EXPERIENCING WINTER QUARTERS AT “BRANDY STATION”

Accounts from “Winter 1864” 2004

by Kevin O’Beirne

Some of the best living history experiences can occur in the most unlikely places and conditions, even in upstate New York in February. This is the story of one of the very best events I have ever attended: “Winter 1864” 2004.

On February 20-22, 2004 over fifty hearty living historians experienced a slice of Civil War winter quarters life circa mid-February 1864. The site of this non-spectator event was the grounds of the Newfane Historical Society, about 25 miles northeast of Niagara Falls. Participants portrayed Companies H and K of the 151st New York Volunteers of the Army of the Potomac’s Third Corps, Third Division. “Winter 1864” is sponsored by the 151st New York reenactment group which, like the original 151st, hails from Niagara County.

Ten CR members participated, together with six CR guests or recruits. Columbia Rifles members were divided between the two companies and battalion staff, and served in various roles as commissioned and non-commissioned officers.

Participants were quartered in a dozen reproduction winter huts, each equipped with either a small wood-burning iron stove or fireplace. The huts were built in various styles, including walls of planking and logs chinked with mud, and roofs of canvas or wood-shingles, and chimneys of brick, stovepipe, and hardtack boxes. One structure that housed nearly a dozen men was a stockaded Sibley tent complete with an iron stove in its center.

The newest hut, completed just a week before the event, was based on a photograph of soldiers of the 140th New York standing in front of a hut in the winter of 1864. Using computer-aided drafting and design (CADD) software, the men in the photo were used as benchmarks to estimate the hut’s dimensions, from which detailed construction drawings were developed.

Event coordinator Scott Schotz (151st New York) said, “This was the fifth time we’ve held ‘Winter 1864’ and this was the most ambitious version yet. Each year we try to improve the event’s authenticity and what it offers its participants, and try to vary the scenario somewhat.”

From this writer’s perspective, it is worth noting that the participants came both from reenacting’s “mainstream” and so-called “campaigners”. The event’s material standards did their job but were simple enough that the vast majority of reenactors could easily meet them. While the material standards were far from odious, what the event did in terms of first-person and period-style activities was highly ambitious. And it worked! Fellows from various areas of the reenactor authenticity spectrum came together and created a very believable winter quarters scenario that, for me (and many others), really worked all weekend.

Sergeant Mike Ryan (140th New York/Columbia Rifles) agreed: “It was true that it was ‘just’ a weekend event, but it really allowed me to ‘step back into the past’.  There were flashes of it throughout the weekend: men standing around the fire in the early evening with their breath puffing in clouds; muted laughter from a cabin in the dark; Sergeant Gast’s curses; the heavy tread as the guard relief passed by marching in step at support arms; and many other things.”

The event was attended by reenactors largely from New York State, but attracted men from as far away as Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia. Participants were organized into two small infantry companies and a partial battalion staff (officer of the day/battalion commander, adjutant, sergeant major, bugler, and clerk) to properly do guard mounting, dress parade, and camp duties. Yours truly had the privilege of portraying the Officer of the Day.

“I went to ‘Winter 1864’ expecting a good event and a fairly authentic time. What I experienced was at least twice as good as I had anticipated,” said Lt. Jim Doyle (155th New York), who one of the two company commanders.

After the event the majority of participants agreed with Lt. Doyle. “It was more than worth the long car trip,” said Tom Craig (Columbia Rifles/1st Massachusetts Cavalry), who traveled from Connecticut.

On Friday, participants checked in at registration where they were inspected and given a corps badge, reproduction period money, and a pass. Before heading to the camp they could also look over an impressive display of CDVs, paperwork, and artifacts from the original 151st New York.

Nick Redding (Calico Boys) recounted what happened next, “A few other lads and I were escorted from registration along a snowy path, that led to a quarter-mile long muddy trail that ran down a slight hill. About half way down we entered some woods and were challenged by a picket, who required the passes we were issued. The picket walked us a short distance over a creek to a small hut that served as an outpost where we met the corporal of the guard. The corporal checked our passes and led us into the camp itself, where we received our hut assignment.”

“I made my way to the small, canvas-roofed log stockade to which I was assigned,” continued Private Redding. “In the hut I met Jeff Lau of the Columbia Rifles, and he pointed out my bunk—it was a lower bunk made wood slats apparently from some old cracker box. I laid out my gear as best I could and proceeded to familiarize myself with the surroundings of our quaint quarters.”

