"Ready for the dumbest horse question ever?" Topic

I two small roughly matching ACW armies. Each has about 250 or so infantry.

They each also have a bunch of cavalry – around 40 – and some cannon with horses and limbers.

So, how should I paint my horses? That is to say, what proportion of colors should I use? Should I mix browns, chestnuts, black, white, etc?

Should I paint all of my Union horses the same color? I.e., "brown?" And then pant the Confederates in more of a range of colors?

Although I believe troops were intended to have the same color horses due to availability color would vary, so I think you could vary the color somewhat in units.

In peacetime, a unit can afford to have matching horses.
However, once the campaign unfolds and replacements come in to …. replace, you take what they send you.

White is actually pretty uncommon, which is why it's usually represented with royalty and generals. Even greys aren't all that common, but much moreso than whites. Do the vast majority in a variety of browns.

The dumbest horse is the one that gets his head stuck in an empty feed bucket.

Here is a list of US horse registrations for 2006 by color with pictures/explanations for each color.

link

Sorrel and bays are by far the most common colors in horses with chestnut a distant third.

McLaddie; that is a good link but it only lists Quarter Horses. Among thoroughbreds brown is the predominate color by far. This is an interesting thread on a reenacting site: link

Drive around in the country, and see what horse colors are most common. I see a lot of chestnut colors. Buff and black seem common.

The Union Army assigned the darker color horses to the Cav. lighter colors went to Artillery and transport. CSA – the trooper generally supplied their own mounts, therefore a Confederate Cav. unit may have a mix.

Light colored horses made for good targets and cav troopers would avoided them. I have read first person accounts of soldiers not even wanting to be close to someone on light colored mount.

At the time of the war it was an old horseman's belief that white socks (the lower part of the leg) on a horse was a sign of weak ankles. Trumpeters would sometimes be mounted on whites or grey.

If you look at painting or photos from the period you get an idea of who rode what.

Bays have black manes and tails. Chestnuts have "like colored" manes and tails. Chestnuts are also referred to as sorrels (the term sorrel usually refers to a reddish chestnut).

Gray horses are born very dark grey or black and get progressively lighter as they age and blow their coats. Given horse casualties in the ACW, I would assume most greys would be darker, not surviving long enough to have lighter coats.

Look for a book called "The Color of Horses" by Ben Green on Amazon. It's an invaluable reference book, and widely used here in Kentucky.

Specifically to answer your question of "Ready for the dumbest horse question ever?" there can be only on answer.

Of course!

The idea that mounts were assigned to Civil War regiments or branches by color is technically correct but wasn't followed in practice. The Union Army ran remount depots that trained horses to either work as Cavalry Horses or as team (draft) horses. Those decisions were made based on type and physical characteristics rather than color. Military need always outweighed aesthetic concerns.

Confederate Cavalrymen were expected to provide their own horses. In fact, if they lost a horse (BTW much more common to disease or overwork than to wounds)they had a certain amount of time to provide a new one or they would be transferred to the infantry. The Confederacy had a big problem acquiring good horse flesh, if you read Lee's communications with Richmond he is almost always complaining about the lack of good horses.

Officers on both sides were expected to provide their own horses. If you google images of ACW Horses you'll see plenty of images of horses. Greys and white horses aren't unknown but the various browns are more common. White faces and sox are also quite common. What I stay away from are Paints and Appaloosas.

Buglers were often mounted on paints, pintos, palominos, grays, or whites for the same reason that they had special uniform distinctions--to make it easier for officers to locate them in the heat of battle. One reason that blacks, bays, and other dark horses were preferred for ordinary military use was an old (but incorrect} belief that they had stronger physical traits than otherwise similar horses.

Where it was not possible to mount a whole regiment on horses of similar color, the available mounts were sometimes sorted out by color for allocation to specific troops within a regiment. For example, this was definitely the case with the U.S. 7th Cavalry in 1876.

I would go for Browns,bays and chestnuts for the majority. Add a smattering of blacks greys and whites as you see fit . Posher horses for Generals etc :)Add the odd piebald as well .

Gone minor think to note: it is uncommon to see a horse of a solid single color. Typically they will have markings around the canons, fetlocks, forehead, etc. also the main and tail maybe different to the rest of the horse.

One other minor thing – horse hooves are almost never uniformly black, unless someone blacks them.

