the disparate parts of the congregation together. Many of those with whom he had “shared so many spiritual feasts,” as well as their children, were still within his care while in the Army, mixed in with strangers whom he cared no less for.77

It is vital to understand that it was not so much the common Methodist faith that allowed Haney to meet with such success in winning over the respect of the men – though a large proportion of the regiment was undoubtedly comprised of Methodists.

Instead, it was the interpersonal skills and leadership style he had developed within the 76 Cayton, The Midwest and the Nation, 44; T. Scott Miyakawa, Protestants and Pioneers: Individualism and Conformity on the American Frontier. (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1964), 3-4. 77 Ibid., 3

73 Methodist discipline on the Illinois frontier that allowed him to navigate the similar environment of the volunteer army so adeptly. Just as he had lacked formal education in theological matters to bolster his image in the eyes of his circuit, so too he lacked any formal military training to reinforce any orders he might levy in uniform. But just as in the antebellum world, this factor was seen as more of a boon than a burden.

“Educationally and socially these preachers were cut from the same fabric as their predominately middling and artisan audiences,” historian John Wigger has noted.

“They began with a natural social affinity with their listeners.” In many cases, he has identified, “the only real distinction between a Methodist preacher and the bulk of his audience was which side of the pulpit each was on.” In Haney's new world, it seemed the only difference between him and his men was who held the commission.78

Though Haney never entirely caught on to why his particular style of leadership was quite so effective with the men, a perusal of his post-war memoir illustrates that the work may as well have been that of an itinerant preacher's re-telling of adventures on the antebellum circuit. When the previous acting Regimental Chaplain departed his position in the early spring of 1862, Haney recognized that his primary ambition of securing souls for God's mission on Earth would be much more easily accomplished as a Chaplain than as a company commander. “In entering upon the duties incident to the chaplaincy,” he later remarked, “I was not a little aided by the fact that I had already served five months as a captain.” Just as Haney's life as a western migrant and

78 John H. Wigger, Taking Heaven by Storm: Methodism and the Rise of Popular Christianity in America. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 48-49.

74 lay Illinoisan had aided him in understanding the plight and concerns of his circuit, so too his time as a line officer had “given me a knowledge of the tricks to which officers at times condescended, and opportunity to observe the causes of the failure or success of chaplains.” He had, by his own admission, “as a captain by some means gained the love of my company and a place in the hearts of the line,” and pledged to do his very best to continue “ministering to the necessities of those under my command.” “It may not seem important that a captain should see that his men were cared for in their lodgings, and protected from cold on the deck of a steamer,” he tellingly wrote, “but twenty-five years ago, as today, there was a chord in human hearts which vibrated to such little offices of love.”79

“Such little offices of love,” as it turned out, entailed a wide array of activities which Haney took on – all well above and beyond the traditional duty of a Regimental

Chaplain. Angered by Malmborg's treatment of the men, Haney mentioned that “to see the men of the regiment wronged by the perverted use of official power always pained me.” Though concerned about maintaining a professional bearing at all times, “I was often compelled to violate military rule by identifying myself with the men as against certain officers, and thus sometimes came into sharp collision with those who ranked me.” In fact, on occasion, “it became necessary for me to follow in the steps of Peter

Cartwright,” he wrote in reference to the rough-and-tumble frontier preacher of legend, “far enough to manifest a willingness to resort to physical force.” Fortunately,

79 Haney, Fifty-fifth, 442.

75 he was never required to fight.80

Haney was not beyond offering tactical advice in the heat of battle, and he did his very best to support regimental combat operations in any way he could. Organizing relief efforts and the evacuation of wounded at Shiloh, he led a small party of detailed men from the front, nearly risking severe wounding or death on numerous occasions.

He made regular forays in search of supplies, food, and tents for the regiment when in need, even going so far as to steal unused tents for use in covering the regiment's wounded at Shiloh. “This proceeding may not have harmonized with the letter of the gospel,” he reasoned, “but I praised God while the tents were erected over the sufferers and nourishing food was prepared for them in the kettles.” Indeed, Haney's perseverance had no limits when it came to securing the good of the men. After witnessing the horrors of a neglected cabin in a hospital steamer outside Chickasaw

Bayou in 1863, Haney stormed directly to the headquarters tent of Major General

William T. Sherman to demand, in no uncertain terms, that the wounded be looked after with more care and attention. While Sherman was by no means pleased with the insubordinate outburst of such a low-ranking officer, he eventually found himself so impressed by Haney's vehemence that he pledged to do anything in his power to aid him for the rest of the war.81

When with the men, unlike Malmborg, Haney never resorted to a single uniform style or leadership methodology when attempting to reach their hearts. “I resorted to

80 Ibid., 443. 81 Ibid., 446-447; Ibid., 454.

76 every innocent measure to restore their spirits and fill them with hope,” he recounted.

“I sang and prayed with them; I laughed and related funny anecdotes, and by word and work encouraged cheerfulness until I had the satisfaction of seeing my efforts in a measure successful.” And successful he was. “The peculiar combination of physical energy, moral courage, intellectual force, broad sympathy, and tenderness of heart” required for a Chaplain, remembered Lieutenant Nourse, were more than all accounted for in Haney. Unlike others, “He was not invisible on the day of battle,” he recalled.

“On the hard march the footsore private was often seen upon his horse; or when he himself rode, his saddle was hung before and behind with knapsacks of the weak or weary.” Haney haunted the regimental hospital at all hours of the day and night, and

“save the kindly and tireless surgeon, no one was oftener beside the cots of the pale sufferers; no hand grasp was warmer, more welcome, more full of comfort than this.”

As a token of their gratitude, the regiment selected a number of “choice literature” volumes to be gifted to Haney in the spring of 1864. But their most obvious token of gratitude was yet to come.82

The ways in which officers like Malmborg and Haney perceived their role as leaders intersected with the ways in which their enlisted subordinates perceived their own identities as volunteers. Thus, the exigencies of leading a force of individually motivated volunteers diverged significantly from those considered necessary for traditional military leadership. Traditionally educated officers like Malmborg, perceiving a fever pitch of insubordination in the volunteer ranks, sought to curb such

82 Ibid., 455; Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 304-305.

77 disobedience by forcibly molding men ever more into loyal and courageous automatons. Conversely, officers like Milton Haney, who seemed to better understand the ways in which volunteers perceived their own limited and temporary status as

“soldiers,” adjusting their expectations and actions accordingly, met with far more success in the volunteer force. Moreover, through acts of perhaps unlikely agency, the men were able to govern their own cooperation with institutional objectives, thus electing which of the two philosophies they would willingly follow. This allowed men to continue the tradition of personal calculus and self-determination founded upon whether or not their unique individual aims were perceived as being met by service in the regiment, and to act accordingly. At no time during the war did the friction between the two leadership philosophies and the enlisted propensity to select between the two become more evident than during the late fall and winter of 1863-64.

VETERAN RE-ENLISTMENT

By its third autumn under arms, the regiment had weaned itself down to less than five-hundred strong. “More than one in four was in his grave,” wrote Lieutenant

Henry Nourse of those who had originally enlisted in Chicago. “More than one out of every three had been hit by bullet or shell – more than one in every two had, by some disabling effect of war, dropped from the regimental rolls.” The company lines were tattered and torn like the regimental colors, and the men themselves showed the wear and tear of two hard years of campaign and battle. George Russell's Company C had

78 lost more than sixty men from its original muster roll over the course of the war. David

Holmes's Company F had lost over seventy. Of those still standing, none could know that the war would require more than a year to obtain victory for Federal arms. None knew of the forthcoming bloody tribulations and costly sacrifices that were to be made in the ragged hills of northern Georgia during the coming spring.83

A long and trying march over four weeks through the brutal cold to their winter quarters camp in northern Alabama late that fall brought many to their knees. “I suffered more in the last four weeks than I have in twice that length of time at any former period,” Holmes wrote home. As the men attempted to thaw their feet after the most brutal movement in the regiment's history, orderly sergeants gathered their companies for roll call and to read Brigadier General Morgan Smith's recent order aloud. “The campaign which you have just completed exceeds by far any other march that has been made during this or any other war,” Smith proclaimed. “I claim for you that your march was more orderly, and that you lost one hundred percent less men from straggling than any other division.” Apparently, Malmborg's “damned ruffians” could hold their own when it counted.84

But Smith had more than simple praise in mind. As the war dragged on month after month, the Lincoln administration quickly realized that the three-year enlistment terms of most volunteers in the Union Army would expire during the coming summer

– prior to the pivotal presidential election. If the government was unable to hold the

83 Ibid., Fifty-fifth 313; Crooker, et. al., Fifty-fifth, 478; Ibid., 492. 84 Letter from David Holmes to Parents, December 22, 1863; Brig. Gen. M. L. Smith to Men of the Second Division reprinted in Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 296.