The weekend was a “semi-immersion” event, where first-person impressions, while not required full-time, were strongly encouraged to create a period atmosphere and modern talk that would “spoil a ‘moment’” was strongly discouraged. Pre-event expectations were conveyed to participants over several months via e-mails and an online listserver. Excerpts from period sources and manuals were posted on the event website to provide helpful how-to information and historical documentation.

To support realistic reactions to pre-planned scenarios, little or no detailed information was provided to the participants. An event schedule was not published and, even on Friday evening, only basic components of the schedule were provided to the company commanders and sergeants

Friday evening included a period talent show by the participants, including recitations of the poetry of Longfellow, Tennyson, and others, Shakespeare, and a sing-along minstrel show by a group that dubbed itself The Ethiopian Cohorts. Orderly Sergeant Garr Gast (122nd New York/Columbia Rifles) with a back-up chorus of two or three men was judged to have the best group performance with a highly amusing recital of Longfellow, although they had stiff competition from one hut that played a scene from Henry V. Corporal Harry Connelly’s recitation of “The Charge of the Light Brigade”, complete with cannon sounds and saber strokes, won a basket of oatmeal cookies for best solo performance, as judged by a panel of “impartial” commissioned officers.

Around 10:45 p.m. Bugler Andy Stupp (148th New York) sounded “Taps”. Sergeant Major Schotz recalled, “Some of the best memories I have of the event was simply going from hut to hut in the dark, checking on the men, and getting to see how they had arranged things and how they adapted or adjusted their quarters for comfort and convenience.”

Pre-event research into the activities of the Third Corps in February 1864 revealed that the camps around Brandy Station were full of rumors of impending marches and, accordingly, participants were awakened by the bugle at 2:30 a.m. on Saturday morning. After a good deal of grumbling, the companies were assembled in the snowy, muddy street between the huts and informed that they were to be packed and ready to march shortly after dawn.

Corporal Jay Avery (151st New York) related, “Being in the dark about happenings—no event schedule was provided to us—and not knowing what was going to happen next, I made sure my pack was ready and my traps and musket were easy to get to before I went back to sleep for four more hours.”

A mis-set watch resulted in a “false reveille” an hour early; no one was more surprised than the slumbering denizens of the officer hut when the bugle sounded in the total darkness at 5:30 a.m.! Private Redding recalled, “When the ‘real’ roll call finally arrived around 6:45 a.m. the boys of Company K groggily trudged into line, and were delighted to hear that the orders to march had been countermanded, and we were to go about our normal camp duties. I knew the temperature was just below freezing because the drip of rain on our hut’s canvas roof had ceased and some light snow flurries started. About a half hour after roll call and some basic fatigue details, ‘Peas on a Trencher’ sounded and our company was issued breakfast: a sloppy mixture of sausage grounds, apple chunks, and some type of potato. We also received some soft bread and a stiff cup of coffee that relieved our fatigue.” Breakfast was served from the kitchen hut by a private and a tired Corporal Jim “Coldfoot” Stauder (151st New York) who coordinated K.P. duty for the weekend.

Saturday’s activities also included inspection of the huts by the Officer of the Day, guard mount ceremony including reliving the Old Guard with the New, police guard duty, fatigue details, dress parade, and other things.

Sergeant Major Schotz noted why guard duty, with all its period pomp and circumstance, was big part of the event: “If we didn’t do guard duty: a new reenactor might never get to learn more of the soldier’s experience than burning powder at other events, the corporals won’t get to practice one of the most important aspects of their job, spontaneous scenarios cannot happen at the sentinel posts, the musicians would not get to experience being ‘musicians of the guard’, guard mount ceremony in its grand splendor wouldn’t happen, authentic paperwork such as guard reports would not be recorded, and we would not be able to reenact what our forefathers proudly wrote in their books, diaries, and letters.”

The event included a number of scripted “scenarios” that were known in advance only to their principal enactors, among which was a soldier “death” by accidental gunshot. After a shot rang out the unlucky soldier, portrayed by Darren Peck (151st New York), was carried from his hut covered in blood and eventually pronounced dead. While a detail of men built a coffin from scrap timber, a collection was taken to pay for embalming and shipping the body home.

While the “corpse” was laid out on a gum blanket in battalion headquarters, the dead man’s company commander and the battalion clerk (Jeff Henion, Columbia Rifles) inventoried all the man’s personal possessions and completed the army red tape that attended such a mishap.

A couple hours later, the body was placed into the newly constructed pine box, a few words were spoken to consign the soul to God, and the lid was nailed on the coffin with Private Peck inside. The coffin was carried outside the boundaries of the camp—ostensibly to the Brandy Station depot on the Orange & Alexandria Railroad—where Peck was set free, none-the-worse for his peculiar experience. He did not return to the event, thus creating the impression for participants that he was actually killed.

