Probably the one pet peeve of mine are those who wear friction primers in their hats. Personally, I cannot imagine artillerists wasting time around their guns picking up spent primers to stick into their hats.

Roy Queen  

--Last edited by roy on 2007-10-09 11:50:30 --

Terre, when it comes to those little dogs, I'll volunteer to stir that pot.  If you need another one, you can borrow my stick to do the whacking.

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ChrisOwens wrote : Here are a few of mine. -Tight single sound volleys in battle along with never turning your back to the enemy. Lets get real, in a battle with real bullets flying you didn’t care how crisp your volley was or that the enemy saw your back for 10 seconds while you reformed the line.

I can agree with you on the back to the enemy statement.. Sometimes it is quicker to just turn and run and reform than to walk backwards.. At a recent event it was easier to disperse the company and reform on a Cpl in the rear of our support company than to try to back away.

But as to the tight volleys, one thing that we need to remember is these guys drilled for most of the day to where they would perform like clockwork.  So one can assume that they are used to the cadence of their officer and so the firing will be crisp until they become engaged and then it may break down.  

You read accounts of units being stunned by a sheet of flame erupting in front of them. An example might be the 8th NY at Cross Keys.  Maybe even Sharpsburg at the Sunken Road where they waited for the Federals to advance.  Do I think that every volley fired was crisp.. nope.  But I think the initial ones may have been more so than ones later in the fight.

The Rufus Dawes book on the Iron Brigade (In Service with the 6th) has some neat passages about hearing repeated volley fires from a Regiment during a battle ONLY at South Mountain from the 2nd Wisconsin. All other times one volley, then the command Fire By File, which meant the men fired as fast as they could on their own crook without regard to whom had fired to their right.

So yes to one crisp volley.....after that it was steel shot on a skillet musketry.

Just to clear that up I didn't mean that you should never have a tight volley. Just not one after the other, after the other, just like a contest.  

The most annoying thing I heard at a reenactment:

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I don't know anything about the 32nd Pawtucket.  I'm just here to keep the beer cold.

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Vamick wrote : how about artillery 'batterys' that "load by detail" "prepare toooo prepare!" "proceed' 'reseed' whos got tha seed?? dry sponge! "prepare to proceed to prepare!!"  If these men worked a gun that way in actual CW combat they'd be wiped out! there were drills that taught men their positions and then there was combat but I suppose reading Barry French and Hunt, or knowing which gun is in position #1 is askin way too much Gary Mitchell 1st Stuart horse artillery

I agree, another thing that I just shake my head at. Here in the West everytime you see a new gun crew,they all show up wanting to be Washington Artillery. That red on the pants etc. Last time I looked can't everyone be from La.  

Always
Doug Thomas
Lyons Battery CS
Kentucky

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The most annoying thing I heard at a reenactment Quote :I don't know anything about the 32nd Pawtucket.  I'm just here to keep the beer cold.

Hey John,

That sounds like something I said!    

I have learned to put the blinders on, but my favorite reenactorism is the 2 beer sized stainless steel mucket (complete with hinged lid to keep debris out).    

Oh yeah, I'm a mainstreamer myself, so this post isn't meant to ruffle any feathers.  

Gregg Hensley
22nd NCST Company K
The McDowell Boys  

--Last edited by Gregg Hensley on 2007-11-17 21:02:36 --

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Gregg Hensley wrote : my favorite reenactorism is the 2 beer sized stainless steel mucket

Gregg,

I know a guy who owns one of these muckets and swears by it. Funny, he works in a metal shop and had the thing chemically blackened. It makes it just a little harder to rag him about the "Farby" mucket.

My personal favorite reenactorisms are "Fire at Will" and "Load and Hold".

This is, by far, the longest running thread on the Common Ground Forum. We may never run out of things to talk about!

Yeah Bill.  Joey21stga (Joseph Gangler) started this thread, but I haven't seen him on here in a long time  .

This is off topic, but blame it on Bill. Something worth reproducing would be the really large dipper that is more wide than it is talk. Several originals in the 2-quart range come to mind, and the only repop I have seen was, well, of a non rusting food service grade material. It watered a beagle well.

Pardon me for any typos, as I was blinded by Bill's gleaming musket barrel yesterday in G'burg, but in self defense I removed my hat to shift a little glare in his direction.  

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Charles Heath wrote : Pardon me for any typos, as I was blinded by Bill's gleaming musket barrel yesterday in G'burg, but in self defense I removed my hat to shift a little glare in his direction.

Charles,

That brings me to the reenactorism that really gets my goat, dirty, rusty, poorly maintained weapons. People all across the Hobby are guilty of this crime against authenticity. You can hide the cooler in your tent, but sooner or later, everybody is going to see your weapon. I've also had young men in perfect kits, who wouldn't think of sleeping in a tent, but failed my weapons inspection. I've had them stand there with a straight face and tell me the "real" soldiers didn't clean their rifles while on campaign. If "real" soldiers don't clean anything else, they clean their firearms.

I know I'm a little anal when it comes to maintenance of my own weapons, but there is really no excuse for showing up at an event with a dirty, rusty weapon. Way too many people think that if they get the worst of the crud out of the barrel, that should be all that's required. Sad to say, too many inspectors think the exact same thing. They listen for the ping of the ramrod and check the half cock and that's about it. Of course, these people can't figure out why their weapons start misfiring after about five or ten rounds.

I've had people tell me they couldn't get the exterior of their weapons clean and shiney using period methods. Federal soldiers had access to emery powder from the Sutlers and every solder had access to wood ash, water, and a rag. That's all that's required to shine a weapon's bright metal parts.  

Well maintained weapons are also a safety issue. A hammer that doesn't strike the cone dead center and flush is much more likely to have problems with caps breaking up. So, each of us has a reason to be concerned about the weapon of the guy standing next to us in line.        

Bill,

If it was Farbie to clean your weapon on campaign then I would be the biggest Farb of them all.  I keep my weapons as clean as I can just on the fact that I spent so much money buying it in the first place.   You sure can tell that the people who say the real soldier did not clean their weapons in the field were never in the real Armed Services.   I really don't want to know how much time I spent cleaning my M-16 over the four years I was in the Army.  

Mark

"The military superiority of his veterans, trained as they were to his own ideal of 'a ragged soldier and a bright musket,' may be held to explain his victories over superior numbers..."

Said of Johann Tzerclaes, Graf von Tilly (1559-1632 -- KIA at the crossing of the Lech by Gustav Adolf)

Mike,

I'm always humbled at the knowledge you retain in your grey cells.      

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hendrickms24 wrote :   You sure can tell that the people who say the real soldier did not clean their weapons in the field were never in the real Armed Services.

Mark,

I'm a firm believer that some things in the military never change. I can picture a Centurion inspecting some poor Legionair's sword and shield, finding them unacceptable and then holding a pointed discussion concerning the possible legitimacy of the children in the Legionair's extended family.  

Early in the Civil War, I can amagine there was a lot of laxity, but time and experience would change that pretty damn quick.