Got a Real World Weapons or Armour Question? Mk X

[fusilier]

Agreed and agreed. Even the Tsar (which is the only three-stage design I know of) was kinda excessive.

There were other designs, the US deployed the three-stage B41 (25 megatons), and the soviets deployed another design of roughly the same yield. However, I believe that the Tsar Bomba was the only three-stage weapon actually detonated.

[Mike_G]

I'm not saying that the bayonet went away, or than aggressive infantry maneuvering ever went away. Formations got looser and covering fire got more important is all.

Just that in forty-odd years between Waterloo and Antietam, armies went from dense formations with smoothbores, relying on the bayonet charge to take ground and hold off cavalry, to looser formations (even the densest ACW formation was looser than a Napoleonic column, and nobody fought three deep after 1850. And those were orders of magnitude less dense than a matchlock and pike square) firing rifled muskets at greater engagement ranges.

Even the alleged veteran Confederates seldom came to grips with a bayonet, often halting and firing when in range rather than pressing the attack.

The diminishing impact of cavalry speaks to better infantry weapons. ACW cavalry tended to operate like rapid light infantry, using mobility to deploy and then repeating carbines to fight, rather than sword and lance charges.

So.. why?

A Springfield rifled musket didn't load much faster than a Brown Bess. But it made massed infantry charges much more like suicide. Pickett's charge got held up at a rail fence 80 yards from the Union line, taking horrble casualties before being rallied forward, to fail at the point of contact. A generation earlier, at Bunker Hill, Col Stark drove a stake into the ground at less than half that range to indicate the point where his men (three deep, instead of two or even one, as at Gettysburg) would fire.

So, it's still 2-3 rounds a minute, but it works better in practice at stopping the enemy. Is it because it's harder to press on if you're getting cut up at 80-100 yards from your goal than if you just have to weather one volley at 30? Or do 100 rifles just get that many more hits than 100 smoothbores?

[Yukitsu]

@Yukitsu
I would challenge the assumption that Confederate troops were more experienced or better fighters. While it is true that the South sent more volunteers to fight in the Mexican War of 1846-48 than the North, the main area of support for that war was "the West", and there were veterans on both sides of the Civil War. More importantly, the scale of the Civil War was of such proportion that such veterans would have been a drop in the bucket.

I'll need to check the statistics again, but I do believe a disproportionate number of the pre-war officers had Southern sympathies. However, it should be remembered that most of those officers had been lieutenants and captains, with no experience leading the large numbers of troops they were elevated to lead during the Civil War. In fact, outside of Winfield Scott (who stayed loyal to the Union, and was too old to take to the field), I can't think of any other generals of the Civil War that had been generals during the Mexican War. Not of the top of my head any way. I think Karl Marx observed in 1861 that if you took every single soldier from the regular army and made them all instructors (which most would be woefully unsuited for), there still wouldn't be nearly enough instructors to train the volunteers for the Northern army alone! Both sides began the war with basically ill-trained militia. However, high morale could overcome such deficiencies, and I think that was well recognized at the time, but overlooked today given the modern emphasis on military training. In the 19th century as much emphasis was put on esprit de corps and elan as on training.

Finally, Confederate victories in the Eastern theater in the first years of the war, should be contrasted with their defeats in the Western theater(s) during the same period.

The Northern army was quite a lot larger, and even then, the Mexican American war was primarily fought by militia as well, many from states closer to Texas. During the early years, the 50,000 militia from the Mexican American war would have certainly been a stronger nucleus than the regular army.

And even when considering the western theater, while they were losing the war, the actual troops were winning battles, save when outnumbered considerably. The actual Generals were not necessarily competent (Bragg seeming to be a bit poor at it), but the actual troops seemed to have had more experience, or had superior morale even on the west for some reason.

[Yukitsu]

I'm not saying that the bayonet went away, or than aggressive infantry maneuvering ever went away. Formations got looser and covering fire got more important is all.

Just that in forty-odd years between Waterloo and Antietam, armies went from dense formations with smoothbores, relying on the bayonet charge to take ground and hold off cavalry, to looser formations (even the densest ACW formation was looser than a Napoleonic column, and nobody fought three deep after 1850. And those were orders of magnitude less dense than a matchlock and pike square) firing rifled muskets at greater engagement ranges.

Even the alleged veteran Confederates seldom came to grips with a bayonet, often halting and firing when in range rather than pressing the attack.

The diminishing impact of cavalry speaks to better infantry weapons. ACW cavalry tended to operate like rapid light infantry, using mobility to deploy and then repeating carbines to fight, rather than sword and lance charges.

So.. why?

A Springfield rifled musket didn't load much faster than a Brown Bess. But it made massed infantry charges much more like suicide. Pickett's charge got held up at a rail fence 80 yards from the Union line, taking horrble casualties before being rallied forward, to fail at the point of contact. A generation earlier, at Bunker Hill, Col Stark drove a stake into the ground at less than half that range to indicate the point where his men (three deep, instead of two or even one, as at Gettysburg) would fire.

So, it's still 2-3 rounds a minute, but it works better in practice at stopping the enemy. Is it because it's harder to press on if you're getting cut up at 80-100 yards from your goal than if you just have to weather one volley at 30? Or do 100 rifles just get that many more hits than 100 smoothbores?

That's all hard to disentangle really. Recreations of the old brown bess, and IIRC even authentic brown bess smooth bores were actually found to be accurate to 50 yards, accurate against a platoon sized target out to 100 yards, and capable of scoring consistent hits on platoon sized targets out to 175 yards a significant fraction of the time. The idea that you need to see the "whites of their eyes" is probably fictitious, and at any rate, you could load a brown bess faster than you could load a Springfield with a minnie ball. If American Generals were insisting the troops fire at those extremely close ranges, it may have been doctrine, much like how Suvurov during the Napoleonic era actually did advocate the bayonet as the killing weapon.

