16th Connecticut: 10 years after Antietam

Connecticut Historical Society collection.

Here's a rare image of the 16th Connecticut taken in Hartford on Sept. 17, 1872, 10 years after the regiment was routed at the Battle of Antietam, its first battle of the Civil War. Many of these men fought at Antietam and survived the horrors of Southern prison camps at Andersonville, Ga.; Florence, S.C., and elsewhere. This image was donated to the Connecticut Historical Society. I'll make a research trip there and to the Connecticut State Library later today. For the definitive book on the 16th Connecticut, check out "A Broken Regiment" by Lesley Gordon, whom I interviewed for this post in July.