Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

[Spinster]

Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

I have seen a cabin begin to rise in the wilderness in a short morning, built of pulled up logs and hacked deadfall, by two long legged men with axes.

I have seen a fine Bloodhound find new purpose in life, doing the work God created her to do.

I have stood under a sudden waterfall in a Howling Wilderness, good for bathing and for drinking, tumbling down weathered rocks.

I have heard distant cannon boom through the night, and wild hogs snort and snuffle near by.

I have seen men weep because they had fallen out, unable to go another step, held their hands and told them they were home.

I have seen a yoke of four oxen, a blue wagon, and a grizzeled wagoneer plodding through the deep woods.

I have laid my head against an ox's side and felt his great heart beat.

I have listened to the wagonneer as he told the stories of his service in the 1812 War, and told the stories of the wars his fathers fought before him.

I nodded as the men negotiated a young boy's apprenticeship and watched as the boy walked away behind the wheel ox, to a new life and the responsibilities of a man.

I have seen men who never stopped working to build a home in the wilderness for their families, and who prayed to Heaven the war would not come to their farms.

I have seen a young widow with her baby strapped to her back and her husband's bloody shirt in her arms, dodge betweeen two armies into percieved safety and home, and find no hiding place there.

I have heard the coyotes howl in the night, and seen the chickens huddle closer to the door.

I have seen children go off a fishin', with poles and bait and picnics and such--fishin' though that does not mean catchin'

I have seen a man hungry enough for hot food, and bereft enough of something to take it in, to hold out his hat as a bowl for the food, and eat from it with his hands.

I have seen women cook enough to feed an army in an handfull of pots over broken deadfall, and haul it a half mile over broken terrain at dusky dark to feed that army.

I have heard voices, strong high, and sweet, singing over the washpots as they did the laundry for 19 people, with scrub boards and washpots, with water hauled with buckets and yoke, over fires they built themselves.

I have seen two women who never, ever stopped cooking.

And two more who never, ever stopped nursing.

And another who never ever was at a loss for fine things five children could find to do.

I have seen an army appear in an instant, silent as the grave, and there without warning. Even though I knew they were coming, and from which direction.

And in that dappled sunlit piney woods, one army looks about like another, hard to tell apart--weary, hard, hungry, men------here, gone.

And leaving us in their wake......to rebuild a war torn land.

Banks Grand Retreat.
No Whiners
No Shirkers
No Weaklings

[DougCooper]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

All I can think of to say is:

"It was all too real"

The best event I have ever attended, and that did more things, all of which by themselves could have "made the event."

The tone you hear from Terre Lawson, the "Angel of the Howling Wilderness", was exactly how we felt in the ranks.

The organizers - Fred Baker, Tom Yearby and civilian Terre Lawson, among the other folks who worked so hard on this, did an extraordinary job before and during the event. They had it all covered, rain or shine, medical and logistics, loss of key folks, etc. In short, they allowed us to do great things.

This morning, as the preservation raffle was concluded and folks began to drift away on the long drive or flight home, Steve Mayeux, head of
Friends of Fort DeRussy was overcome with the generosity and comradeship of the men and women of BGR and asked me this simple question:

"Doug, you mean you are all now just parting ways, its all over?"

I said - "yes, its what we do - but this band of brothers and sisters will do it again, somewhere else, for a battlefield and a cause always worthy of our best efforts."

I am too tired and too far from home to write more.

[Spinster]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

Oh no Doug, its never really over--you always carry it in your heart, and the work we all do is lasting.

Within our ranks was a writer--an Englishman--and you may not have seen him. When the Army's schedule, location, and route changed on Thursday night, we fixed him a bedroll and a bag of food and I 'parachuted' him in between the lines shortly after midnight.

He's written other books about folks who make journeys, but this one is about people like us--living historians who do immersion events, who go on 'adventures' in past times. In the last year he has marched for days with Roman Legions and sailed the ocean in a Viking ship. He moved amoungst us as a "reporter for the London Times".

I saw him move off into the darkness in the wee hours of Friday morning. The next time I saw him, he came into the clearing with the long strides of a runner, calling for a medic and an ambulance for troops some distance away. And, after our medical team went off, he quietly pulled out his journal and began to write.

My last vision of him Sunday as I pulled away from the clearing was that of a long lanky man with a towel and a bar of homemade soap, headed for our lovely waterfall with great anticipation. I imagine he will write about that waterfall too.

Along with all the other things we do.

And folks will read about it. And learn something.