It doesn't seem at face value that more accurate rifle fire would automatically eliminate mass volleys and tight formations, as the civil war era armies typically didn't engage further out than you could have fired a smoothbore.

It may have had more to do with doctrine for the American army at the time. The Americans didn't have the stiff heirarchy that the Europeans did, so the rather forced use of prestigious and probably ineffective horse regiments wouldn't have applied. Without large formations of expensive cavalry, you don't need to maintain dense formations, so it could simply have been the democratic nature of America that enabled them to loosen up their formations, as in all honesty, a more accurate gun isn't really what you want against a cavalry charge. They make an easy enough target of themselves as is back during Waterloo. You generally wanted a dense formation, good discipline and a pointed stick. Cannon and shrapnel had also had marked improvements since the Napoleonic era, and canister shells ripping through infantry formations would have probably made a significantly sharper impact on formation density than would small arms fire. I think the superior cannon likely had a bigger impact on how infantry fought than their own weapons.

[Mike_G]

But infantry attacks did become more costly after the adoption of the rifle, and not just for the Americans. Cavalry charges almost disappear after that point, despite the looser formations. I can't think of any instance of mounted cavalry overrunning infantry during the ACW, and Campbell's Thin Red Line stopped the Russian charge cold, all without forming squares.

The idea of "Shoulder to shoulder, stiffen your lip and fix bayonets" starts to fade shortly after the mass adoption of rifles. It doesn't totally go away, even when facing machineguns and mustard gas in the Great war, but the tide begins to turn in the first half of the 19th century, before breechloaders and metal cartridges became the norm. Even in the colonial wars where enemy artillery wasn't a concern, the infantry lines tended to thin out from three or more deep to two. I don't see why this would have happened if rifles weren't just that much more effective than muskets.

Muskets may have been theoretically capable of hitting an enemy formation at 100 yards, but they weren't used that way, any time I can recall reading about. The idea seems to have been to reserve that volley for the last minute when it will do the most good. Rifles do extend the effective range for engaging the enemy, and seem to have started firing earlier. Pickett's Charge, Marye's Heights, the Wilderness, Shiloh, all those battles saw the attack ground to a a halt over a distance as casualties mounted. The French columns at Waterloo were destroyed by a point blank volley followed by a bayonet charge. Ditto for the first two assaults at Bunker Hill, although there was no Colonial charge.

And yes, chasing the enemy from his position with a bayonet is more common than jamming it in him, and nearly as good, but that happens a lot less after 1840 or so.

[fusilier]

But infantry attacks did become more costly after the adoption of the rifle, and not just for the Americans. Cavalry charges almost disappear after that point, despite the looser formations. I can't think of any instance of mounted cavalry overrunning infantry during the ACW, and Campbell's Thin Red Line stopped the Russian charge cold, all without forming squares.

The idea of "Shoulder to shoulder, stiffen your lip and fix bayonets" starts to fade shortly after the mass adoption of rifles. It doesn't totally go away, even when facing machineguns and mustard gas in the Great war, but the tide begins to turn in the first half of the 19th century, before breechloaders and metal cartridges became the norm. Even in the colonial wars where enemy artillery wasn't a concern, the infantry lines tended to thin out from three or more deep to two. I don't see why this would have happened if rifles weren't just that much more effective than muskets.

Muskets may have been theoretically capable of hitting an enemy formation at 100 yards, but they weren't used that way, any time I can recall reading about. The idea seems to have been to reserve that volley for the last minute when it will do the most good. Rifles do extend the effective range for engaging the enemy, and seem to have started firing earlier. Pickett's Charge, Marye's Heights, the Wilderness, Shiloh, all those battles saw the attack ground to a a halt over a distance as casualties mounted. The French columns at Waterloo were destroyed by a point blank volley followed by a bayonet charge. Ditto for the first two assaults at Bunker Hill, although there was no Colonial charge.

And yes, chasing the enemy from his position with a bayonet is more common than jamming it in him, and nearly as good, but that happens a lot less after 1840 or so.

Cavalry tactics: briefly the increase deadliness at range, would have messed up traditional cavalry tactics considerably. But I would have to do more research into the subject.

You may need to broaden your research a bit. Rifle-muskets do appear to have made battles more bloody, but the change in infantry tactics wasn't that great with them. Take for example the Franco-Austrian War of 1859. The French and Austrians were armed primarily with rifle-muskets, the Sardinians still had mostly smoothbores (although they may have been using Nessler balls). That war is famous for the Furia Francese, a phrase relating to the furious charges that the French unleashed on the Austrians, successfully.

This left such an impression on the Austrians that they emulated those aggressive charges in the 1866 Austro-Prussian War. But the Prussians were now equipped with breechloading needle rifles. The Dreyse Needle Rifle is in many respects a pretty terrible weapon -- the gas seal is poor, the range is bad, the accuracy not much better, and the recoil would lead soldiers to fire from the hip. But, it was breechloading and fast firing compared to the Austrian rifle-muskets. The Austrian charges were decimated by the rapid fire that the Prussians could put out. The high command passed down orders prohibiting such charges, but they were ignored.

