Confederate Militia on Tour

[Captain_Orso]

Militia do not have a malus outside of their states because of a lack of a friendly population in the region they are located. It had to do more with the men who joined these militias and their purpose in doing so. They contracted to fight in their state, if necessary, against enemies of their state. Going into another state might not have even been legal, for many, it might simply be something they didn't sign up for, or they might have felt that they had no moral basis for 'attacking' a neighbor.

However, with 'southern' militia, I'm not so sure if they in general felt the same way as their northern neighbors. Maybe I'm hearing film-voices in my head, but I think of only one time of ever having heard of a southern, militia or other unit, not being willing or allowed to leave a specific area, and IIRC that was McLaw's regiment or brigade before 2nd Manassas, and IIRC it was not supposed to move north of the Rapidan River.

But somehow I have the feeling that somebody in the Arkansas militia, who voiced descent at marching into Missouri, would not fair a favorable opinion with his fellow militiamen. And I know that most of the troops with Forrest and raised in Mississippi were officially militia, that their purpose was to raid into Tennessee and Kentucky, where they were not at home, and were glad to do so.

Should Confederate militia be less restrictive as to which area(s) they should fight well?

[Teatime]

My initial thought is no .. but .. it is a difficult question to answer and is probably not that black and white and may be dependent on when during the war you asked the question

There are a few factors at play here

1. The CSA had effectively 3 categories of troops
a) Regular troops mustered into the field armies
b) State troops under the control of the Governor and nominally for service within the state to defend the state
c) Militia raised as companies and formed into battalions and regiments for the period of a local emergency (typically within their county or a neighbouring one)

2. The CSA had by April 62 introduced conscription so all men between 18 and 45 who were not exempted were nominally with the field armies. This left exempted men, 17 year olds, over 45s and discharged men to serve with the Militia and the State Troops.
a) Some of the reasons for exemption were
- Owned 20+ slaves
- Worked in exempted industries such as mining, black-smith, teaching, preaching and druggists (with quite an increase of men in those professions when conscription was first announced!)
- Worked for the government either State or Confederate
- Had paid for a substitute to take their place, though a substitute could not be a man who could otherwise have been conscripted.
b) An example of State Troops would be Georgia where the men were primarily sourced from government employees working on and protecting the railroads

I would suggest that was not a highly motivated group in general. A quote from the movie Gettysburg about the men in the ANV perhaps illustrates it.

Mostly, they're all veteran soldiers now; the cowards and shirkers are long gone

So ...
Pre April 62 .. the CSA Militia was probably as motivated and capable as any of the line regiments, they were quickly incorporated into the field armies as line companies.
After that they were probably good for a fight in their state or county and capable when on the defensive but anyone who was happy to march off had already done so.

I am sure we could find exceptions to this but in general I don't think you would find motivated Mississippi militia in Kentucky or Tennessee

[Captain_Orso]

Thanks for your answer Teatime.

You start out fine speaking on the facts, but devolve quickly into wide-sweeping statements about militia being absorbed into the Confederate army starting in '62 and a quote about the Battle of Gettysburg.

Militia didn't balk at going into other states to fight because they were poorly trained or afraid or inexperienced, although all of the former may also have been the case, it had to do with their convictions and beliefs, which will probably not change because of training and field experience.

It comes down to, should in-game Confederate militia be treated differently than Union militia, and are there facts to back that up?

EG should militia raised in Arkansas be exempt from the Out-of-State-Cohesion-Malus only is Arkansas, or should that be extended to other neighboring Confederate states, such as Missouri, Texas, Louisiana, Tennessee, and Mississippi.

[kc87]

The pre-war Militia system all but ceased to exist when Militia were supplanted by Volunteer regiments that were no longer bound by specific county recruitment in 1861. The Militia's core organization structure was not sufficient for war on this scale and since each state had a quota and limit on the number of volunteers they were allowed to muster at the beginning of the war this meant the end of pre-war style militias except in rare instances like Missouri where they couldn't be incorporated into the formal Army until early 1862 because there was simply no time and fighting was constant.

Since Militia had no or little to no familiarity with battalion and regimental order they would have been obsolete on the battlefield and massacred, which is why they needed to be absorbed and replaced by standardized volunteer regiments for battlefield roles other than impromptu defenses.