Cavalry in the American Civil War Cavalry in the American Civil War was a branch of army service in a process of transition . It suffered from emerging technology threats , difficult logistics , and sometimes misguided or inept commanders . Nevertheless , it played important roles in many Civil War campaigns and earned its place alongside the infantry and artillery combat arms . Types of mounted forces . There were four types of mounted forces prevalent in the Civil War . Roles . At the time of the Civil War , the cavalry had five major missions , in rough priority : This represented a change from previous eras , in which offensive action was the primary mission . In the Napoleonic Wars , for instance , there were instances of massive cavalry charges used for tactical envelopments of infantry formations . The technology of the rifled musket , which emerged in the 1850s , put an effective end to this practice . While swiftly moving cavalry could overwhelm infantry whose weapons fired accurately only 100 yards , the infantryman with a rifled musket ( accurate to 300 yards or more ) could fire multiple rounds in the time it took the cavalry to reach his position . And a horse and rider were easy targets . Offensive actions were certainly not unknown , however , but they were more frequently employed against enemy cavalry than against infantry . Examples of offensive actions include the Battle of Brandy Station and the Battle of Yellow Tavern ; cavalry versus cavalry examples include the First Battle of Bull Run and Elon J . Farnsworth ' s ill - fated charge on the third day of the Battle of Gettysburg . Reconnaissance was the key to effective cavalry , as it remains today in modern armies ( although modern cavalrymen use light armored vehicle s or helicopter s instead of horses ) . The cavalry serves as the " eyes " of the army . Reconnaissance was a crucial component in the Gettysburg Campaign , where cavalry under Union General Alfred Pleasonton attempted to find the wide - ranging Army of Northern Virginia on its invasion of the North , and Confederate cavalry under J . E . B . Stuart effectively employed counter - reconnaissance to screen passes in the Blue Ridge Mountains and hide Robert E . Lee ' s movements . Long - distance raids were the most desirable mission for cavalrymen , primarily because of the fame that successful raids would bring , but they were often of little practical strategic value . Jeb Stuart became famous for two audacious raids around the Union Army of the Potomac in 1862 ; in his third such attempt , during the Gettysburg Campaign , he squandered much of the cavalry forces of the Army of Northern Virginia and deprived Robert E . Lee of adequate reconnaissance at the beginning of the Battle of Gettysburg , one of the principal reasons for the Confederate defeat there . Union attempts at strategic raids had mixed success . George Stoneman ' s raid in the Battle of Chancellorsville was a failure ; Benjamin Grierson ' s raid in the Vicksburg Campaign was a strategic masterpiece that diverted critical Confederate forces away from Ulysses S . Grant ' s army ; James H . Wilson ' s massive 1865 raid in Alabama foreshadowed the armored warfare maneuvers of World War II . In general , strategic raids were used more effectively in the Western Theater of the war . Defensive actions by the cavalry were critical in the retreat from Gettysburg . Pursuit and harassment of enemy forces were often neglected ( particularly by the Union after Gettysburg and Antietam ) , but can be seen in their finest form in the pursuit of Robert E . Lee during the Appomattox Campaign . Organization . Until the nomenclature changed in the early 1880s , cavalry regiments were organized into companies ( later , " troops " ) authorized at up to 100 men , ten companies made up a regiment ( increased to twelve post - war ) . Two or more companies might be organized into ad hoc battalions ( later , " squadrons " ) , two " wings " of six companies each was used through the Indian Wars . Civil War regiments were rarely near authorized strength so that they were commonly brigaded with two to four other regiments . Two to four brigades were combined into divisions . By the end of the war , 272 cavalry regiments were formed in the Union army and 137 in the Confederate army . Early in the war , most cavalry regiments were dispersed to be under the command of infantry formations , such as divisions or corps . As commanders realized the importance of long - range reconnaissance and raiding , the organizations changed to consolidate more of the regiments into larger units controlled separately . Eventually the Union Army of the Potomac included a Cavalry Corps , which had three divisions . The Army of Northern Virginia , earlier to consolidate under J . E . B . Stuart , organized its force as a cavalry division . In both armies , the cavalry was accompanied by batteries or battalions of horse artillery , as well as its own train of ammunition and supply wagons . Equipment . The principal item of equipment for a cavalryman was the horse and one of the reasons both North and South initially hesitated in forming mounted units was because of financial considerations ; each cavalry regiment cost $ 300 , 000 for initial organization with annual upkeep expenses tallying over $ 100 , 000 . Both cavalries originally required recruits or local communities to provide horses , a policy that lasted briefly in the North , while the South maintained it throughout the war even though Richmond leaders recognized its serious drawbacks . While Confederate troopers bore the monetary cost of keeping themselves mounted , Union cavalrymen rode quartermaster issued animals obtained though public contracts ( although officers had to reimburse the cost of their mounts to the government ) . While open to fraud early in the war , once tightened regulations and stringent inspections were enforced , the contract system yielded an estimated 650 , 000 horses for Union armies during the war exclusive of an additional 75 , 000 confiscated in Confederate territory . Union army guidelines for cavalry horse selection mandated animals be at least 15 hands high , weighing minimally 950 pounds and aged between 4 and 10 years old , and be well - broken to bridle and saddle . Animals were to be dark colors and free from defects such as shallow breathing , deformed hooves , spavin or ringbone . Geldings were preferred for cavalry horses with the purchase of mares strictly prohibited outside absolute military emergency and stallions ’ volatility and aggressiveness made them generally unsuitable for service . In the Confederacy , limited horse numbers did not permit such selectivity in trying to keep their armies horsed . Cavalry horse prices varied throughout the war ; in 1861 the maximum government price for cavalry horses was $ 119 . However , relentless military demand caused prices to continually increase and by 1865 prices hovered near $ 190 per head . In the Confederacy horse prices rapidly spiraled upward due to animal scarcity and inflation costing over $ 3 , 000 by war ' s end . The daily feed ration for Union cavalry horses was ten pounds of hay and fourteen pounds of grain which were ample and fulfilled the animals ’ nutritional needs if of good quality , however , the vagaries of the army supply system did not always insure prescribed forage amounts were delivered where most needed . On both sides volunteer officers often proved notably lax in promoting strict animal welfare , a shortcoming exacerbated by the absence of a trained and organized veterinary corps which allowed serious maladies like strangles , grease heel , farcy , and glanders to spread among army stock . The U . S . Congress finally created the rank of veterinary sergeant in March 1863 , but the meager pay and rank held no inducement for qualified candidates to join the army . Repeated calls to establish a professional military veterinary service failed , and widespread waste , suffering , and destruction among army horses resulted ; not until 1916 was an official U . S . army veterinary corps founded . Horses gave the cavalry forces significant mobility . In some operations , forces were pushed to the limit ( such as Jeb Stuart ' s raid on Chambersburg , Pennsylvania , in 1862 , where his troopers marched 80 miles ( 130 km ) in 27 hours ) . Such excesses were extremely damaging to the readiness of the units and extensive recovery periods were required . Stuart , during the Gettysburg Campaign the following year , resorted to procuring replacement horses from local farmers and townspeople during his grueling trek northward around the Union army . In York County , Pennsylvania , following the Battle of Hanover , his men appropriated well over 1 , 000 horses from the region . Many of these untrained new mounts proved a hindrance during the subsequent fighting at East Cavalry Field during the battle of Gettysburg . Some mounted forces used traditional infantry rifles . However , cavalrymen , particularly in the North , were frequently armed with three other weapons : Confederate cavalry . A Southerner was , on average , considered a superior horseman to his Northern counterpart , especially early in the war . Roads in the rural South were generally poor , and horses were used more for individual transportation than they were for the carriages and streetcars of the urbanized North , where many of the early Federal cavalry regiments were formed . Furthermore , Southern society was more stratified , which made the soldiers more accustomed to a hierarchy of command and were generally considered more suited to the martial lifestyle . Additionally , the strong militia tradition in the antebellum South and the requirements for local ' slave catcher ' patrols led to the development of mounted units prior to 1861 . Confederate soldiers owned their horses and were compensated on a monthly basis . If a soldier ' s horse was sick , injured , or killed , the soldier was responsible for returning home and replacing the horse at his own expense . The general rule was that the soldier had 60 days to return with a new horse or he was forced to become an infantryman , which was considered to be an ignominious fate . The first prominent Confederate cavalry leader was J . E . B . Stuart , who achieved success in the First Battle of Bull Run against infantry . He was a flamboyant dresser and an audacious commander , wildly popular with the Southern