I Have Been To.....The National Museum of the United States Army

 Every level of Professional Military Education in the US Army is supposed to incorporate some formal instruction or application of Military History. This is designed to give Soldiers a better understanding of our military past, create and foster esprit de corps, and provide context for where we are today. 

This past Friday, my course visited the National Museum of the US Army at Fort Belvoir, which is near Lorton in Northern VA. 

The museum is about two hours north of where we are training, but we were permitted to drive our own cars, rather than be schlepped about on a Government bus. Yay me! We also wore casual clothes for our outing, rather than the pickle suit. 

Our timed tickets were for 9AM. We met up in a nearly empty parking lot and this is what we saw...

It's big. Really big. It's shiny. It's....literally in the middle of nowhere... I'm not sure what the thought process was in the location and the architecture, but it sure didn't make me hopeful on what we'd find inside. Especially since the Army Heritage Center in Carlisle, PA is bonkers good. 

The campaign wall is the first thing you see once you enter and go through security.... It's a big bright airy open space where they have several helpful docents who give you a very good run down on how things are organized, where the galleries are, and most importantly after a two hour drive....where the washrooms are located. 

There are several galleries dedicated to different periods in the Army's history, spanning from the Colonial Era to today. The second floor gallery was in the process of being updated to commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day, but the rest of the facility was open. There was also a gallery called "Army and Society" that shows the inter-relationship between the Army, government, and the American people. I did not have time to see that one, before we had a schedule group activity. 

So... what did I see...

You enter the galleries to the left of the foyer. As you approach them, there are several monoliths with pictures of American Soldiers and briefly telling their stories. The stories were from all over history. 

For instance... Joyce Kilmer.

Famous for his poem, "Trees", SGT Kilmer served in the 165th Infantry in the 42nd Division on the Western Front, where he was killed. 

After passing though these pillars, you are encouraged to go from left to right and within the galleries, in a clockwise direction. With the ever-present docents there to guide you and answer questions. 

The first thing I saw when I passed through the pillars was... 

 The good old-fashioned reliable Army mule. The last two mule units, a Transportation Corps pack train and an Artillery battery were not disbanded until 1956. Today, the Special Operations folks retain a pack animal capability using the same manuals and similar equipment you see here. 

I then went to my favourite periods, the Colonial Era and the American Civil War. 

The above flag is a Marker Flag from Webb's Additional Continental Regiment. There was also an amazing diorama of Henry Knox moving the guns from Fort Ticonderoga to Boston in the dead of a New England winter to reinforce George Washington's Army of Observation. I was unable to determine the scale, but it looks 1/72nd-ish... 

There were presentations of the War of 1812 and the Mexican War, as well. The number and choice of artefacts presented was very good. Excellent representation on "what the common soldier carried" balanced with pieces that had an interesting history or were from a historical personage, like Josiah Harmar's sword. 

As I walked into the American Civil War gallery, I was greeted by...

This 12# Napoleon belonged to Battery G, 4th US Artillery and served on Culp's Hill at the Battle of Gettysburg. There was an overwhelming amount of material culture represented here and I did my best to limit how many pictures I took. 

The two flags I did want to post, though, since the National Colours belonged to the 12th Corps D'Afrique, later the 84th US Colored Troops and the bottom picture are the Regimental Colours of the 13th United States Infantry, who served in the Western Theater of the Civil War. The grey areas on the flag are where the backing can be seen through holes that had been shot out of the flag or where there was some other kind of damage from service. 

Moving on from there to the WW1 gallery, you saw a full size diorama, which reminded me of the WW1 Museum in St. Louis, Missouri. 

There was also a FT-17 tank off to the right of the diorama. 

Finally, there were loads of photos of Soldiers along a couple of panels and one stood out for me for personal reasons. 

I was born in Lowell, Massachusetts and CPT Paul Kittredge was a resident of Lowell who went overseas with the 26th (Yankee) Division in WW1 and was killed in action in late October 1918. Kittredge Park in Lowell is named after him. I never knew that until I visited this museum. 

Moving onto the WW2 gallery one of the first things you notice is a large number of B17 models overheard. They put this up as a display of what a box bombardment by a group of bombers would look like. 

They also have the M4 Sherman tank "Cobra King", which was famous as being the first tank into Bastogne to relieve the 101st Airborne Division during the Battle of the Bulge. 

Again, trying to bring the common Soldier to the front, they have amongst the displays, Charles Schultz, the quiet shy kid from Minnesota who became a world-famous cartoonist and who served in 1945 with the 20th Armored Division and helped liberate Dachau. 

All around the gallery were reproductions of the various posters seen during WW2. 

