A very good condition stamped metal 18^th Corps badge with T-bar back and red paint accents indicating the 1^st Division. The corps was officially created Dec. 24, 1862, and composed of troops serving in North Carolina, eventually comprising seven divisions, and part of the Department of North Carolina to August 1863. At that point it was reorganized and largely composed of troops transferred from the 7^th and 9^th Corps. It was then assigned to the Department of Virginia and North Carolina and in Spring 1864 became part of Butler’s Army of the James in the unsuccessful Bermuda Hundred Campaign, attempting to sever the lines between Richmond and Petersburg, and even capture the latter city, later taking part in the fighting on the Petersburg front. The corps was discontinued in December 1864 and its troops segregated, the white troops going into the 24^th Corps and the black into the 25^th Corps.

The badge is the cross with foliate sides officially by the corps under command of W.F. Smith on June 7, 1864, and has two small triangles set into the upper and lower arms that were filled with red paint, also used along the edges of the cross, certainly to indicate the first division. The triangles apparently reflect a somewhat complicated system where division commanders and staff had a large triangle in the center of the cross, and the corps commander and staff had two, superimposed, effectively a six-pointed star, this among other variations and insignia for cavalry and artillery assigned to the corps, etc. The triangles and the star seem to have drawn the attention of commercial manufacturers who did not know, or perhaps care, about the fine points in their usage on the badge and they seem to have employed them as standard or decorative elements of the badge, with some commercial badges using a six-pointed star in the middle of the cross, others simplifying it to a five-pointed star, etc., and this maker using two separate triangles in the arms of the cross rather than one or combining two to form a star.

The condition is very good. The T-bar pin is in place on the reverse. There are no bends, crack, or breaks. The red paint shows some losses and corrosion, but conveys the color.   [sr][ph:L]

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