The annual Texas home front event has now ended. This year
was The War at Home: 1862. We arrived on Friday evening. As with each year,
Friday is spent putting things in place and visiting with all the other
participants. Everyone had arrived by 10:00 or so. Some of us went on to bed,
but a few apparently stayed up until the wee hours on the porch of the “store”
playing music.
I had my own visitor during the early morning. About 4:30 or
so I heard faint thump, thump, thump and felt something climb up to the edge of
the cot. I cautiously looked down toward my feet and saw the site cat, Peanut
Butter, peering over the edge of the cot and then he promptly jumped up and
laid down across my legs. There he stayed until about 6:30 when I had to get
up.
I should preface this report on the event that we found out
about a month before the event that there was a Boy Scout event also scheduled
at the site this same weekend. We were ensured that the scouts would be in
their own area, not using any of the structures and would not interfere with
our event. I left it up to the participants as to whether they wanted to
proceed with the event and all decided to attend.
The event officially began at 7:00 a.m. on Saturday. I
dressed and headed to the store. My clerk decided to sleep on the porch and was
still abed when I arrived to begin the day’s business. Also at this time the
boy scouts started to arrive, driving their cars on to the site and setting up
their modern pup tents on the open area at the end of the town square. We tried
very hard to ignore them and the plastic tables and large blue water jugs they
set up at the crossroads. Some then decided they wanted to us the yard of one
of the farms that we were using as a gathering/lunch spot. This was all before
10:00 a.m.
After getting the front yard camp out taken care of I
returned to the store and found my clerk at work, finally. He was working up
the Lauderdale’s accounts. Mrs. Lauderdale ran up quite an account while her
husband was away at war. We had a small stock at the store, which included not
only the medicines, writing supplies and foods included in my prior post, but
also cards of buttons, papers of needles, and bottles of rolled pills provided
by Mr. Nix.
Mr. Nix arrived later in the morning. He is on his way from
Galveston to Dallas and informed us of the conditions on the island. It seems
only one Yankee ship is in the bay and commerce continues as before. This was
very good news to many as some of the village residents have business concerns
in Galveston.
I received many letters from friends in California,
Mississippi and Tyler. It seems that mail in California was being held up in
San Francisco as the letters I received were somewhat out of order and a
mention was made of a box of seeds that I never received. Mrs. Betts in Tyler
told us about a slave insurrection in Tyler and the resulting punishments. I
also received several swatches of fabrics that were available in California at
very reasonable prices.
Mr. Nix and I then took a stroll around the village to
ensure all had a pleasant night and all was as it should be. First we visited the
seamstress shop to show the fabric swatches and get their opinions on how they
would make up and if I should stock some. Mrs. Frederick was very impressed
with the plaid silk. Mrs. McKinney’s daughter, Victoria, was lovely in her new
dress and shoes.
Our next stop was at Dr. Rice’s household. Miss Hale was sewing in the hall and Mrs. Rice was making green bean salad for evening meal. Dr. Rice was busy explaining to visitors
about Civil War medicine; he truly seemed to be in his element.
We then visited the Lauderdales. There we found Mr. Glover,
apparently he is courting Miss Hooper who is staying with the Lauderdales.
However, Mr. Glover is staying with the Rices as he is under the doctor’s care
for a wound he received at Shiloh. He walked all the way to the Lauderdale
farm; I tried to explain to him that Miss Hooper will need a healthy husband
and that this activity, especially walking such distances would not benefit
him. While at the Lauderdales we heard that Mr. Lauderdale’s man ran off from
the farm to which he had been lent. This was not good news as Mr. Lauderdale
was also injured at Shiloh and cannot use his arm for at least two months and
cannot get a crop in. So not only did he lose the $800 dollars invested in his
man but he cannot earn anything from a crop to replace him and support his
family. I left the gentlemen to discuss war and business and visited with the
ladies in the kitchen. Mrs. Lauderdale was preparing greens and Miss Hooper was
getting ready to make bread.
Our next visited was with Mrs. Brock. We found her churning
butter and entertaining several visitors. As we approached the town square we
saw the boy scouts had added an inflatable bounce house to their pup tent camp.
Upon our return we decided it was a good time to eat. We had
pickled eggs, pickles, bread, sausage, cheese, and lemonade. The rest of the
afternoon village residents came to the store to pick up their mail. Mrs.
Lauderdale received a telegram. She and Mr. Lauderdale seemed not to know who
it was from, but they were coming for a visit and asked Mrs. Lauderdale to ask
Mr. Lauderdale to buy a mule on credit. So we are now looking for someone who
has a mule they are willing to sell. Mr. Gray also entertained us with his
fiddle and Mr. Nix shared some musing of an English woman on Texas and American
woman written in 1845. She apparently was not very impressed with American
women; she commented on how frequently we travel about town without male
company, how frivolous our conversations were and that our dress was loud and
mildly distasteful. We had a good laugh at her expense.
As evening approached, the boy scouts left but the adult
leaders remained and planned to spend the night at the site.
Saturday evening we had a community dinner. There was so
much food – collard greens, ham, pickled eggs, pickles, cole slaw, fruit cake,
cookies, apple pies, corn bread, pound cake, green bean salad, still warm fresh
bread, fresh churned butter, tea and lemonade. After dinner we were entertained
with period music by Mr. Gray on the fiddle, Mr. Gray’s brother on the guitar
and Mr. Lauderdale on the bones. It was a wonderful close to the day.
Sunday is always a laid back day.
After dressing I went to the store and waited for Mr. Gray to wake. We decided
to close the store for the day at noon and spent the rest of the day lounging
on the Rice’s porch.
The event was to last until noon
but the site advertised our “show” until 3:00, so quite a few participants
stayed until then. However, when we started to bring in our cars at 3:00 to
load up the site had issues. Things worked out but it was still a difficult
situation.
The event was good and bad. I
think everyone enjoyed the event and the opportunity to participate in living
history with structures and a village atmosphere. However, the issues we
experienced with the site this year were very stressful and I feel the
communication from the site was not there. I’m really not sure if they grasped
what our event was all about. For these reasons I have decided to not use the
site again. There are a few other villages in central Texas that I’m going to
scout out and hopefully we will find a new home before planning starts for
1863.
Additional photos can be found at
http://s774.photobucket.com/albums/yy25/netnet81/The%20War%20at%20Home/
After the battle the wounded were helped off the field to the hospital tent. Doc always puts on a good display. The rubber rats on the cast off limbs are a great crowd pleaser. 
I left shortly after the battle; Katelyn planned to stay for the dance. However, she said many people started packing up and leaving so she didn't think the dance would be worth staying for. Time Was was to play.