Lt. David McKenna (122nd New York) remembered, “I was privy to more info than most of the men, but even the company officers were kept in the dark about a lot of
stuff, which allowed me to be honestly surprised several times.  When I heard the initial report that Private Peck had a serious accident—I didn’t know at the time that it was ‘fatal’—my first reaction was ‘Really?!’  I certainly never expected that a coffin was going to be built and Peck’s body actually carried away in it with the lid nailed on.”

Saturday also saw a mail call and delivery of packages from the Niagara County Soldiers’ Aid Society. The crates, provided by Charles Heath (Columbia Rifles), contained period-type foods in appropriate packaging and containers, and a variety of socks, mittens, scarves, and other things from home, all packed in sawdust and appropriately addressed with labels of the upstate New York-based Merchant’s Union Express Company.

Private Redding recalled, “The boys of Company H pried open their boxes and found them filled with a lot of knit goods, woolen scarves, foodstuffs including cans of sardines and a whole smoked turkey, bottles of elixirs branded as ‘Bonded Brain Tonic’ and ‘Dutter's Liver Oil'—both later found to be made using different amounts of Maraschino cherry syrup and spiced rum, with some Crème de Menthe in the ‘Liver Oil’—and a number of other things. When our Company K opened our box from home, however, we found it contained only spoiled bacon, rotten potatoes, rancid jam, and other foodstuffs that had definitely seen better days.” A note in the looted box read, “We stole your food,/ It was good,/ Like a fox,/ We repacked the box,/ Lest we be rude,/ Jine the Cavalry, [signed] The Nutmeg Boys”, apparently pointing to a Connecticut cavalry regiment as the culprits. Luckily, the men of Company H shared their largess with their less fortunate comrades in Company K.

A functional sutler portrayed by Craig Schaeffer (151st New York) highlighted the event. Using the reproduction period money and tokens provided at registration, participants were able to buy from a suitably oily-acting “skinner” a surprisingly large array of items, including smoking pipes and tobacco, leather blacking, cookies and candy, pins in the shape of corps badges, and contraband whiskey on the sly. Lt. Dennis Shank (151st New York), who portrayed the Adjutant, took a real shine to the sutler’s “Urbanski’s Army Snuff” and bordered on being a walking commercial for it during the balance of the weekend.

Charles Heath wrote, “The sutler was great. And to boot, on Saturday his hut had a chimney fire and the boys just went and pushed the wooden portion over into the snow. How many times have we all read about real soldiers doing that?”

Shawn Parsons (149th New York) recalled, “One thing that really stands out in my memory was the reaction to the sutler’s chimney fire. I don’t know if it was because we were in first-person or what, but I found it humorously interesting that a dozen or so soldiers stood around watching the chimney burn for about thirty whole seconds before I yelled, “Fire!’ and we all rushed to knock the cracker box chimney into the snow. It was as if we were torn between letting the sutler and his wares burn or rendering assistance.”

A representative of the “U.S. Christian Commission”, portrayed by Renae Stauder (151st New York), visited the camp on Saturday to dole out hot soup and stew to supplement the soldiers’ otherwise bland army fare.

Regimental clerk Jeff Henion spent the day busy with period army paperwork, including consolidated morning reports, requisition forms, receipts for supplies obtained from a local farmer, paperwork related to the “shooting death”, and preparing a letter of condolence for the man’s relatives. As one of the commissioned officers, I can easily state that Private Henion’s performance as clerk was exceptional and he added a good deal of quality of the event, particularly for the officers, who he often pursued, with inkwell and pen in hand, for signatures and endorsements.

The weekend’s weather was tolerable but certainly wintry. While Friday was sunny and nearly 50 degrees, Saturday’s cloudy weather progressively worsened until, by supper, it was in the upper 20s and snowing hard with winds gusting up to 25-mph. While the camp was extremely muddy on Saturday, by Sunday morning the mud had frozen underneath three inches of new snow.

On Saturday evening the companies provided details for picket duty. An abbreviated guard mount ceremony was held in Jack Frost’s icy blast and the men marched off to a field a couple hundred yards behind the huts. The Officer of the Guard, Lt. Shank, ordered the establishment of an outpost and four picket posts that were manned for several hours.

As twilight deepened, the pickets noticed Confederate sentinels just eighty yards away across the open field against the far tree line, shivering in the snow and wind. The “enemy” pickets were event participants outfitted in Confederate uniforms who volunteered to “turn sides” for the evening to create the opposing-picket scenario.

