SEEING THE ELEPHANT-PART 8 Chris had met

SEEING THE ELEPHANT-PART 8

Chris had met a former reenactor who had moved from Tennessee to our area. Chris had cajoled him into coming to a drill and seeing what he thought about us and if he would be interested in being our commander.

Well, we met again for a Saturday morning drill at the State Park we had originally used for our first drill. Toren, the new prospective commander, came in full uniform and talked to us. He wanted to know what we had in mind for our unit. Basically we said we wanted to be the best in our overall command and make the other companies stand up and take notice of what we had learned.

Toren took us through the maneuvers out on the dewy grass of the park. We performed all the maneuvers that we had learned very efficiently. We actually got off some volleys that sounded like 12 rifles going off at one time. Pard, who was now our First Sergeant, had taught us well.

I believed Toren saw our potential and he also saw we were committed to being the best. He saw the hunger and passion we had for our unit and for working to get better.

About 11:00 AM at the end of the drill Toren said he would be our commander. He said we would get even better and he committed to us since we had committed to each other and the unit.

Well, we were walking on cloud nine. We had a First Sergeant who had a lot of reenacting experience and we had a Lieutenant who had command experience and knew what he was doing.

There was a small reenactment coming up the last of March at Poison Springs State Park in south Arkansas and we all committed to participate in it during the last weekend in March. This was going to be our first reenactment as a new and Improved Unit. We were all just itching for that weekend to arrive.

Well, we all got busy accumulating any gear we might need; getting our rifles cleaned; and going over in our minds the maneuvers we had learned.

Little did we know what we would find out at our first reenactment under Toren’s command.