Tag: authenticity

Ceci n’est pas une cruche

On By kittycalashIn Events, Fail, History, Living History, personal, Reenacting, Snark1 Comment
This is not a pitcher

Sometimes a pitcher is not a pitcher. In the same way that Matthiessen‘s Snow Leopard is not about a snow leopard, this was not about me: this was about the woman who approached me as I walked with Cat to the water bubbler with this white ceramic pitcher from Home Goods.

She stopped me to say, “You shouldn’t have a pitcher in camp. You should have a bucket.”

This is true, as far as it goes: but really, I should have a tin kettle (and I do). But the reasoning I was given had to do not so much with the fragility of the pitcher (which I pack in a basket or wrap in our towels and stuff into something in the supply wagon) as it did with the myth of Molly Pitcher. For an explication of the Molly Pitcher myth, I refer you to the Journal of the American Revolution, because, as I said to the woman who approached me, “It’s not my fight.”

So what’s the point? Maybe there are several:

One might be, Everyone has a hobby horse. Some of us are made mad by The Bodice. Some of us cannot abide makeup on “camp followers” who look like stragglers from a high school production of Sweeny Todd. Some of us are material culture and camp equipment fanatics– begone, ironware! Still others twitch at the baggy, off-the-rack cut and fit of some uniforms.

For another, This wasn’t about me– or my pitcher. The woman who approached me had a thing about Molly Pitcher and the myth of the woman on the battlefield with a pitcher, bringing water to the men. My pitcher and I were merely a trigger.

colonial woman with pitcher and kettle
Everybody’s got something to hide ‘cept for me and my…pitcher? or kettle?

And for a third, We all make choices and compromises. I chose not to bring the antique family copper coffee pot into the field, and also chose not to let the coffee and water sit overnight in the tin kettle. I chose, too, to use the white pitcher and a redware one for water that we drank all day long. When it’s hot, I slice lemons or limes into the water to make it easier to drink as much water as we need to in a day spent sweating outdoors, and it prevents scurvy to boot.

Fourth? We can all, always, make better choices. Few among us achieves true 18th century purity– I can assure you that even had I dashed my pitcher to the ground Saturday and dropped to my knees in repentance, I was not 18th century to the skin. There are monthly occurrences that I won’t go old school on, and on this point I shall not be moved.

But back at my ‘rock maple’ table, I could do better. We could/should have but one wooden bowl (mine), and the boys could/should have tin bowls, and we could/should swap out the redware canns with the handles broken off, but they make a nice refugee statement and until they break completely…

And there is a fabulous copper cistern by Goose Bay Workshops that I covet for its copper glory, but since it is not tinned inside, no lemons or limes would be allowed, and it would be hard to argue it for a Light Company. That puts me at another tin kettle, designated for water, and dipping our cups in. I can probably live with that choice.

But then, if I encounter someone who wants to talk about Molly Kettle, I’ll know I’m in real trouble.

Back Bump: The Regency Silhouette

On By kittycalashIn Clothing, History, Reenacting3 Comments
Ah! Quelle antiquité!!! Oh! Quelle folie que la nouveauté ... Engraving, 1797. 1892,0714.755 British Museuem
Ah! Quelle antiquité!!! Oh! Quelle folie que la nouveauté … Engraving, 1797. 1892,0714.755 British Museum

Regency, Federal, Early Republic:  we use these terms to cover (roughly) the period from 1790-1820, though technically the Regency period would mean only 1811-1820, when George IV served as Prince Regent, ruling for his incapacitated father, George III. In the United States, “Regency Costuming” is a bit of misnomer if you’re copying early American gowns, but it does serve as a handy short-hand we all tend to understand.

Grossly, the principles of dress are rooted in neo-classicism and republicanism rising from the American and French Revolutions. Specifically, we see a turning away from the heavily-boned, panniered, and formal gown styles to the looser, short-stayed, flowing, simpler gowns.  The transition is summed up for me in this satirical print.

So, you’re no longer side-to-side wide, baby: you gotta have back.

How do you get back? There are a couple of perfectly authentic tricks that do not require you to stuff a cat into the back of your dress, though you can do that if you want. The combination I have found to work is two-part: a small, crescent-shaped pad, and the method of pleating. How you deploy the pad and the pleats will give you the silhouette you desire.

First, though: which silhouette? In really the 1790s, the silhouette is rounder than you might think. It really is a round gown.

Ann Frankland Lewis, 1793. LACMA
The Frail Sisters, 1794

To get that look, I use a small rump pad, bustle pad, or bum roll (call it what you like), which is stitched to the inside of my petticoat.

Pad from the inside
Pad from the outside

That’s the white IKEA curtain petticoat I made during the extended snow days of last year, and which I have worn with the red curtain-along open robe and under the petticoat and open robe for What Cheer Day. The pad is the same natural light-weight linen I use for a many gown linings, filled with bamboo stuffing. If I’d had wool on hand in the small hours of the morning I made this pad, I would have used it, but all I had was bamboo in the rush to finish up and have something to wear for a photo shoot.

