Appendix D: Confederates from California
Summer 1995, Vol. 27, No. 2 | "The Little Regiment: Civil War Units and Commands"
By Michael P. Musick
In order to identify by their formal unit designations units such as the Orange Rangers or the DeKalb Regiment, the War Department compiled various aids, generally called synonym files. Several of these were printed in very limited editions and reprinted in 1961 as Personnel of the Civil War (1961), edited with an introduction by William Frayne Amann. The Amann publication includes: Local Designations of Confederate Organizations; Memorandum of Armies, Corps, and Geographical Commands in the Confederate States, 1861 - 1865; Memorandum of General Officers [C.S.A.]; Record of the General Officers of the Armies of the United States during the War of the Rebellion; and List of Synonyms of Organizations in the Volunteer Service of the United States. Related printed works that are not included or reprinted are List of Field Officers, Regiments and Battalions in the Confederate States Army, 1861 - 1865, and an untitled volume of synonyms for Confederate artillery organizations. Many of the copies of the originals of the volumes in the National Archives include handwritten addenda.
Far less well known than these printed works is a manuscript version for Confederate units, on 3 1/4-by-8-inch cards, which is the most complete source on this subject. This is in RG 109, entry 459, and is arranged by state, with nonstate categories at the end. Among the cards is this entry in the nonstate category, a reference based on special orders regarding a unit found in no other compilation: Gorham's Co. of Californians, C.S.A.
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