Letters from 'Zoo-Zoo': Columbians in the 23rd Pa

Unidentified 23rd PA Soldier
(or maybe not, see comment below)
CDV by Stehman & Eberman, Lancaster
(Heritage Auctions)

Having enjoyed writing this past weekend's post about Adam C. Reinoehl--a soldier in 76th Pennsylvania "Keystone Zouaves"--I thought it would be fun and timely to draw attention to the only Zouave unit recruited in Lancaster County.  Specifically, men from the bustling Susquehanna River town of Columbia helped fill the ranks of Companies I and P, 23rd Pennsylvania, also known as "Birney's Zouaves."  They were recruited by Lieuts. C. C. and B. F. Haldeman of Columbia, and a roster of men was published in the Columbia Spy on January 11, 1862 <link>, as well as on February 1, 1862 <link>.

The 23rd Pennsylvania fought in most of the battles with the Army of the Potomac in the war's Eastern Theater, with its severest battles being the Battle of Seven Pines (part of the Peninsula Campaign) and the Battle of Cold Harbor.  One of Columbia's boys in the company, as yet unidentified, wrote regularly to the Columbia Spy under the pen name, "Zoo-Zoo."  His letters are unique in that much of their content is squabbling with other Columbia soldiers in the 45th Pennsylvania, stationed on Hilton Head Island in early 1862.  Here's one excerpt from the January 18, 1862, while the 23rd Pennsylvania was camped near the nation's capital:

I have just finished "45's" letter in your last week's "Spy," and we cannot see what we have done that they are for everlasting slurs at us.  He ("45") says that if we were with them it would do more honor to our old town.  We might perhaps have enlisted in Company "K" of the 45th if the captain had been a native of our town, and we had known under whom we were enlisting.  As for freezing and starving we would inform them that we have plenty and more than we nee to wear and eat.  We might have turkeys and chickens too, if we would take them.  As for the "peg-topped trousers" and being called "Zoo Zoo" we would also inform them that a great many of our boys enlisted before they had seen or even knew what kind of trousers that were to get, "peg-tops" or not.  I suppose the reason that they throw their slurs is, that we are digging holes (as they call it); but I can see no difference in building forts to defend our capitol and in occupying a place after the fighting is all over.  We do not want any of their pianos or sofas as we came for "Union soldiers" not as gentlemen.  We have all been furnished with an extra blanket, and the Colonel has given us a comfort, and have now two suits, and more shirts, drawers, and stockings than we can wear.  We have also the Sibley Tent, which we have raised on logs, thus making it very comfortable.  We have never asked (as we have been accused) for anything from our Columbia friends, but we have heard that a box of stockings and globes that were to have been sent to Company "I" were sent either to the 45th or the 5th Reserve, but as they need them more than we do we do not complain as they are all used in one cause.

Uniform of Corp. William Stephens of Company I, 23rd Pennsylvania
(Heritage Auctions)

For more letters from "Zoo-Zoo," his antagonists in the 45th Pennsylvania, and other soldiers in the 23rd Pennsylvania, browse the digitized Columbia Spy available as part of the Pennsylvania Civil War Newspapers Project.  See the following dates for letters from the 23rd Pennsylvania:

• 1/4/1862 Camp Graham, Near Washington (Company I, 23rd PA) A Birney Zouave 1/11/1862 Columbia Spy
• 1/13/1862 Camp Graham, Near Washington (Company I, 23rd PA) "Zoo-Zoo?" 1/18/1862 Columbia Spy
• 1/22/1862 Camp Graham, Near Washington (Company I, 23rd PA) "23rd P.V." 1/25/1862 Columbia Spy
• 1/25/1862 Camp Graham (Company I, 23rd PA) "Zoo-Zoo" 2/1/1862 Columbia Spy
• 2/3/1862 Camp Graham (Company I, 23rd PA) "Zoo-Zoo" 2/8/1862 Columbia Spy
• 3/5/1862 Camp Birney, Prince George Co'y, Md. (Company I, 23rd PA) "Zoo-Zoo" 3/8/1862 Columbia Spy
• 3/13/1862 Columbia I (Company I, 23rd PA) "Bowery" 3/29/1862 Columbia Spy

There are likely many more letters published after April 1862, but this is as far as my browsing has taken me.