[Alamo Guard]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

As many of you know I was the Preacher moving about the armies and civilians. When not hauling, grain, hay or water for the troops I would pop up almost anywhere.
I stopped off sometimes to beg food from the armies for the civilians living in the woods. I was amazed by the men who had so little and gave so much. The children sure enjoyed the crackers that you tired men gave. The monies you donated was given to the women for needed supplies as Im sure the men would have spent it all on something wasteful, right?

[Spinster]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

I have seen a cabin begin to rise in the wilderness in a short morning, built of pulled up logs and hacked deadfall, by two long legged men with axes.

Nearly three years ago, when this event was envisoned on private land, structures were planned to be built in place. Somewhere along the way, a bargain was struck to move the event a year to accomodate Rich Mountain, and to make a trade--the men of the Texas Ground Hornets made the long journey east for Rich Mountain, and men from the east were to make the long journey west for Banks Grand Retreat.

And somewhere in that year of slide, the private land was lost, the event moved to public land, and civilians moved to the concept of portable structures--a daunting and expensive task.

Some of those structures fell by the way due to lost jobs, family crisis, devasting illness, life-threatening injury, and the simple inability to do the task. I was unwilling to leave anyone behind over something so small as what we used for shelter as we built a community of rural farm folk, so no one was left out because of the lack. The last portable structure fell victim less than two weeks before the event when its hauling vehicle spun and totaled on black ice in Ohio, mercifully leaving that family unhurt.

There is a lot of deadfall in a pine barren. Controlled burns on National Forest Service land clean those barrens and make the wood accessible. While some were setting the main camp on Sunday, others were out in the woods dragging up log and stone, notching them out and beginning to stack. Painted canvas had been brought with us in every size and variety to serve as roof.

Those who arrived later found shelters and homes in those woods , and a source of mucky chinking clay nearby.

And more abuilding.......

[Spinster]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

I have seen a fine Bloodhound find new purpose in life, doing the work God created her to do.

Diva was about like any other young bloodhound in a household living on a good-sized city lot. She had a couple of children who loved her, and not really much to do. She'd been educated to search and rescue a bit, but hadn't gotten to use it. Mostly she laid about living history sites on the weekends and tolerated spectator children who kissed her and tugged too hard on her ears.

She was bored. listless, and damn tired of spending life on the end of a leash.

Within a half day in the Kitsachie, she was a new dog, a dog with a job, punching a timeclock and going to work, just as surely as a man gets up and goes joyfully to his carpenter's shop on a Saturday morning.

Leash gone, she established an outer perimeter to be circled and checked regularly for trespassers, and and inner one more for socialble purposes, as she checked both the tent and remote log house camps on a regular basis.

She quickly discerned the difference between civilian dress, military dress, military men who were ill and needed help, Park Service folks in uniform, and just plain old modern folks---and addressed each of them differently, and in accordance with their station and need.

She negotiated a truce with the oxen--after taking a 15 foot flight through the air.

She herded children and guarded chickens.

And she played with a tiny dashhound /terrier named Tad all week, a fine game of Big Dog /Little Dog tag, with no home base, and no off limits---except right there around the oxen.

And when the day was over, she took her bed at dusky dark, first on her on ticking, but eventually in the children's rope bed as the nights grew cold and wet-----but not for long.

Her job was never done, for in the night I would hear her lope through, checking, patrolling, guarding her perimeter and her people.

Dog with a job. Everything created for a purpose, and better for it when it fulfills it.

[Spinster]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

I have stood under a sudden waterfall in a Howling Wilderness, good for bathing and for drinking, tumbling down weathered rocks.

Well, alright, I didn't stand under it. Kimberlee said "Now Miss Terre we can get you down there ........." which I knew meant that it was a terribly bad idea, and one that could result in a little helicopter ride for me. Always a bad idea to do something stupid and beyound one's known ability just for the hardcore points. Especially if it causes grief and trouble for others.

Besides, I started the week leaning on my cane only at night when there was no moon, and ended it reaching for my stick or any substitute with every step, except when I was too prideful to do so.

But I could hear it it, cool and tumbling down the rocks to the platform of hewn wood the men placed under it. And one fine day, Miss Bertie helped me down the upper trail for a splashie bath in the shallows as it poured out of the spring and off the ledge.

One rough huck towel, one bar of homemade soap, one pair clean drawers and a rough linen chemise that Racquelle and Sarah had washed and dried. Turn my stockings inside out, shake and smooth my dress and hair, and I was a new woman.

