MILITARY: Civil War Rosters, Iowa
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Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers in the War of the Rebellion Together with 
Historical Sketches of Volunteer Organizations 1861-1866: 
Vol. 1 
1st -8th Regiments-Infantry. 
Published by authority of the General Assembly, under the direction of Brig. Gen. Wm. 
H. Thrift, Adjutant General. Des Moines; Emory H. English, State Printer, E. D. Chassell, 
State Binder; 1908

HISTORICAL SKETCH

EIGHTEENTH REGIMENT IOWA VOLUNTEER INFANTRY

	The Eighteenth Regiment Iowa Volunteer Infantry was organized under authority of 
Special Orders from the War Department, dated May 21-23, 1862.  The ten companies 
composing the regiment were ordered into quarters by Governor Kirkwood on dates ranging 
from June 10 to July 21, 1862.  The designated rendezvous was Clinton, Iowa, and the camp 
was named "Kirkwood," in honor of the Governor.  The companies were there mustered into 
the service of the United States by Captain H. B. Hendershott, United States Army, on 
August 5, 6 and 7m 1862.  The aggregate strength of the regiment (Field, Staff and Line 
officers and enlisted men) when the muster was completed was 877.  Its first equipment with 
arms was Austria Rifles (calibre 58) with appendages.  It was provided with the other 
necessary equipment for active service, and on August 11, 1862, received orders to proceed 
to Sedalia, Mo., at which place it arrived August 28th, and was ordered to proceed to 
Springfield, Mo., where it arrived September 13th, and joined the Army of the Frontier under 
General Schofield.  The regiment was assigned to the first Brigade of the Second Division, 
commanded respectively by Colonel Husted of the Seventh Missouri Cavalry and Brigadier 
General Totten.
	On September 29th the army advanced in the direction of the enemy's camp at 
Newtonia, at which place the troops which led the advance became engaged with the enemy.  
The brigade and division to which the Eighteenth Iowa belonged were marched quickly in 
the direction of the troops engaged but, before their arrival, the rebel forces had retreated.  
During the forced march in the night preceding the engagement, the Eighteenth Iowa had 
come in contact with and advanced post of the enemy and in the skirmish which ensued lost 
one man killed and three wounded.  The pursuit of the retreating rebel army was continued 
as far as Fayetteville, Ark., where the Eighteenth Iowa, being in advance, skirmished with 
the rear guard of the rebel army, but sustained no casualties.  The enemy having been driven 
out of the State of Missouri, and the object of the expedition having been accomplished, 
General Schofield was ordered to return and make such disposition of his forces as would 
best protect the State against further invasion.  The eighteenth Iowa was ordered to 
Springfield, Mo., where a large quantity of supplies for the army had been accumulated,  
The regiment arrived at Springfield, November 14, 1862.  While its loss in conflict with the 
enemy, up to this time, had been light, the men had suffered greatly from exposure and from 
the hardships to which they had been subjected on the long march, in pursuit of the enemy, 
and the return to Springfield.  They were passing through the common experience of all 
soldiers, in their first year of service.  Many were stricken with disease, the prevailing 
malady being measles, which spread through the regiment and claimed many victims.  The 
entire casualties now numbered ninety, and yet the regiment had been in active service less 
than three months.
	At Springfield, the Eighteenth Iowa constituted and important part of the garrison 
which numbered about 1,500 troops of all arms, and several pieces of field arteillery.  The 
defenses consisted of earthworks and detached forts, but the number os troops in garrison 
were insufficient to man the works at all points.  Brigadier General Brown was in command 
of these troops, with Colonel Crabb of the Nineteenth Iowa in command of the Post.  
Lieutenant Colonel Cook was in command of the Eighteenth Iowa, five companies of the 
regiment being on out-post duty some distance from Springfield.  The rebel General 
Marmaducke had, by a skillful and daring movement, eluded the vigilance of the Union 
Army, and by a series of rapid marches reached the vicinity of Springfield on the evening of 
January 7, 1863.  On the forenoon of that day the scouts of General Brown had discovered 
the approaching force of the enemy, and the garrison therefore had warning of the 
impending attack and made every possible preparation to meet it.  The Union men of the 
town armed themselves, offered their services for the defense, and afterwards fought bravely 
with the troops.  Even the sick in the hospital, who were able to leave their beds, took their 
guns and went to the front.  On the morning of January 8th, the cavalry pickets of General 
Brown discovered the enemy's skirmish line and the preliminary fighting began some three 
miles from the entrenchments.  In his history of the regiment, Colonel Hugh Campbell gives 
the following brief account of the engagement which ensued:

