Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

[DBURT]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

That is my fear on this frog...The rivets. You are quite right Geoff, rivets were post war for regular British army frogs. Both types in Petrie's book are sewn but I have seen another one in a picture taken by Neill Rose of one with an SIC&Co cartouche that also is rivetted. Anyone have any insights into this?

Dave Burt

[DBURT]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

The first rivet did appear in 1866 as Geoff states. By 1890 they were nearly all rivetted, as in the frog pictured on here. But as most of the gear made for the Confederates was commercially made it cannot be ruled out that a company making frogs was using them. As previously stated, there is an SIC&Co frog that has them. But the company was barred from making accoutrements for the British army in 1858, and were only making equipment for the newly formed volunteers from 1859 onwards, so the use of rivets is not inconceivable. Any insights anyone?

Dave Burt

[4VADRUMMER]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Gents, Not sure if its been covered yet but I have a friend that does CS Marines and he advised me over the weekend that he has access to three images of Confederate Marines wearing full sets of English Accouterments. He also stated that the Confederate Marines received their equipment issue via the Richmond Depot. Here is a link that shows, at least in some degree, that Richmond received some of the sets of the English accouterments. My buddies CS Marine unit all use English Accouterments as part of their impressions. Anyone have access to those pictures? Maybe you could post them? Thanks.

[DBURT]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Many thanks for that Eric. I have seen one of these pictures, it is on p 241 of The Civil War Source Book by P Katcher. The Marine is fully kitted out with the ball bag, Enfield rifle and snake belt. As Eric writes, does anyone have access to these pictures? And if so could you post them?

Dave Burt

[Ken Knopp]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

The following information was sent to me by my friend David Jarnagin. David is constantly researching some aspect of his favorite passions one of which is English accoutrements. He sent the info below to me in a simpler form for personal discussion but I thought, given the obvious interest here on the AC for this kind of detail and the current thread, I asked him to flesh it out a bit more and to allow me to share it with you. We hope it adds to the discussion. Perhaps Dave Burt can flesh this out a bit more. Dave your thoughts? Ken R Knopp

