Differences in Federal and Confederate military training camps

Were there any significant differences in Federal and Confederate military training camps with regard to training, discipline, drill, and time?
You simply can't generalize... It was the states that raised the regiments and how this was done different from state to state and over time. In the early part of the war some regiments didn't receive any training before marching of to war.

In the case of drill, different regiments used different drill books depending on where and when.
 
Were there any significant differences in Federal and Confederate military training camps with regard to training, discipline, drill, and time?
We had a thread a few weeks ago about questionaires sent to Tn CW vets from both sides. One Tn federal soldier who joined fairly late in the war only received one week of training. I would think it depended who was in charge of the training camp. Camp Dick Robertson in Ky which trained mostly federal soldiers from Tn and Ky was commanded by Gen.Thomas who was an instructor at West Point under at the time Col. R.E. Lee.I would think that was a very through training camp. has others have pointed out it was somewhat a matter of luck how much training and how well it was carried out . Gen.McClellan was said to be very good at training I am sure their where others on both sides if they had the time to do so.
Leftyhunter
 
At the start of the war, most of the officers and enlisted men in both armies were green when it came to military life. Some officers were reading the Hardee and Casey manuals as they tried to instruct their soldiers. The discipline and drill varied from camp to camp. Thomas Jackson was thankfully an instructor and well versed in drill as well as how to set up a camp so his regiments were better off. I was reading about Benjamin Grierson, the Union commander that led a raid through Mississippi. He was one of the few that understood camp layout and discipline at the start of the war, even though he hated horses. He instilled discipline by moving officers into the camp, setting up proper dining and latrine areas, daily drill both mounted and dismounted and dress parades and inspections on Sundays (Source: Grierson's Raid by Tom Lalicki). For his diligence and organizational skills, he was promoted to major of the 6th Illinois Cavalry.
 
The 2nd, 5th, 6th and 7th Wisconsin regiments used a manual by a guy named Chandler. (and likely many more Wisconsin regiments also did... just not something I can back up with sources for atm)
It was written specifically for the Wisconsin regiments. It is mostly Scott with a bit of Hardees and very compressed. It is only 77 pages in total and covers both school of the soldier and school of the company. So if you know your Casey's you will notice many things missing. But as I see it that actually makes it a rather good book for use during "basic training"

And by summer 64 the Iron brigade regiments had only partly changed to Casey and still did some things like Chandler wrote it...


Amount of training for the 15th Wisconsin.
From the book "oberst Heg og hans drenge"
(my rather loose translation from Norwegian)

At least some recruits arrived at Camp Randell in late December 61.
By the end of Feb the camp held 3000 men. (15th, 15th and 17th regiments)
They drilled each day 3 hours before noon and 3 hours after noon.
On Sunday they marched to church.

The "housing" in the camp was not that good. They did have an oven, but it was not able to warm the huts in the winter cold.

Eating was done in buildings specifically used for this. Each of the 10 tables could have 100 men at it at a time. But there where a lack of something to sit on, so many had to eat standing.
The food was not that good and they did not always get as much as they needed.
By 2nd March all 3 regiments was ready and the 15th marched to the train station at 8 in the morning... and left town... but the train soon got stuck in the snow.

So at least some of the men received about two month of training. But as I understand the text they where 22 men in his company by the late December when they arrived in the camp and the rest of the men keeped arriving until they where mustered in to federal service on the 14th February.. So I believe some men might have arrived in early February and then only received about 2 weeks of training.
 
I was under the impression that available drill books were essentially variations on "Hardee's" Tactics... (itself ultimately an adaptation from French manuals). It seems that "significant differences" would not be Federal/Confederate so much as individual unit; any number of factors could impact regimental performance, not the least of which would be the quality of officers' leadership in camp as well as on campaign.
 
you are correct, but it is a bit more complicated than that. Since your need to remember Scott.

The army had two drill books:
One old one for heavy Infantry (using smooth bore muskets) by Scott.
And Hardee's 1855 book for light infantry using (short) rifles.
And there is a manual of arms for each weapon.

Then there are all the other books(Gilham, chandler, Baxter, Nostrand, Root... just to mention the once I got a PDF of) and they copy+past from both. And some change a few things or add their own stuff.
Today it would clearly be plagiarizing... but as you say both Scott and Hardee's are just translations from French drill books.

Chandler use evolutions from Scott, (even mention a middle rank in one place... by mistake)
others use evolutions from Hardee. (more modern)
The manual of arms is mostly for the musket.(since that is what the state arsenals had and what was issued to the new regiments)
US infantry tactics (1861) use Hardee for evolutions but got both Manuals of arms. So if you where a center company you would use the musket one. and if your where a flank company you would use the rifle one. And at least in some cased they did issue rifled weapons to the flank companies and smooth bores to the center companies in the early part of the war. In other cases one regiment in a brigade got rifled weapons and the rest smoothbores. And the rifle armed regiment was the one used for flank guards and skirmishing duty.

Casey removed the light or heavy split and makes everyone use the rifle manual of arms. And makes everyone use this book, (so the Wisconsin regiments do redrill to that one)

When the war broke out Hardee went south and made his improved and revised version where he partly change the manual of arms back to the musket one. The CSA regiments generally changed to this one during the war.
(Even VMI did so in 64... despite Gilham being an instructor there)
 
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