Part One here

By R. Neil Smith

An Invitation to The

AMERICAN CIVIL WAR

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Part 1

IntroductionWhen I came to the United Statesfrom Scotland in 1996 it was tostudy the American Civil War atpost-graduate level. Before I cameover, I inquired as to where I shouldstudy the conflict, to be toldimmediately, go to the South. WithPolybius’ advice on visiting thesites of history echoing in my head,I asked why. “They’re still fightingit!” the professor replied. Asexaggerated as that answer was, Isoon found out when I arrived thatfew wars in western historyresonate through time as much asthe War between the States – as Iwas quickly rectified on the correctnomenclature for the conflict bypolite southerners; the “W ar ofNorthern Aggression” by thosemore wrapped up in their seeminglyongoing defeat. Rarely has a war soshaped the destiny of a nation asmuch as the conflict that took placebetween 1861 and 1865, across avast array of landscapes, and foughtat all levels by hundreds ofthousands of men, and somewomen.

Despite modern historical searchesfor reasons why the Union won,some that stretch credulity , myinescapable conclusion has alwaysbeen that losing on the battlefield ledto the death of the Confederacy .Indeed, one historian wrote that theConfederate nation and the Army ofNorthern Virginia under Robert E.Lee became synonymous, and whenUlysses S. Grant finally ran the latterto ground, the former vanished intoLost Cause memory . And that iswhat some southerners question:how could we lose? The South hadthe generals; the character; thecause; the everything, except theresources. As another historian putit: “God was on the side of thebiggest battalions”. The North wore

down the South in the form of twoarmies under the command of USGrant in the East and WilliamTecumseh Sherman in the West. Bothwere willing to bring the “hard handof war” down on the South, and

Sherman, who would also say that“war is hell”, promised to makeGeorgia “howl”. But to thesoutherner…well, William Faulknersaid it best when commenting on theConfederate disaster at Gettysburg:

For every Southern boy fourteen years old, not once but whenever he wants it is theinstant when it is still not yet two o'clock on that July afternoon in 1863, the brigadesare in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods and thefurled flags are already loosened to break out and Pickett himself with his long oiledringlets and his hat in one hand and his sword in the other looking up the hill wait-ing for Longstreet to give the word and it's all in the balance, it hasn't happened yet,it hasn't even begun yet, it not only hasn't begun yet but there is still time for it not tobegin against that position and those circumstances which made more men thanGarnett and Kemper and Armstead and Wilcox look grave yet it's going to begin, weall know that, we have come too far with too much at stake and that moment doesn'tneed even a fourteen year old boy to think this time. Maybe this time with all thismuch to lose and all this much to gain: Pennsylvania, Maryland, the world, the gold-en dome of Washington itself to crown with desperate and unbelievable victory the des-perate gamble, the cast made two years ago...William Faulkner

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Faulkner’s quote is an apt one forwargamers no matter what periodthey recreate on their tabletops; themoment before the ramp comes downon a D-Day landing craft; the silenceas the of ficer raises his whistle tosignal “over the top” at the Somme;or any number of rousing speechesgiven by Roman generals. There isalways that moment of anticipation:the dice roll around in your hand, youblow on them, wondering whysomeone would dare challenge yourbattlefield supremacy.

Other wars too have the elements weenjoy so much in war gaming: theuniforms and flags that add colour tothe field; charismatic commanders;stunning victories and defeats toadmire and lament; the violentessence of battle that only the bestcommanders and players can managewith the help of lady luck or friendlydice. The contention in this article isthat the American Civil War containsall of those components. Moreover ,the Civil War is accessible not only in

the Polybian sense but in the virtualsense, so that although we cannot bethere, we can almost literally lookover the shoulders of those whofought for their cause irrespective ofits righteousness.

OverviewThe American Civil War broke out inthe wake of the election of AbrahamLincoln in November 1860. Thesouthern slave owning states wereterrified at the prospect of abolitionand voted to secede from the Union,forming the Confederate States ofAmerica. Soon enough shots rang outat Charleston, South Carolina, thenacross the nation in a bloody conflictthat pitted brother against brother andfather against son.

The first significant battle came atManassas Junction in northernVirginia. The Union army was routed,a feeling they would come torecognize time and again through thefirst two years of the war . In 1862,Robert E. Lee took command of the

Army of Northern Virginia andproceeded to rout a veritableconveyor belt of promising but weakUnion generals at the Seven DaysBattles, Second Manassas, andChancellorsville, before overplayinghis hand at Gettysburg, being forcedon to the strategic defensive fromwhich he never recovered. The warwas more balanced in the west. TheUnion took New Orleans andadvanced down the Mississippi,while they retreated throughKentucky and Tennessee beforerecovering and counter -attacking.But from out of the west emerged thetwo battlefield saviours of theUnion: Sherman and Grant. Shermanpointed his army like a dagger atAtlanta. Grant came east, crossingthe Rappahanock River with histroops in 1864; his tar get was Lee’sarmy.

