The Chicago Board of Trade Battery in the Civil War

In July 1862, the directors of the Chicago Board of Trade used their significant influence to organize perhaps the most prominent Union artillery unit in the Western Theater. Enlistees were Chicagoans, mainly clerks. During the Civil War, the battery was involved in 11 major battles, 26 minor battles and 42 skirmishes. They held the center at Stones River, repulsing a furious Confederate attack. A few days later, they joined 50 other Union guns in stopping one of the most dramatic offensives in the Western Theater. With Colonel Robert Minty’s cavalry, they resisted an overwhelming assault along Chickamauga Creek. This history chronicles the actions of the Chicago Board of Trade Independent Light Artillery at the battles of Farmington, Dallas, Noonday Creek, Atlanta, in Kilpatrick’s Raid, and at Nashville, and Selma.

Dennis W. Belcher has edited or authored nine books on the Civil War and has published in the North & South magazine. He lives in Jefferson City, Missouri.

Dennis W. Belcher

Format: softcover (7 x 10)
Pages: 389
Bibliographic Info: 83 photos, maps, appendices, notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2022
pISBN: 978-1-4766-8391-1
eISBN: 978-1-4766-4562-9
Imprint: McFarland

Acknowledgments viii
Preface 1
Chapter One. The Organization of the Battery and Movement to Kentucky 5
Chapter Two. On to Tennessee and the Battle of Stones River 25
Chapter Three. Horse Artillery and the Tullahoma Campaign 68
Chapter Four. March to Chickamauga Creek (July 5–September 17, 1863) 92
Chapter Five. Battle of Chickamauga and Wheeler’s Raid 126
Chapter Six. 1864 and the Atlanta Campaign 177
Chapter Seven. The Nashville Campaign 245
Chapter Eight. Wilson’s Raid and the End of the War 265
Chapter Nine. ­Post-War Biographical Information 285
Appendix I: Roster of the Chicago Board of Trade Battery 295
Appendix II: Battery Losses 327
Chapter Notes 331
Bibliography 363
Index 373

• “In most ways a traditional accounting of the men who served in the unit and a record of their experiences in camp and combat, Belcher’s work also sheds new light on artillery units, a topic of recent interest among military historians of the war…Great value to genealogists…descriptive”—Civil War Book Review

• “As the field’s most prominent current historian of the Union cavalry attached to the Army of the Cumberland, Belcher is uniquely positioned to document the Chicago Board of trade Battery’s inextricable links to the western mounted arm’s evolution and fighting performance across a vast host of battles, raids, and skirmishes. … Belcher has crafted one of the more impressive Civil War battery histories of recent memory. …essential reading to all serious Civil War cavalry students.”—Civil War Books and Authors

• “Highly recommended…an extraordinary gift”—Argunners Magazine.