JACKSON -- Saturday's rainstorm and Sunday's drizzles couldn't dampen the spirits of the crowds attending Race Days 2008 in Jackson.
Although the parade was canceled, every other event went forward -- including Sunday's celebration of Fort Belmont's 50th anniversary, which included a reenactment of Civil War-era cavalry drills.
"It was great," said Carol Achterkirch of Jackson, after watching the 1 p.m. performance of the Midwest Mounted Reenactors. "I think this whole weekend has been very well planned, very well executed and (there was) something for absolutely everybody."
The Midwest Mounted Reenactors are a group of performing mounted shooting horsemen and women from the Midwest, ranked nationally in the Cowboy Mounted Shooting Association. They portray everything from Union and Confederate cavalry of the Civil War to Texas Rangers and cowboys and Native Americans of the old west.
On Sunday, honoring Fort Belmont's 50th birthday, reenactors portrayed members of the 1st Company of Minnesota Volunteer Cavalry, also known as the Mounted Rangers. They wore authentic uniforms from the Civil War, portrayed characters from that era and performed cavalry drills with both guns and swords.
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Their leader, Tom Jones of Clearwater, played the part of Captain Henning Von Minden, who helped organize the 1st Minnesota company and became its captain. Dale Florek of Maple Lake portrayed Sgt. Major Hank Hill and Sean Francis played the part of Private Sean Francis.
In order to be in the reenactment, their 16-hand horses had to be tested by obstacles and in shooting, jumping and interacting with the public. The horses are very specialized, Jones said, and can ride in all conditions. Two are competition mounting shooting horses.
The crowd lined up on the museum's front lawn in order to watch the show, which included Jones' history of the Union cavalry and the Minnesota cavalry units in particular.
"Minnesota was the first state in the Union to volunteer cavalry," Jones told the crowd, and explained that there were three reasons the Union lagged behind the Confederacy in terms of its cavalry.
First, the Union's leader at the time, Gen. Winfield Scott, believed in artillery more than cavalry. Additionally, there was a huge shortage of horses in the north at that time, such that initially there were five men to each horse even in the cavalry unit. Finally, horses were commonly used in the South because it was a more rural area, so their horsemanship was better.
The Minnesotans volunteered anyway. The 1st Company of Minnesota Volunteer Cavalry started with 98 men, who after a month of training were sent to St. Louis, Mo. in 1861. There, they trained with sabers, pistols and carbines.
"The Remington was the pride of use of officers and whatever enlisted men could get them," Florek explained. "Everything was in short supply in those days... it was tricky to learn to shoot it because it shot high."
The 1861 Remington .44 caliber percussion cap and ball pistol had a 25-yard range, which Francis proceeded to demonstrate to the delight of the crowd, picking off balloons as he rode his horse, Trooper.
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Then the reenactors demonstrated the use of the 1840 heavy saber, the preferred sword for officers and cavalrymen. The close-quarters cavalry drill, aptly named "Running at the Head," consisted of slashing at head-sized targets while riding by on a horse.
The final drill was a competition between Florek and Jones, who both shot and slashed targets and attempted to put the tips of their swords through a three-inch ring on a post. Keeping their horses under control was a critical element, particularly given the soft, damp earth in front of the Fort Belmont museum.
The reenactments were paid for by a $1,900 grant to the Belmont Foundation/Jackson County Tourism Inc.
"It was good," said Bailey Lesch, 8, of Lakefield -- who firmly believed he could have done better with his own BB gun.
