Reminiscences of the Cleveland Light Artillery

In 1837, a group of ambitious young men drilled on an empty lot in a village barely larger than a town. By 1861, their descendants commanded batteries that thundered across nearly every major battlefield of the Civil War. This vivid memoir traces the remarkable evolution of the Cleveland Light Artillery from a small gun squad inspired by a visiting Buffalo company to the First Regiment Ohio Volunteer Light Artillery, a unit whose name became synonymous with precision and ferocity. Through the pen of a participant who lived this history, we witness the transformation: the patriotic fervor of pre-war Cleveland, the frantic mobilization, and the bonds of brotherhood forged in training and battle. The author knew these men not as statues in a history book, but as friends and neighbors who answered the call when their nation tore itself apart. For readers who hunger for intimate, ground-level perspectives on the Civil War, this book offers something rare: the voice of someone who remembers not just the battles, but the decades of preparation, pride, and small-town ambition that made those battles possible.