csmc Fatigue coat

[Charles Kaiser]

Hallo Kameraden,
a question from a friend of mine.
How does the Fatigue Coat from the Eqipment- list of the Confederate State Marine Corps looks like? Dit it exist, or is it only a thing, which existed only on the Paper?
Viele Grüße

[Pvt_Sullivan]

Re: csmc Fatigue coat

Christof,

The small size of the Confederate Marines, less then 2000 during the war, places them as a 'specialty' impression in most reenactors/living historians minds. Here on AC such topics seldom come up, but to give your friend some things to think about.

My generalizations below are gleaned from my recollection of...

American Civil War Marines 1861-65 by by Ron Field and Richard Hook available on http://amazon.com/

- The Confederate Marines were 'Regulars' however like all Confederate organizations there was the written regulation and what was actually procurred.

- The Confederate Marines assigned to Camp Beale (SP?) on the James near Richmond were more closely clothed to regulations. The regulation was for a grey single-breasted frock coat, I do not recall any indication of a fatigue jacket or coat.

- The first however is that in the early part of the war the Confederate Marines in Pensacola were issued dark blue jackets, similiar in design to Federal State Jackets without adornment

- The second however is that as the war progressed and supplies became more and more scarce, the Confederate Marines were issued whatever could be found. There is documented evidence that some of the Confederate Marines in the Naval Battalion at Appomatox in 1865 were wearing the final Richmond Depot III jackets.

Now that was definately too long, but I hope it impresses on you the complexity of your friend's question. My suggestion to him would be to go and read the book I noted above. As well as contact some of the Confederate Marine reenactors on these two sites I've list below...

The Navy and Marine Living History
- http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cwnavyandmarineforum/

Civil War Navy and Marine Reenactor Forum
- http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cwnavyandmarineforum/

For the hard-working and under-appreciated moderators,

This should probably be moved out of the research articles area since I didn't do a bit of research and it has to do with a specialty impression... thanks...