Coffee and The Civil War

#1: Post by **TomC** » May 16th, 2018, 6:18 am

Via Reddit, NPR shared a story about coffee during the Civil War, pretty fascinating bit of history. The NPR article dates to 2016. I especially liked this snippet:

"The word coffee was more present in these diaries than the words "war," "bullet," "cannon," "slavery," "mother" or even "Lincoln."

A lot of "unauthorized" trade occurred between the north and the south. The north always had coffee, the south always had tobacco.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/20 ... -salvation

#2: Post by **jbviau** » May 16th, 2018, 8:47 am

I remember that story! This part especially:

npr wrote:In 1859 Sharps Rifle Co. began to manufacture a carbine with a hand-cranked grinder built into the butt stock - or handle - of the rifle. Union soldiers would fill the stock with beans, grind them up, dump them out and use the grounds to cook the coffee. As the morning began, one Civil War diarist described a scene of "little campfires rapidly increasing to hundreds in numbers that would shoot up along the hills and plains." The encampment would buzz with the sound of thousands of grinders simultaneously crushing beans. Soon, tens of thousands of muckets (coffee pots) gurgled with fresh brew.

#3: Post by **BB Huell** » May 16th, 2018, 11:09 am

Enjoyed this very much - thank you for sharing.

Todd

#4: Post by **sweaner** » May 16th, 2018, 3:07 pm

jbviau wrote:I remember that story! This part especially:In 1859 Sharps Rifle Co. began to manufacture a carbine with a hand-cranked grinder built into the butt stock - or handle - of the rifle.

Here are some pics: https://www.google.com/search?q=In+1859 ... 31&bih=439

According to this http://www.guns.com/2016/02/05/the-coff ... 10-photos/ it was not really meant for coffee

I hear that Orphan Espresso is working on a modern version of this!

#5: Post by **yakster** » May 16th, 2018, 4:57 pm

When I was looking for information on roasting coffee over a campfire with my fireplace popcorn popper, I believe that I corresonded with a civil war reenactor who talked about cooling his coffee in muslin cloth after the roast.

#6: Post by **Tonefish** » May 16th, 2018, 6:22 pm

jbviau wrote:I remember that story! This part especially:

Yea, I saw one of those on Pawn Stars ... so cool!

Thanks for posting this Tom!
No surprise that barter beats battle. I'm guessing the tobacco came from here but the coffee was imported. I wonder if there was slavery involved in coffee production back then (Yup,.. thought so).

#7: Post by **Randy G.** » May 17th, 2018, 7:26 pm

The Rebel soldiers called the Union boys the Coffee Boilers. They would take an abandoned canteen and heat it over a fire to melt the solder and pack one of the halves in their pack. As soon as they stopped on a march for a break they would start a small fire to boil water in it. They would keep a small bag that had a mixture of ground coffee and sugar and make it cowboy style. It should come as no surprise that they preferred whole bean coffee since they could be sure that it was unadulterated. If there was no better method available, they would "grind" the beans with the rifle's butt.