Your Alias

[Johnny McCrae]

How did you come up with your Alias?

My favorite movie was Lonesome Dove. I wanted the alias "Woodrow McCrae" but it was taken, My first name is John so I picked "Johnny McCRae".

When competing in NCOWS, I'd enter the "Originals" category. In the "Originals" category, you had to come up with a story about your chartacter. Here's the story of Johnny McCrae.

[Mogorilla]

Mine started way back in college, before i knew about CAS.  I am a big lad and grew a beard at 13.  Have had it 45 years now.   Also have a fair amount of body hair.  College roommates were smaller guys and not very much in way of hair.   Lots of comparison of me to simian relatives.  It stuck.  . 

[DeaconKC]

Mine has been my moniker for many years prior to finally being able to get into CAS. I was a Deacon and my initials are KC, so that's how it arrived.

[Major 2]

I reenacted ACW mounted cavalry, which began during the Bi Centennial 1776-1976.
By the time, I hung up my saber just after 9-11-2001 I had led Second Florida Cavalry Inc.
20 + years.
Hence, Major, when I signed on to Cas City, there was already a Major Alias, so MAJOR 2 or MAJOR II or Major Too 

[Abilene]

Very cool story Johnny.  When I started in CAS people were encouraged to have a persona or at least a story for their alias.  That all went out the window long ago in SASS, but I had a story for mine.  I doubt I'd go for Originals in NCOWS but would like to look pretty close.

My alias story has me being born exactly 100 years earlier than I was, and would have me being still pretty young during the wild west days, so I just have to pretend that I'm younger than I look (it's a hard life out west and ages you prematurely if you live long enough    )

I had to hunt for the file where I wrote it down, but I found it. It only covers my earlier life and how I got my alias.  What happened later is another story    :

The Story of My Alias
By Abilene,
The fact is, I chose my alias because I was born and raised in Abilene (Texas, not Kansas) and I thought it had a good western feeling.  When I started in SASS folks were encouraged to have a persona, which would generally involve a story or background of some sort.  So I came up with this one a good while back, but just got around to writing it down.
They call me Abilene.  I was born in 1852 to a large Texas family, the middle of 7 children, and named David by my parents.  I was a bit young but tagged along with my two older brothers as they joined the forces of the Confederacy in the great North-South war.  I was told I was too young to fight, but I had other talents.  I had learned to play the bugle and was pretty good.  I also had a knack for telegraphy and picked it up quickly when exposed to it.  Several times I was sent to spy at Union headquarters.  I would avail myself to the officers as an errand boy, keeping their boots shined and brass polished.  This allowed me to be present near their command center.  Even outside the tents or through the open window if they were in a building I could hear and decipher the clicks of the telegraph machines.  They never suspected a young lad such as myself would be stealing their plots and plans.  Getting the info back to our boys was the hard part.  I would pass the information off to area residents who were sympathetic to our cause and they would relay it to our side.  Sometimes it worked well and aided our strategies.  Other times the info got to them too late or not at all.   

My brothers survived and we returned to the family after the war.  The small town of Abilene, Texas was springing up along the railroad between Dallas and El Paso.  This was near our homestead.  So I managed to get a job as the telegraph operator when the fellow that was doing it wanted to move west.  The telegraph "office" is usually just an area in the train depot, and the depot operator would man it along with his other duties, such as ticket sales and baggage arrangements.  But the old fellow who ran the depot just didn't have the patience nor the temperament to learn Morse code, so he didn't mind paying someone else to do it.  I didn't make much but got meals and a place to sleep in the back.  The thing I liked best was that the Sheriff's office was next door, and I spent a lot of time there talking to the lawmen and helping them with odd jobs.  If the telegraph machine started clicking or if someone wanted to send a message, the depot operator would just holler out the front door and I'd hear him and go take care of it. 
If someone here wanted to send a message to San Angelo, they would say, "Send it to San Angelo."  When someone wanted to send a message to our town, they would say, "Send it to Abilene."  So I got to be known by that name since I was the one they were sending it to.  If you happened to meet one of the telegraph operators from another town for the first time, the greeting might go like this: "Howdy.  So you're Weatherford."  "That's right.  You must be Abilene." 