The Canadian breed was ubiquitous in the Union army, used for cavalry, limbers and wagons. Not a pretty breed to look at but very durable and easy to train. An image search for Canadian Horse Breed will show lots of pix. A very plain horse,as you will see. As for the Confederates, I must plead ignorance, although for my own armies I presumed that the cavalry largely was supplied by land-owning families with the resources to breed quality horses.

McLaddie; that is a good link but it only lists Quarter Horses.

Private Matter:

Sort of true, if you include palominos and pintos, as well as a few others in that mix of quarter-horses.

However, the general cross-section of colors for all horses, given that many are bred for color is in the ball-park, which is why I gave that link.

Musicians wore a special uniform and rode a distinctive horse because they are considered non-combatants and you are not supposed to shoot them. That's why it was okay to have drummer boys and bugle boys, they were not to be shot at.

Mike Bunkermeister Creek
Bunker Talk blog

@Bunkermeister,

Maybe that was the understanding in the American Civil War, but it certainly did not hold true in all periods and armies. Also, drummers and buglers were not considered primarily as musicians; they were there to transmit orders over the din of battle. Nor were they necessarily or even usually young boys. In the Napoleonic French Army drummers were supposed to be at least 16. Furthermore, they were supposed to serve as examples to the rest of the unit, and many are recorded as taking part in fighting with particular ferocity.

AICUSV,

I had not thought of color meaning "target" but it makes sense. Now I can mount my cavalry on lots of browns without worrying about variety!!

I can't say for other conflicts, but it did in the ACW.

Assigning horses to companies based on color was NOT a good idea, simply because horses, like people, have different characters and will get along with some in a group and hate others – this causes big problems on a picket line. Being naturally herd animals, you also get some who don't like being separated from their friends, causing further problems, believe it or not!

My approach to painting is to spray a variety of primers in dark, light and buff colors then use a stain wash over that, block painting black manes and tails on about a third of them and light colored manes and tails on some others. It's quick and very effective. Wood stain is awesome on plastic horses because it really gives a hard, protective finish.

This may sound stupid but I look at DVDs of movies that have a lot of horses in them. Not suggesting the Producers hire Civil War repro mounts for the purpose but you get a good idea of what works, appearence wise.

"Ride with the Devil" is very good and even "Lord of the Rings" anything where there's a lot of horses in one place and modern filming techniques.

Just how common were piebald horses in the war? I wonder because I do not think I have ever seen a piebald in any contemporary photograph. (not I that particularly searched for one). Would the frequency be different in the Western theatres?

Pintos and Paints (even though associations exist for them today) are not a "breed" but a color and can be found in many breeds of horse but they were not favored by the military and not popular with horses owners (many possess blue eyes considered a defect in those days).

Another reason that paints were disliked by the average American is because they tended to have white socks/stockings and that was seen as unsound. It was believed that the more white a horse had (particularly on his/her feet) the more apt it was to develop problems related to the feet. Ironically, in the 20th and 21st century I've owned several horses but only one ever developed foot problems, and that was a pony with four white stockings and a big blaze down the face. Every other horse we had, including our grey had solid dark legs.

The paint was often referred to as an Indian pony (though Indian ponies came in solid colors as well), and was seen as being a ladies and/or children's horse. According to one secondary source the Indian ponies "came from the plains of Texas or New Mexico to Kentucky and Tennessee in the last 1700s In the early part of the 19th century, many Native Americans sold their ponies to flatboatmen who brought them up the Mississippi and Ohio rivers and subsequently sold them to farmers…" [History of Agriculture in Ohio to 1880 by Robert Leslie Jones.]

It would seem logical that the plains Indians would not sell their swift war ponies, but rather their mounts for women and old people. This would explain Henry Herbert's quote from 1859 Nothing is to be gained by crossing [Indian ponies] with our horses, and the only utility which they can ever subserve is as the riding animals of children or very young ladies.

For what it's worth, Herbert goes on to say that the Indian pony seldom exceeds thirteen, never fourteen hands, and is a veritable pony -- short barreled, round ribbed, strong-limbed, short and thick neck, with legs, fetlocks and feet literally of iron. His legs are covered with thick hair, his mane is almost as voluminous as that of a lion, often falling on both sides of his neck, while the forelock covers his eyes… They are of all colors -- browns, bays, blacks, sorrels, duns, and by no means unfrequently, piebalds."