1830's USMC Uniform

[Manassas 1861]

For a short time during the Seminole War, there was a company of mounted marines from 1836-37. Commanded by Capt. John Harris.

 

[Manassas 1861]

@RedRover. Do you know the name of the magazine that the 1827 drilling Marine image was published in?

 

[FedericoFCavada]

The standard weapon used by the marines and the army in the 1830's was the 1816 flintlock. Which were produced at the Springfield, and Harper's Ferry arsenals. The cartridges were 2.6 inches in length and contained a musketball, or "buck n ball".

Same Model 1816 .69 cal. flintlock musket was standard issue for the Texas army as well... There are some Tyron Philadelphia-produced examples with lone stars on the lock plates! By the Mexican War, the Model 1842 cap-lock had been brought out, but far and away the vast majority of U.S. troops were armed with flintlock Model 1816s... There's much discussion about how many U.S. personnel wore civilian clothes instead of uniforms...

 

[FedericoFCavada]

This is me in a dated and somewhat erroneous impression of Breece's Company New Orleans Greys wearing the M1825 "pin-wheel" type forage cap... The crown is just ever so slightly--like maybe an inch in diameter--too big.

It is now known more widely that at least some/ many of the Greys wore seal-skin hunting caps or traveller's caps...
QUESTION: Is there evidence of the folding leather forage cap, aka. Model 1833 leather cap in use by the USMC, particularly in the 2nd Seminole War, or just the flat-topped "wheel cap?" The army certainly used the Model 1833 (nick-named the "hog killer" although this is likely a "reenactorism" and not a common term of the period?) until 1839 when it was replaced by the dark blue M1839 wool wheel-type forage cap...

 

[FedericoFCavada]

My comrade in arms on the left is wearing a traveller's cap/ hunting cap. My Model 1825 with outsized crown is in front of me perched on the faux wall there...

 

[FedericoFCavada]

Scandinavian antecedent of the Model 1833 leather forage cap? Seems likely...

 

[FedericoFCavada]

 

[RedRover]

@RedRover. Do you know the name of the magazine that the 1827 drilling Marine image was published in?

I found the image on the web many years ago, given as 1827 Philly in my notes. HOWEVER, doing a search online, I found this better version, and indeed it is not 1827, but 1856!

So they were wearing the blue cloth forage cap of the 1840s-50s here...

Which says in fact the image is published in Ballou's Pictorial Drawing Room Companion, August 16, 1856:

Ballou's Pictorial, 1856, Marine barracks. Google books



So that leaves us visually with but the Quallah Battoo engraving from 1832:

Navy, Quallah Battoo as seen from the Frigate Potomac...

Ten years later, is this image by Gunner Myers aboard the USS Cyane, showing a marine in his flat topped forage cap:

The Cyane set sail in November, 1841 on this cruise.

 

[RedRover]

This is me in a dated and somewhat erroneous impression of Breece's Company New Orleans Greys wearing the M1825 "pin-wheel" type forage cap... The crown is just ever so slightly--like maybe an inch in diameter--too big.

It is now known more widely that at least some/ many of the Greys wore seal-skin hunting caps or traveller's caps...

I've seen that reference to their gray seal caps by one of the veterans, Ebenezer Heath. Seal caps were marketed throughout the country in the '30s...

New York American, 9-9-1833.

Reuben Potter later described the dress of these "New Orleans Grays" included "plain grey jackets, trousers, and forage caps." Evidently gray seal.

The cap you are wearing in the image, so far as the US Army was concerned in the 1825-32 period, was designated a "chakos"
This garment was adopted for wear by officers as a forage cap, and was to be worn in lieu of a forage cap by enlisted soldiers. By 1832, a military board was informed the chakos was unsuited for service, and determined upon a more durable and comfortable replacement...

QUESTION: Is there evidence of the folding leather forage cap, aka. Model 1833 leather cap in use by the USMC, particularly in the 2nd Seminole War, or just the flat-topped "wheel cap?" The army certainly used the Model 1833 (nick-named the "hog killer" although this is likely a "reenactorism" and not a common term of the period?) until 1839 when it was replaced by the dark blue M1839 wool wheel-type forage cap...

In 1832 the Army adopted a new "forage cap" to replace the chakos; of Morocco (or imitation Morocco) leather.

There are no 1830s references to the Army's 1832 pattern leather forage cap as a "hog killer." Indeed, evidently just a reenactorism copied by some authors (who copy each other), and used by reenactment costume vendors. Historically it was sometimes called a "gig top" as regards the style...

From United Service Magazine, Oct., 1865.

From James Lowry Donaldson (an Army veteran of the Florida War in the '30s):

Nor were they made of pigskin.



The Marine Corps wore a "fatigue cap" in the 1830s. During 1811 they adopted one of leather, which folded flat. By the 1830s evidently made with a "flat top." (rather than a folding gig-top).


The 1833 Uniform regulations for the USMC (to be in effect from 4 July 1834) required officers to wear the same forage cap as were "at present" (meaning previously) worn by the enlisted men...

For enlisted men, "same as at present worn"

In 1839 these fatigue caps were described as flat topped, and not gig-topped...

"They left in their fatigue dress; grey round jacket, grey pantaloons, and flat topped leather caps." [Sun, (Baltimore), 4-22-1839.]

