150th Battle of Franklin Reenactment

I was fortunate enough last November 2014 to join with my nephew Andy and the Western Sharpshooters operating as the 65th Indiana at the recent 150th Battle of Franklin reenactment.

The 65th Indiana was a Henry armed unit that help hold the Union left of center, directly east of the Carter cotton gin.  It is thought that their fire killed Confederate General Cleburne.  

It was a special thrill to have my nephew Andy with me to experience a small piece of what was actually a common experience for many civil war soldiers both North and South, that being standing in line with your family.  Andy was armed with my Henry, while I had my trusty Spencer rifle.

We got there at about 10am on Saturday.  Unfortunately Andy only had that Saturday to participate in the event.  Most of the men reenacting the 65th Indiana had gotten there the night before and I was told it was a very cold night.  Thankfully Saturday was perfect - about 45-50 degrees and sunny.  

The 65th really made it a neat experience especially for the teens in our group.  We all got mail from home, got paid and got books and gifts from the "Ladies of Indiana".  This really made Andy's experience and he mentions it to this day.

At about 1:30pm we assembled and after instructions, ammo and weapons check we started off to the field - with a band!  It was a huge thrill.  For those of you who reenact, if you've never had the experience of marching off to "battle" with a band playing then please take steps to correct this.  Below is a youtube of us marching off.  The march being played is the "1812 March".

Once on the field the 65th Indiana deployed forward of the battle line as skirmishers.  As the johnnies approached we started a terrific volume of fire that kept them at bay for a bit.  The following youtube has some great closeups of the skirmish line.

You may want to check out the first 5 min or so for the skirmish part.  During this phase I cut the heck out of my knuckle and was bleeding like a stuck pig.  Unfortunately you can see me with a yellow kerchief around my left hand.  I was able to stay in the line though.

After about 15 minutes or so we fell back to the entrenchments and the johnnies started coming on in earnest.  After a few break-throughs we held the line with the terrific fire from out repeaters,  The following youtube shows the repulse of the first charge.

The johnnies came on gamely and really put up a scrape.  I would like to recognize the Confederate reenactors, they were a great group.  No kevlar johnnies at this battle!  It was a privilege to share the field with them.  On the march out the band (I tell you, even if you're plumb tired it perks you up to have a band to march back to) played Dixie in tribute to the johnnies.

Here's another youtube of the entire battle as seen by a drone.  It's an interesting view.  You'll have to ignore the audience chatting.  You may want to mute the volume.

Andy and I left the field at 5pm.  It ends up that the Sunday events had to be canceled due to a nasty snow storm that hit at about 1pm.  Everyone made in back safe and I want to thank the 65th Indiana AKA the Western Sharpshooters.  A great bunch of folks.

The experience was really terrific - made more so by being there with my nephew and the guys of the 65th.

A Take Down Camp Bed

I have been working on a take down camp bed for reenactments.  I wanted it to be portable, to basically fit into a duffle size package.  It had to at least look period, it had to support my rather heroic frame and it had to be really comfortable.

I started to research rope beds on the internet and came across this series of blog posts by David Friedman.  He made the plans from a picture of a 13th century Byzantine rope bed.

I really liked the design, but it wasn't exactly portable given since the sides would be at least 6' long.  A package that long isn't going to fit into a sedan  I decided that if I slotted the side rails into an aluminium sleeves then the side rails would each be under 42" in length and so I would have a bed that would pack into a duffle.  Here's the result.

It is 36" wide and 78" long.  Its made of of 4 36" and two 42" long, 2" diameter dowels.  I'm a large man (300lbs) so I figured I would have to use hardwood dowels to support my weight over a 78" long span.  I found oak dowels from Baird Brothers Fine Hardwoods.  Six oak dowels cost $200 dollars.  If I had it to do over again I would either use 2" tulip poplar, or 1-3/8" oak.  Poplar would cost maybe $50 and would support my weight easily I believe.

I found two 12" long by 2" in diameter aluminium sleeves from MetalsDepot and it cost me about $30 dollars.  This isn't exactly period, but when covered up no one will know the difference.  Here's a picture of the bed unmade.  Note the dowels slotted into the sleeves.

For the legs I bought 2 4-1/2' by 4" by 4" fence posts from Home Depot.  I cut both down into four bed legs as pictured below and 16" long.  The rounded bottom piece against the floor was made from a couple of decorative post tops I picked them up at Lowes - each top had a 2-1/2" by 1/4" screw that I epoxied and screwed into the end of the fence post.  

Once I had the legs together and true, I drilled a two 2-16" wide holes 2.5" deep into the square part of the leg, one 1" from the top and the other at right angles 3" from the top.  The beds dowels slot into these holes.  I then painted the legs with white Rustoleum.  

I painted the sleeves that color too. initially initially strung the bed with sisel rope.  This worked just fine but I discovered someone on Etsy that made a canvas bottom that replaces the strung rope.   Let me plug the makers, Kingofzoar1817. The canvas bottom is a perfect replacement for the rope, is easy to set up (stringing the rope can take 30 min or more) and is very comfortable.  So much so I don't need any sort of mattress for the bed.

  

One draw back with rope beds is that the rope (even with my canvas bottom) will stretch a bit. Tightening the rope can be a real pain.  To make this easer to do at the bottom of this bed the canvas piece loops around a 1" dowel that is then secured by a tensioning rope to the 2" bottom dowel by a rope as above.  By tightening the tensioning rope you tighten the entire bed.

The best part of this design is that it disassembles into a small package - duffle size.  To dissemble all you have to do is unstring the tensioning rope and then push the canvas bottom toward the top of the bed.

