James Monroe Swales: letters of a Union soldiers.

Abstract

This thesis explores the letters written by James Monroe Swales, a young volunteer of the 10th Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment after his enlistment in August, lA61. The 21-year-old volunteer sent letters to relatives, who retained them until making them available to the public through the Illinois State Historical Library. As a result, the personal account of this Union soldier survives and allows this study to illuminate the man, his regiment, and to a certain extent the society in which he lived. In earthy language his letters expressed the high and low moments of life at the outposts at Cairo and Mound City, Illinois where Ulysses S. Grant was forming an army in the later months of 1861. A record of the individual and his regiment accompanies the letters, and together they contribute to the history of the common soldier's Civil War experience.