Battle of the Chehalis River, 2015
Another exciting event for the 2015 season. For one battle, 13 sharpshooters took the field including our very own Berdan bugler! We also welcomed new recruit Pvt. Tyler Severson to our ever growing company. With this enthusiasm and attention, he quickly showed himself to be an excellent new recruit who performed well during his first reenactment. He also helped to film one of our increasing number of Company D YouTube videos. To check them out visit our YouTube channel Company D 2nd USSS. You can also click on the YouTube icon on the homepage! We noticed that filming YouTube videos at events, while farby, draw our largest audiences for demonstrations. I posted a detailed series on cleaning the Sharps rifle. Expect to see more videos on uniforms, gear, and impression tips.
In addition to our largest military presence in many years we were also very happy to see our biggest civilian camp this season! So many thanks to everyone who could make it!
With so many Berdans, our squads really put the heat on the Confederates who often had a difficult time dealing with so much fire from so many positions. On Saturday we also had a squad of Oregon dismounted cavalry fall in under Captain Whitehall's command. Our effectiveness was increased by the battlefield scouting of privates Reaper and Coffee. Helping our squad work was our very own runner who performed very well delivering messages from the Captain to the different squads all while under Confederate fire. There were so many exciting moments but some that stick out for me was when one of our privates, got tangled up during a retreat from a company of secesh. With a man down, Corporal Spiekerman and myself drew pistols, ran out, grabbed him and laid down a wall of pistol fire covering our retreat! The secesh were so stunned they didn't fire a single shot! We also really upset the Confederates when we charged a visiting Idaho group and took half of them prisoner, marching them off the field in front of the spectators! We were so fast the nearby companies didn't even have a chance to respond. On Saturday, we charged the South Carolina unit and made them scatter and run. Both were great units to play with and we told them to let us know when we can repay the favor.
We really hope to get some time during the battle of Snoqualmie to learn skirmish drill by bugle! Ethan, from the 20th Maine, has been so kind in his willingness to work with us. He hopes to post some skirmish bugle calls for us to start learning before Snoqualmie. Ethan is also a direct descendent of someone who served in Co E, 2nd USSS and already had a complete Berdan uniform including Sharps! If we have the chance to learn bugle calls during Snoqualmie all sharpshooters should expect lots more drill time. Private Edwards brought up the important point that with so many sharpshooters now, we need to expand our drill routine to include more of the school of the company including such things as deploying in fours. We all agreed that was an excellent idea.
This has been such a special year for the company and we couldn't have done it without so many wonderful people. We continue to spend time meeting and hanging out with battalion staff, building positive relationships with other soldiers and commanders, and building our reputation. A good example of putting a smile on battalion's face was how each morning, Pvt. Coffee provided a unique Berdan reveille that who camp could hear. It was great! Thanks again to all our amazing civilians and soldiers. We'll see you in Snoqualimie!
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