Artillery School Starts Sunday

The excitement has been building for weeks now (at least for me) and I'm at the point now where I just want Sunday to get here as quickly as possible. Yes, I know Halloween is tomorrow and it is my wife's favorite holiday, but I have an artillery school coming up! NC Historic Sites holds its historic artillery training and certification class every four years, in compliance with our Historic Weapons Program guidelines. I've taken the class twice, but this is the first artillery class that I have coordinated and will be the first full class that I've instructed. I have instructed a few refresher courses, but never a full blown class. This time around we have 33 students and 10 instructors in the class. It will be held at Fort Fisher State Historic Site in Kure Beach, NC. What separates the full class from the refresher courses is that the full class includes a live fire exercise on the artillery range at Camp Lejeune, the largest Marine Corps base on the east coast. Anytime you get to send real cannonballs downrange, it is a great experience! I will certainly post a report of the training and photos as soon as I get a chance. But, until Sunday arrives I plan to watch some sports, drink some Oktoberfest beer, and pass out candy to the neighborhood ghouls and goblins. The real fun starts once Halloween is over.

Photo from Reilly Dedication

I just wanted to post a photo someone sent me from this past weekend's marker dedication ceremony for Major James Reilly. The photo shows our crew (one of three artillery pieces present) with the battery commander standing on the hill behind us. The ceremony was very nice, even though we had to endure one particularly over the top speech by an SCV official who wasn't even on the program, but was a last second addition invited by someone other than the ceremony's organizer. Luckily, I was in such a position that I couldn't hear much of anything, but what I did hear was more than enough to make me grit my teeth and simmer a bit. Sources tell me that most of the other folks who were present were not happy that this individual had been inserted into the lineup. Otherwise, it was a lovely ceremony and we managed to get the cannons loaded up and hauled out before the rain started. I also briefly visited General W.H.C. Whiting's grave and Captain Joseph Price's grave.

Honoring One of Fort Fisher's Heroes

Tomorrow morning my friend Don Smith and I will hit the road to Wilmington for a grave marker dedication. The subject of the marker is Major James Reilly, commander of Co. D, 10th North Carolina and later second in command at Fort Fisher. Don and I will be on the cannon crew from Fort Fisher when the ceremonial rounds are fired. This will all take place in Wilmington's historic Oakdale Cemetery. A press release concerning tomorrow's program can be found HERE. There are many historic characters of Wilmington's past buried in this cemetery, including Major General W.H.C. Whiting, who commanded the Confederate Cape Fear District for much of the war, Confederate spy Rose O'Neal Greenhow, and Captain Joseph Price, third and final commander of the Confederate ironclad CSS Neuse. I normally don't do a lot of programs such as this, but because of the connections to Fort Fisher I decided to go. And besides, I haven't been to visit Capt. Price lately.

I've Been Busy Educating the Public!

I haven't been intentionally neglecting the blog, but I've been very busy and haven't been able to find the time for an update. I've also been waiting to receive some photos from some folks so I can prove I haven't been just goofing off.

October 3, I assisted Tryon Palace with their Home School Day program. Not nearly as many kids as I expected, but a good day nonetheless. We were talking about Governor Tryon's 1771 militia that marched to Alamance and put down the Regulators. I also received the new coat that Wade Rogers, a Tryon Palace employee, had made for me.
Photos of me in my new coat

October 6 and 8, I was helping Brunswick Town State Historic Site with their Colonial Heritage Days program for the county's school children. I assisted long-time interpreter Bert Felton with a brief program on sailor life and naval stores in the colonial period.Me and Bert teaching the students how to tie some basic knotsTalking with students about naval stores (you can't see it but I have a small pot of pine sap in my hand)

October 10, I assisted Fort Fisher with a living history program that focused mainly on the civilian aspects of the was in the Lower Cape Fear. However, my main duty was to interpret the site's rifled and banded 32-pounder during demonstrations. I don't have any photos from the Fort Fisher program (sorry).

This week I've spent most of my time in the office catching up on all my other work. Our historic artillery training and certification class is coming up November 1-4 at Fort Fisher and I am making all the final preparations. In the meantime, I'll try to keep up with the blog a little bit better than I have. Please accept my apologies and enjoy the photos!