OCEAN CITY, Md. - The Maryland Center for Military History is asking the public to help with identifying the faces of soldiers pictured in a rare Civil War photographic collection.
The collection contains individual tintype photographs of every enlisted member of Company B, 2nd Regiment, and Maryland Eastern Shore volunteers. The photographs were taken shortly after the soldiers enlisted in Chestertown in late 1861.
The collection is believed by the Maryland Center for Military History to be the only known surviving collection of its kind documenting an entire Civil War military company.
Of the soldiers pictured, only one, 1st Sgt. Alfred Benjamin, has been positively identified.
The collection will be on display to attendees during the 2026 Maryland Association of Counties Summer Conference in Ocean City on Aug. 13 to Aug 14.
The staff hopes someone may recognize a family name, have an old family photograph, possess genealogical records, or know something about a Civil War ancestor that could help connect a name to one of the unidentified faces.
