re: the Civil War, today — while reading Jonathan Sperber’s terrific “Marx: A 19th Century Life” — i learned that August Willich, a prominent German communist & political opponent of Marx (who he viewed as too conservative), served as a Brigadier General in the Union Army.

His unit, the 32nd Indiana, fought at Shiloh and participated in the siege of Atlanta, and he commanded troops at the Battle of Chickamauga.

this dude ruled