Fiercely loyal to his adopted South, young Isaac Hermann, at twenty-one, joined the Washington Rifles which rendezvoused with the First Georgia Regiment near Laurel Hill, Virginia in 1861. His accent drew considerable attention, whereupon he mounted a nearby stump and announced: "Gentlemen, it seems that I am eliciting a great deal of curiosity; now all of you will know me as Isaac Hermann, a native Frenchman, who came to assist you to fight the Yankees." Almost fifty years later Capt. Hermann was urged by his many friends to write his experiences while serving with three branches of the Confederate Army. He had seen action with the First Georgia Regiment in Virginia under Generals Henry R. Jackson and T. J. "Stonewall" Jackson.