79 volunteers in service until the war could be won, the entire Northern war effort would collapse from the inside-out. A number of options presented themselves: (1) The government could unilaterally extend the service terms of all those currently enlisted – the option eventually seized upon by Jefferson Davis's Confederate States government, or (2) attempt, in a quite risky maneuver, to re-sell the idea of continued military service to the war-wearied volunteers in hopes of securing the re-enlistment of those maintaining the most combat experience voluntarily.

Though the first option might have appealed most to men like Oscar Malmborg who were oblivious to the complicated nuances of motivating and leading citizen volunteers and were not willing to offer any choices to those under their command, the

War Department was not so naïve. In order to achieve the vital cooperation necessary to gain victory, the volunteer army had to be comprised chiefly of willing men – even if supplemented lightly with reluctant conscripts. Moreover, the government and, as we have seen, many officers who were well-aware of the complicated motivations of the men they commanded, understood that no single incentive would do the job of securing enough of the Army to stall complete collapse of the institution. Instead, a wide array of incentives were required to successfully entice the diverse motivational complexion that made up the heterogeneous ideological composition of the volunteer force. Accordingly, General Orders 191 and 376, issued during 1863, promised a wide variety of incentives designed to appeal to the largest number of volunteers possible.

“Veteran Volunteers” would receive a hefty four hundred and two dollar bounty for re-

80 enlistment. They would be promised an invaluable thirty-day furlough home and issued a dignified chevron to wear on their sleeves while on leave. If three-fourths of any given regiment was to re-enlist, the unit would be allowed to re-consolidate and recruit on leave while maintaining its designation and colors. As a disincentive, those failing to re-enlist would be pushed into other adjacent units in the brigade while the

“veterans” went home on furlough. The program was carefully and effectively designed to seek out and exploit each individual's unique concerns and yearnings. In doing so, the Federal government made one of the most important decisions of the entire Civil War.85

“A grave question presents itself to you,” Smith continued. “Will you join the

Veteran Corps? Will you finish the job you have so nobly commenced, or will you falter so near the end of the race, and resign the crowning glory to other hands?” In the past, no officer of such a grade had been as successful in motivating the regiment as had Morgan Lewis Smith. An enlisted man at heart, Smith never “put on airs” in front of the men, and made sure he was always in the thickest of the fight with those he led into battle. But it was his behavior outside of the fray that endeared him most to the men. “[He] would curse his men in fun and then allow them to curse him in the same manner,” Corporal John Myers of Company G remembered after the war. “It was his way of being sociable.” Myers remembered how the brigade “worshipped him.” The men of the 55th were used to being cursed at by Malmborg, “but not in fun,” he recalled. “Being allowed to curse an Officer was a luxury they had never before

85 Wiley, Life of Billy Yank, 342-343.

81 enjoyed.” If he was indeed worshipped by his men, he worshipped them as well. After being severely wounded on the skirmish line in front of the regiment at Chickasaw

Bayou, Smith made a point of visiting “his boys” just as soon as he had recuperated enough to do so. Upon his surprise arrival to camp, Colonel Malmborg rushed to his feet and attempted all the proper military courtesies he could muster. “O hell! I didn't come out here to see you officers,” Smith exclaimed. Turning to the men, he inquired

“How are you boys?” They “instantly broke ranks and flocked around their crippled chief, eager to shake him by the hand and listen to his quaint and pungent remarks,”

Lieutenant Nourse recalled. Malmborg was given one of many lessons that day in the skill of earning the respect of volunteers.

If Smith was not be able to convince the men to ignore their yearning for home and stay the course, no one could. “Don't for an instant think that I wish to persuade one man to act against his convictions of duty,” Smith added to the end of the order,

“but let me tell you that a great and rich country will never tire of rewarding the men that stand by it to the end.” He promised glory: “Your children and children's children will bless you and your memory to the end of time.” He promised money: “It must be done before the 5th of January to secure the four hundred and two dollars bounty.” And he even promised whiskey – an entire barrel, to be exact, to the first regiment of his division to re-enlist. For all his fiery rhetoric though, a mere fifty men of the regiment chose to sign on for another three years. The rest, it seemed, were biding their time.86

Looking back, although Nourse readily admitted “some undercurrent of feeling

86 Brig. Gen. M. L. Smith to Men of the Second Division reprinted in Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 296.

82 that restrained a majority from binding themselves” to the Army for three more years, he also claimed to have perceived that the men “fully recognized and acknowledged their patriotic duty and the generosity of the government’s bounty.” This

“undercurrent” he and many of his fellow officers assumed to be directly connected with Malmborg’s tyrannical leadership style. Indeed, in yet another letter to Governor

Yates immediately following the regiment's eventual re-enlistment, four non- commissioned officers of the regiment explained how the “reason our regiment delayed so long in responding to the call for veterans was a deep dissatisfaction with some of the field officers.”87

As we will see, the truth of the matter was much more complicated. While it seems probable that the enlisted men saw re-enlistment as a valuable opportunity to force the Army into helping rid the regiment of Malmborg's despotic treatment, the junior officers seem to have been the most deeply involved in such an effort. After

Malmborg left for the North on a brief recruiting excursion in Illinois that winter, many of the company commanders and their lieutenants came together to hatch a plan.

Led allegedly by Chaplain Haney, the group plotted to rid themselves of the “damned

Old Swede” by petitioning the Army for the opportunity to re-elect all commissioned officers in the regiment. Calling themselves the party of “Church & State,” likely in an allusion to Haney's conversion from the cloth to the sword, the officers – among the most popular in the regiment – began to canvas the enlisted men and their fellow officers in hopes of securing support for the endeavor. In the end, the majority agreed

87 Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 299; Ibid., 308.

83 to refuse to re-enlist under any circumstances until the Army promised to allow them to hold a re-election of all regimental officers upon re-enlistment of three-fourths of the regiment. Getting rid of the Swedish tyrant seemed too good an opportunity to pass up, that is if it could in fact be accomplished.88

The “Church & State” party did not comprise the entirety of the regiment.

Outside of those who had already chosen to re-enlist prior to the plot, many – especially foreign-born men – remained loyal to Malmborg and formed their own faction with an appropriately European-sounding name: the “Council of Kent.” These men seem to have been those who had benefitted most from closer relationships with the Colonel himself – usually due to cultural ties. To be sure, the “Council” was quite smaller than its counterpart, and this was made quite clear upon Malmborg's return from the North.89

“I reached the camp of my regiment...with but little hope of succeeding to veteranize the regiment,” Malmborg later wrote in a letter describing the matter to

Governor Yates. Much less hope was entertained by his superiors. In Malmborg's absence, Smith himself had made one final attempt at covering the regiment with patriotic rhetoric in hopes of stirring the most stalwart of hold-outs. “Finally, in finishing what he had to say, he gave the order for all to fall back to the rear who would not re-enlist,” Lieutenant Nourse remembered. “Promptly at the word the whole crowd moved back.” It seemed, at least at face value for the time being, that nothing

88 Ibid., 299-300; Ibid., 307. 89 Ibid., 307.

84 would convince the Illinoisan volunteers that the Army could continue to serve their best interests.90

Impressed at the unbending nature of his regiment's resolve, Malmborg – upon being alerted to the re-election plot – took desperate measures. He promised to fulfill their wishes. Issuing Regimental Order No. 22 on April 4, Malmborg put his own promise and allegedly those of his superiors into writing. “The commanding officer of the Regiment hereby pledges himself officially that a fair and impartial election of officers for the veteran organization shall be held,” he affirmed. Just as soon as three- quarters of the regiment had taken the re-enlistment oath, “the election of all commissioned officers in the regiment, from the lowest to the highest” would take place. “After the proper publicity had been given to this extraordinary and unmilitary concession, for which alone they had been waiting,” Nourse posited, “the men began at once to signify their readiness to re-enlist.”91

Indeed, the enlistments came in a veritable deluge. Of the two hundred and seventy-two men in camp at Larkinsville, Alabama (many of the rest of the regiment were detailed elsewhere), a total of two hundred and twenty-two chose to

“veteranize.” Accordingly, two days later, the election of officers was held on April 6, the two year anniversary of the regiment's baptism by fire at Shiloh. Though

Malmborg made a passing attempt at securing control over the electoral committee by appointing the officers himself, his efforts were subverted by an objection from

90 Letter from Lt. Col. Oscar Malmborg to Richard Yates reprinted in Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 309-311. 91 Regimental Order No. 22, Fifty-Fifth Illinois, April 4, 1864 reprinted in Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 300; Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 300.

