Principal MusicianSSSS, Fife Drum Major, Band Leader.

[RJSamp]

A good discussion going on the AC about this:
http://www.authentic-campaigner.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9842
albeit they aren't getting to the right answer very quickly.

TWO PM's are authorized per Regiment. See Scott's, Hardee's, Casey's.

1 commands the Field Musics (Drummers, Fifers, Buglers)

1 commands the BAND (Cornets, Trumpets, Horns, maybe a percussionist or two).
See Scott's, Hardee's, Casey's. Careful when reading Kautz, he's not superbly organized and keeps jumping back and forth between branches of the military as well as the year as he talks about chief trumpeters, pay rates, principal musicians, et al.

In the absence of a PM, the Sergeant Major commands the Field Music's (tin ear and all).

GO 191 kills over 95% of regimental bands.....along with a second Principal Musician (the band leader).

Drum Major, Fife Major usually in reference to the Principal Musician of the Field Musics......or may be in reference to the principal Drummer, or Fifer.
Fife Major as Principal Musician relatively rare......Drum Major as Principal Musician more common.....and of course just an old grizzled musician with a mace as PM was the most common of all (non playing).

The Band Leader (was sometimes called a Drum Major), would be the principal musician of the Band. So when you see Jari in his bear skin towering hat you could refer to him as the Band Leader, Drum Major, or Principal Musician.....you'd be correct in all three.

So who's the leader of the club that's made for you and me.

Very few regimental buglers called Chief Buglers, wore the insignia of a principal musician, or were paid more money....(in cavalry they were.....1st Mass Infantry had a chief bugler, 124th NYSV Chief Bugler wore the PM chevrons for dress....in general if the Companies had buglers, then the Regimental Bugler MIGHT be a Chief Bugler). Recall that Oliver Norton complained to his sister in a letter that he was the Brigade Bugler but wasn't getting paid more than a Private.

I don't see fifers, drummers being issued additonal chevrons.....exceptions might be if they were actually falling in as a rifle toting Corporal or Sargeant. Corporal Eggleston with the 6th Wisconsin, Iron Brigade, I Corps, Army of the Potomac would be one of these exceptions (he was initially a drummer). Again, Oliver Norton is a great example....he was initially a rifleman in the 83rd PA out of Erie (a true Private, as opposed to a Musician)....became a bugler/regimental bugler (one of two)...rose to Brigade Bugler (Butterfield and Vincent)....and then to Officer......only carried additional rank when he received his commission as a Lieutenant.

Any questions? Let 'er rip!

[toptimlrd]

RJ,

A memeber of my unit does a great impression of Lt. Norton for living history demonstrations and has done quite a bit of research on him. If anyone is interested, here is a brief history and a letter he wrote from Jacksonville Florida. http://extlab7.entnem.ufl.edu/olustee/letters/Onorton.html

[Kevin O'Beirne]

My research on this topic is presented in the CRRC2, so what I have to say is already printed.

RJ, I'll offer here that, while the manuals and regs are nice to read, to get the "real picture" one needs to check primary source documentation. For example, there's one single reference to "Fife Major" in all 128-volumes of the ORs. Certainly, some regiments had one, but were they common? My guess is "no". Similarly, Drum Majors are pretty rare in the ORs, particularly after the general discontinuance of regimental bands in August 1862.

Did every regiment have two Principal Musicians? Very debatable. It appears to me that, when a regiment had two PMs, one was the Principal Musician (second to the Drum Major) and the other may have been the Bugler. I suspect the reality was, and my own research backs this up but I won't claim that it's exhaustive, most regiments probably had only one PM, and that practices varied to a certain extent from regiment to regiment. As usual, the best thing is to research each unit one at a time to get determine how it was done in that regiment at a particular time in the conflict.

[RJSamp]

Good points Kevin. I hope my post didn't imply that there were two PM's, a Fife Major, and or a Drum Major, and or a Chief Bugler in every infantry regiment. And definitely a full complement of these NEVER occurred.

No band, no 2nd PM.....

That's really the gist of the question on the AC....two Principals were authorized, what was their capacity? The answer is one for the FM, one for the Band. No band, no PM. No FM, no PM. In the absence of a PM, the SM gets the job.

