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US Military History Companion:

Union Army

Although the United States had a regular army of 16,000 career soldiers when the Civil War began, throughout the conflict it placed chief reliance on an ad hoc force of U.S. Volunteers, the Union army. On 15 April 1861, President Abraham Lincoln summoned 75,000 militia to serve for three months. (Oversubscribed, 91,816 were actually accepted.) Then, without legal authority, he increased the regular army by 22,714 men and called for 42,034 three‐year volunteers. In July 1861, the U.S. Congress sanctioned Lincoln's extralegal acts and authorized 500,000 additional volunteers.

The Union army grew steadily throughout the war, from 186,751 in July 1861 to 1,000,516 in May 1865. By war's end, about 2 million men had served in the army, a figure that includes 179,000 African Americans and 100,000 white unionist Southerners from the Confederate states. However, at any given time as many as one‐third of Union soldiers might be absent through illness, transfer, or some other cause—including desertion, which accounted for about 200,000 men absent during the course of the war.

Like its Confederate counterpart, the Union army was one of the first great military formations created by mass politics. States and localities played a critical role in its recruitment. Typically, a community leader such as a lawyer or politician with the volunteer rank of captain would encourage men to join his company, which when filled would be offered to the state governor. The governor then assigned ten companies to a numbered regiment and appointed a colonel (frequently yet another community leader) to command the regiment. At that point the new regiment would be mustered into federal service and thenceforth paid, fed, and equipped at national expense.

The system had pronounced strengths and weaknesses. On the positive side, it tended to maximize popular support, and the decentralized nature of American society made it practically the only workable system anyway. But the governors tended to see it as a vast opportunity for political patronage, which meant that as regimental numbers diminished through battle casualties and disease, the tendency was to create new regiments rather than make good losses in existing ones. Only Wisconsin maintained an efficient system of replacements to keep veteran units up to strength.

Politics also played a significant role in the motivation of Union soldiers. Although they might have many reasons to enlist, surviving letters and diaries strongly suggest that many were politically aware and had a strong grasp of the stakes of the struggle, which most understood to be the future of self‐government (a much smaller percentage were animated by antislavery views). This political commitment to the Union cause was one of the most important factors holding the army together during four bloody and often discouraging years of war.

The first wave of Union volunteers achieved significant success in early 1862. But military reversals during the summer of 1862 spurred a call for 300,000 additional three‐year volunteers (which actually produced 421,000 new troops). This outpouring was assisted by the Militia Act of 17 July 1862, which empowered the president to set quotas of troops to be raised by each state, and authorized him to enforce the quota through a special militia draft if a given state failed to supply enough volunteers.

The threat of conscription as a tactic to secure more volunteers was applied systematically in the Enrollment Act of 3 March 1863, by which all able‐bodied males between twenty and forty‐five became liable for military service. But under terms of the act, conscription would be applied only to communities that failed to supply their quota of volunteers. As a result, most communities adopted the practice of paying a cash bounty to men willing to enlist. By 1864, a typical recruit could pocket as much as $1,000 in local, state, and federal bounties. Unsurprisingly, this system was flamboyantly abused. Numerous “bounty jumpers” deserted their units at first opportunity and repeatedly reenlisted, each time pocketing a bounty.

The Union conscription system had three other bad features. First, although the draft law nominally permitted few exemptions, over 50 percent of Northern draftees exploited the exemption categories that did exist and thereby escaped service. Second, it was possible for a man to pay $300 (a year's wages for a worker) and avoid being drafted in any given call‐up. Third, a man could also gain permanent exemption by hiring a substitute to serve in his place. Both the $300 commutation fee and the hiring of substitutes fueled bitter complaints that it was “a rich man's war and a poor man's fight.” Draft riots and other significant disorders resulted, and at least thirty‐eight federal provost marshals were killed trying to enforce the draft. Conscription directly accounted for only 13 percent of Union soldiers, but by the last two years of the war it undoubtedly encouraged a large number of voluntary enlistments.

The basic organization of the Union army was the regiment, theoretically composed of just under 1,000 men but usually operating at half strength or less. Four or five regiments generally made up a brigade, and two or three brigades typically comprised a division. Two or more divisions comprised a corps; several corps comprised an army. The principal Union field armies, named after major rivers in their area, were the Army of the Potomac, the Tennessee, the Cumberland, the Ohio, and the James. But these formations never contained even half the total strength available because many troops garrisoned strategic points or guarded important railroads.

