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Civil War Engineers


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Okay, quick question. What would a civil war engineer have carried on his person? My understanding is that shovels, picks, charges, etc. were carried by wagons and brought up when needed. So did civil war engineers have to carry any special field gear themselves? If this is was posted in the wrong place, I apologize. Not really sure where it should go.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Probably a normal Infantry kit with engineer insignia. Compared to infantry units, there were very few actual engineer regiments. It was much more common to have engineer staff officers supervising infantry soldiers doing manual labor.

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There were Civil War engineer regiments. Not only did the regular army have them, but there were also state volunteer engineer regiments. The 15th & 50th New York Engineers come to mind - they saw HEAVY action while trying to build the pontoon bridge across the Rhappahannock at Fredericksburg. They came under heavy sniper fire from Barksdale's Mississippi brigade.In fact, I have a Grand Army of the Republic membership form from a soldier who was wounded while trying to build that bridge.

 

As far as equipments is concerned, essayon buttons would have been worn on the officer's uniforms, as well as the castle device on the hats. Below are some Civil War engineer photographs, which show the men in a wide array situations.

 

Engineers laying heavy artillery positions....

 

 

post-2801-0-09073300-1370652067.jpg

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  • 1 year later...

This is a long dormant thread, but I got bored this evening....

The image of the troops on the grapevine bridge and the fellows building a corduroy road are examples of details from infantry units assigned to specific work details. In the case of the grapevine bridge photo, Francis T. Miller identified the soldiers as members of the 5th NH and 64th NY. Miller was advised by veterans on a number of the photos he published in the 1911 Photographic History of the Civil War, so there is no reason to doubt the identification, especially because diaries and reminiscences from both these units mention the work details. Interestingly, the photographer (Gardner and assistants) took a second photo from the other end of the causeway in the photo and changed the identification to a second bridge-- a bit of marketing to increase sales I expect, though some of the same men appear in both photos in close to the same positions.

The troops corduroying the road are likely in the same situation: performing duties we think of as engineering, but closer to fatigue duty.

One light note: there was a whiskey ration issued to the men on the bridge detail who were obliged to work in the water. The officers noticed a number of men simply walking out to the end of the structure, jumping in the stream and reporting back for their portion.

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