Hi Hugh, Wow what a wonderful response! Thank you for taking the time to try and help me. I will try and digest what you and the others have sent and then maybe word another post. The "Civil War talk" which is so familiar to you and others is at times a bit much for me to absorb....I have to ponder various terms until I can understand it (ie., Trans-Mississippi etc.) I do have some excerpts from Tunard's book in my file, but even reading that confused me, with all the forming/disbanding, reforming, etc. and the thing with the two Company H's still throws me. Will probably spend the weekend trying to organize my CW files on Ben Allein (1827-1898.) He did own some land and possibly slaves, but not wealthy.

By the way, quite a while back while searching for "Pelican Rifles" on the Library of Congress, American Memory site, a neat photo of some sheet music came up with Pelican Rifles on the cover; I think it included images of all the songs inside but I can't read music so didn't print it all out; copied the cover and it's in Ben's file so will look for it tomorrow. This was in the event Ben was somehow in that unit, that I was pursuing P. Rifles (I get that mixed up with Monticello Rifles all the time) but my point is, there may be other sheet music on that site for other CW units. I think the sheet music cover was from the period. It's my dream to find some eyewitness accounts from soldiers who may have been in Ben Allein's exact unit. The daily lives/history of my ancestors has always interested me way more than the pedigree. The responses from my post today have given me much more than I had this morning, so thanks again, all!

Peggy Dyas (Margaret Allein Dyas)
Virginia Beach
Researching: Allein in MS and Madison Parish, LA