Presiding over the Union army was the secretary of war. Simon Cameron initially held the post, but he resigned in January 1862 amid charges of corruption and incompetence. He was replaced by Edwin M. Stanton, who served forcefully and effectively for the rest of the war. The top military leader was the general in chief, of whom there were four: Lt. Gen. Winfield Scott (April–November 1861); Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan, Jr. (November 1861–March 1862); Maj. Gen. Henry W. Halleck (July 1862–March 1864); and Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant (March 1864–May 1865). Of these, only Grant exercised sustained control over the army; the others tended to plan, propose, and advise, but not direct. President Abraham Lincoln was, of course, commander in chief.

Equipping and supplying the Union army was a for midable task that demanded high professionalism and efficiency. Fortunately, Quartermaster General Montgomery Meigs performed ably, as did David C. McCallum, superintendent of the U.S. Military Railroads, which proved quite successful in its vital transportation task of ferrying troops and supplies within the sprawling war zone. All in all, the Union army possessed an impressive logistics network, and the Union soldier was so lavishly equipped and supplied that European observers, to say nothing of his Confederate army counterpart, frequently expressed amazement.

Of the 583 Union generals, only 217 were West Point graduates, but most had previous military experience. Quite a few owed their appointments to political considerations, particularly their influence over important constituencies. Such “political generals” seldom won battlefield success, although Gen. John Logan, an Illinois congressman who commanded a corps in William Tecumseh Sherman's Army of the Tennessee, was an able exception. They often had substantial administrative abilities and popularity with their troops—no mean consideration in a civil war. Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks, for example, was a former Speaker of the House and an important Democrat. Although a poor combat commander, he performed a considerable service by presiding over a crucial experiment in wartime Reconstruction in Louisiana.

Although at first the goal was primarily to capture Richmond, the Confederate capital, Union strategy eventually focused on the destruction of Confederate armies and (after 1863) the destruction of Confederate war resources, including crops and livestock. The Union army's battlefield performance varied. The Army of the Potomac proved unable to win a decisive victory in Virginia until the closing days of the war, leading some historians to speculate that it suffered from a cultural inferiority complex. The Army of the James's record was even more dismal. But in the western theater, the Army of the Tennessee went from success to success, while the Armies of the Cumberland and the Ohio also achieved significant victories. In every case, however, success or failure owed mainly to the quality of the senior leadership. The rank and file fought with determination and élan in almost every engagement.

Officially, total Union army deaths from all causes are placed at 360,222. Of these, 110,100 were killed or mortally wounded in battle. Most of the rest died of disease. Indeed, a Union soldier stood a 1 in 13.5 chance of dying of illness as opposed to a 1 in 65 risk of being killed in action. An additional 275,175 Union troops were wounded, while some 211,411 became prisoners of war. Proud of their efforts, Union army veterans created the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) in 1868. By the 1880s, it was a potent force in American politics, and remained so for the rest of the century. Unlike most similar organizations, membership in the GAR was open neither to veterans of other wars nor to the veterans' own sons. Their service to the country in saving the Union, Northern veterans believed, was unique.

[See also African Americans in the Military; Civil War: Military and Diplomatic Cause; Militia Acts; New York City Antidraft Riots; Veterans: Civil War.]

Bibliography

  • Bell Irvin Wiley, The Life of Billy Yank: The Common Soldier of the Union, 1951.
  • Ezra Warner, Generals in Blue: Lives of the Union Commanders, 1964.
  • Carl L. Davis, Arming the Union, 1973.
  • Michael C. C. Adams, Our Masters the Rebels: A Speculation on Union Military Failure in the East, 1861–1865, 1978.
  • Stephen Z. Starr, The Union Army, 1861–1865: Organization and Operations, 2 vols., 1989.
  • James W. Geary, We Need Men: The Union Draft in the Civil War, 1991.
  • Mark Grimsley, The Hard Hand of War: Union Military Policy Toward Southern Civilians, 1861–1865, 1995
 
 
US History Encyclopedia: Union Army

When Confederate forces attacked Fort Sumter, the United States army had barely 16,000 enlisted men and officers. The resignations of Robert E. Lee and other Southern officers had also crippled the military. For the next three years, Northern states desperately passed laws to raise, equip, and train volunteers. By April 1861, state governors had offered some 300,000 such troops to the federal government. President Abraham Lincoln, however, refused to assemble Congress before 4 July. Therefore, with no new legislation to authorize an increase in the army, all of the recruiting fervor of the early spring was wasted.