Compelling and Worth Retelling: Letters from the 45th PA and Other Regiments

Scene on Otter Island, South Carolina, where Companies B and K, 45th Pennsylvania, were stationed beginning in December 1861. (New York Illustrated News, May 17, 1862)

In my reading of Lancaster County newspapers from 150 years ago, I recently decided to take a glance at two digitized weekly newspapers, the Columbia Spy and the Mariettian, and have been absolutely amazed at the soldiers' letters they contain!  In late 1861 and early 1862, they seem to average about five per month (a little over one per edition) and cover a variety of units:

1. Co. K, 5th Pennsylvania Reserves
2. Battery G, 1st Pennsylvania Light Artillery
3. Co. E, 107th Pennsylvania Infantry
4. Co. I, 23rd Pennsylvania Infantry ("Birney Zouaves")

But, most of all, they cover the wartime experiences of Companies B and K, 45th Pennsylvania Infantry, which were recruited in Marietta and Columbia, respectively, which were probably Lancaster County's two "bloodiest" companies in terms of casualties, and the regiment ranks in the Top 20 for men killed in battle for all Union regiments.  They also had the most unique travelogue of Lancaster companies, which included

• Spending several months on Hilton Head, South Carolina, where they were on the front line of the Union's emancipation policy and regularly interacted with runaway slaves (Wikipedia page about operations there)
• Fighting at South Mountain and Antietam in September 1862
• Being transferred to fight at Vicksburg, Mississippi
• Fighting in East Tennessee on their way back east
• Going through miserable fighting at the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and Cold Harbor
• Participating in the Siege of Petersburg and operations through the end of the war

Sgt. (later Capt.) John F. Trout
Company B, 45th Pa.
(From recent Ebay auction)

I've barely begun reading these letters, but their content is usually fascinating both from a human interest standpoint and from the perspective of historical analysis.  Several different correspondents contributed, including Columbians George H. Stape ("45," I believe, in the Spy) and Lewis Martin (in the Mariettian).  The first letter from the 45th Pennsylvania in South Carolina, though, was written on December 13, 1861, by a soldier who signed his name "Hempfield."  (Based on circumstantial evidence, I'll nominate Sergt. John F. Trout of Landisville as a possible author.)  <Click here> for a link to the letter in the December 28, 1861, edition of the Columbia Spy, which is part of the Pennsylvania Civil War Newspapers Project.  Here's an excerpt:

Behold us then on the super-sacred soil of South Carolina, and nary bloody hand has welcomed us to ary hospitable grave thus far.  We were all upside down for a little while, but the Colonel [Thomas Welsh of Columbia] soon reduced us to order.  The boys generally went into bathing and oyster hunting, collecting curiosities, &c.  At night the contraband (who arrived simultaneously with the northern invaders) afforded amusement by their grotesque dances, &c.
...
Otter Island, on which we are stationed is some three miles in length by a width of two and a half miles.  It seems never to have been cultivated, but commands a very prominent point on St. Helena Sound.  Hutchinson Island, opposite, is highly cultivated, and grows cotton abundantly, but the crops have either been removed or burned.  

Col. Thomas Welsh
(Source)

Unfortunately, I mostly won't be posting on these letters, as telling the story of the 79th Pennsylvania fully consumes my blogging time capacity, but I just wanted to point out their existence and online availability for anyone who might be interested.  I'm compiling a list of the letters for my own use as a go through the newspapers, and I might polish it at some point and publish it online.

I hope that the resurrection of some of these stories as for entertainment, inspiration, and analysis becomes a hallmark of the Civil War sesquicentennial, as we begin to care not just what was going through the mind of Generals Grant and Lee but also, for instance, what was going through the mind of some corporal from Columbia who found himself building quarters on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, for some of the first slaves liberated by Union armies. 

Other References:

• Pennsylvania Civil War Newspapers Project (includes Lancaster Intelligencer, Columbia Spy, and the Weekly Mariettian), which you can search and browse by paper.
• Bates' regimental history and roster of the 45th Pennsylvania
•  Albert, Allen D. (Editor) History of the Forty-Fifth Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, 1861-1865, Williamsport, Pennsylvania, 1912.
•  Biography of Col. Thomas Welsh (later Brig. Gen)
• Don’t forget it the Civil War military correspondence of Private John W. Bookman, 45th regiment, Pennsylvania volunteer infantry (at Lancaster County Historical Society)
  
• First Sergeant John Hipple, Co. B 45th Pennsylvania / by Donald L. Rhoads, Jr. (LCHS Journal, 2000)
• Also providing commentary from South Carolina was Franklin and Marshall College Class of 1861 Valedictorian Adam Cyrus Reinoehl, who wrote back to the Daily Evening Express throughout the war under the name, "Demas."