85 Sergeant Charles Beers. “The veteran volunteers were competent to manage their own affairs,” Lieutenant Nourse wrote summarizing Beers's allegation. The statement epitomized what had preceded and what was to immediately follow. “The matter ended by the surrender of the whole business to the enlisted men,” he added.92

The results of the swift election were perhaps predictable. Of 186 total votes,

Malmborg received but 22 for the Colonelcy. The entirety of the 164 remaining votes pointed to Chaplain Haney. In a similar vein, Captain Jacob Augustine – the ranking company commander who was also well known for his deep care and consideration of the men – was selected almost unanimously as Lieutenant Colonel. Captain Francis

Shaw, an officer beloved for his sociability and bravery in combat, was offered a spot as Major. Other members of the “Council of Kent” party who remained passingly loyal to Malmborg faired much the same way as the Swede. Lieutenant Colonel

Theodore Chandler, having been identified as the individual who informed Stuart of the plot to oust Malmborg originally, received but a single vote to retain his position in command.93

If the enlisted men and bulk of the junior officers were pleased with the result, the feeling was far from unanimous. To be sure, the election had been “a decidedly unmilitary proceeding,” Nourse admitted freely. The election was “certain to work injustice to some worthy soldiers,” and the same object might easily have been accomplished had “those high in authority...chosen to request two or three

92 Ibid., 307. 93 Ibid., 307-308.

86 resignations.” But such action was never taken. The men had been forced to take matters into their own hands in order to create an environment conducive to their collective self-interests.94

Adjacent regiments camped nearby witnessed the election with wide-eyed disbelief. “They held a new election, left Malmsberg [sic] and Chandler out in the cold, and I understand, a goodly number of their best officers besides,” Captain

Charles Wills of the 103rd Illinois wrote. “Men who have not been under good disciplinarians, will almost invariably, if an election is allowed, choose good fellows for officers,” he continued. He did not propose the same definition of “good” as many might suppose. Instead, it applied to “Men who allow everything to go at loose ends, who have no business whatever with commissions.” To be sure, Haney and Augustine,

“are said to be good men and officers, and exceptions to the above,” he tempered.

“But my experience is such exceptions are rare, and I'd rather time would prove them than man's words.”95

Time did prove them. Though the Army broke its promises outright and refused to provide the commissions promised to those elected (much to the chagrin of the enlisted men), Malmborg resigned from command of the regiment. As Captain

Augustine was the ranking officer, he acceded to the Colonelcy in the Swede's place, paradoxically confirming the results of the election after Haney was disallowed the position. Tragically, Colonel Augustine would be shot and killed during the desperate

94 Ibid., 313. 95 Charles W. Wills to Mary Emily Wills, April 9, 1864, in Army Life of an Illinois Soldier, ed. Mary E. Kellogg (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1996), 223-224.

87 assault on Kennesaw Mountain while charging in front of the regimental line, sword drawn, screaming for a general advance. As if Augustine's heroic sacrifice was not enough to prove the merits of those elected, Chaplain Haney would win the

Congressional Medal of Honor for his actions during the Battle of Atlanta. Malmborg's

“imbeciles” continued to prove themselves until the end of the war.96

If the “damned old Swede” had maintained a democratically agnostic position on the election process in order to secure “veteranization,” his tone changed significantly after the fact. Voicing his grievances and narrating what he perceived to be damning treatment of himself by his beloved regiment, Malmborg wrote promptly to Governor

Yates of Illinois to explain recent events. Though he was convinced that it had been chiefly his own efforts to instill a patriotic tone in the volunteers that had eventually led to their decision to re-enlist (and not promises of an officer election), he felt his dismal fate had come at the hands of “unprincipled schemers” who had it in for him.

Of all the companies in the regiment, Malmborg perceived Companies A, H, and F,

“composed mainly of old and intolerant methodists,” to be the primary nests of resistance, “with our 'rev'd' chaplain at their head.” He supposed that the Chaplain had been “intimately acquainted” with the men of the three companies prior to the war, and alleged that the rest of the regiment regularly referred to the group as “the

'scheming hypocritic[al] methodists.'”

While Malmborg “was busied, faithfully assisted by many officers and men” in

96 Ibid., 313; Ibid., 326; Victor Hicken, Illinois in the Civil War (Urbana & Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1991), xvii.

88 an attempt to secure volunteers in a respectful manner, “that our country might be saved,” Haney and his cohort “were also busied at work indeed, but for their own individual interest.” The painful result was now evident. “Thus under the cloak of religion and by promises of promotion did they succeed to induce, or I should say seduce, good and patriotic men to aid in ruining, if not the glorious reputation this regiment has earned, certainly its future prospects of efficiency,” he wrote. Discipline, in Malmborg's estimation, should be the product of selfless sacrifice and willing subordination – not the product of calculated self-interest on the part of either officers or men.

The regiment's downfall was assured due to the scheming officers's “securing for themselves positions which they are totally incapable of filling.” Such volunteer soldiers could never make the kind of thoroughbred professional officers the likes of

Oscar Malmborg. They were shoddy imitations at best. Not only had the “adjutant, quartermaster, four captains and two first-lieutenants” been “thrown out, and the chaplain, entirely ignorant in military affairs, elected colonel,” but completely

“worthless lieutenants and non-commissioned officers [had been] elected captains and lieutenants.” In fact, a “man hardly able to write his name has been elected quartermaster.”

The entire affair had been “unscrupulous and deceitful indeed,” he raved, “for by honorable means could these men never have been prevailed upon to act thus.”

Certainly, no true soldier would submit to such blasphemous behavior and ill treatment

89 of ranked superiors. Further, “the chaplain, it has been proved, was discovered openly begging votes among the men for himself.” How could such popular democracy be allowed to thrive in a disciplined military unit? Such was the stuff of Malmborg's nightmares. “Thus either by open or secret means did he succeed to ingratiate himself among the men in eight companies, who did not only oust the field [officers] but their own company officers in order to give room for the tools of the religious and patriotic hypocrites,” he concluded. “The whole thing is regarded by every man in this corps, from the drummer boy to the commanding general, as a ridiculous farce.” Even so, he added somberly, “neither I myself nor any one of the officers present who have thus been ousted, neither will nor can serve in the regiment any longer.” The men would have their way.97

RE-ENLISTMENT CASE STUDY IN CONTEXT

A closer examination of the behavior and actions of the enlisted cohort suggests a more complicated and nuanced story for the lower ranking volunteers than

Malmborg's narrative of fallen integrity might suggest. Though it is easy to see the re- enlistment period as a rare moment of opportunity for subordinated soldiers to make up their own minds on a profoundly important issue, such a perception ignores the many instances earlier in the war when then men of the regiment similarly displayed their independence and agency. Contrary to the wishes of Malmborg or other Regular

Army trained officers, volunteers were never completely acquiescent. Although they

97 Malmborg to Yates in Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 309-311.

90 readily referred to themselves as “soldiers,” the volunteers – though thoroughly versed in the art of war – very rarely marched to the beat of the same drum. As Union General

Emory Upton would later remark, “Volunteers can become veterans but not regulars.”

