In Other News - The First Time

 In other news will be where I post non wargaming stuff that doesn't fit in as a random thought.  

This post is an adapted version of something I wrote for the newsletter of my Sealed Knot re-enactment unit, Colonel Robert Hammond's Regiment of Foot.  As a bit of background no one is allowed to fire a musket (using black powder only I should stress, actual musket balls are frowned upon!) with the Sealed Knot without taking and passing a safety test to ensure they are competent.  It's an important part of what we do to ensure safety during displays and passing is not guaranteed.  The test happens after a musketeer has done a  couple of events as a non firer to gain some experience of the display environment but its usually pretty early in their Sealed Knot life, so the test is seen as a big deal and they have no idea what might be thrown at them by the tester!  Now that is clear what follows might make a little more sense.

The First Time

The first time I put on a musketeer’s clothing and equipment was in my back garden, God alone knows what the neighbours must gave thought! I was being lent a full set of kit ready for my first event and I was checking that it fitted. A few years earlier I had done a short stint of American Civil War re-enactment and a friend, who had also involved with that, had gone on to join the Sealed Knot and was musket officer with the Tower Hamlets Trained Bands. He suggested I give it a go as a musketeer. Of course this was before I saw the light and joined Hammond’s. 

Previously at his invite Mrs E, myself and the children had gone to an event to see what we thought of the Sealed Knot. We had enjoyed it so much that we joined on the spot. So my friend had visited a couple of times before the first event I was going to take part in to teach me musket drill and safety so that by the time I turned up at that first event I was supposed to have a vague idea of what I was meant to be doing. 

This was back in 1989 so there was no SK website, no Facebook and no mobile phones. All contact was either in writing, by old school landline telephone or face to face, with no way to view images of SK events unless given photographs. So my expectation of what an SK muster would be like was based on my previous experience of ACW events. It didn’t prepare me for what I was about to take part in at all!

So it came to pass that bright and early on a Saturday morning I jumped into my car and following hand written instructions drove to my first ever SK muster. Driving onto that first SK campsite was an eye opener as it was twice the size of anything from my ACW days, and this was only a Mini! (the smallest event that is open to all members). I had no idea how to find my regiment amongst what seemed like hundreds of tents. With no way to contact my regiment or my friend I was reduced to asking for directions. Still that meant that I learned how friendly the average Knotter is towards fellow eccentrics. 

I eventually found the regiment after a couple of wrong turns. Well I say ‘regiment’, at this particular event we turned out something like five participants! To be honest I recall very little of the battle other than an hour long nagging feeling of panic, as I had no idea of what was going around me, or what I was expected to do next, or what the hell introduction or extroduction were. As for counter marching, well let’s just say I might as well have been a sheep as I was simply dragged from place to place by the people around me with no idea of what I was meant to be doing. I was told to stay out of hand to hand and if anyone attacked me to just lie down and play dead, which suited me just fine as some of the opposition pikemen looked pretty damn scary. 

Despite all of this I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and turned up to do it all over again on the second day. This was when things became ‘interesting’!  I was told to get ‘kitted up’ including all the musket equipment, grab the musket I had been loaned and was promptly taken off to do a musket test. I was about to be tested by the fearsome head of the musket inspectorate ‘Tig’ Wright. I was told that she would be tough and that she would try to find any weakness in my understanding of the safety rules. To say that I was nervous would be a huge understatement. 

Now the first thing to be checked on a musket test is that all of your licences are in order, so I dutifully handed them across for checking. Tig took a long time scrutinising them and then asked a question I hadn’t been primed about! ‘Is this really your date of birth?’. It took a moment for it to sink in, then I had a moment when I wondered if she was thinking I was an imposter or something? Well you read about people doing that for driving tests, maybe it was a thing with musket tests too. It’s funny what races through your mind at moments like this. I must have managed to confirm that it really was my actual date of birth because the next question thrown at me was ‘what time were you born?’ Another question not on the expected script! This was trickier than expected. ‘er….. about 9.30 in the morning as far as I know, why, is it important?’. At which point Tig grinned at me and said ‘Oh yes, I need to know if you are older than me ….we share exactly the same birthday.’ 

As it turns out I am actually younger by about three hours, but we agreed that for all reasonable purposes I was going to be the older of the two of us. She still refers to me as ‘old person’ thirty years later! Oh and after all that I still had to take the rest of the test, but I did pass it.