I think I lost my mind...again

Rusk County Avengers

Captain
Muster Stunt Master Stones River / Franklin 2022
Joined
Apr 8, 2018
Location
Coffeeville, TX
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A close friend of mine, as well as Chaplain of our TX SCV brigade's color guard asked me to come out to his deer lease and help him rebuild the roads that have suffered badly from erosion. The property having a good size Mountain in the middle of it.

For the past year we've talked about getting the color guard, which many fancy themselves reenactors but are not by a long shot, (que the song Man of Constant Sorrow song for this 2nd Sergeant) and have a weekend of camping, and drilling as well as invite local area reenactors to join in on the fun so reality and endeavors to do better can set in for some our belligerent color guard members who have no concept of reenacting, or what CW soldiers look like.

Well today we got to it and I climbed to the top of the mountain for jolly's (the nutcase of Thayer's Approach ain't gained good sense yet) and getting to the top and noticing the old road we're rebuilding snakes its way up there, and the idea sunk in...

So my Chaplain friend had already been crying for this place, which he's the only person leasing for the camp out, and now is gonna check with the landowner and see if he'll allow us to take excess dirt and build earthworks for some of the Mountain Howitzers folks around here camp up there CW style for a weekend of drill and shenanigans. (I know my ambition to buy a 6-pounder tube and build the carriage for it has intensified. As well as my long held desire for a Tredegar 2.25in Mountain Rifle.)

I'm curious about everyone's thoughts. We're a long way from Lookout Mountain but I get those vibes from this place! We might could get twenty guys most, and I'm thinking a skirmish may be needed on top of the drilling. Along with lots of marching...

Plus the place is only three or four miles from an original Confederate training camp in Coffeeville, TX!

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Wonderful place indeed. Except after dark...

There's a few old posers who think they're reenactors and are belligerent about it. Them being older, the fact I've reenacted for 15 years means nothing as its impossible that me or others in the same boat could know a thing, and I'm constantly put down by them and their supposed superior knowledge gained by being older.

I can't wait to send those jacka**es out on picket duty on top of that mountain at 2am....
 
@Rusk County Avengers ,

Looks like a great place to recreate some "magic moments!" The whole place, from what you picture above, looks like you could actually step back in time to the Civil War period.

I wish you the best with this idea and hope you bring it off.

Sincerely,
Unionblue

Thanks. I hope we'll be allowed to use excess dirt to build an earthen artillery battery on the top. It may be a bit inauthentic, (not using dirt on top with ditches in front of the earthworks, no water source, etc.), but I have a lot of ideas.

Morning roll call with a possible flag raising to the sound of the bugle, catch and court martial a deserter or two, heck I'm thinking of calling a close friend who collect cars and wagons to see if a loan of a buckboard or surrey can be arranged, (if I find someone with horses that has experience driving a wagon), so we can bring out a senior officer on an inspection tour.

A full scale reenactment is probably out of the question. But a weekend with 20 or 30 guys just drilling and having fun getting ready for other reenactments? I think the place beyond perfect. Even if we can't use the mountain there's a few hundred acres of woods and small fields to set up camp in.

Just a little outpost or training camp scenario. Even if there's a little farbyness here and there I think a blast of a weekend can be arranged.
 
Heck we have a lot of guys who do Mountain Man Rendezvous' and the place has me thinking we could have fun doing that.

I stumbled onto a grand canvas for fun!
 
Looks like a great place to just sit, or to do what you're suggesting. I'm an ignorant west coast Canadian, so what's a deer lease ?

Its basically a piece of private land rented out to deer hunters. Sometimes strictly deer hunting, other times deer hunting on top of anything else you want to do to improve the property.
 
Looks like a wonderful place. Forgive me if I missed out on something, but, in general terms, where is this? Northeast Texas, Southeast Oklahoma, Southwest Arkansas perhaps?
 
Excepting far west Texas, the State is generally flat, East Texas swampy, but where I took these photos is a line of ridges formed eons ago when the only natural lake in Texas, Caddo Lake, was formed.

Its tiny compared to real mountain ranges, but its all we got!
 
