"ACW - use of regimental reserves" Topic

I've seen many wargaming references to the standard deployment in "line" for an ACW regiment to actually be a sort of triple line, composed of an advanced skirmish line, the main battle line, and a small regimental reserve. In many cases, the numbers cited are 2 coys in skirmish order, 6 coys in line, and 2 coys in reserve – or, put another way, only 60% of regiment's strength would actually form the main line of battle. My assumption has always been that – if this was the case – various permutations would mimic this deployment on the brigade level, while not necessarily following those exact numbers for each specific regiment.

For those more knowledgeable in the details of the period, I have a couple of questions:

1. Well, was this actually the case, or was it theory as opposed to application?

2. If it was the case, was it something that developed during the course of the war, or was it a constant throughout?

3. In practical terms, when basing figures on a "brigade" level (i.e. abstracting the deployment of individual regiments), how much should this be reflected? Should we be basing to represent only about 2/3 of actual strength in line? This has obvious implications for how many men "fit" into our basing frontage.

Cheers,

Christopher

I'm rather skeptical of the notion of 'regimental reserves'. I've never read any first-hand account of it being done and the tactics manuals have no provision for it. (Aside from Silas Casey's not-adopted system of seperate skirmish companies.) I suppose there may have been cases where there wasn't room to deploy the entire regiment in line of battle and some companies were kept to the rear and then fed into the line when causalties made room, but this would have been an ad hoc improvisation rather than any standard procedure.

Skirmishers were deployed routinely, of course. One company would be enough to cover the front of a regiment if no reserve was kept, or two companies if they did keep a platoon in reserve.

Brigades, however, are another matter. You would often find brigades with one or more regiments kept in a second, reserve, line behind the others in the front line.

I could see this in a situation where your entire command consisted of a single brigade, but I too haven't heard of it as regular deployment.

As Scott said when a brigade deployed it was normal to have two – three regiments in the front line with one – two as a reserve.

The skirmishers would have rejoined the line during heavier action so your basing would remain unchanged.

If you are using one unit = one brigade, many rules like my Bitter Angels and Volley & Bayonet represent this with a 3" square to represent the brigades "area of operations" so to speak.

Others just really treat a brigade as a regiment, usually allowing for some sort of double line formation to represent the depth of the reserves.

Brigades typically formed a line or a double line with regiments in 2 lines. Nothing earth shattering here.

A regiment might form a skirmish line in front of the brigade formation.

That's kind of it.

Gents;

Actually, the OR is full of reports wherein regimental commanders specified that they deployed a battle line and a reserve. Likewise, the reports of the regimental commanders to their official commander in chief – the governor of their state – usually in considerably more detail – are as well.

This was seldom done in large set piece battles where the Brigade was moving "en masse" in an established formation. Conversely, when battles occurred spontaneously from a line of march, the regimental commanders quickly learned to hold back a "fire brigade" that could react to cover the flanks of the main line – especially in terrain with limited visibility.

Likewise, when there was no "brigade" skirmish line, in that same battle scenario the regimental commander would deploy a skirmish line, giving himself a recon element that could find the enemy and establish whether the forces found were an actual line or not.

A skirmish line could be as little as one company or as many as four. The reserve was seldom more than two. This left the main line usually four to seven companies.

An example of a battle that saw this extensively was on the first day of Chickamauga – that day also saw several commands that did NOT do this take it in the chin when unseen foes rolled over them after they got within mere "yards" unseen.

It is worth remembering that few battlefields were as open as either Waterloo or Gettysburg. Most, especially in the West – but certainly the Wilderness and many other fights in the east – allowed commanders little if any understanding of what was more than 100 yards from where they stood. It did not take experienced commanders long to realize that a skirmish line to develop the enemy line/attack and a reserve to respond to a threatened flank were what kept their "line" intact and their men alive.

Having had a set of the ORs in my basement for 30 years has allowed for much reading – especially of small battles – that are very interesting :)

Hope this is of interest!

