Confederate POWs who swore allegiance to the United States during the American Civil War
Galvanized Yankees was a term from the American Civil War denoting former Confederate prisoners of war who swore allegiance to the United States and joined the Union Army. Approximately 5,600 former Confederate soldiers enlisted in the United States Volunteers, organized into six regiments of infantry between January 1864 and November 1866. Of those, more than 250 had begun their service as Union soldiers, were captured in battle, then enlisted in prison to join a regiment of the Confederate States Army. They surrendered to Union forces in December 1864 and were held by the United States as deserters, but were saved from prosecution by being enlisted in the 5th and 6th U.S. Volunteers. An additional 800 former Confederates served in volunteer regiments raised by the states, forming ten companies. Four of those companies saw combat in the Western Theater against the Confederate Army, two served on the western frontier, and one became an independent company of U.S. Volunteers, serving in Minnesota.
The term "galvanized" has also been applied to former Union soldiers enlisting in the Confederate Army, including the use of "galvanized Yankees" to designate them. At least 1,600 former Union prisoners of war enlisted in Confederate service in late 1864 and early 1865, most of them recent German or Irish immigrants who had been drafted into Union regiments. 
The practice of recruiting from prisoners of war began in 1862 at Camp Douglas at Chicago, Illinois, with attempts to enlist Confederate prisoners who expressed reluctance to exchange following their capture at Fort Donelson. Some 228 prisoners of mostly Irish extraction were enlisted by Col. James A. Mulligan before the War Department banned further recruitment March 15. The ban continued until 1863, except for a few enlistments of foreign-born Confederates into largely ethnic regiments.
Three factors led to a resurrection of the concept: an outbreak of the American Indian Wars by tribes in Minnesota and on the Great Plains; the disinclination of paroled but not exchanged Federal troops to be used to fight them; and protests of the Confederate government that any use of paroled troops in Indian warfare was a violation of the Dix–Hill prisoner of war cartel. In January 1863, following issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation, the United States began to actively recruit black soldiers. The following May, the Confederate Congress passed a joint resolution suspending exchange of black Union soldiers and their white officers, and ordering that they instead be put on trial and punished. On July 30, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln ordered suspension of exchanges of Confederate prisoners until the Confederacy agreed to treat black prisoners the same as white prisoners.
Gen. Gilman Marston, commandant of the huge prisoner of war camp at Point Lookout, Maryland, recommended that Confederate prisoners be enlisted in the U.S. Navy, which Secretary of War Edwin Stanton approved December 21. General Benjamin Butler's jurisdiction included Point Lookout, and he advised Stanton that more prisoners could be recruited for the Army than the Navy. The matter was then referred to President Lincoln, who gave verbal authorization on January 2, 1864, and formal authorization on March 5 to raise the 1st United States Volunteer Infantry for three years' service without restrictions as to use. On September 1, Lincoln approved 1,750 more Confederate recruits in order to bolster his election chances in Pennsylvania, enough to form two more regiments, to be sent to the frontier to fight American Indians. The final two regiments of U.S. Volunteers were recruited in the spring of 1865 to replace the 2nd and 3rd U.S.V.I., which had been enlisted as one-year regiments.
Due to doubts about their ultimate loyalty, galvanized Yankees in federal service were generally assigned to garrison forts far from the Civil War battlefields or in action against Indians in the west. However, desertion rates among the units of galvanized Yankees were little different from those of state volunteer units in Federal service. Galvanized troops of the U.S. Volunteers on the frontier served as far west as Camp Douglas, Utah; as far south as Fort Union, New Mexico; and as far north as Fort Benton, Montana.
Origin of term.
The National Park Service describes the origin of the expression "galvanized Yankee" in a bulletin published in 1992 for visitors to the Gateway Arch National Park (then known as the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial):
The term "galvanized" is most commonly associated with metal when it is coated with zinc to protect it from corrosion. In the process the surface color of the metal is altered, but underneath the coating the steel is unchanged. During the Civil War, in both Northern and Southern prison camps, soldiers sometimes decided to "galvanize," or change sides, to save themselves from the horrors of prison life. Like the metal, these galvanized soldiers in many cases were still "Good old Rebels," or "Billy Yanks," underneath their adopted uniforms.
The expression "galvanized Yankees" sprang up as a term of deprecation among Confederate prisoners for those who chose to enlist. At the same time, the use of "white-washed Rebels" as a reference came into being among Federal state regiments stationed on the frontier at the time when the 1st U.S.V.I. arrived. Dee Brown cites documentation from March and April 1865 indicating that the term was first used to characterize captured Federals who turned Confederate. The general use of "galvanized Yankees" originated in a story in the "Springfield Republican" (Springfield, Massachusetts) on May 25, 1865, by Samuel Bowles, who wrote:
Among the present limited number of troops on the Plain are two regiments of infantry, all from the rebel army. They have cheerfully re-enlisted into the federal service. They are known in the army as "white-washed rebs," or as they call themselves, "galvanized Yankees."
Federal regiments composed of "galvanized Yankees".
United States Volunteers.
