Uniforms Using South Carolina militia uniforms to better understand early war S.C. uniforms.

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Brev. Brig. Gen'l
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Bellow is an image (by Fredrick P. Todd) which shows a couple of South Carolina militia uniforms from 1856. although not from 1860, these are good examples of what the militia was wearing as the Civil War neared. The beat militia officer to the left wears a fairly standard militia officer uniform from the mid 1850s and basically follows older US Army officer dress uniforms worn up to 1851. Note his cap insignia has a palmetto replacing the eagle.

The Captain to the right wears an interesting frock coat. Note the trim about the bottom part of his frock coat. This trim was seen on a fair amount of early war South Carolina uniforms. This kind of lower frock coat trim is not very common on the frock coats of other states and may some how be connected to South Carolina. For those interested the Edisto Rifles wore "gray coats trimmed with green, white trousers, and a black hat." It appears in this image which is made from a photograph the the Captain wears s dark blue cloth pattern 1851 army cap with added green trim. The cap plume appears to be non standard. Note that green was a common color for units considering themselves a "rifle" company.



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