Mark E. Horan

Brigades were where reserves were husbanded, rather than at the regimental level. For instance, if you can get a hold of A. F. Stevenson's "The Battle of Stones River" with the map included, you will see that most all the Union brigades in the line had regiments in reserve behind them. [one in four, two of six…] Stevenson fought at Stone's River and interviewed most all of the leaders in later years. And this was in December of 1862.

On the other hand, the Confederates seem to have kept entire brigades as the reserve…. at least at Stones' River. Similar practices were seen at Gettysburg, with several lines of brigades on the Second and Third Days.

In most battles, regiments did not fight alone and were often too small to keep significant reserves, but rather depended on external reserves to deal with problems.

Keeping reserves was a basic tenant of all 18th and 19th century wars. Whether it was done in any one particular instance, was a commander's decision…as they were the ones who controlled reserves. When the last reserves were committed, that was the end of the game. For instance, once Wofford's brigade, the last reserves were committed by Longstreet on the Second Day and then stopped, Longstreet called off further actions.

Didn't Chamberlain form a small reserve on Little Round Top prior to the "bayonet charge"? I remember reading something about that in a biography of him, and am completely ignoring the info/mis-info from Killer Angels/Gettysburg.

Likely, small unit actions at the regimental level would, of course, situation-ally determine whether the regimental commander could or would form a reserve for his immediate needs.

I expect this ad hoc affair would be completely out of place in brigade or division level assaults, but may well be an ideal response in defensive situations where the position of the oncoming enemy could not be fully determined

@ Mark Horan: Could you cite a few specific examples in the OR of regiments keeping reserves? I too, have had a full set of the OR gracing my basement for about 30 years and I've read hundreds (thousands) of reports as part of my graduate school studies and my masters thesis and I can't recall ever encountering such a thing. But I can't claim to have read more than a fraction of all the reports-that would be a lifetime's work :)

In most battles, regiments did not fight alone and were often too small to keep significant reserves, but rather depended on external reserves to deal with problems.

I agree.

I would have thought that a Regimental Reserve was likely to be a rare animal, particularly as units got worn down.

If you are putting less than 300 men in the field, keeping a reserve out of the firing line seems a risky business. Far more effective to hold back one or more Regiments, or a Brigade to plug a hole or reinforce a success.

I certainly don't recall the idea of holding back a Regimental Reserve being thought of in any drill manuals and I would question how it could be used. To stop a flank being turned maybe but other wise you would need to pull the remains of one or more companies out of the line while under fire and likely proximity of the enemy might make that a disaster.

Thanks for the replies. This was more or less my thought as well, that the practice would seem best suited to small actions where the regiment was more of an individual maneuver element, as opposed to larger actions where individual regiments could be tasked as local reserves. On the other hand, I can also see it being useful when moving through woods, even on a brigade level – keeping even a single small company in reserve on the flanking regiment could help counter unexpected flanking movements (although of course deploying skirmishers would be even more important).

On the brigade level, it's interesting that brigade and division commanders often seem to have kept a smaller active reserve (1/4 to 1/3 of the whole), rather than a complete second line the equivalent of the first (1/2 of the whole).

Cheers,

Christopher

I read a while back from memory it might have been the Kershaw Brigade often had regiments deployed in two lines the second line could be this regimental reserve?

Keep in mind that when reading the AAR's, reports of reserves on the regimental level may very well be referring to the reserves of the skirmish line.

When skirmishers deployed, they kept a small reserve behind THEIR line, which the Captain commanding them could then use to plug any gaps that occurred, as well as act as a rally point for the skirmishers to fall back upon if needs be.

For example, if a company deployed as skirmishers, it normally would deploy only it's first platoon, with the second remaining as a reserve. The 2nd Lt took the skirmishers out. The 1st remained behind with 2nd platoon to command it, while the Capt & 1st sergeant stayed off to one side with a bugler to oversee operations.

As the skirmish line advanced, the reserves would also advance in order to remain within supporting distance. Same in reverse when falling back upon the main battle line.

