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Hells Bells

So far here in the Keystone state, at least up here in the Allegheny Highlands, weather has been running six or seven weeks behind normal.

Can we have a 140th anniversary of the Draft Riots in New York?

Ping.

This is a perfect example of a reenactment site not suited in the event of rain. Two reenactments I organized I made sure there were gravel roads in and out of the site with enough planning for a disaster if it rained. A couple of years ago they had a reenactment at Shiloh where no allowance was made in the case it rained; it came a flood and some folks were a week getting out of the quagmire. Alternate plans in the event of rain are a must for large reenactments; those that were held and it rained were financial disasters for the organizers, especially those that depended upon the gate or visitor receipts for reimbursement of event expenses. It was not sunny every day of the Civil War and many battles were in adverse weather situations and were a contributing factor to the victory and defeat of many an army. Changing a date for a reenactment signals to me that these organizers were betting upon the weather being good and were not prepared for adverse weather. I wonder how many other aspects of the enactment are up in the air and left to chance?

Dammit. Damned rain.

Must be Pickett's revenge or sumpin' like that.....

The 125th Reenactment organizers (Gettysburg) were alleged to have run off with tens of thousands of dollars and didn't pay several vendors for services rendered for the 125th Reenactment. These same event organizers stiffed folks in North Georgia for thousands of dollars for the Chicamauga event that same year; many reenactors donated money to pay the locals that were cheated out of their money during and after that event. That event was rained on by a little hurricaine called Frederick. I am skeptical of any reenactment that is affected severely by inclement weather (especially if it is three weeks before the event).

Gee whiz, Pards; looks like "GettysBog Revisited"!

My plans for GB were pretty much already kiboshed by Daughter's Wedding planned for the following weekend.
Domestic Management admonished us; "Don't even THINK about going to Gettysburg!"

I would like to try and attend in August if a number of my Unit, the 3rdMaine were going, since I'm already registered - but in reality am not holding out high hopes of it.

This was going to be my "Last Hurrah" for "Big Elephant" events; they can be a lot of fun for sure, and some of my fondest memories of reenacting were formed at some of them.

The past few I have attended, however, have been a somewhat mixed experience;

Long lines at registration tables - temperatures exceeding 100 degrees with humidity to match... the focus of the event seemingly as much on enduring and staying alive through it as it was in experiencing the "Living History" of the event or giving the Spectators a good show for their money.

I'm all for "authenticity" - within reason - and it surely was not all easy going for the "Old Boys" of 1861-5.
But I draw the line at "really dying" 600 miles from home, or even being hospitalized with heat stroke or some other injury or illness for that matter.

Some of the Battle scenarios have been great and unique to the Big Elephants - like seeing a mounted Artillery Battery and team- drawn field pieces and limbers at a full gallop, or a Troop of mounted Cavalry at the Saber Charge...
Or having the bone-rattling pot-charges going off and the bark-mulch "shrapnel" falling all around you.... Marching onto the field to the rattle of thousands of rifles and the thunder of full Batteries of Artillery opening up, under our proud Battle Colors snapping in the breeze with the Field Music (that's US!) striking up a noble Martial air as clouds of pungent battle-smoke roll over us....

But on several occasions just when the mystical and cherished "Time Bubble" seems to envelop me again, I turn around...

And theres' the Commander on his horse, jabbering into a walkie-talkie radio. What's he up to - calling in an air strike?

Or the 50-ish balding guy with the ponderous beer-gut standing there in his Cowboy outfit, complete with boots, spurs, ten-gallon hat, crossed bandoliers and brace of ivory-handled revolvers in quick-draw holsters. Shucks; bring on the bloomin' Indians; let's ALL play!

Or the circa 400-lb. "Foreign Observer" we've all seen trapsing around reenactments with that utterly ludicrous costume of his.
You know; the red, white, and green striped 20" wide banner wrapped around his copious midsection, half an ostrich worth of plumes wafting in the breeze from his resplendant Napoleon Bonaparte hat, and at least a stone and a third of shiney bejeweled jingledy-clinks sparkling in the sun hung all over him.

One time he came lumbering through the 3rd Maine's Camp, and I remarked to my Messmates;
"Glory, Boys!!; Look yonder; The Circus has come to camp! Why, here's the Clown now; surely the elephants can't be far behind!"

Wife ("Aunt Mah'tha"), of course, was suitably appalled and embarrased (one of the more regular features of our 30+ year relationship), so I explained that if this bulbous buffoon were to come waddling unescorted through a camp of the Army of the Potomac in 1863, he'd have gotten a much more colorful and clamorous spontanious reception than that, you can be sure!