The 75,000-man militia, which the government called up on 15 April, had only three-month terms of enlistment and was ill prepared when it rushed into battle at Bull Run. The crushing defeat at Bull Run aroused the federal government, and on the very next day (22 July 1861) Congress authorized the creation of a volunteer army of 500,000 men. At first, political generals chosen by the state governors and officers elected by the enlisted men commanded this army. As a result, its discipline and efficiency developed slowly. The army was further plagued by competition between the state governments and the War Department over military supply contracts, which led to graft, high prices, and shoddy products.

The United States had difficulty maintaining even a rudimentary army after the disastrous defeat at Bull Run. The first army had been so badly depleted by disease and battle that on 2 July 1862 the federal government ordered the states to call up an additional 300,000 volunteers. When volunteering proved sluggish, the United States instituted a draft. Although the draft provided just 65,000 men, federal, state, and local bounties lured enough volunteers during the next few months to boost military morale.

Early in 1863 U.S. leaders feared that the army would collapse as a result of heavy casualties, desertions, short-term enlistments, and scanty volunteering. Consequently, Congress passed the Enrollment Act of 3 March 1863 to stimulate volunteering by threat of conscription. Under the act, men of means could either pay a $300 commutation fee or hire someone to take their place. Congress later limited the commutation fee to conscientious objectors, but rich draftees could hire substitutes until the end of the war. The direct product of two years of repeated drafting was about 50,000 conscripts and 120,000 substitutes. In the same period, however, the promise of government bounties lured more than a million volunteers.

Before federal conscription began on 1 January 1863, the Union army numbered just under 700,000 troops. On 1 May 1865, at its highest point, this number reached nearly 800,000. These totals do not include about 200,000 men unfit for active service. Although the Union army was vast, it suffered from political partisanship and inefficiency. Eventually, however, the army weeded out inexperienced political appointees, eliminated regimental elections of officers, and established a greater degree of military discipline. Contract grafts also continued to undermine the army's efficiency, but to a diminishing degree as the war raged on. Ultimately, the Union army's advantages in manpower, supplies, and access to transportation turned the tide of battle against the Confederacy.

Bibliography

Linderman, Gerald F. Embattled Courage: The Experience of Combat in the American Civil War. New York: Free Press, 1987.

McPherson, James T. For Cause and Comrades: Why Men Fought in the Civil War. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.

Paludan, Phillip S. A People's Contest: The Union and Civil War, 1961–1865. New York: Harper and Row, 1988.

Royster, Charles. The Destructive War: William Tecumseh Sherman, Stonewall Jackson, and the Americans. New York: Knopf, 1991.

—Eric J. Morser

 
WordNet: Union Army
Note: click on a word meaning below to see its connections and related words.

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: the northern army during the American Civil War

 
Wikipedia: Union Army
The 21st Michigan Infantry, a company of Sherman's veterans.
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The 21st Michigan Infantry, a company of Sherman's veterans.

The Union Army was the army that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. It was also known as the Federal Army, the Northern Army, or the National Army.[1] It consisted of the small United States Army (the regular army), augmented by massive numbers of units supplied by the Northern states, composed of volunteers as well as draftees. The Union Army fought and defeated the Confederate States Army during the war, from 1861 to 1865. Of the 2.5 million men who served in the Union Army during the war, about 360,000 died in combat, from injuries sustained in combat, disease, or other causes, and 280,000 were wounded.

History

Formation

When the Civil War began in April 1861, there were only about 16,000 men in the U.S. Army, and many Southern soldiers and officers were already resigning and joining the new Confederate States Army. The army consisted of ten regiments of infantry, four of artillery, two of cavalry, two of dragoons, and one of mounted infantry. These regiments were scattered widely. Of the 197 companies in the army, 179 occupied 79 isolated posts in the West and the remaining 18 manned garrisons east of the Mississippi River, mostly along the Canadian border and on the Atlantic coast.

With the secession of the Southern states, and with this drastic shortage of men in the army, President Abraham Lincoln called on the states to raise a force of 75,000 men for three months to put down the insurrection in the South. The war proved to be longer and larger than anyone had expected, and on July 22, 1861, Congress authorized a volunteer army of 500,000 men. It was this callup of Federal troops that incited four more states of the South to secede, making the Confederacy eleven states strong.

