and the Great Commotions at Mechum’s River Station
The United States’ tragic Civil War, 1861–1865, was soldiered by several million young men (and older youth) living on one side or the other of a fence that was not necessarily of their own making.
National Park Service tallies show the Union Army’s total strength at 2.6 million soldiers spread across four years of war. Conversely, the Confederate Army’s strength was around one million, give or take a quarter-million due to incomplete enlistment records.
Farmers accounted for 69% of the Confederate Army’s civilian occupations, and less than 50% for the Union Army. Casualty counts included those killed in battle, the diseased, those wounded in action, or taken as prisoners of war. Soldiers were more likely to fall victim to infection or diseases such as measles, typhoid, tuberculosis, etc., than battle wounds…