Wiggins Battery,Arkansas Horse Artillery

MINUTES OF THE ANNUAL MEETING OF

WIGGINS BATTERY, ARKANSAS HORSE ARTILLERY

February 5, 2011

In attendance were Commander Kevin Bodenhamer, Sgt. Crain, Cpl. Crowley and their families. We had a poor turnout due to the inclement weather, 5 inches of snow last night. Johnny Bowman is working the snow plow for the county. Billy is in poor health. Digger is with his father who is in critical condition.

Wiggins Battery has affiliated it self with Cleburnes Division; 5th Brigade. Wiggins contact person is Wes Thorne. New members will be getting a membership card in the mail. The cost is $10.00 per member per year. Cleburnes has members all over the south. Wes Thorne is in Texas. This new affiliation offers Wiggins an “in” to the events of the 150th anniversary of the Civil War.

Wilson’s Creek is a national event this year and Wiggins will be able to attend with the cannon through Cleburnes Division. Wilson’s Creek is a maximum effort event with the Blue Grey Alliance. This event is a close a national event as we will have a chance to participate in.

The Blue Grey does not observe the 3 minute rule for firing as did the North South Alliance. We can fire the cannon as quickly as can be loaded.

Insurance is covered with the new Division in the amount of $1,000,000.00 per person.

At some point all members will need to attend artillery school. This year it is on the 22nd of February in Louisiana. None of us can make it. We were talking to Wes to perhaps get another date closer to us. We can send in membership for as little as one person at a time.

Kevin has a few students who would like to join. Larry Barker, Jr. would like to join.

We need to update our web site, List our advertisers. We might use the Arkansas Civil War Sesquicentennial Commission for the logo as they “borrowed” pictures from our site.

Anticipated sponsors for this year are:

First Federal, Telephone Connection, A.S.U. Mountain Home, Petkovich Family Dentistry (new), Historical Society, Larry Black Realty, Buzzard Roost Marina (new), Jack’s Package Store (new), and John A. Crain.

We want to acknowledge that there will never be any way we can repay or thank enough Chester Rout for the beautiful work he did in putting our limber together. We used it for the first time at Prairie Grove this December and the cannon and limber both passed inspection with flying colors. We would like to see if there is something we can do to show our appreciation to Chester.

Aaron Watts will do the welding we need done on the trailer that consists of post to hold up the limber.

THINGS TO DO:

Gather up donation from sponsors.

Place orders for powder and primers.

See what money we get in and then place orders.

We need at least 75 pounds of powder and 200 primers.

John Crain will purchase the primers as his sponsorship for this year. Boom-Boom has died. Will try Larry Fischer Primers or may go through suttlers.

In addition to sponsors there also might be bounty for participation in sesquicentennial events.