Civil War Muskets Used By Vermont Volunteers

[Maple_Leaf_Eh]

Have you invested any time in the Vermont state library and archives? Mass is not far from Montpelier.

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[CLMN]

Have you invested any time in the Vermont state library and archives? Mass is not far from Montpelier.

It is not that far from Massachusetts... and we have. Results to date have certainly been interesting but not yet satisfactory or specific enough for my purposes. It is a cumbersome undertaking... time-consuming, frustrating and expensive too. Some information is very easy to get from the VT state archives... other information seems to take an act of God. The information we want may not even exist any longer. We are tentatively planning another 4-day trip up there in the spring to continue our research.

Your point is well taken that official, archival information is almost always better than secondary sources and anecdotal information. There is lots of information available about the use of Enfield muskets and Springfield 1861 muskets by earlier VT volunteers. There is information suggesting that some (unknown number) of the 1861 pattern muskets were contract muskets... some likely to have been "1861 special" contract muskets.

But my question focuses specifically on the end of the war... 1864 and 1865. It's been suggested by some "experts" that Springfield 1863 Type I or Type II muskets would have been available and issued to/used by late-enlisting VT volunteers. Other "experts" (historians/dealers/collectors/etc.) have insisted that Springfield (or contract) 1861's, new or "recycled", would still have been available and that the notion of Springfield 1863 Type I or Type II muskets ending up in VT volunteer hands at that point in the war was highly unlikely.

For each expert opinion I have received, I seem to have found a contradictory opinion or evidence. Keeping an open mind about other possibilities, this is the main question.

CLMN