Civil War Photo Friday: South Carolina men in blue

While this blog generally sticks to the Trans-Mississippi theater, I do occasionally pull in related material. This image from the Library of Congress shows the South Carolina Flying Artillery in 1861. It was a former state militia outfit that had been issued blue uniforms. The color coding of blue vs. gray took some time to be established, and the caption to this photo, which comes from The Photographic History of the Civil War published in 1911, indicates that these men wore blue throughout the war.

They weren't the only ones. The First Kansas Colored Volunteers, which was the first black regiment to see combat when they defeated a larger force of rebel bushwhackers at Island Mound 29 October 1863, wore gray uniforms. At the Battle of Wilson's Creek, the detachment of the Union army under Col. Franz Sigel confused the advancing 3rd Louisiana for the 3rd Iowa, a Union regiment that wore gray. They didn't realize their mistake until it was too late!