"Dry Stone Walls " Topic

From Warlord Games.

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Amicalement
Armand

These look good. Not sure they fit with ACW, but who knows?

Matthew

This is something I really take objection too. A nonsensical post. We're in Lewis Carroll territory here.

No, it doesn't fit with dry stone walling as I understand it or the American Civil War, sorry, War Between the States, sorry, War of Northen Aggression.

No TMP members were harmed in this post.

I think these are very good looking models – painted grey they look more like North Wales Slate walls than dry-stone walls.

Possible interest for Narrow Gauge Railway modellers as well as wargaming!

I also agree with earlier post – I'm not sure this style of wall was used in North America.

Tony

Thanks dampfpanzerwagon, and 45thdiv.

These aren't ACW terrain. (IMHO).

More like slate walls.

Good looking but not what is on the tin.

Lake District or Wales. Certainly not anywhere relating to Napoleonic Wars….but nice modelling!

Yep deadhead. What was Tango thinking?

Sorry, was Tango thinking?

He posts so many ACW things you'd think he'd learn something about the ACW. *sigh* oh well.

Don

Such stone walls were very common in the bluegrass region of Kentucky. For example, at Shakertown, about 25 miles south-east of Lexington, there are about 24 miles of stone fencing in the 3000 acres of the site.

These fences look pretty close to the Warlord Games walls.

I saw those walls when I lived in Spain many times.

Ryan is right.

Amicalement
Armand

Yep, plenty in Spain & Portugal, some in parts of the USA too.

Well you live and learn. I could imagine USA…….. as having a population significantly drawn from UK areas where such walls could be found. But I have to say stone walls are for the small field, typical of the pre-Agrarian revolution smallholding. I thought US made the most of wood supplies and produced the fences so typical of Gettysburg…..and yet, I admit, that stone wall at Fredericksburg! If they are to be found in the Iberian Peninsula, then they are of great value in Napoleonics. Surprised though…………

From Provence in southern France: link

And of course, on this side of the Pond, Robert Frost wrote his second most famous poem about fixing dry stone walls in New England.

But I have to say stone walls are for the small field, typical of the pre-Agrarian revolution smallholding. I thought US made the most of wood supplies and produced the fences so typical of Gettysburg…

Depends on where you are in the US.

Such stone walls were very common in the bluegrass region of Kentucky. For example, at Shakertown, about 25 miles south-east of Lexington, there are about 24 miles of stone fencing in the 3000 acres of the site.

Look like the walls I grew up with in the Mendip hills or the Cotswolds of SW England

Looks like Tango was definitely thinking!!!

Dan

Sometimes I did my friend… probably by mistake! (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

You see this sort of wall (and home) construction in Pennsylvania as well. The mid-Atlantic features a lot of stratified slate-like rock that stacks neatly. New England is different. The native rock up here is principally irregular glacially worn granite rocks and boulders that percolate up through the ground over successive freeze/thaw cycles. Farmers needed to clear their field of them and used them to build walls (lemonade from lemons). If you drive around in the now re-forested parts of rural New England, you will see walls of this sort of granite stretching everywhere as evidence of old nineteenth century farming activity.

B

New England is different. The native rock up here is principally irregular glacially worn granite rocks and boulders that percolate up through the ground over successive freeze/thaw cycles. Farmers needed to clear their field of them and used them to build walls (lemonade from lemons).

You mean farmers *still* need to clear their fields of them.

LOL – There aren't many farmers left up here nowadays, but those rocks and boulders do still make their way up to the surface over time. In the 19th century, most of New England outside the urban centers was under cultivation of one sort or another. Today, all that old farm land was abandoned as unprofitable and has reverted to second growth forest. If you drive out through any wooded countryside it is a common sight to see old stone farm walls snaking their way into these woods.

B

Seems like a couple of apologies are in order. I won't hold my breath though….

Me too… (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

That's the thing about America: if it was found in Western or Central Europe, it was done here as well. European colonists and immigrants used American raw materials, but they followed designs they knew back home. German fachwerk? Norwegian stone houses? You can find those in Texas and elsewhere. The immigrants and colonists did not adopt American designs overnight, and it took years for them to adopt the local customs, in part because the immigrants formed isolated communities in frontier and unincorporated areas.

Well I have no problem admitting I got this totally wrong. My on line search shows there is a special interest group in USA and many a dry stone wall in the Iberian Peninsula.

Snag about this forum. For every expert who tells you your lance pennons need revising or that rear wheels should have 12 spokes, you get another who pronounces on something totally wrong.

Ignorance of any subject has never prevented me lecturing to med students with great authority………

An interesting fact is that the glacial tumbled round rocks in new england fields work their way upwards from the freeze/melt cycle every year. It takes about 150 years of removing them from fields (and stacking as walls) to pretty much clear the fields of them. That's about how long the New England fields were heavily farmed before most of them were abandoned for better farmland in the midwest. In formerly glaciated regions of Europe, this job was completed by the middle ages………I used to raise sheep in Maine for a few years and used a combination of fenceposts and low rock wall to support the wire fencing. Sometimes you would try to dig out a rock from a posthole you were digging only to find out that it was probably the size of a volkswagen. Those post wound up be supported by an above ground rockpile.

Interesting geological information. I learned something today. About the walls shown above – does anyone know the scale on these walls? The reason I ask is that in my experience with this type of rock wall was that of a low wall in the fields. The only place I have seen the high walls of this type was at upperclass townhomes of this period.

My friend deadhead… you have to be a good gentleman to accept your mistakes, so good for you!. (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

I'm pretty sure the ones at Gettysburg were much lower.

Are the photographed stone walls the result of rich men enclosing their property in the late 19th, early 20th century, and done in imitation of British & European walls or a true regional style of stone wall built by the early immigrant settlers? Just a thought.

Good question my friend.

Amicalement
Armand

Good question my friend.

Amicalement
Armand

Not exactly the same, but definitely using a similar technique.