Chapter 30

In This Chapter

The most important wartime innovations

The new weapons that changed warfare

T he Civil War produced an amazing number of changes in warfare. New weapons and strategy that first appeared during this war are still used by modern armies today. Technology had a great effect on the conduct of the Civil War, and so it still does today. Ever since the Civil War, technology continues to shape the modern battlefield. People think that developments such as hand grenades, land mines, torpedoes, rotating armored gun turrets on ships, submarines, booby traps, and railroad-mounted artillery are relatively recent because they all have been common elements of 20th-century warfare, but they originated in the Civil War. Likewise, amphibious assaults, naval camouflage, repeating rifles, trench warfare, and aerial observation, which are still commonplace on the modern battlefield, first made their appearance on Civil War battlefields.

Given all these developments and many more that occurred during the Civil War, narrowing down the ten most important “firsts” is difficult. Again, I apply some criteria to help narrow the focus:

First, the development must be easily recognizable.

Second, it must have had a significant effect on the development of warfare in the modern world.

Third, it must have had a significant effect on the conduct of the Civil War itself.

Based on these three criteria, the following most important “firsts” stand out. I present them in no particular order; they are presented simply for the sake of rhetorical discussion.

Changing Tactics and Uniforms: The Rifle Bullet

The Minié ball , the conical bullet fired from a rifled musket, was a new innovation on Civil War battlefields. The huge number of casualties that resulted from battles during the Civil War were a direct result of 18th-century tactics running headlong into 19th-century technology. The rifle bullet changed tactics on the battlefield forever. Because of its accuracy and increased distance, this new bullet made massed formations of troops that had been seen on battlefields since the beginning of time now impractical and suicidal. To survive against rifle bullets fired by an enemy, men would have to fight in small groups and move along the ground using cover and concealment. No more fancy uniforms and flying flags, either. Bright colors attracted swarms of rifle bullets. Best to wear clothing that blended in with the surroundings. So after the Civil War, there is a steady change of both the tactical employment of infantry on the battlefield and the soldier’s uniform.

Minesweeping: Naval Mines

Known as torpedoes during the Civil War, thousands of these new inventions were placed in the channels and waterways of the South’s main ports for defense against Northern warships. In fact, most of the losses the Union navy experienced in the war were a result of a ship striking one of these torpedoes. This caused the Union navy to develop its own countermeasures to protect its ships from torpedoes. One of the countermeasures that it developed was the minesweeper — a ship specifically designed to detect and to neutralize underwater mines. Mining and countermining warfare have been a central part of naval operations ever since.

Starting Undersea Warfare: The Submarine

The CSS Hunley was the first submarine to sink a warship. Little more than an iron boiler about 30 feet long, it was more of a danger to her crew than the enemy. Eight crewmen powered it by turning a hand crank that rotated the propeller. It floated just below the surface with an officer sticking his head out of an open hatch that stood above the water to guide the vessel. It was intended to tow a mine under the hull of a Union ship guarding Charleston harbor. The mine would strike the hull and sink the ship. In tests, though, the Hunley sank three times, killing most or everyone aboard each time. But the idea of being able to break the Union naval blockade of Charleston was too compelling and too important to abandon. On February 17, 1864, the Hunley set out to attack the USS Housatonic . Although what exactly happened is still a mystery, the fact remains that the Hunleysank the Housatonic , but was destroyed in the mine explosion. Although crude and dangerous to everyone, the concept of undersea warfare became a critical part of modern naval strategy. Some of the mysteries may be solved now that the Hunley has been recovered.

Changing Tactics and Moving Quickly: The Railroad

One could argue that the North won the Civil War because it had better and more efficient rail lines than the South. Very early in the war, it became obvious that large armies operating across a continent could not be supported or supplied by road only. Railroads could move tons of food, fodder, ammunition, and supplies over long distances, efficiently and quickly. Grant and Sherman in the Western Theater were tied to their lines of supply for most of the war, dependent upon the railroad to sustain their forces. Nathan Bedford Forrest made his name by destroying railroads as fast as the Yankees could repair them. Lee’s last retreat was along a rail line — he moved to Appomattox Station in the hopes of receiving food supplies from rail cars he had dispatched earlier. After Sheridan had cut that rail supply line, Lee had no other option but to surrender.

The railroads changed strategy. Troops now could be moved from one theater of war to another rapidly, allowing Generals to mass their forces for a decisive blow against the enemy. At Manassas, at Chickamauga, and at Chattanooga, the tide of battle was turned because of the use of rail transportation to bring additional troops to the battlefield. From the Civil War on, no staff ever planned a campaign without studying the rail network of friendly and enemy forces.

