Drill Sergeant

“BANG!” went the fifty muskets of the third company of the twelfth regiment in George Washington’s Continental Army.  “Prime your piece, charge your piece, load, present your piece, give, FIRE!”  “BANG!” went the fifty muskets for a second time. The commands were issued, and again the shots rang out across the field.  Again the commands, and once more the sound of firing muskets was heard throughout the encampment.  “Half a minute too short lads,” called the drill sergeant, a man who had been in the army for years. “We need to hit four shots a minute,” he called out again, though he knew that he could not manage what he was scolding the men for not doing.  This man, the drill sergeant was I, John Lawford, a poor farm boy of a family long since passed on, and a soldier in the rebellion against mother England.

I do exactly what I just described on a daily basis and it is all I have done for the army in the past two months, camped here away from the action.  This is too much waiting for a man in the army.  I enlisted to fight the redcoats on the front lines, not fight boredom and fatigue while I rot away in a fort.  This mist soaked plain is not where I want to spend the war.  However, no matter what I do or do not want to do, I have to stay here, and in the meantime, I train.  Other than training, I am faced with the near impossible task of surviving a day in a military camp.  Even now I am nearly insane with hunger and homicidal with fatigue, but I know I must persevere, for my men, for my country, and for my family.  To speak more of my family, my mother died when I was very little, my father, the owner of a small farm, was left to do all of the work as well as care for me and my brother.  When my brother was of the age to work, he began to assist my father  with the farm chores and was able to learn some of the tricks that my father used, which was good because my father died that winter of pneumonia.  My brother kept the farm and took care of me for as long as he could until he died of the pox, at that point I was crushed and driven to join the army, where I have remained these three long years.

I often feel that I have contributed nothing, but when I see my men expertly loading and firing their flintlocks, I see that my years of work have paid off well.  If I were not here to pass on my knowledge of firearms, these young fools would shoot themselves or those around them in seconds.  However, with my help these boys will make a fine army someday. “Lads, good work today!” I shout to the men, “See you tomorrow, same time, if you all live that long!” this is met with mild laughter, but I am too busy to care because by then I am rushing towards the sounds of screaming and killing, through the chaos I think I can hear the words, “British… Inside… Save yourselves,” but I hope I am wrong.  When I arrive at the wall, I see a large bright red mass,and all I can think is, “I’m sorry Joshua, I’ve failed you again.”  Directly in response, the red coated company turn in my direction and I hear the unmistakeable, “Prime your piece, charge your piece, load, present your piece, give, FIRE!” and the  “BANG!” from the forty-three muskets of the second company of the 94th regiment of General Cornwallis’s army, and then, silence.