Hello all, I am sending this to you because you either registered or attended Retreat From Bentonville last June. I would just like to take this opportunity to invite you to "The Fight For Crampton's Gap", which will take place on the same site near Blanchardville, Wisconsin, July 16-18. We will be portraying the Federal advance and attack of Crampton's Gap, a fight which was apart of the Battle of South Mountain during Lee's Maryland Campaign.

Our Confederate forces will be headed by Jason Reinholz. Jason will command a 12 man company portraying the 12th Virginia Infantry, Co. A, while Brad Bodoh will be commander a second 12 man company of the 12th Virginia company C. Our Confederate cavalry will be portraying the 2nd Virginia, which I will be leading.

On the Federal side Terry Sorchy will be in command. We will have two 20-25 man companies, one commanded by Terry Sorchy and the other commander has yet to be decided upon. Harrison Holloway will be serving as Lt. for Terry's Company. Our Federal cavalry will be portraying the 6th U.S. cavalry.

Our civilians will be coordinated by Stephanie Reinholz

I anticipate our Confederate ranks filling up quickly, so be sure to keep an eye out for registration. We will be capping each CS company at 12. I hope to open registration before Christmas.

Thank you and hopefully I will see you all in the field in July!
Dan Chmelar

I spoke to Dan and we will be forming one large company for the event. I am hoping to have between a 50-60 man company with a full compliment of Lts, Sgts, and Cpls.
Your Servant
Terry Sorchy

Hey Fellas,

Mess No.1 has its planning meeting on Dec.22. We are looking at this one real hard! Is there website for this bad boy yet?

El Sorcho...remember, Mess No.1 loves to play as privates!!!!!!

Ken, most of the website is done, we are just working on finishing touchs and it should be out. Hopefully early next week sometime it should be out and registration open. Glad to hear of your interest! It would be great to have you all out!!

Dan

Hello All, This morning I sent an email out to all those that I have recieved registrations from for the Fight For Crampton's Gap. If you have registered but have not recieved the email, let me know and I will look into it.

There is room in both sides for this event still.

Thanks!
Dan Chmelar

Hi Dan,

Give me a call some time. I have an idea for inviting some quality feds.

Steve Acker

Gentlemen

I am sending this message out to remind people that 2 companies (A and C) of the 12th Virginia will be recreated at the Crampton's Gap event on July 17th and 18th of this year. It is a chance to recreate 2 full sized confederate companies from the Antietam Campaign. Each company will have the same command structure that it had at the Battle of Crampton's Gap. (Company A was actually lead by an Ensign at the Battle) Each company is limited to 12 men and the slots are filling up fast.

This event will focus on the hardships these men were facing as well as the conditions that the real soliders on the Antietam campaign were dealing with. The actions will be recreated using the actual time they occured at the battle of Cramptons Gap. The 12th Virginia was one of the more upper class infantry units from Virginia. The men from the 2 companies all lived within a mile of each other before the war. The website for the event is

oldnorthwestvols.org/cramptons_gap/index.php



You may already be registered for the event. But, if you are not I would like to encourage you to register for either Company A or C of the 12th Virginia Infantry. There are slight differences for the guidelines between the two companies so please read before registering. If you are missing a few items to meet the guidelines, please let me know and we have tons of goods that can be lent out. If you have any questions please let me know. See you all real soon.

Jason Reinholz

Hi Gents,
We did a ride through of the event site yesterday. The area where we will be fighting is amazingly similar to Crampton’s Gap. This event is going to be a do not miss. The organizers/command staff have been working together to create an accurate, authentic experience of what both sides experienced. Details from right before, during, and immediately after the battle are being planned. What are these details you might ask? I am not going to tell you because we have agreed that the experience you will have will be better if you do not know exactly what is going to happen. But, I can tell you that if you do your research ahead of time you will recognize a lot of this event from history. We still have openings in all our companies. Get those registrations in.

Brad Bodoh
Mess #3

Brad is right, as the average soldier knowing all of the details of the event will take some of the fun out of it all! So we'll just let you experience them instead of hear about them!

Our Federal company is around the mid twenties already and I know plenty who have not registered yet. We are well on the way to a fifty to sixty man company!!

I have some pictures from the ride that I will put up soon. Infantry boys really can operate a horse afterall!!!!

Hi All, Here is the registered list that I have as of 4/4 for the Fight for Crampton's Gap

Federal Infantry
1.Mike Garbus
2.Doug Cooper
3.Scott Gutzke
4.Brad Argue
5.Sean Collicott
6.Dan Barker
7.Andrew Kasmar
8.Joe Liechty
9.Jeremy Bevard
10.Kurt Klotzuecher
11.Terry Sorchy
12.Andrew Herberling
13.Jim Schumann
14.Layton Pennington
15.Joe Raterink
16.John Wedeward
17.Robert Gobtop
18.Eric Fair
19.Nathan Hellwig
20.David Frohmader

Confederate Infantry, Co. A
1.Todd Spagnoletti
2.David Bushmole
3.Dale Winch
4.William O'Malley
5.William Horn
6.Jason Reinholz
7.Steve Acker
8.Andy Ackeret

Confederate Infantry, Co. C
1.Brian Baird
2.Michael Comer
3.Brad Bodoh
4.Dan McGraw

Confederate Cavalry
1.Dan Chmelar
2.William Maddox

Federal Cavalry
1.James Weighton
2.Peter Yurkonis
3.Chuck Soliday

Remember, both of our Confederate Companies are capped at 12 a piece. Our Federal Company has no cap. We are shooting for a 50-60 man Federal company.

Lets keep those registrations coming in!!
Dan

Hey all,
I just wanted to give everyone a heads up. Michael Comer has agreed to serve as Orderly of Company C.

Brad Bodoh
Mess #3

Lets keep beating the bushes and getting those registrations in folks!! The event will be here before we know it. We still have several spots left in Brad's CS company, along with lots of room for those wishing to portray the 4th New Jersey. We are sitting at right about the low thirties for Federals.
All it is going to take is each person to give ONE call to a pard you haven't talked to awhile and give them that personal invite. Sometimes thats all it takes!!
Dan

Dan, I rattled the chains of Mess No.1. Hopefully you will get at least six of us for this one, maybe a few more. We really look forward to being all privates again in the field. Sorch, did you hear that? Don't ask !

Dan, go ahead and add my guys on the list. I'll track them that way.


Corny

After spending so much time with Disaffected I am feeling behind on reading and research for Crampton's Gap.

Does anyone have any suggested books or sites to start with? Not looking for spoon feeding but a push in the right direction to save a little time and effort.

See you all in a few weeks.

Jeremy, Before Antietam, The Battle for South Mountain by John Michael Priest is a pretty good battle narrative for Foxes Gap, Turners Gap, and Crampton's Gap. Each gap has it's own section in the book devoted to it.

The event website also has a decent selection, including the Roaster for the 4th NJ, Franklins reports on the fight, as well as the orders of battle.
oldnorthwestvols.org/cramptons_gap/


Those are a couple good sources to get you started reading for the event.
Any suggestions from anyone else??
Dan