Although some Connecticut people took leading roles for the Union in the Civil War, the real heroes were rank-and-file soldiers, according to historian David Koch.

“What they ate and how they lived would turn your stomach,” Koch, a professor at Housatonic Community College, told a packed room at the Stratford Library. They ate mainly hardtack, described a plaster-of-Paris so hard it could break your teeth. Soldiers joked that maggots were their best form of protein.

Men were poorly fed and often poorly led, he said. Soldiers elected their officers, meaning their leaders were often the wealthiest and most popular, reluctant to discipline their men.

Koch said 58,000 Connecticut men served in the Civil War out of a population of 465,000, the highest percent of any Northern state. Of those who served 5200 died, many from disease.

Why did they volunteer? For excitement, pay, and to impress their girlfriends, he explained. Most Connecticut farm boys had not been out of their hometowns. They wanted to “see the elephant” as they said, meaning to see combat.

They were paid $13 a month, not a windfall even in those days, but most farm boys had never had much money before. “To hold a dollar was novel, especially when considering what they could spend it on that they didn’t have at home.”

Volunteering was also a way to win admiration of sweethearts. Their sweethearts would remove the brass buttons from their Army uniforms, keep them as cherished mementos, and replace them with wooden buttons.

The first Civil War volunteers signed up for three months stints, expecting a short war. That was a big mistake. “Sure enough,” Koch said, “when they get into battle they began to see things differently.”

Because regiments recruited men from the same town or surrounding towns, some towns lost 50% or 60% of their men.

Connecticut men served throughout the South. The 17th Connecticut Volunteer Infantry was at the wrong end of a surprise attack by Stonewall Jackson at Chancellorsville, reeling back half a mile before building a resemblance of a defense.

The 27th Connecticut served at Antietem, the bloodiest day of the war. “Their commanders had no experience. These guys had no idea what to do. They were cut to pieces.”

The 29th Connecticut was an all-Black unit. The 2nd Connecticut Heavy Artillery was hastily converted to infantry at Cold Harbor, where 5,000 men died in 10 minutes. Knowing they would probably die, men wrote their names on pieces of paper and put them in their practice, a forerunner of dog tags. -by Michael Kling