At first, the call for volunteers was easily met by patriotic Northerners, abolitionists, and even immigrants who enlisted with the hope of a steady paycheck and food rations. Over 10,000 Germans in New York and Pennsylvania immediately responded to Lincoln's call for volunteers, and the French were also among those quick to volunteer. As more men were needed, the number of willing volunteers fell, but nevertheless, between April 1861 and April 1865, at least two and a half million men served in the Union Army, most of whom were volunteers.

It is a widely held misconception that the South held the advantage of a large percentage of professional military who resigned to join the Confederate States Army. At the start of the war, there were 824 graduates of the U.S. Military Academy on the active list; of these, 296 resigned or were dismissed and 184 of those became Confederate officers. Of the approximately 900 West Point graduates who were then civilians, 114 returned to the Union Army and 99 to the Confederate. Therefore, the ratio of Union to Confederate professional officers was 642 to 283.[2] (One of the resigning officers was Robert E. Lee, who had initially been offered the assignment as commander of a field army to suppress the rebellion; Lee refused to bear arms against his native state, Virginia, and resigned to accept the position as commander of Virginia forces instead. He eventually became the commander of the Confederate States Army.) The South did have the advantage of other military colleges, such as The Citadel and Virginia Military Institute, but they produced fewer officers. Only 26 enlisted men and noncommissioned officers left the United States Army to join the Confederate Army.[3]

Major organizations

Noncommissioned officers of the 93rd New York Infantry.
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Noncommissioned officers of the 93rd New York Infantry.

The Union Army was composed of numerous organizations, which were generally organized geographically.

Department
An organization that covered a defined region, including responsibilities for the Federal installations therein and for the field armies within their borders. Those named for states usually referred to Southern states that had been occupied. It was more common to name departments for rivers (such as Department of the Tennessee, Department of the Cumberland) or regions (Department of the Pacific, Department of New England, Department of the East, Department of the West, Middle Department).
District
A subdivision of a Department (e.g., District of Cairo, District of East Tennessee). There were also Subdistricts for smaller regions.
Military Division
A collection of Departments reporting to one commander (e.g., Military Division of the Mississippi, Military Division of the Gulf). Military Divisions were similar to the regions described by the more modern term, Theater.
Army
The fighting force that was usually, but not always, assigned to a District or Department but could operate over wider areas. Some of the most prominent armies were:

Each of these armies was usually commanded by a major general. Typically, the Department or District commander also had field command of the army of the same name, but some conflicts within the ranks occurred when this was not true, particularly when an army crossed a geographic boundary.

The regular army, a term used to describe the permanent United States Army, was intermixed into various units and formations of the Union Army, forming a cadre of experienced and skilled troops. This force was quite small compared to the massive state-raised volunteer forces that comprised the bulk of the Union Army.

Theaters

Operations in the Civil War were distinctly divided within broad geographic regions known as theaters. For overviews of general army operations and strategies, see articles on the main theaters, including the Western Theater, and Eastern Theater.

Leaders

Several men served as generals-in-chief of the Union Army throughout its existence:

The gap from March 11 to July 23, 1862, was filled with direct control of the army by President Lincoln and United States Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, with the help of an unofficial "War Board" that was established on March 17, 1862. The board consisted of Ethan A. Hitchcock, the chairman, with Department of War bureau chiefs Lorenzo Thomas, Montgomery C. Meigs, Joseph G. Totten, James W. Ripley, and Joseph P. Taylor.[4]

Scott was an elderly veteran of the War of 1812 and the Mexican-American War and could not perform his duties effectively. His successor, Maj. Gen. McClellan, built and trained the massive Union Army of the Potomac, the primary fighting force in the Eastern Theater. Although he was popular among the soldiers, McClellan was relieved from his position as general in chief because of his overly cautious strategy and his contentious relationship with his commander in chief, President Lincoln. (He remained commander of the Army of the Potomac through the Peninsula Campaign and the Battle of Antietam.) His replacement, Maj. Gen. Henry W. Halleck, had a successful record in the Western Theater, but was more of an administrator than a strategic planner and commander.

