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Grand Isand Boy Troop 510 - Fort George, Canada camperall/war re-enactment - 2007
By Pat Garten
   Scouts from Troop 510 - Fort George, Canada camperall and war re-enactment - September 14-17 weekend. The following are the comments of Pat Garten.
   I hope that the scouts returning from the recent Ft. George trip have told their parents what they thought of the trip. Bobby did a lot of work organizing with the other troops (although the Pennsylvania Troop was a no show) and it really paid off. Also, the Madigans stepped up and helped drive to Ft. George and stayed to help with the setup in the rain. Lastly, while the scouts weren’t perfect, I thought that they held up very well through all the work. Some points that you may or may not know:

    I forgot to pack the poles for one of the dining tents, so we were stuck with only one dining tent. We were supposed to camp with a troop from Vermont and one from Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania troop was a no show, so the second tent wasn’t needed. Also, we got to eat their food! Overall, that worked out well for us. It was a nice day on Friday up until we wanted to set up tents. Then the rains came. But we persevered. Cloudy and cool on Saturday, but that was OK for all the marching we did. I would say that we must have marched in formation for a total of at least 5 miles. Even though we had some difficulty maintaining our lines, I think that we were one of the most disciplined in the US forces, even counting the “Regular Army.” We were, after all, just farmers turned militia. I myself came back from all the marching with blisters on both feet, but a much improved back. We marched into town on Saturday, and there were a great number of tourists lining the streets. I believe we will be featured in a lot of Asian photo albums. I just wonder how the town merchants felt about being inundated with 2400 scouts at one time. We did not have the cap firing replica muskets that nearly everyone else had, but our scouts did well with what we had. If this becomes an annual event, I would think that we could manage to obtain these for the next battle. Bobby and I both became commissioned officers and as such are now entitled to carry pistols. I believe that everyone was warm and dry in their tents and slept reasonably well. However, several scouts have realized that someone in the troop has a very loud snore. I am not saying who, but I think Sean suffered the worst of it.
   Lastly, it was very interesting watching the scouts come to terms with the type of battle waged in 1812 and how it differs very much from Halo 2 and games like that. Most of the time, the troops would stand around and wait for orders, not knowing what was going on. Or, we would get into the thick of battle, yet not understand how the fight was progressing or even if the battle was over. We unfortunately lost both the US Invasion (Saturday) and the British Invasion (Sunday), so I don’t know how that will rewrite our history. But we were only 700 US troops vs. 1700 British. We put up a good fight and the rumor was the British cheated.
Thanks,
Pat Garten