Civil War Reenacting and Pipe Smoking

[tinpan]

Virginia, Cob, very cool you were at the Spotsy re-enactment. That is right by our house and I took my son to the last two they had, which I think were the first two they had
Marye's Heights

See if this works. It's a little video I made of one of the Fredericksburg re-enactments. I figured ya'll might like it.
Looks like you'll have to download it

 

[rangerearthpig]

Wow. Thanks for sharing those photos. I've always thought that would be a fun thing to get into.

 

[tinpan]

Virginiacob, your uniform is amazing. Your whole unit looks good. What you guys don't see here is that they are truly historically accurate. Including sleeping in the 10 or 20 degree weather and marching in the summer 90 90 combo ( degree/humidity) . We did Saylor's Creek and I am thinking it was probably in the 20's at night . It was the longest coldest night I ever didn't sleep. lol.
Here are some pics from a few years later. I'm thinking 1982 or 1983. I was out of reenacting then but I still loved to photograph. I have probably hundreds of photos from that period I still need to scan. Funny thing is they are now a little historical now.

Ripely Robinson as Stonewall Jackson

This was more recently a couple years ago

 

[virginiacob]

tinpan,
Thanks for the pic and vid. Always interesting to see what other folks in the reenacting hobby have done. The vid looks like it was actually filmed at the Stonewall in Fredericksburg. I would assume if that's correct and the fact that the reenactors were ramming their muskets that this must have been filmed either on behalf of the Park Service as part of a living history educational program or for a documentary with the blessing of the Park Service since the National Park won't allow battle reenactments in National Battlefield Parks. Also, Civil War reenactors today don't use their ramrods during battle reenactments as a safety procedure just in case someone were to get excited and forget to remove his ramrod and fire it out of his musket. I have a buddy of mine who took part in the 100th Anniversary battle reenactments back in the '60s when he was a teenager and said he actually saw a ramrod fired through the air. Fortunately, it didn't hit anyone.

 

[virginiacob]

tinpan,
Thanks for showing the additional pics! I first got into Civil War reenacting in the late '80s while still in college. My first "event" was the 125th Anniversary of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address and the Confederate unit I had joined at the time (2nd Maryland Infantry, Co A.) was taking part in the Remembrance Day Parade through Gettysburg and up to the High Water Mark. My first battle reenactment was the 125th Anniversary Reenactment of the Battle of New Market. The pics bring back some fond memories. I remember General Ripely Robinson and always thought he looked the epitome of a Southern gentleman and Confederate general. The last I remember him was at the Gettysburg Remembrance Weekend ceremonies back in the '90s where he used to give a memorial speech up at the High Water Mark. Haven't seen him in a long time and I don't know if he finally retired from the hobby or has passed on.

 

[tinpan]

Yes it was some type of event the NPS was putting on. I remarked to my son that I couldn't believe they were using ramrods. When we were re-enacting they were taking them away from us for the weekend. Sadly Ripley passed away a few years ago.
I bridged into another historical phenom in the Virginia area, gold prospecting. Like we did with re-enacting we spend a lot of time documenting the cultural and historical significance Virginia played in the gold rush. An interesting note is that a certain person named Jedediah Hotchkiss was a world famous geologist and collected and consolidated volumes of documents pertaining to the early years of gold prospecting in the US. Google books has thousands of pages of information he pulled together. Oh yeah, he was also pretty famous for something else. Anyone care to take a guess?
The gold rush began in Virginia and North Carolina 50 years before the California gold rush. If you have a gold coin that predates 1848, it probably came from Virginia, NC, SC or Georgia. The saying there's gold in them hills actually originated from Georgia as the miners were leaving to go to California. The local merchants were begging them to stay.
I was in a club the CVGP and every year we take a couple ounces of gold to the field days of the past in Goochland. Every kid that hits our panning booths walked away with a piece of gold big enough to pick up with his fingers, a picker. Today we find ourselves totally defensive against the tree huggers as they try to limit where we can go prospecting but we keep up our efforts in educating folsk on the history and the contributions gold played in the foundation of our country.
We often thought of crashing a re-eanactors camp in our period dress (1835ish) just to see what would happen but we were too afraid of getting drafted.
So, back to Jedediah Hotchkiss and his link to the historical aspects of the Civil War and Gold prospecting. i will tell you this name is revered among gold prospectors.

 

[warren]

I say this with a smile, "There appears to be more than little ignoring of Gen'l Lee's order against stealing from the locals. I do believe that more than a few of you are dining on more than a handful of parched corn and fake coffee, judging from the photos. The local chicken and pig population must have taken a big hit."
Seriously, you guys,m and gals, make a great contribution to history studies. I've attended the Cedar Mt. recreation and a couple of others, I love the attention to detail. Also, the volunteers you find through out the year in period clothing in the war parks are a great asset. Great for a photo and often times very knowledgeable regarding the activities of the area in which you find them at the parks.

 

[lonestar]

Fascinating thread. Tinpan, do you sell any of your photographs to frame ?

 

[lurch76]

Neat thread. I live near the Chickamauga Battlefield so we have quite a bit of activity like this. There are living history demonstrations all the time at the battlefield and once a year there is a big re-enactment. They can't do it at the park so that is held down the road.

 

[homeatsea]

I had a high school American History teacher that used to do the Civil War reenactments. He invited the whole class to a local reenactment near the end of the year. Everyone went and truly enjoyed themselves. What a great way to teach and learn history!

 

[bentmike]

Great Thread! Thanks all for sharing the photos. Virginiacob I thought from looking at your profile pic you might be into reenacting. Very cool! One of my favorite things about the PM forum besides pipes and tobacco is seeing and learning of the other hobbies/ interests of the members.

 

[tinpan]

Now i am going to have to get me a couple of those corn cob pipes. I was trying not to but I keep looking at their website.
I Don't sell any pics, you are welcome to download them for free and you can upload them to Walmart and print 8 x 10s for $2 each. If you go to print them and hit fit to paper size the border prints. If you print full size it should crop the borders off for framing. My copyright is a creative commons copyright, you are welcome to copy them, print them give em away for free, I only ask they don't be sold. If you like WWII look up Phil Adair, my father, on burmabanshees.com. I have a couple hundred of those also formatted for printing.
Maybe one day I'll get around to scanning the rest of my Civil War pics.

 

[stbruno70]

Very interesting history here. Thanks to all for posting stories and photos.

 

[virginiacob]

Guys,
Have enjoyed all the comments and especially tinpan's pics. One great thing about my Civil War reenacting hobby is it compliments my pipe smoking hobby. It's a lot of fun sitting around the campfire chatting with my pards and enjoying my corn cob pipe. It seems to be one of the few venues where you can be out in public around both smokers and non-smokers alike and enjoy pipe smoking and since its falls within the historic context of the period we are portraying, no one seems to mind you smoking around them.