Albert Cashier - Enlistment

Enlistment

On August 6, 1862, he enlisted into the 95th Illinois Infantry using the name Albert Cashier and was assigned to Company G. The regiment was part of the Army of the Tennessee under Ulysses S. Grant and fought in approximately forty battles, including the siege at Vicksburg, the Red River Campaign and the combat at Guntown, Mississippi, where they suffered heavy casualties.

Other soldiers thought that Cashier was just small and preferred to be alone, which was not that uncommon. He was once captured in battle, but escaped back to Union lines after overpowering a prison guard. Cashier fought with the regiment through the war until August 17, 1865, when all the soldiers were mustered in and out.

A transcription from a letter written by Thomas Hannah, Jr., a private in Company G, 95th Illinois Regiment, on 17 November 1862, from near Jackson, Tennessee reads:

" ... we have just discovered one of our soulder belonging to this rigment is a woman and she is found out and sent home she is one of those loose caractors that used to run around camp in rockford she put on mens cloths and enlisted just before we started ..."

Thomas Hannah indicates that this woman was sent back to Belvidere.

Also, footnote 4, Blanton, references a "Deposition of J. H. Hines." In fact, it was Robert Dunn Hannah, brother of Thomas, who gave the deposition in 1915. Thomas Hannah died 21 October 1865 from wounds suffered at Spanish Fort, Alabama.