Ocklawaha 2010
Early this month my family and I enjoyed a wonderful weekend participating in the 26th Annual Ocklawaha River Raid as members of the host unit, the 4th Florida, Company G. This event was going to be especially busy for us. We were selling peanuts, root beer, and pickles. We were manning the post office. We were participating together in a fashion show, portraying a middle-class merchant’s family.
Some of us went in the pick-up truck stocked with twenty cases of root beer. (Count them, ladies and gentlemen. That’s a grand total of 480 bottles.) The majority of us piled into our 1970s lime-green GMC camper, known affectionately as the Super Pickle. We didn’t notice any truckers giving us the peace sign—this time.
Below, Littlest Brother poses with our traveling mascot, Larry. (He’s not a pickle; he’s a cucumber.)
Next Sister has a specially reserved seat next to the window, where she can enjoy a brisk wind that so knots her hair, I have to help her brush it afterwards. She was crushed (literally and figuratively) when the forty years-old shade collapsed, to rise again no more. Biggest Brother came to the rescue with a few “ingeniously” placed knots. (I quote Biggest Brother himself.) For this, he received the undying gratitude of Next Sister, who enjoyed wind in her face for all the eight hour drive.
Biggest Brother and I enlivened the last few hours of our drive with a game of Teapot. This simple but confounding word game involves replacing homophones with the word teapot to create often bizarre-sounding sentences. The object of the game is for other players to guess the word that has been replaced.
vv Here I am, considering a submission from Biggest Brother. Maybe it was this one; see if you can solve it.
He is a teapot.
They shot a teapot for dinner.
Teapot a hole in the wood.
The further north we travelled, the colder it got. When the temperature dropped to a bone-chilling fifty (I know, we’re thin-blooded) Littlest Brother fetched one of the warm hats knitted by Grandma (green to match the Pickle, of course) and Papa’s favorite sweatshirt.
When we arrived there was plenty of unpacking and setting up to be done. Soon afterwards, family friends arrived, excited about their first reenactment experience and carefully bundled against the evening chill.
Next Sister and I visited the trailer next door to help with sewing buttons on the clothes to be featured in tomorrow morning’s fashion show. Next Sister put me quite to shame with the speed with which she fastened buttons. I (slowly) sewed the buttons on Papa’s “dandy” plaid vest. You can see him wearing it in the second to last photograph of this entry.
That evening, after a hearty supper, we and several others from our group convened under the party tent for a prayer meeting. There were a lot of people in need of encouragement; reenacting is hard work, and some of these people do it every weekend during the height of the season.
Biggest Brother (far left) had to get up early the next morning and dress in his uniform and leathers in time to join the other soldiers for the colors ceremony (the raising of the flag). I was curled up cozily in the camper, eating hot oatmeal porridge.
After we had dressed in the clothes provided for the fashion show, the hostess’ daughter came to fix the girls’ hair. With four full heads of long hair, it proved quite a task. As each was proclaimed “done,” we took a brief survey in the mirror before rushing out to the tea party tent where the fashion show would soon be starting.
It was a great success. Our family was displayed together, and the hostess briefly described our costumes and noted that each was documented as appropriate to the time and to our middle-class status. Next Sister giggled when she learned that she was quite a rebellious teenager in her Garibaldi shirt and jacket. (You can see her daring costume in the third and fourth photographs below. It looked very feminine to our modern eyes, but it was apparently a very masculine style in the 1860s.) We and the hostess received many kind compliments about the fashion show and our costumes.
At the tea party immediately following, the ladies enjoyed lemonade and hot tea, cookies, cakes, cheese, and fruit. Afterwards tickets were drawn to decide the winners of items from a table generously piled with donations from the sutlers. We three sisters did very well: I won mother and daughter tea cups, Next Sister a porcelain brooch, and Littlest Sister a tea cup. The ticket we were holding for a friend won a bag of gourmet whole-bean coffee.
We scurried back to the peanut wagon with prizes and cookies. It was time to get to work!
Third Brother did a fabulous job distributing hundreds of pamphlets to the spectators. He later purchased a new toy pistol with his well-deserved earnings. In that mechanic’s hat, he looks like a Horatio Alger, Jr. character—perhaps Dan, the Newsboy?
I myself took several turns at passing pamphlets. What do you think of that hat? I made fun of it until I was kindly informed that I was supposed to wear it for the fashion show. “Oh, really? Oh.”