The distinction was vital. “Regulars” of the peacetime Army were perceived to be

(often contrary to reality) highly obedient and orderly individuals – responding immediately and unquestioningly to any and every proper order in a swift and efficient manner. Volunteers, by contrast, were often seen to be wholly lacking in such characteristics while still, after plentiful combat experience, able to fight just as effectively in battle as Regular veteran troops. But if volunteers never quite met the perceived Regular Army standard, they very rarely reached the opposite extreme of unruly insubordination. The men selectively adhered to military regulations and official orders according to how they perceived such mandates to relate both to each individual's personal motivations and their likelihood of survival in or out of combat generally. Orders that seemed to support individual motives or that seemed important to uphold and promote survival or success in combat were widely and uncompromisingly adopted. Those that seemed frivolous or counter to individual aims, however, were often ignored or, worse yet, blatantly disobeyed.98

Historians in recent years have identified ways in which other elements of the

American population previously assumed to have very little positive agency – most

98 Peter Smith Michie, The Life and Letters of Emory Upton. (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1885), 423. A thorough discussion of antebellum and wartime perceptions of the differences between “regulars” and “volunteers” is available within Marcus Cunliffe's Soldiers & Civilians: The Martial Spirit in America, 1775-1865 (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1968), 17-27.

91 signally women and African slaves – actually exerted profound amounts of influence in public affairs while managing to simultaneously appear highly subordinated, silent, or nearly invisible in public life. A brief examination of the behavior of volunteer soldiers suggests a similar phenomenon. Though often perceived to be highly subordinated unreasoning automata, the men of the Union Army regularly took it upon themselves to look out for their own self-interests, even if the necessary action ran completely against official orders. Most importantly though, these acts of blatant insubordination were most prevalent when the men perceived their own individual needs as being neglected by the leadership hierarchy. Whenever the Army seemed to fail at fulfilling the motivations and needs of the individual, the volunteer would not shrink into subordinated obedience. He would instead find a way to fulfill his needs himself.99

For George Russell, the distinction between Regulars and volunteers was less defined. Appreciating the precarious nature of voluntary cooperation embraced by himself and his comrades, he feared for an Army too impotent to enforce its own discipline standards. “These United States and Uncle Sam had better look out for their

Regulars [volunteers] before releasing us Boys,” he wrote home in May 1862 in reference to rumors of an upcoming allowance for liberty passes away from camp. “If we should happen to Break loose there is not officers enough to get us Back again.”

Russell and many of his comrades in Company C made a regular habit of embarking 99 Two examples of historians' recent attempts at uncovering agency where it was erstwhile assumed to be absent are Steven Hahn's The Political Worlds of Slavery and Freedom (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009) and Stephanie McCurry's Confederate Reckoning: Power and Politics in the Civil War South (Cambridge: Harvard University Press,: 2012).

92 on their own personal adventures away from the regiment whenever they saw fit. Very few if any of these private excursions had prior authorization, in fact some drew official censure from regimental leadership – usually discounted considerably by the men receiving reprimand.100

Usually, such adventures were prompted by insufficient rations or shelter provided by the Army, leading directly to unauthorized foraging. During a particularly grueling march in July 1862, Russell and his closest friend Oscar found themselves famished with little more than a single hardtack biscuit a piece to sustain them. Such stories of hardship are reminiscent of all armies and conflicts, bringing to mind images of brave and intrepid soldiers sacrificing all in the sole interest of selfless victory for the cause. Such was not the case for George Russell. “We concluding that this way of using did not exactly suit us,” he recalled nonchalantly, “we took our guns and started out in the timber and that is the last the Reg[iment] seen of us until about 4 O clk.”

Hoping not to alarm Elizabeth, he explained himself by adding that “you must under stand that we knew how far the Regt was going before it stopped so we was in no hurry.” No mention is made of any permission applied for or provided by any officer or non-commissioned officer of any grade. Instead, Russell and his comrade blithely left the roving column in search of supplemental rations on their own – in a blatant assertion of self-interested action. After obtaining a warm and hearty breakfast at a nearby cabin, the pair was audacious enough to stop and purchase “a couple of

100 Russell to Elizabeth Ann Bates, May 16, 1862. Russell Papers.

93 chickens” locally before wandering back into camp later that evening.101

As this behavior ran considerably counter to the standards of good discipline, regimental and brigade leadership, once aware of its frequent occurrence, did their best to curb such “unmilitary” behavior. General orders denied the right of any volunteer to leave the column at any time, for any reason – especially for private excursions “out in the timber.” Not wanting to miss out on the bountiful resources in the surrounding countryside however, the men found alternative methods to secure their booty. On a march in mid September of 1862, “the General issued an order that

[if] any man…was caught more than 5 paces from his stack of Guns [after the column halted] that his Capt should march in Rear of the Regt in disgrace,” Russell related.

“You see it was strict enough,” he added. But it would take more than draconian orders to curb the tendencies of young volunteers to seize any opportunity to improve their own lot. The order, as it turned out, applied only to uniformed soldiers. “Thank

Stars we had a good set of Negros,” he explained with amusement. “They was up foraging so we did not suffer if there was a watermelon patch or a Peach orchard anywhere in sight we would tell the Negroes to start and away they would go on

Double quick time.” Hurrying back to the moving column, the contraband would obediently distribute their treasure to the volunteers “and start on again.” In this manner, the men were able to fulfill their own private wishes while simultaneously managing to stay within the bounds of bureaucratic regulations.102

101 Ibid., July 10, 1862. 102 Ibid., September 13, 1862.

94 The same strategy was applied when, during the summer of 1862, Federal high command attempted to apply conciliatory policies aimed at coaxing reluctant secessionists to willfully return to Federal allegiance. Referred to in the ranks as “kid- glove policy,” such mandates were profoundly unpopular with the troops who, by and large, felt that Southerners should be made to suffer for their transgressions. At the lowest level, the first effect of these policies involved an effort to regulate the endemic burning of fence rails within close proximity of Army camps as fuel for cooking and warming fires. Destruction of private property before ascertaining whether or not its owner was in open rebellion ran counter to the best interests of the government, and

Federal high command meant to put an end to it. “The 'kid-glove policy' then in vogue in high quarters,” Lieutenant Crooker recalled, “was not appreciated nor practically applied by the rank and file of the [regiment's] First brigade.” In accordance with the wishes of his superiors, Stuart attempted to blunt the lawless activities of his regiment in this particular by issuing a strict order designed to protect local fence rails. “Only the top one should be cremated,” Crooker explained the resulting mandate as the soldiers understood it. Fittingly, the men, “ignorant of higher mathematics, at once assumed that when one rail was gone the next one was on top, and so it turned out that all were top rails, and it took just seven men to demonstrate that fact on a seven-rail fence.” Once again, the men had their way.103

Such assertions of independence and agency were not restricted to unauthorized foraging excursions. Continuing to see themselves more as democratic citizens of

103 Crooker, Fifty-fifth, 152.

95 Illinois than as professional soldiers, officers as well as their subordinates regularly and frequently jumped all appropriate military channels and appealed directly to

Governor Richard Yates in order to voice their grievances while in army service. We have already seen how the regiment's officers showed no reluctance to forward their concerns regarding Malmborg's pending promotion straight to the Governor's office.