Battling without Bullets: Psychological Warfare

In their famous March to the Sea from Atlanta to Savannah in 1864, the Union armies of William T. Sherman hardly saw an enemy soldier, let alone engaged in any battles. Yet Sherman’s campaign is considered one of the decisive events of the Civil War. Why? Modern warfare shows that oftentimes you do not need to defeat an enemy army on the battlefield. You can still cripple that army’s ability to fight by striking at its will to face you in battle. Today this is called psychological operations, and it is an important part of any General’s war plans. Few practiced psychological warfare better than Sherman. He went after the Southern people and their morale. Defenseless against Sherman’s troops, they watched as tens of thousands of well-equipped and well-fed, blue-clad soldiers marched across a 60-mile front. Such a sight of raw unrestrained military power was depressing enough, but the people also suffered the cruelty of war directly, losing their homes and property to the invaders. After civilian morale was crushed, the army followed, as soldiers deserted in droves to return home and take care of their families. Thus, the Army of Northern Virginia grew steadily smaller, just as if it had been suffering combat losses every day, yet no bullets had been fired and no battles had been fought. The Union victory demonstrated the importance of national will and civilian morale in sustaining a national war effort. From that point on, no General would neglect protecting the home front, while seeking to undermine the morale of his enemy’s civilian population.

Using Air-to-Ground Communication

Today, armies can observe troop movements from hundreds of miles in space. That technology, as breathtaking as it may be, had its origins in the simple act of Union inventors in 1861. Using a balloon, observers were able to ascend several hundred feet into the air to count Confederate troop strength and dispositions. The Union army made use of balloon observation throughout the war. To make reporting easier, a telegraph wire was attached to the basket holding the observer. Thus, a double first: the first aerial observation and the first air-to-ground communication. Although of limited use during the Civil War, the concept of aerial observation in support of military operations was never questioned; it only awaited technology to catch up to make it more useful to the battlefield commander. Now, military aircraft and space platforms provide nations with strategic and tactical military information on potential enemies every day.

Dominating the Seas: The Ironclad Warship

All modern navies trace their origins to the Civil War ironclad. The battle between the Monitor and the Virginia in 1862 marked a dramatic end to the age of sails and initiated new navies molded by the twin giants of the industrial age — steam and steel. The U.S. Navy built a number of ironclads to patrol the coast of the Confederacy. Although cramped and overheated, the basic design of the Monitor -type ironclad was sound and became the prototype for other armored ships. Soon, all the major powers of Europe were putting armor plate on steamships made of steel. As technology improved, the small ironclads of the Civil War grew, becoming the modern battleship and the Dreadnought. These ships, employing the rotating steel turret containing large guns first seen on the Monitor , would rule the seas until World War II.

Talking over Wires: The Telegraph

Just before the onset of the war, Congress created the U.S. Army Signal Corps. Initially, both sides employed signal flags to relay information to commanders. But this was limited by line of sight and the danger of intercepted messages (both sides used the same signal system, all having been trained in the army prior to the war). But the telegraph quickly came to be the dominant form of communication for the armies. Presidents Lincoln and Davis received the latest news over the telegraph.

By the end of the war, the telegraph had become an indispensable means of communication. General Grant, as commander of all Union armies, used the telegraph to send orders to General Sherman, 800 miles away while he traveled with the Army of the Potomac. As this army moved, the signal troops laid 200 miles of wire a day to meet the needs of the commanders in the field. Telegraph lines were the primary targets of cavalry raiders of both sides and Sherman purposely cut off his reliance on telegraph communications to undertake the march to the sea. Today, instantaneous communications, including voice, video, and even Morse code are an essential part of military operations. Although the technology is more advanced, the principles and process behind the today’s military communications technology would be familiar to Lee, Grant, or Sherman.

Increasing Firepower: The Repeating Rifle

Although the dominant weapon of the war was the rifled musket firing the Minié ball, about 400,000 repeating rifles were issued to Civil War units, primarily to Union cavalry units. These weapons had a distinct advantage over muzzle loading weapons, because they employed a metal cartridge rather than a paper cartridge that essentially had to be disassembled and then reassembled manually by the soldier. The process of loading and firing the rifled musket was time consuming and often clumsy, requiring extensive drill to get the process down correctly in the stress of battle. But the metal cartridge could be inserted directly into the chamber of the weapon and fired. Some models had a loading system that enabled the soldier to load several cartridges at once, and by use of a lever cocking mechanism, eliminated manual loading. Soldiers needed little training to master this process, and the repeating rifle gave the individual soldier a significant increase in firepower over an enemy using muzzleloaders.

At Chickamauga, for example, the Union forces of “Wilder’s Lightning Brigade” effectively delayed the first Confederate advance because of the volume of fire that a relatively small number of men could direct against infantry units. This delay allowed General Thomas to guard the Union retreat, preventing the army’s annihilation. Muzzleloaders went away quickly after the Civil War; they were replaced by a variety of rifle designs all employing metal cartridges and rapid firing reloading mechanisms. Today, all modern armies are equipped with rifles and pistols whose designs directly relate back to the repeating weapons employed in the Civil War.

Born in the Civil War: The Machine Gun

Both the Union and Confederate armies experimented with primitive machine guns , a weapon designed to produce a high volume of fire against attacking infantry. Most of these guns saw only limited service and none of these weapons had any effect on the war itself, but the concept and design came to be perfected late in the war with a weapon known as the Gatling gun . The Gatling gun used rifle barrels mounted on a rotating cylinder. As a hand crank rotated the cylinder, the barrels fired and were reloaded sequentially. For the next 40 years, armies all over the world employed the Gatling gun. By the time of the Great War (World War I), lighter, more accurate, and effective machine guns were deployed in all the armies of Europe. The machine gun changed warfare forever as it dominated the terrible battlefields of the Western Front. Although indispensable in modern tactical combat, the machine gun had its birth in the Civil War.