She does not reenact any more. The heat got to her about 3 Gettysburgs ago, and besides, none of her dresses fit any more.
Now, when (and if) I don the old "Union Blues" and take to the field (or Classroom for an "Educational Outreach" Detail), I go alone.
Just as well, I suppose; she'd be embarassed as hell if she knew what "Chuckie" (my aerosol can-of-cheese-loaded Rubber Chicken Mascot) and I were up to!

Another thing we see a lot of on the reenactment Battlefield - guys toting TV cameras or video cams about the size of a steamer trunk around on their shoulder in the middle of a pitched battle. I know that money is to be made on sales of the commemerative video of the event, but c'mon' can't they at least be a little subtle about it?

How weird is it to have to stop the "battle" for a Huey Medi-Vac helicoptor with a big red cross on the side to come whoppetty-whopping down between the lines of blue and gray to "dust off" a wounded or heat-struck combattant? I suppose after having all of those golf-carts whizzing in and out of the fray we get sort of used to it. I don't think anyone has an authentic civil War Army ambulance with horses to pull it, and the only authentic replica stretcher I've seen is the one I'm making - and it's not finished yet. There might be a couple with the Surgeon's displays in camp, but I've never seen one in the field, much less being used.

If I ever get kicked into the middle of next Wednesday by some particularly nervous horse (and it has nearly happened a couple of times) or some such unlucky event during a sham battle, I want my carcass to be carted off by uniformed Stretcher-Bearers on a regulation, period authentic stretcher, or at least a couple of muskets with a blanket rigged between them, as was commonly done during the Real McCoy.

Of course with predatory Trial Lawyers ever circling potential sources of litigation, that would never do with insurers I suppose, so we must continue to dodge golf-carts, ambulances, and Huey Dustoffs as we skirmish.

Since, I suppose, most if not all of those flagrant and absurd "Farbieisms" are edited out of the official videotape, a more authentic reenactment experience might be had by just ordering and watching one of these in the comfort of our own Home while burning a little sulfur insence, thus saving a lot of time, discomfort and expense.

But then there is the comaraderie around the campfire - if it isn't under water and mud in a torrential downpour, of course, and provided that someone remembered to bring the wood - and sleeping under the stars.

One Antietam we were seranaded all night long with the roaring deisel engine and "Beep-beep-beep..."ing backup alarm of a huge yellow bucket-loader that was trying to extricate vehicles out of a quagmire of mud someone had passed off as a "parking lot". Our tents lit up brilliantly with a lovely orange flash about once a second in time to the stobe lights on the roof of said earthmoving equipment which added a nearly psychedelic effect to the spectacle.

The next Morning the rain let up, the sun came out, and it was about 103 in the steam which rose like phantoms out of the Virginia mud.

The Heavy equipment gave us a break that night, but the Rebels in a nearby Camp let there be no doubt whatsoever as to what a good time they were having, regailing us to fife, drum, and enthusiastic song nearly until sunrise.
And the drunker they got, the louder they hollered, fifed, and hammered away on those drums.
I must give them credit, though; even when nearly too intoxicated to walk upright, they were pretty darned good Musicians!

Of course there were the times we were assigned camp sites close to "Hoople City", or "Sutler's Row"; Shoppers paradise to be sure, but something about the smell of frying kielbassa and cotton candy by day and the gasoline generators and halogen lights running through the night don't contribute much to the period ambiance.

I never plan on sleeping much at a big reenactment, anyway.

Of course it's always nice if I can rely on someone else to drive the 12 or 13 hours back to Maine when the fun is over, after getting only about an hour's semi-sleep (and that while lying "dead" on the field of Honor while the relatively quiet battle raged around my slowly bloating corpse) over the preceeding two or three days.

Who can forget the ubiquitous blue plastic "Porta-Sinks"?

After about the second day when it's 100+ (as it usually seems to be down there in the Summer) it's more like "Porta-STINKS"! It must be hot enough in one of those things to roast a turkey!

It's probably a good thing that most of us have the "Virginnie quickstep" to one extent or another after about the first day, as one would not want to be forced to linger by a prolonged bodily function any more than absolutely neccessary in one of those infernal contraptions!

And pity the poor Ladies in "hoops"! If those things don't cure the darlings from flouncing around camp as if they were in the middle of a High-Society Boston Ballroom, I don't know what will.

Don't you love rolling out of the dog-tent at about 0530 hours to the spectacle of six lines of about a hundred reenactors each lined up in the Morning mist at the only six porta-sweat-lodges within a half-mile of Camp?
... And the Skirmish Line of brave stalwarts moving slowly out through the tall grass behind them seeking a "target of opportunity"?

Yes; those big top events can be a lot of fun... but Iv'e found over the past few that I've been able to attend, that you'd best bring along with your trusty "kit" lots of fortitude, a fair amount of money, and a robust sense of humor!

(And don't plan on getting much sleep!)

"Uncle Jaque", Fifer
3rd Maine Vol. Inf.
Reg'tl. Field Music