My first "away game".

I do hope you'll pardon my protracted absence; updating is far from a habit, as yet. Today's post was inspired by my first "away game", this past weekend. for several weeks, I was unsure as to whether I would be able to go to Fort Niagara, because of possible new job conflicts, etc.  However, things worked out, and my friends Susan and John Bortniak, of Compagnie Franches De La Marine, Dumas, (did I get that right?) invited me to ride and camp with them.  Normally, for French and Indian War, I camp and fight with Joshua Beall's Company of the Maryland Forces, (British Provincial Regulars) but in the uncertainty beforehand, I apparently never actually told Beall's that I was coming! It worked out, though, and I had a great weekend. I had never been to Niagara, nor to any F&I fort other than Fort Frederick, Maryland. (Home base for the Maryland Forces)We arrived late Thursday night, and I was able to grab bunk space on the second floor of the North Bastion. The bunks there are better described as 7-foot-deep shelves along two walls. The 7' depth makes them a LOT more comfortable than the less-than-6-foot length of the bunks at Fort Frederick, since I can actually stretch out, without having to drape my ankles over the footboard! Compagnie Dumas ' camp was just in front of the bastion, which allowed me to still be a part of the camp.  Friday and Sunday, I fought as French, skirmishing as Milice on Friday morning, and as a Marine for the other battles, and on Saturday, I joined my Beall's comrades in my usual Maryland Provincial guise. The best part was the reenactment of the routing of the French re-enforcements at La Belle Famille, Sunday morning.  Advancing with the French line, and passing under the branches of a tree, I spotted Beall's Company about 15-20 yards ahead, on my right oblique. When Lieutenant Tom Kerling (commanding Beall's) gave the order to present, all I saw was a row of muzzles. They'd spooted, me, and I was going to 'get mine' for going Frenchy on them!  Since I knew 7 or 8 of my friends were aiming at me, (actually, over my head) there was no way I could NOT take the hit. I took it as a wound, so I wouldn't have to lie for 15 minutes with my arm awkwardly pinned under my body, and crawled back to a small tree, dragging one leg, pathetically. After our (French) forces were decimated or driven off, and the Brits started marching off, I began hurling insults at the Brits: "Batard Anglais!"  "Je chouchez avec ton mere!" "Elle a' un moustache grande et noir, et une arierre comme un chameaux!" "English bastard!" "I bed with your mother!" "She has a large, black moustache, and a rear like a camel!" It was only when I heard laughter on my right that I realized that some of my "French" companions actually WERE Quebecois!  I'm not sure I would have had the guts to shout my bad French, had I known that they were there!
     There was one thing I learned, though, that gave me pause; few of my French friends have friends in the British camp, and vice-versa; given that my reenacting crowd includes a lot of bleed-over between units, (we have Brit provincials, French Marines, Rev War Brits and Hessians, and Jacobites, plus several people who are associated more with Mount Vernon, Carlyle House, and the Claude Moore Colonial Farm, than with any military unit) it hadn't occured to me that there wouldn't be a lot of mixing between sides. I hope I'm wrong, and there's a lot of mixing, but if we're not mixing together, simply because the geography of British camps and French, or American and British, Scots and English, Union and Confederate, pyhysically separate us into out own, insular groups, then I think it behooves us all to venture to the enemy camps of an evening, and find that the people we "shoot at" during the day, are just as prone to bad puns, obscure Firefly references, and historical enthusiasm as we are. If you're one of those unfortunates whose unit mixes primarily with its own side, may I propose stealing the "sister city" program from towns acroos America, and have each unit become "sisters" with an "enemy" unit, to help each other/  I think it would be awesome, and the hobby could only become that much better!

Walnut ink and other strange substances

As a reenactor, I have recently made a transition in my level of "professionalism".  I have begun seeking out period sources much more than I ever did, and I've increased my efforts to recreate period materials, ande develop period methods.  Any time I brown ground beef, for pasta sauce, chili, etc., I pour off the grease into a wooden bowl, which I set in the refrigerator. The next day, I pry out the hardened disc of tallow, scrape the gelating off the bottom, (I haven't found a use for the gelatin, yet) and put the tallow in a ziplock bag in the freezer. I now have at least a pound, possibly two, and I hope to make blackball, to blacken my shoes and boots. I also have ten pounds, each, of brine-cured Salt Beef and Salt Pork in ziplocks in the bottom drawers of my fridge, (I use a lot of ziplocks!) in hopes of carrying some on a multi-day trek somewhere out in Western Maryland, soon.
     My most recent 'substance project' is black walnut ink.  A neighbor, who uses walnuts from her trees for various recipes, allowed me to gather the rotted remains of the hulls from the pile where she dumps them. (Next year, I may offer to help her husk the walnuts, and take them fresh, so they're easier to manage) I have 3 or 4 gallons of blackened, rotten husks, ready for rendering.

     I did an online search for instructions, but I haven't found a great deal. I'm taking what I did find, and experimenting as I go.  Here is the method I have developed for creating the walnut-husk-solution-concentrate that I hope will form a good basis for ink:

I have three pots ready; a cast-iron pot for the initial boiling, (the iron is supposed to darken the ink, making it black, rather than dark brown. A handful of rusted nails will produce the same result, if you don't have cast iron) a saucepan for the next stage, and a large stockpot sitting in a sinkful of cold water for cooling.  I also have a spoon or ladle at the ready, oven mitts and pot holders, and a ready supply of paper towels for mopping up spills. A number of empty jars will contain the cooled concentrate when I'm done.

First, I filled the iron pot with walnut husks, then added enoguh water to cover. I recommend leaving space for boiling, or else you'll spend half your time mopping up overflow.  I brought the husks to a hard boil, spooning off some of the liquid into the saucepan, as it threatened to boil over, When the husks had boiled down to where ther was very little liquid left, I poured the liquid off into the saucepan, and added fresh water to the husks, which I then put back on to boil. I brought the saucepan to a hard boil, until it almost boiled over. I then pured the liquid into the stockpot, to cool. Once it was cool, I poured it off into empty pepperoncini jars.  I repeated the process with the fresh water I had put into the iron pot. In the end, I had about 40 ounces of an almost black liquid, which tended to cling a bit to the bottom of the stockpot, before running off into the jars.  I suspect that this liquid will be sufficient to serve as a base for my final ink, but first I'll see what I can find out about mordants and binders, etc. (From what I've read, I may need vinegar and  Gum Arabic)  I also intend to try mixing a bit with 'wood prime' (50-50 linseed oil and turpentine) to create a wood stain.  I'll post the results of the next steps here.  Any thoughts or advice are most welcome!