"How often did Patriot musicians reverse colors?" Topic

In other words, if the parent regiment had as its official uniform a blue coat with red facings, how often would the drummers have red coats with blue facings?
I am presuming this would only happen, if ever, if there was money to spare in the uniform budget.
Or maybe if supplied by foreigners, like the "lottery uniforms".

It's one of those important issues that only the guy painting the figures really cares about.
I've done a few, but not many.

I try and put my musicians in reverse colors if I am painting Continental regulars. State line and militia not so much. But that's me.

Since they were a Gentlemen's club composed of the finest wealthy young men of the city (minus the Loyalists of course) I would very well think the bugler of the Philadelphia Light Horse would wear a white coat with brown facings. And so does mine.

Well, it was traditional in the English-speaking world. It was specifically ordered for later Continental uniforms, and we have a few stray examples besides. I figure that's excuse enough for me to do it for any uniformed regiment of the period. If I'm wrong sometimes, I doubt it's my worst mistake, and it always looks good.

Worth remembering that drummers and trumpeters are the RTOs of 18th Century warfare, and officers have to be able to find them quickly. Where they didn't have distinctive coat colors, people went overboard on lace. Of the two, I'd rather paint a distinctive coat color.

I think robert has pretty much summed it up – prior to the 1779 Regulations, any unit that was more-or-less completely uniformed would have attempted to distinguish its musicians, and different colour coats (not always "reversed") would have been the most common method.
Bear in mind, however, that many Rebel communities had German or Dutch origins (French in the case of the 1st Canadians) whose practices for distinguishing musicians would have involved wings and sleeve lace instead.

It was definitely a "goal", but possibly observed more in the breach than in the practice in the early years of the war when any type of uniform was a godsend. In the middle part of the war, it was common for units to be given a number of captured British coats. And the 1779 Regulations specified "reverse colours" for all regimental music, except for those units with blue facings which were given lots of extra lace instead.

"Worth remembering that drummers and trumpeters are the RTOs of 18th Century warfare, and officers have to be able to find them quickly."

I think you are over-valuing musicians as a means of communications in combat. I've read a lot of first person accounts and seem to recall few from officers mentioning musicians in combat. Recall the British drummer that mounted the works at Yorktown to beat a parley? They had to get an officer with a white flag to get the attention of those shooting.

Even in the din of fake combat (re-enacting) it is extremely difficult to make out drum signals, or determine if they are part of your unit or a neighboring one. Having attended some very large Civil War re-enacting events as a spectator, I was astonished at the overwhelming noise of it all – this minus the bullets, screams of wounded, and explosions.

Good point, historygamer. I could come up with counter-examples, but most of them are at the start of the engagement, involve bugles, or both. In the heat of battle nothing works well, but surely voice and drum or bugle work better than voice alone?

I think in fairness to that overmatched drummer at Yorktown--does anyone know his name? His regiment?--he was trying to communicate to an opposing army over a serious artillery bombardment. Communicating orders to a 300-man infantry regiment or a 30 man company should have been a little more straightforward.

I suspect this is one of those things that would need to be researched on a unit by unit basis.

This topic has been covered in the past. SM has posted numerous things about how the musicians were often sent home to help recruit. We know they retained some musicians (massed music of the Grenadiers at Brimingham Hill – which I was just at this weekend), and perhaps the battalion/regiment commander retained a duty drummer as well.

Wolfe wrote, in his Instructions to Young Officers that prior the battle musicians should be dismissed in order to help with the wounded. I'll defer to the late General Wolfe on his thoughts on the matter. He wrote a good deal about how to manage a battalion.

As a former drummer, I find that having one or two within arms reach is fine, but honestly, do the officers really know the drum calls? Do the men? Are they hearing their own, or the unit next to them?

My own reading leads me to believe that commands were given by voice, and perhaps re-enforced by drum – or for the Lights, bugle. Speaking of Lights, this was a new creation (again). No standardized training (nor was there for drum), no standard army bugle calls. The units were "borrowed" from their parent organization. I have to wonder how effective the bulges calls were, unless very few and very basic.

In 1778, Amherst confirmed (via an official order which authorised what had already been going on in America) that orders were to be given by word of mouth, rather than by drumbeat. By that time, almost every regiment in America had sent their drummers home to recruit, retaining a Drum Major (or occasionally a second drummer if the regiment was the senior one in its brigade) to act as an orderly to the CO. Further to Wolfe's instructions, there were orders issued in America that units lacking numbers were to arm the drummers and have them stand in the ranks (German regiments did this, too, after recruiting black men to replace the drummers).

Over the course of the AWI, British lights moved from word of mouth, to a mixture of hat waving, whistles and horns (the latter being used for simpler long-range/large group commands. Somewhere, there is a reference to the OC of the 38th's light company being ridiculed for using a whistle before the NYC campaign began, but everyone changing their tune once the efficacy of his system was shown in action.

I want to say that whistles were used by the British Lights from their fielding in 1759 onwards.

My understanding was that the British were the ones who sent some of their musicians home to recruit. I believe Winston/John's question was about American/Patriot musicians. Are you suggesting that the Americans sent theirs home to recruit as well?

I always believed that the drummers set the marching cadence for the battalion and for commands.

If the entire battalion was to change formation or other activities, the drummers might have a special tune for that. Voice commands would be given either to reinforce and/or to spread the command the entire unit.

Maybe there was one battalion all the others guided on and it was only important for that guide battalion here the orders.

Did light infantry use horns instead? There is always a guy with horn in every command pack. At least with Jaeger's.

I can't speak for other armies, but I can guarantee you that the British army did not use drummers for moving and forming the battalions.

Yes, Lights used horns, among other things.

Once committed to combat units and brigades fragmented all over the place. Michael Harris' book on Brandywine details this. I would, however, skip most of his chapter on the British army, but his first person accounts of what happened to units is great.

American music, like American uniforms is less certain. While you eventually get Washington's regulations (which were never really enacted), I would say that the American army become almost a carbon copy of the British army by the end of the war.

Brumwell's book on Washington makes a great case for this point.

Honestly, I don't think many of the reference books really covers that in any detail. So… best guess maybe. :-)