Population (in millions)	Enrolled (in thousands)	%
Union	26.2	2803.3	10.7
Confederacy	8.1	1064.2	13.1
Combined	34.3	3867.5	11.1

	Combat Deaths	Other Casualties	Total Dead	KIA per Mo.
Union	110,070	249,458	359,528	2293
Confederacy	74,524	124,000	198,524	1553
Combined	184,594	373,458	558,052	3846

 

Note:  Those KIA (killed in action) per month does NOT include "other casualties" (ie.: deaths from disease, privation, and accidents, and includes losses among prisoners of war).

For an even better perspective, for 4 years (48 months):

Each month:  11,626 - soldiers lost their lives
                         3486 - killed in action
                         8140 - other casualties.

*Statistical information obtained from The United States Civil War Center

Civil War Trivia

• The first civilian killed by John Brown's raiders at Harpers Ferry was a free Black man.

• Almost 1/3 of US Army officers resigned to serve the Confederacy.

• Of the 425 Confederate generals, 146 were graduates of West Point.

• In February 1861, the Choctaws became the first Indian tribe to declare for the Confederacy.

• Nashville TN was the first major Confederate city to be permanently occupied by Union troops.

• In combat October 29, 1862 at Island Mount MO, the 79th US Colored Troops/1st KS Colored Vols. became the first Black regiment to fight in the war.

• In the decade before the Civil War, the Underground Railroad movement helped approximately 70,000 slaves escape safely into Canada.

• US Gen William Rufus Terrill, killed October 8, 1862 at Perryville, and his brother, CS Gen James Barbour Terrill, killed May 30, 1864 at Bethesda Church, were supposedly buried by their father in a single grave over which the tombstone reads 'Here lie my two sons. Only God knows which was right'.

• When US Gen James Birdseye McPherson, Commander of the Army of the Tennessee, was killed July 22, 1864 at Peachtree Creek, he became the only US commander of an army to die on the field of battle during the war. Commanding the opposing Army of Tennessee was West Point classmate, CS Gen John Bell Hood whom McPherson had tutored in math.

• The last Confederate soldier to be executed by the Union was Robert Cobb Kennedy. On March 25, 1865, Kennedy was hanged for his part in the November 25, 1864 attempt to burn New York City.

• The youngest recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor was Willie Johnston, drummer boy for the 3rd Vermont. He was 12 years old during the action at the Seven Days' Battles for which he received his medal.

• Mary Edwards Walker, a physician, spent three years as a nurse in the Union army before being commissioned an assistant surgeon. Treating the wounded of both sides, she moved between the lines and became active as a spy. While treating a Confederate soldier, she was captured and spent four months in a Confederate prison. Having been awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, the medal was revoked six days before her death February 21, 1919. It was officially reinstated in 1977

• US General Lewis Wallace was the author of the novel Ben Hur.

• The most commonly used medication during the war was alcohol in the form of whiskey or brandy. While its value as a medication is questionable, it did relieve pain and it is doubtful most soldiers complained of its use.

• During the Civil War, gonorrhea was treated with injections of ink.

• US Gen Galusha Pennypacker was the war's youngest general. Born June 1, 1844, he was 20 years old at war's end.

• Archibald Gracie III, a West Point graduate and son of CS Gen Archibald Gracie, Jr., survived the sinking of the Titanic.

• With more than 30,000 the battle at Antietam, Maryland September 17, 1862 was the single bloodiest day of the Civil War. ***More than twice as many Americans were killed or mortally wounded in combat at Antietam that day as in the War of 1812, the Mexican War, and the Spanish-American War combined.

*For the complete list of these civil war trivia see: American Experience, Fascinating Civil War Trivia

 

 Civil War Photographs 

Photographs from the Library of Congress Civil War Collection

This picture is quite famous.  Found in the hands of a dead soldier on the Gettysburg battlefield, it was used to identify the young man.  A song was written about the picture titled Children of the Battlefield and proceeds were used to aid the widow and her children.

Although most young boys between 10-12 years old who joined the war were drummers, it is unlikely they actually marched into battle.  If they did reach a battlefield, it was to usually to offer water and bandages to the wounded.

As the Union took over the south many of the black men and women who had been slaves began working for the Union army or starting new lives.  In the North, after initial opposition, black men formed military companies. While the Massachusetts 54th was the most famous of these units, the 180,000 African Americans who served in the Civil War came from every part of the United  States.  By the time that the Emancipation Proclamation went into effect, in January, 1863, many slaves had emancipated themselves.

