136,000 Union soldiers, more than half of those who had volunteered in 1861 and whose three-year enlistments were set to expire in the summer of 1864, reenlisted. And an overwhelming majority of Union troops, 78 percent, cast their votes for Lincoln that fall, rejecting the Democratic Party’s call for peace negotiations and with that the man they had nominated, their still-admired former chief, George McClellan.
