Lieutenant Colonel Roswell Farnham and Major Levi G. Kingsley had held commissions in the 1st Vermont Infantry, along with a total of 65 officers and men.

The regiment went into camp at Brattleboro on September 25, 1862, and was mustered into United States service on October 4.

Stoughton was not popular with the officers and men of the brigade, so when he was captured by Confederate partisan John S. Mosby on March 9, 1863, few mourned his loss.

The regiment marched to Munson's Hill on October 30, and Hunting Creek the next day, where it stayed until December 12, in 'Camp Vermont.'

It was engaged in picket duty near Fairfax Courthouse from December 12 to January 20, 1863, participating in a repulse of J.E.B.