German-Americans were the largest ethnic contingent to fight for theUnion in the American Civil War^{[citation needed]}. More than 200,000 native-bornGermans, along with another 250,000 1st-generation German-Americans, served in theUnion Army, notably fromNew York,Wisconsin, andOhio. Several thousand also fought for theConfederacy. Most German born residents of the Confederacy lived inLouisiana andTexas. Many others were 3rd- and 4th-generation Germans whose ancestors migrated to Virginia and the Carolinas in the 18th and early 19th centuries.

Approximately 516,000 Union soldiers, or 23.4% of all Union soldiers, were immigrants; about 216,000 of these were born in Germany. New York supplied the largest number of these native-born Germans with 36,000. Behind the Empire State cameWisconsin with 30,000 andOhio with 20,000.^[1]

Scores of individualregiments, such as the52nd New York,9th Ohio,74th Pennsylvania,32nd Indiana (1st German),107th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, and the9th Wisconsin, consisted entirely of German Americans. Major recruiting efforts aimed at German Americans were conducted inCincinnati,St. Louis, andMilwaukee, among many other cities.

Commonly referred to as "Dutchmen" by other Union soldiers, and "lop-eared Dutch" by Confederates, German-American units, in general, earned a reputation for discipline.^[2] Some of them had previously served in European armies, and they brought valuable experience to the Union Army.

A popular Union commander and native German,Major GeneralFranz Sigel was the highest ranking German-American officer in the Union Army, with many Germans enlisting to "fight mit Sigel." Sigel was a political appointment of PresidentAbraham Lincoln, who hoped that Sigel's immense popularity would help deliver the votes of the increasingly important German segment of the population.^[3] He was a member of theForty-Eighters, a political movement of revolutionaries in German states whose failure led to thousands of Germans emigrating to theUnited States. These included such future Civil War officers as Maj. Gen.Carl Schurz, Brig. Gen.August Willich,Louis Blenker,Max Weber andAlexander Schimmelfennig.

Schurz was part of the socio-political movement in America known as theTurners, who contributed to gettingLincoln elected as President. The Turners provided the bodyguard atLincoln's inauguration on March 4, 1861, and also atLincoln's funeral in April 1865.

Other prominent German generals includedPeter Osterhaus,Edward S. Salomon,Frederick Salomon,August Kautz andFelix Salm-Salm. Hundreds of German-born officers led regiments during the war, including Col.Gustav Tafel, Col.Paul A. Frank, Col.Friedrich Hecker, Col.Leopold von Gilsa, and Maj.Jurgen Wilson. Among the very best Union artillerists was German-born Capt.Hubert Dilger, who had been trained at theKarlsruhe Military Academy.

Another famousGerman American, though not an immigrant, was Brevet Maj. Gen.George Armstrong Custer (Küster). He fought against the Confederate cavalry of Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart atGettysburg and famously died in theBattle of Little Big Horn during theIndian Wars.

Among those German immigrants who received theMedal of Honor for valor during the war include:

Although the Confederacy had general officers born in Ireland, France, and England, only one German-born soldier reached that rank in the Confederate Army,General John A. Wagener ofSouth Carolina. ColonelAdolphus Heiman, a Prussian-born veteran of theMexican–American War who commanded the 10th Tennessee Infantry and later a brigade; and ColonelAugustus Buchel, a native of Hesse and commander of the 1st Texas Cavalry,^[4] were probably the next highest ranking German-Confederates.

Lt. Col.Heros von Borcke, who served on the staff of Maj. Gen.Jeb Stuart, is the most famous German officer in the Confederacy. Von Borcke, aPrussiancavalry officer, slipped through theUnion blockade intoCharleston Harbor and eventually became one of Confederate Maj. Gen.J.E.B. Stuart's closest confidants and his Adjutant and Chief of Staff. In 1866, he returned to Prussia to fight in theAustro-Prussian War.

German immigrantSimon Baruch served 3 years as a Confederate army surgeon, before becoming a leading advocate of hydrotherapy and bath houses in New York City. His son was famous Presidential advisorBernard Baruch.

