Colonial Williamsburg

[Robert]

If you're ever in the Washington, DC area it would be worth your time (in my opinion) to dedicate some time to see Colonial Williamsburg. I happened to be there not too long ago and spent an afternoon looking at the buildings/exhibits. The two that impressed me the most (I'm biased, and keep in mind I didn't spend too much time there, though I wish I could have spent more) were:

1. The weapons of the Revolution. The British guns were impressive, imposingly large and well-made. They all looked alike. The American guns by contrast looked smaller, with smaller bores, and some guns even looked home-made. No idea how they found the right size ammunition for the hodgepoge of weapons they had. The disparity between the American/British weaponry makes the American Revolution all the more impressive. It takes gutsy folks to stare down the well-trained, "superpower" Redcoat army (and their arms) while holding a pea shooter.

2. The coin collection. They had examples of many of the coins in the front of the Red Book. I don't believe I had seen some examples of those coins until I went to Williamsburg. Most were in decent shape, and at least some were dug up on the grounds. I remember they had a Virginia Shilling. And they found/dug up a circa 1700 coin from the "Iles du Vent", or Windward Islands, on the Williamsburg site itself. The Virginia shilling looks a lot like a contemporary shilling of Great Britain.

http://www.history.org/Foundation/press_release/displayPressRelease.cfm?pressReleaseId=405

[KurtS]

I was in Williamsburg years ago, and apparently missed the coin collection--next time, thanks for the reminder!

[MorgansRmine]

Visited many years ago. Well worth the time. Ordered one of the hand made 50 caliber flint lock rifles. Three year waiting period that turned out to be almost four, shoots fine.