From volunteers to veterans: A social and military history of the II Corps, Army of the Potomac, 1861--1865

This dissertation analyzes the evolution of the II Corps, Army of the Potomac, into the most distinguished of the Union army corps organized during the Civil War. The work makes four main arguments. First, the large number of urban soldiers who served in the II Corps made its social composition distinct from the rest of the Union army. The manner of raising regiments in cities emphasized ethnic, political, and occupational networks, rather than the more traditional ties of community and family in the countryside. Second, the high-ranking leadership of the II Corps was peculiarly effective. Through a combination of personal charisma and professional skill, officers demonstrated a talent for winning the respect of volunteer soldiers and leading them to victory. Third, the II Corps compiled an exceptional battlefield record, despite the frequent arrival of new regiments. Individual commanders grasped the need to achieve relatively equal numbers of men among the divisions and brigades of the II Corps, while also maintaining unit cohesion. Last, the strong unit identity of soldiers of the II Corps helped them to withstand heavy casualties in nearly every campaign of the Army of the Potomac. The men carried this pride into the postwar era, when many formed veterans organizations to remember their service in the II Corps.;"From Volunteers to Veterans" traces the history of the II Corps through three chronological phases. The first was marked by the transformation of antebellum Americans from citizens to citizen-soldiers, from their recruitment and organization in 1861--62 through their first experience of combat during the Peninsula Campaign in the summer of 1862. The rise of the II Corps to the height of its battlefield success characterized the second phase, from storming the Sunken Road during the Antietam Campaign to repulsing Pickett's Charge during the Gettysburg Campaign in the summer of 1863. The last phase was defined by nearly continuous fighting and rebuilding, from the Overland Campaign in the spring of 1864 to the effective end of the war at Appomattox Court House in the spring of 1865.