"Captured Cavalry arms" Topic

Would any of the very knowledgable TMP contributors care to render an opinion on the re-supply of ammunition for Yankee carbines captured by Confederate cavalrymen. One reads frequently of the rebel troopers gleefully blasting away with their newly acquired captured yankee carbines. It seems like it would have been logistically very difficult to keep such arms supplied with ammunition after the rounds iniatially captured at the time had been used up, and in cases of mettalic cartridges almost impossible. This question has bothered me for some years, (guess I need to get a life!). Thanks in advance for any insights you may care to render. John Miller

It depends totally on the weapon in question. In some cases the South had its own copies of Federal fire arms and in others actually had the same guns.

In others captured supplies of ammunition served for a while and in some cases it was possible to reproduce ammunition to fit but its not hard to imagine that anything that required yet another manufacturing process would not really be that welcome given the South's problems in that area. You really need look no further than the nightmare that was ordnance supply to the Confederate Artillery to see how that might pan out.

Its worth noting that the half dozen or so, Federal carbines in service at one time or another didn't use the same ammunition as each other so picking them up as booty wasn't a great help in the long term.

The one that's generally considered an impossibility is, as you have already mentioned, guns where metallic cartridges were concerned.

Firstly they were not in volume service with the Federal army so capturing them wasn't that common and secondly tooling up for the numbers involve wouldn't have been worth it, even if the South had the capability to produce them.

Finally, access to any real numbers would have been in 1864-65 when basic survival was paramount not branching out from an armaments production nearing the end of its rope.

I have always assumed they were gleefully fired off as long as the bullets held out, and then eventually retired because they couldn't get more ammo…

Trajanus & Extra Crispy: Thanks a lot for you responses. I had thought something like this might be the case but I wondered what experts might say. Thanks again, John Miller

It also depended on the type of carbine captured. The South could manufacture paper cartridges, but brass was impossible. Thus capturing a Sharps worked in the long run, but a Henry was only as good as the ammo supply captured.

What John the Greater says. The southern ordnance department tried it's hand at manufacturing brass cartridges but quickly gave up on it. The resources required were needed for other projects and quality control was an iffy thing depending upon where these items were to be made.

Paper cartridges were not only equal to their federal counterparts, though, but with the advent of the Gardner Patent round, more efficient & faster to produce and use.

One note here: It was always possible to use a Sharps rifle or carbine as a muzzle-loading weapon if needs be. Since the weapon used a nitrated paper cartridge anyway, simply leaving the breach block closed and then loading a proper-caliber round from the front could be done. However, it was virtually impossible for the CS government to supply metallic cartridges for captured federal arms.

In fact, CS officers armed with pinfire revolvers were constricted to purchasing imported rounds through commercial outlets, as the government didn't supply either the weapon or the ammunition.

It's a fascinating subject, the entire CS Ordnance Department, and how it started with little to hand and still managed to keep the CS armies in the field armed and supplied with ammunition right up through the end of the conflict.

In fact, LEE, in his final report to President Jefferson, notes that ammunition and medicines were the two items that he never had to worry about having sufficient amounts of, throughout his term as Commander of the ANV. If you read his reports (and they all still exist) you can see that his remarks are backed up and that both fly in the face of post-war remarks about extreme shortages of ammunition and medical supplies.medicines.

V/R

both fly in the face of post-war remarks about extreme shortages of ammunition and medical supplies.medicines.

Absolutely, it was lack of food supply's that was the problem right till the end at Appomattox when Lee was trying to get to railroad connections with food trains waiting for him.

Forage for the horses was also chronically short.

Don nailed it.

Absolutely. In not so many words, Lee also bemoans the lack of supply wagons, effective logistical transport, for the majority of his army's woes, and I concur.

Going through the surviving documentation, along with memoirs and accounts by period authors, it is clear that the Confederacy was able to produce sufficient arms, ammunition, clothing and rations for it's field armies, and even it's reserves. What it had consistent shortages of was transport to get those items where they were needed.

Just one example, the CS Richmond Depot's report(s) for the period ending October, 1864, indicate that in just that year alone they had manufactured and/or purchased and issued some 80,000 knapsacks. 80,000 knapsacks! That's more than there were troops in Lee's army during 1864.

Thanks very much to all of you for responding to my question, (I live for this stuff!). Hope you don't mind if I take the question a step further and ask if Confederate cavalry regiments are using several different types of small arms did supplying ammunition for them in the field become a logistical problem. It seems like it would. Thanks again, John Miller

Forage for the horses was also chronically short

Not to mention the number of horses themselves, whereas the Union furnished 284,000 remounts in the first two years of the war alone!

Given that he would be in the Infantry if he could not supply a new horse for himself, it would be my view that our Confederate trooper would be more likely to grab a horse than any carbine!

John,

Regarding CS ammunition for cavalry units, etc.

Though the majority of CS units might be armed with different weapons, it isn't quite the hodge-podge people think. The weapons tended to be lumped by company/troop/squadron, vice interspersed throughout the ranks.

Thus, in a single 1-troop/company cavalry unit, you might find 4 companies armed exclusively with a revolver & saber, 4 companies armed with muzzle loading carbines/rifles, and 2 armed with rifle-muskets or muskets.

This was done to not only standardize the TYPE of weapon within each company, for ease of repair, etc, but also these arms would invariably be of the same caliber.

One thing that happened to both sides was that the respective Ordnance Departments decided to slightly decrease the windage of ball ammunition in order to service multiple arms with a single round. Thus, both sides only produced .57 caliber ammunition, as it served both the US .58 weapons, and the English .577 arms.

Likewise, .53.54 ammunition was produced so as to service the M1841 rifle, as well as various Prussian & Austrian .55 arms.

Allocating arms by caliber first, then type second, to the individual companies greatly helped to reduce ammunition headaches, though to some extent, it was always there.

Another note: CS shotguns disappeared from cavalry ranks very early in the war. As the style of fighting changed to more of a "mounted infantry" style (generically speaking) shotguns were fairly useless. Certainly, they could still be found here and there, but not in any quantity to be worth considering for rules or even figure inclusion.

Revolvers were always in chronically short supply. The Sought could never produce the numbers required, and so it was battlefield pickups, captured arms shipments, and imports that provided what could be had. That is why you often see 1-4 companies of a CS Cavalry regiment armed solely with revolver and saber. There weren't enough of the former to arm everyone, so they went to dedicated "traditional" companies.

A good source of CS info may be found here:

link

TKindred, Trajanus, Bill N, donlowry, John the Greater, and Extra Crispy: Thanks very much to all of you for the information. I really appreciate it!!! John Miller