Always find it interesting there was no heavy cavalry wearing breast plates as one saw in Europe. American cavalry was hardly employed for shock action.
We were past the point in long gun history where rate of fire, ring bayonets and pikes could stave off armored calvary as it could not in Vienna against the Polish heavy calvary some 180 years prior.
My guess, is that the ‘no heavy cavalry wearing breast plates’ was influenced by there was no enemy cavalry to oppose here in North America, other than perhaps the Mexican cavalry, but the main opponent was the American Indians, whom one could call ‘light cavalry.’