A Summer in Maryland and Virginia: Campaigning with the 149th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, A Sketch of Events Connected with the Service of the Regiment in Maryland and the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia

The winter of 1863–4 on the banks of the Rapidan was passed in preparation by both Grant and Lee’s armies for that wrestle of giants that was to begin in May in the wilderness and end at Appomattox in the following April.

In the southwest Sherman had won Missionary Ridge and Chicamauga and was getting ready for his Atlanta campaign, and a great force was doing garrison duty at various points. General Grant told the President that if he could have thirty thousand new men to relieve the veterans, he could capture Richmond and push the war to an end during the summer. This was a difficult proposition on account of resistance to the draft, and the vigorous activity of the Knights of the Golden Circle and the copperheads in the North.

President Lincoln, however, acting on the suggestion, called to Washington for conference the loyal Governors of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Iowa. At this meeting Governor John Brough of Ohio said he would furnish thirty thousand men to serve for one hundred days. Governor Morton of Indiana promised twenty-five thousand. Governor Yates of Illinois twenty thousand, and Stone of Iowa, ten thousand. Governor Brough returned to Ohio, and at once began active work.

On April 23d he issued general order No. 12 calling the National Guard of Ohio into active service for one hundred days, unless sooner discharged, to rendezvous on Monday, May 2d, and to report on that day the number of men present for duty. This call was responded to with alacrity, reports coming in showing thirty-two thousand present. The 27th Regiment of Ross County reported five hundred and ninety-six men.

This Regiment had been organized under a law passed in 1863, forming the Militia into volunteer Companies and Regiments. The 27th was enrolled with the following roster of officers: Colonel, Allison L. Brown; Lt. Col., James H. Haynes; Major, Ebenezer Rozelle; Adjutant, Robert Larrimore; Quartermaster, D. C. Anderson.

The North had suffered an enormous drain upon her resources, had seen her men sent home from the front, suffering from disease and wounds, pitiful survivors of battles in which thousands had gone down to death. The romance and glamor of war had gone, the horror of it remained. There was scarcely a family in the North who did not suffer sorrow that cannot be described, hardly a fireside that did not mourn for a husband or lover, brother or friend, who went forth with pride, never to return. Under such circumstances the men of the hundred days service, knowing just what to expect, hastily arranged their affairs, and from the stores, work-shops and farms, flocked to the defence of their country in the hour of its direst need.

On Wednesday, May 4th, the 27th Regiment O. N. G. reported at Camp Dennison. It was a cold, disagreeable day. Snow fell that afternoon, a day on which men would rather have remained by their own fireside, but a firm determination of duty urged them on.

It was found necessary now to have a reconstruction of the Regiments and Battalions. The eight companies of the 27th were by consolidation reduced to seven. Three companies of the 55th Battalion from Clinton County were added, making ten companies. By orders, the Lieut. Colonel and Adjutant were relieved, and returned to their homes. The Regiment entered the United States service as the 149th Ohio Volunteer Infantry.