Quote :

Bill wrote : Guys, Check out that shiny sling keeper. Must be stainless steel.

Nah, just a motivated soldier with some rottenstone at his disposal.  

Nick, I'd love to see the LOC reference number on this one, as I'm clueless on how to find it.

A group of us are aiding in building a corduroy road next summer, so many of the aspects of posing a reproduction image could be in place.  Would be a nice thing if we managed to add that facet to an already interesting job.  

It is titled
[Chickahominy River, Va. Grapevine bridge built May 27-28, 1862, by the 5th New Hampshire Infantry under Col. Edward E. Cross].

Woodbury, D. B. d. 1866, (David B.), photographer.


CREATED/PUBLISHED
1862.

SUMMARY
Photograph from the main eastern theater of war, the Peninsular Campaign, May-August 1862.

NOTES
Reference: Civil War photographs, 1861-1865 / compiled by Hirst D. Milhollen and Donald H. Mugridge, Washington, D.C. : Library of Congress, 1977. No. 0063

Title from Milhollen and Mugridge.

Forms part of Civil War glass negative collection (Library of Congress).


Hope this "heps"
Digital ID: cwpb 03792   Source: digital file from original neg.

Nick,

This is a great discussion, keep posting this kind of stuff  

The fastner that you see in the photograph is clearly a belt back adjustment.

I examined a pair of federal issue enlisted trousers bearing the identical form of adjustment in the back belt area.

Nick, my guess is they weren't real common then.

Ken:

They are very common, and seen well into the 1890's.

I thought the little doodad below the waistband was the typical belt adjuster, but what's the vertical shadow just above it on the waistband? Is the waistband just doubled over due to the adjuster being pulled tight, or is the belt adjuster anchored up on the waistband too?

The belt adjusters I've seen are below the waistband, but were they on the waistband also sometimes?

Hank Trent
hanktrent@voyager.net