The French paid attention to this war, and adopted their own needle rifle, the Chassepot, which was a superior weapon, and changed their tactics to be primarily defensive. The infantry in rifle slits were to rely on the superior range and rate-of-fire. It wasn't enough to save them during the Franco-Prussian war, but there were other organizational issues at play there. And in some battles they were able to inflict very heavy casualties on the Prussians, who used aggressive tactics, even if they couldn't achieve victory. (It would then be France's turn to learn the wrong lesson, and put more emphasis on elan at the outbreak of WW1 -- but that's an over-simplification of a very complex issue going on in the French high-command at the time)

While the rifle musket had an effect on tactics, it wasn't as great as widespread use of breechloaders. Things changed very rapidly during that period. The percussion cap started a revolution that would culminate in the self-contained metallic cartridge within only a few decades. The minie-gun was almost obsolete within a decade of being developed. It was more of an aberration in the development of firearms, but the time of it's introduction meant that it was involved in the most significant wars of the mid-19th century, and that gives a prominent place in history.

P.S. The Brown Bess may have had a faster rate of fire than a Springfield rifle musket. It's generally accepted that smoothbores were a little bit faster loading than the first rifle muskets. Also, the idea of delivering the first volley at the very last moment, as close as possible to the enemy, was one that carried over to the Civil War. There's probably several reasons for this, but there was a sense that the first volley was the most effective.

[fusilier]

The Northern army was quite a lot larger, and even then, the Mexican American war was primarily fought by militia as well, many from states closer to Texas. During the early years, the 50,000 militia from the Mexican American war would have certainly been a stronger nucleus than the regular army.

And even when considering the western theater, while they were losing the war, the actual troops were winning battles, save when outnumbered considerably. The actual Generals were not necessarily competent (Bragg seeming to be a bit poor at it), but the actual troops seemed to have had more experience, or had superior morale even on the west for some reason.

There are many myths surrounding the Civil War, and especially the confederacy.

The volunteers and militia during the Mexican-American War have a terrible reputation -- they were ill-disciplined, poorly trained, and often rancorous in camp. The US basically gave up on them, and temporarily expanded the regular army to meet it's needs.

Even then, veterans from the Mexican American War, probably had little to no impact on the effectiveness of southern soldiers during the initial stages of the Civil War. There just weren't enough of them. Many officers, in fact most of the high-ranking ones, had seen some service during that war, but there were plenty of them on the Union side too. This is the first time I've heard anybody make the claim that rank-and-file veterans of the Mexican War raised the fighting level of the Confederacy.

A lot of bogus claims out there about the Civil War are the result of exaggerations. For example, I've read history textbooks that make it sound as though the Union army was almost universally equipped with breechloaders and repeaters by the end of the war! Which isn't remotely true. Yes, the Union would have had proportionally more of such weapons than the Confederacy, but it was still just a drop in the bucket compared to the muzzle-loading weaponry.

[Mike_G]

P.S. The Brown Bess may have had a faster rate of fire than a Springfield rifle musket. It's generally accepted that smoothbores were a little bit faster loading than the first rifle muskets. Also, the idea of delivering the first volley at the very last moment, as close as possible to the enemy, was one that carried over to the Civil War. There's probably several reasons for this, but there was a sense that the first volley was the most effective.

This seems to be contradicted by much that I've read and seen. The ranges in the American Revolution were very short. I've stood on a number of Massachusetts battlefields, and at thirty paces, I could have hit an individual Welch Fusilier with a thrown anvil, let alone a musket. The thought of three ranks firing in sequence at that range is horrifying.

But that's not how Union troops defended Cemetery ridge, stoically holding their fire until the rebels got within fifty yards. Indications are that they were firing at at least 100 yards and sustained that fire, rather than hold for the one devastating volley.

The Irish brigade, armed mostly with smoothbores because the Meagher felt that buck and ball would be more effective, were said to find themselves at a disadvantage in several battles when sustained firing at longer ranges.

[Yukitsu]

That not actually how Waterloo went. The French position wanted to essentially shell the English out of their hidey hold behind the hill, while the English were using point blank volleys only because they were staying behind cover to avoid cannon fire. The majority of the attacks were actually either mini sieges over the 2 farm houses holding the English flanks, long range cannon and infantry fire, or a few poorly executed charges by Michelle Ney to the English lines (which fired at point blank from squares because of line of sight restrictions due to the hill, not because they wanted to fire from within 30 yards.)

The "thin red line" was actually expected to have faltered, it was sent only to delay the Russian cavalry, as a square would have been circumvented. The only reason the thin red line held, was the Russians figured it was a trap and ordered a retreat.

I would still conclude it wasn't the infantry, but the artillery that forced the more dispersed formations.

The volunteers and militia during the Mexican-American War have a terrible reputation -- they were ill-disciplined, poorly trained, and often rancorous in camp. The US basically gave up on them, and temporarily expanded the regular army to meet it's needs.

The exact same was said and done of the Canadians during WWI, but none of those opinions of their discipline seemed to matter to their efficacy. The fact is, given two camps of ill disciplined, poorly trained, rancorous militia, the one with experience at all, is still going to be a more effective force at least through morale than the ones that are ill disciplined, poorly trained, rancorous militia that haven't had any experience on a battlefield. In any event, I wouldn't consider the relative minor (in terms of loss comparisons) losses in the west, and the victories in the east as having much to do with the commanders chosen on either side. No one can boast have having had any truly brilliant or revolutionary leaders during the war (Not even Lee IMO), and I don't think any of them were atrocious lemons either (Not even Hooker). I think the actual troops, or if not that then the weapons they used must have played some factor in the difference.

It's also not as though the approximately 50,000 militia from the Mexican American war would have been entirely insignificant in terms of numbers. The Union and Confederate armies at the start of the war weren't breaching even say, 500,000 men, or they were at the very least exceeding a 1 in 10 ratio. They were certainly not so few that they couldn't have even trained the soldiers they were recruiting, that claim is ludicrous.