You can then remove the bottom section of the bed (the legs and cross dowel) from the side dowels and disassemble the bottom section.

Once you push the canvas bottom (or strung rope) up toward the top of the bed you can disassemble the rest of the bed by un-slotting the side dowels from their sleeves and then un-slot and remove the side dowels from the top legs.  You can then bundle up the top and bottom dowels and the canvas bottom (leaving it strung to the top 2" dowel and the 1" tensioning dowel.   Bundled up it looks like this.

You can then wrap it up in a shelter half or into a duffel.  The entire package weighs about 30lbs.  If I had used tulip popular dowels it would weigh half that.

This was a great project and sleeps well.  I expect a lot of good and comfortable use for many years.

Old Father Abraham's Spencer Target

On August 18, 1863 Spencer came to the White House bearing a new repeating rifle as a gift for Lincoln.  He was ushered into an office where Lincoln was waiting and presented the rifle to the President. Lincoln knowledgeably inspected the rifle, then asked Spencer to take it apart and show the "inwardness of the thing." 

Spencer was asked if “not busy” to return the next day at 2 p.m. to shoot the rifle.  He returned the next day and according to Spencer:

“The target was a board six inches wide and three feet high, with a black spot on each end, about forty yards away. 

Abraham Lincoln's Efforts with the Spencer

Loaded with seven cartridges. Mr. Lincoln’s first shot was about five inches low, but the next hit the bull’s-eye with the other five close around it. ‘Now,’ said Mr. Lincoln, ‘we will see the inventor try it.’ The board was reversed and I fired at the other bull’s-eye, beating the President a little. ‘Well,’ said he, ‘you are younger than I am and have a better eye and a steadier nerve.’"

Spencer Blacksmithing - Kinda

I saw this combination tool for the Spencer recently and really wanted to have one.

It wasn't available for sale and I couldn't find anything similar at any sutlers, so after looking at musket tools I had accumulated over the years I decided to convert a Burnsides Carbine tool to a Spencer tool.

The Burnsides tool looks like this:

I cut off the nipple wrench part and drilled a hole through the center to look like this:

The metal was soft steel.  The tips would bend and twist with a moderate amount of force so after I reshaped and formed the blade ends to fit my Spencer, I hardened it by heating it up in a grill using real charcoal and a blow dryer to provide enough oxygen to get the metal just bright red hot.  I then quenched it in a bowl of old motor oil to harden it.  

The result (below) was plenty hardened to use fit perfectly in the slots of the screws on my Spencer. 

It's not exact, but it's close enough to use in the field, in living history events or in camp during a reenactment without exciting too much comment.

All in all this was a fun weekend project and has been useful at a number of reenactments.

A Civil War Podcast That I Have Been Very Impressed With and Honorable Mentions

Been on a bit of a break I will spare you the gory details.  This post is off topic, but I hope useful.

I'm a huge history podcast fan and follow and support a number of goods ones.  Recently I have been listening to a podcast called the Civil War Tours Podcast.  I've been impressed with the site and podcast subjects and thing the lady who runs this does a great job.  Please check it out.

Some others I enjoy as well include:

Hardcore History

Revolutions

The History Of England 

Please check them out as, they cover a great deal of history and the authors of them do a fantastic job on their subjects.

The Spencer at the Tennessee State Match (October 10, 11th & 12th)

A quick post.  Me and my trusty Spencer at the Tennessee State SASS Match.  I use the Spencer as my primary lever action rifle.

Some Smokeless Loads For The Chiappia (Armi Sport) Spencer

DISCLAIMER:  THESE LOADS ARE FOR INFORMATION PURPOSES ONLY.  Shooting is dangerous and you must take care when doing hand loads, one mistake and you could cause yourself serious injury or death.  I take no responsibility for any deliriousness effects resulting from this information.

ALSO, these loads are ONLY for the Chiappia (Armi Sport) Spencers.

Since the last Tennessee State Match, I've been working on some loads using Trail Boss, 5744 & Unique.

The following is some load data I think will work for you.  Note the chronograph used was a ProChrono Digital PAL Chronograph and is accurate +/- 5 fps.  I used 4 loads weights per powder that I chronoed, the muzzle velocity results from these loads are in BLUE.  The curve fit values are in RED.  I used linear regression to extend out the load values.

For long range (100 yards +) I've changed my load from 8.8 grains by weight of Trailboss under a 350 grain lead flat-nose bullet to 19 grains by weight of Accurate 5744 under the same bullet.  I really like this load it seems crisper and tighter in its groupings.  I will still be using Trailboss for my Cowboy shoots though.

5744	Charge (gr.)	17	17.5	18	19	20	21	22	23
	Muzzle Vel.	820.46	841.33	862.2	904.8	945.1	986	1070.9
Unique	Charge (gr.)	5.5	6	6.5	7	7.5	8	8.5	9	10	11
	Muzzle Vel.	606.03	660.20	714.37	775.1	822.71	869.7	931.05	979.9	1093.6
Trail Boss	Charge (gr.)	5.5	6	6.5	7	7.5	8	8.8	9	10	11
	Muzzle Vel.	700.9	726.99	783.2	808.76	842.1	876.91	929.3	945.06	1013.21	1081.36

If you want to extend these out further you can use the following formula for each powder:

5744	Theoretical Muzzle Velocity = 41.74 * CHARGE_WEIGHT + 110.88
Unique	Theoretical Muzzle Velocity = 108.34 * CHARGE_WEIGHT + 10.16
Trail Boss	Theoretical Muzzle Velocity = 68.1487 * CHARGE_WEIGHT + 331.7228

Keep in mind that errors will accumulating as you go out from the ends.