Firearm identification by Civil War soldiers

[Jack C., 69th NY]

Does anyone know if there was an "official" policy allowing or prohibiting a soldier, Confederate or Union, from marking his individual musket with his initials or name? Although not too common, all of us have seen original firearms the have been carved with initials or names. Was this more prevalent with the Southern soldier as opposed to a Union soldier?

Was it a practice or policy for a regiment to stamp or paint a soldiers number or a rack number on muskets? I have seen several Mass. marked muskets with stamps into the butt plate. Was this done by other states as well?

Thanks for any information!

[Jim Mayo]

Some state units marked their gear. I have seen a letter where a officer in a Vermont regiment (9th?) spent the day marking the men's Enfields and the next day was going to be spent marking accouterments. This was not the norm as many CW weapons do not have regimental identification markings. I have never heard of any official policy against the men marking id marks on their weapons but the government being what it is, it was probably against the regulation of damaging gov. property. Since many of the officers of both sides were not regular Army officers but volunteers, it was probably ignored by many resulting in the identified arms present today. Many of these id carvings in the stock could also have been added post war. I have a couple of examples on this page.
http://www.angelfire.com/ma4/j_mayo/scabbard.html

[Kurt Lacko 7862]

Jim, very informative, nice website. Kurt

[J Weber 4114V]

2nd set of kudos on the fine infomational web site.

[John Gross]

For the Confederate side I can offer you the following from the OR, Series 1, Volume 35, Part 1, page 587, Captain L. Jaquelin Smith, Artillery, Assistant Chief of Ordnance, to Lt. Col. J. R. Waddy, Charleston, SC, February 10, 1864.

John Gross

"The companies are uniformly armed, and the arms in fine order; many of the guns I, however, observed had the names of the men cut on the stocks of the guns. I called the attention of the senior captain in charge of this battalion to the fact that cutting the gun-stock, &c., is an abuse of public arms, and hence a punishable affair. "

[RaiderANV]

dang Rebs,,,,,,whatdaya gonna do with us :roll:

[Southron Sr.]

Back in the early 1970's I was attending a Skirmish at Shakertown, KY.
It was Saturday evening and most units were around their campfire socializing or whatever.

One Skirmisher was going from unit to unit trying to sell an original 3rd Model Enfield Rifle. He was asking $250.00 for the rifle which was "pricey" back in those days for an original Enfield.

One fella asked to see the Enfield and examined the rifle as if he were considering purchasing it. Handing the rifle back to the owner, the prospective customer made the comment: "If that Enfield had Confederate markings on it, I would pay you $300.00 for it-right now!

The owner of the Enfield said: "Get your money out, I'll be back in five minutes!"

There is a moral somewhere in that story.

P.S. The fella that looked at the rifle DIDN'T purchase that Enfield!

[Jim Leinicke 7368V]

In the Regular Army, you would be severely punished for carving on your musket, but the militia and volunteers always did it and gun collectors and historians have been grateful ever since. The oldest that I have is a Charleville flintlock musket with "A. Kaley" carved in it, and he served in the Massachusetts Line in 1777-1778. I am always tempted to buy an old gun if there is a name on it. My favorite in my collection is a Model 1803 Harpers Ferry rifle with "Jas.Dodds" neatly stamped (not carved) on the stock. James Dodds was a leiutenant in the 1st Georgia Regiment of Foot in Mexico, and was inviladed out in June 1847 with wounds. The boy went home to Coweta County and married his sweetie and a couple of years later inherited a nice little plantation from his daddy-in-law with all the trimmings. Presumably he lived happily ever after. Those names and initials are a real treasure if you take the time to read them, but they were always added by volunteers and militia, not regulars.

[Southron Sr.]

Confederate Enfields purchased in 1861 & 1862 have "Blockade Markings" on the tang of the buttlpate. These are "hand engraved" 4 digit numbers with a single letter underneath. Something like this:

"2948
B"

Like Luger serial numbers, when 9999 was reached, another letter sequence was started, i.e., "C" "D" "E" "F" etc.
These were not "Rack Numbers" but basically a serial number on Southern purchased Enfields for record keeping (financial) purposes.

Apparently this system was discontinued sometimes in 1862. In addition, most Confederate Enfields have a "JS & Anchor" stamp on the stock.

Supposedly, Mr. JS was an inspector hired to inspect all Southern purchased Enfields.

Also, Georgia purchased Enfields were marked with a "G" stamped in the wood of the stock a few inches in front of the tang. South Carolina purchased Enfields were marked with a "SC."

Just because there is a "G" stamped in the stock DOES NOT MEAN that Enfield was necessarily issued to Georgia troops. When I did research in the Georgia Archives, I found several letters written by the Adjutant General to Gorgas complaining that when state purchased Enfields arrived in Wilmington, N.C. after being run thru the Blockade, Confederate Ordnance officers were seizing the arms. Presumably, these arms were issued by the Confederate Ordnance Dept to Confederate troops.

Needless to say, most likely original Enfields with "CS" or "CSA" marks on them are probably spurious marks that were added in the past 50 or so years to enhance their value to unsuspecting potential buyers.

[Jim Mayo]

Many CS Enfields had no CS inspector’s markings or any other markings identifying Confederate use. Among those were guns brought in through the blockade by speculators who bought the guns in England and sold them to the South to make a few bucks. This resulted in bypassing the Confederate government inspectors in England (who put the markings on when the gun was inspected) and few records exist as to the numbers arriving by this method. The only way to determine the number of these guns bought in through the blockade by speculators is to look at arriving ship's manifest which may or may not exist.

There are also CS inspector’s markings other than those mentioned in the post above. Among these are the Sinclair Hamilton & company and Caleb Huse markings. There are a couple of others but it's late and my mind is fuzzy. If one searches Tim Prince's website he explains much about Confederate inspectors marks when he describes a gun for sale with those markings. http://collegehillarsenal.com/store/