By 63, certainly the Confederates were running on raw recruits as much as the Union, but you don't find people introducing sweeping doctrine changes in a 2 years time span during the course of a single war. I am still confident that the idea to avoid close combat was due in a large part to earlier experience from the Mexican theater rather than the weapons of the time. (and even without, the raw recuits wouldn't have been better off doing bayonet charges anyway.)

Case in point, over 40 years later, the world concluded that close combat was to be the deciding action against entrenched defenses when they observed the Russo-Japanese war, partly causing the god awful doctrine of human wave assaults during the onset of WWI. By then, the weapons were more advanced, not less so.

[fusilier]

This seems to be contradicted by much that I've read and seen. The ranges in the American Revolution were very short. I've stood on a number of Massachusetts battlefields, and at thirty paces, I could have hit an individual Welch Fusilier with a thrown anvil, let alone a musket. The thought of three ranks firing in sequence at that range is horrifying.

But that's not how Union troops defended Cemetery ridge, stoically holding their fire until the rebels got within fifty yards. Indications are that they were firing at at least 100 yards and sustained that fire, rather than hold for the one devastating volley.

The Irish brigade, armed mostly with smoothbores because the Meagher felt that buck and ball would be more effective, were said to find themselves at a disadvantage in several battles when sustained firing at longer ranges.

There were events in the Civil War where the troops blasted away at each other at around 30-40 yards too, even with rifle muskets. While there may have been more exchanging of volleys at a hundred yards than was done during the Revolution or Napoleonic Wars, a hundred yards was not an uncommon range to exchange volleys during that time either. For that matter I think the longest ranged volley ever, was a Napoleonic volley by an Army Corps in Spain at 1000 yards. (I'm trying to remember all of this from a book I read a long time ago: I don't remember the name, but it was a detailed analysis of tactics of the Civil War, based on statistics -- and volley ranges was something it went into considerably, with the argument being that they fired at roughly the same ranges as they had with smoothbores).

Just because the *idea* of holding off a volley until very close was popular, doesn't mean it was practiced! ;-) With the inability of rifle-muskets to use buck-and-ball, the devastating close range volley wasn't as devastating as it used to be. However, there was still a sense that the first volley was the best, and it should be reserved. Some officers allowed their troops to open fire at 300-400 yards -- not because it was effective at harming the enemy, but because it could relieve anxiety among the troops. I believe those that advocated it, stated it should be done when advancing, and not defending a position. The sights on most rifle-muskets of the period adjusted out to 500 yards (and that was a war-time simplification down from a 1000 yards). So one would certainly be tempted to think that volleys would efficacious out to that range. And I would bet it was tried from time-to-time, but didn't work out to well in practice, and that would have been figured out pretty quickly.

[fusilier]

The exact same was said and done of the Canadians during WWI, but none of those opinions of their discipline seemed to matter to their efficacy. The fact is, given two camps of ill disciplined, poorly trained, rancorous militia, the one with experience at all, is still going to be a more effective force at least through morale than the ones that are ill disciplined, poorly trained, rancorous militia that haven't had any experience on a battlefield. In any event, I wouldn't consider the relative minor (in terms of loss comparisons) losses in the west, and the victories in the east as having much to do with the commanders chosen on either side. No one can boast have having had any truly brilliant or revolutionary leaders during the war (Not even Lee IMO), and I don't think any of them were atrocious lemons either (Not even Hooker). I think the actual troops, or if not that then the weapons they used must have played some factor in the difference.

It's also not as though the approximately 50,000 militia from the Mexican American war would have been entirely insignificant in terms of numbers. The Union and Confederate armies at the start of the war weren't breaching even say, 500,000 men, or they were at the very least exceeding a 1 in 10 ratio. They were certainly not so few that they couldn't have even trained the soldiers they were recruiting, that claim is ludicrous.

By 63, certainly the Confederates were running on raw recruits as much as the Union, but you don't find people introducing sweeping doctrine changes in a 2 years time span during the course of a single war. I am still confident that the idea to avoid close combat was due in a large part to earlier experience from the Mexican theater rather than the weapons of the time. (and even without, the raw recuits wouldn't have been better off doing bayonet charges anyway.)

Case in point, over 40 years later, the world concluded that close combat was to be the deciding action against entrenched defenses when they observed the Russo-Japanese war, partly causing the god awful doctrine of human wave assaults during the onset of WWI. By then, the weapons were more advanced, not less so.

Did they send the Canadians home after a few months service in WW1, and basically disband the CEF? It's a rhetorical question -- the efficacy of the volunteers in the Mexican-American War was at the heart of the issue. Some of the better units, as I recall, were from northern states like Illinois (New York units had a good reputation too, but they didn't get anywhere near their quotas!)

However, more importantly, I'm not convinced that those militia men, could have made much of a difference. First, what are the statistics? How many veterans of the Mexican War did the Confederacy recruit, and how many did the Union recruit?

Second, what impact can be discerned? This is the first time I've heard anybody argue that rank-and-file Mexican War veterans contributed to confederate victories. [Either that, or I've put up a mental block] Do you have sources for some of these claims?

The Confederate draft is almost never mentioned in detail, but it was authorized in April of 1862. The Union draft came later in the year, but most states were able to avoid implementing it for sometime.

[fusilier]

Mike_G

The book may have been:

Battle tactics of the civil war by Paddy Griffith

Seriously, I think I read this in middle school! It was one heck of a flash of memory that allowed me to dredge up the title. It clearly left an impression on me.

Ok, I just read a review of the book on this website:
http://personal.tcu.edu/swoodworth/Griffith-BT.htm

Which contained:

Griffith contends that Civil War rifles did not represent any great advancement in firearms technology. Instead, he cites that Civil War armies tended to fight no further apart than before, suggesting that the gap in technology was not as great as perceived. Griffith also examines artillery and finds similar shortcomings. It was not until the Prussian campaigns of the 1870s, Griffith says, that truly long-range artillery comes to the field and forces noticeable differences in tactics.