	January 8, 1863, the rebel forces, thirty-five hundred strong, under Marmaduke, 
attacked Springfield, then held by the Eighteenth Iowa, and a few hundred militia.  The 
regiment was under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Cool.  After a severe engagement, 
lasting the whole of the day, the enemy retreated, leaving one hundred and eighty killed and 
wounded.  The Eighteenth Iowa suffered severely in the action, losing fifty enlisted men 
killed and wounded, and two commissioned officers killed—Captain William R. Blue, 
Company C, and Captain Joseph Van Metre, Company H, who died of wounds received in 
the action—and two commissioned officers wounded, Captain Landis, Company D, and 
Lieutenant Conaway, Company C.  The regiment behaved nobly, standing their ground 
against three times their number, and by their coolness and determination saving the town 
and its valuable stores on which the army of the Frontier, thence drawing its supplies, 
depended for its existence.  The regiment received a well merited compliment from 
Brigadier General Brown, commanding, for their bravery and gallantry in this action.
	The official report of the part taken by the Eighteenth Iowa in the gallant defense of 
Srpingfield not being obtainable, the compiler has availed himself of the accout given by 
Major Byers, in his "Iowa in War Times," and that of L. D. Ingersoll, in his "Iowa and the 
Rebellion," to supplement the statement of Colonel Campbell.  The following is a part of the 
concluding portion of Major Byers' account:
	
By two o'clock, the rebels massed their forces several lines deep and made a 
determined effort on the Union right and center.  It was then that Captain Landis, of the 
Eighteenth Iowa, with a piece of artillery, was pushed forward into an exposed and 
dangerous position at the right, three companies of the Eighteenth Iowa, under Captains Van 
Metre, Blue and Stonaker, were sent along as supports.  By a bold dash, with overwhelming 
numbers, the rebels succeeded in capturing the gun, but not till Captain Blue, Van Metre and 
Landis were wounded—the two former mortally,  At their sides fell many of their brave 
comrades.  A the same moment the rebels got possession of a strong stockaded building 
south of and near to the town, and from this vantage point poured a heavy fire into the Union 
line.  In another hour Brown's forces were being heavily pressed, and the position seemed 
extremely critical,  Ten the "Quinine Brigade,." Led by Colonel Crabb, rushed to the front.  
They were real soldiers, if they were sick ones.  In an hour's fighting they drove the enemy 
back on their left center, but an immediate and very nearly successful assault by the rebels 
followed at the right.  Some of the militia were giving way,  General Brown hurried to their 
front to re-form them, but was shot fromm his horse in the endeavor,  it was now 4 o'clock, 
and Colonel Crabb assumed the command.  Again the battle was resumed at the center, and 
for another hour continued with varying results.  Once more some of the militia faltered and 
for a time all seemed lost, when others, also militia, charged for the lost ground with a cheer.  
At the same time Lieutenant Colonel Cook, with the remaining companies of the Eighteenth 
Iowa who had hurried from outpost duty to the scene, came up, and they, too, charged the 
rebel center with a shout and drove it rearwards.  Darkness soon ended the contest, and that 
night the defeated rebel army withdrew.  This handful of brave men and the sturdy, heroic 
militia of Missouri had saved Springfield with its enormous stores, and it had saved a 
disaster to the Union Army.

Ingersoll, who wrote a lengthy account of the engagement, giving the details with 
great particularity, confirms the statements of Major Byers heretofore quoted, near the close 
of his account he says:

Meantime five companies of the Eighteenth Iowa, which had just reached the scene of 
action from an outpost at some distance from Springfield, came up in fine style, under 
Lieutenant Colonel Cook, and went into the fight on the center with such effect as to drive 
the rebels back into the stockade, and encourage the men who had been fighting for hours 
most wonderfully.  Darkness was now coming on and the firing gradually ceased.  The 
enemy retired under cover of the night from his position south of town, and had taken 
position more than a mile to the eastward.  Hither Colonel Crabb sent a cavalry force to 
engage them and retard their advance, but they declined battle, and soon retired in haste.  
They had lost in the battle more than two hundred in killed and wounded.  Our loss was 
about the same.  There were but five companies—A, C, g, G, and H—of the Eighteenth 
Iowa taking part in the contest until near its close, when the other five came up and turned 
the tide of battle in our favor, as has been related.  The number of the regiment engaged was 
less than five hundred, of whom fifty-six were killed or wounded.

