U.S. M-1878 Haversack

[tj214]

Interesting speculation about the two letters under the crossed rifles. Makes sense. Since the first letter is obscured (at least to my eyes), perhaps it could be any state with a 2-letter abbreviation that ends in "A." Crosscheck could be to determine which states might have used the modern US postal "service" 2-letter codes as common abbreviations of their state's name at that point in history--again well beyond my expertise.

It appears to me the final letter in the "U.S.(x)." under the crossed rifles is more likely to be a "V" than "A" due to the spacing of the letters. The strong vertical stroke seems too far left, spacing wise, to have represented the strong vertical stroke of an "A" and about right for a "V."

[oldfoneguy]

If I were a betting man I would put my money on the number 14 as being under the US per my cleaning up of the photo.

I'm interested in how you gentleman were able to get the negative effect? My photo editing software doesn't have that feature.

[jond41403]

You are correct! It is USV. It stands for United States volunteers. There was only one photograph where I could partially make out a letter G before the letter A. First regiment company H Georgia volunteers. The picture I posted of the Georgia volunteers, zoom in in the pictures and look at the writing in the top right hand corner. It says US volunteers