While the Federal outpost was well sheltered from most of the elements, the Confederate outpost was exposed to a constant, biting breeze that drove snow and ice into the men’s faces. The grayclad men, who portrayed the 2nd Florida regiment, spoke quietly of home in first-person drawls and cursed the army shortages that deprived most of them of overcoats.

During the evening, the pickets watched each other across the dark, snowy field. There was only one instance of fraternization between the sides, including the inevitable trade of coffee and tobacco.

“Picket duty was just incredible,” said Jay Avery, who was a corporal in the Federal detail. “I’ve wanted to do something like that in first-person for years and at this event it was very well done.” Private Jeff Lau, who portrayed one of the Confederate pickets, agreed: “The picket scenario in the snow was something that was fairly common for Civil War soldiers but not something that reenactors get much of a chance to experience.”

Lt. David McKenna commanded the Rebel pickets and related, “The only thing we had going for us at the Confederate outpost was a healthy fire; otherwise we were just standing on the edge of a field with very little cover from the snow and wind, both for the sentinels and the relief at the outpost. I was impressed by everyone's willingness to man their posts in snow up to their knees while fully exposed to the weather the entire time. There was a genuine effort by all to remain in first-person and it made for a very rich experience. I am very proud of all involved.”

After almost two hours of exposure, most of the Confederate pickets, including Lt. McKenna, decided to “desert” and surrendered to the Yankees. The Rebels’ arms were confiscated and their names and rank taken, after which they were blindfolded and led off into captivity. Refusing to surrender, Private Charles Heath and Steve Tyler (Columbia Rifles) remained shivering in the field as counterparts to the Federals.

The first-person impressions at the Confederate picket post impressed Mike Ryan, who was the Rebels’ sergeant of the guard: “Private Heath’s Confederate soldier on picket was the epitome of unsurpassed believability. Lt. McKenna took a vote and the boys of the ‘2nd Florida’ all agreed that the war was almost over, we had almost no food, little ammunition, so what was the sense of dying for a lost cause? We voted to march to the Union picket line, perhaps bowed but still proud.  Except for Charles.  Standing there in the snow, peering through the flurries coming down, with the wind blowing across the field where shadowed figures in blue overcoats stood their own lonely picket, the last Confederate at the outpost said simply, ‘I cain’t do it.’  We tried to convince him—Tyler, Redding, Lau, and me—but he wouldn’t be persuaded. Spring was coming in just a few weeks, Charles said quietly.  The army would be back.  There would be food then.  ‘Ya’ll go on,’ he murmured, making no judgment and doing only what he had to do himself.  He peered through the blowing snow at the distant Yankee pickets and, for a few minutes, I believed that we didn’t have to cross the lines.  I believed that spring was coming. The supply trains would arrive.  We could hold on and the Confederacy could prevail.  For a few minutes out there in the snow and cold and night, honest to God, I believed it.”

Charles Heath recalled, “Being the last Reb on picket was priceless. After most of the rest of the Confederates surrendered, a Yank came trundling over with enough tinware clanging around as if he wore a cowbell. Shooting him from 12 or 15 feet away would have been cold-blooded murder. Steve Tyler stayed for a while, and then took the long walk from which a man doesn’t return—he ‘deserted’ back to camp I guess. Using a short board I dug a two-foot deep hole in the snow behind some bushes for cover, and the wind was kind of blocked, so I stayed for a while. At one point the Yanks sent out a patrol that spread out like skirmishers and followed footprints in the snow. It was ‘a moment’ to simply watch them move slowly toward me over the last eighty yards or so.  I was finally caught and the gracious Federals allowed me time to warm up by their outpost fire, and we had some good first-person going on there. The whole picket duty scenario was a nice twist. We ‘Rebs’ could see the ‘Yanks’ walking their beats, knapsacks white with snow, and hear their conversations, but never really knew what was going on over there. The distance was close, but the blowing snow at night gave a surreal optical illusion of more yardage than there was. You just can’t get that experience from a history book.”

After roll call at Tattoo, followed by Taps, the men turned in to their warm huts for the night. The day’s exertions and cold temperatures made for sound sleepers, except when the fires in the huts burned low and had to be re-stoked. Quality snoring was the rule in the officers’ hut, and many others besides.

“Sunday morning came earlier than expected,” admitted Private Redding, “and musicians’ call roused us from sleep. Groggily we made our way out to roll call, and reveille played as we fell into line.”

