General Wheeler writes, "There were about nine regiments and three battalions of reserves...." As a high school student exploring this volume for the first time, the statement seemed to beg the question, can these "nine regiments and three battalions of reserves" be identified? I've wondered ever since. In the section entitled, "Extracts from Official War Records", Wheeler attempts to do this.

1. First Reserve Regiment, Col Daniel E Huger
2. Second Reserve Regiment, Col Olin F Rice
3. Third Reserve Regiment, Col William M Brooks
4. First Reserve Battalion, Lieut Col W M Stone (became Fourth Reserves)
5. Third Reserve Battalion, Capt F S Strickland
6. Fourth Reserve Battalion, Lieut Col E M Underhill
7. First Junior Reserve Regiment
8. Second Junior Reserve Regiment
9. Third Senior Reserve Battalion
10. Fourth Senior Reserves (Regiment?)

Wheeler identifies the 1st Reserve with the 4th Reserve Battalion, so we're left with six regiments and three battalions. How did he arrive at the figure of nine reserve regiments? If we add the 62nd, 63rd and 65th to his list, that's nine.

Unless Joe Wheeler learned a different way to count while growing up in Derby, Connecticut, I don't know of another way to get to that number.

My notes compressed the Alabama Reserves as follows --

1. First Reserve Regt, Col Daniel E Huger = First Junior Reserve Regt = 62nd Alabama Regt.
2. Second Reserve Regiment, Col Olin F Rice = Second Junior Reserve Regiment = 63rd Alabama Regt
3. Third Reserve Regiment, Col William M Brooks
4. First Reserve Battalion = 4th Reserve Battalion = 4th Senior Reserve Regt
5. Third Reserve Battalion, Capt F S Strickland = Third Senior Reserve Battalion

That's four regiments and one battalion. In his narrative Wheeler tells us that "some of these were, in 1864, consolidated under command of Col Daniel Huger, of the First Reserve Regiment, and the new regiment was known as the Sixty-Second Alabama. Others, under Col Olin F Rice, of the Second Reserve Regiment, were known as the Sixty-third."

There's no evidence to support "some of these" being consolidated to form the 62nd and 63rd Alabama Regiment. After a year in service (1864-65), both Alabama junior reserve regiments transferred from the Reserve forces of Alabama to the PACS. No consolidation required. That took place near the end of the war, not in 1864.

After a year in service young men enrolled as Junior Reserves (age 17) became eighteen, making them eligible for the PACS. The Official Records includes a petition by officers of the 1st Alabama Reservesin November 1864 for transfer of the 1st Reserve Regiment to PACS service. On the other hand, members of the 3rd and 4th Alabama Senior Reserves would never reverse course and become young enough to qualify for the PACS. Until reaching age 50 or the Pearly Gates or being discharged, Senior Reserves would always be Senior Reserves.

Wheeler states that the 1st, 3rd and 4th Reserve Battalions were consolidated under Underhill's command to become the 65th Alabama. Where's the evidence to support this? As Senior Reserves, neither the 3rd or the 4th could have been transferred to PACS service.

Correspondence from the Official Records (Series IV, volume 3) makes it clear that the War Department regarded Junior and Senior Reserves as different types of units. An order to consolidate reserve units wouldn't have come from Richmond, and records show the 3rd Reserve Battalion (Senior) never lost its identity.

A company was added to the 1st Reserve Battalion in Sept 1864 to increase it to a regiment known as the 4th Alabama Senior Reserves. That much is correct. During one month (Nov 1 - Dec 1, 1864) the 4th Reserves was reported as a battalion, perhaps because one of its ten companies (the "Chunchula Guards") had been reassigned to the Mobile City Battalion. Regiment or battalion, there is still only one 4th Alabama Reserves.

Wheeler says the majority of the new regiment remained at Mobile, a "detachment" retiring from Montgomery to fight at Girard. Extracts from the OR report 150 present for duty with the "Fourth Senior Reserves" at Montgomery, Feb 20, 1865. Wheeler mistakenly assumes this is a detachment. Since nearly all Alabama senior reserve units not recruited in Mobile had been reassigned to the interior of Alabama, that figure must represent most if not all of Underhill's command.

As noted, the 1st and 2nd Junior Reserves became PACS units (62nd and 63rd Alabama Regiments). The 65th Alabama must have been eligible for PACS service, so it couldn't have included Senior Reserves. The only available unit then in the state that could have been increased to a regiment was the Mobile City Battalion. The "Chunchula Guards" was returned from the 4th Alabama Reserves to the Mobile City Battalion. A few members of this company surrendered as Co "G", 65th Alabama Regt.

That's not much to go on, but it's all we have at the moment.