![]() Townsfolk walked alongside a few troopers of the color guard, each person gallivanting around in their western characters an outlaw here, a saloon host and the sheriff there. “Playing actual cavalry soldiers saving the town from bank robbers and saving the day was probably one of the coolest things I’ve done with this company,” said Cpl. The stage was set and the curtains had been drawn. Music from classic Western films played over a loudspeaker. A crowd of locals had gathered to watch the show. “Being able to take a weekend and live in such a way as the cavalry did on the Great Plains was an insightful and humbling moment,” said Villarreal.Īs the sun began to set on Saturday evening, word came out that Billy the Kidd had been sighted around town and was planning to rob the bank. To watch a little bit of the pain and sweat and then afterward getting to see the smiles on the soldier’s faces at the end of the day made everything worth it, Walters said. They competed in knife and tomahawk throwing competitions and played characters inside a saloon as re-enactors played out skit after skit that comically mimicked life in the old west. In fact, troopers of the mounted color guard enjoyed many activities offered to those living back in the day. ![]() Much of the Color Guard's time was spent tending to camp and the horses, interacting with people at the event and talking about the unit’s history. Though it was not all pain and suffering. You can never know how it was because it was different back then, said Cohen. It’s one of those things you can only imagine. They posted roaming guards throughout the night to tend to the horses that had been tied to trees in pairs as had been done when they were used as the premier means of transportation. They slept on the ground on top of their bedrolls or saddles under the stars, after spending the day sweating bullets in hundred-degree heat. Freddie Cohen, who had attended the annual event last year, “when soldiers were wearing that uniform, traveling and doing their job.” “You try your best to conceptualize what’s happening, what you’re actually doing and what it could have been like back then,” said Sgt. Throughout the event, troopers experienced some of the same hardships that soldiers of the era would have experienced. Roman Villarreal, the XO of the Commanding General’s Mounted Color Guard. “We are a living history of the United States Army, the cavalry and Fort Riley,” said 1st Lt. On Saturday morning, after a night spent sleeping under the stars, the smell of bacon grease and coffee, percolating over the fire, kept people flipping through the pages of a history book that was playing out before their very eyes.ĭressed in blue pants, white collared shirts and vests made entirely of wool, the mounted color guard rode through the streets of Council Grove wearing knee high leather riding boots and their signature Stetson hats, a symbol of the unit and U.S. ![]() The smell of horses, gunpowder and charcoal fires transported people back to this particular chapter of history. ![]() You’re out there living it and being a part of it.” Roy Walters of the Commanding General’s Mounted Color Guard, “where you get teepees and the old officer tents. “You get to go back to that late 1800, early 1900, era,” said 1st Sgt. Influenced by Buffalo Bill’s legendary troupe, the annual Gunfight on the Santa Fe Trail was a Broadway spectacle with a western twang, staged on the streets of Council Grove where for many troopers of the Commanding General’s Mounted Color Guard, it was a surreal moment in which they were able to look back through the lens of history and live as those who came before. ![]() Some sat behind small stands, selling trinkets made of bones, medallions and artifacts resembling the era under tents constructed as nomadic museums of sorts showcasing an array of arrowheads, tomahawks, gunpowder horns and rifles with their wooden stocks rotted away, found long ago on some nearby American battlefield. As though it had carried the same electrical charge as Doc’s Delorean, the troopers emerged the cloud of dust and stepped into a world known only to the pages of history wearing the same wool uniforms worn by ancestors of the United States Army.Īlong the Neosho Riverwalk at Council Grove, reenactors traveled from across the country dressed in clothing reminiscent of the old West. – Before the dust had settled on their drive to Council Grove from Fort Riley, the troopers of the 1st Infantry Division Commanding General’s Mounted Color Guard had gone through a transformation. ![]()
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