Hibernia Park, August 24-26, 2001

At Hibernia Park (in PA) in August of 2001, we had a fine time honing our signaling skills, getting a little marching drill, and even figuring out how to escape from the Yankees. Here's some of the action caught on film.

Going out with the infantry. We started as a 4-man signal party, which was subsequently broken up into 2 parties. The man in the back is Private Davis. The 3 men in front, starting with the one closest to the camera, are Private Taylor, Sergeant Nichols and Private Saling.

This and the following few scenes show us doing some night signaling with the torches. The torch on the ground both helps the book man see to read his book (i.e., code and decode messages) as well as provide a reference point so that the far signal party can tell the difference between left and right. In this picture, Private Taylor has the book, Private Saling has the torch and Sergeant Nichols, as usual, is practicing his impression as a Prussian observer.

A close-up of Private Taylor on the book during night signaling.

Now Private Saling is on the book and Private Taylor is signaling with the flag.

A close-up of Private Taylor on the torch.

Saturday night, after about an hour of night signal practice, Captain Stecker, Sergeant Nichols and Private Taylor, along with Yankee Signal Sergeant Glenn Ranck (who was spying on our night signaling operation) were captured by a platoon of slightly inebriated Yankee Irish soldier (they thought Ranck was a Confederate spy in a Yankee uniform). Our freedom was purchased with a bottle of spirits, but the Yankees insisted on keeping the Yankee signal sergeant, which was fine by us. The following day we took a stretcher to recover the "dead soldier" (the empty whiskey bottle).

Last rites for the dead soldier.

Webmaster: Private Lee A. Taylor, C.S.A.