In neutralMissouri on May 9, 1861, Union Capt.Nathaniel Lyon, curious of the Missouri State Guard's intentions for Camp Jackson, engaged in a covert operation to uncover the Guard's plans. Disguised as a woman, Captain Lyon scoured the camp, searching for evidence of any secessionist threat. Lyon and his agents discovered falsely labeled crates containing a number ofsiege guns to be used for assaulting the Missouri arsenal, sent by the Confederate PresidentJefferson Davis himself.^[5] On May 10, 1861, Lyon, aRadical Republican, marched a large contingent of pro-southern Missourimilitia prisoners-of-war through the streets ofSt. Louis. The men had been captured by a large force composed mostly of German volunteers during an unsuccessful attempt by the pro-southerners to seize the Federal arsenal in St. Louis.^[6] The prisoners were guarded by two lines of German-American Union soldiers, who were unpopular with many native-born Missourians, who resented their anti-slavery and anti-secessionist political views. Many people in St. Louis, having moved to the area from Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, and Virginia,^[7] had southern sympathies.

Tensions quickly mounted on the streets as civilians hurled fruit, rocks, paving stones, and insults at Lyon's Germans. Shots rang out, killing three militiamen. The soldiers fired into the nearby crowd of bystanders, injuring or killing numerous civilians. Angry mobs rioted throughout the city for the next two days, burning a number of buildings. At least seven more civilians were shot by Federal troops patrolling the streets. The final death toll was 28.^{[citation needed]}

In the spring of 1862,German Texans from Central Texas and theTexas Hill Country, mostly Unionist or neutral in their political views, weredrafted into the Confederate Army over their strong objections. Confederate authorities took their reluctance to serve as a sign of rebellion and sent in troops. A violent confrontation between Confederate soldiers and civilians took place on August 10, 1862, inKinney County, Texas, leading to the deaths of 34 German Texans who were fleeing toMexico to avoid the draft.