... While doing research on an article on a Confederate Cap pouch (which was obviously made of scrapped leather from imported British ball-bags) I realized it was imperative that I understand more about the patterns of British ball-bags (a.k.a. Expense Pouch (see note at bottom)) that were shipped over here during our Civil War. I soon discovered that there were no less than three different styles of this British ball bag.
For clarity, I should make note that the English Army called all patterns “Ball Bags”with no differentiation between the patterns. The first pattern, sometimes called the “Brunswick Ball Bags” apparently shows up in Massachusetts at the begining of the war. According to research done by Craig Barry and David Burt, the Mass. State government sent purchasers to England very early in the war to buy materials to outfit their troops. They purchased 10,000 full sets of English accoutrements (referred to as “cap or loading pouches”) bought in both black and russet. I have not been able to figure out the origins of this British pattern (Crimean War perhaps earlier?) but note that it is somewhat different from subsequent other British army ball bags. For starters, the Brunswick Rifles bag is of a different shape. It also has a very different flap which extends completely over the front then underneath and up to a brass finial placed at the center/rear of the bag as compared to later ball bags where the finial is located at the front/center of the bag. It also has two belt loops in the rear as opposed to the others which have one single and wider belt loop. Apparently, not many of these came over but regardless, the pattern I want to talk about is the more common second pattern ball bag, which was adopted on May 5, 1859 for issue to regular British army troops.
This pattern is the first of the half-moon style 10 round ball-bags. The stated purpose of the ball bag was to hold ten rounds of rifle ammunition in the front of the soldier for immediate use while another 50 rounds were kept in package, in the cartridge box at the rear of the belt. Interestingly, I could find no reference to this initial ball bag pattern having anything inside of it (such as cap pouches or oil cans) as was found in later patterns. However, very soon after, on October 21, 1859 this pattern was changed to include the inside loop for the oil can. It should be noted here that there was obviously no need for a cap pouch inside the bag since the regular Army was using a separate cap pouch at that time (the pattern of 1856 or 1857 ) known as the “angled cap pouch”. This cap pouch was worn on the cartridge pouch belt about the center of the chest.
The third pattern British ball bag is what was issued to English Volunteer Rifle Regiments. In a British War Office Memorandum (of 13 July, 1859) the English changed the way their British Volunteer Rifles were accoutered. Up to this point the volunteers used accouterments as follows: “Brown leather consisting of a fifty-round pouch with cap pocket; with pouch belt; waist belt with snake; frog for bayonet belt ( perhaps beeter known today as a Baldric); rifle-sling; percussion pouch on belt; ball-bag with oil bottle.” According to this and other written sources it seems the volunteers were not issued the angled cap pouch at all but an entirely different one that was carried on the waist belt. There are a couple of pictures of English soldiers in the Crimean War with cap pouches on the waist belt. Sometime shortly after the memorandum noted above there was a significant change in the volunteer equipment as follows: “Accouterments will consist of waist-belt of black or brown leather, sliding frog for bayonet scabbard, ball-bag containing cap pocket and twenty-round pouch.” Obviously, the volunteers were now issued ball bags with “built in” cap pockets. This is of interest here because it might help explain why (apparently) there does not appear to be very many of the English made angled cap pouches in Confederate hands. While I am aware of only a few of these original angled cap-pouches with Confederate lineage there are many more CS related ball-bags. But why? Perhaps the pattern was discontinued by the time of our war or, more likely very few were imported. But again, why? Since the angled cap pouch was a regular army pattern and, according to Barry & Burt, Isaac & Campbell had lost their gov't contracts by the time of our war (about 1858) they were no longer contracting for the regular army. Still, some of the angled boxes did come into the South. Could it be that these ball bags were made by A. Ross & Co. - another significant Southern supplier and, an official British army contractor? As such, the Ross-made ball bags would not have had inner cap pouches and therefore might have been sent over (in fewer numbers than I & C) accompanied by the angled cap pouches as would have been typical of regular army issue but not the volunteer issue. Interesting but it nevertheless remains speculative.
At any rate, as you can see there is a significant difference between the ball bag issued to the Regular British army and those issued their Volunteer army. More importantly for us, all of the original Issac & Campbell ball-bags I have seen personally or in pictures show the cap pocket on the inside of the bag which suggests these were the third pattern as made for volunteer regiments. Since I & C had lost their British Army contracts were now possibly making ball bags (perhaps of lessor quality) for the volunteer regiments it would have been simple to convert some of that production to the Confederacy. So in summary, perhaps this suggests that most of the ball bags coming in to the South were perhaps these volunteer (I & C) pattern ball bags and not that as issued to the Regular British army troops.
I have not been able to find any additional changes made to British ball bags after these dates at least that coincided with our American Civil War and, I admit I have no interest in English equipment after this point.
Naturally, all of the physical observations are taken from very small samples of surviving artifacts so no real conclusions can really be drawn however, the corresponding documented evidence does create some interesting considerations does it not?

One other note regarding the angled cap pouches..... In 1857 Capt. George McClellan visited the European armies for the purpose of study. In his post-op report he notes the Russian use of a cap pouch which attaches to a shoulder belt. Photos of Russian troops during the Crimean War also show this type pouch. Could it be that the Brit’s copied their angled cap pouch from the Russians?

Note on the word “Expense Pouch”: I found no use of this word in British Army vernacular until 1866. Up to that time, the pouches are always referred to as “ball-bags”.

The photos are of the Mass. Brunswick Rifles Ball Bags and the other a Crimean War era photo of British troops with cap pouches on the waist belts.

Compliments of David Jarnagin


SOURCES: Allen’’s Indian Mail, Approved by his Excellency the Commander-in-Chief, Published on the arrival each overland mail, London, Wednesday June 30, 1848 page 391
Regular Army ball-bags
Official Catalogue of the Museum of Artillery in the Rotunda Woolwich, Brigadier-General J.H. Lefroy, R.A., F.R.S., Printed for Her Majesty’’s stationary office, By George E. Eyre and William Spottiswoode, Printer to the Queen’’s Most Excellent Majesty, 1864, pages 174-175 (Think the publisher information is long enough.)
Volunteer Ball-Bags
Rifle Club and Volunteer Corps., By W.H. Russell, London, Routledge, Warne, and Routledge, Farringdon Street., 1859 page 54.
Journal of the Royal United Service Institution, Whitehall Yard., London, Published by W. Mitchell and Son, 1861 pages 231-233
The English Pattern 1859 Cartridge Box, By Craig L Barry. Camp Chase Gazette, Vol. XXXIX, No. 1, Sept/Oct 2011, Pg. 60-62.

[DBURT]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Ken,

I have been working with David Jarnagin for the past month on this very subject which myself and Craig intend to put out as a book, hopefully next year. All of what David states is what we have found out by going through all the British military journals of the time. David Jarnagin is an expert on this area and a true gentleman in sharing a lot of his information with me. As our last book on S Isaac Campbell & Co stated the company only made volunteer equipment having been banned from supplying the British army because basically the Isaac brothers were rougues- to give them a nicer name. It is right that their ball bag differed from the regulation one in the fact it had an internal cap pocket, while the regulation one did not.

