4th Alabama at Manassas

[4thVirginiaSoldier]

Wasn't quite sure whether to post this here or in the history section, but I was curious if someone had any helpful links or places to look for documents, etc. pertaining to this specific unit considering my unit, the CVG, will be portraying the 4th. From what I've already been told, I know they wore battleshirts which were mostly blue with red trim but the 4th also picked up more men along their way to Manassas, so I'm assuming that not all of the 4th were wearing specifically blue overshirts with red trim. I also know that they had kepis with havelocks along with white canvas traps. The only few pieces of information that I was able to find was just the basic background on the unit and a painting by Don Troiani, which didn't help a whole lot.

[4VADRUMMER]

Re: 4th Alabama at Manassas

Doc, check out this site: https://sites.google.com/site/thefou...ted-guidelines
This was put together for all of us doing the 4th Alabama at Manassas. I'm in PSL and we are doing Companies B & C. I'm in company C. For one I'm wearing a off white Linsey woolsey overshirt, grey wool trousers, pull on boots and a brown bell crown hat. If you search on line you will find tons of pictures of Alabama soldiers dressed in a myriad of ways. Several Companies of the 4th were militia companies before the war and they wore really nice tailored frocks and shako hats with plumes. Hope this helps!

For more detailed questions you may want to look up Greg Starbuck. I know he has been researching the 4th Alabama for a long time and he has more information on them than you can shake a stick at!

[yeoman]

Re: 4th Alabama at Manassas

Sir, this thread may be of help...,http://www.authentic-campaigner.com/...y-war-uniforms

[4thVirginiaSoldier]

Re: 4th Alabama at Manassas

Nice! Thanks a lot, guys.

[Stonewall_Greyfox]

Re: 4th Alabama at Manassas

From what I've already been told, I know they wore battleshirts which were mostly blue with red trim but the 4th also picked up more men along their way to Manassas. I also know that they had kepis with havelocks along with white canvas traps. The only few pieces of information that I was able to find was just the basic background on the unit and a painting by Don Troiani, which didn't help a whole lot.

What you've been 'told' is a gross simplification of the 4th Alabama's uniforms. For start's each company had they're own rather unique uniforms...compromised by picking recruits up en route from their towns of origin, to the location of the 4th Alabama's formation (Dalton, GA) to their formal enlistment into service (Lynchburg, VA) to their arrival @ Manassas. This regiment would have been quite a site, to see so many wildly outlandish and different uniforms in service.

Shoot me your email address, and I'd be happy to forward you the information that Mr. Starbuck provided to my friend and I. The prescribed reenactor guidelines have been simplified to what might be considered a more uniform/achievable impression, most of it does not have a firm basis in fact.

According to Todd's Military Equipment, the 3rd and 4th Alabama Regiments were largely formed from pre-existant units that had been apart of the 1st and 2nd Regisments of Volunteers Corps of the State of Alabama (AVC) which had been formed February 24th, 1860. Not all of the companies joining the 3rd and 4th regiments had been apart of the AVC, and many of the companies existant coincided seperately for the year before the reorganization.

4th Alabama
Co. A ‘Governor’s Guards’
Co. B ‘Tuskegee Zoauves’
Co. C ‘Magnolia Cadets’
Co. D ‘Canebrake Rifle Guards’: Black Shako w Green Pom-Pom w letters C R G & Mounted Rifleman’s Bugle, Blue Frock Coat w Gold Birdcage and trim on collar and cuffs, dark blue trousers, Mississippi Rifle w/o bayonet, some men evidently had knapsacks. Pvt. Mims Walker image shows individual wearing black shirt heavily trimmed with rick-rack, blue cap and grey trousers.
Co. E ‘Conecuh Guards’Co. F ‘Huntsville Guards’ Grey Frock Coat with Black Trim on Collar and Black Trim Triangle on Cuffs
Co. G ‘Marion Light Infantry’
Co. H ‘Lauderdale Volunteers’
Co. I ‘North Alabamians’: Grey Frock Coat
Co. K ‘Larkinsville Guards’

Which company are you portraying? I'll be in with Co. D 'Canebrake Rifle Guards' and will be the Company 1st Sgt. for the weekend, you shouldn't have trouble finding me.

email: paulboulden@hotmail.com

NOLI ME TANGERE

Paul B.

[33rdaladrummer]

Re: 4th Alabama at Manassas

Lt. Col. Bartley Boone of the 2nd Miss. mistook the 1st Minnesota for the 4th Alabama at Manassas. Since the 1st Minn. wore red shirts, this could mean that part of the 4th Ala. wore red shirts as well.

Here is a reference to Co. D being given "summer uniforms". It is from the Richmond Dispatch, December 14, 1861. Are they thanking them for summer of '61 uniforms?

Acknowledgment to the Ladies.
Camp Law, near Dumfries, Va., Headquarters 4th Ala. Reg't, November 28th, 1861.

At a meeting of the "Canebrake Rifle Guards," of the 4th Alabama Regiment, held this day, for the purpose of returning their thanks to the ladies in the vicinity of Locust Dale, Madison county, Va., for making up their summer uniform, and for the kindness and attention shown by them to the sick and wounded members of the company Lieut. Jones offered the following resolutions, which were unanimously adopted:

1st. We hereby return our obligations to the ladies of Locust Dale and vicinity for their uniform kindness to our company, and though they are friends we have never seen, we have learned to admire them as faultless types of heroine patriots, in whose eyes every Southern soldier is a friend, and at whose houses every sick and wounded soldier can find a home.
2d. Resolved, That the ladies of Locust Dale and its vicinity have endeared themselves to us by acts of kindness, the remembrance of which will survive the war, and in bonds of friendship which we hope will ever characterize the relations between the beauty of Virginia and the chivalry of Alabama.
3d. Resolved. That the papers in Richmond are hereby politely requested to publish these resolutions.
Richard Clarke, Capt.

Wm. O Hudson, O. S.