"The First Fruits of a Re-United People": The Loyalty, Motivation, and Allegiance of the Men of the Second United States Volunteer Infantry Regiment

Abstract

We were discussing the issues facing President Abraham Lincoln’s Administration during the war when he mentioned that in 1864 it had to deal with the uprising of the Plains Indians in Minnesota. To address this threat, the Union enlisted Confederate prisoners of war and sent them to fight the Indians. They were called the ‘Galvanized Yankees’. . . . . . I quickly discovered that some research had been done on the first group of ‘Galvanized Yankees’, the 1st United States Volunteer Infantry Regiment (U.S.V.I.), but that almost nothing had yet been published on the 2nd United States Volunteer Infantry Regiment, the first U.S.V.I. regiment raised specifically to combat Plains Indians. I found this to be an important distinction . . . . . . I cobbled together a narrative of the men, the policy, and the unit, and placed it in the broader context of the Civil War.