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Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Birdsboro, PA 2008 - Part 5 - The Battle


After lunch the boys had a battle. First all the colonists formed up in the field behind our tents, and the coordinators came around in their orange shirts and checked all the guns for safety.



While the calvary looked on to make sure their troops were doing as they were told.



The First New Hampshire had a small turn out of guys this time, only four! But they joined up with some other small groups and all together they were rearing to go battle some British!



There was actually a strong showing of colonists overall. Because this was a Continental Line event, we saw groups all the way from Virginia. Usually we don't see them at the events we do, because it's too far for them to travel to our events and we don't travel to theirs (though we will be doing another Continental Line event in VA this year). So it was neat to see colonist groups from NH to VA, and all points in between.



After the safety checks, it became just like the modern military, hurry up and wait.

They brought their guns up ...



Then they brought their guns down ...



Then they finally headed off to battle.



Oh and it wouldn't be a post about the Daniel Boone experience without mentioning some more about the mud! Here's a bit of what our captain had to say about it:

Just a quick note to intrepid few that made the trip to Boons. Never in all my years have I ever seen that much deep mud. Flanders field in France was the only one that could have surpassed it.

I literally had 2 inches of red clay mud caked on the bottom of my petticoat. Lindsay took this picture for me as we were headed out to watch the battle.



The battle started with some fighting going on around this little house. I didn't get any pictures of that part, because we decided to set ourselves down in front of the lower field to make sure we could get some good pictures and videos of the guys.



The colonists pushed the British past the house and into the lower field.



I got some pictures and video of a group of loyalists, who were the first into the field, but I wasn't sure who they were, so I asked if anyone knew when I posted the video on YouTube. I got a response from lgrzerostr:

It's the Jagers!! loyal to King and Country! HUZZA!! (there are umlauts over that a in Jager)Signed "a happy lobsterback"







Eventually all the British moved down into the lower field and they were handing out some good volleys to the colonists.





The Indians joined in the battle and were seen ducking in and out of the bushes, putting up a good fight.



Once the colonists were in the field completely, our guys were right up front, which was great. Most times I have a hard time getting good pictures of them because they always seem to be towards the back side of the field. Our captain had a few things to say about the battle as well.

We also had a battle, that turned out well. We captured a gun position, that went over well with the attending British commander. After the battle he conceded he never expected that to happen. It was done safely and swiftly. Stunned would be a good explanation.

Unfortunately I missed that part, so I don't have any pictures of it, but I did get a fun series of pictures that shows each step of them lowering their guns to shoot at the British across the field.





















And here is a picture of what they were shooting at.



I also was able to capture a few videos of the action:





After a short break ...



The boys started to move forward.







Pushing the British even farther back ...





Overall it was a great battle, probably one of the better ones I have seen. They were nice and close to the audience in the field and we really got a good view of all the action.

To see all the photos from the Saturday battle, click here.

Believe me yours faithfully,
Rachel

Saturday, May 24, 2008

Birdsboro, PA 2008 - Part 4 - Lunch is Served


I know, I know you are asking yourself by now "When is she ever going to quit talking about the mud?" Well let me tell you, we could not get away from that stuff while we were there, so don't go thinking you're going to get away from it here. It was dang muddy. It was messy and slimy and no fun at all. Alright, so certainly it could have been worse, much much worse:



But it also could have been better much much better:



But we did our best to protect ourselves. The boots came in handy and really finished off the ensemble don't you think?




Lori started off the day with shoes, but she gave up and just decided to go with the all natural look.



And hey with mud like this we figured we could make a little money for the regiment by selling tickets for mud bathes just like those high falootin' salons in New York City.



What do you think?



Well we ended up only having one taker on our offer, and really we weren't too keen on letting her stay.



So we gave up on the whole endeavor and moved on to the next thing on our to do list.



Getting lunch ready!! A woman's work is never done. Pretty much as soon as breakfast is over, we move on to preparing for lunch. Debbie made us a lovely pie. And yes she is rolling it out with a bottle of Pam, and no she didn't want me to get that on camera (sorry Debbie!!), but if you are curious as to why she is, you may recall from my last post that we found we were missing quite a few kitchen necessities when we arrived here. A rolling pin was one of them! In this photo from left to right we have Debbie, Kitty, Lindsay, and Lori. Lindsay really put in a lot of time helping us in the kitchen this weekend. It is always appreciated to have an extra set of hands!!



Baking a pie over a fire is truly an art form. Sometimes it works really well and sometimes you get a burnt pie. This time it looks like it worked really well for Debbie.



Getting the pie out of the cast iron pan is always difficult as well because everything is extremely hot and you don't want to leave it in there because it will just keep cooking even off the fire. It makes the job a lot harder when the only gloves you have to work with are thin work gloves or one left-handed thick glove. (Don't even ask us where the right handed one ended up!) But Debbie's a pro and she got it out of there and we got to eat her beautiful and yummy pie as a prize.




Lori made us a very lovely fruit salad to go along with her lunch, and Kitty cut up some more fruit for a compote to go with dinner.



Once all the preparing was done, it was safe for me to wander around the grounds for a bit. In my travels I happened upon Jeffrey and Kolby hanging out under a tree.






They were sitting there chit chatting and chewing on grass. I could not for the life of me tell you why they were doing this, but I can tell you that it was probably one of the cutest things I have seen to date.





Now when you get to look at and take pictures of a scene like this one, well this just makes the entire weekend worth while, mud and all.



I left the boys to continue on with their grass chewing and I wandered over to the Sutlers. This event probably had the most Sutlers I have ever seen. It was quite exciting. There were two seperate rows of Sutlers, and each row had Sutlers on both sides, so really four rows of Sutlers! This is a peek in just one of the tents.



Oh and here's another view that makes the whole weekend worthwhile (sorry guys).



After my travels I came back to the tent for a wonderfully yummy lunch. Lori made us a stew that had beef, turnips, beets, potatoes, and carrots. Usually I don't like turnips and beets, but I thought they were so yummy in her stew!! Maybe I really do like them and I just never knew it!



To see all the pictures from this part of the day, click here.

Next up will be pictures and videos of our brave men in battle!

Believe me yours faithfully,
Rachel