This volume does not propose to review the causes, rise and progress of the unhappy civil strife, which for more than two years has rent our land; neither is it designed to describe all the operations which have marked the war in the single department of Virginia and Maryland.
It aims merely, as the title page indicates, at giving a narrative of one of the many Regiments which the Empire State has sent into the field, together with a description of the various campaigns in which it participated.
Nor should it be inferred, from the embodying of their experience in book form, that the soldiers of the 33d esteem their services more worthy of notice than those of numerous other Regiments. The work has its origin in the general desire expressed on the part of the members and friends of the command to have the scenes and incidents connected with its two years’ history collected and preserved in readable shape—valuable for future reference—interesting as a souvenir of the times.
The plan, as will readily be seen, comprises separate sketches of each company until merged into the Regiment; the regimental history from the period of its organization at Elmira, in May, 1861, until its return from the war, May, 1863; brief biographies of the various officers, and muster rolls of the men.
Such facts as did not come under the personal observation of the writer, have been derived from the statements and reports of Division and Brigade Generals, and other sources. Owing to the confusion consequent upon the death, disease and desertion attending a two years’ campaign of nearly one thousand men, some of the members may find themselves incorrectly “accounted for.”
A double interest attaches to the numerous engravings which embellish the volume, from the fact that instead of being gotten up to order, they were “drawn on the spot” by a skilful artist—an officer of the Regiment—who participated in all the scenes through which it passed. They constitute in themselves a pictorial history of the first two years of the Eastern campaigns.