Winter Quarters Specifics

[Sanssouci]

Gentlemen,

Is there a specific manual or reference from an engineer unit or "higher HQ" source which lays out specific details for the establishment of a winter camp area, and the specific instructions for building accomodations?

Thanks for the help.
John Turner

[tomarch]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

As I understand it, the laying out of camps per Regulations was pretty much a hit-or-miss affair, depending on the caliber of the commanding officer. The best description of a winter quarters accmodation is in Josh Billings "Hardtack and Coffee" His description and Chas Reeds' illustrations match the photos I've seen of winter quarter huts

[33rd VA Co. H]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

I don't think you're going to find explicit directions as to how to build your winter quarters but there are some pretty good guidelines to follow when laying out the camp. Attached is a photo I took from Butterfield's Camp and Outpost duty manual a few years ago showing how a regimental camp should be layed out. I've dug the winter camps of many regiments and the camp of the 4th Michigan was the only one I've seen that had the huts layed out exactly like Butterfield specified.

Below is probably the best description of hut construction I've seen. It was written by a soldier in the 44th New York and describes his construction of a hut at Stoneman's Switch. Coincidentally... the 44th New York infantry camp was right next to the 4th Michigan camp at Stoneman's Switch during the winter of 62-63. I had the privledge of digging quite a pile of relics and bottles from both of those camps as well as many other camps in the area over the course of several years.


" Being, as I said, aware of the long duration of supposed temporary stays in military life, this house of ours ("shanty" was the correct name in camp language) was promptly begun. In our regiment they were not so strenuous for uniformity of architecture as in some commands, and allowed scope for individuality; as long as the line of front doors was pretty straight down the company streets, we could build our shanties of size and style to suit our tastes. Certainly, Eugene and I had about the worst looking one of the settlement. It was, first, a cellar dug the full size of the ground plan, about two feet deep. Next came a wall of split pine logs, resting on the ground and held up by stakes, carrying up the cellar wall to a height of five feet in all. Now, the roof was of canvas, made of several of the little shelter tents, fastened together and stretched over a ridge pole, which was supported by two stout uprights in front and rear. The front, or door, was also of canvas until we got our chimney built , later on. Our next step was to caulk our wall with mud. Glorious Virginia mud! The one product of which there was always enough. Plastic as butter, but tough as spruce gum when dried; for architectural purposes, admirable; for pedestrian uses, vile. We plastered our wall pretty tightly with this natural stucco, and banked up the lower edge. We ditched around our house, and conducted the waters into the company gutter. Our bed, which comprised all our furniture, being also chair, sofa and table, was our next care. It was a spring bed. We split long, straight pine saplings and laid them crosswise of the shanty on supports which held them about level with the surface of the ground. The bed was about three feet wide, Eugene and I were both slender. When sitting on the edge of the bed our feet rested against the front wall of our mansion. Here we talked; here we smoked; here we read; in pleasant weather, with our front canvas fastened back. We conversed with our neighbors, discussing every subject under heaven, and here we sat, Eugene and I. By our own fireside after the chimney was built."

Be aware that as the war went on.... the method of hut construction changed for the most part. If you study photos of 62-63 and 63-64 winter camps... you'll find that the majority of huts in 62-63 around the Falmouth/Fredericksburg area were dug into the ground while 63-64 huts in the vacinity of Brandy Station were built up above ground and seldom seen dug into the ground as they were the previous winter. I don't have a theory as to why but that's the way they did it. With the research I've done on the subject.... I am of the opinion that as long as you keep your door on the company street.... you can build your quarters almost any way you like. If you're going to be 'authentic'... I guess you need to decide what winter you plan to build for and either dig in or build up.

[Jeremy Bevard]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

I have a book that was put together from Irwin Shepard’s, a Michigan man, journals and letters from 62-64. He has quite a few references to winter quarters. He often referred to building huts. I found earlier he talks about digging and using fence rails. Later on he just says they built huts using their tents. There are also a couple of entries that refer to the lay out of the huts. One such reference that comes to mine now is he said they built huts in line. It must have been a different action then normal because he referred to it as if it was special. I took this to mean they were in line to their place in the ranks of their regiment. Perhaps this was done to fall in and get moving as fast as possible. I believe this was around the Knoxville area.
I have a possible answer for Greg’s find about digging early on but not later. Shepard’s journal entries are all dated. As many times as he refers to building huts or quarters it seems they only stayed for a few days and then moved. Then their will be entries about him hoping they will go back to their old camp. From my memory they were only so lucky once or twice. It’s possible that the men started to put less effort into the huts because they knew they most likely would be leaving in a few days to a couple of weeks regardless of the rumors or previous orders.