• Allendorf, Donald (2006).Long Road to Liberty: The Odyssey of a German Regiment in the Yankee Army; The 15th Missouri Volunteer Infantry. Kent State University Press.ISBN 9780873388719.
• Baron, Frank (2012).Abraham Lincoln and the German Immigrants: Turners and Forty-Eighters (Yearbook of German-American Studies, Supplemental Issue, Vol 4). Lawrence, Kan.: The Society for German-American Studies.ISSN 0741-2827.
• Bearden-White, Christina (2016). "Illinois Germans and the Coming of the Civil War: Reshaping Ethnic Identity".Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society.109 (3):231–251.doi:10.5406/jillistathistsoc.109.3.0231.
• Burton, William L. (1988).Melting Pot Soldiers: The Union's Ethnic Regiments. Ames, IA: Iowa State University Press.ISBN 0-8138-1115-5.
• Efford, Alison Clark (2013).German Immigrants: Race and Citizenship in the Civil War Era. Cambridge University Press.ISBN 9781316025734.
• Engle, Stephen D. (1993).Yankee Dutchman: The Life of Franz Sigel. Fayetteville, AR: University of Arkansas Press.ISBN 1-55728-273-0.
• Faust, Albert Bernhardt (1909).The German Element in the United States. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
• Kamphoefner, Walter D. (1991)."German-Americans and Civil War Politics: A Reconsideration of the Ethnocultural Thesis".Civil War History.37 (3):232–246.
• Kamphoefner, Walter D. (April 2012)."Missouri Germans and the Cause of Union and Freedom".Missouri Historical Review.106 (2):115–36.
• Kamphoefner, Walter D. (1975). "St-Louis Germans And The Republican-Party, 1848-1860".Mid-America-An Historical Review.57 (2):69–88.
• Kamphoefner, Walter D. (1999). "New perspectives on Texas Germans and the Confederacy".Southwestern Historical Quarterly.102 (4):440–455.JSTOR 30242540.
• Kaufmann, Wilhelm (1999). Tolzmann, Don Heinrich; Mueller, Werner D.; Ward, Robert E. (eds.).The Germans in the American Civil War, With a Biographical Directory. Translated by Rowan, Steven. Carlisle, Pa.: John Kallmann.ISBN 9780965092678.
• Linedecker, Clifford L., ed. (2002).Civil War, A-Z: The Complete Handbook of America's Bloodiest Conflict. New York: Ballantine Books.ISBN 0-89141-878-4.
• Lonn, Ella (2002) [1940].Foreigners in the Confederacy. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.ISBN 9780807854006.
• Mekel, Sonja (1 April 2008)."Mekel on Schaller and Schaller,'Soldiering for Glory'".H-Net:Humanities and Social Sciences Online. Michigan State University Department of History. Retrieved4 June 2023.
• Öfele, Martin W. (2004).German Speaking-Officers in the U.S. Colored Troops, 1863-1867. University Press of Florida.ISBN 978-0-8130-2692-3.
• Reinhart, Joseph R. (2010).A German Hurrah: Civil War Letters of Friedrich Bertsch and Wilhelm Stängel, 9th Ohio Infantry. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press.ISBN 9781606350386.
• Reinhart, Joseph R. (2006).August Willich's Gallant Dutchmen: Civil War Letters from the 32nd Indiana Infantry. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press.ISBN 9780873388627.
• Reinhart, Joseph R. (2004).Two Germans in the Civil War: The Diary of John Daeuble and the Letters of Gottfried Rentschler, 6th Kentucky Infantry. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press.ISBN 9781572332799.
• Reinhart, Joseph R. (Autumn 2019)."Louisville's Germans in the Civil War Era".Register of the Kentucky Historical Society.117 (3 & 4):437–484.doi:10.1353/khs.2019.0096.
• Rosengarten, Joseph George (1890).The German Soldier in the Wars of the United States. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott..
• Tafel, Gustav (2010).The Cincinnati Germans in the Civil War. Translated and edited with Supplements on Germans from Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana in the Civil War by Don Heinrich Tolzmann. Milford, Ohio: Little Miami.ISBN 9781932250862.
• Valuska, David; Keller, Christian (2004).Damn Dutch: Pennsylvania Germans at Gettysburg. Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania: Stackpole Books.ISBN 0-8117-0074-7..
• Williams, R. H.; Sansom, John W.The Massacre on the Nueces River; story of a Civil War tragedy. Grand Prairie, Texas: Frontier Times – via University of North Texas Libraries.
• Wittke, Carl (1952). "In Defense of the Union".Refugees of Revolution: The German Forty-Eighters in America. University of Pennsylvania Press. pp. 221–43.JSTOR j.ctv4s7m9n.19.

• Richter, Rüdiger B.; Balder, Hans-Georg (2013).Korporierte im amerikanischen Bürgerkrieg (2nd extended ed.). Hilden: WJK Verlag.ISBN 9783933892270.
• Kaufmann, Wilhelm (2015) [1911].Die Deutschen im Amerikanischen Bürgerkriege. Hamburg: Nikol Verlag.ISBN 978-3-86820-236-6.
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• Kamphoefner, Walter D.; Helbich, Wolfgang Johannes, eds. (2006).Germans in the Civil War: the letters they wrote home. Translated by Vogel, Susan Carter. U of North Carolina Press.doi:10.5149/9780807876596_kamphoefner.ISBN 9780807830444.
• Kamphoefner, Walter D.; Helbich, Wolfgang; Sommer, Ulrike, eds. (1991).News from the Land of Freedom: German Immigrants Write Home. Translated by Vogel, Susan Carter. Cornell University Press.ISBN 9780801425233.
• Rowan, Steven, ed. (1983).Germans for a Free Missouri: Translations from the St. Louis Radical Press, 1857-1862. Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press.ISBN 0-8262-0410-4.
• Schaller, Mary E.; Schaller, Martin N. (2007).Soldiering for Glory: The Civil War Letters of Col. Frank Schaller, Twenty-second Mississippi Infantry. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press.ISBN 1-57003-701-9.

• German-Americans in the Civil War
• German-American Soldiers in the US Civil War^{[permanent dead link]}
• Kentucky’s German Americans in the Civil War
• Germanic Surnames in Gray

• Social history of the American Civil War
• German-American history
• New York (state) in the American Civil War
• Missouri in the American Civil War
• Ohio in the American Civil War

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