Finally, in the Pacific Theater gallery was a small display that I found very moving. Two fragments of flags. The one on the left was from a piece found on Corregidor after it was recaptured from the Japanese. It's from a Coast Artillery Regiment's flag that was destroyed to prevent it from being taken as a trophy. The fragment on the left, is from a US flag that flew at Hickam Army Airfield on the 7th of December 1941. 

The next galleries were about the Cold War and going up to the Army of today. 

The first picture is still something I see and why I have a job as a Warrant Officer.... If I never see another container stuffed with duffle bags after I retire, it'll still be too soon. 

Overall, the experience was wonderful. I have no idea what the cost for a ticket was, as the trip was organized by our Small Group Instructor. I'm sure it was covered by the Schoolhouse, since it was on our POI as a block of instruction. 

The exhibits are worth seeing. The presentation is excellent. There are VR simulators if you want to drive a tank or fly a helicopter. I decided to pass on those experiences. The gift shop is okay. I was hoping for a better selection of books. They did have Hickey's history of the War of 1812, which I recommended to my classmates. 

As we left, I did take one more picture. There are plaques along the walkways to honour units or corps in their connection to the US Army. This seems to be a fairly new display, as there were only a few dozen. 

For the Warrant Officer Corps, we are

The Quiet Professionals...

Doing Tree-age In The Duchy

 Last Saturday, while at The Muster, Sandy sent me a text with some pictures that one of the large pine trees had fallen over as a result of the last storm. 

I drove home yesterday and did an inspection of the disaster. 

Well, it's about 70 feet long and around 20 inches at its thickest portion. It didn't crush anything and looks to be completely within the territorial boundary of the Duchy. 

Not owning a proper chain saw, I'll be reaching out to some friends over the next few days to coordinate cleanup. 

Could have been much worse. The tree literally fell the only direction where it wouldn't hit anything or cause any damage. That's the Higher Power at work in my life. 

The Great Travel Plaza Fight....Battle of Port Walthall Junction

 A half day on the course left me with a free afternoon, after lunch and a quick nap, that is. 

Right around area of the hotel where I am staying was fought an action in the Bermuda Hundred Campaign, the Battle of Port Walthall Junction, on May 6th and 7th of 1864. 

Port Walthall was a disused tobacco port on the James River. Its claim to fame as an objective was its proximity to the Richmond and Peterburg railroad, with a spur leading from the port to the main line.

The forces involved were not particularly large. On the 6th of May, Heckman's brigade of Massachusetts men fought against Hagood's South Carolinians. The next day, four brigades under WHT Brooks tried again and were stopped by two Confederate brigades. This advance was the farthest made by the Union Army of the James. 

This is a NPS study map of the area.

Why do I talk about a travel plaza? Well....because the area where Heckman advanced and fought has a Pilot Travel Plaza built on top of it. There is one graffitied interpretive stand by the Wendy's restaurant.  

I'm going to assume that Heckman's men probably didn't use the Drive Thru at the Wendy's but they would have if it had been there back then! 

I, on the other hand, did get a small chocolate Frosty... 

Unfortunately, it was too dangerous to try to get a picture of the brigade's avenue of advance towards the intersection of Woods Edge Road and Ruffin Mill Road, which was their target. Ruffin Mill Road dates from the period. 

I did manage to swing over to the other side of WHT Brooks' right flank attack on the 7th of May. 

There is a State Marker right at the Robert E. Lee VFW Post....a little irony there. The view of the road shows Brooks' avenue of advance up what is now Route 1 heading towards Port Walthall Junction. The railroad bridge in the distance was the limit of their advance. Again, it's a bit dangerous to be walking along the sides of the roads, so I tried to take a picture from the VFW towards the railroad bridge. 

The total number of casualties was small. Only about 550 total for both sides. The main effect was to convince Benjamin Butler to stop his advance to cut the Richmond and Petersburg Railroad and to dig in and await the Army of the Potomac. 

I think this would make a nice set of small scenarios for either Gettysburg Soldiers or maybe Sharp Practice 2, if you didn't want to fight the whole action, but just a segment. 

Either way, it was nice to get out into the fresh air and sunshine, even if I did think I was taking my life into my hands with the local motorists. 

I was Mustered this weekend...and I relished it!

 Dad Jokes about condiments notwithstanding, I had the opportunity to attend the Williamsburg Muster for the first time. The Muster, as it's called, is run by the Old Dominion Miniature Society. The vibe here is electric and very friendly and positive. It reminds me of the Seven Years War Association convention, but with more periods. 

