Being from Ohio, I have a great interest in the formation of the units throughout the state. A project I have been working on is a map seeing all of the known camps established during the war and associated units from each. As a lot of the exact locations of these camps have been lost to history, so I opted to just narrow it down to counties.
Below is a working draft. It's not complete and I need to pretty it up some, but I wanted to share and show the progress. Figure if I put it out there, it'll keep me working on it.
camps
.pdf
Download PDF • 69KB
I would love to see one made for Pennsylvania. I know Camp Curtin was in large a main camp, but I am sure there were more. It would make for a good book if one could piece together every camp in every state along with the details like you've got here with each unit. I know in NC there was a main camp in Raleigh, but many regiments were mustered in other places. Greensboro, I believe was a spot. Right on the Railroad to Wilmington.
In a book about the 34th NC, "The Cry is War, War, War!" there are letters & diary entries that explain how the regiment was formed. I'm from Cleveland County here in NC & out of the 8-9 companies, two were from Cleveland County, two or three were from Rutherford County, & one each from Mecklenburg, Montgomery, Ashe, Lincoln & Rowan counties. Interesting how they organized the regiments on both sides. In many cases, the South couldn't replenish the losses like the Union since the North had a vast population. I believe, after a campaign or battle, when regiments & brigades needed to be reorganized, the South would merge while the Union, in a lot of cases, would bring new recruits in. A vast facet of the war for me is the life at camps. Not just the camps during the campaigns or during the winter, but the ones like you've mapped out. There is a lot of room for the imagination to wonder about how life would have been like at the initial camps, joining up, being sent off with your Royer Tent, I believe Royer was the standard for the North. Ohio was a prominent state for soldiers in the war for sure; interesting to know the state provided the most soldiers only behind New York & Pennsylvania. I recently read a small bit on the Copperhead issue in Ohio & how it was dealt with. Really cool man!
Wow. This is an amazing in depth project you've got going on here. Looking forward to seeing how your finished product turns out. All the best!
----Michael