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AspireAgain t1_iyoqe3g wrote

Reply to comment by jeffh4 in [OC] Number of Union Army Units/Companies during the American Civil War. by BLAZENIOSZ

Given the existence of the "20th Maine", renowned for their part in defending Little Round Top at Gettysburg, at least 20.

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Slipper_Sleuth t1_iyoxzrf wrote

I’m sorry to jump on this post but your assessment may not be entirely true. War is deception. In World War Two we created the 10th mountain division. In fact we only had one; but didn’t want the axis powers to know how many others may be around.

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phryan t1_iypb3c5 wrote

While your statement is true, one of the great Allied intelligence accomplishments of WW2 was tracking the serial numbers on German equipment and estimating production output. Because the Germans didn't obfuscate serial numbers the statisticians working for the Allies were able to gauge German industrial output with incredible accuracy.

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AspireAgain t1_iyoymrv wrote

I appreciate the comment and it’s true what you say, but the map actually shows they had at least 40. As it turns out they didn’t get creative with the numbering system for their infantry regiments. As it turns out they had about 50 regimental sized units depending on how you count them. I think units like the 82nd Airborne and 101st names derive from their original associations (its been awhile so I'm not sure), but I do know in WWII in the Pacific the 3rd Fleet and 5th Fleet were comprised of the same ships, with the Fleet changing names depending upon whether Halsey or Spruance was in charge.

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Rogue100 t1_iz0w5px wrote

>As it turns out they had about 50 regimental sized units depending on how you count them.

I wonder how many of those were recomprised from the remnants of earlier regiments. A full sized regiment in the civil war was about a 1000 strong. 50k seems like a lot for a state like Maine to have provided to the war effort.

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MrRemoto t1_iypa1vg wrote

My dad's thesis was on the Maine 27th

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Rogue100 t1_iz0ujog wrote

The 20th Maine was a regiment though, where the heading here is units/companies. It's a bit unclear what's meant by 'unit' in the heading, which could mean a bunch of possible size groupings, but company refers to a smaller unit, of which a regiment would normally be composed of 10. So 20 regiments would mean about 200 companies.

Some more clarity on what unit sizes are actually being represented would probably make this graphic a lot easier to properly appreciate.

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