Iowa 10th Infantry Regiment, Company H

Using ancestry.com’s American Civil War Regiments records, I did some follow-up research on the regiment Thomas Benton Turpin joined. That set of records consists of four sections: regiment records, soldiers, battle histories, and officer records.

Thomas only served a few months before he died however I wanted to check to see who else might have enlisted with him.

After searching for the Iowa 10th Infantry Regiment, I reviewed the three year history of the regiment. I see that 10 companies were mustered in during September and October.

“The regiment received its equipment at St. Louis and moved to Cape Girardeau, where it went into camp. In early November it was ordered to Bloomfield to drive out Jeff Thompson's force, but found it gone on its arrival. Taking possession of a large amount of property left by Thompson, it returned to Cape Girardeau, and in December went into winter quarters at Bird's Point.”


The winter march was hard and the soldiers suffered. It was in here that Thomas died from the measles in December.

Then I clicked the link for the list of soldiers. Once the list displayed of all those who served, I clicked the Edit Search and filtered the search by specifying those who lived in Rippey, Greene County, IA. That search might not present a flawless list of the boys from Rippey but it is fairly close. I then reviewed the list to look for surnames that were familiar from my research on the family. Here are some of the names that popped out at me in addition to Thomas who enlisted as a Private on 23 August 1861 at age 18 in Company H of the 10th Infantry Regiment Iowa on 7 Sep 1861.

John Vanhorn enlisted as a Private on 23 August 1861 at the age of 21 in Company H, 10th Infantry Regiment Iowa on 7 Sep 1861.

There is a definite relationship here. John was the son of Ralph Wilson Vanhorn and Margaret Golden Turpin, daughter of Robert Newton Turpin and a nephew of Thomas.

James R. Carter of Rippey enlisted as a Private on 23 August 1861 at the age of 18 in Company H, 10th Infantry Regiment Iowa on 7 Sep 1861.

James is the same age as Thomas. Carter was probably Thomas’s grandmother’s maiden name. So looking to see if there is a connection could help me. A bit of research shows there are no records of him in Greene County, Iowa in the 1860 census. I may want to scan the census in case the indexing is in error. I don’t see any James Carters in 1870 census that look like a potential match either. There is a 1890 Veteran’s Schedule which shows many James Carters. I guess this is a research project to put on my rainy day list.