A common reaction that many researchers have when first confronted with a reference to the Confederate States Marine Corps is, "There was a Confederate Marine Corps?" Genealogists familiar with researching Confederate soldiers and sailors rarely, if ever, investigate the Confederate Marine Corps.
One of the reasons for a lack of interest in this subject is simple math. One historian has estimated that the Confederate Marine Corps never exceeded more than six hundred marines at a given time and that no more than twelve hundred men served as Confederate marines during the Civil War. At six hundred men, the C.S. Marine Corps was equivalent in size to a Confederate infantry regiment.
Another reason for the lack of research is that few records of the Confederate Marine Corps survived. In 1880, Lloyd J. Beall, former colonel commandant of the Confederate Marine Corps, explained in a letter to a U.S. Marine Corps officer that the "books and papers" pertaining to the C.S. Marine Corps were burned. Beall claimed Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen R. Mallory ordered the destruction of the records, presumably to prevent capture by Federal forces. The small size of the corps, combined with this lack of documentary evidence, results in only occasional research by Civil War historians, present-day marines, or individuals researching ancestors who served as a Confederate marine.
The Provisional Confederate Congress established the C.S. Marine Corps under the act of March 16, 1861. The act, providing for the organization of the navy, authorized a corps of marines to consist of one major, one quartermaster sergeant, and six companies of one hundred men each. Later an amendatory act of May 20, 1861, increased the size of the corps and raised the rank of headquarters officers. During the war, marines served in small detachments on land and at sea. Many recruits and new officers trained at Camp Beall at Drewry's Bluff, Virginia. Confederate marine guard detachments served at naval stations at Richmond, Wilmington, Charleston, Savannah, Mobile, and Charlotte. Marine detachments were also assigned to many of the larger vessels of the C.S. Navy.
The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) maintains the fragmentary records relating to the C.S. Marine Corps such as Confederate muster rolls, shipping articles, clothing receipts, descriptive rolls, and payrolls. Headquarters records were destroyed around the time of the evacuation of Richmond on April 2, 1865, including corps records kept at Colonel Beall's house. Lt. Nathaniel E. Venable, assistant to the quartermaster, took records of that department to Danville, Virginia, where they too were destroyed.
Confederate Marine Button
Backmark: "H T & B * / Manchester" Definitely the rarest of the block lettered Confederate buttons.
Stand up shank intact, attractive patina very very small push.
Recovered: Drewry's Bluff, Virginia
The good news for those navigating this rarely traveled road is that a few historians have paved the way. In addition to several articles on this subject is Ralph W. Donnelly's book, The Confederate States Marine Corps: The Rebel Leathernecks (1989). The author begins by focusing on the first year of the war and provides background on the organization of the corps including various Confederate laws establishing and expanding the Confederate Marine Corps. The book continues by describing duty ashore in Virginia, Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. One chapter provides information on marines serving on board Confederate ships. Donnelly also concentrates on life as a Confederate marine, providing a chapter each on enlisted men and officers. The appendix contains a list of Confederate marines taken prisoner at Fort Fisher on January 15, 1865.
To research officers, consult the Register of Officers of the Confederate States Navy, 1861 - 1865 (1931) and the more descriptive "Biographical Sketches of Marine Officers" in Donnelly's Rebel Leathernecks. For enlisted men, consult Donnelly's earlier work, Service Records of Confederate Enlisted Marines (1979). This book is arranged alphabetically by name of marine and provides a brief description of service. As an example, the following is information provided in Donnelly's book for enlisted marine John W. Barry:
Co. A. Private enlisted New Orleans, 5/8/61. On CRR [clothing receipt roll] Capt. Holmes comd., c. 5/10/61. Corporal as of 7/25/61. Presumably served at Pensacola until company transferred to Savannah c. 9/18/61. On Ga. & S.C. Stations [Savannah] 9/1/-12/3/61. On board CSS Savannah 1/23/62 and 3/25/62. Transferred with company to Drewry's Bluff c. July 1862. Assigned Marine Guard, Navy Yard opp. Rocketts [Richmond], by 10/8/63; on this duty through 4th Qr. 1864. Charged for canteen and strap lost at Wilmington 9/30/64. Took oath to US in Richmond, Va., 8/24/65. Age 36 in 1865; occupation: farmer; residence Alabama.
First Lieutenant Becket K. Howell, C.S. Marine Corps
Halftoned image, printed in "Two Years on the Alabama", by Lieutenant Arthur Sinclair (2nd edition, 1896).
He served as Marine officer of CSS Sumter and CSS Alabama in 1861-64.
Col. Lloyd J. Beall, a West Point graduate, was a paymaster in the U.S. Army stationed at St. Louis, MO when he tendered his resignation and headed south. Although born at Fort Adams, RI, he was a Marylander who married the daughter of a South Carolina senator, and his loyalties were with the South. On May 23, 1861, Confederate Secretary of the Navy, Stephen R. Mallory, appointed Beall a colonel in the Confederate States Marine Corps and served in that capacity throughout the war.
An administrator during the Civil War, Beall's military knowledge and experience remained an untapped resource. Beall worked hard to have the Confederate Marine Corps receive the personnel, supplies and other benefits accorded to other branches of the military. The training of officers and enlisted Marines took place at the Marines' barracks named Camp Beall in honor of the Commandant just a short distance to the south of Richmond at Drewry's Bluff overlooking the James River. By the end of the war, he had succeeded in helping improve the resources available to the Confederate Marine Corps and established separate marine training camps in Charleston, South Carolina; several permanent stations on the Mississippi River and Atlantic Coast. Thanks, in part, to Beall's efforts; the Confederate Marines gained a reputation for distinguished combat service, on the sea and land. After the Civil War, Beall lived in Richmond, Virginia, and kept most of the Confederate States Marine Corps records at his home. Much of this history, along with Beall's personal history, was destroyed in a fire. Beall died in Richmond, on November 10, 1887.
George Seton Johnston, a member of Company B of the Confederate States Marine Corps, is probably the only member of the CSMC to be buried in Arlington Cemetery. He enlisted at Richmond on September 1, 1864, as Private, and was assigned to the CSS Virginia II; surrendered at Greensboro, North Carolina in April, 1865.
He resided in Virginia after the war and received a Confederate pension from the state government until his death at Lyon Park on June 2, 1928.
Additional Sources:
www.homeofheroes.com
www.archives.gov
www.history.navy.mil
www.marines.mil
www.artfinders.com
www.relicman.com
humphreys1625.homestead.com
