THE REVISED MANUAL
of suggested

BATTALION DRILL
for the
ARMY OF TENNESSEE
(formerly known as the First Confederate Division)


    This is a slightly enlarged, but much enhanced, update of the manual originally published in 2005.  There are twenty-five different illustrations of drill included in this sixty-six page manual.  Feel free to download and use this manual.  It has been created for use in the field.  You won't find a better manual for the price, but you can pay much more for a lesser manual.  As far as printing and reprinting the manual is concerned :

    All rights reserved. Liberal and extensive distribution of this FREE pamphlet is encouraged. However, reassimilating, rearranging, cutting, pasting, reorganizing and/or otherwise taking credit for any part of this work without the written permission of the author is prohibited. Hey, I put some serious time into this pamphlet!

   Paragraph numbering in the body of this booklet is to the School of the Battalion as found in Hardee’s Revised and Improved Tactics (Goetzel, 1863) which mirrors the paragraph numbering found in the School of the Battalion of the 1861 U.S. Tactics.  The U.S. Tactics was recently reprinted by Stackpole Press as the 1863 U.S. Tactics.  Consequently, paragraph numbering is the same in Hardee's Revised Tactics and the 1863 U.S. Tactics.  

     To give the manual wider coverage and understanding, the topic heading for each manoeuver detailed includes corresponding paragraph numbers for the School of the Battalion in Casey’s U.S. Tactics (1862-3), in Gilham's Manual of Instruction for Volunteers and Militia (1860), and in Dom Dal Bello’s Parade, Inspection, and Evolutions of the Line (4th Ed., 1998).  Also included are paragraphs from the C.S. Regulations and from the manuals produced by Gilham, Scott, Coppee and Morris.

    The manual has been published to the internet in two different formats :  (1) standard and (2) booklet.  The side-by-side version allows the viewer to examine each page in a sequential order.  Each printed sheet contains consecutive numbering.   The booklet version is formatted for double sided printing.  The pages do not become consecutive until printed and folded into a booklet. 

Printing Instructions for the standard version :

    The standard version requires no special instructions for printing.  It is a "what you see is what you get" document.  It's a good reference when you are looking for something in particular from the convenience of your monitor.  As a printout, it's not as good as the booklet, but it works.  Click here, open the pdf document, print it.

Printing Instructions for the Booklet :

   This document has been specially formatted to print as a booklet.   This pdf booklet requires double sided printing as well as a pdf reader.  Any printer can produce double sided product.  There are thirty-four pages which requires seventeen sheets of paper.  You need to perform two printings.

    First, click on this link to open the odd pages for the pdf booklet.  Open the document and select print.   Check the print properties making certain that the print orientation is on LANDSCAPE, not portrait.  Print the first seventeen sheets.  Don't rearrange the sheets.  Reinsert the sheets into your printer making certain that : (1) the blank sides will be printed next, (2) the first page printed previously will be the first page printed in this second printing, and (3) the edge of the paper which exited the printer initially will now be the last edge to leave printer. 

    It sounds harder to describe than it really is.  I just scoop my first set of copies, flip them 180 degrees counter clockwise, and drop them into the paper feeder of my printer. 

    Second, click on this second link to open the even pages for the pdf booklet.  Print.  If you've done it right, you've got a two sided booklet.  I printed a booklet for myself using these two links so I know it works. - Silas


Link to other Civil War drill manuals

Link to the AoT Booklet for Guards and Pickets / Link to the NSA Forum


Hosted by:

Major Silas Tackitt,

Assistant Inspector General,
Army of Tennessee / North South Alliance
and
compiler of
Guides Posts,
the new manual of Civil War drill


Hit Counter
hits since 11 July 2005

Last updated:
29 September 2010 05:40 PM