Andrew,

Sir! What a nice-lead in you've given me with your last post.

You see what you have just done is to have just given an account of why some sutlers should be banned from selling items at events. In this case - FANTASY INSIGNIA (but the rank-and-file probably won't be so blessed to see it occur).

When, in your last, you stated, "On another note, I did see a Confederate officer with signal corps shoulder boards" you Sir uncovered an inaccuracy of the highest order and the perpetrator should be handed a knife on the spot and ordered to remove his SIGNAL shoulder boards else remove himself from the event grounds. Would it not be so for pink tenis shoes? Then I ask why not this? Where is Ronald McDonald when the bugle sounds? Where dwell the defenders of historical accuracy?

We have no known documentation that early 1860's (war-time) signal officer's shoulder boards (US or CS) were ever supporting the crossed-flags with-or-without a torch.

Now, thanks to you Andrew, we know of at least one Confederate officer[?] re-enactor and a Confederate corporal re-enactor [?] who both have taken to supporting fantasy insignia at events.

The question is: Will the serious minded signal re-enactors, who will grace the field (and this web site from time-to-time), place themselves into forward postions with their 'supporting' general staffs, so as to have such nonsense banished from the field of re-creations. The sutlery's who produces such nonsense in-turn should be dealt with, else we shall soon see P.T. Barnum smile down on the lot of otherwise serious signal re-enactors saying... "There's one born every minute".

And that joke, My Friends, is no joke!

Walt
3.3.3.