“BOILED PEANUTS!!! ROASTED PEANUTS!!! ICE-COLD ROOT BEER!!! PICKLE ON A STICK!!!” Next Sister’s voice is a family treasure. She says the first call is the hardest, but after that she seems to do very well. Spectators and re-enactors alike came to tell us how adorable and effective she was. “I live now to hear her hawking peanuts,” commented one member of our company.
Ain’t she purty, though?
Here is another lovely young lady—Littlest Sister. Since she was our family photographer for the event, we unfortunately didn’t get many pictures of her. Here she poses by the original John Deere wagon in front of which we peddled our goods. (It looks like one of the signs blew over and exposed our very un-authentic gas burner.)
Mama sits prettily in her beautiful new dress and bonnet. It was only the second time in years of reenacting that she was “dressed out.”
Cat-like, she immediately settled herself in a warm pool of sunlight.
The street was lined with sutlers, big white tents stocked with Civil War headwear, footwear, and everything in between. Across the street was a fresh-air restaurant where spectators and re-enactors congregated for lunch and conversation.
From the porch of the homestead, the band 7 lbs. of Bacon entertained the gathering spectators with jokes and old-fashioned music. From left to right there are a washtub bass, a mandolin, and a guitar. We bought their first two recordings before we left; we’ve been playing them continuously since. Biggest Brother has them all memorized.
Papa and the boys had crafted a wooden cart to hide the unauthentic cooler that held “ICE-COLD ROOT BEER!!!” It looks very nice, but the sound it makes is something awful. We could hear its insistent squeaking hundreds of yards away, as Papa and the boys peddled root beer along the spectator line. It competed with musket fire and cannon booms. Squeeeeeeak. Squeeeeeeak. Squeeeeeeak. Squeeeeeeak. Back at the peanut stand, we couldn’t keep from laughing, but not everyone was as amused. One woman was filming the battle when the root beer cart squeaked past. “That’ll sound great in the video,” she was heard to complain bitterly.
Oops. Sorry, ma’am. Would you like some root beer? Squeeeeeeak. Squeeeeeeak. Squeeeeeeak. Squeeeeeeak.
One gentleman paid extra for his root beer. “Buy some grease with that,” he said wryly.
Who is that handsome soldier in front? Why, it’s Biggest Brother! He looks a bit sorrowful. Perhaps he’s thinking of his family back home, still selling peanuts. Naw. He really was having a lot of fun. Well, he was until someone died on top of him.
The remnant of our company marches past. Alas! Biggest Brother has already been “kilt.”
The surgeon helps a wounded Confederate soldier to a safer place on the field. The soldier made a great show of his pain.
The Confederates experienced a crushing defeat on Saturday, but they would be back the next day.
The spectators had left and the western sun was slanting over the campground when members of the company trickled into our camp, bringing food for the traditional Saturday potluck supper. We enjoyed food and fellowship before everyone disbanded to prepare for the dance. I hadn’t been planning to attend the dance myself, but soon before supper Biggest Brother had whispered to me, “I’ll dance at the ball tonight.” That night he stood up with me to do the Virginia Reel, the Cumberland Reel, and the Pat-a-Cake Polka. We had lots of fun, despite it being so cold that I couldn’t stand still for shivering. We had regretfully forgotten to take our camera with us, so there are no photographs to share.
We drove back to camp late, packed into the bed of the pick-up truck with plenty of quilts and blankets. The brittle wind bit our cheeks. Littlest Brother was crying softly with cold and fatigue. The stars winked frigidly in the heavens. We would be glad of Daylight Time Saving tonight.
On Sunday morning—after a very cold, stiff night hardly alleviated by the space heater Papa had installed—we attended the morning church service; and, after some old-fashioned hymn-singing, Chaplain Roger of Battle Line Ministries preached on the need of our spirits for quickening by the Holy Spirit of God.
You can experience a bit of Chaplain Roger by watching this YouTube video. He certainly is a character. Hear this rebel chaplain cough when he admits he has Yankee tracts available. “These are the thickest, since they don’t seem to take them.” Even at the church service you can’t escape good-natured taunting between the blue and grey.
With three other women in the family, it is a rare chance that I get to hold a baby. I managed to gain possession of this blue-eyed boy early Sunday morning, and refused to surrender him until the late afternoon. Throughout I remained implacable to feminine protests of “Baby hog!”
We had a much better crowd today, and my brothers and their little friend were kept very busy passing pamphlets. As the first few gunshots sounded from the battlefield, the incoming crowd swelled. “Follow the noise of gunfire up the road,” Papa called out to spectators as they jogged past, clutching pamphlets.