The regiment remained in Springfield during the remainder of the winter of 1863, 
performing the monotonous duties incident to the camp and garrison life of soldiers.  While 
the holding of Springfield was very necessary and meant so much to the loyal citizens of 
Missouri, it could not be otherwise than unsatisfactory to the gallant officers and men of the 
Eighteenth Iowa to be retained upon such duty, while so many Iowa regiments were actively 
participating in the great campaigns then in progress in other parts of the South, and winning 
honor and distinction for themselves nd their State.  In April, 1863, Colonel Edwards, who 
had been on detached service at St. Louis, returned to Springfield and assumed command of 
the Post.  The operations of the regiment now assumed a much more active character.  The 
rebel General Shelby had invaded Missouri with a considerable force, and besides holding 
the Post at Springfield, portions of the Eighteenth Iowa were called upon for active service 
in the field.  The subsequent service of the regiment is described by Colonel Campbell, as 
follows:

During the spring and summer of 1863, different portions of the regiment, under 
command of Major Campbell, made three long marches of one hundred and ten miles each, 
two of them forced marches, besides doing very heavy fatigue and guard duty, in which they 
were taxed to their utmost strength, by reason of the smallness of the garrison and the 
constant proximity of the enemy.  In the latter of these marches, they participated in the 
canpaign against Shelby, who invaded Missouri and penetrated nearly to the Missouri river.  
The regiment was ordered to Cassville, Mo., under command of Lieutenant Colonel 
Campbell, to cooperate in heading off Shelby's retreat.  October 9th, Springfield being 
considered in danger, a part of the regiment was ordered back by forced marches, and 
marched the distance of fifty-five miles in twenty-seven hours, including halts.
	
