I will try to explain how your ancestor held commissions in both Andrew County Battalion and the 88th EMM.

Union Major General John Schofield and Missouri Provisional Governor Hamilton Gamble developed the EMM program in the summer of 1862 to combat hundreds of southern guerrillas and Confederate behind-Union-lines recruiters who were a great threat to the Union military in various parts of the state that summer. The EMM program was enforced by Dept. of the Missouri General Orders Number 19 of that year which required all able-bodied men in Missouri to enroll in their nearest enrolling station, usually the county seat. If the enrolling officers approved a man's loyalty, he would then be mustered into his local EMM company or regiment. These were "grassroots" local militia similar to the militia during the colonial times. The men remained home at their civilian occupations unless a southern threat materialized nearby, at which time the state EMM apparatus would activate all or part of an EMM regiment to deal with the problem. Very little was provided to these men except rifle-muskets and ammunition, which were usually kept in a room in the county courthouse designated as an armory. Even when no threat was nearby, some men of the local unit were activated to stand guard over valuable infrastructure like the courthouse and local railroads, or bridges, if any. They also guided active duty Union units through their home area, performed limited patrolling, and assisted the local provost marshal to arrest and guard local suspected Rebels. Since the EMM militiamen were all local, several units took advantage of their power and knowledge of the people of the area to strike out at old enemies and arrest or harass local southern sympathizers. In this way, a number of EMM units committed atrocities against local southerners, who had little ability to resist.

By General William S. Rosecrans' term as commander of Missouri during 1864, the EMM was somwhat in disrepute, so he developed the citizen guards of various localities to serve as a local guard force not really answerable to anyone outside of the community. This was enforced by Dept. of the Missouri General Orders Number 107, that set guidelines for these units. Many of the men who joined the citizen guards were already members of the local EMM units, but Rosecrans pushed this new concept. Nobody seemed to mind that many of the same men who were in the EMM were also in the citizen guards, and Rosecrans rather liked that idea, anyway, since he wanted the new citizen guards to replace the EMM eventually.

Any questions?

Bruce