John,

The C-Ville flag is an ANV First Bunting issue flag from the Richmond Depot, the first ANV flags to bear 13 stars.

With regards to the phrase, "shot to pieces," or even "shot to shreds," I take those with big grains of salt and that comes from many years of researching CS flags. I have seen such flags that were claimed in reports as being in that states that were not that badly damaged at all. A few holes here and there but not "to pieces" or "in shreds." Even the OR reports have human hyperbole to sort through.

On the flip side of that I have seen flags that were indeed claimed to have been damaged badly and indeed are. The flag of the 1st Battalion of Hilliard's Alabama Legion comes to mind. In his report in the OR the commander stated that some 80 plus bullet holes were in the folds of the flag. That flag is in Memorial Hall in New Orleans and the first time I saw it years ago I counted the holes and they matched up pretty close.

Bullets and artillery fragments tear into flags leaving bits of the thread hanging loose. Beware of any bug damage however - those holes are even all the way around as the bugs eat the threads as well.

Also hurting the modern flag historians is the phrase, "carried through the war," about a certain flag. The flag of the 37th Alabama Infantry is a Mobile Depot battle flag and that pattern did not come into existence until October 1863 and yet the placard for the flag states "carried through the war," from the unit's inception much earlier.

Lastly, flag history is sometimes transposed from one flag to another which makes it problematic today. The Mobile Depot flag of the 22nd Tennessee Cavalry is in the Pink Palace Museum in Memphis and its placard states that it was made by some ladies in Mississippi in 1862. As this pattern, again, did not exist before October 1863, and we know that Forrest's corps did not get them until July 1864, what they have done is transpose the history of an earlier flag of the regiment, probably a First National, onto the flag from 1864.

Welcome to the wonderful world of flag history! Full of potholes, bad information, etc. but sometimes the pot of gold as well.

greg Biggs