Confederate Blue in the American West: The Galvanized Yankees, Part I
They served their country for over two years on the frontier, guarding wagon trains and emigrants, fending off Indian attacks and loneliness, building forts and wondering about their future.
Officially they were the United States Volunteers, former Confederate prisoners of war who swore an oath to serve the Union in return for a way out of the harsh life of prison camp. Unofficially they were the Galvanized Yankees, doing their best to find their way in a world turned upside down.
Well over a century after their remarkable story unfolded, they are all but forgotten by North and South alike.
My Country, The Enemy
The idea of soldiers switching sides during a war is not unheard of. Probably the most famous "switcher" in U.S. history is Benedict Arnold, a man who holds the unique distinction of being both American hero and American traitor.
Nearly a century after Arnold changed from Continental Blue to British Red during the American Revolution, the American Civil War saw its share of men who, like Arnold, began their service wearing the uniform of one country and ended it wearing the uniform of another.
Any number of reasons could account for this. Disillusionment; a hoped-for chance at personal gain; A genuine change of heart; a belief that one had been forced into the service of a cause one did not believe in; or even a simple if not always accurate belief that life would somehow be better in that other uniform.
And sometimes, the change could come as a result of an overwhelming desire to escape the ravages of a prison camp. Such was the case for some 6000 former southern fighting men beginning in 1864.
Early Converts
Semi-official attempts to recruit captured Confederates into the Union Army had actually taken place as early as the spring of 1862. Colonel James A. Mulligan, the commander at Camp Douglas in Chicago, discovered that a number of his prisoners seemed willing to fight for the Union in return for release from prison. Requesting authority to do just that, Mulligan at first received permission, only to have it revoked in no uncertain terms a short time later.
The good Colonel was not happy with this, and apparently decided that he never actually received the second order commanding him to cease recruitment of captured enemy troops. The recruitment effort continued unabated, its sudden illegality a matter of seemingly minor importance to Mulligan.
Not until the following October was his disobedience finally discovered, by which time more than 200 former Rebels had been officially sworn in as Yankees. One of those so sworn during this period was none other than Henry Morton Stanley, who would one day achieve fame as the man who found Dr. David Livingston in Africa.
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