The other key factors are pleating styles and fabric weight. Pleats can add lift, but in general, the lighter the fabric, the more lift a small pad will give you.

Double and triple box pleats, exterior view
Double and triple box pleats, interior view

1780_1790
I’m particularly fond of the pleats used for the gown shown on page 75 of Nancy Bradfield’s Costume in Detail. I’ve used this as a guide several times, and I am very pleased with the results. They do vary, of course, depending on fabric weight, fibre, and length. Stiffer cottons, like the Waverly Felicity of the curtain-along gown, will make a round shape; tropical weight wool does fairly well, also, but the most amazing 1790s rendition I have achieved to date is the light-weight India print cotton short gown.

On Cassandra
On me

Now that’s 1790s back. The bustle-like shape surprised (OK, shocked) me, but on the whole, I think I’m pleased. So there you are: pad, petticoat and pleats: that’s how you get back.

Tactical Strategies

On By kittycalashIn Events, Living History, Reenacting

One of the things I liked best about this year’s School of Instruction was the Petite Guerre demonstration that followed a discussion of those tactics by Dr Stoltz of the 5th NY.

Mr McC & the Young Mr share a tree; note British officer and Hessian

Demonstrating skirmishes instead of linear warfare makes sense, given the numbers of men who take the field at events, and the smaller engagements will reflect exchanges common between the sides during the war.

What I like in particular is that using ‘petite guerre’ tactics requires the commanders and soldiers to tailor their actions to a site (site specific immersive experience: you cannot go wrong) and as the action unfolds, soldiers at all ranks are forced not only to move but also to think. Any action where the interpreters have to think is likely to create a better experience for visitors—and no great surprise, that usually makes a better experience for interpreters. It also flatters the site managers and visitors, who will appreciate that you’ve taken the time to explore and understand their place, and its place in history.

While you don’t necessarily want to fight the Battle of the Comfort Station, skirmishing around a site with buildings provides an objective, while multiple buildings and some woods or undergrowth provide cover for the Light Infantry troops and opportunities for deceit.

Of course, depending on troop size, it may be that each man needs his own tree. On Sunday, the Young Mr kept close to Mr McC, demonstrating troop [leg] length.

It’s hard to be invisible when you’re tall.

But I do mean this seriously: scaling events to available resources allows for a better interpretation.

That’s common sense, and sound museum practice, and that’s pretty much the business living history practioners (aka reenactors), are in: interpreting the past to visitors. Best practices for professionals and hobbyists are grounded in the same principles:

  • Primary source research
  • Material culture research
  • Site, resource, and audience- appropriate delivery
IMG_1386
Direction provided by Mr C with spontoon.

Building an encampment and tactical demonstration on the first two principles grounds the event in in historical authenticity. Adding the third principle, and increasing the use of smaller group tactics, tailored to the participants and site, would be a subtle but strategic shift to build a more engaging experience that better educates visitors and might even attract new recruits.

Dirt Stew & The King’s Oreo

On By kittycalashIn Events, Food, Living History, Reenacting4 Comments
What Lights through Temple window Break?

What do you do when the kettle tilts off the pothook and spills onto the floor?
Scoop the food back in and keep cooking.

That’s how you make dirt stew, with just enough ash to keep the texture interesting at the bottom of your bowl, plus ham, onion, turnips, parsnips, potatoes and carrots. If you wash the inside of the kettle later in your motel bathtub, you will add to the list of very bad things you’ve done in the bathrooms of temporary accommodations.

On Saturday, the original event plan called for a camp kitchen demonstration; this was nixed because a long string of permissions could not be obtained in time, so we fell back on bringing the three sticks and two kettles. Outdoor fires of all kinds were nixed Thursday because of red flag warnings, and after downpours Friday night followed by rain on Saturday afternoon, we ended up cooking in the back room of the Temple building.

Third from the left, Mr S in the ‘Ugly Dog’ coat.

Some of us were too focused on getting food into the kettle to tidy up the surroundings, and that is why you need several people in any group: someone has to keep their head and clean up the wreckage of previous occupants. Fortunately for us, Mr McC managed that while the Young Mr swarmed around like a cat wanting its dinner, I cut vegetables and Mr S stewed about spilling the stew.

In the end it was a cozy evening boiling roots and hearing stories. I took no photos because that would have ruined it, but Mr S kneeling before the fireplace in the Ugly Dog coat and overalls as the last of the light came through the watery glass made a Vermeer-like and beautiful sight.

On Sunday morning, Our Musician Friend (who has turned his coat, and now sports yards and yards of lace and a bearskin hat nicknamed Lamb Chop), produced a package of Oreos from his haversack, and the Young Mr and I took the King’s Oreo with pleasure and no commitment.