The origins of the game are unknown, but "base-ball" or "base ball" was being played, under that name, during the Civil War:
The origins of the game are unknown, but "base-ball" or "base ball" was being played, under that name, during the Civil War:
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:Captain Kimberly was an experienced and skillful player and base ball player and took the lead in inaugurating a series of games of base ball.<ref>Nash, Eugene Arus (1910) ''A History of the Forty-fourth Regiment, New York Volunteer Infantry, in the Civil War, 1861-1865'', [http://books.google.com/books?vid=0Tt8agPo9LwQQsMG9YEqtf&id=L1eQYSRFhIQC&pg=PA166&lpg=PA166&dq=base-ball+civil+war&as_brr=1 p. 166]
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:Captain Kimberly was an experienced and skillful player and base ball player and took the lead in inaugurating a series of games of base ball.<ref>Nash, Eugene Arus (1910) ''A History of the Forty-fourth Regiment, New York Volunteer Infantry, in the Civil War, 1861-1865'', [http://books.google.com/books?vid=0Tt8agPo9LwQQsMG9YEqtf&id=L1eQYSRFhIQC&pg=PA166&lpg=PA166&dq=base-ball+civil+war&as_brr=1 p. 166]</ref>
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:<ref>Johnson, Robert Underwood and Clarence Clough Buel (1888), ''Battles and Leaders of the Civil War,'' Volume IV, [http://books.google.com/books?vid=0veexS1IQVEWthmLI7jQgT3&id=rSwOAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA37&lpg=PA37&dq=base-ball+civil+war&as_brr=1 p. 37]</ref>
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:The air seemed full of heavy shot, and as the flew they could be seen as plainly as a base-ball in one of our games.<ref>Johnson, Robert Underwood and Clarence Clough Buel (1888), ''Battles and Leaders of the Civil War,'' Volume IV, [http://books.google.com/books?vid=0veexS1IQVEWthmLI7jQgT3&id=rSwOAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA37&lpg=PA37&dq=base-ball+civil+war&as_brr=1 p. 37]</ref>