Army Staff Ride Talk

Anthropologist and Archaeologist Dr. Laurie Rush will discuss the importance of Army Staff Rides on Thursday, Feb 8, at 7 pm, at the former Union Hotel building, at the corner of West Main and Ray Streets, in Sackets Harbor.

The talk, entitled “Yesterday’s Battlefield’s for Today’s Soldiers: The Army Staff Ride,” is part of the combined annual meetings of both the Sackets Harbor Battlefield Alliance and the Sackets Harbor Historical Society.

More than just “old meadows,” historic battlefields have an important role to play in educating our soldiers of today. Known as a “staff ride,” a military field trip to a former battlefield offers an opportunity to teach soldiers not just the historic details of a given battle but also how the strategy and tactics played out on the actual battlefield, an opportunity that cannot be duplicated in a video or classroom.

Soldiers of the 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum come to Sackets Harbor to experience firsthand the lessons learned from the Second Battle of Sackets Harbor, which happened in May 1813, including vulnerability from amphibious landings, the importance of local allies, and the critical component of accurate and timely communications.

Dr. Laurie Rush is an internationally recognized authority on how to teach military personnel to identify and respect cultural property and the sacred sites of others. As an an anthropologist and archaeologist, Dr. Rush has also lived in and studied northern New York for more than 40 years. She was formerly a professor in the SUNY system and is a visiting faculty member at the American University of Rome and Donau University in Krems, Austria. Additionally, she is a 2011 fellow of the American Academy in Rome, a Smithsonian Research Associate, and a consulting scholar with the University of Pennsylvania.

For more information, please contact the Sackets Harbor Battlefield State Historic Site by phone at 315-646-3634 or visit their website.