200 years later, Riverhead students recreate a battle scene
In April, a group of Riverhead High School sophomores, juniors and seniors visited a spot on the Long Island Sound near Hallockville Museum Farm, standing just a few hundred feet away from where some of Riverhead’s founding fathers fought off the British in a once-forgotten battle from the War of 1812.
There, they gathered twigs, plant roots, smooth beach rocks and strips of seaweed to use for a project in their Long Island History class: a 1/72 scale diorama of the battle, complete with painted seas, miniature militiamen, tiny trees and a recreation of the sandy cliffs.
“Nature replicates itself in miniature,” said Jack Smith, a retired teacher and miniatures expert. “I wanted them to really get a feel for what the bluff looked like.”
Over the past two months, the students have constructed a diorama of the Defense of the Eagle, a nearly 200-year-old naval battle between American sailors and militiamen and a pair of British warships off the Northville coast.
That diorama, now complete, will be unveiled at a celebration of the battle’s anniversary tonight, Thursday, at Hallockville Museum Farm starting at 6:30 p.m.
The battle took place over three days in October 1814 after an American cutter — the Eagle — found itself face-to-face with the HMS Dispatch, a British vessel preying on East Coast merchant ships. The Americans intentionally ran the Eagle aground and fought off the British from the shore, using the ship’s guns to fire at the British.
Eventually, the British returned with an even larger frigate, bombarding the coast with cannon fire and taking the Eagle as their prize.
The battle has been obscured in the past by inaccurate local retellings but is now being re-examined and commemorated as the 200th anniversary draws near.
The students’ diorama is part of an exhibit about the battle at Hallockville Museum Farm in Riverhead this summer.
This was the first time any of the students — or their teacher — had attempted to make a diorama to scale.
“We didn’t know what we were getting ourselves into,” history teacher Justin Cobis said. “We’re learning on the fl y, but it’s been great.”
The students were assisted by Mr. Smith, who recently helped restore a Lionel model train set at the Railroad Museum of Long Island, and Richard Wines, a local historian who had studied the forgotten battle.
Students were given a variety of jobs to complete the diorama, with some carving pieces of insulation to use as a base for the hill and others adding sand and foliage. Some students painted tiny cannons to place on the bluffs.
“It’s bringing to life an unknown part of history,” Mr. Smith said.