ABSTRACT
With the beginning of the Civil War, 150,000 of 31 million Americans were Jewish. At least two-thirds of these were immigrants, and during the war another 50,000 arrived. Nearly all immigrant Jews had come to taste the nectar of freedom, long denied to them in their native lands. During the Civil War era, Jews resided in both the North and the South. The contributions of Jewish soldiers who fought in the Civil War have largely gone unnoticed. Between 1861 and 1865, approximately 9-10,000 Jews served in the Union Army while some 1,800 - 2,000 fought for the Confederacy. 1 From the initial firing at Fort Sumter to Appomatox, seven received the Congressional Medal of Honor for acts of valor. Many had recently immigrated to the U.S.; they were just beginning to adjust to their new country when war divided the nation. Some Jewish soldiers experienced blatant religious discrimination. 2
