Features

U.S. Cavalry Competition

 

Annual Event Demonstrates the Challenges and Hardy Determination of a Group of Enthusiasts and Former Cavalrymen.

 

It’s all about the horse and rider …

 

The National Cavalry Competition tweaked this expression–it’s about the well-trained horse and extremely proficient rider, particularly when it comes to this annual match.  Most interestingly, many of these incredibly impressive riders, and spectators as well, are current active duty military, military/cavalry veterans, historians, and reenactors.

 

Cheyenne was the host city, where Old West history abounds. The Nelson Museum of the West offered a special welcoming Wednesday night.  Couple this with The Plains Hotel, a historic downtown hotel, serving as cavalry headquarters, plus a scheduled side trip to famed Fort Laramie and this was a Western history buff’s dream come true.  

 

Arriving at the TTnT Ranch, located about 15 minutes north of town where the competition was held, the first sight was the obstacle course within the arena.  Looking like the Olympics, the grounds were set up for jumping and nearby, in the practice field, riders were improving their talents.  Most notable were the costuming and tack.  In all, 70 competitors represented, in painstaking detail, the Civil War, Plains Indian Wars, the Spanish American War, and WWI and WWII eras.

 

There are three levels of competition. Level One is for the novice, requiring basic riding skills, including jumping up to one and a half feet, plus fundamental skill with arms (saber and pistol).  The Intermediate Level requires jumping up to two feet and the use of arms at gaits above a trot.  Advanced Level entrants must jump up to two feet, six inches and be at the competitive level with arms.

 

Competitive events included Mounted Saber, Mounted Pistol, Military Horsemanship, Military Field Jumping, Platoon Drilling, Cavalry Bugler, Authenticity and Historical Impression, and the Bolte Cup. There was also the Major Howze competition, where mounted teams of four compete against one another in riding in formation over a set distance and engaging a series of saber targets and obstacles at the end of the distance course.

 

Each segment offered its own appeal.  Saber competition presented multiple targets, including head, ground and ring, plus negotiating tricky obstacles and hurdles.  Pistols required engaging six targets.  Each balloon, filled with a small quantity of propane, exploded when struck by the black powder, sending a flash of dense smoke and a ring of fire skyward.  Imagine how your trusted steed would react, while in the middle of a two and a half foot jump!

 

Especially rousing was the Platoon Drill, performed by teams of eight outside the arena on the practice field.  The maneuvers, executed in formation in accordance with cavalry drill regulations of the appropriate era, included charging while discharging pistols and carbines, and again with sabers … Western movie director John Ford would have been proud.  Each exercise received a well deserved round of approval from the crowd.

 

Finally came the Bolte Cup, a complex, timed final event requiring excellent horsemanship, a superbly trained horse and adept arms control.  Only the top 15 Level Three riders that completed and placed in the previous competitions were allowed to compete on this demanding, twisting course involving Mounted Saber, Pistol and Field Jumping, not to mention dismounted carbine and a water feature that created hesitancy among many of the horses.  

 

While waiting for the field to be prepared for the next challenge, I had the privilege to speak to several riders and spectators.
Wearing his original WWII uniform, 90-year-old Bob Hanson stood proud as he told me of his military exploits.  After his stint at Fort Riley, Kansas, he was assigned to the 15th Cavalry, which fought as a mechanized cavalry unit in Europe.  Captured in 1944, he was held as a German POW for ten months.  To this day he continues his profession as a blacksmith.

 

Donovan Ketzler, owner of the 130-year-old Dehner Boot Company, is, at 84-years-old, the oldest competitor at this event.  As a 19-year-old buck private, he received his basic cavalry training at Fort Riley, and then was tasked with training 35 draftees how to ride.  He went on to ride with the 124th Cavalry – the only mounted unit at the time.  In the competition, Mr. Ketzler rode an Omaha Fox Trotter Quarter Horse, saddled with a German-made Posse “A” saddle.  His very proud son and first-rate horseman in this event, Dr. John Ketzler, an anesthesiologist at the University of Wisconsin, was attired in his father’s original WWII uniform.

