Gibbon's request granted, the 24th Michigan joined the brigade and saw its first action at Fredericksburg taking on a nuisance battery of Confederate horse artillery south of the town.

The regiment would follow up its actions at Fredericksburg with a raid on Port Royal, Virginia and fighting at Fitzhugh Crossing.

He was then helped from the field by Lt. Charles Hutton of Company G, with the last alive and non-wounded officer, then Captain Albert M. Edwards, assuming command of the regiment.

"[2] Thereafter, the 24th participated in the rest of the Army of the Potomac's campaigns and battles, participating in the Overland Campaign, being heavily engaged at both the Battle of the Wilderness and the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, with Colonel Morrow being wounded in the Wilderness and Lieutenant Colonel Edwin Wight would take command through the rest of the Overland Campaign until he was forced to resign to his wounds he sustained at Gettysburg, with command of the Regiment once again falling on Albert M. Edwards, who by then was a Major and was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel, who would be the commander of the regiment until December, 1864 when Colonel Morrow would return and then would become commander once again when Morrow was promoted to Brevet Brigadier General.

The regiment suffered 12 officers and 177 enlisted men who were killed in action or who died of their wounds and 3 officers and 136 enlisted men who died of disease, for a total of 328 fatalities,[3] including John Litogot, the maternal uncle of auto tycoon Henry Ford.