I'm pretty sure this is the book I read! His views may be unconventional though, or perhaps were unconventional at the time. And like with many things in life, when you learn something young it tends to be ingrained as the "right" answer. The first printing was in 1987, but Amazon's version lists a publication date of 2001 -- so he may have been persuasive enough in his arguments not to be simply dismissed.

I need to see if I can find the book in a library and read it again -- I'm sure I'm not getting all the details right! Not sure when I will have time to do that though.

[Yukitsu]

Did they send the Canadians home after a few months service in WW1, and basically disband the CEF? It's a rhetorical question -- the efficacy of the volunteers in the Mexican-American War was at the heart of the issue. Some of the better units, as I recall, were from northern states like Illinois (New York units had a good reputation too, but they didn't get anywhere near their quotas!)

They had wanted to get rid of them sooner actually (and at the end of the war did rather unceremoniously ship them off to stop them from breaking everything), but given the scope and intensity of the wars in question, I don't think getting rid of unruly troops was an option. Despite that, there seem to have been very few companies from New York, good reputation or not.

However, more importantly, I'm not convinced that those militia men, could have made much of a difference. First, what are the statistics? How many veterans of the Mexican War did the Confederacy recruit, and how many did the Union recruit?

There were 50,000 approximately in the militia (and a seperate number which I would have to look up for actual soldiers). The militia were predominantly pulled from states closer to Texas, with Texas being the main state they were pulled from. As for recruitment, that statistic will probably be virtually impossible to determine. Tracking the militia and then cross referencing the names from those sign up sheets to the conscription notes during the civil war is beyond the scope of anything I've seen anywhere. However, the density of those militia were concentrated south.

Second, what impact can be discerned? This is the first time I've heard anybody argue that rank-and-file Mexican War veterans contributed to confederate victories. [Either that, or I've put up a mental block] Do you have sources for some of these claims?

Not in particular. It doesn't, however, make any sense to say that untrained, untested conscripts would be equivalent to poor, but at the very least experienced conscripts the first 2 years of the war nor does it make sense to drag militia from say, New York all the way to Texas when you have the Texas state militia at hand to fight the Mexican American war, especially when so few were drafted for that war. Unless you're arguing that the victories in the eastern front were purely due to General Lee, or perhaps due to his opposition. Personally, I'm not willing to credit the victories to any particular genius on the part of Lee, nor to any Ineptitude on the part of Hooker, nor subsequent lack of inspiration from Lee or any genius from Grant.

While most people don't like wiki for anything, they're pretty good if you just want a "who was involved in X" situation, and they have a full list of militia that were enlisted to fight in the Mexican American war. They refer to "regiments" in many cases, which isn't always a useful designation, but the majority of the volunteers came from Texas. The Union state with the largest number of volunteers were from Illinois. Coincidentally, they were further south, and contributed to the rather costly Union victories early in the war on the Western front, while the states that provided fewer militia to the war fared worse, and were concentrated on the Eastern front, so there is a correlation between states that provided troops to the Mexican American war and their pre-draft years of performance during the civil war.

The Confederate draft is almost never mentioned in detail, but it was authorized in April of 1862. The Union draft came later in the year, but most states were able to avoid implementing it for sometime.

When the numbers on either side started getting inflated to approximately 100,000 troops devoted to either side to a single battle (or to one side), the victories the confederates were managing to pull were getting narrower, and their losses started to become much sharper, even considering that they were typically outnumbered. The command on either side had changed very little at that point. While I do recall the confederates were starting to rely on older, younger and generally less fit conscripts at this point in time, even considering that, I would imagine the quality of the soldiers was declining.

[fusilier]

The terminology is a bit strange here, but we're not talking about conscripts, were primarily talking about volunteers. This needs to be understood in the proper terminology of the day: volunteers were NON-professional soldiers that had volunteered for a particular event or war (90 day volunteers were sometimes recruited in peace-time in the territories). Volunteers did not technically fall under the militia system in place in the United States at the time, but using other definitions of citizen militia, they could be called "militia". Militia service in the United States could be compulsory, but at that time it was rarely so, and some states were treating their militia more as a national guard, where individuals volunteered to train on a more regular basis. New York sometimes referred to its militia as New York National Guard, and other times as New York State Militia -- I think certain units preferred one or the other moniker; I haven't seen anything to indicate they were actually different systems. Having said that, the militia could be called out for service in a more conscript like fashion, but that service was for the state, and not the country. Georgia was notorious during the Civil War for activating it's militia, and thereby denying the use of those troops to the Confederate Army!

Concerning the raising of volunteers in the Mexican-American War:
From the Osprey Men-at-arms book:

In May of 1846 president Polk called for 50,000 volunteers to serve a year, in quotas from the various states. To give you some idea of the difficulties:
North Carolina was expected to deliver one infantry regiment of 10 companies. 32 companies were immediately formed -- but they lost interest so quickly, that the North Carolina regiment was shipped off with only nine companies, and none of them were completely filled! Virginia had to send recruiters to Maryland to try to meet quotas! Five companies of the 1st Georgia got involved in a fight, where it was reported that bayonets and muskets and were used freely. The fight had to be quelled by the 4th Illinois Volunteers.

Volunteers are noted as having lower combat deaths than the regulars, because they saw less fighting.

The 7th New York was described as one of the two best disciplined volunteer units in the army. The other was the Mormon battalion, both performed garrison duty in California during the war, and I don't think they saw combat.

From The United States Infantry, by Urwin, has some more information.

