Hello Debbie,
Another person descended from these Cooks and Seays have been talking about them, one having a pic of him in early war uniform. But yes, I kow what you mean by feeling like one big family. My Whites, from Spartanburg, were much the same as you described. Four marched off to war and with the 5th S.C. and then into the PSS. The 5th brother was there along with his brothers but not sure if he was just there helping them around the camp, to take them home, or what, but young Jasper C. "Jack" White, only like 16 in 1863, was the only brother out of five to survive the war, my gr gr grandfather John Warren White among them.
Dave