The same mentality was embraced by enlisted men as well. After the regiment was first armed in January 1862, the men were repelled and disgusted with the shoddy muskets the state government had to provide them. Originally promised patent Colt

Revolving Rifles, the volunteers were understandably irritated when the comparatively ancient weapons they were handed often exploded in the hands of the firer upon first discharge. Enraged, Sergeant H. H. Kendrick of Company K, apparently seeing no need to forward a formal complaint through the proper channels, opted to not only write directly to Governor Yates, but to issue a threat. “The men would have as much faith in killing secesh with alder pop-guns as they would with the guns they have,” he sarcastically remarked. “If you wish your best Illinois men killed off by not having guns to defend themselves with, let us go as we are.” Kendrick begged Yates to “For

God's sake remember us in mercy, for the men cannot and will not fight with such guns. It is impossible; they have no faith in them.” In fact, alarmingly, the volunteers

“would surrender before they would fight,” he warned. Needless to say, the threatening of a state executive by a junior non-commissioned officer was not a facet of traditional military order.104

104 Letter from H. H. Kendrick to Richard Yates, January 5, 1862 reprinted in Crooker, Fifty-fifth, 42.

96 By the winter of 1864, such assertive acts of independence had reached an entirely new level. Quartering within close proximity to Southern locals, many of the men disregarded official camp boundaries completely and organized covert late-night rendezvous with nearby civilians in order to engage in raucous dance parties away from the official constraints of army life. “Care was taken not to give too general notice of these entertainments,” Lieutenant Nourse wrote, “for there was great danger that the self-invited guests would be too many for the house to hold, and the dance find indefinite postponement for lack of floor room and superabundance of floor managers.” But there was another more poignant reason for concealing the proceedings as well. The best venues for such activities were difficult to come by, and enlisted men who made an effort to break the law by escaping the picket boundaries to attend had to do so swiftly – but only so as to beat like-minded officers to the punch.

“Several of the officers of the brigade having planned a select party, on the appointed night proceeded to the rendezvous,” Nourse comically recalled, “but on drawing near the proposed ball-room, they not only met the resplendent glare of the usual tallow- candle illumination, but the sound of exhilarating music and the shuffling of sympathetic feet struck their astonished ears.” The men, it seemed, “had got wind of the festivities intended to be so exclusive, and beaten the shoulder-strapped soldiers at strategy, much to the disgust of the latter.” In an attempt to restore some vestige of order to the regimental camp, Malmborg ordered midnight roll-calls at random every few nights. However, “strange to say the usual guests trod the same measures at the

97 regular cottage dances without appearing in the reports as absent from roll-call,”

Nourse wrote. Those who bent the rules looked after their own.105

In the end, these incidents, common as they were, illustrate the vigorous assertion of independence by the men of the Fifty-fifth exerted throughout the course of their service. As with the case of Russell and Kendrick, they came most frequently when the individuals under consideration felt the Army was failing to operate to their best personal self-interest. Finally, by the winter of 1864, nearly all the veterans of the regiment, officer and enlisted, felt they had an authentic understanding of what was truly required of them in order to maintain the structure of the volunteer force.

Stretching order, discipline, and hierarchical subordination to their very limits – and often beyond – these men had become something very near quintessentially

“unmilitary” in all affairs but combat.

Perhaps unsurprisingly though, assertions of independence were not absent from the battlefield either. As discussed in the previous chapter, the men and their junior officers had, since the formation of the regiment, perceived an unequal level of competence in tactical matters between themselves and regimental command. This contrast was made all the more visible in the most dangerous of moments. Pressed by reports of onrushing Confederate cavalry early on the first day at Shiloh, Malmborg – then commanding the regiment – ordered the only maneuver he had learned in Sweden to counter such a threat: the hollow square. A spectacularly involved piece of tactical choreography, vastly outdated and inappropriate for the time, place, or situation, the

105 Nourse, Fifty-fifth, 300-301.

98 enlisted men and junior officers who knew better took things into their own hands, refusing to remain in the formation any longer and moving unilaterally back into line of battle – the customary formation for combat. A similar incident took place during the attack on Chickasaw Bayou in the late winter of 1862, when Malmborg again attempted to maneuver the regiment based upon outdated European manuals that placed the men in great danger while under enemy fire. Again, in the face of contrary orders, the line officers moved the men back to the customary line of battle while

Malmborg was out of sight, adjusting the position of an adjacent unit. Even in battle, the men looked after their own best interests.106

Still, to examine only the cases of insubordinate behavior illustrated by men who, sometimes temporarily and other times regularly, saw military discipline as an encumbrance, ignores the vast numbers of individuals who entertained a contrary opinion. As we have seen, for young men like David Holmes the Army had come as a boon to the achievement of his personal life objectives. It was usually in his best interest, therefore, to obey the orders and expectations of the officers appointed over him, and he usually did so. Perhaps partly due to his youth, Holmes also seems to have seen many of his officers in a paternal light. Unlike many of his comrades who might have simply asserted their independence until forced to do otherwise, Holmes was always careful to inquire of his superiors if he thought his pending actions might be legally questionable. When his parents wrote to inquire as to whether or not he might be authorized to carry a pistol as a sidearm into battle – a product of their heightened

106 Crooker, Fifty-fifth, 96-97; Ibid., 190.

99 concern for his well-being – he “inquired of Cap and first lieutenant of our Company” about it before authorizing them to send it along.107

Instead of making random forays “into the timber,” Holmes valued officers that made an effort to offer chaperoned trips into nearby towns when the regiment camped in close proximity to towns that might contain shops or interesting sites. This separated him markedly from much of the regiment, which would depart at whim whenever they thought opportunity might be beckoning. Corporal John Myers of

Company G similarly seems to have seen the Army in a favorable light, and accordingly was much more mindful of disciplined order than many of his comrades.

After the relief march to Knoxville in the fall of 1863, much of the regiment flew to the winds immediately after arrival in hopes of securing plunder in town. “They had all left without permission and gone into the city to feast on what ever they could find,” Myers later remembered. “As usual I was at my post ready for duty.” Even after a close friend detailed to a nearby field hospital invited him to dine with the fellow hospital stewards, Myers was careful to obtain permission through the proper channels. “[I] asked permission of the Captain to go with him,” he reported diligently.

“The request was granted and I went.”108

In the end, the men of the Fifty-fifth Illinois cannot be described as uniformly or even consistently subordinate or insubordinate. Discipline was neither omnipresent nor entirely absent. All of these matters existed along a continuum of obedience and

107 Holmes to Parents, October 25, 1861. Holmes Papers. 108 Ibid., November 10, 1861; John H. Myers Memoir, 1888. MS2009-061. Special Collections, University Libraries. Virginia Tech University, Blacksburg, Virginia, 27-28.

100 cooperation which ceaselessly shifted over time and was inextricable from the same personal self-interested calculus that had governed these Westerners throughout their lives. Men were largely obedient to official orders and acted in the interest of military discipline if and only if they perceived that doing so was in their best interest. Often this calculation was the result of a very general consideration of the army as a whole's ability to benefit their self-interested goals and motivations. Other times, it marked a brief departure in an otherwise highly disciplined soldier's military career – the result of a temporary abandonment by the regiment of its usual habit of looking after his needs and fulfilling his personal objectives. With each individual following a highly dynamic trajectory, tracking the minute shifts in the correlation between individual volunteer motivations and each man's corresponding behavior in response to orders and military expectations is probably impossible given the limited extant record available. Fortunately, the re-enlistment campaign of the winter of 1863-64 offers a unique snapshot of the process.

Importantly, the opportunity for enlisted men to determine their own future actions during re-enlistment did not mark so much a profound departure from the normal course of affairs, but rather derives its importance from its ability to display to the historian the individually unique deliberative processes that drove volunteer behavior. A general look at demographic shifts within the regiment in the wake of re- enlistment followed by a more specific examination of the correspondence of both

David Holmes and George Russell during the period offers an insider's view of events.

101 Instead of the perspective of junior officers provided by the Regimental History and other official correspondence, these sources suggest a much more complicated decision making process.

DEMOGRAPHIC PATTERNS OF RE-ENLISTMENT

An analysis of shifts in the demography of the regiment following re-enlistment, drawn from the tabulation of data recorded on descriptive rolls for each volunteer at initial enlistment and later upon re-enlistment, illustrates interesting patterns. Even after years of living and fighting together, the decision to continue service seems to have had much more to do with concerns regarding individual self-interest than with esprit de corps or the achievement of the national mission. Volunteers regulated their willful cooperation with institutional objectives based on the results of a continual personal calculus designed to identify to what extent continued service coincided with the unique (and often shifting) ambitions and interests of each man. These patterns become most clear when evaluating the proportional differences of occupation and nativity between the early and late war companies.