Some of the things you can do with a very small group of reenactors are scenarios where one side knows how to react, and the point is to get the other side engaged. For instance, if you've got a prepared position, you could detail off 2 or 3 guys to act as sharpshooters to fire on your position. They have orders to fade away, regardless of the response, but the defenders don't know that. In a similar way, an OPFOR could harass a marching column. Make it deploy, then fade away - just don't get caught. Or you could arrange the capture of a local Federal sympathizer, or ambush a lone reputed sympathizer as in Twain's "Private History." The important thing is that the OPFOR reacts according to orders and doesn't let it turn into a force-on-force tactical. I wrote up some reusable scenarios about 10 years ago. If I can find them, I'll pop you a note.
 
Some of the things you can do with a very small group of reenactors are scenarios where one side knows how to react, and the point is to get the other side engaged. For instance, if you've got a prepared position, you could detail off 2 or 3 guys to act as sharpshooters to fire on your position. They have orders to fade away, regardless of the response, but the defenders don't know that. In a similar way, an OPFOR could harass a marching column. Make it deploy, then fade away - just don't get caught. Or you could arrange the capture of a local Federal sympathizer, or ambush a lone reputed sympathizer as in Twain's "Private History." The important thing is that the OPFOR reacts according to orders and doesn't let it turn into a force-on-force tactical. I wrote up some reusable scenarios about 10 years ago. If I can find them, I'll pop you a note.

So many good ideas I didn't think of...

Another I've thought of, and this could be used to switch things around another year, have everyone go Federal, (as I type that I hear a lot of SCV screams of agony in my head that makes me want to do it more lol, I'm a good member), and do patrols along the roads I'm rebuilding, with Rebel sympathizers/bushwhackers on the prowl.

It'd be perfect for a signal station on top, have two or three guys go Federal and a Confederate detail dispatched to take it.

Heck if I could get mules or horses out, I could arrange for a farmer's wagon coming to camp to sell food and contraband, (funny story in Footprints of a Regiment inspiring that).

The possibilities for a small non public event are endless!
 
I've been scratching my head, are there any instances of isolated earthen batteries on top such hard to take positions?

I'm vaguely remembering that there was, I just can't recall for certain.
 
So many good ideas I didn't think of...

Another I've thought of, and this could be used to switch things around another year, have everyone go Federal, (as I type that I hear a lot of SCV screams of agony in my head that makes me want to do it more lol, I'm a good member), and do patrols along the roads I'm rebuilding, with Rebel sympathizers/bushwhackers on the prowl.

It'd be perfect for a signal station on top, have two or three guys go Federal and a Confederate detail dispatched to take it.

Heck if I could get mules or horses out, I could arrange for a farmer's wagon coming to camp to sell food and contraband, (funny story in Footprints of a Regiment inspiring that).

The possibilities for a small non public event are endless!
Yeah - that's the sort of scenario I mean! Events that are culled from regimental histories or letters, etc. I like the "taking the signal post" scenario: you can give the outnumbered defenders several choices - they can be run off, surrender or die in place - but they're going to lose the position. They can put up a spirited defense or run like rabbits. It's up to them. Just don't tell the attackers. They need to plan and execute the plan.
 
Yeah - that's the sort of scenario I mean! Events that are culled from regimental histories or letters, etc. I like the "taking the signal post" scenario: you can give the outnumbered defenders several choices - they can be run off, surrender or die in place - but they're going to lose the position. They can put up a spirited defense or run like rabbits. It's up to them. Just don't tell the attackers. They need to plan and execute the plan.

Surrender is the absolute best option.

They get to be marched off--as in to a prison camp--and the guys who complained about marching to the top of the hill get to turn around and march down it escorting them.

I've never really tried to have a super accurate kit for my Union impression, I've worn the same blue shell jacket for 15 years, and as the officers at events tend to be a bunch of jerks, I've had to go Union at what few events I've been able to get out to for the past 3 or 4 years. Hence why I've been debating getting a proper Union sack coat.

If this happens, I think I'll keep using my Union shell jacket, but with Signal Corps insignia. That old farby shell jacket just won't wear out!
 
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