[1] He matriculated at Columbia College in 1861, but the condition of his eyes led his father to send him abroad to consult oculists in Paris and Berlin.

At the advice of Baron von Graefe, he discontinued lectures after reaching Berlin and sought open-air environments as necessary to complete his treatment.

He visited Bayard Taylor at Gotha and en route visited the galleries at Dresden, tramped through Saxony, Switzerland, studied Bohemian life at Prague, passed through the Black Forest region, saw the toymakers of Nuremberg, continued the tramp through the pleasant region of the Thuringian Forest and finally reached Göttingen, where he took up his studies at the University of Göttingen.

However, with the outbreak of the American Civil War he left the university without graduating to return home to serve in the Union Army.

[1] Putnam enlisted as a Private in the 176th New York Infantry Regiment in December 1862 and was promoted to Sergeant in January, 1863.

Promoted to First Lieutenant in December 1863 and Adjutant in March 1864, he was captured at the Battle of Cedar Creek near Middletown, Virginia, and was held for a short time at the notorious Libby Prison in Richmond, Virginia before being transferred to Danville where he was held until March 1865 when he was returned to the Union forces as part of a prisoner exchange.

[5] Bertha went on to become a noted medieval historian, and Corinna became the wife of Joseph Lindon Smith, painter of Egyptian archaeological discoveries.