ACW -need help identifying uniforms

[tonydawe]

Hi guys,

I'm working on a 54mm Verlinden vignette called Close Combat (see pic), depicting a Union Captain standing over a dead Confederate soldier.

I'd like someone to tell me if they can what uniform the captain is wearing and what regiment he belongs to. He looks like a Zouave, but I can't find this uniform in any of my reference books.

Is there anything that could help me identify what unit the Confederate soldier belonged to?

Is there anything in the vignette that helps identify a particular battle or period these two may have met on the battlefield?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Steve]

Hard to see the details from the pic and I am not familiiar with this kit, but most zouave uniforms were very similar in design. However most zouave units dressed their officers in pretty much standard officer garb without regimental distinctions save the color of the trousers or the hat. Having said that, this could be an officer of the 11th Indiana (Wallaces). I have a plate in a book that shows a captain in zouave dress. There is literally no way to tell the origins of the fallen rebel. If you can pick out the details of his shell jacket then maybe you can set a timeline based upon when it was issued, but that is about it. I believe that is a forage cap lying on the ground near the rebel; it appears to have crossed something on the top. Unless that is an item unrelated to the two figures the crossed whatever need to be removed as neither is an artilleryman or cavalryman, and the infantry device for both armies was a bugle horn, not crossed rifles. The hat itself is fine, just the device is off. It may also be a quatrefoil, the clover-like device found most frequently on the caps of Confederate officers but used in both, in which case it is just fine. Hope you can sift something useful out of this ramble!--

 

[tonydawe]

Hi Steve,

Thanks for your reply.

The device on the forage cap is a quatrefoil, so that seems to fit with what you're telling me. The short jacket and the gaiters seem to suggest the standing figure is an infantry officer from a Zouave regiment. If that's the case, shouldn't his trousers be red in colour and the gaiters white??

As for the Confederate soldier lying dead on the ground, he seems well equipped and clothed. That suggests its relatively early in the war, when the Confederate forces still had reasonably good uniforms and equipment. Would you concur?

 

[Steve]

ACW Uniforms

Tony, see PM.--

 

[tonydawe]

Thanks to Steve, I've decided to paint these two figures representing the Battle at Antietam. The infantry captain is from the 9th New York (Hawkins) Zouaves and the dead Confederate soldier from the 1st Virginia.

What a wonderful resource we have here on Planet Figure. Experts in every possible period of military history, experts in every modelling skill and all of them willing and happy to share what they know with others.

I wish the rest of Planet Earth was as friendly and helpful as Planet Figure. Thanks once again Steve.

 

[Steve]

Acw

Thanks for the plug, but I am not any sort of expert. I just have a lot of books!

 

[garyjd]

I would have guessed 9th NY. Anyway, it's a good choice. ~Gary

 

[Martin Antonenko]

Hi!

I would think, 9th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment, also called "New York Zouaves" or "Hawkins Zouaves".

Regards