Grant’s grand Army of the Potomac,bolstered by thousands of newlyenlisted African-American soldiers,engaged Lee in the Wilderness, anaptly named almost impenetrableforest of slender trees andunderbrush north of Richmond,Virginia. The armies tore at eachother relentlessly, the Union drivebeing brought to a standstill. But thistime instead of retreating back to thesafety of the North, Grant orderedhis men to advance south. Hisshocked and jubilant troops marchedand Lee raced to block them atSpotsylvania, on the North Anna,anywhere he could, but he wasfinally driven into the defenses ofPetersburg. In perhaps the greatmilitary irony of the Civil War, Lee,who constantly sought a Napoleonicbattle to knock the Union out of thewar and on to the peace table, nowsaw his army bleeding dry intrenches more akin to the westernfront of World War I. TheConfederate dam that had held solong finally broke in March 1865,and Lee’s army – outgunned,outmanoeuvred, and exhausted –capitulated at Appomattox CourtHouse on 9 April. But for a fewskirmishes and the assassin’ s bulletthat killed Lincoln in his hour ofglory, the Civil War was over.


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If I had my choice I would kill everyreporter in the world but I am sure wewould be getting reports from hell beforebreakfast.

William Tecumseh Sherman

SOURCESMy friend told me recently that he does notwargame the American Civil War becausehe has no connection to it, and I suspect thatis true for many war gamers. But whatconnection do we have to any of the wars werecreate? As I scan my neatly boxed armies,I don’t have a direct connection to any ofthem; not the Zulus, Custer ’s 7th Cavalry,my pirates, the Imperial Romans, none ofthem. Except, I have studied them all or Ihave a cultural connection to them; they area part of me through my own efforts to makethem so. The same goes for my 15mmAmerican Civil War armies. My initialinterest to study the war and to invest in weebags of metal both came from Ken Burns’magnificent documentary series on the warthat I watched when on Christmas breakfrom university. The movie Glory wasreleased not long after, and I was hooked.

Reading followed. If you like readingmilitary history, the American Civil Warhas you covered and then some. Irecommend starting with McPherson’ sBattle Cry of Freedom, but from there youcan follow almost any path or interest youdesire. There are books on campaigns,armies, and battles; biographies oncommanders, the great and the less so;regimental histories, memoirs, andsoldier’s diaries. You might also wanderinto the minefield that is social history;slavery, women, community studies etc. Atsome point you will encounter War of theRebellion: A Compilation of the OfficialRecords of the Union and ConfederateArmies (O.R. for short), now online. Bewarned, though: if you explore the O.R. tiea rope to yourself, you may never comeout. And there are more books publishedseemingly every day to add to yourmountainous collection, not to mention theplethora of content on the internet, well-informed and otherwise.

For a more immediate experience, you canfollow the dictates of Polybius and seewhere it all happened, if the developers donot beat you to it. There is a surprising

amount of Civil War sites to visit, from thewell preserved major battlefields lovinglycared for by the National Parks Service –Gettysburg, Antietam, Manassas - toscenes of smaller battles where, if you arelucky, you will meet an old-timer whoknows exactly what happened and whereto find the evidence, to vignettes of minordramas such as a trench and gunpit inAthens, Georgia, where the town militiaorganized to fend off Sherman’s cavalry in1864. Almost everywhere you visit inVirginia contains memories of some CivilWar event; even my local shopping mall inCharlottesville has a signmemorializing a long-for gottenskirmish that took placebefore Dick’s SportingGoods moved in.


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The truth is, when bullets arewhacking against tree trunks andsolid shot are cracking skulls likeeggshells, the consuming passion inthe breast of the average man is toget out of the way. Between thephysical fear of going forward andthe moral fear of turning back,there is a predicament ofexceptional awkwardness.Private David Thompson of the 9th New York Infantry, Battle of Antietam.

Getting StartedNow your interest has peaked andyou are back from the library, we canturn to the logistics of war gaming.Here too, ACW gamers are wellcovered. The first question is one ofscale. This will depend on yourbudget and available room and time,but 15mm works well for the biggerengagements, although some of thenewer 6mm figures are well worthconsidering. For smaller battles andskirmishes, or big fights if you havelots of space, 20mm and 25/28mm

might be better choices. With therelease of the excellent Perry range ofplastic 28mm figures, expenditure forthe larger scale is also becomingmore manageable. Nearly everysignificant manufacturer has a rangeof ACW figures and you shouldconsider mixing and matching for thecorrect aesthetic feel of Civil Wararmies, especially on the logisticallychallenged Confederate side for mostof whom the concept of uniforms wassomewhat alien.

