Confederate Sergeant from Georgia

[Private Watkins]

Would this jacket have been home made? Or could it have been gov made and buttons replaced?

Do you collect a lot of CW images?

I was antiquing the other day and I think I found an image from GAR with a gentleman wearing a Medal of Honor. I didn't buy it but may be going back after it.

My theory is home-made, perhaps a small unit of guys from the same town, uniforms home-made by their women-folk, some mom or wife thought big buttons were stylish... Someone once told me he thought he'd seen an ID'd image of a Mississippi soldier with very similar uniform & buttons, but I haven't been able to track anything like that down. Others have speculated maybe post-war the buttons were covered with cloth to comply with federal ban on confederate insignia, but I'm not sure I subscribe to that being the reason the buttons are so large; I think most likely just a unique home-made unit uniform...

I don't have many images, just a few... I think they're really fascinating. I go more by whether or not I like the overall character and portrait of the guy (or gal) than by the technical aspects, like how many weapons, or how few scratches on the image, etc. An image has to really "speak to me", like Ole Glass Eye did, for me to pursue...

 

[Bloody 11th]

Where does everyone come up with these pics?

 

[Private Watkins]

Where does everyone come up with these pics?

One really nice source is the Liljenquist Family Collection donated to the Library of Congress...

http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/lilj/​

I also enjoy just browsing from time to time what a few of the private dealers have in stock, as they often get new images from some family who is looking to sell 4x-great-uncle Harry's old photo they found in the attic (for example), or some of the older big collections will run through these dealers when heirs are looking to sell. A couple of such dealers I've had good experience with are:

http://thecivilwarimageshop.com
http://www.mikemedhurst.com​

But I'm no expert, just a novice, and there are many here on this site who can speak to sources and quality thereof better than I can...