"They didn't always wear green..." Topic

Hello everyone,

Mr. Robert Piepenbrink wrote here

TMP link

"Even my beloved United States Sharp Shooters didn't always wear green."

What was the uniform evolution of the United States Sharp Shooters throughout the ACW?

Basically it ebbed. Around 1863 their green uniforms were worn, and they wore parts of the standard blue uniform to keep themselves clothed. Green pants and blue sack coats were common at Gettysburg. Or all blue.
I believe they were issued new uniforms in all green again for the Overland Campaign. I'm not sure how long those held out.
In September 1863 the newly recruited 200th Pennsylvania was outfitted with the Sharpshooter's surplus green uniforms, so there had to be enough on hand.

Not sure there was an evolution. As I recall, they were issued green, converted to standard dark blue, and were later given their old green coats back--quite literally: there were complaints.

@Cleburne1863
Around 1863 they were wearing their green uniforms, and they were wearing parts of the standard blue uniform, light blue pants, I guess.

@robert piepenbrink
So we would say green coats and light blue pants?

"So we would say green coats and light blue pants?"

As I understand it, yes--at some point post-Gettysburg, and as Cleburne says prior to the Overland Campaign. But there is such a thing as serious research, which I have not done on this issue, and there are serious uniform experts, which I am not. My opinion is not binding on reality.

Finding a uniform a regiment wore in period is relatively easy. Researching the correct uniform for the afternoon of 2 July 1863 for every unit in two decent-size armies--not taking someone else's word for it, but consulting primary sources--would take years, and I'll buy a copy of your book once you've done the research.

I wonder if it was a conscious decision to change their uniform, or whether it was just a case of a bunch of men needing new clothes and blue was what was most readily available.

Question calls for guesswork, Bill. I do remember that at least some of the "new" later 1863 green coats were the old green coats--there was grumbling about it--so they can't have been completely worn out.

Way too much time in uniform and reading military history. I'd say from the latter 17th Century on there's a sort of default setting at high levels to make everything as uniform as possible and sometimes more uniform than is really practical. But there's also an impulse at a much lower unit level to make their uniform distinct. Many more units wore berets in Vietnam than were ever authorized, for instance.

One way to keep track of who's winning is to look at commanders repeating orders. If--going from memory here--Lutzow has to issue orders for the third time that only certain units were to wear the totenkopf, it's a safe bet that other units were still doing it. Washington has to keep ordering Continentals not to have a lace border on their tricorns, which I take pretty much the same way. Plenty of instances of troops refusing to give up uniforms or insignia.

My reading would be that someone high up in AoP staff thought those green uniforms were an added burden on the supply chain, just flat didn't like distinctive uniforms or both, but the regiments and their commanders whined, wheedled, wrote congressmen and pulled favors. Sometimes one side won, sometimes the other.

There's an interesting fuss about the US Special Forces green berets back in the early sixties along similar lines.

@robert piepenbrink
So we would say green coats and light blue pants, after Gettysburg and before the Overland campaign.

And before Gettysburg they were all green?

@Bill N
Their weaponry has evolved too.

I painted them all green but if I was doing them now I might give a few of them kersey blue pants. You have to give them at least green coats and kepis because that is part of what makes them so cool to have.

Unless you are specifically painting your army for Chancellorsville or Gettysburg, I would paint the USSS all green. Green is what makes them unique. That's just me.

Sometime in 1863, I believe, a factory in Philadelphia was given a contract to produce replacement green uniforms for the Sharpshooters. As Cleburne notes, after the Sharpshooters mustered out of service in late 1864 there were enough of the green clothes left over to outfit a new Pennsylvania regiment.

@Old Contemptible
Mine in the 'S' ranges are all in "Frock Coat" and forage caps with backpacks, what do you think?

@Cleburne1863
So the light blue pants and the "Frock Coat" are for what period?

Before and after Chancellorsville and Gettysburg?

And I suppose that given their tactics they did not have their backpacks on their backs in combat?

@ScottWashburn
What the Sharpshooters mustered out of service in late 1864?

Why?

The Sharpshooters were 'three year regiments' like most Union troops. They signed up for "three years or the War" (meaning if the war ended before three years had passed they got to go home). Otherwise their enlistment ran out after three years and they could go home.

At the start of the war you had troops who signed up for a year, two years, very early on some only signed up for three months (after all the war couldn't possibly last longer than that, could it?). This caused a lot of problems for the Union Army because they had a lot of veteran troops demanding to go home at inconvenient times.

The two regiments of sharpshooters were raised in the summer and fall of 1861, and they actually stayed a bit longer than three years, mustering out at the end of 1864.

@ScottWashburn
That meant if the war ended before the three years were up they could go home and if their enlistment ended before the war ended?

At the beginning of the war there were a lot of veteran soldiers asking to go home at inopportune times because their enlistment was up because it was their right so why did the men in the two sharpshooter regiments stay for more than three years?

Conscription was for the duration of the war…

According to C.A. Stevens' "Berdan's United States Sharpshooters in the Army of the Potomac" the mustering out process was spread out from October 1864 until February 1865. The Berdans had been recruited (and apparently sworn into Federal Service) on a company by company basis instead of as whole regiments like most volunteer regiments. And thus they were discharged on a company by company basis, or for men who volunteered for the sharpshooters later in the war, on a man by man basis. The 1st Regiment was disbanded completely by December 31, 1864, with any individuals who still owed service transferred to the 2nd Regiment. By February 1865 all of the 2nd Regiment companies were gone and the regiment disbanded with any individuals who still owed service transferred to regiments from their respective states.

@ScottWashburn
And how many re-enlisted for the end of the war?

Not enough to keep the regiments or companies intact.

@Cleburne1863
So they joined blue regiments with their green uniforms?

They joined blue regiments from their home states. Whether they kept their green uniforms (and their Sharps Rifles) was probably up to them. If their regiment's colonel saw the wisdom of retaining them in their sharpshooter role probably was a big factor in this.

@ScottWashburn
Yes, I think they kept their uniforms and weapons, but in fact, originally there weren't two light companies per infantry unit of 10 companies?

No, the infantry regiments did not have 'light companies'. All companies were expected to be trained as skirmishers and any company could function as 'light infantry'. There is some confusion about this because Silas Casey wrote an infantry tactics manual in 1862 which DID have two companies that were supposed to be the light companies and they maneuvered separately from the other 8 companies. While the Army did adopt Casey's Tactics, all of the special rules regarding these two companies were "suspended" and not used. Other confusion probably arose because if a regimental commander was going to detach a company or two as skirmishers he would be most likely to take those companies from the flanks of his battalion rather than create a hole in the center of his line. That being the case it is easy to see how those flank companies might come to be thought of as the light companies. Finally, there were a number of cases where volunteer regiments equipped one or two companies with special rifles and made them their light companies, but this was done independently of any official regulations.

I actually see that quite often in early to mid war. Smoothbore armed regiments would have the flank companies armed with rifles to act as their skirmishers.

@ScottWashburn
I knew I read something like that.

@Cleburne1863
Makes sense.