Terrain too is easy to find or buildfrom scratch and there are manyphotographs of the Americanlandscape online from which to seekinspiration. The American Civil Warwas fought mostly across rollingrural terrain, so a simple grassyboard will work. Many terrainmanufacturers make generic ACWperiod buildings and some of themore distinguished Civil Warlandmarks. Trees, hills, and fieldsare fairly standard, but one uniqueaspect of the American landscape is


the zig-zag fencing foundparticularly in the east; I used a boxof decapitated matches, dyed, thenglued in three rows, to make mine.Also consider the railway modelingfraternity for useable buildings,trains, and af fordable rail track.Finally, bear in mind that thelandscape changed little duringAmerica’s formative domesticconflicts; therefore, what works foryour ACW gaming will probablywork for the American Revolution,French and Indian Wars etc.

Painting figures is always achallenge and again depends on yourlevel of involvement. The Unionarmies are easier but less fun. Theywore dark blue jackets, light bluetrousers, dark blue kepis or blackslouch hats. In many respects, as thebetter equipped and supplied army ,the Union was much more uniform.Nevertheless, there were somedifferences, particularly in thebeginning when no one had much ofa clue what mass volunteer armies

should wear for what was supposedto be a short war . The most notablydistinct units were the Zouaves,based on French colonial troops, withmulti-coloured uniforms, baggypants, and brightly colouredheadgear. As the war dragged on,however, Union forces discardedmuch of their accoutrement and wentfor comfort over style.

The American Civil War has oftenbeen referred to as the war betweenthe Blue and the Grey , but for mostConfederate infantrymen grey was anideal or something officers wore. Thefoot-soldier, the barefoot soldier inmany cases, wore what he had,homespun clothing dyed in butternutor other earthy colours. Theirensembles were completed byblanket rolls and slouch hats, again inmost cases. The Confederates hadZouaves too, but less of them. Whenpainting the Confederates, therefore,deploy the full range of browns andgreys for clothing, the more irregularlooking the better.

Artillerymen on both sides dressedsimilarly to infantrymen with somedifferences. They tended to be moreuniform throughout the war . Thecavalry came from the wealthierclasses; therefore dressed moreuniformly, but here too theConfederates were more irregular .Books and internet sites abound forall aspects of Civil War clothing andwhen in doubt visit the variousoutlets for Civil War re-enactorswhose webpages always have greatphotographs.

Civil War regiments carried two flagsinto battle. One was the national flag,although the famous Dixie flag did notcome into being until after FirstManassas when their ‘Stars and Bars’was easily confused with the Union‘Stars and Stripes,’ leading to someunfortunate friendly fire incidents inthe smoke of battle. The other flag wasusually the state flag and mostregiments and divisions formed underthe flags of their states. The cavalrycarried guidons, triangular flags

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designating their units. Again, bookand internet references abound forflags. The point to remember when itcomes to uniforms and flags is that itis the exceptions that make the rule, sonose around for those little differencesthat will enliven your tabletop.

Both sides wore similar equipment,usually consisting of a leathercartridge box, haversack, percussion-cap pouch, tin canteen, bayonetscabbard, and belt. This wasparticularly true after major Uniondefeats early in the war whenvictorious Confederates scavenged thedead. The basic infantry weapon wasthe rifle-musket. The Confederates, asyou might expect by now , carried agreater variety of weapons, but thosewithout picked up weapons on thebattlefields too. The cavalry carriedcarbines into the field, which wereshorter than the rifle-muskets butworked in much the same way . Theyalso carried sabres, and the AmericanCivil War is one of the last wars wherecavalry came together in sabre melees.Towards the end of the war , breech-loading rifles became more commonand revolving pistols were handy forclose quarters combat. Both sidesdeployed the M1857 Napoleontwelve-pounder cannon as their chiefartillery weapon, but more accuraterifled cannons became widely used,especially by the Union. In questions

of men and material, it should alwaysbe borne in mind that the Uniongreatly out-produced the Confederacyin every department. Robert E. Lee’ saddress to his troops on their finalsurrender encapsulated succinctly thedisparity between the sides:

After four years of ar duous servicemarked by unsurpassed courage andfortitude, the Army of NorthernVirginia has been compelled to yield tooverwhelming numbers and resources.

Finally, a note on flesh-tones; mostmen who fought in the Civil Warwere white, but from 1863 African-Americans joined the Union ranks intheir thousands and fought withdistinction at many critical battlesthereafter. In addition, twenty-thousand Native-Americans took partin the Civil War and the Cherokeewere principal protagonists in the warfor the Oklahoma territory – afascinating mini-campaign in itself.

Having bought your soldiers,checked out your library books, andgoogled everything American CivilWar, how do you play with all thoselovingly painted, if scruf fy, troops?Part II of your invitation to theAmerican Civil War looks atstrategies and tactics, the greatcommanders and their soldiers, andthe battles they fought.

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Further Reading (no apologies for southern bias)

Battle Cry of Freedom - James MacPherson

General Lee’s Army - Joseph Glatthaar

Army of the Heartland & Autumn of Glory -Thomas Connelly

The Confederate Nation - Emory Thomas

Confederates in the Attic - Tony Horwitz


Documents

Part One here