Identity ? Fold3 Look up Request

[lelliott19]

Ok........so we've got this photo, probably everyone has seen. Identified at the LOC as follows:

[Thomas Kitchen, Pvt., Georgia regiment, C.S.A., three-quarter length portrait, seated holding bayonet and rifle, facing front]

Expired Image Removed

We have the above image appearing in this non historical article of May 14, 2014
http://www.ajc.com/news/news/opinion/civil-war-150th-are-we-too-busy-to-remember/nf5JC/ where the image is identified as follows: "A Civil War-era photograph depicts Pvt. Thomas Kitchen, Georgia regiment, Confederate States of America. Library of Congress"

Next, we have the same photo appearing in this Aug 2014 article from the blog of the Gettysburg National Military Park entitled "The Home of a Rebel Sharpshooter Revisited, Part III"
https://npsgnmp.wordpress.com/2014/08/21/the-home-of-a-rebel-sharpshooter-revisited-part-iii/
In that obviously well-researched article, the subject is identified as Corporal J. Thomas Kitchen, Company I, 8th Georgia Infantry.

Here's the problem.....there is no J T Kitchen listed on the roster of the 8th Georgia Infantry. Could someone with Fold 3 please see of there was a J Thomas Kitchen in the 8th Georgia Infantry, the 8th Battalion Georgia Infantry? Or maybe in another Regiment?

Thanks!!!!

 

[AndyHall]

There is a Corporal Thomas J. Kitchen, Co. I, 8th Georgia Infantry (State Guards) -- different unit from the regular 8th Georgia Infantry.

 

[lelliott19]

Thanks @AndyHall . Wonder why the folks at the GNMP thought that was necessarily him? Im assuming there are lots of men listed as T, Tom, or Thomas Kitchen/Kichen who served in Georgia regiments?

 

[AndyHall]

Not many. There is also a Thomas J. Kitchens (with an S on the end) in Co. K, 22nd Georgia Infantry. The 8th State Guards was a six-month enlistment in the latter half of 1863, and this second man enlisted in the 22nd in March 1864. They may be the same man.

 

[lelliott19]

Hmmmm. Ok so that guy enlisted in 63/4.

The GNMP article uses the Kitchens photo specifically to demonstrate the early GA Confederate uniform variety.

"(Georgia) in 1861 adopted "a single breasted frock coat of Georgia Cadet gray, with a skirt extending one half of the distance from the top of the hip to the bend of the knee," as the official dress uniform for enlisted men. The early coat, seen here as worn by Corporal J. Thomas Kitchen, Company I, 8th Georgia Infantry (at left), indeed has some similarities in style and design to the uniform coat in question. In an effort to stretch the supply of material, the regulation was modified in 1862 or early 1863 and the short-waisted jacket adopted for enlisted men..."
​

@Frederick14Va @Cumpston1862 @Patrick H can you guys help? I'm no uniform expert by any stretch. Did the state troops keep on issuing and using the early uniforms as late as 63/4?

EDIT to add: Im also not a firearms expert, but that sure looks like a nice gun to me. Did the CSA have enough arms to issue such weapons to Home Guard units? For some reason, I had always imagined them as running around with old squirrel rifles and what not.

 

[AndyHall]

LoC image at full resolution:

 

[12th Missouri Yankee]

Formidable knife weapon