The top pinback bar and planchet are both bronze toned brass, and are connected by a dark blue ribbon. The top bar reads in raised letters: “165^th N.Y. VOLS” The planchet is in the shape of the “fan leaved-cross” of 19^th Army Corps badge with a circle, rather than an octagon, in the middle. The arms of the cross bear in raised letters “1862” at top and “1865” at bottom, with “US” divided by the circle. The center of the circle has a monogram “2DZ” within a border reading, “SECOND. DURYEE . ZOUAVES . VETERAN . ASSOCIATION*” The pin is in place on the top bar. The ribbon is solid. The top bar is marked on the reverse “JOHN FRICK,” a well-known New York City jeweler. The badge has nice color and tone. We see just bit of thin green on the middle right of the planchet and a little green and some rubbing to the prominently raised letters on the top bar.

Attired in much the same zouave uniform as the 5^th NY, the original Duryee Zouaves, the   Second Duryees were organized from excess recruits hoping to join that regiment and were initially designated the “Second Battalion Duryea’s Zouaves.” (Spelling varied between Duryea and Duryee.) In the end they did not serve with the 5^th NY, but did see a fair amount of action, receiving their own designation as the 165^th NY. Only six companies had been filled by the time it left the state in December 1862 and when four more were added in March 1864, they were simply amalgamated into those six. They served first in the Department of the Gulf as part of the 19^th Corps, seeing some light action in Louisiana at North Pass, Berwick Bay, and Plains Store, before more serious fighting in the siege of Port Hudson, where they lost 117 men, about a third of the regiment, almost all in the first assault of May 27, 1863, including their commanding officer and two color-bearers. In late 1863 they took part in the expedition to Sabine Pass, fighting twice at both Vermilion Bayou and Carrion Crow Bayou. In Spring 1864 they were on Banks’s Red River Campaign, fighting at Sabine Cross Roads with a loss of 48, Pleasant Hill, losing 49, Cane River Crossing, losing 3, and Mansura, without loss. They returned to Virginia in late July, taking light losses at Deep Bottom, Cedar Creek, and Bunker Hill, and ended the war in Georgia and the Carolinas. Its total losses were 2 officers and 52 enlisted men killed or mortally wounded, another 9 officers and 101 enlisted men wounded, along with 70 recorded simply as missing.

This is a scarce regimental veteran association badge for a known zouave unit. [sr] [ph:m]

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