This year we had the pleasure of going back to Newark, a muster we also did back in 2015. Once again, it was hot hot hot and we enjoyed a weekend in the sunshine.
The campsite is notoriously a little on the small side but we all crammed in and had a good turnout for the event. Newark is also home to one of the regiment’s favourite pubs, the Organ Grinder so some of the regiment made the short walk into town on Friday evening to enjoy some beers in the very monkey themed pub!
Newark was also the debut of the regiments own ‘car bar’ provided by our resident brewer David. Aptly named ‘The Landrover’s Return’, it proved a hit with the regiment and will surely make more appearances as the summer continues.
Saturday morning dawned and the regiment got started with some drill before a quick lunch and then it was onto the battlefield.
Once again we were fighting on the Queens Sconce, the very impressive earthworks that still survive from the time of the original battle. We enjoyed manoeuvring down the hill as an entire army before meeting Parliament in the middle and pushing them back up the slope on the other side towards the Living History encampment.
Once again, it was an absolutely scorching weekend so the few hours after the battle on Saturday were spent doing as little as possible to try and cool down again after a battlefield that had absolutely no shade!
In the evening, once the temperatures cooled a little we headed back to town and back to the Organ Grinder for a few beers before an evening of singing to a great disco in the beer tent.
We spent the rest of the night, post beer tent, in Simon and Tig’s awning celebrating Andy B’s birthday. It’s safe to say that he got suitably merry for the occasion and has called it ‘one of my better birthdays’, so it turned out to be a great night!
Sunday morning dawned and there were a few sore heads in the morning, most notably so, Andy B’s! Nothing a bit of drill couldn’t sort out and the regiment practised again, working on issues we’d picked up in the previous days battle.
We followed up drill with some live firing practise. We are working on getting as many of our pikeman as possible through their musket test, making the regiment more durable and adaptable at events meaning we can balance our numbers and fill our musket ranks which tend not to be as large as our pike numbers. The pikemen had a great time practising live firing under the supervision of our experienced musketeers and will hopefully going through their tests next year.
Sunday afternoon rolled around and it was another hot battle but fun none the less. We enjoyed a good effort by all involved and some good results on the field with both musket and pike dominating their enemy.
Unfortunately, with it not being a bank holiday weekend although it was one of our biggest events this year, it was over all too soon and we packed our camp down and said goodbye once again, luckily knowing we’d all be at an event again in only 3 weeks time.
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Photos courtesy of Rusty Aldwinckle, John Beardsworth, Beth Knight and Kev Salmon.