Harold B. Birch

The 50th Pennsylvania's Civil War Odyssey: the Exciting Life and Hard Times of a Union Volunteer Infantry Regiment:1861 to 1865 Harold B. Birch

This is the story of a volunteer infantry regiment from Pennsylvania in the Civil War. The author looks at that war through the eyes of the 50th Infantry Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers, and comes to a deeper understanding of the conflict. He thinks you will, too. This regiment, recruited from small to moderate-sized towns in eastern Pennsylvania, played an important role in many of the war's key battles. After being mustered into Federal service, it fought in six different states and three very separate theaters of the war--an odyssey of epic proportions. Sadly, it believed that it had left more dead in more states than any other Union regiment. About 1,900 men served in this regiment during the war. Men, who began their military service as enlisted men, winnowed by battle, increasingly assumed the commissioned leadership roles in the regiment. Reading of their experiences, you will come to understand, how the Union army, despite the battlefield debacles of the early years of the war, was converted into an army that could stand up to the Confederacy's best. In telling this story of heroism and sacrifices, the author also shows the warts and blemishes of a volunteer regiment.