Illinois eventually supplied 14 volunteer regiments. 10 above its quota. Tennessee responded to the initial request for 3,000 volunteers by offering 30,000 volunteers. However, that was probably the state legislature's zealous response, and there is no mention of how many troops were actually organized into regiments (like what happened to North Carolina's volunteers).

Urwin notes that the responses to the volunteers were mixed, and their efficacy ultimately relied upon having good officers who could whip them into shape. Buena Vista, he claims, was won by Taylor's artillery supported by the 1st and 2nd Illinois, 2nd Kentucky, and 3rd Indiana Infantry. (All northern states -- despite what Kentuckians say nowadays, the vast majority of the soldiers from that state fought for the North in the Civil War.) However, he notes that the most "outstanding heroes" of the battle were Jefferson Davis's Mississippi Rifles. It should be noted that Jefferson Davis was a West Pointer.

I don't have access to my copy of Brassey's book on the subject. If I get the chance I'll see what it says about the proportions of volunteers from the various states.

[Mike_G]

Mike_G

The book may have been:

Battle tactics of the civil war by Paddy Griffith

Seriously, I think I read this in middle school! It was one heck of a flash of memory that allowed me to dredge up the title. It clearly left an impression on me.

Ok, I just read a review of the book on this website:
http://personal.tcu.edu/swoodworth/Griffith-BT.htm

Which contained:


I'm pretty sure this is the book I read! His views may be unconventional though, or perhaps were unconventional at the time. And like with many things in life, when you learn something young it tends to be ingrained as the "right" answer. The first printing was in 1987, but Amazon's version lists a publication date of 2001 -- so he may have been persuasive enough in his arguments not to be simply dismissed.

I need to see if I can find the book in a library and read it again -- I'm sure I'm not getting all the details right! Not sure when I will have time to do that though.

I read Forward Into Battle by Griffith a few years back. He tends to emphasize the advantage of aggressive maneuvering over firepower, so I can see how he would be less of a rifle disciple.

I just think that since every army in the world spent the money to upgrade from smoothbore muzzle loaders to rifled muzzle loaders, whose only advantage was accuracy, there must have been a sizable perceived advantage.

And the infantry assault gets more and more costly and formations get looser as rifles (and artillery) get better, while the cavalry charge almost vanishes (with a few exceptions, but pretty much it's never the threat it once was)

Full disclosure, I joined the Marines, where marksmanship is a religion, and I spent an ungodly amount of time learning to shoot accurately, and that one well aimed shot is worth a hundred "spray and pray," so that's how my bias runs.

[Storm Bringer]

I have heard quite a lot of sources, over pretty much the whole period of muzzle loading firearms, state the belief that "The first shot is the best".

the explanation normally given is that when the troops first load their musket, their are out of contact and take their time to load it "properly", making sure the bullet is firmly packed, with wadding and such, while when they are in contact, they cut as many corners as possible, in order to speed the rate of fire. thus, the first she is both more accurate and more powerful, compared to later, "rushed" shots, and so something not to be wasted.

I have also seen it proposed that soldiers would often "aim high", either though poor marksmanship, or some desire not to be a killer, meaning that a lot of shots were wasted. Thus, long range fire would often miss completely, so officers would wait as long as they could to ensure maximum effectiveness.

[rrgg]

Early firearms didn't necessarily have a tremendus amount of muzzle velocity. Even if you took perfect aim at man 100 yards away the bullet is going to hit the ground somewhere in front of his feet. Not to mention that it is unlikely a soldier will be able to see where his round struck and compensate in the chaos of battle.

This means it would take quite a bit of training before a marksman gets good at estimating ranges and the physics of their gun. I'm not sure how things changed before the Civil war, but Napoleonic Era troops often got as few as 10 real practice shots per year.

[Storm Bringer]

thing is, due to (by modern standards) loose manufacturing tolerances of powder, ball diamiter, barell diamiter, and such, most muzzle loading weapons were inconsistant form shot to shot, so even knowing where the last shot went didn't really help in aiming the next, as the margin of error was often very large.

[fusilier]

I just think that since every army in the world spent the money to upgrade from smoothbore muzzle loaders to rifled muzzle loaders, whose only advantage was accuracy, there must have been a sizable perceived advantage.

And the infantry assault gets more and more costly and formations get looser as rifles (and artillery) get better, while the cavalry charge almost vanishes (with a few exceptions, but pretty much it's never the threat it once was)

I would agree with the first part. I don't believe that rifle-muskets had no effect on warfare. However, my recollection, is that Griffith provided enough evidence to convince me that they didn't have much effect on the ranges at which battles were fought.

As for the formations getting looser, I don't really see that. Two rank formations were standard in the United States Army manuals, until the 1835 Scott's Tactics. Then three ranks were standard, but two rank was still addressed (whereas prior, three-ranks was not mentioned). The 1835 Scott's Tactics is what would have been used in the Mexican-American War, but I'm not sure which formation (two or three ranks) was preferred. The visual evidence is not consistent. Hardee's tactics, reverted to two ranks, and that was standard throughout the Civil War. Upton's post war tactics focused on both one and two rank formations, with one rank being preferred for the new breechloaders. So in my opinion it was breechloaders that had a bigger effect on the tactics.

I suppose what I'm trying to communicate, is that rifle-muskets were superior to smoothbore muskets, but they still fit within the musket paradigm, at an operational level. They were not revolutionary weapons that changed the entire nature of warfare. Instead, they made it more deadly (but not to such an extent that tactics had to be significantly altered).

