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Company I,40th Alabama Infantry Regiment

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
Did some more genealogy research on my mother's side of the family today. Found my mom's father's grandfather. I think that makes him my great,great grandfather. He served in the 40th Alabama Infantry Regiment,Company I during the Civil War. Found a picture of his C.S.A. military gravestone online. More research to follow. Neat stuff.
 

fairsheet

Senator
Did some more genealogy research on my mother's side of the family today. Found my mom's father's grandfather. I think that makes him my great,great grandfather. He served in the 40th Alabama Infantry Regiment,Company I during the Civil War. Found a picture of his C.S.A. military gravestone online. More research to follow. Neat stuff.
I think I've noted before, that nothing in my genealogy hints at any of my ancestors ever venturing south of the Mason-Dixon line. However, I have actual newspaper clippings describing how one of my ancestors bought his way out of serving in the Union Army.

Am I "bragging" about this? Of course not. Nevertheless, it IS interesting as a bit of history. I'm guessing you feel similar as to your great-great-grandfather.
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
Am I "bragging" about this? Of course not. Nevertheless, it IS interesting as a bit of history. I'm guessing you feel similar as to your great-great-grandfather.
Yep. It's the history and the soldiers' fight,not politics,that first drew me to my renewed interest in the Civil War and now my own family's role in it. Not all soldiers' fought in the front line. I've read that some who were slackers when it came to combat were detailed to supply wagons and such other type details and they were openly derided by the combat soldiers. I'm ordering copies of the service records of all my kin who I find to be Civil War veterans. Found 3 more today.
 

fairsheet

Senator
Yep. It's the history and the soldiers' fight,not politics,that first drew me to my renewed interest in the Civil War and now my own family's role in it. Not all soldiers' fought in the front line. I've read that some who were slackers when it came to combat were detailed to supply wagons and such other type details and they were openly derided by the combat soldiers. I'm ordering copies of the service records of all my kin who I find to be Civil War veterans. Found 3 more today.
My Father's side came from Ireland in the mid-19th Century, so there's really not a whole lot of American historical note there.

On the other hand, my Mother's side goes back to Mayflower days, so the history is worth considering.
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
My Father's side came from Ireland in the mid-19th Century, so there's really not a whole lot of American historical note there.

On the other hand, my Mother's side goes back to Mayflower days, so the history is worth considering.
Genealogy research is fascinating. I dabbled a little in it on my dad's side of the family a few months back,particularly focused on one man who was the most likely to have been a Civil War veteran. Found out pretty quickly that he wasn't. Dabbled a little bit with my mom's father's family a coupla weeks ago. Hit a roadblock pretty quickly. My mom has early stage dementia. Her sister is deceased and her brother was born when she was a senior in high school. He was too young to know much about his grandparents etc. All but one of them died when he was young. Hit upon an idea for the research this Wednesday. Went to my mom's mom's side of the family and did research there. Hit paydirt on day one. Hit my dad up today for info on his family. One of his kin had already done some family tree stuff. Did my research working off that info and hit paydirt within an hour. Gonna do a top-post about that later today.
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
On the other hand, my Mother's side goes back to Mayflower days, so the history is worth considering.
It's not all that easy doing the research sometimes. One of the issues I'm having is with initials in names. In some old records, initials are used instead of full names. One person in my family tree's initials are L.H. His death certificate has L.H._____ as his name. It's even that way on his gravestone. Some of his military records are like that. That feature in old records leads one down a lotta wrong paths on Ancestry.com and FindAGrave.com.
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
Looks like this ancestor might be the one I use for eligibility for membership in the Sons Of Confederate Veterans. Not yet sure I'm gonna join though. Still checking 'em out.
 

Charcat

One of the Patsy's
Looks like this ancestor might be the one I use for eligibility for membership in the Sons Of Confederate Veterans. Not yet sure I'm gonna join though. Still checking 'em out.
Genealogy has been my hobby for the last several years. Not only have I found info, I have also found relatives. One of the "cousins" I found had the family Bible from my father's paternal side from the 1870s. My father was the last birth listed in it. A couple of years ago he sent it to me--my TREASURE!!

Another "cousin" I found collaborated with me on the family history for a book published by the Montezuma County (Colorado) Historical Society and we have become "published." LOL

My mother's family was a little more difficult, as my grandparents on her side had immigrated from Russia and were part of the "Germans from Russia" people. After years I did find some relatives, found the village they came from and even have a picture of the ship they came over on along with a picture of their names in the ship's log.

