He enlisted on April 16, 1861, as a private in the New Jersey State Militia. Two months later, fed up with garrison duty, he resigned to enlist in New York, again as a private. In January of 1865, the war nearly over, he resigned from the Army, a lieutenant colonel, age twenty-seven, and a veteran of Second Bull Run, South Mountain, Antietam, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and the Crater at Petersburg.