One hot day in late spring, I was lounging in the shade on the porch of the depot, wishing for a breeze, when I heard the clicker inside come alive.  I could tell something was up from the first few characters.  I could tell the hand of the sender was not steady, as if adrenaline was rushing through his system.  It was coming from Sweetwater,  telling us that the bank there had been robbed by three men.  One was overheard mentioning Buffalo Gap to the other, and they took off on the road towards Buffalo Gap.  The Sweetwater sheriff was out of town and his deputy was wounded in the arm, and they were losing time as they tried to round up enough qualified men to organize a posse.  Abilene is closer than Sweetwater to Buffalo Gap, which is too small to have telegraph lines.  So the idea was that a posse from Abilene would go there and be waiting for them.  We didn't have a good description of the men as they were masked and just described as being "very dusty".  But there were good descriptions of a couple of their horses. 
Our sheriff and his deputy grabbed six more men and lit out for Buffalo Gap.  I was asked to keep an eye on the law office.  They had been gone about an hour and a half when I got another message from Sweetwater.  It seems that the bank robbers were heading this way instead of Buffalo Gap.  A rancher who was heading towards Sweetwater had spotted three men riding fast on the road to Abilene.  They had not seen him as he had thought it prudent to move behind a large boulder when he heard what sounded like a small army thundering towards him.  When he got to Sweetwater and heard about the robbery, he knew that's who passed him on the road.  The trio had apparently cut across the Jamison spread to get to the Abilene road.  They had purposely misled their pursuers.  These were some pretty smart banditos. 

They were on their way here and we were pretty much defenseless.  I told the blacksmith's apprentice, Zeb, to head towards Buffalo Gap and let the Sheriff know the news.  Zeb doesn't like guns, but he can ride fast!  There was no way the posse could get back here in time, so it was up to me to take action as they would be here soon.  I got the bank and store owners to lock their doors, and the bank teller got on the roof of the bank with a shotgun from the Sheriff's office (I knew where the gun rack key was hidden).  I took the remaining Henry rifle.  The posse had taken the two new 1866 Winchesters, but I liked the Henry and the Sheriff had let me practice with it a fair amount when I promised to clean it.  I also took a Colt Navy from the desk drawer and loaded and capped it, sticking it into my waistband.  The blacksmith got his squirrel rifle and kept it at the ready.  He was located across the street from the depot.  The bartender at the saloon took his shotgun and placed it on the bar in front of him. 
Before too long they arrived.  The road from Sweetwater enters Abilene right by the train station.  They were riding slowly now but it was them.  The paint and buckskin horses matched the descriptions. One of them had a rifle in his hands in front of him.  I was inside the depot with the barrel of the Henry sticking out of a window.  There was a rain barrel on the porch right in front of the window so I knew it was good cover.  I figured surprise was our best option.  I didn't want them to get too far into town or the deserted main street might tip them off.  So as soon as they got even with the depot, I yelled out, "Throw down your guns, you're surrounded!"  I think my teenage voice was not too intimidating, and the one closest to me pulled his pistol and was swinging it around my way when I squeezed the trigger on the Henry and hit him in the chest.  He looked down at his reddening shirt and he fired his pistol into the dirt just before dropping it, then fell to the ground.  Meanwhile, the second man was trying to draw a bead on me with his rifle, but his horse was not cooperating.  The blacksmith was around the corner of his shop and with his rifle aimed at the duo, he yells, "Don't try it!"  This distracted the desperado enough for me to draw a bead on him and fire another round.  The bullet hit his right hand and he screamed and threw the rifle about ten feet.  Honestly, I was aiming at his chest but his hand got in the way.  But this started my reputation as being a crack shot, as if I had done it on purpose.  The third man just threw his hands up and said, "Don't shoot!" 
Turns out there was a reward on these guys.  I shared the money with the blacksmith, kept enough to buy myself a yellowboy and a Navy Colt of my own, and gave the rest to my parents.  The Sheriff told me that when I turned 18 he would make me a deputy if I wanted, and that's what I did.  I've been a lawman off and on since then.  But them stories is for another time.  And the name Abilene just kind of stuck.
*    *    *    *    *    *

[Russ T Chambers]

My story is rather simple,  My real last name is Chambers, so I wanted to play off that.  The first registered alias with SASS was Fully Loaded Chambers.  A few years later (got tired for being the town drunk), I ran across an story somewhere, written by a Russ T Chambers.  Having just switched to shooting Black, I thought this was perfect! I found it was available and quickly switched it.  I have found one drawback.  As I normally sign none (first name, middle initial, last name), I have to be careful I'm signing the right name.