By Eric Mink

Over the past few days there has been a very active thread concerning Gilham’s manual, its usage and comparison with Hardee. The constant concern seems to be how heavily Gilham may have been used and where its usage compares with Hardee. For the past six years, I have been chasing Gilham’s “ghost” with particular attention paid to the development and use of his manual. Here are a few of my views, conclusions and opinions on the subject.

Gilham’s work was nothing new. It was simply a compilation, and rehash, of others material such as Hardee, Scott, Poinsett, etc. Nonetheless, the strength of Gilham’s text is in what it includes. For the volunteer and militia officer, it leaves almost nothing out. In one single volume, an officer is instructed in the drill, duties (line and staff officers), organization of the various arms and army, advice on fighting and tactics, explanation of weaponry and ammunition, target practice, conducting courts martial, music, and a glossary of all terms used. For the citizen-turned-soldier, it is the most complete textbook for the training and supervision of commands. For this reason, General Philip Kearney wrote the publisher (Charle Desilver of Philadelphia) on August 3, 1861 “It is comprehensive, complete, and reliable. I regard it the best Military Work that exists.” George McClellan wrote on May 23, 1861, “I…think it an excellent work to be placed in the hands of the Volunteers.” Gilham’s strength, again, is in what it includes, everything needed for a novice officer.

As regards its usage in comparison to Hardee. We do know that the Confederate government never adopted any one manual as its official choice. In May 1861 a resolution was proposed in the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States to adopt Hardee and that the Secretary of War purchase “ten thousand copies…the cost of the same shall not exceed one dollar a copy.” This resolution was tabled and apparently never acted upon. Furthermore, with but a couple exceptions there don’t seem to be any surviving orders, from the army level, stipulating what manual is to be used by the troops. Thus, it appears that the decision was left up to the states and/or officers. I have found orders from Virginia and Georgia stating that Gilham is their choice, and endorsements from Adjutant Generals to the governors of Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi and New York for the adoption of Gilham. Georgia supplied their troops with copies, while in Virginia the officers had to purchase theirs.

As for the heavy use of Gilham’s early in the war, and then changing to Hardee later on, who knows. We can only speculate. To say that just because Hardee is the latest, in its revised form, and therefore the best? Well, maybe changing horses in midstream was widespread, but there seem to be so few major and important differences between the drills that it would not surprise me if many of the officers held to what they started with. Besides, standardization was something the Confederacy was never too good at.

With all of that said. I believe, and this is my opinion, that claiming that the usage of Gilham is a “reenactorism” is a little harsh. I have examined over 40 id’d copies of Gilham that were used by soldiers north and south, east and west, and from 1861 to 1865. The material I have gathered is in preparation of compiling it and publishing it in the near future.

The following write-up is of a talk delivered to the Rappahannock Valley Civil War Round Table by Eric J. Mink on January 10, 2000.

The January meeting began with the audience being asked how many have heard of William Gilham. Only about 10% of the long time students of the war raised their hand. Yet Gilham’s presence was felt on almost every major battlefield of the war for his work behind the scene. His life and career was linked with that of Thomas J. Jackson. While Jackson is now recognized around the world as a military genius and Confederate icon, Gilham’s fame doesn’t appear on the radar screen in our national conscious.

Historian Eric Mink, after posing the opening question, spent the next 45 minutes informing the audience of who Gilham was and what he accomplished. Mink, a graduate of Mary Washington College, has worked on numerous battlefields including his current position at Richmond National Battlefield Park.

While little is known about Gilham’s personal life, we know he was born in Vincennes, Indiana on January 13, 1818. His father’s family came from Virginia and it was with the Old Dominion that he would make his mark. He gained a military education at West Point where he graduated 5th in the class of 1840. Upon graduation, he became a lieutenant in the 3rd United States Artillery and fought in the Seminole and Mexican Wars. Gilham was cited for good conduct in both of his battles in Mexico, but felt that his real calling was as an educator rather than as a fighter. Hearing of an opening at Virginia Military Institute, Gilham left Mexico to become a professor on the Lexington campus. From 1846 through 1851 Gilham never took a vacation as he developed VMI’s departments of Chemistry and Agriculture, taught infantry tactics and served as the Commandant of Cadets. To lighten the load on Gilham, the Lexington school in the summer of 1851 hired another professor, an uncommon man with the common name of Thomas Jackson.

