The units personnel enlisted for six months in 1862, but during its brief service it participated in the battles of Second Bull Run, Chantilly, South Mountain, and Antietam.

Artillery, Battery E under Samuel Nicholl Benjamin were part of Isaac Stevens's division in the IX Corps.

Learning that a Confederate column under Stonewall Jackson was trying to turn the Federal right flank, John Pope sent Reno's corps and other units to intercept it.

[3] The 8th Massachusetts and Benjamin's batteries were part of Orlando B. Willcox's 1st Division at the Battle of South Mountain on 14 September.

Another gun was moving up to replace the damaged piece when James W. Bondurant's Confederate battery suddenly opened a heavy fire from a distance of 600 yd (550 m).

Cook's limber drivers panicked and rode to the rear through the lines of the 17th Michigan Volunteer Infantry Regiment.

[8] The Federal batteries were unable to suppress the opposing artillery file until the Union infantry seized a bridgehead.

[9] A section of the 8th Massachusetts battery under Lieutenant John N. Coffin advanced 200 yd (180 m) in front of the infantry and came under close range fire from Confederate guns.

Hugh Boyle Ewing's Union brigade marched into this confused situation and was mistakenly targeted by Cook's battery and Federal infantry, which caused friendly fire casualties.

One of Coffin's shells exploded next to a gun in David G. McIntosh's Confederate battery, mortally wounding a gunner.