The Confederate States Marine Corps (CSMC), also referred to as the Confederate States Marines, was a branch of the Confederate Navy during the American Civil War. It was established by an act of the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States on March 16, 1861. The CSMC's manpower was initially authorized at 46 officers and 944 enlisted men, and was increased on September 24, 1862, to 1,026 enlisted men. The organization of the CSMC began at Montgomery, Alabama, and was completed at Richmond, Virginia, when the capital of the Confederate States was moved to that location. The headquarters and main training facilities remained in Richmond throughout the war, located at Camp Beall on Drewry's Bluff and at the Gosport Shipyard in Portsmouth, Virginia. The last CSMC unit surrendered with 28 men to the Union army on April 9, 1865, with the Confederacy itself capitulating a month later.

Modeled after USMC

Before the war, the United States Marine Corps had been an "exceptionally fine and well-disciplined" organization, and "from it came the nucleus of the corresponding establishment of the Confederate service", the CSMC. The CSMC was modeled after the United States Marine Corps, but there were some differences: the Confederates organized themselves into permanent companies, replaced the fife with the light infantry bugle, and wore uniforms similar to those of British Royal Marines. Like the USMC, when ashore they provided guard detachments for Confederate naval stations at:

  • Richmond, Virginia
  • Camp Beall, located near Fort Darling at Drewry's Bluff, Virginia
  • Wilmington, North Carolina – Fort Fisher
  • Charlotte, North Carolina
  • Charleston, South Carolina
  • Hilton Head Island, South Carolina
  • Savannah, Georgia
  • Pensacola, Florida – (manned naval shore batteries)
  • Mobile, Alabama

Seagoing detachments served aboard the various warships and even on commerce destroyers.

Organization

The C.S. Marine Corps was formed in the early days of the Civil War from three sources:

  • Sixteen officers (resigning or deserting from the U.S. Marine Corps)
  • 100 enlisted men
  • The amalgamation of state organizations such as the Virginia State Marines
  • Active recruitment

Source of men

thumb|upright|Rank insignia of a CSMC captain

The Colonel-Commandant of the CSMC, Lloyd J. Beall, said the CSMC "was composed of enlisted men, many of whom were old soldiers and commissioned officers, a number of whom had seen service before in the U.S. Marine Corps and elsewhere." The record of US Marine officers who "resigned and tendered their swords to the Confederate Government"

! Name !! State

|-

! Major Henry B. Tyler (USMC Adjutant)

| Virginia

|-

! Brevet Major George H. Terret

| Virginia

|-

! Captain Robert Tansill

| Virginia

|-

! Captain Algernon S. Taylor

| Virginia

|-

! Captain John D. Simms

| Virginia

|-

! First Lieutenant Israel Greene

| Virginia

|-

! First Lieutenant John K. H. Tatnall

| Georgia

|-

! First Lieutenant Julius E. Meire

| Maryland

|-

! First Lieutenant George P. Turner

| Virginia

|-

! First Lieutenant Thomas S. Wilson

| Missouri

|-

! First Lieutenant Andrew J. Hays

| Alabama

|-

! First Lieutenant Adam N. Baker

| Pennsylvania

|-

! Second Lieutenant George Holmes

| Florida

|-

! Second Lieutenant Calvin L. Sayre

| Alabama

|-

! Second Lieutenant Henry L. Ingraham

| South Carolina

|-

! Second Lieutenant Beckett K. Howell

| Mississippi

|}

These officers assembled with the CSMC as it stood up in Richmond, Virginia, with the exception of Captain Tansill, who had resigned while still on board USS Congress at sea. Captain Tansill was arrested by order of Secretary Welles of the U.S. Navy when he arrived in New York on August 23, 1861, and was held without charge, hearing or trial. He was released on January 10, 1862, as part of a prisoner exchange, and subsequently joined the CSMC in Virginia. "The gross injustice done him was recognized in an act of the Confederate Congress of April 11, 1863, which provided that 'officers of the navy and Marine Corps who resigned from the navy and Marine Corps of the United States in consequence of secession, and who were arrested and imprisoned in consequence of such resignation, and who subsequently joined the navy and Marine Corps of the Confederate States,' should receive 'leave of absence, pay for and during the term of such imprisonment, and up to the time of their appointment in the navy and marine corps of the Confederate States.'" Though the officers were mostly former U.S. Marine officers, the head of the corps, Colonel-Commandant Lloyd J. Beall, was a former U.S. Army paymaster with no Marine experience. Major Lloyd J. Beall, USA graduated from the United States Military Academy, and had served in the First Infantry and Second Dragoons before becoming a paymaster from 1844 until the outbreak of the war. He resigned his commission on April 22, 1861, and was appointed Colonel-Commandant of the CS Marine Corps on May 23, 1861. Colonel Beall served throughout the war as the only Commandant of the Marine Corps.

Service during the war

Confederate Marines saw their first naval action aboard (formerly ) off Hampton Roads, Virginia, March 8 to 9, 1862, and near the end of the war were part of the naval brigade that fought at Sailor's Creek, Virginia.

From the Drewry's Bluff and other major posts (Wilmington, Charleston, Pensacola, Norfolk, Galveston, and Savannah), Marine detachments were parsed out to serve on major warships and for special operations, including the captures of and , and an attack to free Confederate prisoners of war being held at Point Lookout, Maryland.

Marine sea-based amphibious operations included the "Old" CSS Savannah shore party at Fort Beauregard, Phillips Island, South Carolina to evacuate the garrison under attack. Marines under the command of Commodore Josiah Tattnall III were used to construct and man shore batteries which turned back Union gunboats and monitors both at Richmond and at Savannah.

The forage cap insignias were the same hunting horn surrounding the Marine corps M on a red background. This is verified as being placed on a sun hat worn by a CS marine at the 75 reunion.

See also

  • Blockade runners of the American Civil War
  • Battle of Fort Pulaski/Federal blockade and contact
  • Bibliography of American Civil War naval history
  • Confederate States Army
  • Marines

Notes

References and further reading

  • Donnelly, Ralph W. (1989) The Confederate States Marine Corps: The Rebel Leathernecks,
  • Donnelly, Ralph W. Biographical Sketches of the Commissioned Officers of the Confederate States Marine Corps (Published by the Author, 1973. Pp. xii, 68.)
  • Donnelly, Ralph W. Service Records of Confederate Enlisted Marines (Published by the Author, 1979. Pp. xxii, 125. Copies can be ordered from 913 Market Street, Washington, North Carolina 27889.)
  • Krivdo, Michael E. "Marines in gray: the birth, life and death of the Confederate States Marine Corps" (PhD Diss. Texas A & M University, 2010). online
  • Krivdo, Michael E. "Confederate Marine Corps Recruiting in New Orleans and Marine Activities in the First Year of the Civil War." Louisiana History 48.4 (2007): 441–466. online
  • McGlone, John E., III, The Lost Corps: The Confederate States Marines, United States Naval Institute Proceedings, November 1972. online
  • Sullivan, David M., "Biographical Sketches Of The Commissioned Officers Of The Confederate States Marine Corps." White Mane Publishing, 2001.
  • Sullivan, David M. "The Confederate States Marine Corps in South Carolina, 1861-1865." South Carolina Historical Magazine 86.2 (1985): 113–127. online
  • Sullivan, David M. "Tennessee's Confederate Marines: Memphis Detachment." Tennessee Historical Quarterly 45.2 (1986): 152–168. online
  • CSMC at HOTMCL
  • U.S. Navy Officer Resignations & Dismissals On the Eve of the Civil War