pocket augur

[Branson]

Has anybody seen one of these?  Apparently they were issued during the Civil War especially for the building of "blanket boats."  I've attached a photo of an assembled blanket boat, and another of lashed together blanket boats ferrying a cannon and limber.   I found them pretty astonishing.

[lzenglish]

I have one that is very similar, if yours unscrews, and the bit stores inside the round case? But, I have never heard of, or seen a blanket boat, tell us more!

Wayne

[1930]

Thats neat Branson, thanks for the pics

[anglesmith]

One those and a folding draw knife in your kit and you be ready any number of rivers. Note that is exactly same way they made chicken (stick) cages in that time.
Graeme

[Papaw]

As a photographer, I just am thrilled by this photo- a tintype or even a  daguerreotype.
 

[Branson]

I have one that is very similar, if yours unscrews, and the bit stores inside the round case? But, I have never heard of, or seen a blanket boat, tell us more!
Wayne

I'll get to the more later, if it won't bore people.  I only *wish* the one in the picture was mine!  I believe the one in the picture works like yours.  One end appears to unscrews.  I have never seen one in person, never seen another picture, for that matter.

[Branson]

One those and a folding draw knife in your kit and you be ready any number of rivers. Note that is exactly same way they made chicken (stick) cages in that time.
Graeme

Just so!   And thanks for pointing out the chicken cages!  I knew the frames looked familiar! 

[Branson]

As a photographer, I just am thrilled by this photo- a tintype or even a  daguerreotype.
 

It's a photograph from the 1860s.  I found it in the Library of Congress online files.  I spent a lot of time last year going through the over 7,000 pictures there, looking for ... well, looking for everything I could find that touched on artificers and their work and tools.  There really isn't much, as the photographers seemed most interested in taking pictures of officers and dead soldiers.  If memory serves, this pic was not one of those taken by Brady.

One of my favorite pics shows a field expedient replacement of the tongue of a limber cart, certainly made by a Union artificer.   There are two traveling forges in the picture attached.  The near one is as issued, but the tongue on the back limber has been replaced with a sapling, bark still on, just cut to length and trimmed to fit.

[Branson]

quote>But, I have never heard of, or seen a blanket boat, tell us more!
Wayne

The URL below is for Herman Haupt's book, Military Bridges.  The relevant pages for blanket boats begins on page 99.  I thought it better to post the URL than to attach those six or seven pages to this post.

http://books.google.com/books?id=LfH6cJ7I8PwC&pg=PA102&dq=%22blanket+boats%22&hl=en&ei=dT1xTI_-G8WqlAfalq2mDw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CDMQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22blanket%20boats%22&f=false

As the earlier post showed, assembling the blanket boats as a raft, you could transport just about anything -- lumber, men, horses, wagons, and even cannon.  Note in the first pic here the fellow in the foreground wearing the white smock.  It's the only known photo of anybody actually using one of these; they're called stable frocks, and seem to have been generally useless...

[Branson]

>As a photographer, I just am thrilled by this photo- a tintype or even a  daguerreotype.

You might like this one, too.  Not as clear as it might be, but here's a fellow holding and apparently studying a pocket augur.

[scottg]

Hey that is a Gedge pattern auger bit!
See the curved cutting lips on the end?  This will drill an angled hole with ease!
 Regular augers won't for crap. They will be happy to drill a hole just a little off from straight, to mess you up, but a serious angle they just won't do.  Gedge was designed for it.
 
   This blanket boat thing has my mind on fire!! I never saw them before, are you kidding?
Cannons??? Whoo hooo!!
  yours Scott

[Branson]

Hey that is a Gedge pattern auger bit!
See the curved cutting lips on the end?  This will drill an angled hole with ease!
 Regular augers won't for crap. They will be happy to drill a hole just a little off from straight, to mess you up, but a serious angle they just won't do.  Gedge was designed for it.   
   This blanket boat thing has my mind on fire!! I never saw them before, are you kidding?
Cannons??? Whoo hooo!!
  yours Scott

I can't make it out very well.  Is it a Gedge?!   Maybe we can coerce Wayne into taking a picture of his (hint) -- there can't be too many variations of this augur.

It seems they could transport just about anything.  Haupt wrote that with three rafts of 15 boat apiece could transport 10,000 soldiers across a 600 foot wide stream in an hour.    Here are some more photos.  By the way, these pics were taken in Virginia, and all the supply depot buildings were put together from lumber shipped  down by the Union Army.  Talk about logistics...

[Aunt Phil]

Really hate to throw cold water on this adventure in military yachting, but I'm thinking blanket boat is a serious misnomer for a couple reasons. 

The first would be the size of the frame in comparison to the size of issue blankets in the War of Northern Aggression.

Second would be the proclivity of a wool blanket to absorb water and allow water to pass.  Now that same frame covered with readily available cotton would quickly become 99% waterproof in a couple minutes due to the property of cotton swelling when exposed to water.

As to the man wearing the white smock, obviously he's an Engineering Officer sent from Washington to instruct and expedite the building of the boats.  Such men were generally put in high visibility clothing to make them more easily identifiable as sniper targets.  Snipers were generally told to not shoot the white coat because leaving him alive to direct operations was a far greater loss to his side in the conflict.  This tradition with Engineering Officers has continued to this day in the Military.

[lzenglish]

Read reply #8, on page 99, and your cold water may warm up a bit Aunt Phil! They used "Rubber Blankets", up to 5 foot x 7 foot in size. Kinda like a poncho liner of the day, I guess.

Wayne

[Branson]

Really hate to throw cold water on this adventure in military yachting, but I'm thinking blanket boat is a serious misnomer for a couple reasons.
The first would be the size of the frame in comparison to the size of issue blankets in the War of Northern Aggression.  Second would be the proclivity of a wool blanket to absorb water and allow water to pass.  Now that same frame covered with readily available cotton would quickly become 99% waterproof in a couple minutes due to the property of cotton swelling when exposed to water.

Um, it's not my name for the boat; it's the Union Army designation, as used by General Haupt.  Aside from the photographic evidence that they did indeed float -- men, timber, and even a 12 pound cannon with limber, the article called a blanket was a rubber "blanket" designed specifically for this use. 

For whatever reason the fellow in front wore it, it's still a regulation army stable frock.  See attached 1866 photo (hand colored)