Phila. Enquirer, 9-20-1832.

In May, 1839 uniform regulations, to take effect July 4, 1840, the officers fatigue cap changed to blue cloth. The enlisted men to wear same as at present worn... (the leather ones):

From the Baltimore Sun, Aug. 31, 1841.

 

[Manassas 1861]

I found the image on the web many years ago, given as 1827 Philly in my notes. HOWEVER, doing a search online, I found this better version, and indeed it is not 1827, but 1856!

So they were wearing the blue cloth forage cap of the 1840s-50s here...

View attachment 501946

Which says in fact the image is published in Ballou's Pictorial Drawing Room Companion, August 16, 1856:

View attachment 501948
Ballou's Pictorial, 1856, Marine barracks. Google books



So that leaves us visually with but the Quallah Battoo engraving from 1832:

View attachment 501950

View attachment 501951
Navy, Quallah Battoo as seen from the Frigate Potomac...

Ten years later, is this image by Gunner Myers aboard the USS Cyane, showing a marine in his flat topped forage cap:
View attachment 501952
The Cyane set sail in November, 1841 on this cruise.

Thanks so much.

 

[Manassas 1861]

I thought this image was cool, inside the marine barracks. Wearing fatigue uniforms and flat tops.

 

[Manassas 1861]

@RedRover. Random question. I'm hoping to write a book about when after I turn 18 on the evolution of early US Army/Marines uniforms and accoutrements, sense you have years of research and have been a massive help to me, would you want to be my co-author?

 

[Old Soldier]

This is one of my favorite Civil War photos - Marines at Washington Navy Yard. 1864. Totally different to the field army!!

 

[RedRover]

@RedRover. Random question. I'm hoping to write a book about when after I turn 18 on the evolution of early US Army/Marines uniforms and accoutrements, sense you have years of research and have been a massive help to me, would you want to be my co-author?

I would be satisfied with a simple acknowledgement of assistance one day...

A good book on military accoutrements of this period (ahem... the only book) is R.T. Huntington's "Accoutrements of US Army Infantry, Riflemen, and Dragoons" ...

Huntington, Accoutrements; amazon

 

[Manassas 1861]

@RedRover. So the image of the drilling Marines is just a 1856 reprint of the 1827 illustration?

 

[RedRover]

@RedRover. So the image of the drilling Marines is just a 1856 reprint of the 1827 illustration?

Nope. Looks like it is from 1856, and my previous comments upon it were incorrect. That's what I get for trusting the internet.

So going back to post number 35, I would ammend this:

"My conclusion would be that you have found an evidence that between 1818 and 1825, (particularly 1824) the Marine Corps was providing "glazed hats" for fatigue wear in lieu of the leather fatigue cap adopted in 1811. From May, 1825, however, if not before, a "fatigue cap" was provided again. This last was certainly the "flat topped" one, given the 1827 image from the naval yard, and referenced thereafter..."

To this:

My conclusion would be that you have found an evidence that between 1818 and 1825, (particularly 1824) the Marine Corps was providing "glazed hats" for fatigue wear in lieu of the leather fatigue cap adopted in 1811. From May, 1825, however, if not before, a "fatigue cap" was provided again. By the 1830s, if not before, it was "flat topped."

 

[Manassas 1861]

I noticed that marines at this time had gray uniforms with yellow trim. The US artillery uniform from 1821-32 was also gray with yellow trim. So the Marines in the 1820's and 30's basically had the same uniform as the US artillery.

 

[major bill]

When it comes to Marine uniforms, I consider David Sullivan an expert in the field. He with Lt. Col. Charles H. Cureton USMC(ret), coauthors of "The Civil War Uniforms The United State Marine Corp the Regulation of 1859" and are the experts about Marine uniforms. David Sullivan has numerous article about Marine Uniforms published in the Company of Military Historians and Collectors Journal. I have most of Sullivan's article in my back issues. Anyone seriously interested in Marine uniforms is welcome to "private message" me and I will see what articles I have. I assume I will see Sullivan at our convection in May. Detailed questions regarding Marine uniforms will cost me a "red pop" at the motel bar.

 

[Manassas 1861]

@FedericoFCavada . You posted a picture of your uniform on post #44. I've just been wandering what the thing that's hanging from your cartridge box sling next to the star is.

 

[FedericoFCavada]

Ah, the dated and rather farbtastic version of Breece's Co. of the New Orleans Greys image...? I have a tarred canvas strap/baldric holding a Model 1808 militia-type box [wooden block drilled out for 24 cartridges, above a metal tray holding turn-screw, tow-worm, a hank of tow, extra cartridge, extra gun-flints.

I had a brass "Texas" star, total fantasy piece, holding the chains for my vent pick and my pan brush. And then I've tossed a powder horn over it, for extra gun powder, I guess, although of course powder horns were more of the sort of thing a rifleman would have used.

The musket in that photo is a Frankenmusket I got off a French-and-Indian War reenactor, on the premise that it was a "bargain" ["ganga" in Spanish, LOL!] Not so. My wife will never let me buy things on the internet ever again after that whole conundrum... I did just get the lock repaired on that beast though, which is very nice...

I've since repurposed the shell jacket into the fatigue dress uniform of the Republic of Texas army: new Texas Army buttons, repairs, and black worsted-wool uniform lace... I really should get back to that project!