Connie Kuntz wrote:

I read Brenda's history of Jane and noticed that around 6000 men from her area died in the Civil War and that got me wondering if perhaps her quilt was meant to be a memorial to those men. I know that the pieces in the quilt don't equal the number of men that died during that time, but I was wondering how many had died at the time she first may have finished the quilt top, if the number might match closer. Does anyone know more about this?

My husband, Tom, checked for me and found that:

According to the 1892 Revised Roster published by the Vermont Adjutant General says there were 1,832 killed in action or died of wounds, and 3405 died of disease, in prison or from accident, total 5237, for the whole war.

Specific numbers for each year haven't been tallied yet, but a quick count shows over 2,000 died in 1864 alone. (killed or mortally wounded, died of disease, and died in prison).

The total number lost for the entire war is less than the 5602 pieces in the quilt and the total up until 1863 is somewhere near 3200 men.

He added:

To quote an old adage, you can prove anything with statistics.

Here's some:

In his 1866 Report, the Vermont Adjutant General said:

28,967 officers and men served in Vermont organizations in the war.

In the same report, he said: the number credited to the State of Vermont by the War Department was 35,242 (which was 1,004 more than Vermont records indicated).

The difference between the 28k and 35k could be as follows: Navy, about 1000, Sharpshooters, about 580, African Americans, 170, regular army, who knows, frontier cavalry, 206 (were credited to 21st New York Cavalry), and a number of men who served in two or more units, who were counted twice. For instance, about 600 of the 1st Vermont Infantry (3 months regiment), reenlisted in other units and were counted twice, several hundred from the 9 months regiments reenlisted, and were counted twice, and about 1880 reenlisted in their original units, who were probably counted twice.

If you would like more information about Vermont in the Civil War please take a peek at Tom's website http://vermontcivilwar.org/index.shtml. There's loads of info, pictures and pretty much anything you want to know.