The Muster is held at the Clarion Hotel in, you guessed it, Williamsburg, Virginia. The drive from my hotel where I am staying for my course to the Clarion is just under an hour. Traffic wasn't an issue, although driving in Virginia is always...interesting. 

Friday and Saturday have scheduled games, with pick up games Thursday night and Sunday. Sunday is really dedicated to the flea market. There were a few dealers present as well, like Miniature Building Authority and Age of Glory. 

For the whopping price of $30 USD, I was able to register for the entire weekend. The format doesn't exactly have pre-registration for games, like the large HMGS conventions, but that works. You literally find the game you want to play in from a large chart posted on the wall, walk up to the GM, and if there is a slot, you are in. And if not, you can find another one just as easily. I played in all four games I was hoping for. I was looking forward to a fifth, but a circumstance required my attention. More of that anon. 

Not knowing what time to show up (as this was my first Muster), I opted to travel early and eat breakfast close by. I poked around the Inter Webs a bit and found this place. 

The Astronomical Pancake House lives up to its billing. It's a breakfast and lunch operation and the food was bonkers good. I wanted to go back for every meal, since it's a short distance from the hotel. 

Clean, bright, airy and at eight in the morning there was exactly myself and a small party of Navy personnel who were having a group breakfast. 

Why is it called the Astronomical Pancake House? I'm glad you asked that question.... 

That's my standard size baseball cap for reference... It's about two or three times what I normally eat with a whole banana on top. I was able to finish half. 

But I needed that feed for the games I played in...  

First up was the Battle of Germantown from the American War of Independence, played in 15mm with Live Free or Die rules written by the Little Wars TV crew. 

Units are regiments, made up into brigades. I played the role of Major General Knyphausen. As Old Knip, I had a force of three decent sized brigades of British and Hessian infantry and a company of 6pdr guns. 

I was placed on the left flank and we were told that we had to hold the terrain, but the Yankee Doodles had a victory condition and we weren't allowed to know until the end of the game what that was. 

Well, it was a hard-fought battle on the table. There was fog and other bits built into the scenario to add confusion. Both sides had reinforcements coming in at various times. The Rebels had traffic control issues with maneuvering their brigades, but pushed forward and pressed us hard. We lost the Chew House and were slowly giving way when we finally were able to prevent Washington and his men from reaching their victory condition, which turned out to be a terrain-based requirement, occupying a road junction. 

Overall, a very satisfying game. I would recommend these rules for large, multi-player battles like Germantown or Brandywine. 

Other games I played in:

Bill Molyneaux ran another one of his super-sized 54mm extravaganzas. In this case, French Foreign Legion versus Arabs. Buckets of dice, and one page simple rules, made this a real hoot. Whilst the French lost, it was a great time for everyone. 

Saturday morning I was able to get into Robert Durst's game of Trent's Reach. I've been fascinated with this January 1865 battle on the James River. This game found me with half of the Confederate Navy, two ironclads and a gunboat. 

Long story short, while we did not win, my fellow Confederate and I managed to make it much farther down the James River towards the Federal supply depot at City Point than the real CSN did. 

The rules were The Portable Ironclad rules. I'm not quite sold on them. I have a copy, but I think I still prefer Beer and Pretzels Ironclads. I'll try the scenario at home and see, since I've got the ships in my collection. 

Saturday afternoon saw me try a game of Muskets and Tomahawks set in the Early Republic with Wayne's Legion fighting the Shawnee. 

I liked the minimalist terrain and the GM was very knowledgeable about the period. The figures are the Old Glory range for Wayne's Legion, which in my opinion, are some of their best. That being said, the GM had a fair amount of looking up to do for morale rules and effects and similar. Apparently the rules don't have a Quick Reference Sheet, which would have been a massive help. In the end, The Clock ran out and we had a very unsatisfying draw. 

For small skirmishes, I'll stick to Song of Drums and Tomahawks. For bigger skirmishes, the Gettysburg Area Gamers (GAG) Rules work just fine. I think it may have been a case of too many players for the scenario. But everyone was a gentleman and it was a good time. 

Other great games I saw:

The Battle of Trenton in 28mm using Sharp Practice 2

A 15mm Battle of Chippewa using SHAKO Rules and run by the irrepressible Cliff Brunken. Cliff is one of the jolliest gamers I know and he organizes and run Del-Val Gamers Game Days once a month. 

One very interesting game I saw was a macro-game for Operation Overlord. Run by Pete Panzeri, it looked like an Axis & Allies mod and I thought it pretty clever. Sadly, I did not get to play this one. 

This game of the German attack on the Granary in Stalingrad was a massive spectacle. I was impressed by the sheer modeling required. 