Drum Major/Fife Major, if they existed in the regiment were simply another title for the Field Music's leader (Principal Musician), or Band leader (Principal Musician). We know of several Indiana Regiments that had 'Fife Majors' early on in the war.....they may have become extinct when the 90 days regiments disappeared. Drum Major is a title for the leader of a marching musical group...to this day.....football marching bands, Drum and Bugle Corps, Pipes bands, Mummer's Day parade, etc.

Even if bugler's were being used more as the war progressed, not all regimental level buglers became Chief Buglers or a PM.
Some regiment's had more than one chief bugler.
Dan Butterfield commended two buglers from a NY Regiment after the Gaines Mill battle for serving him well and bravely (the cite is in the OR) (so two Brigade Buglers not 1, not permanently attached to the Brigade staff).

I've often posted that the Iron Brigade had no infantry buglers that we know of.....the diaries speak of hearing a roll of the drums, or the tap of the drums, and they soon fell in line (they did have two artillery buglers in Gibbon's old battery). 83rd PA had 12 buglers early in the war. Musician's were tacit during the siege of Yorktown (they didn't play, Oliver Norton went back to being a Private and traded in his bugle for a rifle). 1st Mass Infantry had 11 buglers, et al. Major Blackford of the 5th AL sharpshooters would sound his own bugle on ocassion, and had a mess of buglers in his Rodes' Division sharpshooter/skirmisher unit. Colonel Cross didn't use a brigade bugler, instead he would grab the nearest regimental bugler and have him sound for the entire brigade (see Pfantz Second Day). We've got a picture of the 43rd MS with 9 buglers in the picture.

So absolutely, do your research when you portray any unit....find out what they wore, what condition it was in, what rifles they used, what sort's of music and musician's did they sing, play, march to, issue command's with.....

For example....we switch bugle types around based on which unit we're supposed to be bugling for.....and I became a free lance bugler for events/commanders instead of a 2nd Wisconsin Co. K member because it wasn't correct.

[Kevin O'Beirne]

In short, that I can tell, the manuals and ORs seem to imply this structure for a regiment of Federal volunteers:

Drum Major - Leader of the regimental Band, and overall boss of the regiment's music (Band plus field music). One sees few Drum Majors mentioned in the ORs and they appear to have been almost non-existant after August 1862.

Principal Musician 1 - assistant to the Drum Major. May have (probably?) led the field music directly. He filled the Drum Major's role when the Drum Major was absent.

Principal Musician 2 - Appears that if a regiment had one, he could have been the Bugler. I suspect that Principal Musicians who served as Buglers are the source of the buglers seen at some reenactments wearing lots of chevrons and a star in the chevron.

Bugler - When present, he reported to the battalion commander. Obviously, not all Buglers were Principal Musicians. Frankly, I suspect a lot of regiments had either no Bugler or more than one Bugler, and it'd be nice to see more information on this. I freely admit I'm not too well-informed on this one.

Band - Brass and percussion instruments, part of the regiment's field and staff, and largely discontinued at the regimental level after August 1862. Some brigades retained brigade bands through the end of the war. I believe that--going from memory here--many Federal regimental authorizations allowed a Band of 24 members; after the official discontinuance of regimental bands in 1862 (Yank army) brigade Bands of 16 members were allowed. One of my favorite regiments, the 23rd Ohio of George Crook's Army of West Virginia (Eighth Corps) had a brigade Band even in 1864 that marched with the unit on some very arduous campaigns. One of my favorite accounts of them is the band playing at Dublin, Virginia in May 1864 as the Yank army stood on one side of the New River and the Rebs stood on the other bank, while the critical Virginia Central Railroad bridge over the river burned furiously. I have several first-person accounts from the regiment, including one from Col. Rutherford Hayes, describing this. :) During a battle, the typical Band served as medical assistants and stretcher bearers.

Field Music - Fifers and drummers; typically one of each per company. Typically reported to the rear as medical assistants and stretcher bearers for a battle, despite them often playing throughout many reenactor battle scenarios.

To tell the truth, I have no real idea what a Civil War Fife Major did. One sees them in a few regiments, but they were rare. They seem to have been a more-common feature in Eighteenth Century and early Nineteenth Century regiments, particularly in the British Army.

I'm sure that folks can find many exceptions to the above for certain units.