Good to hear from you again, Comander. After I completed boot camp in balmy San Diego, I went to Airman School in Norman, Oklahoma, from November til February. Although a little further south than Chicago, the only thing slowing those "Northers" down ffrom Canada was a couple of barbed wire fences. Colors every morning was really "fun".

My great uncle Frank was captured in July, 1864, while recovering from a serious gun shot wound. He was in Camp Douglas from then until June, 1865. He claimed the climate gave him rheumatism, going into great detail in his pension applications. After he died in 1899, his widow wrote shorter and shorter applications, until 1924, the year she died, when she said, "He went to the war and it killed him." She got the pension for that year.

It's interesting that the last two galvanized regiments were mustered in so close to or after the end of the war, and had to serve so long after Uncle Frank was paroled.

Years ago I read a book Titled "The Indian War of 1864", by Captain Eugene F. Ware. He was stationed at various posts along the stagelines. If I remember correctly, he was cavalry, but the conditions he experenced would have been similar to those of the galvaized troops. Stan