102 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% Non-Farmers (%) 40% Farmers (%) 30% 20% 10% 0% Company C (Vet/1864) Company F (Vet/1864) Company C (1861) Company F (1861)

Figure 1.0: Comparison of Occupation by Company, 1861-1864

As Figure 1.0 suggests, the proportion of individuals within both companies engaged in work other than agriculture dropped considerably between 1861 and 1864.

Proportional shifts like this illustrate important trends on the Northern home front that volunteers in the field learned quickly about through local newspapers and letters from home. Though some of this change can probably be attributed to personnel losses during the war (both to casualties and other causes), it is also indicative of the booming Northern wartime economy. While Northern women aptly worked the fields of Illinois to great effect in the absence of their husbands, artisans and those in skilled trades necessary to support agricultural work were in high demand and short supply.

These statistics suggest that men who could offer these skills saw the Army as less conducive to their individual mission to increase personal wealth than plying their

103 trade as a civilian. Again, the self-centered calculus that drove voluntary participation in the national mission caused many to re-evaluate their situation and depart when given the respectable opportunity to do so.109

100% 90% 80% 70% 60% Slave-State (%) 50% Free-State (%) 40% Foreign (%) 30% 20% 10% 0% Company C (Vet/1864) Company F (Vet/1864) Company C (1861) Company F (1861)

Figure 1.1: Comparison of Volunteer Nativity by Company, 1861-1864

Figure 1.1 illustrates changes in the proportional native composition of each company between 1861 and 1864. As is immediately evident, Company C maintained a substantially larger proportion of foreign-born volunteers than did Company F, which contained primarily men born in the free-states. Interestingly though, re- enlistment shrunk the proportion of free-state born men in both companies – most notably in Company C. Instead, the proportion of foreign and slave-state born

109 Statistics drawn from careful analysis of the Muster and Descriptive Rolls of Illinois Volunteers. RS 301.020. Adjutant General, Springfield, Illinois.

104 volunteers increased in the “veteranized” companies. The former can likely be explained by the outstanding financial opportunities for foreigners in the Army – opportunities that could not be had in a harshly xenophobic Illinois. Easy access to

Federal lands through the Homestead Act, bounty incentives, as well as the public reputation of having served one's adopted country all made continued military service attractive to immigrants desperate to become “true” Americans.110

The increase of southern born volunteers is slightly more difficult to explain.

While the increase was minimal in both companies, it seems at least possible that these men saw the war – carried to the very land of their youths – in much more personal terms. Many likely still had family members living in the states occupied by Southern forces, and many (or the families of the same) had undoubtedly moved North to escape what they perceived to be the despotic control of the landed slave-holding elite.

Now that the Federal government had given them an opportunity to correct the imbalance, they were eager to do their part.

110 Ibid.

105 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% Northwest (FS) 40% Northeast (FS) 30% 20% 10% 0% Company C (Vet/1864) Company F (Vet/1864) Company C (1861) Company F (1861)

Figure 1.3: Comparison of Free-State Born Volunteer Nativity by Company, 1861-1864

An ironically similar pattern is visible in Figure 1.3, which illustrates the proportional increase of Northeastern born volunteers in the “veteran” companies when compared to the number of free-state born men as a whole. Similar to their slave-state born comrades, Northeasterners were much more likely to align themselves amicably with the popularly perceived shifts in the war's meaning. The President's

Emancipation Proclamation combined with his rhetorical efforts to construct support for the emancipation of black slaves had enraged much of the Upland Southern populated Northwest and alienated many Northerners who felt the war should continue to be restricted to an effort to restore the Union “as it was” - with slavery intact. While such dissension was by no means absent from the Northeast, the regions of the eastern states that were traditionally the hotbed of abolition – the very regions many of the

106 Northeastern men in both companies called home – found the moral incentive of emancipation much more appealing. It is very likely that this perceived alteration in the direction of the national mission played a large role in convincing these individuals of the Army's continued service of their own personal aims.111

RE-ENLISTMENT AND PRIVATE DAVID HOLMES

By his own admission, David Holmes suffered tremendously “with the reenlisting fever which is making great havoc among our boys.” As early as the late summer of 1863, as unconfirmed rumors of government incentives floated about camp, Holmes had begun to weigh his options. “Some times I think I will reenlist,” he wrote home to his anxious parents, “and then other times I think I will stay with the old 55 regt till my time is out.” Though having matured enormously, he still felt the decision was one of such gravity that it should not be made unilaterally. “At any rate,” he closed, “I will wait for a word of advice from you.”

Their response was predictable. Though the letters Holmes received from home while in the Army do not survive, his placating responses suggest considerable concern issuing from his parents. In an assurance perhaps reminiscent of discussions around the dinner table prior to Holmes’s initial enlistment, he did his best to calm their nerves. “If I do enlist again I shan’t go in a infantry regiment,” he promised – unaware at the time that opportunities to shift branches were not part of the

111 Ibid.

107 government’s official incentive package.112

Like most of his comrades, he was largely unmoved by the promises and protestations of men like General Morgan Smith and Colonel Stuart. Following the officers’ entreaties for “veteranizing” that fall, the complete void of any positive response from the regiment’s enlisted men was impressive and amusing to him. “They both gave us a short speech and told us a good many things,” he wrote after one particular incident, “but the joke of it was they did not tell us any thing that we did not know before.” It would take much more than star-spangled rhetoric to move the war- torn veterans who carefully weighed the Army’s promises against their likelihood of surviving the next three years. Moreover, many were not so sure that such promises would be immediately forthcoming. “They are two men we know as well as they know themselves,” Holmes remarked, “more especially the former [Stuart].” Their former

Colonel’s remarkable ability for failing to deliver upon his word was duly noted by all who were accustomed to his political machinations.113

Not long after the regiment had settled into its Alabama home, the “re-enlistment fever” returned with increased vigor. The brutal march to Alabama had not helped motivate men to sign on for three more years of the same kind of treatment. “Our boys think that they are veteran enough now,” Holmes remarked bluntly, “that is my ticket now.” By New Year’s Eve of 1863, he had decided that “by the time it goes around at three years apeace [sic] the war will be about played out.” While the promise of the

112 Holmes to Parents, August 3, 1863. Holmes Papers. 113 Ibid., September 26, 1863.

108 four hundred and two dollar bounty “gets a good many boys,” he noted, “I can’t see it.” If the war would soon come to a close, as it then seemed to him it would, so would his volunteer service. Still, he tempered, “If I thought I would be needed I would not hesitate a minute.”114

A month later, as the number of regimental re-enlistments continued to stagnate and the efforts of the appointed recruiting officers redoubled, Holmes continued to bide his time. “I never was at such a stand still in my life,” he wrote. “I want to go on and help finish this good begun work and still I know it is against your wishes.” The pleading of his beloved parents to return home to safety as soon as humanly possible was powerfully influential to the still young Holmes. As if that was not enough, “some of our co[mpany] is going one way and some the other and all want me to stay or go with them,” he added. “That all the more bothers me.”115

Hoping to make the most informed decision possible, Holmes grasped for whatever data he could obtain. “I don’t think this war will last a great while longer,” he wrote home in February. “What is the opinion up in Illinois on that?” After the political situation at home was added to the apparent likelihood of the upcoming spring campaign’s character as one full of “plenty of marching and fighting,” his decision became all the more complicated. “You can’t find a man among us that wants any more marching,” he admitted.116

By March 24, the fruit of the recruiting officers’ efforts sat at little more than “90

114 Ibid., December 22, 1863; Ibid., December 31, 1863. 115 Ibid., January 25, 1864. 116 Ibid., February 7, 1864; Ibid., March 24, 1864.

