I am from North Alabama and had family on both sides in the Civil War. My father’s great uncle was in first Alabama Union Army was captured and sent to Danville Virginia where he died in Late 1863. The brother, my dad’s GF, never went to war and hid out during the war. North Alabama was mixed in the decision of which side to support.
Was this an actual Union Army unit? (i.e., 1st Alabama Regiment,USA?)
I probably had some distant relatives on my maternal great grandmother's side involved in the Civil War. (Probably on the confederate side since they lived in south central Virginia.) But she didn't come into our family line until the 1890's.
My maternal family line is from various parts of the United Kingdom and started arriving in the North either just prior to or, more likely, just after the Civil War. Proceeded by bounds across the northern US (Minnesota, Nebraska, etc.) before settling in Idaho.
My paternal line arrived as a penniless 15 year-old WWI refugee from Belgium in 1915 and settled in Michigan.