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The Alton Jaeger Guard is a new Campaigner Mess being formed in the St. Louis area. We are comprised of members stretching through Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Our main focus is on Western Federal, and specifically, Illinois troops. Many of our members are seasoned campaigners, but a large number are WWII re-enactors making the transition.
Our first campaign was Ft. Blakely, where we portrayed Company E, 37th Illinois and had the honor of being the color company, and the largest company present. We then attended Pigs and Tomatoes and had an excellent time at that event hosted by our fellow Sucker State Boys in the 36th Illinois.
For Memorial Day this year we wanted to do something special. Our mess is called the Alton Jaeger Guard, which was the name of a pre-war militia unit from our home base of Alton, Illinois. They eventually comprised Co. A. 9th Illinois Volunteer Infantry. However, we do not limit ourselves to portraying one unit from Alton, and try to represent various units. For Memorial Day, we chose to portray Company F. 32nd Illinois Volunteer Infantry, which was raised in Alton, Illinois. This storied regiment saw many campaigns, which were evident on the flag returned to the state after they captured Vicksburg.
Alton, Illinois is famous for being the place where Elijah P. Lovejoy was murdered and his printing press thrown into the river, in addition to having housed thousands of Confederate prisoners in a horrific prison located in town. However, another interesting piece of Alton history is the fact that it has the oldest Memorial Day Parade in the country. The parade was started in 1868 by local Union veterans, after having been told by women who had recently traveled south that all the Southern war graves were beautifully decorated, while the local ones in town seemed neglected. The Union veterans decided to form up in uniform, and muster at the National Cemetery where over 250 union soldiers were buried. They played funeral music, laid flowers, and fired a volley, before marching across town to another cemetery and doing the same thing. This became tradition, and ultimately became the Memorial Day Parade, the oldest in the nation. This year, we wanted to pay tribute to that.
First we replicated the torn and tattered colors of the 32nd Illinois, sent back after Vicksburg. After countless hours, we had an accurate representation of a flag that could tell alot more about the horrors this regiment saw than we could in our uniforms. We then mustered 40 men, who traveled from four states to come help with our ceremony. We had a three man color guard, two officers, a fifer and a drummer, and 33 rifles on the line. We marched the parade in full marching order, the first time Civil War soldiers had been seen in force on the streets of Alton in over 150 years. And the first in uniform period since the last veterans died, which is a tragedy considering the immense amount of Civil War history involving Alton.
Following the parade, which ended at the Upper Alton Cemetery as did the original route taken by the veterans, we due to time, had to do it backwards, and head down to the National Cemetery located in the city cemetery. This National Cemetery was started during the Civil War for Federal soldiers who died while in Alton. The first men buried there were assigned to the 13th US Infantry, who died of disease while serving their first post at the Alton Prison, which would eventually house thousands of Confederate POWs, Many men from various states are buried there, as countless troops stopped in Alton during the war. You will find alot of markers for men from the 77th Ohio, 37th Iowa, and 10th Kansas who served as prison guards while the prison dealt with an outbreak of Small Pox. Many guards also succumbed to the disease. Other soldiers from Alton who were killed during the war or died while home recuperating are buried there. We planned to lay carnations on the graves of the 275+ graves of Civil War soldiers located there, as well as those scattered throughout the city cemetery, including Col. F.S. Rutherford, commander of the 97th Illinois Infantry, and Col. John Kuhn, former Captain of the Alton Jaeger Guards and later commander of the 144th Illinois Infantry raised in Alton to guard the prison in 64.
After a short speech, the fifer and drummer played a funeral beat while the men rested on arms. We then stacked arms, handed out carnations and began the task of placing carnations on the graves. The men made fairly quick work going up and down the line at the cemetery while the fifer played a somber tune. I took a detail of men to go through the main cemetery to lay flowers and place flags on the stones that had been missed before stopping the detail at the grave of the former Captain of our namesake, John Kuhn. Col. Kuhn died just a few months after the war ended in a tragic accident/murder, and was buried in his family plot and the funeral was not done with military honors, surprising given the career he had during the war and his bravery which was well known from Shiloh. For the first time, John Kuhn had men by his grave to render proper military honors and respect. Two flowers were laid on his stone, and the detail returned down to the National Cemetery. The men fell in once more, took arms, and broke ranks just as a Spring shower began to come down.
I have been in the hobby since I was about 13 years old and have done countless events and been to some amazing places, but the feeling I had after having followed in the footsteps of the survivors of that terrible conflict, to pay homage to their fallen brothers, was a feeling I have a hard time putting into words. I cannot express my gratitude to all those who came out to support this endeavor, and I hope it reminded them, as it did me, why we do what we do. I've got some links below, including a full photo gallery from that day, and a brief teaser video shot by an videographer who was there that day.
Photo Gallery:https://www.altonjaegerguards.org/me...-day-2019.html
Video: https://youtu.be/uDUN38P_ys0
Local Newspaper Article: https://www.riverbender.com/articles...ards-35767.cfm
Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/altonjaegerguard/
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