However, this is not to say that Civil War tactics were Napoleonic, I view them as part of a transition in a time period. At some fundamental level, would I say that they were Napoleonic -- yes. They still used troops in dense formations lined up in multiple ranks. However, other advances in tactics had occurred. The quick-step and double quick-step were now common to all infantry, and traditional distinctions between light and line infantry were breaking down, with all troops expected to perform both functions. How much those advances in tactics were dictated by new weaponry, and how much they were simply developments of trends begun under older weapons is not known to me. Certainly, maneuvering faster on the battlefield isn't a bad thing when equipped with smoothbores.

[fusilier]

I have heard quite a lot of sources, over pretty much the whole period of muzzle loading firearms, state the belief that "The first shot is the best".

the explanation normally given is that when the troops first load their musket, their are out of contact and take their time to load it "properly", making sure the bullet is firmly packed, with wadding and such, while when they are in contact, they cut as many corners as possible, in order to speed the rate of fire. thus, the first she is both more accurate and more powerful, compared to later, "rushed" shots, and so something not to be wasted.

I have also seen it proposed that soldiers would often "aim high", either though poor marksmanship, or some desire not to be a killer, meaning that a lot of shots were wasted. Thus, long range fire would often miss completely, so officers would wait as long as they could to ensure maximum effectiveness.

That's basically the reasoning that I've heard.

The tendency to aim high probably has a couple of roots. I'd put my money on the fact that when firing volleys, soldiers simply level the musket -- which would put the aiming point high on the chest. The other factor is that unless trained to aim at the center of mass I suspect that many soldiers naturally aimed at the center of the chest.

[fusilier]

thing is, due to (by modern standards) loose manufacturing tolerances of powder, ball diamiter, barell diamiter, and such, most muzzle loading weapons were inconsistant form shot to shot, so even knowing where the last shot went didn't really help in aiming the next, as the margin of error was often very large.

Absolutely. A lot of old muskets that are ostensibly .69 caliber, will be found to have larger bores. And the windage that was allowed on the balls was really high. The main concern was to prevent a ball from being too large to be loaded quickly. So oversized bores, and undersized balls were ok. I have heard of instances where troops with .69 caliber rifled-muskets were issued .58 caliber ammo -- they said they could see the bullets splashing into the puddles just a few yards in front of them. So too much windage (and not enough powder to compensate), could be a problem.

A smoothbore musket with a tight fitting ball (or ball and patch), can be surprisingly accurate. But it will take just as long to load as rifle musket.

[JustSomeGuy]

I have recently been wondering...
Beyond training on laws (and who is THE LAW), region specifics, and tactical formations/instructions, and assuming a generic longsword and light armour combo - what would be the training differences between, say, a light footsoldier, a town/city guard, a rural deputy (or similar).

I'm asking because in a book one of the characters (a sellsword) says the city guard are good fighters but they're no soldiers. Are the differences basically about knowledge of battle formations and the like, or would each have fought differently enough to make grand, sweeping statements on the topic?

I considered the differences between modern (armed) law enforcement and soldiers, and because of tactics and deployment situations they would be armed differently, but more importantly the tactics (or rules of engagement) would very much impact upon their actions. However, in ye olden dayes, they didn't have such encompassing legal restrictions so what, if any, differences would there be in, say, a fight of 1-on-1, 5-on-5, and 20-on-20 (basically individual combat, small group and midsize group - anything beyond i'm assuming soldiers win hands down)

[Spiryt]

I have recently been wondering...
Beyond training on laws (and who is THE LAW), region specifics, and tactical formations/instructions, and assuming a generic longsword and light armour combo - what would be the training differences between, say, a light footsoldier, a town/city guard, a rural deputy (or similar).

Well, longsword and light armor generally wouldn't be generic at all for neither foot soldier, nor town guard, for the record.

Some kind of polearm would pretty much ubiquitously used in such situations.

As far as the rest of the question goes, it's really pretty hard to tell - we don't have that much sources about it, but generally as far as group fighting goes, general cooperation, predictability of your fellow combatants, and general bond would be most important - so one could fight well, knowing that other will stand too, hold formation, protect his sides etc.

So distinction like that would be sketchy at best, one could always theoretically know what to do as far as cooperation etc. goes, but in case of say, town guards who had never seen any serious trouble, it wouldn't be all that useful practically then.

Same goes for sheer fighting though, noone can really be good fighter theoretically or from some dry, light sparring.

[eulmanis12]

Several things on the topic of line infantry and the Civil War.

1. First shot is the best. This was mentioned before, here is my take on it.
It is a simple concept. Say I two equally sized groups of men in firing lines with muskets or rifle muskets facing eachother, for the sake of argument say group A with 100 men and group B with 100 men. Both are arranged in line formation 50 men long by 2 men deep. Every man can fire in this arrangement. If group A fires first, 100 men will fire, a number of men from group B will be hit. When group B returns fire <100 men will fire, and assuming roughly equal quality of marksmenship a smaller number of men from group A will be hit. Group A now outnumbers group B, and has started reloading first and so if of roughly equal quality to group B, will probably fire its second volley before Group B does, most likley improving its numerical advantage.

2. Distances of firing. Yes, a good marksmen with a smoothbore musket has a Good chance of hitting a target at well beyond the distance that musket armed infantry would normally engage at. The chief reason for this was that A, not every man was a good marksmen, B even the good marksmen would be hampered by the fact that most smoothbores had primitive sights at best, often no rear sight, C, Most soldiers did not actually aim (this was more common in Europe than America, in the Americas soldiers depending on the state were encouraged to take careful aim at a specific target), at the command "Present Arms" they leveled their muskets in the general direction of the enemy formation without sighting along the barrel, the assumtion being that it would hit somebody and it didn't matter who. Untrained infantry were more likley to engage at a longer distance, and to take careful aim than veteran infantry. When rifle muskets came along, at first, though now soldiers were all using much more accurate weapons, and now took careful aim at individual enemies, officers who had commanded in the days of the Smoothbore failed to adapt immediatly, massive casualties occured due to the high accuracy an short distance of the engagment. As time went on, most officers adapted to fighting at longer distances, and in looser formations.

