Infantry in The American Civil War - Weapons and Equipment

Weapons and Equipment

Trained in the era of short-range smoothbore muskets, such as the Springfield Model 1842, which was issued to many units immediately prior to the war, many generals often did not fully appreciate or understand the importance and power of the new weapons introduced during the war, such as the 1861 Springfield musket and comparable rifles which had longer range and were more powerful than the weapons used by the antebellum armies. Its barrel contained several rifled grooves that provided increased accuracy, and fired a .58 caliber Minié ball (a small conical-shaped ball). This rifle had a deadly effect up to 600 yards and was capable of seriously wounding a man beyond 1,000 yards, unlike the previous muskets used during the American Revolutionary War and Napoleonic Wars, most of which had an effective range of only 100 yards.

Even smoothbore muskets underwent improvements: soldiers developed the technique of "buck and ball," loading the muskets with a combination of small pellets and a single round ball, effectively making their fire scattergun-like in effect. Other infantrymen went into combat armed with shotguns, pistols, knives, and assorted other killing instruments. Very early in the war, a few companies were armed with pikes. However, by the end of 1862, most infantrymen were armed with rifles, including imports from Great Britain, Belgium, and other European countries.

The typical Union soldier carried his musket, percussion cap box, cartridge box, a canteen, a knapsack, and other accouterments, in addition to any personal effects. By contrast, many Southern soldiers carried their possessions in a blanket roll worn around the shoulder and tied at the waist. They might have a wooden canteen, a linen or cotton haversack for food, and a knife or similar sidearm, as well as their musket.

One primary account of the typical infantryman came from James Gall, a representative of the United States Sanitary Commission, who observed Confederate infantrymen of Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early in camp in the occupied borough of York, Pennsylvania, in late June 1863.

Physically, the men looked about equal to the generality of our own troops, and there were fewer boys among them. Their dress was a wretched mixture of all cuts and colors. There was not the slightest attempt at uniformity in this respect. Every man seemed to have put on whatever he could get hold of, without regard to shape or color. I noticed a pretty large sprinkling of blue pants among them, some of those, doubtless, that were left by Milroy at Winchester. Their shoes, as a general thing, were poor; some of the men were entirely barefooted. Their equipments were light, as compared with those of our men. They consisted of a thin woollen blanket, coiled up and slung from the shoulder in the form of a sash, a haversack swung from the opposite shoulder, and a cartridge-box. The whole cannot weigh more than twelve or fourteen pounds. Is it strange, then, that with such light loads, they should be able to make longer and more rapid marches than our men? The marching of the men was irregular and careless, their arms were rusty and ill kept. Their whole appearance was greatly inferior to that of our soldiers... There were not tents for the men, and but few for the officers... Everything that will trammel or impede the movement of the army is discarded, no matter what the consequences may be to the men... In speaking of our soldiers, the same officer remarked: 'They are too well fed, too well clothed, and have far too much to carry.' That our men are too well fed, I do not believe, neither that they are too well clothed; that they have too much to carry, I can very well believe, after witnessing the march of the Army of the Potomac to Chancellorsville. Each man had eight days' rations to carry, besides sixty rounds of ammunition, musket, woollen blanket, rubber blanket, overcoat, extra shirt, drawers, socks, and shelter tent, amounting in all to about sixty pounds. Think of men, and boys too, staggering along under such a load, at the rate of fifteen to twenty miles a day.