Page:John Banks Wilson - Maneuver and Firepower (1998).djvu/38

 16 sions. Paralleling the Union armies, the field artillery batteries were organized as corps-level units, which were designated battalions rather than brigades. Confederate cavalry employed a divisional rather than a corps structure, but it functioned as an aggressive independent force earlier than Union cavalry. Unlike the Union forces, Southerners rarely numbered their brigades and divisions but used the names of commanders for identification. Army corps were numbered within their respective armies.

To help control and identify units on the battlefield, armies traditionally used flags, and Union army corps and their divisions and brigades employed them during the Civil War. The national colors formed the basis of the flag system. Along with distinctive flags, Union corps badges were introduced to identify men and foster esprit de corps.

Following the Civil War the War Department disbanded the field armies, along with their army corps, divisions, and brigades. Militia units returned to their states, the volunteers left service, and most of the Regular Army troops returned to scattered posts throughout the South and West. Congress in 1869 set the peacetime Regular establishment at 25 infantry, 10 cavalry, and 5 artillery regiments, but few were ever able to assemble their far-flung companies, troops, and batteries in one place until the end of the century. Field operations usually involved less than a regiment or were conducted by gathering the geographically closest elements of several regiments on a temporary basis. Army Regulations, nevertheless, continued to repeat the ideas for organizing army corps, divisions, and brigades, with the division described as "the fundamental element and basis of organization of every active army."

On 25 April 1898, Congress declared that a state of war existed between the United States and Spain. Even though the USS Maine had been sunk six weeks before, threatening war, the nation had taken only minimal steps toward mobilization. One of these steps, however, was congressional authorization for President William McKinley, when necessary, to organize a new army consisting of the Regular Army and the Volunteer Army of the United States. The regiments of the Volunteer Army were to be raised and officered by the states and eventually included most of their organized militia units. The regulars and volunteers were to be formed into brigades, divisions, and army corps. On 23 April the McKinley administration directed the regulars concentrated at Chickamauga National Park, Georgia, to be organized as an army corps; those at Mobile, Alabama, as an independent division; and those at New Orleans, Louisiana, as a separate brigade.

After the declaration of war McKinley revised that arrangement and approved the organization of eight army corps, each of which was to consist of three or more divisions of three brigades each. Each brigade was to have approxi-