The 1st U.S.V.I. was recruited at Point Lookout prison camp between January 21 and April 22, 1864, as a three-year regiment. Assigned to the District of Eastern Virginia, Department of Virginia and North Carolina, it moved to Norfolk, Virginia, where on orders of General Grant it was relegated to provost duty there, Portsmouth, Virginia, and Elizabeth City, North Carolina. In August 1864, Grant ordered it to the Department of the Northwest in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The 1st U.S.V.I. traveled by ship to New York City, and by train to Chicago, where it received further orders splitting the regiment. Four companies continued to Milwaukee, while six companies (B, C, D, E, H, and K) were sent to St. Louis, Missouri, arriving there August 22. They moved by the steamboat "Effie Deans" and by forced march to Fort Rice, Dakota Territory, arriving there October 17 for garrison duty. Conditions were hard over the winter, and fully 11% of the command died of illness, primarily scurvy. Between May 10 and August 31, 1865, Company K garrisoned Fort Berthold and Company B the trading post known as Fort Union at the mouth of the Yellowstone, obliged to travel by steamboat through hostile territory. Four companies were present at Fort Rice, along with two companies of the 4th U.S.V.I., when a large force of Lakota and Cheyenne led by Sitting Bull attacked for three hours on July 28, 1865, making away with the entire horse herd and killing two soldiers. In October 1865, the battalion returned to St. Louis to muster out November 27.
The four companies continuing on to Wisconsin in August 1864 were ordered to the District of Minnesota. Their muster out in July 1865 was canceled and in October, they were ordered to build and garrison Fort Fletcher, Kansas, and man two outposts at Monument Station and Ponds Creek Station, also in Kansas, to protect the new Butterfield Overland Despatch stagecoach route. Companies A, F, G, and I of the 1st U.S.V.I. mustered out at Fort Leavenworth on May 22, 1866, after 25 months of active service, the longest service of any of the "galvanized Yankees."
Authorized in October 1864 at the Rock Island prisoner camp in Illinois as a one-year regiment, the 2nd U.S.V.I. was not organized until February 1865. It was ordered to the Department of the Missouri and sent by rail to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where it was assigned to duty in the District of Upper Arkansas along the Santa Fe Trail from the Little Arkansas River to Fort Dodge, Kansas, and along the Cimarron Crossing to Fort Lyon, Colorado. From Fort Leavenworth the unit marched to Fort Riley, and stationed companies there and at Salem, Fort Ellsworth, Fort Larned, Fort Zarah and Fort Scott, Kansas. Companies F and G were involved in the establishment of Fort Dodge in the summer of 1865. Their duties involved scouting, wagon train escort and operating against Indians. Members of the regiment were present as guards at the signing of the Little Arkansas Treaty. The regiment mustered out at Fort Leavenworth November 7, 1865.
The 3rd U.S.V.I. was authorized at the Rock Island prisoner camp in October 1864 as a one-year regiment but not organized until February 1865. It was ordered to the Department of the Missouri, arriving at Fort Kearny, Nebraska, April 9, 1865, where it was assigned to duty in the Districts of Nebraska and Colorado. Companies A and B were stationed at Fort Kearney; C and D at Cottonwood, Colorado; E and F at Fort Rankin; and G and H at Julesburg, Colorado, protecting overland mail routes from Indian attacks. Companies I and K were sent to Fort Laramie, and on May 15, 1865, were parceled out in small detachments along 300 miles of the Pacific Telegraph Company line from Laramie to South Pass, Territory of Idaho (now Wyoming). Company I was involved in numerous skirmishes, including combat at the Battle of the Platte Bridge Station, and suffered higher casualties than any other company of the 3rd U.S.V.I. The regiment mustered out November 29, 1865, having served with distinction, including a low desertion rate.
The 4th U.S.V.I. was organized as a three-year regiment at Point Lookout on October 31, 1864, although only six companies could be induced to enlist. The quality of recruit was not as high as that of the earlier 1st U.S.V.I. The regiment waited at Portsmouth, Virginia, in hopes that more troops could be raised, but calls for men from the west led to its transfer to the frontier at the end of April 1865. 10% deserted before the regiment reached Sioux City, Iowa, in Department of the Northwest, on May 28. Many were arrested and held in confinement before returning to the ranks. Two companies were stationed at Fort Rice, then at Fort Sully; one at Fort Berthold; and three at Fort Randall until June 1866, when the six companies were recalled to Leavenworth, mustering out as they arrived between June 18 and July 2.
The 5th U.S.V.I. was enlisted at the Alton and Camp Douglas prisoner camps in Illinois in March and April 1865 as a three-year regiment, then ordered to Fort Leavenworth on April 28, 1865, at the urging of Maj. Gen. Grenville Dodge, commanding general of the Department of the Missouri. From there it moved to Fort Riley between May 18 and May 28 to relieve units of the 2nd U.S.V.I. in guarding the Santa Fe Trail. In August three companies were sent to Fort Halleck, Idaho Territory (now Wyoming); two companies to Camp Wardwell, Colorado; two companies to Fort Lyon, and Company B to Denver for quartermaster duty. Companies saw periodic duty at Fort McPherson, Nebraska; Fort Collins, Colorado; and Fort John Buford, Wyoming. Companies C and D, consisting mostly of former Union soldiers who had been captured after enlisting in the Confederate 10th Tennessee, escorted the Sawyers expedition to build a road to Montana and garrisoned Fort Reno for nearly a year. Companies A through G reassembled at Fort Kearny in August 1866 and mustered out on October 11. Companies H, I, and K garrisoned Fort Lyon until October 1866, when Gen. William T. Sherman closed the post for deplorable living conditions. They marched to Fort Leavenworth, where they mustered out on November 13, the last of the "galvanized Yankees".
The 6th U.S.V.I. was recruited from prisoner camps at Camp Chase, Ohio (two companies); Camp Morton, Indiana (two companies); and Camp Douglas, Illinois (six companies), as a three-year regiment, and assembled on April 2, 1865, at Camp Fry near Chicago for outfitting and drill. It traveled by rail to Fort Leavenworth,