six inches above the cap ; those of the Mounted or Field 

 Artillery, Dragoons, and Mounted Rifles, of horse-hair, 

 falling six inches. The front ornaments, as now worn in 

 the Staff, Staff Corps, Artillery and Infantr\', with the 

 figure, for number of regiment (three quarters of an 

 inch long) in the angle of the cross cannon for Artil- 

 lery, and within the bugle for Infantry. The Dragoons 

 to have two cross sabres (edges upwards) instead of the 

 star, with the number of the regiment in the angle 

 above : the Mounted Rifles a trumpet perpendicular. A 

 model cap for officers will be deposited at Washington, 

 Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, Boston, New Or- 

 leans, Cincinnati and St. Louis, as a pattern for cap 

 makers ... IX ... All officers of and below the 

 grade of Colonel, who have the brevet rank of a Gen- 

 eral officer, will wear the plume at all times of their 

 respective departments, corps, or arm; . . . X . . . 

 These changes in relation to officers, will go into effect 

 on the first of October next, or before, in any regiment, 

 or at any post, where all the officers may wish to adopt 

 the new dress. XI . . . General Officers, on parades 

 and reviews, and in processions, and on semi-military 

 occasions, without troops, may wear the present full 

 dress coats and cocked hats, or chapeaus . . . and 

 plumes .... UNIFORM FOR ENLISTED MEN 

 . . . XVII . . . Cap, of blue cloth, gig top shape; 

 front and rear si.x inches high, rounded, and stiffened 

 with felt or other light material ; visor of patent leather, 

 234 inches wide, reaching back to within half an inch 

 of the tip of the ears, projecting nearly horizontal, but 

 somewhat concave, so as to shade well the eyes and 

 face; on the back part a flap — outside of cloth lined 

 with thin japanned leather — of the height of the cap, 

 when up. for protecting the neck from sunshine and 

 rain ; front ornaments of metal, to be pemianent, and to 

 show the corps or ann ; viz : Engineers, a castle ; Ord- 

 nance, a shell and flame; Dragoons, two cross sabres 

 (edges upwards) , with the letter of the company in the 

 angle above, and number of the regiment below: 

 Mounted Rifle Regiment, a trumpet, perpendicular, 

 with the letter of the company above; Artillery, cross 

 cannon, with the letter of the company in the angle 

 above and number of the regiment below; Infantry, a 

 horn bugle with sling, with the letter of the company 

 above and number of the regiment within the sling; 

 all yellow, except the Infantiy, which will be white. For 

 parades or full dress, the caps will contain a pompon 

 of wool yarn, short fringe, spherical, three inches in 

 diameter, on a bent stem without socket, and standing 

 forward at an angle of 45 degrees : those of Sergeants 

 to have a crest of fringe I i/o inches above the globe; 

 those of Engineer soldiers to be black; all others the 

 color of coat trimmings of their respective anns ; those 



of all company musicians will be a netted sphere l'/2 

 inches diameter, on a straight stem, without socket, and 

 stiff horse-hair standing five inches high from the upper 

 side, and spreading gently; all of the color of their 

 corps . . . .'^^^ 



There are several noteworthy points about these new 

 cap fonns. With the exception of making the chapeau 

 optional on certain occasions, there was to be but one 

 cap form for officers and one for enlisted personnel. 

 Both caps were designed from the point of practicality 

 to be used for both dress and fatigue or campaign 

 duties. The "gig top shape" of the enlisted cap as men- 

 tioned in the order is difficult to define. It is clarified 

 somewhat, however, in an undated memorandum in 

 ChurchilFs handwriting dealing with the samples pre- 

 pared in Philadelphia. The memo states: 



The bellows tops to be higher and stiffer in front, the 

 visor to be hollowed out more so as to conform to the 

 shape of the head, to be larger, so as to shade the faces 

 . . . This kind is approved because it will fold flat, 

 and may be placed under a man's head .... Improve 

 the forage cap by making it higher in the crown so as 

 to contain the ornament and stiffen the top, so that it 

 \vill retain a more permanent shape: for I think this 

 will (or should) be the officers cap, and the bellows 

 top for the men. . . .'^" 



From this it appears that the enlisted cap must have 

 been very nearly a cloth \ersion of the 1 832 leather for- 

 age cap with the addition of insignia and pompons, 

 while the officer's model seems to ha\e been a modifi- 

 cation of the 1 839 forage cap. 



General Orders, No. 25, War Department, 23 

 August 1850, suspended this uniform.'-' Considering 

 the short period of time the order was in effect coupled 

 with the large stocks of old pattern clothing left from 

 the war with Mexico, it seems unlikely that any ex- 

 amples of the new enlisted cap, other than the patterns, 

 were ever made. Some officers may ha\c provided them- 

 selves with the new model, since the order of suspension 

 stated that those officers who had provided themselves 

 with the new uniform would be permitted to wear it 

 "for the present." In any case, no examples of either 

 form are known to exist. 



A contemporary' foreign comment on the 1850 uni- 

 form, and the cap in particular, is interesting, however. 

 An editorial in the London United Service Gazette for 

 13 April 1850 praised the American Army in having 

 ". . . . good common sense in the article of dress, and 

 a disposition to yield to the wishes of the soldiery in 



57 



