John Craven McQuiston enlisted in 1861 as a captain in the 16th Indiana Infantry Regiment, seeing his first combat at the Battle of Ball’s Bluff and in operations around the Shenandoah before being discharged in 1862. He later organized and commanded the 123rd Indiana Infantry Regiment as colonel, leading it through the Atlanta Campaign, Franklin, Nashville, and the Carolinas Campaign, and was brevetted brigadier general in March 1865.