Cravats: How Common

[Emmanuel Dabney]

Re: Cravats: How Common

On this forum we prefer to see researched responses especially when saying "During the war ALL soldiers/civilians did X" or "believed Y." It's not true that all people did one thing or the other.

We continue to welcome PRIMARY SOURCE evidence (this means in photographs, detailed sketches/drawings, or written) as a means to understanding when or why soldiers and officers thought they needed a cravat.

[ElizabethClark]

Re: Cravats: How Common

To chime in with Mr Dabney: in some circles, research may not be required. On this particular forum, it is.

Please share your sources for your statements. If you do not have sources, please confine your comments to things that can be backed up by the historic record.

[lojafan]

Re: Cravats: How Common

I do not think this is something that can really be documented properly enough to give a definate answer. Most of the pictures are, as it has been said already, for the camera. If you feel you should wear one, wear it, if you don't, don't. But don't do it because everyone else is, or we will all look like were going to a dinner party. Just my .02

[AZReenactor]

Re: Cravats: How Common

A year later and people are still no better educated or aware of what forum they are in it seems.

While it may not be possible to come up with quick statistical figures for how common cravats were in the ranks, there is ample evidence that they were worn at various times for various reasons. Photographic and documentary evidence is generally spotty and anecdotal to be sure. However, the question is well worth exploring academically and the other parts of the question regarding what types and styles were worn has a great deal of room for further research and insights. Just because something is challenging to research and doesn't have a simple statistical or absolute answer doesn't mean we should simply "go with our gut" or just do what ever we want to do.

Eventually individual reenactors do have to make choices on what to wear, but the quality of the basis of those choices will vastly affect the quality of the end result.

[Pvt Schnapps]

Re: Cravats: How Common

As a kind of indirect evidence, it's interesting to note how many 19th century references one can find to the use of cravats as tourniquets. This, for example, comes from On Bandaging, and Other Operations of Minor Surgery, by Fitzwilliam Sargeant (Philadelphia, 1862), p. 290:

An ' impromptu' tourniquet, for use in emergencies, consists of a cravat, in the middle of which a knot is formed; the cravat is made to encircle the limb, the knot corresponding in situation with the artery: the two extremities are then tied together, a piece of stick inserted between them and made to revolve until the limb is sufficiently compressed. This is commonly called the field-tourniquet.

This seems to assume that a cravat would not be a rarity in the field. Given discussions elsewhere about the wearing of cravats by farmers and workingmen, we might conclude that the article was less of a formality than today's necktie, just as the manual of arms was then more a matter of practical necessity than ceremony.

Until we have better evidence, I think the decision to wear or not wear a cravat can come down to three questions about the specific impression: who, where, and when?

I understand the thinking that would lead one to conclude that cravats would not have appeared as much later in the war, but it may not be that simple. A lot of new faces appeared in the AoP in early 1864, in addition to the veteran volunteers. They had a large amount of bounty money and, after they settled into positions around Richmond and Petersburg, they were in good supply and contact with home -- I think both of those facts would have made it easier for them to keep up peacetime habits like wearing cravats.

On the other hand, I don't find it quite as easy to imagine Sherman's men hanging on to their cravats in the rainy winter march through the Carolinas.

This is just my opinion, of course, but it's also a suggestion that the answer to the original question is again "it depends." Finding out what it depends on is the fun part for us.