The Boston Brigade Band was a brass and reed band that performed in Boston, Massachusetts, and elsewhere in New England. Some of the musical pieces played by the band were subsequently published as sheet music, including "The Mammoth Cod Quickstep" of 1839. The band received acclaim in its day, particularly for its combination of both brass and woodwind instruments.

Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore was an Irish-born American composer and military bandmaster who lived and worked in the United States after 1848. While serving in the Union Army during the U.S. Civil War, Gilmore wrote the lyrics to the song "When Johnny Comes Marching Home". This was published under the pseudonym Louis Lambert in September 1863.