MSS 1094 AV Alexander McDowell McCook Papers

              MSS 1094 AV
Alexander McDowell McCook Papers
Page 1
OHIO HISTORICAL SOCIETY
Manuscripts/Audiovisual Collections
MSS 1094 AV
Alexander McDowell McCook Papers
1858-1962
OVERVIEW OF THE COLLECTION
Number: MSS 1094 AV
Title: Alexander McDowell McCook Papers
Creator: Unknown
Dates: 1858-1962
Media: Papers, scrapbooks, photographs
Quantity: 1.17 cubic feet
Location: Ohio Historical Center
HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE COLLECTION
Alexander McDowell McCook, the son of Daniel McCook and Martha Latimer, was born on April
22, 1831, in Columbiana County, Ohio. The following year the McCook family moved to Carroll
County. McCook received an appointment to West Point at age 16. He entered the academy on
July 1, 1847 and graduated in 1852. He became a career officer in the United States Army. He
held assignments in Newport Barracks, Kentucky; Jefferson Barracks, Missouri; and New
Mexico Territory. During the 1850s he participated in campaigns against Native American tribes
in the west, including the Utes and the Apaches.
After a leave of absence, McCook became an instructor of infantry tactics at West Point in 1858.
He held this position until the outbreak of the Civil War. On April 22, 1861 he was sent to
Columbus, Ohio, to muster in new recruits for Union Army. Alexander was the highest ranking
of the fourteen men from the McCook family who served in the Union Army during the Civil War.
They became known as “The Fighting McCooks.”
McCook’s was commissioned colonel of volunteers of the 1st Ohio Infantry, a three months
regiment, which he led to Washington, D.C. to assist in the defense of the capital in May-July
1861 and at the Battle of Bull Run, or First Manassas, on July 21, 1861. When the 1st Ohio was
reorganized as a three year regiment McCook was appointed Colonel. He was promoted to
Brigadier-General of volunteers on September 3, 1861. McCook assisted in organizing the
Second Division of the Army of the Ohio. This division participated in the capture of Nashville,
Tennessee in February 1862; the Battle of Shiloh in April 1862; and the Siege of Corinth in
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