[orngblsm]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

I haven't found specific directions for building winter quarters. What I have found is mostly generalized descriptions in letter's home such as, "our shanty is made of logs, one laid on top of the other in such a manner as to form our primitive house" or "William and my house is a fine accommodation, it is made of logs and boards with a tent roof...". Letter's are great, I have a few references to some not having doors, of soldiers being jealous of other soldiers houses and embarrassed of their own, etc. If you want to build winter quarters, start looking at pictures and reading letters. I've built 6 now with my unit and those are the sources I've used.

Respectfully,

[Dignann]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

John,

As Greg has shown, there were regulations about how camps were to be laid out. That said, not everyone followed the regs. Topography, size, etc. often influenced how camps were organized.

There is no standard for how huts were built. More than likely, it was left up to the men who inhabited the hut as to how it was constructed. I see that you live in Virginia. If you have a chance, visit the White Oak Museum in Stafford County (very close to Fredericksburg). There, you can see a handful of reconstructed huts based on the evidence dug up by the proprietor.

Eric

[Kevin O'Beirne]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

To support Eric Mink's post, the actual layout and construction of a winter camp depended on many factors, particularly including topography of the site and the attitude of the commanding officers. If they directed specifics and enforced them, then the camp would perhaps be closer to "regulation"; if they brigade or battalion commanders were a bit more hands-off (and many were), then the camp could vary quite a bit from "regulations".

Engineer regiments were few and far between in the Civil War and did not have much to do with how a brigade's camp was arranged and built.

Even within the same camp, there were huge variations in how the men's quarters were constructed. Some had fairly well-done hutments, and others lived literally in a hole in the ground with a fireplace in it and perhaps a canvas cover over the entrance. There's one photo of officers of the 164th New York and 170th New York in the winter of 1863-1864, nera the Orange & Alexandria RR in the Manassas area, where the officers are standing around a "hut" that looks like little more than a huge mound of mud.

Ultimately, I doubt there's even a "plain, everyday, common" answer to this question. It varied so greatly from one regiment and camp to the next, that it's probably impossible to say "This is usually how it was done..."

[JimConley]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

From: Billings, John D. Hard Tack and Coffee: Soldier's Life In The Civil War. (Old Saybrook: Konecky & Konecky) , 54-57, 73-74.