 

Lily Boaz, one of four Mounted Color Guards at the competition, is currently stationed at Fort Carson, Colorado Springs.  She, and the other three, are active duty personnel, and perform formal ceremonies at Fort Carson.  They all rode bay Quarter Horses (with the exception of one Mustang), and their uniforms represented the Plains Indians era.

 

Melissa Johnson, on active duty at Fort Irwin, California, wore a 1901 Spanish American War uniform and rode Precis, a 16 hand Thoroughbred, saddled with a 1904 McClellan.

 

I commented to one attractive lady wearing the rank of a Navy Ensign, “Nice uniform,” as she was grooming her 17.1 hands high, 10-year-old, salt-colored Thoroughbred.  She smiled and commented, “World War II Mounted Coast Guard.”  I detoured in her direction to learn more.  

 

During WWII, the US government found the best way to guard the 8,500 miles of coast was with horses.  The Coast Guard got the assignment and 200,000 horses.  They rode 1904 and 1928 McClellan’s, and carried a variety of firearms, from .38 and .45 revolvers to 7 ½ inch barreled SAA (Single Action Armies) to .45 ACPs.  Unsung heroes, they sighted a German submarine off the coast of South Carolina in 1943, caught five boarding parties of Germans off the East coast, captured over 400 people attempting to penetrate our borders, and sighted two Japanese submarines off the West Coast.  Now here’s a story needing attention!

 

The nattily clad Coast Guard Ensign, Linda Scholtz, a trick rider for 22 years, is married to 61-year-old Reverend Paul Scholtz, also a competitor in this event.  He has been riding since he was six weeks-old and broke broncs for 23 years.  His father was in the 4th Cavalry during WWII.  Paul calls himself a rodeo Bible minister.

 

Kim Duxbury, her wonderful accent punctuating every syllable, indicated she and three other riders had flown in for the competition, representing the ALH – Australian Light Horse Division.  Their uniforms were from the 1917-1918 Palestine, WWI era.  Though they ride Australian stock horses back home (a mix of Thoroughbred, Quarter, Arabian and pony – very versatile with strong endurance), they rode borrowed horses for this event.

 

1st Lieutenant Scott J. Cummings and his three riders are from the 11th ACR (Armored Car Regiment).  All on active duty from Fort Irwin, California, they rode Thoroughbreds and their 1901 Spanish American War uniforms represented the 11th US Cavalry when it was first organized.  

 

And of course, the man who led the last U. S. Cavalry charge in American history was present – the much revered 91-year-old, retired Lieutenant Colonel Ed Ramsey, (see his story in “The Last Cavalry Charge in U.S. History,” October 2008 Western Shooting Horse).   

 

The comradeship of these competitors was most evident during the Punch Bowl Ceremony and Water Call at Friday night’s dinner.  Enough alcohol, from every conceivable distiller, was poured into the ceremonial US Cavalry bowl.  Different members of the organization each poured a bottle, every one with its own colorful history as it pertained to events around the world, into a 75 quart bowl.  An adequate amount of pitchers were filled to accommodate all tables and every able drinker … after all, it’s a cavalry tradition!

 

Although units from Ft. Carson, Colorado, Ft. Irwin, California, Ft. Riley, Kansas, the Alaskan National Guard, and the Colorado National Guard competed, in the finale it was Ft. Huachuca, Arizona stepping front and center to proudly accept the General Casimer Pulaski Award, named after the 1st American Chief of Cavalry.  This award is presented to the unit with at least four riders that best represent the highest standards of the US Cavalry.  Judging included their competitive scores, military conduct and bearing, and good sportsmanship.  Their name will be engraved on a brass plate on the base of the “Trooper of the Plains” bronze statute at USCA headquarters.

 

The National Cavalry Competition, demanding of horse and rider, should be penciled on anyone’s calendar that loves horses and the thrill of the challenge.  Fort Robinson, Nebraska is slated as next year’s host, September 24-26.  For information, go to:  www.uscavalry.org.

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