Faces of the Civil War

Young Hero
Johnny Clem, from Ohio, sought to enlist in the Union army when he was 10 but was not allowed to actually do so until he turned 12. He saw action at the Battle of Chickamauga in Tennessee in 1863, where he is said to have carried a musket cut down to his size. The story goes that he shot a Confederate officer who asked him to surrender. After the battle, he was promoted to sergeant. Later he was captured by the Confederate army and freed in a prisoner exchange. Nationally famous by war's end, Clem graduated high school in 1870.

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