Folks trained for this event in different ways--one of mine was a bit odd. For the last 10 months, I have taken only a "Saturday night bath", washing daily with bowl and basin, and washing my hair every one to two weeks. That change has served to toughen my skin, change the chemistry of it, make it not so thin, delicate, and easy to blister or chafe. And the chill was not a true problem--with various rennovation challenges, we've had only intermittent hot water at my home for the last six months.

That trail to the waterfall also had another fine resource, pointed out by the oxcart driver. Churned mucky clay, just the stuff for hauling out in buckets and making a fine period paint. And, he told me the receipt for it, including how to make it blue just the color of his wagon, with mixtures I already knew from my dyepots.

[Spinster]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

I have heard distant cannon boom through the night, and wild hogs snort and snuffle near by.

Now, obviously, our men were not fighting and firing all through the night. And when we first heard the cannon's roar, they weren't even on the place--it was only Sunday, and the civilian contingient was the only portion there.

No, this was another shining example of the excellent choice Fred Baker and Tom Yearby made to use this particular piece of land---we sat at a high point and miles away was the active and working Fort Polk range, where a modern army was on training manuevers this week. One women in our number had hoped to see her brother in the course of the week, as he is stationed there.

Instead, his orders put him out in those same forests, with live munitions, and we heard the war close in around us from the very moment we stepped on the place.

The wild hog were another matter. Primarily noturnal and shy, they are large and can easily kill a man, especially during mating season or when the shoats are young.

We pulled perimeters in accordingly, and made provision for 'bear bags' for some of the food. We had some family units who wished to live more remotely from their neighbors and I scouted sites that would allow that option while still maintaining the wisdom and safe guards that would remove them from discerned hog paths.

Additionally we had two modern weapons in the place, well loaded with hog shot, and hung high--so that we could reach them readily but the obedient children could not.

We required the children to wear emergency whistles--high pitched and loud, to be blown when in danger or lost. If they became disoriented, their instructions were to sit down and blow until someone found them. We recommended them for adults as well.

Living and working in a wilderness area is not something to just be blundered into. It requires a great deal of planning, woodcraft skill, and cooperation within and between family units for the safety of all.

And, I must admit, that first night, when my shelter was set up some distance from the home of my neighbors, and the rest of my 'family' had not yet arrived, when I heard the first hog snort in the darkness, I very nearly went flying barefooted accross that clearing and into the rope bed occupied by 2 children and one large bloodhound.

As I was gathering myself for that run, the blood hound came loping out of the house , circled my place and laid there for awhile. When she commenced to snore, so did I.

[DougCooper]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

Nearly three years ago, when this event was envisoned on private land, structures were planned to be built in place. Somewhere along the way, a bargain was struck to move the event a year to accomodate Rich Mountain, and to make a trade--the men of the Texas Ground Hornets made the long journey east for Rich Mountain, and men from the east were to make the long journey west for Banks Grand Retreat.

Decorum prevents my commenting on how this bargain was kept.

And somewhere in that year of slide, the private land was lost, the event moved to public land, and civilians moved to the concept of portable structures--a daunting and expensive task.

Some of those structures fell by the way due to lost jobs, family crisis, devasting illness, life-threatening injury, and the simple inability to do the task. I was unwilling to leave anyone behind over something so small as what we used for shelter as we built a community of rural farm folk, so no one was left out because of the lack. The last portable structure fell victim less than two weeks before the event when its hauling vehicle spun and totaled on black ice in Ohio, mercifully leaving that family unhurt.

There is a lot of deadfall in a pine barren. Controlled burns on National Forest Service land clean those barrens and make the wood accessible. While some were setting the main camp on Sunday, others were out in the woods dragging up log and stone, notching them out and beginning to stack. Painted canvas had been brought with us in every size and variety to serve as roof.

Those who arrived later found shelters and homes in those woods , and a source of mucky chinking clay nearby.

And more abuilding...

Again, the building effort put in by the civilians was astonishing to our eyes. One of the tents even looked to have some floor boards obviously salvaged from a period structure. Floor coverings and as many comforts as could be placed on a wagon by refugees in flight were used. Heck, everything was in use.

I hope somebody took photos before you guys moved on Terre. It was amazing.

[Spinster]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

Nearly three years ago, when this event was envisoned on private land, structures were planned to be built in place. Somewhere along the way, a bargain was struck to move the event a year to accomodate Rich Mountain, and to make a trade--the men of the Texas Ground Hornets made the long journey east for Rich Mountain, and men from the east were to make the long journey west for Banks Grand Retreat.

