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William Wray
Birney's Zouaves (infantry's nickname) 23rd Volunteers started
recruiting on April 18th 1861 in Philadelphia and was mustered
into the U.S. Army service on April 21st 1861. The regment's
uniforms were a dark blue Zouave color, and thusly became
known as Birney's Zouaves. Its combat history began at Harper's
Ferry on June 17th 1861. Even though experiencing transfers
into other combat organizations, Birney's Zouaves 23rd Volunteers
closed out their military existence in 1865. This publication
is not a history of the Civil War in general, nor does it
intend to show how battles should have been fought, but is
a recital of the life of the Twenty-third Pennsylvania Volunteers,
compiled by the Civil War hero, William J. Wray while he was
Secretary of the Survivors Association, 1903-1904 with references.
Meetings of the various companies had been held from time
to time, at which not only the history of the regiment had
been reviewed carefully, but also the individual records of
the officers and men, so that a complete and truthful story
of the old command appears in this volume.
William J. Wray had most of the
information for Birney's Zouaves Civil War compiled by 1903,
but by the time the book went to print and was available it
was May of 1904. This third edition has been a work in progress
for several years. When I told Frank P. Marrone, Jr. (founder
of the Birney's Zouaves re-enactors group) that we had to
have a cut-off date or we would never see the release of the
third edition, Frank deluged me with new information he had
been (and continues) to uncover. I was paralzyed for several
months (figuratively) by this onslaught of new information,
but slowly, began to process it and got on a roll to print
with a firm deadline. I think you will be pleased with the
result.
By strange coincidence, the printing date of this third edition,
May 2004, coincides with the 100th Year Anniversary release
of the original book. We have added a table of contents, a
new color section, new reports, letters and black and white
photo section, and we have moved all of the charts and tables
of the original book into one section for easy referencing
as well as re-paginating the original index. Detailed corrections
have been made (as they have been uncovered) to make this
Unit History as accurate as possible in keeping with William
Wray's vision. |
