When exploring the records of the military organizations from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania which fought to defend America’s Union during the U.S. Civil War, researchers will periodically encounter muster rolls and other records which designated certain soldiers as “Unassigned Men.” According to Samuel P. Bates in his History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5, many of these men were simply awaiting assignment, and were eventually added to the rosters of specific companies within the numbered regiments of Pennsylvania Volunteers; some, however, were classified incorrectly—their reassignments never noted by clerks or updated by historians, or their names spelled differently from one roster to the next.

A fair number of soldiers, though, remained unassigned for the duration of their service. Mustering in at various phases during the Pennsylvania Volunteers’ respective tenures from 1861-1865, these “Unassigned Men” performed general duties for the central operations functions of their regiments without ever being assigned to specific companies within those regiments.

In other cases, men listed as “unassigned” may have been among the many Civil War dead interred in unmarked graves and whose resting places remain unidentified.

The following is a list compiled by Bates of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers’ “Unassigned Men”:

Clewell, Joseph (also see “Company G”)*
* Source for Corrected Data: Civil War Veterans’ Card File, Pennsylvania State Archives

Dunn, Dennis
Term of Service: 24 April 1863—unknown service end date (not on muster-out roll)
Rank: Private

Gehle, William
Term of Service: 9 July 1863—unknown service end date (not on muster-out roll)
Rank: Private

Hanes, John (also see “Company D”)*
* Source for Corrected Data: Civil War Veterans’ Card File, Pennsylvania State Archives

Hartley, David
Term of Service: 23 February 1865 – 24 February 1865 (mustered in for one-year term; deserted)
Rank: Private
Service Distinctions: Mustered in for one-year term of service 23 February 1865. Deserted the next day

Keiser, Uriah William
Alternate Spellings of Given Name: Uriah, Uric, Urie. Alternate Spellings of Surname: Keiser, Keizer, Kiser
Term of Service: 20 February 1864 – 18 or 29 July 1864 (died from disease-related complications at New Orleans)
Rank: Private
Honors/Service Distinctions: Mustered in with the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers as a Private 20 February; according to the U.S. Civil War Pension application filed by his widow, Margaret Keiser, he remained on the 47th’s roster of “Unassigned Men” for the duration of his service. Fell ill with tertiary intermittent fever or camp fever and other medical complications, and was was initially admitted to Union Army medical facilities aboard the USS Laurel Hill before being transferred to the Union’s Marine General Hospital at New Orleans, Louisiana on 23 May 1864. Transferred from the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers to the 11th Company of the 1st Battery of the U.S. Army’s Veterans Reserve Corps (also known as the “invalid corps”) on 22 June 1864, he died from disease-related complications at the Union Marine General or Barracks Hospital in New Orleans, Louisiana on 18 or 29 July 1864. He was interred at the Chalmette National Cemetery in Section 57, Grave 4477

Rogers, John
Alternate Spellings of Given Name: John, Jonathan. Alternate Spellings of Surname: Rodgers, Rogers
Term of Service: 2 September 1861—unknown service end date (not on muster-out roll)
Rank: Private
Service Distinctions: May have mustered in later with the regiment’s Company A on 13 August 1863 as “Rogers, John S.”; however, no muster out date is listed on either the Company A or Unidentified Men entries for soldiers by this name or any spelling variants in the Civil War Veterans’ Card File at the Pennsylvania State Archives

Schuyler, James
Term of Service: 1 December 1863—unknown service end date (not on muster-out roll)
Rank: Private

Seiner, Jacob
Term of Service: 15 January 1864—unknown service end date (not on muster-out roll)
Rank: Private
Prior Service: Transferred from Company F, 181st Pennsylvania Volunteers 15 January 1864. Not listed on 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers’ final rolls for December 1865/January 1866

Sock, Andrew
Term of Service: 19 October 1864—unknown service end date (not on muster-out roll)
Rank: Private

Wagner, Henry E.* (also see “Company A”)
* Source for Corrected Data: Civil War Veterans’ Card File, Pennsylvania State Archives

Wilts, John (see “Witz, John” below)

Witz, John (also see “Company E”)
Alternate Spellings of Surname: Wilts, Wiltz, Wilz, Witts, Witz
Term of Service: 26 February 1864—23 June 1864 (died from typhoid fever near Morganza, Louisiana; alternate date of death: 21 June 1864)
Rank: Private
Service Distinctions: Died from typhoid fever on 23 June 1864 aboard the USS Laurel Hill, a Union Army hospital ship that was docked near Morganza, Louisiana; possibly buried at sea (alternate date of death: 21 June 1864)