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Camping at Antietam Battlefield
Members of Pack 209 and their families spent the weekend at the Antietam National Battlefield in Sharpsburg, Maryland.
The pack arrived Friday afternoon and early evening to a rather soggy campground, as it had been raining all afternoon until just before we arrived. We were camping at sites one and two, the closest to the parking lot. The Scouts and siblings helped to haul our equipment to the campsite and helped with the set-up. Once the majority of the equipment was unpacked, we began cooking dinner. Almost as soon as we finished dinner, the leaders decided to put our canopy up over one of the picnic tables.
As soon as the canopy was completed, it began to pour. We hurried the Scouts and their siblings into their tents and completed the assembly of the canopy, putting the sides and one end up also. We then moved all the cooking equipment under the canopy to keep everything dry.
The next morning we awoke to a chill in the air. We warmed everyone up with pancakes, sausage, juice and hot cocoa for breakfast. After our Tigers and Wolves did the breakfast dishes, we got lunches ready for our hike of the Antietam Battlefield.
We drove up to the Visitor's center, where we watched the 6th New Hampshire Infantry recreate the life of a Civil War soldier. The Pack learned how he lived, marched and fought. They also watched the re-enacters doing close order drill and firing their muskets. They learned about the first two years of the war, which culminated in the South's first incursion into the North for the Battle of Sharpsburg (which we now call Antietam). 23,000 soldiers were killed, wounded or missing after twelve hours of savage combat on September 17th, 1862. The Battle of Antietam ended the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia’s first invasion into the North and led to Abraham Lincoln’s issuance of the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.
After the watching the demonstration by the 6th New Hampshire Infantry, the pack began its hike of the battlefield, stopping at Bloody Lane for lunch and a quick siesta. Afterwards, they completed the hike, which ended at the Rohrback Youth Campground where we were staying. The weather was gorgeous, staying in the mid-70's the whole day.
That evening we enjoyed a dinner of beef roast flavored with lots of garlic, potatoes and green beans, all cooked in dutch ovens over coals. Dessert, again cooked in dutch ovens, was apple cobbler spiced with cinnamon. Our Webelos had kitchen detail for dinner.
Sunday morning we again awoke to a chill morning while we broke camp and got ready to leave. Breakfast was blueberry and chocolate chip muffins, along with cinnamon swirl coffee cake.
Everything was packed up and we were ready for the road by 9:30 in the morning.
The Pack and their families had a great time at Antietam and are looking forward to our next camping trip.
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