History of the Seventeenth Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry - Or One Hundred and Sixty-Second in the Line of Pennsylvania Volunteer Regiments; War to Suppress the Rebellion, 1861-1865; Compiled From Records of the Rebellion, Off... #265105

Immediately after the Seventeenth Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry, was mustered out of the service, Brevet Lieutenant-colonel Theodore W. Bean, of the regiment, issued "The Roll of Honor of the Seventeenth Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry," which was to have been followed by a more comprehensive history. After waiting a reasonable time and the history not materializing, the author called on Brevet Lieutenant-colonel Theodore W. Bean, and was informed that, because the men who had composed the regiment were widely scattered, and because of pressing professional duties, the contemplated history, for the time being at least, was abandoned; and before the project was again taken up, Colonel Bean had died.<br><br>In compliance with an Act of the General Assembly, approved June 15, 1887, to provide for the erection of monuments to mark the position of Pennsylvania commands in the battle of Gettysburg, the Seventeenth Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry Association was organized. And while the chief object of the association was to aid the Commission in locating, designing and erecting such a monument as the regiment was entitled to under the act, the subject of a regimental history was freely discussed, and it was confidently hoped that its compilation could be accomplished at the same time. But the design and material selected by the properly constituted committee for the monument exhaust ed the available funds; and, because the principal consideration then was the erection of the monument, the regimental history project, for the time being, was again abandoned.<br><br>By chance, while the author was visiting in the city of Washington, D. C, he met Lieutenant James A. Clark, who was at one time the adjutant of the regiment. We both deplored the fact that the regiment was without a regimental history. Lieutenant James A. Clark at once volunteered to edit the compilation of the history provided sufficient data could be secured to warrant its publication.