Themes of the American Civil War

Tactical Conditions
The explanation for the high casualty figures arising from Civil War combat,
particularly in 1862–63, is the subject of some controversy. In Attack and
Die: Civil War Military Tactics and the Southern Heritage Grady McWhiney and Perry D. Jamieson have pointed to the failure of Confederate commanders to comprehend and adapt to the introduction of new technology
—specifically, to the invention of the Mini bullet. At the time of the Mexican
War, when most of the US. Military Academy graduates who would lead armies in the Civil War received their only experience of combat, muzzle- loading smoothbore muskets were by far the most common infantry weapon.
The inaccuracy of smoothbore muskets dictated that effective fire could be delivered only by a close-order line, and training and tactics were arranged accordingly. Rifled muskets, while more accurate, had an extremely slow rate of fire because, to utilize the rifling in the barrel, the ball had to bean extremely tight fit, and was consequently difficult to load. The Mini bullet,
an oblong projectile small enough to drop easily down the barrel, but with a hollow base which expanded to fit the rifling of the barrel when fired,
changed the tactical situation completely. Infantrymen could now fire accurately over afar greater range, making fire zones larger and transferring battlefield dominance to the defensive. However, not only did Civil War commanders fail to properly adapt to these new circumstances, but
Confederate commanders destroyed their armies in repeated frontal assaults in the misguided belief that the offensive remained superior in spite of the prevalence of rifled muskets.
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The explanation for this Southern predilection for the offensive was, according to the McWhiney–Jamieson thesis,
not merely a misunderstanding of the tactical situation—after all, federal army commanders had also fought in Mexico, but did not attack as much in Civil War battles—but a Celtic heritage which pervaded Southern culture and inspired a dedication to the charge, the ancient tactics of the Celts.
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For McWhiney and Jamieson, the Civil War battlefield is dominated by the
Southern charge, and its crushing repulse at the hands of the rifled musket.
Pickett’s charge during the battle of Gettysburg may therefore be considered as the apotheosis of the Attack and Die thesis.
In contrast, Paddy Griffith has argued that Civil War battlefields were not dominated by the rifled musket at all, and the superiority of the defensive was instead exaggerated by the failure of the attackers to exploit their opportunities. Griffith based this proposition on his belief that discipline in Civil War armies remained poor, and they were consequently unable to carry through the Napoleonic tactics that would have brought decisiveness to the battlefield. Without the competence to force a breakthrough, Civil
War battles degenerated into costly firefights. Casualties mounted,”
according to Griffith, because the contest went on so long, not because the
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fire was particularly deadly Griffith thus concludes that the American Civil
War was in fact the last Napoleonic war rather than the first modern war—
although the Americans failed to copy correctly Napoleonic tactics, and thus failed to achieve the decisive battles the French had won fifty years earlier.
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Griffith’s battlefields are dominated by these indecisive firefights, and by the poor fire discipline of the men which leads to them.
Combining parts of both the above theses, though it was written before either, Thomas V. Moseley has produced perhaps the most balanced portrayal of the Civil War battlefield, and of the combat effectiveness of the troops involved. Moseley certainly finds evidence to support Griffith’s contention that the fire discipline of Civil War soldier was not all that might have been expected, and cites, byway of example, a memorandum circulated among officers of the Army of the Potomac in April, 1864, which indicated that
“there are men in this army who have been in numerous actions without ever firing their guns, and it is known that muskets taken on the battlefields have been found filled nearly to the muzzle with cartridges.”
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Moseley concludes that it was the exception, not the rule, if an officer could control the delivery of his fire on the battlefield, maintaining that few exerted much influence on proceedings once a firefight had commenced. On the other hand, Moseley makes it clear that the rifled musket and other technological innovations made a significant impact upon Civil War combat, and hastened the deterioration of cohesion and control, particularly in attacking units.
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In point of fact, most units in the Civil War were well disciplined and poorly trained, and it was this combination as much as the destructive power of rifled muskets that created high casualties in the battles of 1862–63. In battle after battle attacking forces, arrayed in close-order linear formations,
were able to breakthrough the lines of their opponents, usually following a brief firefight and a close-range charge.
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It was at this point that a number of factors would come into play to prevent exploitation of this success and the battle of annihilation that all Civil War commanders sought.
The key to the problems encountered after an initial breakthrough was the loss of command and control on the part of the attacking forces, and the ability of defenders to adapt quickly and fallback to new positions, often augmented by additional infantry and increased artillery support. The
Confederate attack upon the federal right wing at the battle of Murfreesboro is a good example. Having initially surprised and routed the better part of two federal divisions, the Confederates were then slowed by a dense brake of cedars and underbrush which broke up their close-order lines and made coordination between regiments very difficult. By this point Southern corps and division commanders were taking an increasingly peripheral role, but brigade and regimental leaders remained in the thick of the action and crucial to the continuing momentum of the attack. The difficulty of communicating orders to commanders spread across long lines in dense
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woods led to increasing dislocation, and regiments would advance ahead of their supports, becoming exposed to flanking fire from the federal forces falling slowly back in their immediate front. Firefights were constantly breaking out, forcing one side or the other falling back to find supporting units,
thus slowing the Confederate advance and allowing federal commanders time to rush forces to the threatened point and reorganize. Ultimately,
though the southerners continued to advance through most of the day, any possibility of annihilating the Union army was lost in the early hours of the battle when the assault became mired by difficult terrain, Federal resistance,
and Confederate loss of command and control.
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Of course, not every assault conformed to this pattern the battle of Antietam, for example, was marked more by the repulse of frontal assaults bylines of rifled muskets rather than by the breakthroughs and firefights described above. Every battle is to some degree unique, and any generalization on tactics in the Civil War has to take into account the different circumstances and objectives on the part of the protagonists. What is clear is that a sufficient number of men were prepared to go forward into the hail of musket and artillery fire to produce bloody repulses, partial breakthroughs, and hugely destructive firefights.
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The reasons why men fought areas complex and debatable as the tactics they employed. For the man in the ranks battle was as awesome and confusing as it was for the brigade and divisional commanders desperately trying to coordinate their forces. Most battles took place across abroad expanse which encompassed woodland, rivers and small farms. Soldiers themselves remarked on the contrast between the battles they had read of, where entire armies would be arrayed on open plains, and the intimate fighting that took place between trees and underbrush on the American battlefield. The
“fog of war dispensed by thousands of muskets and dozens of cannon,
further obscured men who habitually went to ground until it was their time to advance. I have taken part in two great battles reported one federal officer, and heard the bullets whistle both days, and yet I had scarcely seen a Rebel save killed, wounded, or prisoners.”
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Both sides also employed the tactic of having their men lie down during a firefight while they prepared fora final assault, further adding to the concealment of troops on the battlefield, and, of course, increasing the tension for those awaiting the assault
—not being able to seethe enemy was often more stressful than having his lines in view, not only because of a fear of the unknown, but also because the lack of a target removed the emotional satisfaction gained from firing.
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“If you wish to know how a soldier feels in a battle such as that you must ask someone else one Confederate said, recalling the battle of Perryville.
“If you ask me if I was scared, I answer I don’t know that I was scared before we got in the thickest of the fight.”
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