Gilham and Jackson despite widely different personalities became close friends. They were roommates for a year and later became business partners. Thomas Munford, the future cavalry leader, wrote that the contrast “was as marked as it was possible to be.” Gilham is described as a personable man with a twinkle in his eyes and a tremendous sense of humor. Jackson’s students described him as a lethargic and sickly person without the hint of a sense of humor. The contrast extended beyond their personalities differences to their teaching methods. While Jackson is thought of as one of the poorer instructors in all American history, Munford wrote that Gilham “was an instructor of high order.” The VMI students looked at Jackson as a weirdo and one frustrated student challenged him to a duel. In contrast, a cadet wrote that Gilham “commanded our profound respect, admiration, and love.”

In 1859, the VMI cadets, with their instructors Gilham and Jackson, went to Harpers Ferry to put down the John Brown Raid. In response to this raid, Virginia Governor Henry Wise ordered Gilham to write a manual to train volunteers and militia. The taunting task, finished in the fall of 1860, was entitled Manual of Instruction for the Volunteers and Militia of the United States. Future Union general Phillip Kearney regarded the book as the “best Military Work that exists.” While other books on military tactic existed for professional soldiers, Gilham’s comprehensiveness and easy to understand text made it perfect for the American civilian soldier. The book was officially adopted by Virginia and other Southern states.

When Virginia seceded from the Union on April 17, 1861, Gilham’s star far out shown that of his friend and colleague Thomas Jackson. Four days later, Gilham and the VMI cadets received orders to report to Richmond. Gilham, now a colonel, became the Commandant of Camp Lee, the camp of instruction for thousands of Virginians. With the outbreak of war, Gilham’s manual, which had been published in Philadelphia, was briefly unavailable to the citizen soldiers of the South. But being the ideal book for the training of these young men, the manual was quickly republished throughout the South.

During the summer, Gilham organized a unit, which became the 21st Virginia, one of the future backbones of Jackson’s command. The regiment was ordered to northwest Virginia where Gilham temporarily commanded a brigade. In the fall, Jackson arrived on the scene and took command. In the first week of January, 1862 the Romney campaign began despite severe winter weather. Gilham’s Brigade led the advance to Bath (now Berkeley Springs) on the 3rd and 4th day of the New Year. Jackson captured Bath but blamed Gilham for allowing the Union troops to escape. Although Gilham followed orders, Jackson brought court martial charges against his friend for neglect of duty and being slow. Douglas Southall Freeman, the famous chronicler of Robert E. Lee’s army, wrote that the charges against Gilham were just one example of Jackson’s efforts to cover his own mistakes.

Nothing came of the charges, but January 4 ended Gilham’s career on the battlefield. He seemed to realize that his interest and ability lay in teaching rather than duty in the field. He returned to VMI. On May 15, 1864, the VMI cadets participated in the Battle of New Market. As acting superintendent, Gilham was present on the battlefield but did not command troops. About a month later a Union raid torched the campus of VMI. The VMI cadets spent the final months of the war in Richmond.

After the war, VMI reopened, but had little money to pay its instructors. In debt with little salary from his job and no royalties from his book (the Confederacy never adopted a copyright law), Gilham was forced to resign to seek other income. Gilham moved to Richmond where he became a chemist and later president of the Southern Fertilizing Company. Seven years later, he went to Vermont for health reasons. The re-location did not help and he died on November 16, 1872. Fittingly his body was returned to Lexington for burial in the Stonewall Jackson Memorial Cemetery, just a few yards from his friend and colleague.

by Erik Mink, 4th Virginia

I thought I might stray a little bit from uniforms and equipment, and share a couple of quotes concerning firing practices during the war. Although all three of these accounts were written by Northern soldiers, their sentiment could quite easily have been penned by men of Lee’s army.

At living histories we often refer to “firing by file” as the favored way in which the soldiers fought. In training officers in the instruction of firing, William Gilham states that “firing by file being that which is most frequently used against the enemy, it is highly important that it be rendered perfectly familiar to the troops.” William Hardee and Silas Casey have similar statements in their manuals, in fact Hardee asserts that “the instructor will, therefore, give it almost exclusive preference.” As we know, theory and practice can be very different. So how often did the officers in battle utilize this style of firing?