	October 16th, Companies D and F, under command of Captain Ray, marched 
from Cassville to Fayetteville, as escort to a supply train, and at Cross Timbers 
encountered the enemy under Colonel Brooks, who attacked the train with five hundred 
men.  After a short but severe contest, the enemy retired with a loss of ten men killed 
and wounded.  Octobert 17th, the remainder of the regiment, under command of Colonel 
Edwards, moved, along with all the forces of the district of southwestern Missouri, 
under General McNeil, in pursuit of Shelby, who was then retreating from Missouri, 
and reached Fort Smith, Arkansas—after an animated pursuit, during which they 
marched night and day, fording deep streams, and crossing the Boston Mountains—
October 31, 1863.
	January 2, 1864, a portion of the regiment, under command of Lieutenant 
Colonel Campbell, marched to Roseville, Arkansas, to prevent an anticipated attack 
upon a supply train on the way from Little Rock, in charge of Captain Clover, Company 
K, Eighteenth Iowa, with a detachment of the regiment, and returned to Fort Smith, 
January 9, 1864, having marched seventy-five miles in the depth of winter, the snow 
being six inches deep, without tents or shelter of any kind.  During the rest of the 
winter, the regiment was engaged in excessive labor, in fatigue, escort, and guard duty, 
men and officers going on duty for months every other day, and living upon half 
rations.  March 22, 1864, the regiment, under command of Captain Duncan, Colonel 
Edwards commanding the First Brigade, and Lieutenant Colonel Campbell being 
detained at Little Rock by a severe hurt, which disabled him entirely from walking or 
riding, moved with the Third Division to join General Steele, who with the Seventh 
Army Corps was moving on Camden, Ark., to cooperate with General Banks.  April 
12th, the regiment participated in the battle of Prairie d' Anne.  April 13th, the Third 
Division, being the rear guard of the army, was attacked by the enemy in force at 
Moscow.  In this engagement the Eighteenth Iowa, with the Second Indiana Battery, 
held the enemy in check until the rest of the division came up and forced the enemy to 
retire.  Captain J. K. Morey, Company F, then actin Assistant Adjutant General of the 
first Brigade, was highly complimented by Colonel Edwards, commanding the brigade, 
for bravery in this action.
	April 18th, the regiment, under command of Captain Duncan, moved form 
Camden to reinforce Colonel Williams, Second Kansas (colored), who was escorting a 
large forage train.  About fourteen miles from Camden, at Poison Springs, Colonel 
Williams was attacked by the enemy six thousand strong, under Generals Marcy and 
Fagan.  He had with him the Eighteen Iowa, the First Kansas Colored, one section of 
the Second Indiana Battery and about two hundred cavalry.  His small force was 
completely surrounded and separated, and after a fierce and sanguinary conflict, in 
which the rest of the command was entirely routed and scattered with great loss, the 
Eighteenth Iowa was completely isolated and hemmed in on all sides.  It retired slowly 
rod by rod, reforming and charging the enemy seven times, and finally cut its way 
through the enemy's lines and returned to Camden.  The casualties in this engagement 
were eighty enlisted men killed, wounded and missing and one commissioned officer 
wounded.  The regiment received great credit for the deliberate and determined courage 
with which it held together in the face of such desperate odds and forced it way out.  
The officers and men behaved gallantly.  Captain Thomas Blanchard, when wounded, 
and under a heavy fire, seized the colors and held them, by ordering the men to form 
upon him.
	April 30th, the regiment participated in the battle of Jenkin's Ferry, at Saline river, 
where the enemy attacked General Steele's army, then retreating from Camden, and 
endeavored to prevent his crossing, but was repulsed after a day's hard fighting, with 
heavy loss on both sided.  The regiment returned to Fort Smith May 15, 1864, having
marched seven hundred and thirty miles, through swamps and over mountains, 
subsisting part of the time on raw corn, wading whole days and nights in mud and 
water, and suffering hardships that have been surpassed in no campaign of the waar.
	The subsequent months of the summer and fall of 1864, and the winter of 1864-5, 
were occupied with a series of long and rapid marches, the intervals of which were 
employed in severe labor on the fortifications around Fort Smith, and extremely heavy 
guard duty.  Different bodies of the enemy, under Shelby, Gano, Cooper, Fagan and 
Brooks, emboldened by their successes against General Steele, hovered closely around 
Fort Smith, cut off our communications, captured supply trains, and completely held the 
surrounding country.  During the whole time the troops at Fort Smith, were kept upon 
two-thirds, and, during the greatest part of the time, half rations, and the subsistence 
that was furnished consisted, for a long time, mostly of damaged bread and meat.
	May 25, 1864, the regiment, under command of Major Morey, together with the 
Second Kansas (colored) and a section of the Second Kansas Battery, all under the 
command of Lieutenant Colonel Campbell, moved to Clarksville, Ark., to hold that 
place and keep open the navigation of the river, upon which the army at Fort Smith 
depended for supplies.  The regiment lost on the march two men killed by guerrillas.  
While here, Sergeant Vance, Company C, Eighteenth Iowa, Clarksville, by forty rebels, 
but repulsed them and saved his train, killing two and wounding two of the enemy, and 
losing one man wounded.
	August 6th, Clarksville was evacuated by order of Brigadier General Thayer, and 
the Eighteenth Iowa under command of Major Morey, together with a battalion of the 
Fourteenth Kansas Cavalry, and a large train of government stores and refugees, all 
under command of Lieutenant Colonel Campbell, marched for Fort Smith.  On their 
march they were followed closely by the enemy, who harassed them slightly, but 
without doing serious injury.	From August 11th to December the regiment was sent, 
