author
James Moses Nichols
1835–1886
A Civil War veteran turned chronicler, he is remembered for bringing the story of the 48th New York Infantry to life in a vivid regimental history first published in 1886. His writing blends eyewitness experience with memorial tribute, giving readers a personal way into the Union Army's wartime world.
1 Audiobook
Perry's Saints; Or, The Fighting Parson's Regiment in the War of the Rebellion
by James Moses Nichols
About the author
Born in Haverhill, Massachusetts, in 1835, James Moses Nichols was educated in the local public schools, prepared for college at Phillips Academy in Andover, and graduated from Williams College in 1857. The surviving record around his exact birth year is not perfectly consistent, but multiple library and book records identify him as the author of Perry's Saints; Or, The Fighting Parson's Regiment in the War of the Rebellion.
Nichols served in the Civil War with the 48th New York Infantry, and later sources remember him with the rank of colonel. His best-known book, published in 1886, is a regimental history centered on the 48th New York and Colonel James H. Perry, combining military narrative with remembrance of the men who served.
He died in Haverhill in 1886. Today, he is chiefly known through Perry's Saints, a work that preserves both the day-to-day texture of army life and the pride of a veteran writing about his regiment after the war.