Cavalry Papers

[USS ALASKA]

THE CAVALIER IMAGE IN THE CIVIL WAR AND THE SOUTHERN MIND
COLT BAKER ALLGOOD
Texas A&M University
MASTER OF ARTS
May 2012
Copyright 2012 Colt Baker Allgood

ABSTRACT
This thesis examines the methods and actions of selected Virginians who chose to adopt irregular tactics in wartime, and focuses on the reasons why they fought that way. The presence of the Cavalier image in Virginia had a direct impact on the military exploits of several cavalry officers in both the Revolutionary War and the American Civil War. The Royalist cavalry during the English Civil War gave rise to the original Cavalier image, but as migrants came to Virginia during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the image became a general term for the Southern planter. This thesis contends that selected Virginia cavalry officers attempted to adhere to an Americanized version of the Cavalier image. They either purposefully embodied aspects of the Cavalier image during their military service, or members of the Southern populace attached the Cavalier image to them in the post-war period. The Cavalier thus served as a military ideal, and some cavalry officers represented a romanticized version of the Southern martial hero. This thesis traces the development of the Cavalier image in Virginia chronologically. It focuses on the origins of the Cavalier image and the role of the Royalist cavalry during the English Civil War. After the Royalist migration, and especially during the American Revolution, Virginians like Henry Lee embodied aspects of the Cavalier image during their military careers. Between the end of the American Revolution and the beginning of the Civil War, some Southern authors perpetuated the image by including Cavalier figures in many of their literary works. In the Civil War, select Virginians who fought for the Confederacy personified the Cavalier hero in the minds of many white Southerners. Despite a Confederate defeat, the Cavalier image persisted in Southern culture in the post-Civil War period and into the twentieth century.

https://oaktrust.library.tamu.edu/bitstream/handle/1969.1/ETD-TAMU-2012-05-10985/ALLGOOD-THESIS.pdf?sequence=2&isAllowed=y

Because of copyright, please use above link.

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[USS ALASKA]

Volume 1 Issue 1 Article 8
7-1963
With the Confederate Cavalry in East Texas: The Civil War Letters of Pvt. Isaac Dunbar Affleck
Robert W. Williams Jr
Ralph A. Wooster

This Article has been accepted for inclusion in the East Texas Historical Journal by an authorized editor of ETHA and SFA. This Article is brought to you free and open access by the Journals at SFA ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact [email protected].

https://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1021&context=ethj

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USS ALASKA

 

[USS ALASKA]

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
UTC Scholar
Honors Theses
Student Research, Creative Works, and Publications
3-1996

General Joseph Wheeler and the mounted rifles: cavalry proves its worth in the Chattanooga area
Josh Correll
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

This Theses is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Research, Creative Works, and Publications at UTC Scholar. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of UTC Scholar. For more information, please contact [email protected].

Introduction
There is a commonly held opinion among some historians that cavalry, men fighting from horseback, were obsolete by the time of the American Civil War. The problem with this perception is the definition of obsolescence. While it is true that cavalry as a charging, frontline force was mostly ineffective, this was not the kind of cavalry used in that conflict on a large scale. Instead, a new kind of cavalry, the Mounted Rifles, was put into practice by some of the commanders, most notably one of the Confederacy's youngest cavalry generals, Joseph Wheeler. Wheeler's tactics differed from those of other commanders like Phillip Sheridan and Nathan Bedford Forrest. Wheeler's cavalry worked within an army, by far the more common role for that branch. This role has been frowned upon increasingly as time passes, mostly because it lacks the glamour of Forrest and Sheridan's independent wars. However, his cavalry was no less valuable.

https://scholar.utc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1515&context=honors-theses

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USS ALASKA

 

[USS ALASKA]

Old Dominion University
ODU Digital Commons
History Theses & Dissertations
Spring 2007

The Tactical Flexibility of the Union Cavalry: How Modern Firearms Changed the Federal Cavalry
Peter J. Francione
Old Dominion University

This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the History at ODU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in History Theses & Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ODU Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected].

ABSTRACT
The history of warfare is replete with episodes chronicling the struggle between developing tactics with technological advances. From the bow to the smoothbore musket, military leaders have always been forced to alter their tactics in order to take advantage of technological advances. During the American Civil War the Union cavalry was able to achieve great heights by wedding their tactics to the advanced firearms their troopers carried. Realizing the potential of breech-loading and repeating firearms the Union cavalry, from 1861-1865, developed a flexible set of tactics that took advantage of those modern weapons. Their efforts came to fruition as the war ended in the spring of 1865, as the Federal cavalry had become an unrivaled mounted force at that time. Prior to the American Civil War, theorists declared that the cavalry served a specific and limited purpose in warfare. Europeans believed that the cavalry was an offensive aim that was strictly limited to relying on the mounted charge. Arguing that horse soldiers should not fight dismounted the European cavalry remained true to its traditional role as a strictly mounted force. In America, young Union officers deviated from the traditional path after two years of failure. Modern firearms provided an opportunity for Union officers to devise new, flexible tactics that provided a battlefield edge. Combining dismounted and mounted action with close artillery support, Federal cavalry officers designed a mounted force that had never been seen before on the battlefield.

https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1124&context=history_etds

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USS ALASKA

 

[USS ALASKA]

Old Dominion University
ODU Digital Commons
History Theses & Dissertations
Fall 1988

The Evolving Tactics of the 4th Virginia Cavalry: A Study of the Adaptability of Stuart's Cavalry, 1861-1865
Kenneth L. Stiles
Old Dominion University

This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the History at ODU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in History Theses & Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ODU Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected].

ABSTRACT
Very little has been written about the doctrine and tactics employed by Major General J. E. B. Stuart's Cavalry Corps, Army of Northern Virginia during the Civil War. This study will examine how Stuart employed his cavalry in large-scale raids against his adversaries and as dismounted infantry in the battleline. These tactics contradicted the accepted European doctrine of the times, the doctrine that was taught by the U.S. military community in the mid-1800s. This study of the Confederate cavalry's evolution of tactics and its employment in battle will center around the Fourth Regiment Virginia Cavalry, Stuart's Cavalry Corps, ANV. The sources used include official publications, manuscript collections, memoirs and other primary sources, as well as many secondary sources.

https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1246&context=history_etds

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[USS ALASKA]

Journal Article
Raising Thunder with the Secesh: Powell Clayton's Federal Cavalry at Taylor's Creek and Mount Vernon, Arkansas, May 11, 1863
Rhonda M. Kohl
The Arkansas Historical Quarterly, Vol. 64, No. 2 (Summer, 2005), pp. 146-170
Arkansas Historical Association

https://www.jstor.org/stable/40031057

Full article at above link on JSTOR with Google sign-in (In the upper right-hand corner of the linked page, there is a 'Log in' button. If you have a Gmail account, you have a Google sign-in and this will allow for free reading of 100 articles a month).

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USS ALASKA