Courtesy of the 1864 US Army Field Artillery Tactics Manual
The cannons that both armies had at their disposal during the Civil War were heavy and hard to move. Artillery crews knew that they had a job to do when arriving onto a battlefield. Their job was to try to break up the enemy before the battle even began. The basic organization of battery crews would contain approximately 80 to 100 soldiers. Each cannon was pulled by six to eight horses. Each cannon had about five-hundred pounds of supplies and ammunition within wagons that trailed the convoy. Each battery consisted of four to six cannon and each position around a cannon had a specific job to accomplish before the cannon fired a shot.
- Cannon crews were advised by their commanding officers to fire their cannons twice to three times a minute a minute. Here is a picture of a few cannon crews prior to battle. Below, is a picture of the 1st Connecticut Battery, near Fredericksburg, Virginia, on May 2nd, 1863.
[ Courtesy of the photographer Andrew J. Russell from the Civil War Collection, Library of Congress ]