As above, it was quite common for Brigade commanders to hold back 1 regiment as a reserve, or to sometimes deploy their brigade into two equal lines, separated by 200-400 yards.

V/R

Didn't Chamberlain form a small reserve on Little Round Top prior to the "bayonet charge"?

You may be thinking about the company he positioned well to his left flank that came in at just the right moment during the final charge. It wasn't so much a reserve as a flank guard (a smart idea)

Agreeing with Scott and Trajans, regiments didn't keep reserves. What they could do was divide the wings and act at a short distance as two battalions. This might be useful for refusing a flank attack for example. However, once you do open up like this, you expose your color guard. This creates a danger for the Colonel. The regiment is designed to operate so that the men and officers have the flags as a center rally point of the battle line. If the battalions are separated by terrain/action, then there is no common rally point and a disastrous rout is possible.

I read a while back from memory it might have been the Kershaw Brigade often had regiments deployed in two lines the second line could be this regimental reserve?

Here I think the difference between a supporting line and a reserve is rather moot. Basically, both served the same purpose, whether at the regimental, brigade or division level.

I must confess I'm not up to speed with Civil War units operation by Wing in the Drill context, although it did happen in practical terms.

The big problem for Civil War regiments was that they often got down to such small numbers of men splitting the unit in any way was too dangerous. Hence my comment in relation to a Reserve.

In Napoleonic times the Drill was that the Colonel had one Wing and the Major the other and the Color Guard always went with the Colonel. In British practice at any rate.

In the Civil War I suspect, without looking it up, that the original intent was that the two Wings were supposed to be under the Lt.Colonel and Major, with the Colonel in overall control.

However, as the Lt Colonel seems to have vanished as a breed pretty quickly, as far as I know, the British style split would seem likely. Although in either case I imagine that the Senior Captain, or Regimental Adjutant, could have been substituted to keep the Colonel's hands free on that Wing.

In the Napoleonic wars, the British had both a colonel and a Lt. Colonel. Often the colonel never did command, and it more often than not fell to the Lt. Colonel. You also found regiments with more than one major. On campaign, the effort was to have commanders for both wings, but leaving the CinC of the regiment free to command overall. Of course, that is only generally, as it was often catch-as-catch-can with the actual order of battle.

In the Civil War there still were Lt. Colonels. For instance, the Philadelphia Brigade had colonels and Lt. colonels at Gettysburg according to their history of the battle. The Vermont Brigade started out with Lt. Colonels for their regiments in 1861.

It is hard to make a solid generalization for Lt. Colonels at any point in the war or theatre….

It is hard to make a solid generalization for Lt. Colonels at any point in the war or theatre….

That's kind of what I thought!

In the Napoleonic wars, the British had both a colonel and a Lt. Colonel. Often the colonel never did command, and it more often than not fell to the Lt. Colonel.

Agreed, in some cases the Colonel was a honorary title. That's carried over into members of the current Royal Family who are 'Colonels' of a number of Regiments.

I think reports of the time often confuse matters by just referring to 'Col' such and such without differentiation. Chamberlain was a Lt Colonel at Fredericksburg but was promoted to Colonel a month prior to his heroics at Gettysburg.

I wonder if Lt Colonels became less used as the war progressed?

Chamberlain was promoted to Colonel because his predecessor Col Adelbert Ames was promoted to BG and transferred, leaving Chamberlain in command of the regiment.

Lt Colonels were used, as they were posted on one corner of the line and the major on the other, leaving the colonel in the center with the regimental staff, etc.

One thing to note: There were, on occasions, units who lost their colonels and lt colonels due to losses of manpower. One example is the 10th Maine Infantry. At Cedar Mountain they suffered horrific losses and were reorganized as a battalion of 4 companies. As this was insufficient number of companies to allow for a LT Colonel as well as a Colonel, both were reassigned and command of the battalion devolved upon their Major. Afterward, they served as HQ Guard for 12th Corps.