Generalship and reasons for Confederate successes in the first half of the war.
On an individual level, the average confederate private and the average union private were about the same in terms of quality. the majority of both armies had next to no experiance, and not a whole lot of training.
The quality of the generals was the major difference in the way the battles turned out. Lee was not a perfect general, but when compared to Burnside, McClellan, and Hooker, he was Sun Tzu. Take Fredericksburg for example. Burside might be forgiven for ordering the first attack though the basic plan of "the enemy is in cover with large amounts of artillery and has the hight ground, let's line up and march forward slowly while pausing once in a while to shoot at targets we probably won't hit" isn't exactly a spark of military genius. Burnside can't be forgiven for ordering 8 additional attacks against the same position using the same tactics after watching the first, then the second, then the third, and so on, not just fail, but fail with as high of casualties as they did upwards of 30% for many units. The definition of madness is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result, I think Burside qualifies. Lee might not have been a genius (Gettysburg comes to mind), but he was at the very least a good general. his northern counterparts were sub-par generals on a good day.

[fusilier]

2. Distances of firing. Yes, a good marksmen with a smoothbore musket has a Good chance of hitting a target at well beyond the distance that musket armed infantry would normally engage at. The chief reason for this was that A, not every man was a good marksmen, B even the good marksmen would be hampered by the fact that most smoothbores had primitive sights at best, often no rear sight, C, Most soldiers did not actually aim (this was more common in Europe than America, in the Americas soldiers depending on the state were encouraged to take careful aim at a specific target), at the command "Present Arms" they leveled their muskets in the general direction of the enemy formation without sighting along the barrel, the assumtion being that it would hit somebody and it didn't matter who. Untrained infantry were more likley to engage at a longer distance, and to take careful aim than veteran infantry. When rifle muskets came along, at first, though now soldiers were all using much more accurate weapons, and now took careful aim at individual enemies, officers who had commanded in the days of the Smoothbore failed to adapt immediatly, massive casualties occured due to the high accuracy an short distance of the engagment. As time went on, most officers adapted to fighting at longer distances, and in looser formations.

1. While individual marksmanship and ability has a bearing, military practice was to use an undersized ball -- this allowed for poor tolerances, and to compensate for fouling. To give you an idea, a .69 musket was to use .65 caliber ball. If it used a .685 ball, accuracy would have been much improved, but loading times would be longer and being slightly out of tolerance would yield to a bullet that couldn't be loaded (this was a problem with minie balls at the time).

Smoothbore muskets were significantly more deadly at very close ranges (~30-40 yards), and there is some evidence to back up the claim that if the soldiers could weather the casualties from rifles to get that close, they could be more effective. The minie ball made it more difficult to close.

2. Unless the soldiers are skirmishing, most of the time your target would be a mass formation, and aiming at individuals wasn't necessary. Skirmishers were ordered to take their time aiming, and to aim using the "rear sight", which involved a different stance, compared to firing in the ranks.

Two-rank fighting was the standard tactic throughout the war. As the war went on, and training increased, more troops probably had better skirmish drill, but rarely did troops get significant target practice. Siege warfare involved different tactics, and in the late war such warfare was more common. But on an open battlefield, infantry would still deploy in two ranks.

[fusilier]

Brassey's book on the Mexican American War, has some more detail on the breakdown of troops from various states.

The Northeast only provided about 8,000 volunteers, the South 20,000 and the West 40,000.

Now it's a bit confusing, as the government kept changes regulations. Initially states were asked to provide one year volunteers -- then there was hesitancy to actually accept all those troops -- then they realized that one year wasn't long enough, and they wanted to recruit volunteers for "during the war". As a result there were twelve-month units that were pretty likely to have seen some conflict -- these were partially replaced by the volunteer units that were raised for the duration, but most of those were just involved in the occupation of Mexico. However, some of the units rased for the duration of the war were formed in late 1846, and may have seen some combat.

He also breaks it down by state and by regiment, but not all regiments saw combat. Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio, did send a lot of volunteers however. If I have time I'll give you a breakdown.

[fusilier]

A quick count of the regiments from each state, gives the following Volunteer forces for the Mexican-American War, organized by where those states were during the American Civil War.

I classified Missouri and Tennessee as Southern states. Kentucky, Maryland, and DC are border states. Battalions were counted as half-a-regiment, and I usually ignored the occasional odd company, unless there were many of them (Ohio, sent 15 independent companies to Mexico!), in which case 10 companies = 1 regiment. Also, I only considered units raised for 12 months or the duration of the war, and ignored the 3 months units that appeared briefly at the beginning of the war.

Southern States: 20.5 Regiments
Border States: 7
Northern States: 24

That's rough, but it shows a slight preponderance of the Volunteers were from the North. The majority of them coming from the old "Northwest territories" (Ohio, Indiana, Illinois).

[Yukitsu]

I'll just leave it at that, as the last thing I want to do is disentangle statistics when the units of measurement are battalions to regiments.

[PersonMan]

How much of an influence does environment have on the types of weapons used? It influences armor, of course, which changes which weapons are the most viable, but I'm interested specifically in the effects a northern Scandinavia-esque environment on weapons. Which sorts of weapons would be the most common, focusing primarily on the ability to function (ignoring logistical problems and the like, i.e. difficult to forge weapons or ones requiring special kinds of ore)?

Specifically, kama-esque weapons, would they be worth using?

[J.Gellert]

Specifically, kama-esque weapons, would they be worth using?

I think that bans on actual weapons were the only reason that kamas (and similar implements) were ever used in the first place.