 

Authentic Civil War Recipes
From the "Civil War Interactive" Newspaper

WHITE CHICKEN FRICASSEE

1 or 2 chickens
3/4 pint water or veal broth
Salt and pepper to taste
1-2 tbs. flour
1 tbs. butter
sweet herbs
2 egg yolks
1 gill (about 1/2 cup) cream
juice from 1/2 lemon
Bit of nutmeg
Onion slices (optional)

The chickens are cut to pieces, and covered with warm water to draw out the blood. Then put into a
stew-pan, with three quarters of a pint of water, or veal broth, salt, pepper, flour, butter, mace, sweet herbs pounded and sifted. Boil it half an hour. If it is too fat, skim it a little. Just before it is done, mix the yolk of two eggs with a gill of cream, grate in a little nutmeg, stir it up till it is thick and smooth, squeeze in half a lemon. If you like onion's stew some slices with the other ingredients.
 From The American Frugal Housewife by Mrs. Child, 1833.

VIRGINIA STEW

2 young chickens, cut up
1 quart Irish (white) potatoes (about 8-10)
1 dozen tomatoes
1 dozen ears roasting corn
1 onion, large
Salt, pepper and butter to taste

"Take two young chickens, cut them up, and parboil them; then peel and cook one quart of Irish potatoes; then peel and cut up one dozen large, ripe tomatoes; then cut the corn off one dozen soft roasting ears and mash it up; add to these one large onion, cut up fine. Put all in a stew pan and stew for two hours, stirring frequently to prevent burning. Extract the bones of the fowl; season with salt, butter and pepper, and serve hot. If, after a fair trial, you pronounce this an unpalatable dish, then your loyalty to the Southern Confederacy ought to be questioned."
 From Southern Recorder, September 2, 1862. Reprinted in The Confederate Housewife by John Hammond Moore.

MILK PIE 

Unbaked pie shell
 1 cup white sugar 
Milk 
1/4 cup flour Butter 
1/4 tsp. salt 
Cinnamon or nutmeg (optional) 

Dump the dry ingredients into the pie shell and mix a bit with finger or fork. Pour WHOLE milk over the dry ingredients to fill pie shell*. Dot the top with butter, and bake for 15 minutes at 400 deg. Turn oven down to 350 deg. and continue baking 35 - 40 minutes. Top should be slightly browned.

 *I find the pie thickens better if I stir the milk with the dry ingredients before baking, though grandma NEVER did. Also prefer plain, no spice.
This is a delicious plain pie my grandma made while I was growing up, and it's STILL my favorite. The recipe had been handed down to her by her mother, Sarah Elizabeth (Heimbach) Romig, daughter of Civil War Veteran, George Henry Heimbach. 
Submitted by loyal reader Lisa "Zoe" Nye, whom we thank profusely.

CONFEDERATE'S OLD FASHIONED STACK CAKE

3/4 cup butter 
2 eggs
1/4 teaspoon soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon allspice
3 cups flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup sorghum molasses
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/4 teaspoon cloves
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking powder

Cream butter and sugar together. Add eggs and molasses. Mix well. Add soda  to buttermilk. Mix dry ingredients together. Add alternately with milk to  batter, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. Bake in thin layers  (about 1/2 inch thick in either 9-inch cake pans or the old-fashioned "black"  griddle) for about 12 minutes at 350 degrees.

Filling......

1 1/2 pounds dried apples (3 cups)* [see recipe below for "Sulphured Apples"]
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 1/2 cups water

Cook together, and when almost done add 1/2 teaspoon each cinnamon, allspice  and cloves. Cool. Spread between layers of cake and stack. Green apples or  dried peaches can be substituted for dried apples.

Submitted by reader Rhonda Stamper-Nuccio of Louisiana, from ANTIQUE COOKBOOK 
 by Bertha Barnesa  featuring recipes from  around 1870.

NECTAR FOR 90 DEGREES IN THE SHADE

1/2 C. whisky
1 bottle soda water, chilled
Lemon ice (composition not described--try freezing lemonade in ice cube trays)

Put a lemon ice in a soda water glass, add one half gill of whisky and a bottle of iced soda water, mix and serve. 
From Cooling Cups and Dainty Drinks by William Terrington, 1869.

PLUM CORDIAL

Ripe plums
Brown sugar
Brandy

Break up some fine ripe plums, and boil them in a small quantity of water till soft, adding the kernels from half of the plum seeds, after bruising them. Strain the liquid through a cloth, and to each three quarts add two pounds and a half of the best brown sugar. Boil it up, skim it, and cool it; put in a quart of brandy to every three quarts of the syrup, and bottle it for use.
From The Kentucky Housewife by Lettice Bryan, 1839.

HOT EGG NOGG 

1/2 c. cognac
1/4 c. rum
1 egg
1 tbs. cold water
1 tbs. sugar, confectioners if available
about 3/4 c. boiling water
Milk

Dissolve the sugar in one tablespoon of cold water, and add this mixture and the remaining ingredients to a large tumbler one-quarter full of boiling water. Fill the glass with milk, shake the ingredients until
they are thoroughly mixed together, and grate a little nutmeg on top. This drink is very popular in California. 
From Bon-Vivant's Companion by Jerry Thomas, 1862

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