Bachelor of Arts (BA), Ohio University, 2014, History

Since the late 1980s, historians of American Civil War soldiers have struggled to understand the nature, character, and social order of the volunteer Union Army. Debates over individual motivations to enlist and serve, the success or failure of the institution to instill proper military discipline, and the peculiar requirements of leading volunteer citizen-soldiers have remained salient elements of Civil War soldier studies historiography. This thesis offers a new methodology for addressing these questions by examining the antebellum worldview of men from a single regiment -- the 55th Illinois Volunteer Infantry -- in order to create a lens through which to view their wartime behavior in uniform. This allows for an examination of how the antebellum voluntarist social order of Illinois towns continued to structure life in the ranks. Leaders who were aware of this cultural factor were often more successful in enlisting the support and cooperation of their subordinates than those who sought to breakdown their men and force them into the traditional mold of military subordination. Finally, the decision to enlist, cooperate, and remain in the volunteer force was governed by the same personal calculus of individual self-interest that governed men before entering into military service.

Committee: Brian Schoen (Advisor) Subjects: American History; History; Military History