We Were the Ninth
A History of the Ninth Regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry April 17, 1861, to June 7, 1864
by Constantin Grebner
Civil War Sesquicentennial Edition
2009, 348 pp
courtesy of our partner, Atlas
“. . . another valuable source for understanding the war from the common soldiers’ point of view.” —The Journal of Southern History
“Despite hardship and danger, The Ninth never wavered or shirked but did its duty to the end. . . . Of those who had taken the oath in 1861, fewer than half remained to be discharged in 1864.” —from the Introduction
We Were The Ninth is a translation, carefully edited and thoroughly annotated, of an important Civil War regiment. The Ninth Ohio—composed of Ohio Germans mostly from Cincinnati—saw action at Rich Mountain and Carnifex Ferry in West Virginia, Shiloh, Corinth, Perryville, Hoover’s Gap, Nashville, Chattanooga, and Chickamauga.
The Ninth began the War amid misgivings (Would a German-speaking regiment in the Union Army cause chaos?) and ended its active service among the honored units. It continued as an active German-speaking veterans’ organization. Constantin Grebner published this significant history, in German, in 1897 and noted that it “is intended as neither a history of the war nor a definitive account of battles. Rather, it is restricted to a straightforward, veracious report of what happened to The Ninth, and to recounting as accurately as possible The Ninth’s experiences as a wartime regiment.” Frederic Trautmann’s English translation is faithful to Grebner’s original text, preserving its integrity while maintaining its energy, precision, and grace.
Frederic Trautmann is professor emeritus of rhetoric and communication at Temple University. He has written more than fifty articles, reviews, and short translations for professional and historical journals and is the author, editor, or translator of numerous books.