Goofs for
Glory (1989) More at IMDbPro »

• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: In the opening scenes, when Shaw is seen marching beside his soldiers towards the Antietam battle, the rank insignia on his epaulets change from that of a captain (two bars) to that of a second lieutenant (no insignia within the epaulet borders) because it's a flashback.
  
  
• Continuity: When Shaw and Cabot are talking to General Harter about their transferring their men to combat command, Cabot has his hands on his lap when the camera faces him, but as the camera faces General Harter, Cabot's face is leaning on one hand.
  
  
• Factual errors: As Rawlins hands out the Enfield rifles, he calls out each one's serial number. Authentic Enfield rifles don't have serial numbers, but the reproductions do.
  
  

• Continuity: The Confederate soldier that Trip wrestles with gains a hat just before being clubbed.
  
  
• Continuity: Shadow on Shaw's face when he tells men he will tear up his cheque.
  
  
• Continuity: The position of the sun as Shaw inspects the beach before Fort Wagner.
  
  
• Errors in geography: During the final battle scene with the 54th forming up for the attack on Ft. Wagner on the beach, the ocean is to their left. This would mean that they were headed south instead of north. Fort Wagner was actually attacked from the south, therefore, the Atlantic Ocean should be on the right, not the left.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: After Sgt. Maj. John Rawlins talks to a group of children standing by a white fence, he walks away and you can briefly see a digital wrist watch on a child on the right side of the screen as they wave goodbye.
  
  
• Factual errors: When Rawlins is promoted to Sergeant-Major on the boats, he is called to front and centre. As he does so, he salutes, with his palm facing forwards, to the officers. However, in the next shot, his palm is facing down to the ground. In the film, Shaw asks who will carry the colors if they should fall during the assault on Fort Wagner. In reality, it was General Strong who asked this question, and Shaw was the one who volunteered to carry them.
  
  
• Continuity: When Major Forbes arrives on the scene when the 54th is starting a fight with the white Union soldiers, the corporal the Major calls out the rank changes from corporal to sergeant and back.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: During the assault on the fort, the bayonets are obviously rubber.
  
  
• Continuity: The sky changes from clear to overcast multiple times during the scene on the beach prior to the charge of Fort Wagner.
  
  
• Factual errors: In the scene the night before the big attack on Fort Wagner, you can to see the men's breath, which is unlikely for South Carolina in July.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Pvt. Trip is being brought before Cpt. Shaw for desertion, the beatings of the drum are off.
  
  
• Continuity: During the battle at James Island, within a second, and without orders to attach them, all of the 54th Regiment are shown with their bayonets mounted for the charge.
  
  
• Continuity: The length of Forbes facial hair when General Strong is giving his speech and then later the next day during battle.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Shaw is shot during the assault on Fort Wagner, a cable is clearly seen trailing from his leg as he falls to the sand. The director points this out in the UK DVD version of the movie.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: When the African-American children's choir sings right before the burning of the town, the choir sings "My Country 'Tis of Thee." The scene takes place in 1863; these lyrics date to 1831.
  
  
• Factual errors: Robert Gould Shaw was the one responsible for inspiring his troops to refuse a lesser pay.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: The gun that Thomas hits a Confederate soldier with bends right before he is stabbed in the final attack.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: As the 54th Massachusetts is preparing for battle at James Island, Rawlins shouts to the solders "All right men, form a firing line! Over here!", but he is not speaking.
  
  
• Continuity: When Shaw, is wounded at the battle of Antietam, he crawls up against a dead soldier. When Rawlins finds him, he is lying next to a completely different man, though neither is supposed to have moved.
  
  
• Anachronisms: As the 54th march through town in South Carolina, modern tourists appear briefly in the background.
  
  
• Anachronisms: When the 54th is first shown marching past a mansion in Georgia, there is a square concrete curb visible on the left side of the road (to the soldiers' right).
  
  
• Continuity: At James Island, Thomas' bayonet sticks out of the confederate soldier's chest, with Thomas right behind him. In the next shot of the soldier's back, there is no wound, bayonet, rifle, or Thomas.
  
  
• Continuity: During the scene where they are first mustering in, the buckle on Colonel Shaw's kepi moves from the right side of the chin strap to the center, and back again several times.
  
  
• Anachronisms: At one point Shaw tells Sergeant Major Mulcahy "at ease." During the Civil War this command did not exist. The command would have been "rest" or "in place rest."
  
  
• Factual errors: The film depicts the 54th Masachusetts Infantry Regiment training through the Christmas holidays of 1862 (after the September 1862 Battle of Antietam), but the real 54th Massachusetts did not organize until March 1863, just four months before attacking Fort Wagner in the climactic scene.
  
  
• Factual errors: Shaw did not receive the request to be Colonel of the 54th while at a party in Boston, nor did he accept immediately. In fact, he refused the command at least twice, feeling himself unworthy. It was only after some convinving by his friend (and the man who would later marry Shaw's sister) Charles Russell Lowell, commander of the 2nd Massachusetts Cavalry, he would accept the command. Lowell's own command was unique in that 5 companies of Californians (known as the California Battalion) served in it.
  
  
• Factual errors: The Color Sergeant of the 54th Mass. was a son of Frederick Douglass.
  
  
• Factual errors: The film depicts the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry training through the Christmas holidays of 1862 (after the September 1862 Battle of Antietam). But the real 54th Massachusetts did not organize until March 1863, and it was engaged in its first battle on James Island, South Carolina, on July 16, 1863, and then Fort Wagner (the final battle in the film) on July 18, 1863. The 54th went on to fight at Olustee, Florida (February 20, 1864); Honey Hill, South Carolina (November 30, 1864); and Boykin's Mill, South Carolina (April 18, 1865).
  
  
• Factual errors: Flogging was banned in the Union Army in 1861. Pvt. Trip would not have been whipped, at least not by someone as by-the-book as Colonel Shaw; however, there were harsh punishments, such as being "spread eagled" on the spare wheel of an artillery limber, which often broke the man's back.
  
  
• Factual errors: The manner in which Colonel Shaw dies in the movie is based on fact. His final words were "Forward, Fifty-fourth!" before he was shot several times in the chest. The film depicts him falling on the parapet; in fact, he made it to the top, and his body fell into the fort.
  
  
• Factual errors: In the movie, it is claimed that "over half" of the regiment was lost during the assault on Fort Wagner. However, official records state that the 54th sustained 272 casualties, which is closer to 40%. Of these casualties, only 116 were fatalities, just under one fifth of the men to storm the fort. If the 156 soldiers that were captured are included, it would bring the total to "over half". In formal military terms, though, "casualties" include captured soldiers. In any event, by most standards, including those of the Civil War, these are heavy casualties and the regiment was widely viewed as having performed bravely indeed.
  
  
• Factual errors: In the movie, Shaw is surprised when the men refuse pay that was reduced because they are a "colored" regiment (though he eventually joins them in their refusal). In reality, the refusal was his idea, and he encouraged them to do it.
  
  
• Factual errors: In one scene, a Union regimental band plays "The Bonnie Blue Flag". This was a Confederate song. No Union regimental band would have played it.
  
  
• Anachronisms: In the scene where the 54th Massachusetts has just marched past the Southern plantation, a group of slave children run out to wave at them. After being greeted by Undertaker, they wave. One of the slave children has a digital watch on his hand.
  
  

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