This photograph of members of Company I was
probably taken in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin
shortly after the 26th Regiment was officially mustered into service on
the 17th of September 1862. From left to right are: Jacob
Stauff who enlisted as a Private on the 12th of August 1862; George
P. Traumer who enlisted in Company I as its First Sergeant on the 20th
of August; John Orth, selected as a Second Lieutenant in Company I on the
10th of September; and, Private Philip Waldorf and Corporal John Koege
(Kegie) enlisted on the 15th of August. When John
Orth is wounded at Thoroughfare Gap, Virginia during the Spring of
1863, George P. Traumer will become a Second
Lieutenant. George Traumer and Jacob Stauff will be the only people in
this photograph to be mustered out of Company I (Wenze Guard) at the end
of the war in 1865.
Write-up by Robert Kadlec
