Osprey:
Confederates
(American Civil War)

book

By Paul Koch

Confederate Infantry, Cavalry, and Artillery

Once again this reviewer is somewhat at a loss for words. The most recent of Osprey's justly celebrated Men-At-Arms series has reworked their coverage of Confederate forces in our late unpleasantness between the states.

This in itself is most welcome and long overdue. Back in the dawn of time when I first started miniatures gaming, my first choice of armies was our own great Civil War. Even then Osprey had two books on the conflict. They quite frankly were not very good, with numerous factual errors and specializing in the gaudy but seldom-to-never seen militia uniforms. My early armies similarly featured New York Highlanders and almost Napoleonic Charleston Light Dragoons. Oh, it was colorful, but it was not the Civil War. There were no battered, butternuts of Hood nor any rough and ready dash of Billy Sherman's buccaneers.

This Osprey book is an answer to the prayers of modelers, diorainists, and wargamers alike. It contains tons of those little jewels of esoteric information we need. Some examples:

A. By mid-war what percentage of Rebs still wore kepis?
Ans. About 1/3.
B. What colors were those old slouch hats the rest wore?
Ans. About 1/2; black and about 1/2; light-grey, butternut, white, tan, etc.
C. What percent of Rebs were in butternut by 1865?
Ans. Almost none as a good grey dye had been invented the previous winter.

Also, did you know that Lee's army wore the spherical belt buckle while western "Johnnies" favored the rectangular variety?

These are things serious gainers want and need to know to accurately construct their forces. The plates, too, are excellent even by Osprey's elevated standards. For the first time I really know where that damn stripe was on Southern cavalry horse cloths.

The research is drawn from primary sources and close photographic studies. As I have done this sort of painstaking work myself, I can doubly salute both Philip Katcher, the author, and Ron Volstad, the artist, for a truly outstanding effort. I more than recommend the book and tell you straight -- GO OUT AND BUY IT!

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