We move on now to the fascinating fact that it does look like CS Marines were fully accoutered with British ball bag, snake belt, pouch and Enfield rifle. If anyone has more information regarding Marines, please post it.
This has been one of the most enlightening and fascinating threads on this site for some time.

Dave Burt

[Andrew Kasmar]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

http://www.collegehillarsenal.com/shop/product.php?productid=776&cat=13&page=1

[Mississippian]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Was doing a little digging the other day when I found this tidbit regarding the 24th Mississippi Infantry:

"The Twenty-fourth Regiment, Colonel Dowd, was ordered by the War Department, November 22, 1861, to report to Gen. Robert E. Lee at Savannah. General Lee, then in command of that coast department, was instructed to furnish the men with arms. As they were enlisted for the war, General Lee gave them arms intended for Georgia, which State had no troops to offer except for twelve months. In December General Lee ordered the regiment to Fernandina, which was exposed to the Federal naval expeditions. The abandonment of that coast soon followed and the Twenty-fourth was ordered, late in February, I862, to Tennessee. They were not able to start, on account of limited railroad transportation, until late in March. March 31, ordered detained at Chattanooga with command of General S. B. Maxey. April 9, Maxey ordered to Corinth with Twenty-fourth Mississippi and other regiments. Regiment brigaded with Forty-first Georgia and Ninth Texas, under Gen. S. B. Maxey, in Polk's Corps, at Corinth during the siege. Corinth was evacuated May 29-30, and the army fell back to Tupelo, under command of General Bragg."

Now the question is what was the 24th armed with? The time and place of the arms issues and the fact that the 24th was a "for the war" regiment strongly suggest that they would have gotten newly imported arms. And if they got Enfields, did they get English Accouterments to go with them? So many questions, will have to check the CSR's for clues....

Will MacDonald

[Mississippian]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Ok, found some more info, not Enfield stuff, but still English.

In the CSR's of Col. Leon Marks of the 27th Louisiana Infantry there is the ordnance return for the initial arming of the regiment, which took place on April 30th 1862. Among the usual Percussion muskets and Mississippi rifles were issued 152 Brunswick Rifles. In the same return 30 "Bayonet Scabbards for Brunswick Rifles" were also issued. I'm guessing these were imported along with the rifles. Maybe this was surplus ex British Army gear?

Will MacDonald

[DBURT]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Will,

Huse did buy 2,020 "Brunswick rifles" from British gun-makers in his report to Gorgas of Feb 3rd 1863. By this time the Brunswick had been in production since the 1830s and was pretty much obsolete by the 1860s. A good indication though that old surplus was being imported. By the way, can the CSR's be accessed online?

Dave Burt

[Mississippian]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Dave,

Found that some men of Gen. Chalmers' cavalry division were issued Enfield traps in May 1864, go to this thread for details:

http://www.authentic-campaigner.com/forum/showthread.php?34096-Cavalry-Ordnance-issues-from-the-CSR-of-Lt.-J.T.-Buck-%28A-lot-to-see-here%29

Will MacDonald

[DBURT]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Brilliant Will, if you find any more please post it. Is there any way I can access the CSR's online?

Dave Burt

[Archie R. Lib]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Dave,

I don't know if anyone ever answered your original question, but could that possibly be Private Jonathan Iverson Johnson of Company E, 45th Georgia? There are several ancestors of his listed on the descendant's roll call at www.petersburgbreakthrough.org/45thGAroll.html. May be a place to start to positively identify him.

Cheers.
Rich

[DBURT]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Rich,

Yes we did positively identify him as J.I. Johnson of the 45th GA, but thanks anyway.

Dave Burt

[Mississippian]

Re: Soldiers wearing English accoutrements

Dave, you will love this:

From the CSR of Maj. Robert Anderson, CO of 1st Bttn, Georiga Sharpshooters

Aug. 19th 1862 - Issued at Savannah GA

20 Enfield Rifles & Bayonets
20 Bayonet Scabbards
339 Knapsacks
259 Haversacks
259 Canteens and Straps
329 Cartridge Boxes
329 Waist Belts
329 Ball Bags
329 Shoulder Belts
329 Gun Slings
329 Frogs
329 Mess Tins and Covers
329 Sets Knapsack Boards
1200 Enfield Rifle Cartridges and Caps

There is that Savannah connection again.....

Will MacDonald