"Berdan's (1st) Sharpshooters-Confederate equivalent?" Topic

I am thinking of getting Perry's Berdan's Sharpshooters but I like to mirror whatever Union unit I paint up with an equivalent Confederate unit. Can anyone tell me of an equivalent Confederate unit and maybe what uniform they wore (frock coat, sack coat, ?).

There were several "sharpshooter" battalions in the Army of Northern Virginia. Whether they could be considered a mirror of the 1st USSS Regt is a matter of much more research than I've ever done. Their uniform would have been the "standard" Confederate uniform of the time, whatever that might have been.

Jim

While there were a number of Confederate sharpshooter battalions, you will not find the equivalent of Berdan's Sharpshooters. You will also find Confederate sharpshooter battalions standing in the line of battle with the rest of the infantry. They wore whatever they had at the time. You can call any confederate infantry unit a sharpshooter battalion.

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Thank you, both! "Mirror" might have over-emphasized what I was looking for, but you have both given me the answer that I thought might be the case. If anyone else has anything else, I welcome all ideas. Thank you.

Nope, no equivalent Confederate unit. You would have to look to Europe for an equivalent unit.

Use to play with a guy who was convinced that any CS unit having the word "Sharpshooter" in the name of their unit was the equivalent of Berdan's unit.

"The King County Sharpshooters and Bushwhackers." Certainly they were just like Berdans. I had to explain to him that these names given to these units was for recruiting purposes.

Much better to join a sharpshooter unit than a run of the mill infantry unit. Why do you think there were more Texas Cavalry units than there were horses for them?

Sure there were a few CS soldiers that had a special sharpshooter rifle like a Whitworth. But they were few and far between. There were some companies of CS sharpshooters as pointed out in an earlier post.

But nothing the likes of the 1st and 2nd United States Sharpshooters. None trained as well, none uniformed as well and none armed as well.

Different than the USSS, several ANV divisions had sniper squads. Hood's division had a squad armed with Whitworth sniper rifles fitted with scopes. They shut down the Union supply line across the Tennessee River, shooting teamsters and mules at long range. A battalion of Union sharpshooters armed with Spencer rifles could not silence them. Finally a brigade of Union troops seized the area in an amphibious attack for other reasons and the snipers had to decamp.

I suspect such groups accounted for Reynolds at Gettysburg and Sedgewick at Spotsylvania.

Thank you, all! I appreciate your input.

There's a theory that Reynolds was actually inadvertently hit by friendly fire. The sharpshooter story was an embellishment

The Confederate sharpshooter battalions were ad hoc units, drawing marksmen from the ordinary regiments to perform skirmish duties and the like. Seems unlikely that they'd have unit colors, and they were probably somewhat smaller than ordinary regiments.

It should be noted that the Berdans could also fight like regular line infantry and did so on several occasions.

Also that the North had other sharpshooter units than the Berdans. They were usually company-sized units attached to line regiments. This practice was common in the South, too. They would sometimes be grouped into battalions for administrative purposes.

Historians today discount the story that Reynolds was specifically targeted by a sniper. He was in the middle of a firefight, it is much more likely that he was simply shot by an ordinary Confederate soldier. The same is probably true with Sedgewick as well.

In Sedgwick's case, IIRC, the range was pretty long when he got shot, leading to the assumption that it was the work of a sniper, but, yes, in Reynolds' case he was within normal rifle range of the Rebels, leading a regiment forward, against a Confederate line, so no reason to assume he was hit by anything other than normal fire. Being a mounted officer, he would have attracted a lot of lead.