It's a very fun and rewarding hobby--Good luck and happy hunting!
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
Found out through military records that his service actually began with a 90 day enlistment in the 4th Alabama Volunteer Militia.
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
Not much in the records about his individual service. Gonna have to rely on his Muster in and out dates and his Regiments' records to determine when and where he may have fought in the ACW.
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
40th Regiment, Alabama Infantry
OVERVIEW:
40th Infantry Regiment, organized at Mobile, Alabama, in May, 1862, recruited its companies in Perry, Sumter, Morgan, Covington, Pickens, Colbert, Mobile, and Choctaw counties. It served at Mobile until December, then moved to Mississippi where under the command of J.C. Moore it was active in the operations on Deer Creek. Later four companies were transferred to General Extor's Brigade, which fought at Chickamauga. The other companies were part of the garrison at Vicksburg and were captured when that city fell. After being exchanged, the regiment was united and sustained 135 casualties at Chattanooga. Attached to A.Baker's, Gibson's, and Brantley's Brigade, it participated in the Atlanta Campaign, moved to Mobile, then returned to the Army of Tennessee in North Carolina. This unit had 332 fit for duty in January, 1863, and totalled 429 men and 338 arms in December. During the Atlanta Campaign, May 7-31, it lost twenty percent of the 416 engaged. Only a handful surrendered on April 26, 1865. The field officers were Colonels Augustus A. Coleman and John H. Higley, Lieutenant Colonels E.S. Gulley and Thomas O. Stone, and Major Elbert D. Willett.

http://www.nps.gov/civilwar/search-battle-units-detail.htm?battleUnitCode=CAL0040RI
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
40th Regiment, Alabama Infantry
OVERVIEW:
40th Infantry Regiment, organized at Mobile, Alabama, in May, 1862, recruited its companies in Perry, Sumter, Morgan, Covington, Pickens, Colbert, Mobile, and Choctaw counties. It served at Mobile until December, then moved to Mississippi where under the command of J.C. Moore it was active in the operations on Deer Creek. Later four companies were transferred to General Extor's Brigade, which fought at Chickamauga. The other companies were part of the garrison at Vicksburg and were captured when that city fell. After being exchanged, the regiment was united and sustained 135 casualties at Chattanooga. Attached to A.Baker's, Gibson's, and Brantley's Brigade, it participated in the Atlanta Campaign, moved to Mobile, then returned to the Army of Tennessee in North Carolina. This unit had 332 fit for duty in January, 1863, and totalled 429 men and 338 arms in December. During the Atlanta Campaign, May 7-31, it lost twenty percent of the 416 engaged. Only a handful surrendered on April 26, 1865. The field officers were Colonels Augustus A. Coleman and John H. Higley, Lieutenant Colonels E.S. Gulley and Thomas O. Stone, and Major Elbert D. Willett.

http://www.nps.gov/civilwar/search-battle-units-detail.htm?battleUnitCode=CAL0040RI
Hard to know yet whether he was captured at Vicksburg after the surrender. None of them show up in prisoner of war records because they were immediately paroled after the surrender. The time period of his service in the 40th Alabama coincides with the surrender at Vicksburg.
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
Looks like this ancestor might be the one I use for eligibility for membership in the Sons Of Confederate Veterans. Not yet sure I'm gonna join though. Still checking 'em out.
Don't think I'm gonna join the SCV. I've checked out a coupla Chapters and they are just too political for me.
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
Wednesday,I decided to look some more for information on my 40th AL Infantry ancestor and decided that I was gonna look again at what I already had. I saw one thing that I had not noticed before. There is a copy of the Receipt for his pay in the 4th Alabama Volunteer Militia and a copy of his Discharge Certificate from the 4th Alabama Volunteer Militia. The handwriting of what I thought was the signature of my ancestor is the same as the handwriting in the rest of the documents. In the middle of each of those signatures is an "x" and "his mark". I realized when I saw that that my great,great grandfather did not know how to write and may not have known how to read either.

2 other things I had noticed before. His 4th AL Vol Militia documents say it was a 90 enlistment,that he enlisted on April 2,1862 but was discharged on May 10 1862. Including those 2 dates,that's only 39 days. The other thing is that some of those papers have his last name spelled "______". He didn't write that because he didn't know how to write and if he couldn't read he wouldn't know that the person who filled in those documents had misspelled his name. I have only been doing this a coupla years now. Obviously,when I first saw that last year,I didn't know enough to know that I needed to research the name "______" too. I did that Wednesday and BAM! I had to adjust the brightness/contrast on some of the documents before I downloaded them. Had to do that to be able to read some of 'em too.

He enlisted in the 40th AL Infantry on May 10,1862 for "3 yrs or the war". There is a gap in the Muster Records from 1/1/1863-8/30/1863. The records show that he was was issued clothing on May 31,1864 and June 9,1864 and the personal records stop there. Don't know where all he might have been but the Muster Records convince me that he was at least at Lookout Mountain and probably saw hard fighting elsewhere too. Wednesday was an exciting day.
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
What prompted me to keep digging was 2 things. In January I visited Richmond/Petersburg and found this in the Museum Of The Confederacy in downtown Richmond:

2016-01-08 11.40.57.jpg
 

bdtex

Administrator
Staff member
The second thing was a battlefield tour trip to Chattanooga/Franklin,TN/Chickamauga from 6/6-6/11/2016. On the afternoon of 6/9 we went to Lookout Mountain,while at the Lookout Mountain Battlefield Visitor Center I saw an interpretive sign that mentioned the 40th AL Infantry Regiment as one of the units involved and saw the famous painting of "The Battle Above The Clouds":

 
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