On Wednesday, whl came by visiting and helped me nail the section of fence back to the posts. However, there were several boards on our elderly fence that had not survived this mistreatment, so I drove over to Home Depot and snagged eight replacement boards, because it struck me that there were probably some other boards that needed replacement while I was at it.
And then I called samwinolj, because I clearly needed a circular saw that I did not own, but which Sam did.
So Sam came by today and we made substantial repairs to the fence, nailing a few more panels back to their posts and replacing six boards that needed it -- and renailing a few more boards that needed that.
The fence remains imperfect, but it is now much less imperfect than it was. :)