Daley CS Trousers

[GaReb]

I saw on CJ Daley's website that they were offering CS trousers based on a pattern found at Getty'sburg National Military Park Visitor's Center. The price is great and they look good but as they are in Gettysburg I'm not sure that they would be correct for an AoT impression. I would like to buy them but I am not sure that they are correct for me. Also like Chas. Cantrell's AoT trousers and they are only $5 more, but I don't really want to wait for them. Help would be greatly appreciated

Pvt. Chris Anderson
5th Geo. Infantry

[Michael Comer]

Re: Daley CS Trousers

I have a pair and I primarily do Western CS. They are a basic issue trouser I believe and do not follow the same pattern as, say a Richmond Depot issue. Perhaps someone else knows more about it than I , but I have been using my pair (they are a gray jean), enjoy them very much and have had no negative comments or questions about why I was wearing an Eastern CS trouser at a Western event.

[Yellowhammer]

Re: Daley CS Trousers

Guys,

First, few, if any, of the CS enlisted uniforms on display at Gettysburg have any connection to that battle. For example, the two "Mobile" or "Mystery" jackets and their four button CS jacket have no provenance other than the date of acquisition by the park.

(As an aside, the trousers that Chris Daley is reproducing from the Gettysburg collection are sometimes called the "Louisiana" trousers. As the story was related to me, this was based on an off-hand remark made by a historian when the trousers were acquired in preparation for the 125th anniversary of the battle.)

To answer the bigger question of CS trousers, several scholars of CS military material culture, most notably Nick ************, have documented that CS military trousers are simply existing civilian patterns adopted for military purposes. As such, one can't cleanly delineate the source of these garments as has been done to some degree with CS jackets. However, there are plenty of CS trousers with documentable usage to armies and departments and several patterns appear to cross this spectrum. (Which makes sense since they are of common civilian patterns.) For example, the "Richmond Depot" trouser is something of a misnomer created largely for marketing purposes. While trousers of this pattern were undoubtedly produced in Richmond and/or worn by ANV soldiers, they were also produced elsewhere. A quick glace at the trouser section of CS EoG will confirm this.

Years ago, when County Cloth was the primary supplier for authentic trousers, ANV reenactors bought "Richmond Depot" trousers while AoT reenactors bought their "Other Issue" trousers. Over the years, this practice became rule and then rule became law and many of us are surprised to see the practice continue in spite of evidence to the contrary. In fact, both those patterns are based on trousers with ANV provenance but both patterns, with some variations, appear all over the South.

So, to finally answer your question, the CS trousers that you asked about have no documentable link to the battle of Gettysburg or the ANV but are a perfectly good generic (or PEC if you prefer) pair of CS trousers.