Uniforms Union or Confederate uniform?

major bill

Brev. Brig. Gen'l
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Aug 25, 2012
I purchase this some time ago and there was some nice images in his Civil War set. However I do not not if the artist here was depicting Union soldiers or Confederate soldiers. I want to put this image in my Civil War" album but not sure if it depicts Union or Confederate.

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Does anyone have any issues with these "Civil War" uniforms? Which army wore light blue shirts with dark blue trousers? What about the crossed rifles on the canteen? The caps appear to be model 1873 caps. The other Civil War images in this portfolio are a bit more accurate.
 
I do think the artist was probably going for Union Infantry but the uniforms look off as does some of the equipment. This is part of a 9 figure set.
 
This is all typical CW Centennial era souvenir junk - these "uniforms" would've fit in perfectly at the 1961 reenactment of First Bull Run which I attended as a young teenager.
The portfolio does have a Civil War centennial look to it. I wonder if these were promotional items and given out by the company. Each image is mounted on a 11 by 17 inch piece of heavyweight textured paper. Dispite any shortcomings in accuracy they are interesting and of fairly high quality. The art work itself is fair good once you get past the accuracy part. I did not pay much for them.
 
The portfolio does have a Civil War centennial look to it. I wonder if these were promotional items and given out by the company. Each image is mounted on a 11 by 17 inch piece of heavyweight textured paper. Dispite any shortcomings in accuracy they are interesting and of fairly high quality. The art work itself is fair good once you get past the accuracy part. I did not pay much for them.
Very probably, as there were many such tie-ins available at the time. However, I'm aware of two small series or sets that appeared then that were very good, one of which is still in publication these many years later and available in souvenir and gift shops at Gettysburg. It's two portfolios of postcard-weight cards approx. 3" X 7" in a slipcover, each containing paintings of: a General (Lee in the Confederate set but unnamed); infantryman; infantry officer; artilleryman; cavalryman; zouave; and in the Union set, an infantry drummer and in the Confederate set Cavalry General (again unnamed but obviously Jeb Stuart). All were done by Frederic Ray, then Art Director for Civil War Times Magazine. I forget the artist of the other series, two sets of four approx. 4" x 6" prints on heavy paper, again one Union and one Confederate, showing various uniforms in "vignettes". The Union set shows a mounted artillery officer, 1861 Rhode Island infantry sergeant, 1862 Wisconsin infantry, and 1863 N. Y. dismounted cavalryman; the Confederate, a S. C. infantry sergeant, Terry's Texas Ranger, Washington Artilleryman of N. O., and 1st Va. cavalry officer. These were very well done and to my belief accurate.
 
I purchase this some time ago and there was some nice images in his Civil War set. However I do not not if the artist here was depicting Union soldiers or Confederate soldiers. I want to put this image in my Civil War" album but not sure if it depicts Union or Confederate.

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Does anyone have any issues with these "Civil War" uniforms? Which army wore light blue shirts with dark blue trousers? What about the crossed rifles on the canteen? The caps appear to be model 1873 caps. The other Civil War images in this portfolio are a bit more accurate.
You are correct, there is so much wrong here it is almost humorous, the canteen insignia is IW, as are the kepis and the braces are a later version as well. No haversacks, but packs, so they are not in light marching order. I think someone did go to Centennial activities, took pictures and sketched away!
 
That´s classic Centennial look there! Hard to tell what they were going for in that original post. I´m going to go with Union infantry, probably intending a July 1861 appearance, judging from the shirtsleeves and blue pants and caps. They have a pretty ¨new¨ look to them, both in equipment and attitude, meandering around and chasing rabbits. The gear is pretty laughable, though: the cap has an 1870s look to it, and the canteen is marked like 1898, to include the crossed rifles branch insignia that didn´t exist in the timeframe 1861-1865.
The Confederates in the second one are better, if not correct. There´s a hint of a blue band on the foreground soldier´s cap, almost as if the artist knew it should be there, but never actually was. I don´t like the look of the cavalryman´s canteen, but the two infantrymen with barrel canteens are OK. That picture has nice interaction between the figures.
These take me back to the Civil War images I grew up with and spent hours staring at as a child. Ah, those simpler days!
 
Some of the uniform prints from the 1960s is horrid as far as accuracy goes. The upside is that the interst in Civil War things, including the study of uniforms, helped to spur additional research and this brought about better unifiform plates in the 1970s and 1980s.
 
Another image from a portfolio from the Centennial. This one is dated 1961. These plates are 11 by 17 inches.
csa 32.png


Again there might be some questions of the accuracy of the uniform and equipment. Does the yellow sergeant stripes make this a cavalryman? What about the musket? Perhaps he is a dismounted cavalryman. Note the soldier does not appear to have an ammunition pouch or a haversack, well the blanket roll could be covering up the ammunition pouch. . He also does not have a bayonet. Still the images in this portfolio are interesting if not totally accurate.
 
It´s hilarious when artists ¨fudge¨ details they don´t want to think about by putting them on the back of the figure, or by covering them with something else - like a blanket roll. Then title the picture with a generic name like ¨Typical Enlisted Man, CSA.¨ Probably the truest thing I know about CW uniforms is even the typical CS soldier was covered in atypical details, like state issued items, substitutions and gear that was tailored for time/place. I would say that his cartridge box is probably behind his right hip (conveniently out of the viewer´s sight) and is hung on his belt, because he doesn´t have a sling hanging over his shoulder. Doesn´t have a bayonet, and has cavalry stripes, so he may be a cavalryman - wouldn´t be an incorrect assumption but the artist isn´t giving us any explanation of the backstory on his sergeant.
 
For much of the 20th century and into the 21st, the 1912 statue and monument to the Confederate war dead on the UNC- Chapel Hill campus, aka. "Silent Sam" (and certainly very, very many UNC alumni perished in the Civil War, and North Carolina suffered, I believe, the highest per capita losses of any Confederate State?) had a rifle musket in his hands, but no visible or discernible cartridge box. I believe the story was that the pockets were stuffed with cartridges or some other rationale for explaining away its absence?

Truth be told, when I first saw the statue, I thought: "Huh, here I am out on the East Coast and they've got all this colonial-era history we don't have on the Left Coast... Oh look! A minute man statue!" I used to take Latin American students and visiting faculty to see the bronze monument of James K. Polk, he of Mexican War fame.... "Young Hickory" UNC class of 1818.
 
That´s classic Centennial look there! Hard to tell what they were going for in that original post. I´m going to go with Union infantry, probably intending a July 1861 appearance, judging from the shirtsleeves and blue pants and caps. They have a pretty ¨new¨ look to them, both in equipment and attitude, meandering around and chasing rabbits. The gear is pretty laughable, though: the cap has an 1870s look to it, and the canteen is marked like 1898, to include the crossed rifles branch insignia that didn´t exist in the timeframe 1861-1865.
The Confederates in the second one are better, if not correct. There´s a hint of a blue band on the foreground soldier´s cap, almost as if the artist knew it should be there, but never actually was. I don´t like the look of the cavalryman´s canteen, but the two infantrymen with barrel canteens are OK. That picture has nice interaction between the figures.
These take me back to the Civil War images I grew up with and spent hours staring at as a child. Ah, those simpler days!
In addition to the cover art there are at least a couple of other similar full-page illustrations in the OFFICIAL Program to the 1961 First Manassas reenactment I picked up when I was there:

1st Manassas Program Cover.jpg
 
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