All the new officers and soldiers had to undergo military training. Officers spent their evenings learning tactics and other military matters from books and field manuals. Soldiers spent their days learning to drill and shoot their weapons. Many quickly found that military life was not as romantic as they had pictured it. None realized that training could be the difference between life and death on a battlefield. So training suffered, but the Confederate army had the same problems with their militia units. When the war started, both sides had to depend on their militias.