"When cold weather came on, the soldiers built the stockades to which I have already referred. The walls of these structures were raised from two feet to five feet, according to the taste or working inclination of the intended occupants. Oftentimes an excavation was made one or two feet deep. When such was the case, the walls were not built so high. Such a hut was warmer than one built entirely above ground. The size depended on the number of the proposed mess. If the hut was to be occupied by two, it was built nearly square, and covered by two half-shelters. Such a stockade would and often did accommodate three men, the third using his half-shelter to stop up one gable. When four men occupied a stockade, it was built accordingly, and covered by four half-shelters. In each case these were stretched over a framework of light rafters raised on the walls of the stockade. Sometimes the gables were built up to the ridge-poles with smaller logs, but just as often they were filled by an extra half-shelter, a rubber blanket, or an old poncho...
The chinks between the logs were filled with mud, worked to a viscous consistency, which adhered more or less tenaciously according to the amount of clay in the mixture. It usually needed renewing after a severe storm. The chimney was built outside, after the southern fashion. It stood sometimes at the end and sometimes in the middle of one side of the stockade. It started from a fire-place which was fashioned with more or less skill, according to the taste or mechanical genius of the workman, or the tools and materials used, or both. In my own company there were two masons who had opportunities, whenever a winter camp was pitched, to practise their trade far more than they were inclined to do. The fire-places were built of brick, of stone, or of wood. If there was a deserted house in the neighborhood of the camp which boasted brick chimneys, they were sure to be brought low to serve the Union cause in the manner indicated, unless the house was used by some general officer as headquarters. When built of wood, the chimneys were lined with a very thick coating of mud. They were generally continued above the fireplace with split wood built cob-fashion, which was filled between and lined with the red clayey soil of Virginia, but stones were used when abundant.
Very frequently pork and beef barrels were secured to serve this purpose, being put one above another, and now and then a lively hurrah would run through the camp when one of these was discovered on fire. It is hardly necessary to remark that not all of these chimneys were monuments of success. Too often the draught was down instead of up, and the inside of some stockades resembled smokehouses. Still, it was "all in the three years," as the boys used to say. It was all the same to the average soldier, who rarely saw fit to tear down and build anew more scientifically. The smoke of his camp-fires in warm weather was an excellent preparative for the smoking fireplace of winter-quarters.
Many of these huts were deemed incomplete until a sign appeared over the door. Here and there some one would make an attempt at having a door-plate of wood suitably inscribed; but the more common sight was a sign over the entrance bearing such inscriptions, rudely cut or marked with charcoal, as: "Parker House," "Hole in the Wall," "Mose Pearson's," "Astor House," "Willard's Hotel," "Five Points," and other titles equally absurd, expressing in this ridiculous way the vagaries of the inmates...
The camp of a regiment or battery was supposed to be laid out in regular order as definitely prescribed by Army Regulations. These, I may state in a general way, provided that each company of a regiment should pitch its tents in two files, facing on a street which was at right angles with the color-line of the regiment. This color-line was the assigned place for regimental formation. Then, without going into details, I will ad that the company officers' tents were pitched in rear of their respective companies, and the field officers, in the rear of these. Cavalry had something of the same plan, but with one row of tents to a company, while the artillery had three files of tents, one to each section.
All of this is preliminary to saying that while there was in Army Regulations this prescribed plan for laying out camps, yet the soldiers were more distinguished for their breach than their observance of this plan. Army Regulations were adopted for the guidance of the regular standing army; but this same regular army was now only a very small fraction of the Union forces, the largest portion by far--"the biggest half," to use Hibernianism--were volunteers, who could not or would not all be bound by Army Regulations. In the establishing of camps, therefore, there was much of the go-as-you-please order of procedure. It is true that regiments commanded by strict disciplinarians were likely to and did keep pretty close to regulations. Many others approximated this standard, but still there then remained a large residuum who suited themselves, or, rather, perhaps did not attempt to suit anybody unless compelled to by superior authority; so that in entering some camps one might find everything betokening the supervision of a crucial military spirit, while others were such a hurly-burly lack of plan that a mere pl[?]ugh-jogger might have been, and perhaps was, the controlling genius of the camp. When troops located in the woods, as they always did for their winter cantonments, this lack of system in the arrangement was likely to be deviated from on account of trees."

Billings then goes on to describe what the inside of a winter hut would have looked like, what bunks and other things were constructed of, and how they organized their equipment and effects. If you don't have a copy of this book, it would be a good idea to pick one up as it provides a wealth of information for your activities in the field.

As Eric mentioned, too, if you have not been to the White Oak Musuem, then you are really missing out, friend. You might also contact Curator D.P. Newton, who is a wealth of information about the camps around the Fredericksburg area.
540-371-4234 -or- www.whiteoakmuseum.com

Here are some images to take a gander at from the LOC. As you can see, there are images that show very precise camp layouts and others that are somewhat scattered.
From: The Library of Congress Selected Civil War Photographs Collection
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/cwphtml/cwphome.html

IMAGE #1: Manassas, Va. Confederate winter quarters
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1862 July
SUMMARY: Photograph from the main eastern theater of war, Confederate winter quarters, 1861-1862.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B815- 648

IMAGE #2: Centreville, Va. Confederate winter quarters, south view
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1862 March
SUMMARY: Photograph from the main eastern theater of war, Confederate winter quarters, 1861-1862.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B817- 7212

IMAGE #3: Centreville, Va. Confederate winter quarters
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1862 March.
SUMMARY: Photograph from the main eastern theater of war, Confederate winter quarters, 1861-1862.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B815- 332

IMAGE #4: Brandy Station, Va. Winter quarters of telegraphers and photographers, Army of the Potomac headquarters
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1864 April.
SUMMARY: Photograph from the main eastern theater of war, winter quarters at Brandy Station, December 1863-April 1864.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B815- 126