under command of Lieutenant Colonel Campbell, upon four successive expeditions.  In 
November, a large supply train of four hundred wagons, enroute for Fort Smith, was 
lying at Neosho crossing, Cherokee Nation, deterred from advancing by the threatened 
intervention of Gano's forces between them and Fort Smith.  The supplies at Fort Smith 
were exhausted, and the possibility of holding it all depended upon the safe arrival of 
this train.  November 22d the Eighteenth regiment, under command of Lieutenant 
Colonel Campbell, marched to Fort Gibson to meet the train.  On arriving there, he was 
ordered to proceed by forced marches towards Neosho crossing, one hundred miles 
distant, with the Eighteenth regiment, under command of Captain Blanchard, and the 
First Indiana Infantry, till he met the train.  Hiscommand drew for rations a peck of corn 
in the ear per man, and a  little coffee, and upon this supply, with no salt and a little 
fresh beef, killed on the way, the command marched day and night till it reached the 
train at Neosho crossing,  the suffering from exhaustion on this march exceeded that 
experienced in any of the campaigns of the regiment.  At Neosho crossing, the 
command met the train, escorted by the Second Kansas (colored), the Second and third 
Indina, portions of the Sixth and Fourteenth Kansas Cavalry, and two sections of 
artillery, under command of Major Phillips, who was waiting for reinforcements.  The 
whole, under command of Lieutenant Colonel Campbell, immediately marched for Fort 
Gibson, and thence to Fort Smith, which he reached December 11th, having marched 
three hundred and twenty miles in the winter, forded two rivers and numberless swollen 
streams, making night marches, the only subsistence for his whole command, for a part 
of the time, being raw corn, and beef seasoned with gunpowder in lieu of salt.
	About the last of February, 1865, four companies of the regiment, under 
command of Major Morey, were detached for garrison duty at Van Buren, Ark., and 
remained there until July 6th, when the regiment was concentrated at Little Rock, Ark.  
There, on July 20, 1865, the regiment was mustered out of the service of the United 
States, and was soon afterwards conveyed to Davenport, Iowa, where it was formally 
disbanded, the officers and men receiving their discharges and final payment August 5 
to 7, 1865, just three years from the date of their muster into the service at Clinton, 
Iowa.
	Colonel Campbell states that only about 400 of the original members of the 
regiment were with it ion its return to Davenport, and that but eight of its original 
officers remained with it at that time;  he also states that during its term of service it had 
received 235 recruits, of which 86 2343 from Iowa, 72 from Missouri and 77 from 
Arkansas and Texas.  The larger number of its officers had received well deserved 
promotions from the ranks, as vacancies occurred from death, resignation, discharge for 
disability, or other causes.  Quite a number of its officers had been discharged to accept 
promotion in other regiments.  All these changes will be found noted in the subjoined 
roster, together with the record of each officer and enlisted man, in paragraph form, 
opposite his name.  Every effort has been made to secure accuracy in this revised roster, 
but no doubt errors and omissions have occurred owing to the imperfect manner in 
which part of the records have been kept, and this imperfect condition is largely, if not 
wholly, due to the failure of officers to make full reports and returns to the Adjutant 
General of Iowa during the progress of the war.  In some instances names will probably 
be found not properly spelled, but this could not be avoided for the reason that the 
records were the only guide to follow.  In the case of the Eighteenth Iowa, the compiler 
has found no official reports of battles on file, and has been compelled to rely upon such 
general information as he could obtain from the sources perviously indicated—mainly 
the history of the regiment, from which liberal quotations have been made.
	The Eighteenth Iowa Infantry has a record of service that reflects high honor 
upon its officers and enlisted men and upon the State which sent it into the field.  While 
it was not engaged in any of the great battles of the war, its service was no less 
important to the cause of the Union than was that of the regiments from Iowa which 
served in the great campaigns in Mississippi, Georgia and Virginia.  Its service was 
upon the southwestern frontier, against and active and ever vigilant enemy;  the posts 
which it held and successfully defended were most important ones, its conflicts with the 
enemy and its losses showing plainly with what determined bravery and unflinching 
fortitude it performed it duty.  Its record of long and toilsome marches, of suffering 
from cold and hunger and from al the vicissitudes of war, entitles it to a place in history 
second to none of the gallant regiments which went forth from the State of Iowa at the 
call of the Government to assist in conquering a gigantic rebellion.
To the memory of the brave men of this noble regiment who gave up their lives 
on the field of battle, or who died from wounds and disease; to those who lived to return 
to their homes and loved ones, but have since answered the last roll call; to those who 
still survive, the fading remnant of this once powerful military organization; to the dead 
and the living, to their wives, families and  kindred, and to all who shall come after 
them and inherit the proud legacy transmitted by these heroic soldiers, who endured and 
suffered and died that their country might live, this brief history is consecrated.

	SUMMARY OF CAUALTIES
Total Enrollment						1127
Killed								   28
Wounded							   79
Died of wounds						     9
Died of disease					 	 113
Discharged for disease, wounds or other causes	 253
Buried in National Cemeteries				   89
Captured							   63
Transferred							   15	

EIGHTEENTH REGIMENT IOWA VOLUNTEER INFANTRY
Term of service three years

Mustered into service of the United States at Clinton, Iowa, Aug, 6, 1862, by 
Captain H. B. Hendershott, United States Army.  Mustered out at Little 
Rock, Ark., July 20, 1865