Corporal Avery recalled, “Sunday morning held ‘a moment’ for me. A few of us sat around the fire in the company street and found the frozen leftovers of some scorched bacon laying in a snow-covered fry pan from the day before. Charles Heath removed the bacon, pondered the pan and warming it up, and instead decided on cold bacon for breakfast. It’s the little things like this, which initially seem innocuous, that get a man thinking about what soldiers of 1864 went through.”

Sunday’s morning routine was similar to Saturday’s, except that dress parade was held in the morning, during which an order from the commanding general was read announcing that the men were to pack up and be ready to march. Shortly afterward Bugler Stupp sounded “The General” and packages of ammunition were issued to each man. Private Redding wrote, “We all packed our knapsacks, and gathered our belongings, making preparations for the march.”

One final incident remained, as related by Private Redding: “The order was given to empty straw from our bed ticks onto the trail leading out of camp, the plan being to burn the straw. However someone apparently misunderstood the order and in no time the company street was ablaze instead of the trail leading out of camp! Thankfully, the fire was very quickly put out.”

Around 10:15 a.m. the bugle sounded “The Assembly” and then “To the Color” and, after the small battalion was assembled in line in overcoats and full knapsacks, the men were marched a few hundred yards to the participant parking lot and dismissed to conclude the event.

The rumors and eventual orders to march from winter quarters were per the history of the original 151st New York which, together with the rest of the Third Corps and the Sixth Corps, marched from Brandy Station in February 1864 on a brief campaign that culminated in the battle of Morton’s Ford on the Rapidan River.

Upon their departure, each participant was given a CD-rom with historical documentation on the history of the 151st New York and a color poster featuring the names of the event participants superimposed over a facsimile of a 151st New York recruiting poster from 1862.

Charles Heath reflected, “For a few days, the whole winter camp chapter from John Billings’s Hardtack and Coffee came to life, along with similar passages from Corporal Si Klegg and His Pard, and all those other tales of little huts and slippery streets.”

“In almost every respect this was the best ‘Winter 1864’ event yet,” said Sergeant Major Schotz. “With the help of a few fellows from some other reenactment groups we planned some very good scenarios and it looked to me like the average participant was in ‘true’ first-person more than half the time. It exceeded our expectations.”

Schotz’s favorite experiences of the weekend were small things, including, “Watching Charles fix a grinding wheel he found and then sharpen the axes; the small, crude sled brought by Jeff Henion that saw a hell of a lot of use; the Adjutant’s salt pork conflagration at the campfire in the company street; ‘Urbanski’s Army Snuff’, taking my shoes off to warm up in battalion headquarters and listening to the clerk scribble paperwork on Peck’s ‘death’; fluffy snow on knapsacks; entering the guardhouse and seeing the next relief in period conversation; the sound in the company street of hammering from within the huts as men built furniture; candle shortages; blue lozenge corps badges on almost everyone; the changing of the guard; heavy smoke from the chimneys when the boys went inside for a bit of free time; watching the sergeants simulating pulling balls from muskets when guard duty was over; curious men asking me, ‘What’s being planned up in the officers’ hut?’; candlelight emanating from the huts at night; and many other things.”

Charles Heath concurred: “It was a combination of lots of little things, like making coffee in the guardhouse for the men of the next relief, donating money to ship the dead man from Company K home, getting a neglected old treadle grindstone working again, receiving a letter at mail call, starting a campfire in the snow at the picket outpost, period grub that sometimes resembled gruel of various colors, properly done guard mount, the hilarious sight of the Adjutant’s flaming bacon, the sights of the men in line on the company street, the stove in our hut glowing red in the cold night, the sergeant dropping a log on my foot, seeing a big rabbit running down the company street in the morning twilight—right over the Officer of the Day’s feet, and being in the ranks as the battalion gave three cheers for George Washington on his birthday. This event was just filled to overflowing with great experiences.”

Private Matt Ryan of Connecticut wrote afterward, “It was certainly an event of extremes in terms of weather, authenticity, and experience.  Rarely has any reenacting event stirred such strong emotions in me or expanded my knowledge of day-to-day army life in camp. The organizers put a tremendous amount of work into the event and their labors were not wasted: the participants received the benefits in spades.”

Despite the fact that it was held on a site far removed from Brandy Station, Virginia, “Winter 1864” 2004 provided a load of unique opportunities for reenactors to experience winter quarters in an historically accurate fashion. Shawn Parsons perhaps summed it up best when he wrote, “All of the scenarios were well-planned and well done. Coupled with the site and the atmosphere it provides, you can’t buy this type of experience. ‘Winter 1864’ provides a unique environment where even—and perhaps, especially—the unplanned and unannounced incidents provide an unparalleled opportunity to experience the life of a Civil War soldier.”