The wind-tossed Stars and Stripes wrapped around the color sergeant as he took up his position and planted its staff in front of his blue-clad regiment. Several hundred yards ahead stood the enemy breastworks. The battlefield was pandemonium. Clouds of drifting smoke and dust, the thud of artillery, the crackle of thousands of muskets, shouted commands, cries of the wounded-all combined to rattle even veteran soldiers. Still, the flag could be seen. It was more than a patriotic symbol. It was a fixed point, and like the calmness of its bearer, it steadied the men. Responding to orders, the blue line behind the color sergeant advanced with heads lowered, as if walking into the heart of a storm, advancing around comrades who had dropped as the Confederates began to find the range. When the men reached the colors, they halted

to regain their alignment.

The regiments of the brigade approached the enemy field works through a series of such advances. Each time Old Glory led the way, allowing the line to maintain its formation. At a hundred yards the men exchanged volleys with hardly visible opponents in butternut and gray. But as often happened during the Civil War, the advantage lay with defenders under cover. Canister and Minie balls ripped gaps in the ranks until finally the command "Fall back!" rang out. The impulse to run for safety was strong, but once again the color sergeant served as a steadying guide. The sight of the unit flag moving through the swirling battle imposed order on the chaos. Recovering the precision mastered on the parade ground, the battered unit withdrew from the field, surviving to fight another day.

After the Mexican War, Congress reduced the Army to a small force of regulars with traditional peacetime roles. Initially set at slightly less than 10,000 officers and men, the size of the Army had grown to about 16,000 effectives by 1860, reflecting the need to secure the large territorial gains in the Southwest. Most of these troops were employed west of the Mississippi River; the rest were garrisoned at eastern coastal fortifications. Spread thinly in 130 garrisons, posts, and camps scattered over 3 million square miles, the regulars relied mainly on noncommissioned officers for junior leadership.

The military's most significant tasks after the war with Mexico lay in the West. The Army was involved in exploration, railway surveys, and mapping. In addi

tion, troops assisted civil authorities during the 1850s in efforts to enforce federal law in Utah and to halt the fighting between pro- and anti-slavery forces in "Bleeding Kansas." The discovery of gold in California and the opening of the Oregon Territory's rich farmlands not only dramatically increased the westward movement, but also added to the Army's responsibilities. Wagon trains and routes had to be guarded by troops who protected the settlers from Indians and the Indians from the settlers. Combat experience gained during those missions came in the form of isolated small unit actions.

The outbreak of the Civil War in 1861 brought a very different challenge. Congress promptly raised the strength of the Regular Army to over 22,000 men. Infantry regiments increased from 10 to 19, cavalry from

5 to 6, and artillery from 4 to 5-leading to immediate promotions to NCO rank for hundreds of soldiers. These events proved that Secretary of War John C. Calhoun had been right in the 1820s in urging Congress to organize the Army in peacetime on an "expansible" basis, but the regulars were never expected to deal with the crisis of secession by themselves. The Civil War would be fought by volunteers on both sides.

In 1861 President Abraham Lincoln, like the Confederacy's Jefferson Davis, issued a call for volunteers to be raised by the states and organized into regiments. Various terms of enlistment were used during the war on each side; most men signed up either for a three-year stint or "for the duration." In either case, the obligation was different than the Regular Army's five-year hitch. So great was the response that by mid-1861 several hundred infantry regiments had been formed in each army and almost 500,000 volunteers had entered the federal service. Volunteer units, especially those raised early in the war, often depended upon existing militia formations for their cadres. They carried designations that included a number (each state employed its own numbering system), their state of origin, and, in the North, the term "volunteer," all of which were emblazoned on the unit's colors. Common usage simply referred to the infantry regiments as the 2d Massachusetts or the 5th Virginia.

On paper, a Civil War infantry regiment consisted of a small headquarters element and ten companies. Each company included a captain, a first lieutenant, a second lieutenant, a first sergeant, 4 other sergeants, 8 corporals, 2 musicians, 1 wagoner, and between 64 and 82 privates. The minimum strength of a regiment was supposed to be slightly more than 850 officers and men; the maximum strength, about 1,050. Actual numbers in the field were much lower, especially as units incurred losses from combat and disease. On the Union side, present and fit-for-duty strengths often fell into the 150- to 500-man range. Attrition took a heavier toll on Regular units than on volunteers because longer enlistments and lower benefits attracted few replacement recruits. The 2d Infantry, for example, consisted in 1864 of only seven officers and thirty-eight enlisted men, assigned mainly to guard duty.

One of the most honored and sought-after NCO positions in the regiment was that of color bearer. These men carried the national and regimental colors at the head of the unit in battle, a responsibility entrusted only to the most respected and courageous individuals. Regulations authorized each Union regiment of infantry two silk flags the U.S. national color and an organizational color. Usually only the former went into combat. at the head of the regiment, with the organizational color remaining with the trains for safety. Regulations also

allowed a unit to inscribe on the colors the names of battles in which it had participated. Confederate regiments followed similar practices.

The true importance of the colors in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries did not come from ceremonial use. They played a critical tactical role in this era of linear warfare, providing immediate visibility at the center of the unit. Vital as a key element in the command-and-control system, they also served as a rallying point during close combat. These functions related directly to the weapons of the day. During the Revolution and War of 1812, smoothbore flintlock muskets required units to deploy in long lines two or three ranks deep to achieve maximum efficiency in the use of their cumbersome short-range firearms. The volleys were controlled in part through the use of the flags, which were then carried by junior officers called ensigns.

