Monacacy Encampment

I stopped at Monocacy National Battlefield on the way home from Libertytown yesterday and discovered an 'Encampment' event being held on the grounds of the Gambrill Mill section, which is my favorite part of the battlefield. There was a group of Confederate re-enactors and a group of Yankee re-enactors. The Yankee group did a nice artillery demonstration. There were only six of them, but it wasn't hard to imagine that same sound, but coming from a thousand guns. Pretty scary.

I was sketching this view of the Confederate tents (they had slept in them the night before) when four of them came over to chat. To see what I was doing. And then one of them showed me his sketchbook! He had been working in it for years! It was chock full of delightful pen and ink drawings done with an historically accurate steel nib! (I should have asked him about his ink.)

His drawings recorded encampments and re-enactments that he had participated in. It was meant to be like the sketchbooks Civl War soldiers and their contemporary newspaper illustrators kept during the War. The other three guys looking over my shoulder pointed out buddies and relatives and recognized events they had attended from these drawings. This is testimony to how well the artist had captured likenesses! These were great drawings, very delicate and precise, and I urged him to take very good care of them! He just shrugged.

Anyway, these Confederate fellows were telling me about some of the odd questions that they get from onlookers during these kinds of re-enactments and encampments. I wrote some of the good ones down. These were NOT questions from children either:
-- How come all the battles were fought on National Park Service land?
-- Were all these monuments here during the battle? Is that how the troops knew where to go?
-- (and my favorite) Is that real fire?
-- (and the one I asked yesterday) So, who won?

Later in that same general area I got out my new sketch box and set it up to paint a small view of the edge of a pond and a path leading off into the dark woods. I learned a bit about the logistics of the set up and the limitations of the watercolors. (Gouache or the pastels will be much more fun!) As well as the odds of attracting folks who want to look and chat. I suspect that the sketch box all set up is a magnet. I actually enjoy this chatting part. Especially when they have to come some distance off the 'beaten path' to get close enough to talk. You do meet some nice folks! Which I did yesterday.

On the way home from there I stopped at Homestead Farm, just a bit south of Poolesville. I got the most beautiful peaches and blackberries. There were folks emerging from the orchard area with wheelbarrows full of peaches! Who were they? What on earth do you do with thirty pounds of peaches? Cobbler for a hundred!