Alan J. Pitts
Right name/wrong unit....
Mon Feb 26 23:28:39 2001


He's right where you said, Co. "D", 40th Ala. Inf. Regt., listed under J. S. Waller. Some records mention his first name as 'John'. Here are a few notes from my records about his company:

Company “D” of Choctaw County “Fielder Rifles”

Captain Augustus A. Coleman. Appointed Colonel May 27, 1862, to rank May 16, 1862; official appointment dated October 15, 1862.
Capatin Abraham G. Campbell. Promoted Captain May 27, 1862, to rank May 1, 1862.

Company elections took place on March 18, 1862, officers and men being accepted in Confederate service the same day. Waller's records show that he joined on Mar. 22, 1862. They mustered at Cantonment Walter, Alabama, May 2, 1862. Initially referred to as Company “E”, its designation was changed to “D” within a few weeks.

There are a number of great histories on the 40th Alabama available if you wish to know its history. Briefly, the regiment drilled near Mobile until the end of 1862 when it was called to defense of Vicksburg. On Apr. 28, 1863, Co. "D" became one of three companies to be sent on a mission up the Sunflower River. Cut off from the rest of the regiment, this detachment joined Ector's Texas Brigade and went to Georgia to fight at Chickamauga, Sept. 19-20, 1863. It was reunited with the rest of the regiment near Chattanooga in October of 1863 and placed in Moore's Alabama Brigade.

Your ancestor was listed as killed at Lookout Mtn. in the fighting on the slopes below Craven House on Nov. 24, 1863. However, Federal records show that he was captured and sent to prison at Rock Island, IL, where he remained until May 3, 1865. At that time he was sent down the Mississippi to New Orleans and released on May 23, 1865.

Please check into those books I mentioned. The detachment listed above was also called Stone's Battalion.