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This is a roster card from the Italian Guards Battalion of the 6th Regiment European Brigade of the Louisiana Militia. Foreign born citizens were not allowed to fight in the war but were allowed to join the European Brigade which essentially served to police the city. If there were enough of a single ethnicity they could form a battalion as the Italians did. Of the 341 men in the Italian Guards, 86 of them have Ustican surnames. That's about 25% of the battalion. The 1860 census of New Orleans lists 896 Italians in the city so just those 86 men alone could indicate that the Usticans were at least 10% of the total Italian immigrant community during this time. This seemed incredible to me and I had the story published in the newsletter of a historical society based in Ustica and ...