Ulysses S. Grant was the final commander of the Union Army. He was famous for his victories in the West when he was appointed lieutenant general and general-in-chief of the Union Army in March 1864. Grant supervised the Army of the Potomac (which was formally led by his subordinate, Maj. Gen. George G. Meade) in delivering the final blows to the Confederacy by engaging Confederate forces in many fierce battles in Virginia, the Overland Campaign, conducting a war of attrition that the larger Union Army was able to survive better than its opponent. Grant laid siege to Lee's army at Petersburg, Virginia, and eventually captured Richmond, the capital of the Confederacy. He developed the strategy of coordinated simultaneous thrusts against wide portions of the Confederacy, most importantly the Georgia and Carolinas Campaigns of William Tecumseh Sherman and the Shenandoah Valley campaign of Philip Sheridan. These campaigns were characterized by another strategic notion of Grant's—deny the enemy the supplies needed to continue the war by widespread destruction of its factories and farms along the paths of the invading Union armies.

Grant had critics who complained about the high numbers of casualties that the Union Army suffered while he was in charge, but Lincoln would not replace Grant, because, in Lincoln's words: "I cannot spare this man. He fights."

Union victory

The decisive victories by Grant and Sherman resulted in the surrender of the major Confederate armies. The first and most significant was on April 9, 1865, when Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Grant at Appomattox Court House. Although there were other Confederate armies that would surrender in the following weeks, such as Joseph E. Johnston's in North Carolina, this date was nevertheless symbolic of the end of the bloodiest war in American history, the end of the Confederate States of America, and the beginning of the slow process of Reconstruction.

Casualties

Of the 2.5 million men who served in the Union Army during the Civil War, about 390,000 died in combat, or from injuries sustained in combat, disease, or other causes, and 280,000 were wounded. More than 1 out of every 4 Union soldiers was killed or wounded during the war; casualties in the Confederate Army were even worse—1 in 3 Southern soldiers were killed or wounded. This is by far the highest casualty ratio of any war in which America has been involved. By comparison, 1 out of every 16 American soldiers was killed or wounded in World War II, and 1 out of every 22 during the Vietnam War.

In total, 680,000 men died during the Civil War. There were 34 million Americans at that time, so 4% of the American male population died in the war. In today's terms, this would be the equivalent of 5.9 million American men being killed in a war.

Ethnic groups

The 26th U.S. Colored Volunteer Infantry on parade, Camp William Penn, Pennsylvania, 1865.
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The 26th U.S. Colored Volunteer Infantry on parade, Camp William Penn, Pennsylvania, 1865.

The Union Army was composed of many different ethnic groups, including large numbers of immigrants. About 25% of the white people who served in the Union Army were foreign-born.[5]

Breakdown of the approximately 2.2 million Union soldiers:

Many immigrant soldiers formed their own regiments, such as the Irish Brigade (69th New York, 63rd New York, 88th New York, 28th Massachusetts, 116th Pennsylvania); the Swiss Rifles (15th Missouri); the Gardes Lafayette (55th New York); the Garibaldi Guard (39th New York); the Martinez Militia (1st New Mexico); the Polish Legion (58th New York); the German Rangers (52nd New York); the Highlander Regiment (79th New York); and the Scandinavian Regiment (15th Wisconsin). But for the most part, the foreign-born soldiers were scattered as individuals throughout units.

For comparison, the Confederate Army was not very diverse: 91% of Confederate soldiers were native born and only 9% were foreign-born, Irish being the largest group with others including Germans, French, Mexicans, and British. Some Southern propaganda compared foreign-born soldiers in the Union Army to the hated Hessians of the American Revolution.

Army administration and issues

Various organizational and administrative issues arose during the war, which had a major effect on subsequent military procedures.

Blacks in the army

The inclusion of blacks as combat soldiers became a major issue. Eventually, it was realized that blacks were fully able to serve as competent and reliable soldiers. This was partly due to the efforts of Robert Smalls, who, while still a slave, won fame by defecting from the Confederacy, and bringing a Confederate transport ship which he was piloting. He later met with Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War, to argue for including blacks in combat units. This led to the formation of the first combat unit for black soldiers, the 1st South Carolina Volunteers. Regiments for black soldiers were eventually referred to as United States Colored Troops.

Unit supplies

Battlefield supply was a major problem. It was greatly improved by new techniques in preserving food and other perishables, and in transport by railroad.

Combat medicine

Medical care was, at first, extremely disorganized and substandard. Gradually, medical experts began calling for higher standards, and created an agency known as the United States Sanitary Commission. This created professional standards, and led to some of the first advances in battlefield medicine as a separate specialty.