And speaking of spectacles, this was a huge What A Tanker game set in Stalingrad. I do love these rules, especially for big convention-style games. This game ran multiple session and every time I looked over, all the players seemed to have a good time. 

One of the pick up games that popped up was run by Society of Daisy Grand Poobah, Tracy Johnson. A staple of OttoCon, Divine Right is a great strategic boardgame set in a fantasy world. I've played it and although it's not normally something I would play, I do enjoy it when Tracy or George Deppner are the GMs. 

Finally, there was a gentleman putting on a game about the Battle of Bennington. Being a member of the Vermont Army National Guard, I simply could NOT pass up a chance to take a picture. However, the GM was using Black Powder for the rules, and I just cannot play them. But the figures and the table were wonderful. 

And yes, I have my "Vermont Militia" flag travelling with me as well.... 😁

And last, but not least, the gratuitous Loot Pictures... 

Well, it seems I need to learn how to edit photos... But I picked up some books from Steve at Age of Glory, some Highland cows and sheep from Silver Eagle, and this lovely croft from Adora Belle's for my 1745 Project. 

Overall, I found the Muster to be an outstanding convention. I would put this on my list over Historicon or Fall-In, that's how much fun I had. 

Thank you to all the Game Masters, vendors, organizers, and staff who put on this event. Well done.

I Have Been To.... The Mariner's Museum and Park, Newport News, Virginia

 Last weekend, my wonderful wife Sandy came down to stay with me for a couple of days. We went out with the rest of my classmates to a restaurant in Richmond and had a wonderful Cuban dinner. 

The next day, was quite nice so we decided after breakfast at the Keystone Diner (located in the Keystone Tractor Museum) to trek to Newport News and visit this particular museum. 

Located on a 550 acre park, this museum is also engaged in conservation of artifacts, most notably those recovered from the wreck of the USS Monitor. Yes, THAT USS Monitor. 

It was, for me, quite moving. 

And the price of admission was staggering. One whole United States Dollar. Yes, that's right. $1 USD. 

The photo above showing my darling bride with a Spanish 24 pounder mounted outside the museum entrance. 

The museum has several other galleries in addition to its focus on the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia (nee USS Merrimack) They have a wonderful separate building with small craft from literally around the world. Ranging from the original Criss Craft motor boat, to dugouts from Polynesia, to Dutch and Italian pleasure craft, to my personal favourite, a dory from New Engalnd. 

There is also a hall dedicated to the modern America's Cup. And another couple of halls dedicated to models of cargo ships, some four to six feet or more in length and incredibly detailed. 

But back to the CSS Virginia and the USS Monitor...

There are several galleries dedicated to the two vessels as well as a full-scale model of the USS Monitor outside of the museum and several artifacts like the propeller from the USS Monitor, a gun from the CSS Virginia, etc. 

The USS Monitor exhibits include short films on the recovery process, interviews with the commander of the Navy unit assisting in the salvage, and clips talking about various members of the crew. 

One of the guns from the USS Monitor in the conservation process. The turret is in another bath and they hope to display it in the future. To say it was very moving would be an incredible understatement. 

They have reconstructed the turret to show how it worked, since the USS Monitor was so unique and revolutionary. 

And finally, they made a full scale model of the USS Monitor, which is located outside of the museum, and you are able to walk on her deck. You cannot go inside, but it's still amazing. 

If you find yourself anywhere near Newport News, Virginia, I would highly recommend visiting this museum. This was an amazing experience and I was very moved by the way the exhibits were presented.

Some Talk of Alexander...

 

And some of Hercules;

Of Hector and Lysander;

And such great names as these... 

When I re-enacted the AWI, I always had a great admiration for the folks who portrayed the Grenadier companies of the Regiments of Foot. The impression was not cheap. They played "the baddies". And unless you've got a number of fellows in line, it just doesn't look "right". Not the easiest thing to pull off and do it properly. 

With my friend Mark N., from My Brave Fusiliers blog, coming back online, after taking a quick knee, I thought I would honour him by showing some figures I painted the other day. Mark is a true gentleman and a scholar and if I wanted to research Lexington and Concord, I'd reach to him as a resource. 

Representing the 27th (Inniskilling) Regiment of Foot, these stalwart Redcoats are getting ready for 2025 and the 250th Anniversary of Battle Road (Mark and I are both locals to that event). 

I've got more grenadier companies in the works for Sharp Practice 2. And a couple of Light Infantry companies as well, in support. 

I just need to find a good figure to play Francis Smith (a proper fat bastard) mounted on a truly heroic horse. 

I've got another three companies to finish, plus two of Light Bobs and some command figures. This will give me enough for a basic force for SP2 to counter my Generic Doodle Militia.