Last year the Resaca event was so bad that many units threatened to boycott it this year. In order to prevent this, the organizers placed the military control in the hands of the First Confederate Division. While not a perfect event, the change in command certainly made it better than it has been for several years in the past. There were still possum bones aplenty, the cars parked in camp were legion, and Sunday's battle still saw 200 Yankees cross an open Þeld to rout 700 Confederate troops from their prepared works, but there were still many improvements from recent years.

Normally this is a relaxed event for the PLA, since none of us have any battalion duties here, but with it being handed to the First Confederate Division, it meant that Bruce Hoover had to assume his role of AIG on the division staff, and Bruce Rollin had to take his part as the Battalion Ordnance ofÞcer on the staff of the 1st Battalion. This placed them in charge of all artillery safety inspections, and meant that they were effectively removed from the action for the duration of the event.

The Deep South Artillery Battery came as a unit to Resaca, so the PLA was able to Þght alongside of friends for the entire weekend. On Saturday our position was somewhat less than perfect as we were placed in a deÞle behind a large row of trees, and could hardly see the battle at all. Consequently we saved most of our rounds for Sunday.

On Saturday afternoon we moved all the guns in one large convoy to the Sunday battle site. When it came time to place the DSAB guns, DSAB commander Phil Brinson asked Chief of Artillery, Roger Hansen about the choice between a small hillock, and a position behind some prepared breastworks. The hill had easy access, while placing the guns behind the breastworks would be involve a major effort. Roger told Phil, "Well, the easy choice would be the hill, but the authentic choice would be the breastworks." Needless to say, the DSAB fought from the breastworks on Sunday!

As mentioned earlier, Sunday's battle has always been a "Yankee Shoot" where 700 Confederate soldiers stand behind their breastworks and blaze away at the 200 Yankees who advance across the Þeld and chase them from the breastworks. One good part about our location this year was that we were far enough away from the battle that we didn't notice the silliness of it nearly as much. We felt more like an artillery unit who was deployed in support of the infantry and who were Þring from the correct distance.

Lastly, we have to mention that this was probably the coolest Battle of Resaca on record. The high temperature on Saturday did not make it to 80° and it barely made it there on Sunday..