Page 15 - Civil War Curriculum Book

CIVIL WAR MUSIC

Music has always been an important part of American society and

it was no different during the Civil War. Military bands were called

upon to play at recruitment rallies and their patriotic marching

tunes were sometimes a great incentive to inspire young men to

enlist. When volunteer regiments were recruited, a regimental

band was usually included as a part of that organization. The

bands were needed to play for parades, formations, dress parades

and evening concerts. Union and Confederate armies both

authorized regimental bands. In the Union army, each artillery or

(Hardtack & Coffee) infantry regiment could have one 24-member band and the cavalry

was limited to a 16 member

band. So many bands and the need for more disciplined organizations made officials in the

Union War Department reconsider the regulations. In 1862, the Department ordered the

dismissal of all brass ensembles that belonged to volunteer regiments. To replace

discharged regimental bands, brigade bands were formed to serve the entire brigade of a

division. Despite the order, some regimental officers were able to retain their bands. The

musicians re-enlisted as combatants and were detailed by the colonel commanding the

regiment into a regimental band.

There were fewer Confederate bands because musicians

were not quite as plentiful in the South and good

instruments were expensive and very difficult to obtain.

Quality brass instruments were rare because that metal was

in short supply in the Confederacy and some of the best

instrument makers were in the North. Like their Union

counterparts, most Confederate bands were dismissed from

service after the first year of the war though several

organizations, including the 26th North Carolina Infantry,

retained their bands and many southern officers were glad

Members of the 26th North for it. Generals Lee, Jackson, and Longstreet were all

Carolina Infantry Band serenaded by Confederate bands while in camp and they

enjoyed the music very

much. Most officers, including General Lee, felt that the music supplied by these surviving

bands was very important to keep up the morale of the men. The bands that remained with

the army often used music borrowed from Northern song books and used captured

instruments in place of the inferior Confederate-made instruments. Some Confederate

bands were better than others and not all bands sounded that good. One Confederate

soldier regarded the playing of his regiment's band "comparable to the braying of a pack of

mules..."