Not-so-good old days

Once again this week we offer our readers a brief refuge from the seasonal events by bringing an item that has nothing to do with the holiday season. While this offering seems too lighthearted to be counted as a "not-so-good old day," it might qualify when one remembers that the militia was our nation's first line of defense. Watch our present-day, well-trained, well armed and equipped National Guard at drill and sigh with relief the militia isn't still active. Why, today, rumor has it, our state's soldiers even all wear the same outfits and don't have to bring their own guns.

From the Oxford County Advertiser, October 18, 1912:

The author of the story wrote his recollections, entitled "Looking Backward in Otisfield" for the Oxford County Advertiser during the 1910s and teens. The memories appear to have been formed well before the Civil War, when the author, Granville Fernald, was a boy.

From back in the period of subjection to the government of Massachusetts the citizens of Maine were required under the militia laws of that province to hold annual meetings of the enrolled soldiery of the towns and plantations in the district of Maine for training and drill in military tactics and marching evolutions. The militia of Otisfield consisted of one uniformed company organized as the Otisfield Light Infantry. I cannot give the date of its organization, but I think it was in active existence until the repeal of the militia laws, and the abolishment of annual trainings and musters of the militia sometime in the 40s.

The first Tuesday in May was the annual training day, and was one of the most prized holidays of the year. It was an occasion of infinite hilarity and fun. Every enrolled soldier of 18 to 45 years of age was summoned by the warrant of a non-commissioned officer of a company to appear at the old meeting house at an hour stated "armed and equipped" as the law directs and there await further orders.

The arms possessed by these soldiers were generally old-fashioned flint-lock muskets, such as had descended straight from previous wars, and used on occasion for shooting henhawks, woodchucks and squirrels or perhaps a bear, a fox or a bob-cat.

The lack of precision in marching and formation of files and platoons and the awkwardness of a company of farmers in executing the manual of arms without drill or practice on every day but one of the year (excepting general muster-day) may be imagined, but cannot be described. The light infantry of Otisfield was composed of an excellent quality of citizens and was an honorable constituency of the 2nd Regiment, 1st Brigade, 5th division of the militia of Maine as I remember it. It was commanded at various times by Capt. Samuel P. Anderson, Capt. Otis Fernald, Capt. John Spurr, and, I think, Capt. Stephen W. Knight, and others before my remembrance of those events commenced.

The most popular sport for the young men of training age on training day, after the military exercises of the day were completed and the "awkward squad" had been dismissed from further duty, was wrestling.

It was on such an occasion I witnessed the fidget game of wrestling by well-matched country farm-bred athletes I ever saw, and I have seen other good ones.

As is our custom, we try to exactly reproduce the grammar, spelling, punctuation and style of the original. Commas might appear where least expected and remain absent where we’d expect them if the item was written nowadays. On the other hand, consistency was not considered of utmost importance, so variations of a spelling might appear within one story. In addition, some words were abbreviated differently than today. Where brief explanations of terms are considered necessary, they are presented in brackets [] within the quote. Otherwise, explanations appear at the beginning or at the conclusion, without quotes. Parenthesis () used in a quoted passage appeared in the original.