As a reenactor I’ve spent many hours studying the physical impression of the soldier. When I was younger and thinner, my pursuit was for the most accurate physical impression possible. Wearing the correctly made garb was only part of the challenge. What did he carry, how dirty was he, how did he carry his kit? Answering those questions and more went into building an impression. Below are some of the pieces I’ve used to help me. Now that I’m older and wider, I still pursue the physical element, just not with the same zeal.
FOR FUN
“In one of the companies of our regiment there was a sergeant, an old country gentleman. When he left home he carried an umbrella. During a march on a hot day one would see the old sergeant marching along at the head of his company with his umbrella hoisted; the boys would call to him, "Come out of that umbrella." He took it kindly, and would generally reply that he knew they wanted it. During a rain when he hoisted it, he always had numerous applications for a part of it. When it was not in use he carried it strapped to his knapsack. John Worsham, 21st Virginia
“There, behind the log, he lay on his back…The rifle and cartridge box were of English make, and the only thing about him which did not indicate extreme destitution. His feet, were wrapped in rags, had course shoes upon them, so worn and full of holes they were only held together by many pieces of thick twine. Ragged trousers, a jacket and a shirt of what used to be called “two-cloth”, a strawhat, which had lost a large portion of both crown and rim, completed his attire. His hair was a mat of dust and grime. A haversack hung from his shoulder. Its contents were a jackknife, a plug of twisted tobacco, a tin cup and two quarts of cracked corn… with perhaps an ounce of salt tied in a rag” (Source forgotten) NOTE: This is the ultimate impression of a confederate soldier. It is of a soldier killed outside Washington City, he being a part of Early’s attempt to relieve pressure from Lee’s front that 1864 summer.
Nearly thirty-three years have passed since the alarm of war called from their peaceful pursuits the citizens who were to make name and fame as Confederate soldiers. The stirring scenes and the dreadful carnage of a memorable conflict have been removed by the lapse of time into the hazy past, and a new generation, however ready it may be to honor those who fought the battles of the South, is likely to form its idea of their appearance from the conventional military type. The Confederate soldier was not an ordinary soldier, either in appearance or character. With your permission I will undertake to draw a portrait of him as he really appeared in the hard service of privation and danger.
A face browned by exposure and heavily bearded, or for some weeks unshaven, begrimed with dust and sweat, and marked here and there by the darker stains of powder - a face whose stolid and even melancholy composure is easily broken into ripples of good humor or quickly flushed in the fervor and abandon of the charge; a frame tough and sinewy, and trained by hardship to surprising powers of endurance; a form, the shapeliness of which is hidden by its encumberments, suggesting in its careless and unaffected pose a languorous indisposition to exertion, yet a latent, lion-like strength and a terrible energy of action when aroused. Around the upper part of the face is a fringe of unkempt hair, and above this an old wool hat, worn and weather-beaten, the flaccid brim of which falls limp upon the shoulders behind, and is folded back in front against the elongated and crumpled crown. Over a soiled, which is unbuttoned and button less at the collar, is a ragged grey jacket that does not reach to the hips, with sleeves some inches too short. Below this, trousers of a nondescript color, without form and almost void, are held in place by a leather belt, to which is attached the cartridge box that rests behind the right hip, and the bayonet scabbard which dangles on the left. Just above the ankles each trouser leg is tied closely to the limb - a la Zouave - and beneath reaches of dirty socks disappear in a pair of badly used and curiously contorted shoes. Between the jacket and the waistband of the trousers, or the supporting belt, there appears a puffy display of cotton shirt which works out further with every hitch made by Johnny in his effort to keep his pantaloons in place. Across his body from his left shoulder there is a roll of threadbare blanket, the ends tied together resting on or falling below the right hip. This blanket is Johnny's bed. Whenever he arises he takes up his bed and walks. Within this roll is a shirt, his only extra article of clothing. In action the blanket roll is thrown further back, and the cartridge is drawn forward, frequently in front of the body. From the right shoulder, across the body pass two straps, one cloth the other leather, making a cross with blanket roll on breast and back. These straps support respectively a greasy cloth haversack and a flannel-covered canteen, captured from the Yankees. Attached to the haversack strap is a tin cup, while in addition to some odds and ends of camp trumpery, there hangs over his back a frying pan, an invaluable utensil with which the soldier would be loth to part.
