"During the Civil War, Union soldiers in the Far West frontier faced a dilemma. They were cut off from the main theaters of war, often thought of as shirking their duties, yet they faced unique challenges that their more conventional comrades in arms didnot experience. Oregon and California often sheltered Copperheads and Confederate deserters; their foes sometimes included Native Americans; the territories they guarded were poorly defined and sometimes lawless. This is the first primary document collection of soldiers serving in the Pacific Northwest. It consists of letters, most often written anonymously to local newspapers, a series of longer reminiscences by officers in the First Oregon, and some more fragmentary memoirs of officers and soldiers."--Provided by publisher.
To introduce readers to the first regiment from the Pacific Northwest to serve the Union cause, Jewell presents wartime letters in which cavalrymen shared their experiences with people back home in Oregon. He also collects a series of reminiscences and excerpts from memoirs by officers and soldiers. They describe experience quite different from those of most of the US Army, he says, because their battles tended to be against Indians and most often concerned with their own status in the territory than the Civil War. But, searching for pro-Confederate spies and sympathizers, the First Oregon Volunteer Cavalry Regiment carried out its responsibilities successfully, he finds, managing to expedite the development of the Pacific Northwest in the process. Annotation ©2019 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR (protoview.com)
