Canvas Tent Questions

[Kenney Moore]

I learned that wall tents aren't perod correct for 1800, so it looks like I will need a wedge.

Howdy,

It depends on how many people and/or gear you have as to what type of shelter you should use. We use a wall tent with an oversized fly for medium sized rendezvous' and have not been approached at any event we have gone to questioning it for period correctness.
If you need a good amount of room, and do not want a wall tent, the museum wedge with a bell back is a good choice from Tentsmith. Also, be sure to really consider a fly for what ever structure you decide on. Most of our waking time in our camp is spent outside the tent and under the fly. This is the reason for the oversized fly I mentioned. It protects the front of your tent in the event of bad weather, is a place for socializing, preparing food and storing various truck associated with primitive camping. We have a 10'wide X 12'long wall tent with a fly that is made for a 12' wide tent. This gives us an extra 3' of width to the fly. We also overlap the fly 1 panel of the fly over the wall tent and we have weathered some bad weather without the front of the tent getting wet.

I am not trying to sway your opinion towards one type of tent, but telling you what we do. Everyone has to make it right in their own mind as far as what type of equipment they use. I only wish we would have had a place like this forum to get some ideas of what to use or not use.

 

[LFord]

Before you dismiss a wall tent take a look at these links.

http://www.revwar75.com/library/rees/tents.htm
http://www.najecki.com/repro/Special-Images.html
http://www.revwar75.com/library/rees/shelter1.htm

While I cannot say if they were used in Texas in 1800 they were used in the Rev War(just not by lower ranking enlisted soldiers). The wall tent goes back to Roman times where the standard tent was a goatskin wall tent.
http://www.caerleon.net/history/army/page12.htm

I not trying to send you in any direction concerning what type of tent you buy but thought that you might like seeing this info.

 

[Holley]

Aren't correct When did that happen?
Do you mean for the 1800 western part of the Us..or before it was a US :results: ::

Wall tents have been around for a LONG time. Ask any old Roman, Colonial Soldier or Military person. :results:

 

[Riley/MN]

I was just reading another historical text that documents an early tent:

It was made of goat hair, ram's skins dyed red and the hides of sea cows. :redthumb:

 

[Jimrogers]

Going back to the original poster's question, we have 2 wall tents (8X10 and 10X12) depending on how many are camping with us. We made our awning and treated the canvas with Thompsons and it never leaked. Might be cheating but we were dry. Have camped in 14 deg weather in the mountain in the snow and been comfortable long as our rears were off the ground somehow.
At nationals in 1991, a feller advertised tipi's for rent. He set them up and took them down. We just had to show up. Always wanting to try a tipi, we rented an 18 footer and it was a pleasure. We had a he*& of a hailstorm one day (golf ball sized), and daily thunderstorms and even one during one night and were snug and warm inside. As for skeeters, there are a lot of people to choose from for them at rendezvous so juts set close to the fire.

 

[rifleshooter2]

I know that the Legion of the United States used wall tents in the 1790's so I would say that the 1800's are still a viable time period

 

[76monza]

Stumblin,

Just curious about the use of a brazier in a tent. I understand about the CO2 poisoning, but as drafty as some canvas tents are and with the porous canvas, wouldn't the CO2 disperse through the fabric more readily? If not how much opening would one have to leave to disperse the CO2?

Smokeydays

 

[TexasMLer]

Thanks for the information!!

I guess that maybe I should have continued in my research before deciding once-and-for-all that wall tents are period incorrect. Actually, someone told me that they are not correct and I just believed him - I had no reason not too, I thought. I still haven't found info regarding the correctness of wall tents in my location in the time period that interests me. Would it be correct to assume that a given tent that was available in one part of the US, would have been available in the rest of the US?

I would much rather have a wall tent than a wedge anyway b/c of the space.

Although, I will be doing most of my trekking by myself, so weight will be an issue. A wedge would be good in that situation. Decisions...Decisions... :hmm:

:thumbsup:

 

If yore gonna be trek'n, you might consider a simple "fly" to use as a lean-to!! (light, cheap, and "PC")

YMHS
rollingb

 

[TexasMLer]

Rollingb,

When you say "fly" do you mean a rain fly? Would that be just a large square piece of canvas?

Thanks! :thumbsup:

 

Yep!!... One of the most "versitile" pieces of equipment a fella can possess!! :thumbsup:

Check out the Rocky Moutain Fur Trade forum,... Mountainman Tent/Cover (page 3)!!

YMHS
rollingb

 

[TexasMLer]

Sorry for the dumb question. :haha: I just looked it up on the www, and yep, it is just a square of canvas. I could make one of those and save a few bucks!

 

[TexasMLer]

The flys don't offer much in the way of skeeter protection, but I could always carry a mosquito net with me.

 

[Huntinfool]

The flys don't offer much in the way of skeeter protection, but I could always carry a mosquito net with me.

Use smoke to chase em away build a fire in front of your lean to.

Or you could just do as Swamp Fox "Francis Marion" did drink a cup of vinegar a day. They knew if they drank it they wouldn't get malaria they didn't know the malaria came from skeeters!

YMH&OS, :redthumb:
Chuck

 

[TexasMLer]

Or you could just do as Swamp Fox "Francis Marion" did drink a cup of vinegar a day.

That's interesting. I didn't know that drinking vinegar would keep the skeeters away! But, to be honest, I would never be able to belt down a cup of vinegar...talk about eewwww!::
:crackup:

:thumbsup:

 

[Huntinfool]

I tried it once ya have to add water to it. There's a bunch of other benefits from drinkin' it also! LOL! I can't remember what they are now I got that disease CRS (Can't Remember Stuff)!

Found it at least one ref. to it!...Scroll about half way down the page!

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~rkinfolks/stories/francismarion.html

YMH&OS, :redthumb:
Chuck

 

[hack]

I have camped the second weekend of february since 1974 in canvas tents ( Michigan )
seen everything from 60 above to 18 below zero.
wouldn't miss it for anything. had a ball this year with the other fellows who braved the weather,snow and cold. most of us are not new to this and have wood stoves in our tents. this year we had wall tents, a tipi, a marquee, and some of the braver slept in leanto's.
try it and you will get hooked on it.

 

[kenneth strickland]

Considering using charcoal to heat your tent? You have a likely situation where you will never wake up. It is not CO2 but carbon monoxide. Your blood has an affinity for CO many times more than oxygen and you absorb it into your blood readily. I have seen this several times and seen hundreds of people dead from other things. I don't want to see it on rendezvous. Please don't try it. It is better to be cold than stone cold.

 

[crockett]

The other day I was reading an article on the Black Hawk War and there was a painting. There were four or five tents all wedges(I THOUGHT) then I noticed one was a wall tent with a low wall that looks like a wedge. In any event a low wall would give you more room and still look pretty much like a wedge. In all the paintings of Rendezvous events I have seen it seems the tents are all wedges, in other words the wall tents were around but who knows whether they were used in the mountains. Chances are, from 1825 to 1840 there must have been at least a few that made it to the Rockies.