Its companies were recruited in the counties of St. Johns, Hernando, Jefferson, Duval, Wakulla, Madison, Columbia, and Suwannee.

In Company C, the average age of the eighty-seven enlisted men was twenty-five, with the youngest being fifteen and the oldest forty-four.

Around the same time, a portion of the regiment defeated a small U.S. naval force that was attempting to land near New Smyrna.

Sometime in late-April, early-May 1862, the regiment was gifted a new battle-flag made by a group of women from Jefferson County.

The flag had the motto “We Yield But in Death.” The regiment adopted a stuffed wildcat as their mascot, which traveled with its owners; Company C, who were dubbed “The Hernando Wildcats.”[3] The 1st and 3rd were engaged at Murfreesboro and Jackson, then participated in the campaigns of the Army of Tennessee from Chickamauga to Bentonville.