8. The Little Drummer Boy
Frank Pettis was born in 1850, in Reedsburg, Wisconsin. In 1862, as a child of eleven, Frank joined the Union Army’s 19th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment. He enlisted as a drummer boy in the regimental band alongside his father, a fife player, and served in a company commanded by his school teacher, captain A.P. Ellinwood.
Drummer boys had been in use for centuries in many armies. The era’s tactics called for closely formed columns and lines to advance and fight in well-ordered formations and in neat rows and lines. The shouted commands of officers were often difficult to hear above the din and roar of battle, so musical instruments such as bugles and drums were used to signal commands. Drummers beat a pace, or rhythm, to assist with the evolutions and formations involved in marching or advancing on the enemy. Drummer boys, tapping the appropriate beats as directed by the officers in charge, accompanied their units into combat, and were thus exposed to shots and shells as the battle raged and men fell.