IMAGE #5: Rappahannock Station, Va. General view of 50th New York Engineers' winter encampment
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1864 March
SUMMARY: Photograph from the main eastern theater of the war, winter quarters at Brandy Station, December 1863-April 1864.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B817- 7276

IMAGE #6: Brandy Station, Va. Officers and a lady at headquarters of 1st Brigade, Horse Artillery
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1864 February
SUMMARY: Photograph from the main eastern theater of the war, winter quarters at Brandy Station, December 1863-April 1864. Photograph includes woman.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B817- 7582

IMAGE #7: Brandy Station, Va. General view of 6th New York Artillery encampment
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1864 April.
SUMMARY: Photograph from the main eastern theater of war, winter quarters at Brandy Station, December 1863-April 1864.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B817- 7265

IMAGE #8: Petersburg, Va. General view of camp of Oneida, N.Y., Independent Cavalry Company at Army headquarters, with men at leisure
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1865 March.
SUMMARY: Photograph of the main eastern theater of war, the siege of Petersburg, June 1864-April 1865.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B817- 7112

IMAGE #9: Brandy Station, Va., vicinity. Camp of 18th Pennsylvania Cavalry, 3d Division, Cavalry Corps
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1864 March.
SUMMARY: Photograph from the main eastern theater of war, winter quarters at Brandy Station, December 1863-April 1864.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B817- 7625

IMAGE #10: Fort Burnham, Va., vicinity. Camp of the 5th Pennsylvania Cavalry near the battlefield of Oct. 29, 1864
CREATED/PUBLISHED: Between 1860 and 1865
SUMMARY: Photograph from the main eastern theater of war, the Army of the James, June 1864-April 1865.
CALL NUMBER: LC-B811- 2499

There is also another thread I put up a while back with photographs of winter quarters in Tennessee: http://www.authentic-campaigner.com/...ad.php?t=11935

[weed]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

To take a look at winter quarters we built, go to:

http://www2.inxpress.net/jwedeward or

http://www.cwquartermaster.com

We used Billing's book, Johnnie Reb and Billy Yank as referances to help use with our construction back in the mid 1980's

John W;)

[33rd VA Co. H]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

To take a look at winter quarters we built, go to:

http://www2.inxpress.net/jwedeward or

http://www.cwquartermaster.com

We used Billing's book, Johnnie Reb and Billy Yank as referances to help use with our construction back in the mid 1980's

John W;)

Nice job! Love the chimney! Do you have any more photos? I'd love to see any more you may have.

[weed]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

When I get home tonight, I will scan and put a number of more photos up. We actually built 3 cabins. All we used was a period axe, shovel, buck saw, iron square cut nails and a period hatchet. I remember on the first cabin, we cut 42 trees about 1' in diameter and had to notch the ends with the hatchet getting them to lay and fit ok.

The hardest part was digging the 3' for the bottom of the cabins and the chinking of them using water, dirt, and straw as it was COLD in November and our hands got wet and cold very fast. But it had to be done to keep the cold wind from blowing thru the gaps. The hardest part was deciding on the construction layout. As we used Hardtack and Coffee, Johnny Reb and Billy Yank as referances, me and Paul McKee kind of argued over diferant constuction techniques. I remember Scott just sitting down and letting us "discuss the situation". We used them all the time. Even had a Thanksgiving Day weekend, cooking a turkey over the fire in the cabin. The one interesting thing was when it snowed, the "warmth" from the fire (most of the heat went up the chimmney) and our body heat warmed the canvas (shelter halves) roof and the snow melted dripping into the insides.

Did do some GREAT living history using them!!!!

John W:)

[27thNCdrummer]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

In the photos that Mr. Conley posted it seems as if shakes are almost the norm for the roofs of the confederate shanty's. I've noticed with some other photos of confederate huts that they have simple shake or log roofs, not tent roofs.

[Rev]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

Is that an impromptu gallows or a skinning frame in picture number four?

[1stOVIGuard]

Re: Winter Quarters Specifics

John,

Those are really awesome. If any other members have pictures, especially of the inside of their huts I and probably others would appreciate it. My unit and I are wanting to put on a living history for winter quarters, we have the land just not design ideas to go off of, lol. The pictures that I have researched show much larger shanties but I have not perused AC's library yet:D ...and Merry Christmas all!