With his trusty gun in hand - an Enfield rifle, also captured from the enemy and substituted for the old flint-lock musket or the shotgun with which he was originally armed - Johnny reb, thus imperfectly sketched, stands in his shreds and patches a marvelous ensemble - picturesque, grotesque, unique - the model citizen soldier, the military hero of the nineteenth century. There is none of the tinsel or trappings of the professional about him. From an esthetic military point of view he must appear a sorry looking soldier. But Johnny is not one of your dress parade soldiers. He doesn't care a copper whether anybody likes his looks or not. He is the most independent soldier that ever belonged to an organized army. He has respect for authority, and he cheerfully submits to discipline, because he sees the necessity of organization to affect the best results, but he maintains his individual autonomy, as it were, and never surrenders his sense of personal pride and responsibility. He is thoroughly tractable, if properly officered, and is always ready to obey necessary orders, but he is quick to resent any official incivility, and is a high private who feels, and is, every inch as good as a general. He may appear ludicrous enough on a display occasion of the holiday pomp and splendor of war, but place him where duty calls, in the imminent deadly breach or the perilous charge, and none in all the armies of the earth can claim a higher rank or prouder record. He may be outre and ill-fashioned in dress, but he has sublimated his poverty and rags. The worn and faded grey jacket, glorified by valor and stained with the life blood of its wearer, becomes, in its immortality of association, a more splendid vestment than mail of medieval knight or the rarest robe of royalty. That old, weather-beaten slouch hat, seen as the ages will see it, with its halo of fire, through the smoke of battle, is a kinglier covering than a crown. Half clad, half armed, often half fed, without money and without price, the Confederate soldier fought against the resources of the world. When at last his flag was furled and his arms were grounded in defeat, the cause for which he had struggled was lost, but he had won the faceless victory of soldiership.
Source: Written by G.H. Baskett, Nashville, Tenn., published in the Confederate Veteran, Vol. I, No. 12, Nashville, Tenn., December 1893.
http://www.civilwarhome.com/typicalconfedsoldier.htm
I have worn out the suit pants coat and socks, but as I was getting tolerably ragged and the brigade secured a supply of English clothes. I was one of the needy ones and am now rigged out in a splendid suit of blue. “On hard campaign the uniform may last only a month. Barclay on his return from Gettysburg wrote home,” I have had on my clothes for a month, may pants are nearly worn out, you may make up two under shirts, two pair of drawers, three pair of socks, a pair of socks, a pair of pants and a jacket. The army is in such a bad condition as far as clothes are concerned and our means of transportation are so limited.”
Ted Barclay 4th Virginia
ARTHUR FREEMANTLE
Liddel’s Brigade of Arkansas troops
“The men were good sized, healthy, and well clothed, but without any attempt at uniformity in color or cut; nearly all were dressed in either gray or brown coats and felt hats. I was told that even if the regiment was clothed in proper uniform by the government, it would become parti-colored again in a week, as the soldier preferred wearing the course homespun jackets and trousers made by their mothers and sisters at home.
The Confederate has no ambition to imitate the regular soldier at all; he looks the genuine rebel; but in spite of his bare feet, his ragged clothes, his old rug, and toothbrush stuck like a rose in his button-hole*, he has a sort of devil-may-care, reckless, self-confident look which is decidedly taking. This toothbrush in the buttonhole is a very common custom, and has a most quaint effect.
I was told that even if the regiment was clothed in proper uniform by the government, it would become multi-colored again in a week, as the soldier preferred wearing the course homespun jackets and trousers made by their mothers and sisters at home.” -- - Arthur Fremantle, Her Majesty’s Coldstream Guard
“A musket, cartridge box with forty rounds of cartridges, cloth haversack, blanket and canteen made up the Confederate soldier’s equipment. No man was allowed a change of clothing, nor could he have carried it. A grey cap, jacket, trousers, and a colored shirt-calico mostly- made up a private’s wardrobe. The method for carrying our few assets was to roll them in a blanket, tying each end of the roll, which was then swung over our shoulder. A night this blanket was unrolled and wrapped around its owner, who found a place on the ground with his cartridge box for a pillow.” David E. Johnston, 7th Virginia
ear of the Confederate Soldier
“On his back he strapped a knapsack containing a full stock of underwear, soap, towel, comb, brush, looking glass, toothbrush, paper and envelopes, pens, ink, pencils, blacking, photographs, smoking and chewing tobacco, pipes, twine string and cotton strips for wounds, needles and threads, buttons, knife, fork, spoon. On the outside of the knapsack were blankets, a rubber or oil cloth.” Carlton McCarthy
“A musket, cartridge box with forty rounds of cartridges, cloth haversack, blanket and canteen made up the Confederate soldier’s equipment. No man was allowed a change of clothing, nor could he have carried it. A grey cap, jacket, trousers, and a colored shirt-calico mostly- made up a private’s wardrobe. The method for carrying our few assets was to roll them in a blanket, tying each end of the roll, which was then swung over our shoulder. A night this blanket was unrolled and wrapped around its owner, who found a place on the ground with his cartridge box for a pillow.” David E. Johnston, 7th Virginia
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