Why is so much Civil War stuff found?c

[Monty]

That is a question I saw posed in a post several months ago. I am reading "The Civil War Archive" by Henry Commager. It is a very thick book of excerpts from articles , documents and letters from the Civil War era. One item I just read was about how the soldiers of both sides were equipped when enlisted. The clothing was mostly heavy wool that was extremely hot when marching in any kind of weather, harbored lice and was very heavy to carry. Most of it was thrown away in short order or traded for lighter weight cotton material. It says that many of the troops except elite units threw away their bayonets because they were mostly useless and hard to carry around plus you couldn't fire your issue weapon when it was in place as the end of the bayonet fit inside the bore. Makes me wonder why the remains of more aren't found. They discarded their boots in favor of brogans. Backpacks were thrown away and replaced by haversacks. When on the march they often even discarded canteens and depended on roadside streams for water. Originally they were issued 100 rounds of ammo and immediately threw away forty rounds because it was so heavy! Very interesting reading. Monty

 

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[Montana Jim]

That is interesting...

I can understand most of trading and tossing... but the rounds?

I bet they didn't do that after the first battle they got into...

 

[civilman1]

Very interesting Monty...Too bad a unit didn't get the order to discard all these item's all at the same time in one place....It would make my job easier!!It's kinda hard to trace the footstep's of these men let alone gain access to a property these day's or there would be even MORE goodie's to be had.Good question.....HH!!

 

[Monty]

The article also said the cavalry threw away or lost many of their swords and very few carried pistols, mostly relying on short rifles. From what I understand most of the discarding went on while they were on the march to a battle site rather than in their encampments. I'm sure most of the main "turnpikes" or thoroughfares were paved over long ago. But I'll bet that the shoulders and ditches of old remaining roads or even those that were farmed over or abandoned and all grown up with vegetation would be a good place to hunt. There should be maps online to indicate were some of these roads were located at one time. After the first months of the war the troops were only issued 60 rounds so they wouldn't throw away the extras. Interesting enough it seemed that the first line troops were always calling for more ammo in the heat of battle. M nty