By the time of the Civil War, technological advances in weaponry had led to an accurate, dependable, muzzleloading percussion rifle for general use. In 1855 the highly effective .58-caliber rifled musket" had been adopted by the Regular Army. The new weapon was accurate to 600 yards, 500 more than the range of the old smoothbore. Although the new rifle underwent minor modifications during the war, it would remain the standard infantry weapon until a breechloader was adopted in 1873.

Although improved weapons allowed more emphasis on individual marksmanship and initiative, tactical manuals lagged in taking full advantage of the Minie ball's potential. Napoleonic concepts still dominated. Doctrine still called for infantry to stand shoulder-toshoulder in two ranks. Loading, firing, and bayonet charges were all performed on command in drills. involving many separate motions under rigid discipline. Decisive action continued to depend on platoon, company, battalion, and even regiment and brigade volleys. These were designed to bring the greatest mass of firepower possible to bear on a specific part of the enemy's line, softening it up for a charge. The goal of training became the "perfect volley," in which every soldier pulled his trigger at the same instant.

Under linear tactical systems, effectiveness depended heavily on the smooth and rapid alignment of a unit. Without proper control, maneuvers such as forming lines of battle from the march, wheeling, oblique firings, and bayonet charges simply degenerated into a mob of armed men, each acting on impulse. When the newly raised Civil War regiments received their baptism of fire and began to experience the far heavier casualties inflicted by rifled muskets, subtle adjustments began to appear. Given half a chance, units opened the distance between individual ranks and, if on the defensive, dug in or took

ready cover to minimize losses. Those changes increased the burden on officers and NCOs and the importance of the colors.

By 1861 the ensign had disappeared from the United States Army. All company grade officers were fully occupied with other duties. Responsibility for carrying the two flags devolved upon NCOs, and two color sergeants were added to the regimental headquarters to perform this special duty. To protect them in combat, a distinct color guard was also created, consisting of five to eight color corporals, depending upon the number of colors carried. Regulations stated that members of the color guard would carry their muskets with bayonets always fixed. Often, for added protection, a specially selected color company of varying size would accompany the color guard.

Through this natural evolution, the colors became a key factor in esprit de corps. The flags represented the

honor and integrity of the unit. They symbolized the glories of the past, stood guard over the present, and provided inspiration for the future. Both officers and men fully understood that their colors could not be surrendered. To return from battle without them was the ultimate disgrace. For example, General Orders of the Army of the Potomac denied any unit that lost its colors in action the right to carry others without the authority of the commanding general. Permission would not be given in cases where a unit had lost its colors through misconduct, until such troops shall, by their bravery on other fields, have fully retrieved their tarnished honor."

Because of their tactical and psychological importance, and because of their visibility even in the smoke of battle, the colors often became the focal point of enemy fire and charges. Casualties among color bearers were high.

Of the more than 2 million men who served in the Union Army, over 1,925,000 were volunteers. Since about one in ten eventually became a noncommissioned officer, the wartime NCO corps was also essentially a volunteer group. Like their Regular counterparts, volunteer NCOs held their rank through the action of the regimental colonel, who made selections based upon recommendations by the company captains. All appointments had to be announced in regimental orders. Once an NCO was appointed, he could not be removed from office except by sentence of court-martial or by the order of the regimental commander.

During the early part of the war, when base pay for Union infantry sergeants was $17 per month, soldiers were considered well paid. However, wartime inflation cut into the buying power of military pay, as did the Army's decision to issue the troops paper currency that depreciated rapidly. By 1864, when the greenback dollar was worth only 39 cents in coin, Congress voted an increase in military pay, adding $3 a month to the income of a line sergeant. This still left him far behind civilians in terms of buying power, but his inadequate pay was partially offset by enlistment and reenlistment bounties. In 1864, when the three-year enlistments were about to expire, all members of veteran regiments, regardless of rank, received a $400 bonus to remain in service. Some states offered additional sums, so that by the end of the war some soldiers received up to $1,000 to reenlist. Foreign observers, accustomed to the low pay of European armies, were struck by America's generos

ity towards its soldiers.

Yet the sums of money involved, accentuated by the relatively small difference between the pay of a private and a sergeant, belied the important roles carried out by NCOS during the war. The tactics of the time called for officers up to the rank of brigadier general to lead their men in person, and in consequence officer casualties were high. As a battle went on, sergeants and corporals often found themselves assuming command of companies. In extreme cases, such as the charge of Pickett's Virginia division at Gettysburg in 1863, whole regiments lost all their commissioned officers. The demonstrated ability of the NCOs to handle the burden of leadership in such cases permanently affected the corps' future

status.

The exposed position of a unit's colors and their tactical significance led to particularly high casualties among the sergeants and corporals carrying them—often wiping out the entire color guard. During the 1862 battle of Fredericksburg, for example, the 155th Pennsylvania was ordered to cross an exposed area and assault enemy-held heights that dominated the field of battle. When the color sergeant was killed, a corporal seized the flag. He soon feli, as did three successors. A fifth corporal grasped the banner and kept it aloft, an act for which he was promoted to color sergeant. In the battle of Antietam, the 62d New York lost sixteen color bearers in quick succession. Two years later at Spotsylvania, Sgt. Nathaniel Barker, 11th New Hampshire Infantry, took up the national and regimental colors after six