Rufus Dawes of the famed Iron Brigade penned on of the most vivid and informational memoirs of any officer in the Army of the Potomac. Having witnessed some of the heaviest firefights of the war, Dawes wrote with some amazement of his regiment’s participation in the Battle of South Mountain. In this particular action, Major Dawes wrote that the 6th Wisconsin Infantry moved forward: “The left wing fired a volley into the woods, and the right wing advanced in the same manner over them and fired a volley into the woods. Once more [Lieutenant Colonel Edward] Bragg gave a volley by the left wing. There were four volleys by wing given, at the word of command. In a long experience in musketry fighting, this was the single instance I saw of other than fire by file.” It seems interesting that this battle tested officer would mention that only once during the war did he ever witness fighting done by command other than fire by file.

Another veteran officer, in the Army of the Potomac, that seemed amazed by the usage of volleys was Major Frederick L Hitchcock of the 132nd Pennsylvania Infantry. Historians have stated that fighting on May 3, 1863, at Chancellorsville, was some of the fiercest during the war in Virginia. In his memoirs, Hitchcock wrote that that morning, as Lee’s men assaulted their position, his battalion fired a volley that: “Had exactly reached its mark and had done fearful execution. There must have been more than two hundred lying there either dead or wounded, marking their line of battle. This was the only instance in my war experience where we delivered a volley as a battalion. the usual order of firing in line of battle is by “file”, each man firing as rapidly as he can effectively, without regard to any other man.” Although Hitchcock’s regiment only saw service for nine months, his experience in fighting continued as he went on to command the 25th United States Colored Troops in the last year of the war.

Although the preceding quotes pertain to Union regiments utilizing firing by files, one officer who witnessed the effectiveness of Confederate fighting in this style was Sartell Prentice of the US Regulars. As Prentice watched the Regulars charge across Saunders’ Field in the Wilderness, Edward “Allegheny” Johnson’s Confederates opened fire. Prentice stated that:

“a line of fire began in their [his] front, but nearly a brigade’s length to their [his] left, and swept along the edges of the wood, from where the wood touched the Turnpike, to and past the brigade front, slowly beautifully in its machine-like regularity, file-firing, past the brigade front, and lost itself out of sight, and by sound way off, in the woods to its right.”

“As the sound of firing ceased in the woods on the right, again that sheet of fire began upon the left, and with clock-work regularity file-firing moved slowly along the wood’s edge and past the brigade front, and again lost itself in the distance, in the woods at the right and once more begins the clock-work fire on the left; and how grim and severe it seems now, in its slow, sure movement, and awful in its effect!”

Three times the Confederates were able to fire by file while the Yankees charged across the field. In the ten minutes it took the Regulars to cross Saunders’ Field, they lost almost half their strength.

Although three accounts certainly do not reflect the entire war, they do represent what these men witnessed. It is interesting that in the first two accounts, the officers take time to mention that the volleys their men delivered were extraordinary, in the sense that they usually fired by file. Rationalization would indicate that it would be easier for the men and officers to utilize firing by file more often, as it allowed the men to fire on their own. As soldiers load at different rates, it would no doubt be very disconcerting to be loaded and waiting on your comrades, the whole time taking casualties from enemy fire. For the officers, firing by file would eliminate trying to shout commands above the noise of battle. Regardless of whether the armies as a whole preferred to fire by file, at least two officers saw that practice did indeed follow theory. This post is sponsored by our partners.

New Material Found for Article – February 24, 2000:

Today, while chasing down a Gilham lead at the Virginia Historical Society, I went through the papers of Colonel John M. Patton – 21st VA. I found the following in his handwritten “Reminiscences of Jackson.” Unfortunately, the manuscript was torn, right in the middle of his quoting “Stonewall,” but I managed to make out all but one word. This conversation between Patton and Stonewall was supposed to have taken place in December of 1861. It reinforces my continued belief that “firing by file” was the preferred, and predominant, method of firing on the field. [The following is an excerpt from Col. Patton’s manuscript]:

“I asked his opinion of the comparative advantage of the ‘fire by file’ and the ‘fire by company’ or Battalion, remarking that it seemed to me if the officers and men could be kept cool in action, the fire by company or Battalion, made deliberately under orders, and with a caution to the me to aim well, would be much more deadly, and intimidating to the enemy, than the promiscuous ‘fire by file.’ He replied, ‘I don’t know, Colonel, I rather think the ‘fire by file’ —— the best on the whole, for it gives to the enemy an idea that the fire is heavier than if it was by Company of Battalion. Sometimes how ever one may be best. Sometimes the other, according to circumstances, but my opinion is, there ought not be much fighting at all. My idea is that the best mode of fighting is to reserve your fire till the enemy get, or you get them, to close quarters, then deliver one deadly deliberate fire and Charge!!!'”