Civil War Colored Troops of Callaway County Research

By Drew Doebelin

The majority of what I did this week was on the project on colored soldiers in the Civil War from Callaway County. I wanted to share some highlights from what I’ve found so far!

Drew Doebelin working on the Civil War Colored Troops of Callaway County Project.

Although, I am only a quarter of the way through the soldiers service records, all the casualties I have found so far have been non-combat related. Diarrhea and Pneumonia being the most commonly listed, but It was interesting to see that one soldier (Private John Bright of the 67^th Missouri Colored Infantry, company F, born and from Callaway County) had passed suddenly at 18 while serving due to Epilepsy!

Some of the descriptions of the Troops.

Private Reuben D Blackburn (of the 18^th Missouri Colored Infantry, company C, from Callaway County) enlisted when he was 47, and in his service records was a letter from his family stating that they were looking for land near St. Louis because they had been kicked off their former slave owner’s farm. I will be attaching that letter to the presentation board, as it has been the only letter I have been able to find so far, and gives a look into the lives of soldiers families during the Civil war.

"The Family of Reuben D. Blackburn / Colored W. S. recruit consisting of his family and three children having been ordered from their former home not to return by their master are allowed to pass from Wright City, MO to St. Louis, MO in search of employment."

I’m doing more research into this, but one soldier's service records listed him as having taken ammunition and deserted to the confederate side!

I should mention that I have only been researching union soldiers so far, and will only have union soldiers prepared for the Triple L in August. In the future, I hope to make the information I’ve found easily accessible for genealogy and research purposes, and that will also eventually include confederate colored soldiers from Callaway (if information can be found on them). I feel like this project has bloomed farther than I expected when I first started, but overall I hope it is useful and helps Callaway understand a little more about its history!