This is the Senator, a well-loved fixture of Civil War reenactments. Passing the spectator line, he talked about the history and politics surrounding the Ocklawaha River Raid.
Biggest Brother says this second battle was his favorite; I think his favorite part must have been the orange volley. When his commander saw sour oranges scattered on the ground the commander asked, “Wouldn’t an orange volley be cool?” Yes, everyone thought so, and they pelted the Federals with fruit. This is some of the lively action the soldiers enjoy where the spectators can’t see them.
Unfortunately, Biggest Brother died before his company came close enough to see.
The Southern Volunteers march onto the field to the spirited beat of a drum.
The Federals and the Confederates face each other, brother against brother. The Federals are doomed today, since they won yesterday. Still, they don’t see to die very well; Chaplain Roger says it is because they are afraid of him.
From the grass on the back of these Feds, I would guess they’ve died before. Littlest Sister tells me that one died four times that day; resilient soldiers they are.
The Confederate officer stretched on the foreground died with an amazing back-flip. Some soldiers have too much fun getting shot.
Will her pa be coming home again?
Meanwhile, back at the peanut wagon... Yes, that baby is still mine. No, you can’t take him.
As the battle wound down and the crowd began to disperse, Papa took charge of the peanut stand. Between Erica’s cries of “ROASTED PEANUTS!!! ICE-COLD ROOT BEER!!! PICKLE ON A STICK!!!” Papa called out to the passersby. “Roasted peanuts for your trip home, ladies and gentlemen! I don’t want to take them home! I don’t want to take them home! Only one dollar a bag! Help a fellow out!”
“He seemed quiet before, but now he’s really getting into it, I guess,” commented a friend as Papa banged his palm on the table for emphasis.
“It’s desperation,” Mama laughed.
“Root beer is still a dollar fifty,” Papa informed a customer. “There’s no discount for the root beer. I’ll take that home.”
He won plenty of laughs that afternoon.
We sold more than sixty bags of roasted peanuts to the outgoing crowd. We also had a flush of requests for pickles on sticks.
“That’s so gross,” Mama whispered, laughing in disbelief at yet another request for pickles. (I like pickles.) Next Sister had to open the second jar; at the end of the day the tally marks told us that we had sold twenty-six pickles that weekend, definitely more than Mama had anticipated.
When the spectators were gone, we distributed—“for the reduced price of free,” said Papa—the remaining six bags of roasted peanuts. We packed up shop, dressed in modern clothes, and began breaking down the camps. By the late afternoon, the field in which scores of tents and campers had been parked, was nearly empty. The little children love this part; they get to run freely back and forth—playing “Civil War battle,” of course.
We had a long trip ahead of us, so we said goodnight early and endured another cold night. Monday morning, we did the last of the packing and had a hurried breakfast. I and several siblings took a few turns around the empty pasture; we would soon have to sit for eight hours. A friendly gentlemen greeted us and asked what we were doing. “Taking our morning constitutional.” “Yep,” he said, breathing deeply of cold air. “That’ll do it.”
Littlest Sister and I looked at photographs of the event as we drove home. “That was a lot of fun!” she told me. “What’s the next event we’re going to?”
You can see these and more of the beautiful photographs taken by Littlest Sister, with commentary by Next Sister, HERE. Be sure to leave a comment. In a previous Cabbages and Kings post you can read the account of the 2007 Ocklawaha River Raid. Enjoy!
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NEXT SISTER said...
Loved it! Though I must say that I didn’t hear half the funny stories mentioned in here Have you all been keeping something from me? :-) That’s what happens when you give up your camera to your little sister, allow yourself to get hoarse (I did not), and drive home in the pick-up with Mommy. :-) :-) I’d do it again, only I wish I could have been everywhere at the same time. I enjoyed reading your captions. —Middle/ Next Sister
Monday, November 15, 2010 08:48 AM
NEXT SISTER said...
DId you see that monster under the Confederate flag in the top picture?! This is referring to height, not looks. Unless everyone else is short, that guy is huge! Just noticed it. Pardon the outburst.
Monday, November 15, 2010 08:50 AM
HANDMAIDEN said...
Isn’t that just like you, though? ;-) Still, I can definitely sympathize with the desire to be everywhere at once. Whenever our family walked in two (or more) separate directions, I’m always torn about which way to go. Someone is bound to have fun without me! ;-)
Why the outburst? I don’t notice any man of monstrous height.
Monday, November 15, 2010 12:19 PM
Friday, November 12, 2010