Decorum prevents my commenting on how this bargain was kept.]

Oh Doug, I know full and well how that bargain was kept. That I why I mentioned it. Fred is too much of a gentleman to do so. I am not. That bargain cost us a good two dozen static civilians, and two large traveling families, traded off for an event style that is increasingly the case----"no civilians", as we reenact a war fought on civilian land with civilian goods and civilian casualties.

Lives change in a year, but a word given should be kept when at all possible. In our small community we've seen cancer, stroke, large scale unemployment, cross country transfers, military call up, divorce and child custody cases----you know, all the really important things in life. Still and all----well, you saw it.

There is a lot of deadfall in a pine barren. Controlled burns on National Forest Service land clean those barrens and make the wood accessible. While some were setting the main camp on Sunday, others were out in the woods dragging up log and stone, notching them out and beginning to stack. Painted canvas had been brought with us in every size and variety to serve as roof.

Those who arrived later found shelters and homes in those woods , and a source of mucky chinking clay nearby.

And more abuilding...

Again, the building effort put in by the civilians was astonishing to our eyes. One of the tents even looked to have some floor boards obviously salvaged from a period structure. Floor coverings and as many comforts as could be placed on a wagon by refugees in flight were used. Heck, everything was in use.

I hope somebody took photos before you guys moved on Terre. It was amazing.

:D You noticed our Imported Eye-talian Parquet Floors did you? :D

Had all gone according to time table, those would have gone up in a blaze of glory to give you Confeds even more eye candy to fight about.

Danny Burns works for a company that gets transmissions from Italy in big wooden crates. The large cupboard in the front room was one of those crates whole and intact, while the floors in that room, the back kitchen, and the two side rooms were also made of those broken down crates.

Danny Burns and Mark Simpson put a lot of time into those floor panels. The crates themselves were free. Hauling them from Lexington, Kentucky on a flatbed trailer at eight miles to a gallon was not.

And when we got about 4 inches of rain they were priceless.

Oh, and that trailer started 'walking' about 30 miles into that journey--which means the Burns and Simpsons, with five children and 2 dogs, unloaded that trailer in vacant parking lot in central Kentucky on Friday night, then reloaded it to balance the walking problem-------all the while fending off folks who wanted to know "How much you want for that barrel, chair, rope bed, table, stove, ........

It was about 2 am Saturday morning when they rolled into Tuscaloosa.

[Spinster]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

I have seen men weep because they had fallen out, unable to go another step, held their hands and told them they were home.

Many men kept going on this event because they loved those men they were marching with. The bonding of men in such circumstances is deep and abiding---yet another reason I do not hold with women in and around military camps---it interferes with a process that forms and makes men, in a society that increasingly does not allow that vital process to occur.

Knowing that, we had prepared in certain ways for those who simply could not sustain any longer. We wanted to to provide excellence in medical care, to offer a period experience within the scope and level of the injured man's ability to perform, to enable those who were fit to return to the ranks, and to keep one man's injury from taking out a whole carpool.

Accordingly, our medical team consisted of long time reenactors with professional medical experience. Kimberlee Bruce is a Certified Nurse Practitioner, an RN with a Master's in Nursing---her special training allows her to work under a doctor's broad supervision to write prescriptions, suture wounds, and perform a variety of emergency medical services. Jim Bruce is MedTech with service in the Vietnam War, and a continuing career in emergency rooms. Diana Myers is an RN with specialty training in OB and pediatric work in addition to emergency medicine.

With no idea as to the weather, or numbers of fall outs to be reasonably expected, we packed a number of extra things.

My big 12 X 12 A tent, and a stack of painted cloth, in case the nights were unseasonably cold and wet.

I purchased a new 16 x 16 Tentsmiths tarp--a shelter designed with multiple loops on the brown canvas that would allow arrangment into any form from a free-standing fly, to a shebang, to another tent.

Six blankets, two feather beds, a bearskin, several gallons of molassas and vinegar, and Kimberlee's fully stocked medical box.

All saw heavy use--and proved one of my maxims that there is no such thing as too many blankets or oilcloths. I started the event with two feather ticks under me and three blankets around me---about my usual load as I chill easily. We ended it with Amy and I on one tick with blanket and baby.

Most injuries were the normal things----heat and muscular, though there were two serious medical evacuations for heart and cramping problems. One man who presented as simple exhaustion and dehydration was actually far more serious, and required monitoring for the next 24 hours as he also had a medication imbalance that was exacerbated by the hydration problem.

