July/August, 2012
The Citizens & Soldiers Digest
in by the SS Fingal, and the first mention of “buff” waist belts. As well as buff infantry belts the P1855 white enamelled (buff) leather British cavalry sword belt was also imported. This particular one was used by an unknown Confederate officer or cavalryman during the war. This style of whitened buff leather sword belt (above) was the regulation for all cavalry except the Household Cavalry. First authorized in 1855 it was first worn by the 1st King’s Dragoon Guards in 1857 and subsequently by all Cavalry regiments. (4) This belt was just one of some 5,392 Cavalry saber-belts that had been imported by Huse by February 1863. (5) Another whitened buff snake hook belt was recovered from the Antietam Battlefield; it was an enlisted man’s belt with a snake buckle measuring 62 x 87. Written on the belt is the following inscription: “Taken from the body of a dead rebel soldier at Antietam by a member of the 1st Massachusetts Battery Light Artillery” The snake hook belt was very popular amongst Confederate soldiers, and it was probably the most widely used item of British equipment and can be seen in numerous photos of both enlisted men and officers alike, as in the photo of this unidentified soldier here. The snake hook waist belt was still in use in the British military as late as the First Word War, and was still in use for British school children as late as the 1960s. ABOVE RIGHT: Unidentified C.S soldier wearing a British import snake: belt (Authors Collection)
Notes:
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1. L.F. Jewitt, Rifles and Volunteer Rifle Corps, Their Constitution, Arms and Drill, 1860. Some of this new equipment was designed by a Mr C.F. Dennet. 2. Martin Petrie, Equipment of Infantry, compiled by Captain Martin Petrie, Topo-graphical Staff, Part V, Infantry, 1864, printed by the Secretary of State for War (London) 1866, p. 46. 3. The Colin McRae Papers, in the collection of the South Carolina Confederate Relic Room & Museum, Columbia, South Carolina. www.ccr.sc.gov/research. 4. Pierre Turner, Soldiers Accoutrements of the British Army 1750 -1900. The Crowwood Press (London) 2008, p. 27 This belt appears to be vegetable tanned leather and has been enamelled. 5. Official Records of the War of the Rebellion Series IV Volume II, US Government Printing Office, (Washington, DC) 1866, p 382 -84.
ABOVE: White enamelled sword belt (David Burt)
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