This company was organized at Centralia, Illinois, and mustered into service of the United States on June 14, 1861, for a period of one year.

On March 2, 1862, the group, joined by then-Colonel James D. Morgan, led the pursuit of Confederate Brigadier General M. Jeff Thompson in southeastern Missouri.

Col. Morgan praised the group's perseverance and Gen. Thompson later recalled, "The cavalry are a perfect set of daredevils, all officers wearing feathers on their hats.

"[2] From February to April 1862 the company joined Brigadier General John Pope in the Union effort to take New Madrid, or Kentucky Bend, on the Mississippi River.

After the fall of New Madrid the group proceeded down the Mississippi River, and in June 1862 their company were the first U.S. troops to enter the city of Memphis.

[3] Constituted 1 July 1897 in the Illinois National Guard as a squadron of cavalry and organized from existing troops.