The Men Stood Like Iron: How the Iron Brigade Won Its Name

Lance J. Herdegen

Indiana University Press, 2005 - History - 271 pages

"Exciting and even moving, this book successfully personalizes the history of the Brigade's formative months and enriches our understanding of how these men felt and lived—and became distinguished soldiers." —Alan T. Nolan, author of The Iron Brigade and Lee Reconsidered

"A colorful and skillful record of the lives of the men in the ranks of a famous brigade, who served and saved the Union at a great sacrifice in a dark time." —Kirkus Reviews

"Well-written and researched... Excellent first-hand accounts of the brigade in action from letters, memoirs, diaries and other sources of the brigade members are included." —The Civil War Courier

"Sound research in unpublished materials allowed the author to impart a freshness to his descriptions of fighting at the Brawner Farm, South Mountain... and Antietam." —Civil War

No volunteers tramped with more innocent resolve on the drill fields of 1861 than the farmers, immigrants, shopkeepers, and "piney" camp boys who volunteered for the Second, Sixth, and Seventh Wisconsin and the Nineteenth Indiana Infantry. The Men Stood Like Iron is the moving, often melancholy, story of how the backwoods "Calico boys" became soldiers of the celebrated "Iron Brigade."

What people are saying

THE MEN STOOD LIKE IRON: How the Iron Brigade Won Its Name

User Review  - Kirkus

A history of four regiments of young, independent, feisty frontiersmen from Wisconsin and Indiana, who became a proud force fighting bravely and unwaveringly in bloody Civil War battles, and winning ...

The men stood like iron: how the Iron Brigade won its name

User Review  - Not Available - Book Verdict

Herdegen (An Irishman in the Iron Brigade, Fordham Univ., 1993) provides here a history of the Iron Brigade, one of the most famous brigades in the Union Army. Consisting of regiments from Wisconsin ...

Contents

• Marching Day and Night: 11
• Greenhorn Patriots: 18
• The Volunteer Army of 1861: 26
• The Fair Miss Peters: 49
• Massa Linkums Men: 57
• The Boss Soldier: 64
• Hindquarters in the Saddle: 74
• Come On God Damn You: 87
• Devil Take the Hindmost: 105
• The Army Ran Like Sheep: 125
• We Have Got a General Now: 133
• The Iron Brigade of the West: 143
• Sharpsburg Maryland: 154
• Too Horrible to Behold: 185
• The Men Have Stood Like Iron: 196
• May God Bless Us: 206
• The Government Has Gone Mad: 212
• NOTES: 219
• BIBLIOGRAPHY: 257

About the author

Lance J. Herdegen is Director of the Institute for Civil War Studies at Carroll College. Herdegen has written for many national publications and is author of the award-winning In the Bloody Railroad Cut at Gettysburg.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Men Stood Like Iron: How the Iron Brigade Won Its Name
• Author: Lance J. Herdegen
• Edition: illustrated, reprint
• Publisher: Indiana University Press, 2005
• ISBN: 025321825X, 9780253218254
• Length: 271 pages
• Subjects: History / Military / United States; History / United States / Civil War Period (1850-1877)