Civil War pipes

1689Piper

This may be an impossible question to answer but being a Civil War buff, does anyone know the major brands of pipes the soldiers would smoke during that time? There is no shortage of pictures online showing soldiers smoking their pipes but I thought it would be cool to see who made the pipes for them.

AnantaAndroscoggin

Perhaps they might know something about this at Dixie Gun Works of Union City, Tennessee. Among their many black-powder shooting goodies, they also have a selection for both Revolutionary War and Civil War re-enactors.

Zouave

@1689Piper glad to find another civil war buff on here. I have been a civilwar reenactor for a long while and me and a bunch of guys have been spending years trying to figure out period correct pipes and tobacco. From what I can tell, you would have seen a good deal of clay pipes durring the war. It was still a common and inexpensive pipe for the average soldier on both sides. Briar seems like it was still seen a bit less durring the war but not unheard of. In the North where the majority of European soldiers fought you would see a good deal of German or caviler style pipes in use. I don't know that you would find any one maker or manufacturer in common use? Also British soldiers durring the 1850s started bringing back meerschaum from the Crimean war. Hope this helps. Hit me up if I can help anymore and I hope what I posted is fairly accurate. Happy smokes

motie2

Civil war tobacco pipes
http://www.internationalopulence.com/civil-war-pipes/

Zouave

@motie2 and @1689Piper what I would love to find is the perfect period correct pipe tobacco. 

motie2

https://civilwarhome.com/tobacco.htm

BTW, Lone Jack out of Lynchburg, Virginia was a popular brand of pipe tobacco. Out on the picket lines during the Civil War Yanks swapped coffee for Long Jack tobacco. By far the most popular smoking tobacco was Bull Durham.

Zouave

https://www.democratandchronicle.com/story/news/local/2013/10/29/when-it-came-to-cigarettes-rochester-was-peerless-/3307845/ this surprised me as well. A few years after the war, but from a veteran of it.

Zouave

this was posted on Reddit

Zouave

@motie2 I would assume a straight Virgina or Burley would be most appropriate for a more 19th century smoke? What do you think?

motie2

I’m not informed enough to have an opinion.....

thebadgerpiper

@1689Piper Hey, I've just recently dived into Civil War history after discovering that my Great great great grandfather fought for the Union with the Michigan 11th. I started things off by reading Billings Hard Tack and Coffee, a great book detailing the day to day life of a Union soldier in camp. In it, he mentions that the camp sutlers would sell plugs of a black Navy tobacco that the soldiers were fond of for smoking and chewing. 

He later says that during a later campaign, the soldiers found a large stash of tobacco that was drying. The soldiers tried smoking it, but found that they preferred their regular old tobacco.