These illustrations contributed by: Jim Gillgam
This illustration is of the uniform shipment from Philadelphia to the North Carolina Continental Line on October 18, 1776.
The United States at this time (early in the war) didn't have a standardized uniform yet. So they sent these uniforms of many different colors to all Continental Regiments. This illustration that I sent you would have been how the NC Continentals looked in the Battles of Brandywine and Germantown, PA. These uniforms were from Philadelphia, Pa and received by the Halifax, NC Committee of Safety on October 18, 1776. At Valley Forge, the North Carolina troops received new uniforms. I'm not sure what these looked like, but they were wearing them when they were all captured in Charleston, SC. in 1780. Later on in the war, General George Washington finally made an order that all the uniform coats of the Continental army be blue. Near the end of the war, the NC Continental troops were wearing blue jackets with red facings.
Here is what the NC Continentals uniform buttons looked like.
Here is the uniform that the NC Continentals used to the end of the war. A Blue coat with Red facings. They first received these in September 1778 at Valley Forge. These coats were from France.
Additional info received on this coat: This uniform is called a "Lottery Coat". The Continental army at Valley Forge received 4,674 Brown Coats with Red Facings and 3,613 Blue Coats with red facings. All the troops wanted the blue coats, so to avoid conflicts, a lottery was held at Washington's Headquarters. Lieutenant Colonels were selected to draw for different colonies continental troops. Robert Hanson Harrison drew for the North Carolina Continentals. Richard Kidder Meade for Delaware and Virginia, Tench Tilghman for Maryland, James McHenry for Pennsylvania and Alexander Hamilton for New Jersey. The winners of the Blue Uniforms were the troops from the North Carolina, Maryland, New York, New Jersey. The brown uniforms went to the troops from Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Delaware and Virginia.
I have created an illustration of Hunting shirts, these were commonly worn by the North Carolina Continentals and Militia throughout the war. They came in a great variety of colors.
Here is the uniform of the North Carolina Light Dragoons. Most have no idea that North Carolina had it's own Dragoon Corps during the Revolution. I tried to find information on the uniform and located just information on the colors of the jacket and put them on this Revolutionary War style Dragoon coat. Here is a link to their very little-known history The American Revolutionary War
An amazing find was made in November by a friend with a metal detector. He found this North Carolina Continental Line button. Here is the illustration next to the real thing for the website.
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