109 odd veterans” by Holmes’s own counting. After months of careful deliberation and introspection, he finally made his decision. “You appear to be anxious to know if I have enlisted,” he wrote home proudly, “I have not.” In fact, “it is the least of my thoughts at this time.” Admittedly, “I did once think I would go,” he wrote, “but I have got bravely over it.” The soundness of his decision was bolstered when Company F’s recruiting officer returned the same day from a three month “expedition” through northern Illinois which resulted in but one fresh recruit to the ranks. 117

As with most of his decisions, Holmes found security in the fact that his sentiments seemed to mirror those of the majority of his comrades. Peer pressure never ceased to have a profound influence on the young man, and its effects were increased during the re-enlistment debates. After General Smith gave his final patriotic speech at Larkinsville on March 29, Holmes enjoyed how “the boys made all sorts of fun and beat him at his own game.” Responding with frustration and anger, Smith

“told us he would keep us in front till our time was out,” he wrote, but “that made a big laugh so that the Old Genl recalled that part.”118

Interestingly, Holmes only mentioned Malmborg’s antics as a factor weighing on his decision when combined with the feelings of his peers - and even then, ostensibly only after he had come to his own private conclusions. While the notorious

Colonel was absent on his own recruiting venture in Illinois, the papers reaching camp announced his potential promotion to Brigadier General. “We are all in hopes that he

117 Ibid., March 24, 1864; Ibid., March 29, 1864. 118 Ibid., March 29, 1864.

110 is promoted so that he can’t tyrannize over us,” Holmes wrote on behalf of his comrades. Notably, the remark is the only critical statement he made in regard to the

Swedish officer throughout the entirety of his surviving correspondence home.119

If such evidence of Holmes’s youthful obedience to peer pressure is not quite convincing enough, the final result of his bout with “re-enlistment fever” speaks volumes. Though prior to March 31 only four of his company comrades had re- enlisted as veterans, the day after official guarantees regarding the re-election of regimental leadership brought twelve more men into the veteran ranks for a total of sixteen re-enlistments in Company F. Only Company H, with twelve total veterans, re- enlisted in fewer numbers. The fact that the birthplace of the “Church & State” party,

Haney’s own original command, would be reluctant to fall prey to more of

Malmborg’s groundless promises is unsurprising. More illustrative though, is the fact that among the twelve who took the oath for the second time that day was twenty-one year old David Newton Holmes. Peer pressure had struck yet again.120

RE-ENLISTMENT AND PRIVATE GEORGE RUSSELL

If the re-enlistment campaign ended differently for George Russell, the results were equally indicative of his own unique personal concerns and motivations. Though he must have been well aware of the upcoming opportunity, Russell neglected

119 Ibid., March 24, 1864. 120 Re-enlistment statistics derived from Muster and Descriptive Rolls (RS 301.020); Nourse, Fifty- fifth, 307.

111 mentioning “re-enlistment fever” in his letters home to Elizabeth until December

1863. “There is considerable stir at present about the Veteran Volunteer and the Four

Hundred and two Dollars bounty,” he explained, “and more than that there is a Badge of Honor to be worn By the so called Veteran Volunteer that they may be

Distinguished from the other soldier.” The idea of catapulting those who re-enlisted into greater public esteem through such petty means as cloth badges and lofty titles angered the already embittered Russell. Still, his special emphasis on the government’s offers to provide an elite public image of the “Veteran Volunteer” belies his continued concern for the health of his public reputation at home. Fear of what desertion might mean for that reputation, as we have seen, played a chief role in keeping him in the ranks. He had reluctantly submitted to the authoritative attitudes of his officers, and had done so with remarkable resilience. Now, it seemed Uncle Sam expected still more from Russell - more even than what he had already extracted, which the exasperated private perceived to be well beyond the original agreement. Reflecting on the past two years, he decided then and there “that if I am Granted my Life and health that when my three Years is up that Uncle Sam and George is Two Different Persons.”

Even still, seizing apparently upon the same idea as the younger Holmes, Russell considered his options hypothetically. “There is considerable Noise about enlisting,” he wrote. “There has [been] a Number of men said that they would go if they could get into [the] Artillery and some of them prefer cavvey [cavalry].” For his part, “I would prefer Artillery,” he explained to his anxious sweetheart. Such a position would save

112 him from the most dangerous fighting, allow him to secure the valuable bounty, and perhaps offer an opportunity to transfer away from the iron grip of many officers he disliked. Alas however, “I want the Bounty and there is no show [chance] of getting it without Reenlisting,” he finally concluded. “And that I cannot stand.”121

Such a resolute stance was difficult to maintain while surrounded by men discussing their options endlessly around the fire. Even before the sun dawned on the first day of 1864, Russell’s disposition had softened. “It would not take much coaxing

Before my Name would be on the Reenlistment Roll,” he wrote. “I would have 30

Days Furlough which would Probably be…long enough to stay in Burritt at a time.”

After indoctrinating himself into the unrefined and brutal culture of war, like many of his comrades he began to wonder what the blessings of “home” might really entail - or whether they would truly be blessings at all. “After that [thirty days] any one would get more or less lonesome,” he added. “There is many a Soldier that will not stay at

Home more than six Months after they once get there.” Regardless of any qualms

Russell maintained (and he did, vehemently) in regards to military hierarchy or lacking leadership methods, his place in the fold of the bloodied regimental brotherhood made the choice a difficult one. He knew well that he had changed as a man, that his conceptions of the world had been transformed considerably, and that a swift return “home” might make for a rough and difficult adjustment. His comrades understood the same.122

121 Russell to Elizabeth Ann Bates, December 31, 1863. Russell Papers. 122 Ibid.

113 But even with espirit de corps coursing through his veins, Russell could not manage to bring the idea of continued military service into profitable connection with his own perceived needs and motivations. The Army had been less than a great fit for the eager and fiercely independent young man. After having spent much of the preceding years exerting that independence at every available opportunity, he finally decided to handle the re-enlistment hurdle in the same manner. “Let them that likes

Soldiering stick to it,” Russell concluded. At the end of his term, he would be headed home.123

Interestingly, Russell’s decision to leave the Army (which, unlike Holmes, he stuck to) did not preclude him from hoping that those who found the military a better fit for their personal goals and individual dispositions would find it in them to re- enlist. “I like to See the Enlisting go on and I am in hopes that 2/3 of the Regt will enlist and the Whole Regt will have an opportunity to go to Illinois,” he mentioned in a note home. By mid January, but six men of Company C had re-enlisted, some of whom he reasoned Elizabeth would have “little thought would go.” Indeed, the same algorithms that governed individual decisions in 1861 were no longer valid after years of hard campaigning and brutal combat. Still, though “them that has gone wants him

[Russell] to go pretty Bad,” he would remain a “non-veteran” for the remainder of his service.124

If indeed he was supportive of his comrades who had successfully found their

123 Ibid. 124 Ibid., January 13, 1864.

114 niche as volunteer soldiers and chose to “veteranize,” Russell remained irked by the popular imagery that seemed to surround the “Veteran Volunteer.” Though surely aware that the government went to extreme pains in order to build up this public image, such awareness did not soothe his annoyance. “If General U. S. Grant makes one more Campaign with his U. S. Boys this Rebellion will In my opinion by crushed,” Russell posited. Once the Confederacy had fallen to the brute force of

Federal arms, the “Veteran” and “true Soldier,” as Russell referred to those who refused to re-enlist, would “have a chance to go home, the Veteran with his Four

Hundred and the true Soldier with his one Hundred.” Perhaps worse, the flashy chevron affixed to the Veteran’s arm, he considered, would likely “be worth some thousands if not more,” and certainly “the Girls will as soon as they See his Arms fixed off Signifying Veteran” would inform him “that He can go with the Best of them and with all of them.”125

Russell’s designation of those who opted not to re-enlist as “true Soldiers” is telling of his general opinion of not only the re-enlistment campaign, but of the volunteer force itself. In an attempt to explain his use of the title, Russell penned “a few words concerning the True Soldier and the Dependence that is placed on him” to

Elizabeth in mid January. Apparently in agreement with him, she had written to express how “there is no one held in as high Esteem as a true soldier.” Concerned that she had misconstrued his real meaning, he replied to note that by 1864, it had become the “Next thing to an Impossibility to find a true soldier” in the Union Army. Clearly,

125 Ibid.

115 his definition of such an individual encompassed much more than just his status as a veteran or “non-veteran.” Such a “true soldier,” he explained, would “agree with that small piece of Paper that I got from Mary headed the Truly Just man.”126