public for his escapades in twice encircling the Army of the Potomac . These long - range reconnaissance missions accomplished little of military value but boosted Southern morale . After Stuart ' s death in 1864 , he was replaced by Wade Hampton , who was a more mature , and arguably more effective , commander . Another Eastern commander of note was Turner Ashby , the " Black Knight of the Confederacy " , who commanded Stonewall Jackson ' s cavalry forces in the Valley Campaign ; he was killed in battle in 1862 . In the Western Theater , the most fearless , and ruthless , cavalry commander was Nathan Bedford Forrest , who achieved spectacular results with small forces but was an ineffective subordinate to the army commanders he was supposed to support , resulting in poorly coordinated battles . Much of the same issues could be said of Forrest ' s counterpart in the Army of Tennessee , John Hunt Morgan . In the Eastern Theater , the Partisan Ranger John Singleton Mosby succeeded in tying down upwards of 40 , 000 Federal troops defending rail lines and logistical hubs with only 100 - 150 irregulars . In the Trans - Mississippi Theater , John S . Marmaduke and " Jo " Shelby became prominent . Union cavalry . The Union started the war with five Regular mounted regiments : the 1st and 2nd U . S . Dragoons , the 1st Mounted Rifles , and the 1st and 2nd Cavalry . These were renumbered the 1st through 5th U . S . Cavalry regiments , respectively , and a 6th was recruited . The Union was initially reluctant to enlist additional regiments , because of the expense , the understanding that training an effective cavalryman could take as long as two years , and the conventional wisdom that the rough and forested terrain of the United States , being so different from that of Western Europe , would make the deployment of Napoleonic - style cavalry forces ineffective . As the war progressed , the value of cavalry was eventually realized ( primarily for non - offensive missions ) , and numerous state volunteer cavalry regiments were added to the army . While initially reluctant to form a large cavalry force , the Union eventually fielded some 258 mounted regiments and 170 unattached companies , of differing enlistment periods , throughout the war and suffered 10 , 596 killed and 26 , 490 wounded during the struggle . The Union cavalry was disadvantaged at the start of the war because Northern soldiers allegedly had less comparative equestrian experience than their Southern counterparts , and the Union army did not institute an examination in basic horsemanship before a recruit was mustered into service until August 1862 . In addition , over half ( 104 out of 176 ) of the experienced U . S . Army cavalry officers had resigned their commissions to fight for the Confederacy . One advantage the Union horseman had over his opponent was the centralized horse procurement organization of the army , relieving him of any responsibility for replacing an injured horse . Commanders often tried to procure specific breeds for their men , with the Morgan being a particular favorite within the Army of the Potomac . Famous Morgan cavalry mounts from the Civil War included Sheridan ' s " Rienzi " and Stonewall Jackson ' s " Little Sorrel " . Early in the war , Union cavalry forces were often wasted by being used merely as pickets , outposts , orderlies , guards for senior officers , and messengers . The first officer to make effective use of the Union cavalry was Major General Joseph Hooker , who in 1863 consolidated the cavalry forces of his Army of the Potomac under a single commander , George Stoneman . Halfway into the war , during the summer of 1863 , the Union cavalry came into its own . Widely regarded as inferior to its Southern counterpart up until then , the Battle of Brandy Station , although tactically indecisive , is recognized as the point at which it was acknowledged to have comparable competence . In 1864 , Philip Sheridan was given command of the Cavalry Corps of the Army of the Potomac , and he deployed his horsemen in a more effective , strategic way than his predecessors . Despite the reluctance of his superior , Major General George G . Meade , Sheridan convinced General - in - Chief Ulysses S . Grant to allow him to deploy the cavalry in long - range raids , the first of which , at Yellow Tavern , resulted in the death of Confederate commander Jeb Stuart . He later employed his cavalry force effectively in the Valley Campaigns of 1864 and the Appomattox Campaign , in pursuit of Robert E . Lee . In the Western Theater , two effective cavalry generals have not achieved the fame of their Eastern counterparts : Benjamin Grierson ' s dramatic raid through Mississippi was an integral part of Ulysses S . Grant ' s Vicksburg Campaign ; James H . Wilson was invaluable in the Franklin - Nashville Campaign and in his 1865 Alabama raid . After the war , the U . S . Army cavalry achieved great prominence on the Western frontier , fighting against the force that most historians consider the best light cavalry in the world , the American Indian . Significant cavalry battles and raids . The following are Civil War battles , campaigns , or separate raids in which cavalry forces played a significant role .