Additionally, care of the wounded was greatly improved by medical pioneers such as Clara Barton, who often worked alone to provide supplies and care, and brought a new level of dedication to caring for the wounded.

Military strategy

The Civil War drove many innovations in military strategy. It brought the first mass movement of troops by railroad. There were many other innovations brought by necessity. It also forced generals to reexamine the Napoleonic infantry tactics of maneuvering large groups of soldiers towards the enemy by walking as a single mass. The improvement of the rifle made this tactic almost obsolete, as defenders could cause more damage at a long range. Thus the Civil War saw the beginning of modern tactics of mobility.

Desertions and draft riots

Desertion was a major problem for both sides. The daily hardships of war, forced marches, thirst, suffocating heat, disease, delay in pay, solicitude for family, impatience at the monotony and futility of inactive service, panic on the eve of battle, the sense of war weariness, the lack of confidence in commanders, and the discouragement of defeat (especially early on for the Union Army), all tended to lower the morale of the Union Army and to increase desertion.

In 1861 and 1862, the war was going badly for the Union Army and there were, by some counts, 180,000 desertions. In 1863 and 1864, the bitterest two years of the war, the Union Army suffered over 200 desertions every day, for a total of 150,000 desertions during those two years. This puts the total number of desertions from the Union Army during the four years of the war at nearly 350,000. Using these numbers, 15% of Union soldiers deserted during the war. Official numbers put the number of deserters from the Union Army at 200,000 for the entire war, or about 8% of Union Army soldiers. It is estimated that 1 out of 3 deserters returned to their regiments, either voluntarily or after being arrested and being sent back.

Of all the ethnic groups in the Union Army, the Irish had the highest number of desertions per capita by far; by some accounts they deserted at a rate 30 times higher than Native-born Americans.

Many of the desertions were by "professional" bounty men, men who would enlist to collect the often large cash bonuses and then desert at the earliest opportunity to do the same elsewhere. If not caught, it could prove a very lucrative criminal enterprise.

The Irish were also the main participants in the famous "New York Draft Riots" of 1863 (as dramatized in the film Gangs of New York). The Irish had shown the strongest support for Southern aims prior to the start of the war and had long had an enmity with black populations in several Northern cities dating back to nativist attacks on Irish immigrants in the 1840s, when it was observed that blacks, who rivaled the Irish at the bottom of the economic ladder, were frequently reported encouraging on nativist mobs. With the view that the war was an upper class abolitionist war led in large part by former nativists to free a large black population, which might move north and compete for jobs and housing with the poor Irish and others, it could hardly be expected that the poorer classes would welcome the draft that a richer man could buy his way out of. As a result of the Enrollment Act, rioting began in several Northern cities, the most heavily hit being New York City. A mob reported as consisting principally of Irish immigrants rioted in the summer of 1863, with the worst violence occurring in July during the Battle of Gettysburg. The mob set fire to everything from African American churches and an orphanage to the office of the New York Tribune. The principal victims of the rioting were African Americans and activists in the anti-slavery movement. Not until victory was achieved at Gettysburg could the Union Army be sent in; some units had to open fire to quell the violence and stop the rioters. By the time the rioting was over, perhaps up to 1,000 people had been killed or wounded (estimates varied widely, then and now).

See also

References

  • Eicher, John H., and Eicher, David J., Civil War High Commands, Stanford University Press, 2001, ISBN 0-8047-3641-3.
  • Hattaway, Herman, and Jones, Archer, How the North Won: A Military History of the Civil War, University of Illinois Press, 1983, ISBN 0-252-00918-5.
  • McPherson, James M., What They Fought For, 1861-1865, Louisiana State University Press, 1994, ISBN 978-0807119044.
  • Grant, Ulysses S., Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Charles L. Webster & Company, 1885–86, ISBN 0-914427-67-9.

Notes

  1. ^ See, for example, usage in Grant, Preface p. 3.
  2. ^ Hattaway & Jones, pp. 9-10.
  3. ^ Hattaway & Jones, p. 10.
  4. ^ Eicher, pp. 37-38.
  5. ^ McPherson, pp. 36-37.
  6. ^ Laurence Otis Graham notes that there were as many as 345,000 blacks in the Union Army and Navy in his book on the career of Blanche Kelso Bruce, The Senator and the Socialite (2006).

External links