Written by Robert Lebling
As tensions escalated and the nation moved toward the outbreak of the US Civil War in 1861, a law student in Chicago formed the first American company inspired by a North African light infantry known as Zouaves that had won distinction in both Algeria and Crimea. Soon dozens of Zouave regiments mustered up and, from 1859 to the end of the war in 1865, Zouave soldiers were wildly popular in both the North and the South—mostly for their courage and elite training, but also for their fashionably colorful Algerian-style pantaloons, waistcoats and headgear.
Read