Arrival in Amerca and the Civil War

The Pooch family arrived in America about four years before the Civil War started.  The exact date and the ports of departure and arrival are still unknown, but their Prussian dismissal (emigration) permit was dated May 20, 1857.  The earliest family records indicate that the father, Johann, was born in Reinfeld, Kreis (County) Rummelsburg, Pomerania in 1806.  Their last residence was about 15 miles away from Reinfeld in Trezebiatkov, Pomerania, on the eastern border of Pomerania with Prussia.  They settled in Metomen, Marquette County, Wisconsin.

The family consisted of Johann Gottlieb Pooch and his wife, Charlotte; five sons, Charles, born in 1836, John August, born in 1838, William, born in 1842, Henry, born in 1846, and  Frank, born in 1852; and one daughter, Ernestine Helene, born in 1850.  At the time of immigration, Charles was 21, John was 19, William was 15, Henry was 11, Ernestine was 7, and Frank was 5. 

The four older sons all served in the Union army, but joined at different times during the four year Civil War.  

The oldest son, Charles volunteered at the age of 24 for Co I, 7th Wisconsin Infantry on August 2, 1861.  The 7th Infantry became part of the Army of the Potomac which defended Washington, DC and fought Robert E. Lee’s Confederate Army.  The 7th, two other Wisconsin regiments, and an Indiana regiment were named the Iron Brigade for their bravery in the Battle of South Mountain in August 1862. Days later they were in the heart of the battle of Antietam.  A year later they held off the Confederate Army in the first day of the battle of Gettysburg in July 1863.  Charles re-enlisted in 1864 and was near to the surrender of Lee at Appomatox in 1865.  The 7th fought in twenty-six  battles in Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania.  He was mustered out on July 3, 1865.

Many books have been written about the Iron Brigade, including diaries of soldiers.  Thus, it is possible to know where Charles was on nearly every day of the war.  We hope to retrace his life in this blog.

On August 15, 1862, William, at the age of 20, enlisted in Co B, 32nd Wisconsin Infantry.  The unit was mustered into service on September 25, 1862 and left Wisconsin for Memphis, Tennessee, on October 30 and moved through Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, the Carolinas, Virginia, and Washington D.C. It participated in the Siege of Atlanta, Sherman's March to the Sea, the Battle of Bentonville, and the surrender of the Confederate army. 

John August was drafted and mustered in Co D, 1st Wisconsin Cavalry on November 20, 1863 when he was 25 years old.  The regiment served in Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia, and participated in the capture of Confederate President Jefferson Davis on May 10, 1865.  He served until the end of the War and was mustered out at Edgefield, Tennessee on July 19, 1865.

Henry, at the age of 19, enlisted in Company K, 3rd Wisconsin Infantry on February 8, 1865.  The 3rd Infantry was in Sherman’s March to the Sea where he was hospitalized by sunstroke in a march from Wilmington to Goldsboro, North Carolina.  He was mustered out on July 3, 1865.

More details are available for each these Union veterans and will be added as time goes along.

Written by Arlin Krueger

The American Civil War Begins

At 4:30 am on April 12, 1861 the bombardment of Fort Sumter at Charleston, South Caroline signaled the formal beginning of what has come to be known as the Civil War in America. Beginning on December 20, 1860 states began seceding from the Union beginning with South Carolina followed by Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas. On February 9, 1861 the Confederate Army was formed. Abraham Lincoln was sworn in as President of the Union on March 4, 1861. A confrontation over maintaining the Union and dealing with the issue of slavery had been long brewing. On April 12 the military conflict began.

Wisconsin was a free state and a center of the abolitionist movement. The Supreme Court ruling on the Dred Scott case had generated strong public opinion among many people of Wisconsin. The ruling ordered Federal officers to return freed slaves from free states and return them to owners in slave states. Slaves were seen as property and the constitutional right to own property was to be enforced. There had been intense debate over the issue of slavery since 1854 among the people of Wisconsin.

Our maternal family of origin had arrived in Wisconsin in 1859 from Pomerania and Prussia in Northern Germany, a region now included in Poland. The Pooch family was restless as war swept over and again through the relatively flat land area along the Vistula River just south of the Baltic Sea. Crossing the Atlantic by sailing ships that brought many immigrants, they landed at New York City and made their way west to the Wisconsin Territory which became a state on May 11, 1858.

We can assume that they were affected by the mood of other people in Wisconsin as the Federal government moved to enforce slave ownership in the free state of Wisconsin where slavery was forbidden. Some Wisconsin citizens were of the opinion that secession was a divine right. When President Lincoln asked for 75,000 volunteers there was slow response. It was a tense time as the Union and Confederacy moved into what would involve the loss of more people than in all the other wars fought by Americans since that time.

It would be summer time before the Pooch boys joined the Union ranks

Written by Delton Krueger

Note: This weblog is presented by Delton and Arlin Krueger, grandsons of Charles Pooch Ford who would be in the Union Army of the Potomac for nearly the entire war from 1861-1865. Comments from readers will be used to add information over the next four years. We will attempt to present information related to grandfather and his brothers who were all in the Civil War at some point.   Thanks for following this historical adventure. We welcome comments and suggestions.