Though the scrap does not survive, it is very likely that the document outlined

Plato’s prescription in The Republic for the characteristics of acting as a “truly just man.” The selection was often referred to in Christian dialogues during the era. Plato’s hypothetical moral hero was “a man of true simplicity and nobleness,” but more importantly one “resolved…not to seem, but to be, good.” External symbols (like the veteran chevron) of inner justice and integrity could easily serve as a shroud for lesser men. “If he be thought to be a just man,” Plato explained, “he will have honors and gifts on the strength of his reputation, so that it will be uncertain whether it is for justice’s sake, or for the sake of the gifts and honors, that he is what he is.” In

Russell’s eyes, those who re-enlisted to obtain government incentives like bounties and attractive chevrons could never be “true Soldiers” like he was. Further, the volunteer Union Army was one which had, in his view, been initially populated by men motivated not by worldly incentives but by burning patriotism and a profound sense of duty. Interestingly, this perception suggests a considerable short-sightedness on Russell’s part, illustrating a lacking awareness of his own constantly shifting motivations across the course of the war. Conveniently forgetting when he himself had debated re-enlisting to secure the same incentives, he prided himself like a true

126 Ibid.

116 Christian for refusing to give in to temptation.127

While his conviction to fulfill his three-year obligation to the government and thus preserve his reputation as a man of his word kept him in the ranks, Russell’s decision to turn down the re-enlistment incentives slowly transformed into a point of pride. He began to envision the joys he would experience in the relatively short future should he continue in his resolve not to give in to the incentives. “It will not be long before my time will be out,” he wrote, and imagined himself and Elizabeth on brilliant sleigh rides “and many other things [that] will Happen if I do not conclude to Enlist as a Veteran.” Later in April, he reminded her that he had “tried hard to think that I had ought [to] Reenlist but could not think that it was my duty.” For his part, “it is my impression that [the] Veterans is for the most part sorry for what they have done but do not Dare own it.” Having given in to the temptation of the government’s attractive siren song, they would pay the price in good time, ineligible for the title of “true

Soldier” in Russell’s eyes.128

Both Holmes’s and Russell’s cases suggest that the re-enlistment debate took on a very personal dimension for each and every individual volunteer. Just as with their initial motivations to enlist in the Army to begin with, and with the sustaining motivations which kept them in the ranks through terrible hardship, the calculus necessary to determine each man’s thoughts and decisions remained a powerfully self- centered equation. Every volunteer was in the Army for his own personal reasons.

127 Plato. The Republic (Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions, 1997), 41-42. 128 Russell to Bates, January 13, 1864; Ibid., April 10, 1864; Ibid., February 16, 1864.

117 Sometimes these reasons shared remarkable symmetry with those embraced by comrades, and sometimes they maintained no resemblance whatsoever. By offering a wide array of incentives to re-enlisting volunteers, the Federal government seized on this reality in ways that Malmborg and other Old World or traditionally trained officers never did. Although, as with the cases of Russell and many others, these incentives could never hope to entice the entirety of the Union Army to “veteranize,” in the end the greater the extent of bureaucratic flexibility, the greater the share of volunteers who perceived the Army as continuing to be beneficial to their own personal missions.

FINAL CONCLUSIONS

In the end, what made the freshly minted “veterans” of the 55th Illinois willingly cooperate and abide by lawful orders on and off the battlefield? What caused them to re-enlist? The answer might very well be that there existed no single unifying element in either scenario. Instead, it would behoove us to examine the complicated network of individually governed self-interests as they connected with the volunteer's own perceptions of his regiment and the Army as a whole. The motivations of each man, as outlined in the previous chapter, consistently transformed in response to external and internal pressures over the entire course of the war. Volunteers were influenced in different ways by different factors, each following his own unique motivational trajectory. The point at which authoritative pressures (as opposed to external ones, such as combat, affairs at home, etc.) were applied to this trajectory by regimental

118 leadership was of pivotal importance in anticipating the extent to which the volunteer would cooperate with orders or submit to the officer's wishes.

In the previous chapter, we engaged the many different factors affecting the motivational trajectories of two men: Private George Russell and Corporal David

Holmes. When combined with the data presented in this chapter, we are now able to draw the following conclusions.

If, as often in George Russell's case, the volunteer felt the Army was falling short in fulfilling its obligations to him (as with its inability to provide him with adequate rations), or was simply out-of-sync with his current larger motivational attitude, then the likelihood of insubordinate behavior was increased significantly.

Such behavior might range from outright refusal to comply with orders, application to the Governor or other civilian authorities for a redress of grievances, or even individual unilateral action away from the observation of leaders (as with Russell's foray “into the timber”).

The connection or disconnection of the Army's interests with that of the volunteer's, or its relationship to his larger motivational attitude has in the previous chapter been shown not to be entirely dichotomous. Though Russell often felt his service in the Army to be a mistake, he continued to see its ability to maintain and perhaps even improve his public reputation to be a price worth paying for remaining with the regiment. Still, his disaffection with the circumstances of enlisted life caused him to “act out” on many occasions, often taking matters into his own hands and – in

119 the end – caused him to back away from all of the government's incentives for continued service.

Conversely, as in the case of David Holmes, if willing service in the Army continued to be an attractive proposition to the volunteer – coinciding with his larger motivational attitude to one or many extents – leaders could expect willing subordination in the interest of success and order in the unit. This mentality was usually achieved by leaders who attempted to govern the fewest aspects of a volunteer's life, especially those engaged in while off the battlefield. This leadership philosophy allowed for the co-existence of a wide array of shifting individual motivations without supporting the ambitions of some at the expense of others.

Perhaps not surprisingly, this attitude toward constructing a social environment conducive to cultural diversity mirrored directly the tactics of antebellum village

“stayers” in their attempts at boosterism and the development of social order on the adolescent railroad frontier. This was the world they knew, and it should come as no surprise that it followed them into the Army.

Volunteers expected officers to be proactive both in and out of combat, but in importantly different ways in each environment. On the field, officers were expected to show inspirational bravery, to make sound tactical decisions, and to maintain awareness of the battle while providing such intelligence as was available to the men in line. Off the field and in camp, he was expected to provide the necessaries for comfortable and sociable living while simultaneously serving as a quasi-paternal

120 figure in the lives of each and every man. By no means was he to attempt to micromanage the lives of his men, appear overbearing in his leadership style, or suggest in any way that he was superior in some capacity to his voluntary subordinates.

For many volunteer officers, especially those with similar work experience in the antebellum world (i.e. itinerant ministers like Milton Haney), this behavior came naturally. For more traditional officers, like Oscar Malmborg, it did not. The fundamental problem was a discontinuity between popular perceptions of what a

“soldier” or “volunteer” was, in effect, supposed to be like. Because, as with so many other aspects of the Union Army, there was no general consensus on this point, inevitable friction resulted with great frequency. Due to the overwhelming and collectively asserted principles of voluntarism and popular democracy embraced by the large majority of Union volunteers however, a working consensus slowly began to take shape over the course of the war.

After years of hard campaigning and bloody battles, the erstwhile naïve civilian volunteers had become hardened veterans in their own right – regardless of whether or not they chose to re-enlist in the winter of 1863-64. They perceived the experience of combat as having taught them precisely what elements of traditional military life and hierarchical order were necessary to provide for victory and survival, as well as those that could be deemed frivolous or a waste of time generally. It was this experience that gave the men the confidence to assert themselves on behalf of their own individual

121 interests with increasing frequency as the war progressed. Though often turning to the advice and orders of elected officers and “old soldiers” with prior military experience in the early months of the war, the grognards of the late war Union Army's veteran regiments no longer felt the need to constantly rely on authority figures for leadership.

While they would never be completely independent – as effective soldiers never can be – the veteran volunteers knew the ropes, and were most comfortable when allowed to operate under leaders they chose to respect and to act in ways they chose to deem appropriate. Try as they might, the bureaucratic powers that be – those that comprised the institutional structure of the Union Army – would never be able to cow such men into constant subordination. Instead, they would be forced, from Sumter to

Appomattox, to continue to bargain at every turn for the citizen volunteer's cooperation and support in the costly effort to preserve the Union.

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