I noted quickly that the invalids would not avail themselves of the comforts of a closed floored tent unless ordered to, and that order was not given unless a medical necessity prevailed. The ranged them selves around that open tarp, kept the bake fires moving, drug up dead fall and chopped it, hauled water with bucket and yoke.

It was a fine thing to hear an Old Soldiers Home begin to take form outside my door, and a comfort to hear their voices long in the night.

While they did not finish the march in quite the same way, they were in place to welcome the troops home. They too made an adventure in the wilderness, pulled their own weight, and added to the strength of the community. I am thankful to them.

I am equally sorry that there were whole carpools who fell out when only one man in the group had a minor injury. Provisions had been made for the comfort and safety of all, while maintaining a period experience. I am not sure where the line of communication failed on that availablity, and would like to know it for future reference.

[Rob Murray]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

Mrs. Lawson, I would like to thank you and the citizens for their help during the long march. Thanks to their kind hands, five men of Co. B, 81st Ill. were able to complete the march a little more comfortably. Many thanks.

Rob Murray
Capt.
Co. B, 81st, Ill

[Spinster]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

I have seen a yoke of four oxen, a blue wagon, and a grizzeled wagoneer plodding through the deep woods.

I'd heard of Gerry and his oxen, named for the four kings of England he hates the most, through Darling Daughter and her work at Fort Defiance, North Carolina We'd had the joy of meeting him in the crisp cold Christmas at Mansker's Station, riding in the great cart under the blazing stars.

When I saw those great red horned heads coming out of their trailer in the Kitsachie, I nearly burst into tears with the sheer joy of having such a grand thing move through our lives. I'd known it coming, and kept it secret from the others.

These oxen are trained to voice command--great shaggy vest pocket animals who will do anything for their daddy. They come up to yoke and water by name, turn and tiptoe delicately as 2000 pounds of sheer muscle can be said to do. Gerry tells us they are paired and herd animals--that it is not unusual for one ox to follow its yoke mate shortly if the first one dies, or for all to die if the wagoneer dies.

Miss Bertie and I followed them, flashers on, for the first few miles, in low gear, and often riding the brakes, to hold far back and provide a guard for the wagon moving at 4 to 6 miles per hour down the paved road. We marveled at the meandering path taken to get the wagon down the hill, and the mark the brake wheel of the wagon left on the road--a path that later proved valuable and readable as we hunted the army.

Gerry and Tim walked beside the wagon rumbling down that road, and others took up escort as the day went on. Some hours later they walked into our little clearing, and I noted that Gerry was barefooted---just as Daughter said he always was.

Chawls has asked elsewhere the breed of the oxen. The proper name escapes me, other than they were imported from England, and were of the sort that a prosperous and forward looking man would have purchased in the early 1700's--if he will go over and ask on the BGR military board, Gerry wanders through every now and again.

The blue wagon itself was painted with a period paint, mixed from local clay, turpentine, and linseed oil, as well as some coloring known to me from my dyepots. Its interior held the period tools common to its use at the time, along with quilts and buffalo robes.

Gerry had used its cotton cover over the bows, knowing that the deep woods would tear the expensive linen cover, but grumbling that the cotton cover lets in the rain, while the linen one does not.

He and Tim were glad for the shelter I had built for injured soldiers, as it provided a night of relatively dry sleep.

Gerry takes longer treks than we have dreamed---three to six months, and has traveled the great wagon roads of this country, along with a family group of 18th century reenactors.

Gerry and those fine oxen are also the ones who built another little home in the woods that we have come to love---one we know as Brown's Stand.

Folks will be adventuring there next weekend. I hope they have as fine a time as we did.

[Charles Heath]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

Terre,

I mentioned to Joe and Steve that they looked much like Red Durham, but didn't get a chance to ask the oxhandler. They were very well kept animals, and I understand Gerry's language is as colorful as any muleskinner's. They were very special, and it is rare these days to see a four-up of oxen. Phil would have enjoyed seeing that operation as much as I did, or even more.

[Spinster]

Re: Oh the Wonders I have Witnessed

Gerry's in my email box right now, exhausted from a 17 hour drive, and says the boys are happy and sound asleep.

And yes, seeing Gerry seize Charles :D (the ox most prone to 'issues') by the yoke and give him a good eye to eye talking to is another great joy not to be missed.

He also want to know when we are getting up to go again. Since Jack King has been making noises for about a year now, I better get my good walking shoes resoled. Whatever got on them down below New Orleans last year ate them right up.