selves, to be of home
manufacture. Time permitting, the work was then commenced, continued in
the field, and kept up with current events till the order for return
home of the command to which the company belonged. Serious illness of
the compiler, and the scattering of the members of the company,
prevented the finishing of the work at the intended time, and caused
its indefinite postponement.

As a contribution, though humble, to material for some future history
of the part taken by Minnesota in the war for the Union this little
book has been completed and published, and the writer would be greatly
pleased if its appearance should stimulate the necessary research for
the putting on record in somewhat similar form of the histories of
other companies of our state regiments.

ALFRED J. HILL.

St. Paul, Minn., 1869.

PART I.

ORIGIN AND ORGANIZATION--1862.

In the spring of 1862 a sixth regiment of infantry had been called for
from Minnesota by the Governor of the State, but, from various causes,
the enlistments proceeded very languidly till the disasters of the
Virginian armies in the summer and the consequent proclamations of the
President of the United States for volunteers gave an immense impulse
to recruiting.

Under such circumstances it was that the "Sigel Guards," afterwards
Company E of the Sixth Regiment, were projected and raised. In the
month of June, Mathias Holl, of St. Paul, was authorized to recruit for
the proposed company; and on the 23rd of July, twenty men having been
enlisted, he received a regular recruiting commission. Rudolph
Schoenemann and Christian Exel, of the same city, also engaged in the
work in connection with Lieutenant Holl, themselves enlisting in the
company on the 6th and 14th of August, respectively. Many of the
members, however, were not obtained particularly by these gentlemen,
some having been recruited for other companies or regiments and
transferred involuntarily to the Sigel Guards, others who had purposed
enlisting in other companies--that never were filled--having joined it
of their own accord, while a large proportion acted as their own
recruiting officers, and made it their first choice. The names of those
recruited for, or who intended to join, other organizations, are as
follows, viz.: (1) Beckendorf, Besecke, Detert, Gropel, Mahle, Mann,
Metz, J. J. Mueller, Schaefer, Simon, and Temme, were to have belonged
to the company projected by Messrs. Klinkenfus, Kn