A Bowdoin College professor, Joshua L. Chamberlain went to the Maine state capital to offer his services in 1862. Offered the colonelcy of a regiment, he declined, according to John J. Pullen in The 20th Maine,preferring to “start a little lower and learn the business first.”

With the regiment Chamberlain took part in the battles of Antietam, Shepherdstown Ford, Fredericksburg (wounded), and Chancellorsville. At the battle of Gettysburg the regiment, now commanded by Chamberlain, held the extreme left flank on Little Round Top, a service for which he was later awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

He then took part in the Appomattox Campaign, about which he wrote The Passing of the Armies. He was given the honor of commanding the troops that formally accepted the surrender of the Confederate army. He later served as governor of Maine and president of Bowdoin. 

Probably also the first American Hipster (please see moustache) … totes intense.