Living the Life of a Black Hat

My unit is Company B 6th Wisconsin Volunteers of the Iron Brigade, the most famous unit of the Civil War. The Iron Brigade earned its fame the hard way, suffering the most casualties percentage-wise of any brigade during the war. Mustered into Union service in 1861, the 6th reenlisted in 1864 and served throughout the war, producing four generals. Must be those black hats.

The only all-Western unit in the Army of the Potomac, the Iron Brigade was composed of five regiments including the 2nd, 6th and 7th Wisconsin, the 19th Indiana and later reinforced by the 24th Michigan. All but the 24th are represented today by units on the West Coast. The 6th Wisconsin is the only Black Hat unit in Southern California, but nationwide, there are hundreds of Black Hats. Nearly 500 of us were at Gettysburg for the135th anniversary reenactment in 1998, where we shot many rebs.

Besides their history, the Iron Brigade wore the best uniforms. Unlike the vast majority of Yankees who wore a kepi, sort of an ancestor to the baseball cap, all soldiers in the Iron Brigade were issued a distinctive wide-brimmed black hat. They also wore a long nine-button frock coat (no one’s friend on a 100-degree day) plus distinctive white leggings. Our uniforms cost more than those of a basic Yankee, but we dress to impress.

Personally, I hate guns and have never owned one until I bought a musket and joined the Iron Brigade five years ago. My son is also in the unit and we spend quality time together trying to shoot just as many of those traitors as we possibly can.

To simplify: There are but two sides to this issue then as now, patriots and traitors. I’m a Yankee patriot, a corporal in the ol’ 6th, and no matter how the rebs try to change history, they still lose. With a master’s degree in history, I know how this thing ends. Well, eventually it ends. We remain hopeful.

Did you see the movie “Gettysburg”? The Iron Brigade was scarcely in it. They should’ve been, but that’s Hollywood. The Black Hats saved the Union on the first day of Gettysburg by taking 61% casualties but holding off half the Confederate army, thus buying more time for other units to arrive and take the high ground. The 6th gained fame with their impetuous charge on the Railroad Cut where Sgt. Francis A. Wallar won the Medal of Honor.

If not for the Black Hats, the rebs may very well have won at Gettyburg, and perhaps, the war. If the South had won, the U.S. could’ve well ended up like the Balkans--a bunch of stubborn countries that don’t get along. And we’d all be saying “you all.”

Lucius Fairchild, an Iron Brigade officer who lost an arm at Gettysburg, and later became governor of Wisconsin, put it all in perspective at a veterans’ reunion after the war. “You look upon us perhaps, like a lot of braggarts who blow our own achievements, but I will tell you, young friends, back of all this there is more heartache in the bosoms of these men than you can imagine.”

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Bill Locey can be reached at blocey@pacbell.net.