Civil War re-enactors divided -- over style

The boom of cannons vibrates your innards. The sharp crackle of muskets sends drifts of pale smoke into the summer sky. Across the pasture, lines of men in blue face lines of men in gray, exchanging volley after volley after volley.

Few men fall dead. After all, for most of the soldiers, it's too far a drive just to lie in the grass.

In addition to travel time, each of the 1,500 or so Civil War re-enactors in the mock battle at Tunnel Hill just south of the Tennessee line has spent $1,000 or more on a uniform, firearms and other equipment. No wonder most of them want to keep shooting instead of lying still under the searing September sun.

This fight is for fun. But there is another, continuing conflict among those dressed in blue and gray. Reliving the Civil War is a hobby divided.

The 40,000 to 50,000 Civil War re-enactors across the country are divided into two camps. Not Yankee and Reb, but mainstream and hardcore. Mainstream re-enactors -- by far the largest group -- refer to their hardcore brethren as "button counters" and "snitch Nazis" because of their unforgiving attention to detail. Hardcores call those less authentic "farbs," a pejorative of uncertain origin thought to be shorthand for something like "far be it from authentic."

A mainstream uniform, for example, may be machine-made from modern fabric. A hardcore uniform will be hand-sewn from wool of jean wool, a cotton-wool blend, woven using techniques of the 1860s. And while a mainstream re-enactor might cut costs by wearing Sears work boots to battle, a hardcore one will wear only reproductions made using period lasts.

A mainstream soldier may have just one uniform and set of gear -- called an impression -- that is used at all events. So, for example, he might go into battle in Tennessee wearing a uniform seen only on the battlefields of Virginia.

A hardcore re-enactor -- also called a campaigner -- will usually have the clothes and gear for several impressions. The array will allow him to take on the look of soldiers in several campaigns and remain historically accurate. Each impression may cost $2,000 or more.

Uniforms for both sides, including wool coats, cotton shirts, a half dozen pairs of boots and shoes stuff a basement closet in the Cobb County home of Coley Adair, founder of a cavalry unit called the Critter Company. In another room hang more than a dozen different belts, four canteens, five hats, four swords, three knives and at least seven riles.

"It's like playing golf," Adair says of his collection. "You can't use one club all the way through."

The differences between the two factions is easy to see when visiting their camp sites at a battle re-enactment. The mainstream camps, which include many families, have canvas tents with 21st century cots, air mattresses, coolers and other comforts hidden inside -- items beyond the imagination of a Civil War solider.

"The idea of living like they [soldiers] did doesn't appeal to me," said Rick Ivey of Henry County, head of an artillery crew.

"Being that authentic would spoil the fun for me," Ivey says, admitting the big fun comes simply from firing the $6,500 cannon he and his crew have built.

In a mainstream camp, you're likely to see a Confederate infantryman drinking Dr. Pepper from a plastic bottle. Meanwhile, in the campaigners' camp men are sleeping on the ground and eating boiled beef and hardtack.

Such rigors keep campaigners the minority among re-enactors. Bill Holschuh, publisher of the re-enactor newspaper Camp Chase Gazette, figures about 25 percent of re-enactors are hardcore. Gordon Jones of the Atlanta History Center puts the percentage of hardcore at about 10 percent and growing. Adair, solidly in the campaigner camp, says both are way off.

Few are more hardcore than Adair. He handcrafts his saddles and tack using period patterns. The dye he uses is made of of vinegar and iron filings, mixed from a recipe found in a 19th Century U.S. Army Calvary manual. The stirrups are held together with rivets instead of farbish bolts -- despite the fact the rivets are later covered with leather.

Adair, together with Critter Company member Mike Ventura, boiled in a cast iron kettle a concoction of beeswax, pine tar and pine resin to waterproof the thread to stitch the leather riding gear.

Hardcore re-enactors take pride in rigorous scholarship, a task made easier, they say, by the decidedly farbish World Wide Web. Part of the fun, they say, is sharing the history at places such as the Atlanta History Center or Picketts Mill Battlefield Historic Site.

"When you're trying to interpret history," Adair says, "you're climbing a big wall because you're fighting every Civil War movie made."

"If you want to drink beer, hoot and holler, and shoot your buddies with blanks, that's fine," Adair says. "But don't stand up and say you're an authentic Civil War soldier."

Reliving the Civil War for fun may seem an odd sort of recreation, but the number of re-enactors is growing.

About 12,500 re-enactors took the field in 1988 to re-create the Battle of Gettysburg, and that number swelled to more than 25,000 in 1998, says Gordon Jones, director of exhibitions and collections at the Atlanta History Center. Jones has become an expert on re-enactors in pursuit of his doctorate in cultural history at Emory University.

The ranks of re-enactors is certain to spike, say Jones and others, with the re-broadcast of the PBS series "The Civil War: A Film by Ken Burns." GPTV will begin airing the documentary Sunday. GPTV will also air a locally produced, four-part companion series, "Georgia's Civil War," a program that features many Georgia re-enactors.

While Hollywood may inspire some to enlist, Jones says, the real draw for re-enactors is history.

"They want to make history into a personal experience," says Jones. "They want to re-create a past they can feel. It's not a past they know in their heads, it's a past they feel in their hearts."

Re-enactors call it the magic moment or a period rush -- that confluence of circumstances that makes you believe it is 1864.

"There are certain moments that are really freaky, when the hair on the back of your neck stands up," says Rick Joslyn, who has been re-enacting "off and on" since 1975.

The rush sometimes comes during combat, re-enactors say, but more often happens away from the battlefield.

"Sometimes early in the morning, when the mist is rising from the ground. Or after you've been in the saddle for eight or nine hours and you're hot and thirsty, riding through the woods," says Adair of the Critter Company.

"If you're going for that authentic, historic period rush," says Joslyn, "you can't get that standing in line with men wearing Sears work boots."

Union and Confederate units exchange fire earlier this month during the 138th Anniversary Reenactment of the Battle of Tunnel Hill.

Jordan Compton (left) and Omar Alkalouti of Columbia, Tenn., take a break at Tunnel Hill. The men served with the 1st Tennessee Maury Grays, Co. 8.

Re-enactors representing the 46th Tennessee Infantry and the 1st Tennessee Infantry march into camp.

Stand Proud, Boys!

"the big fun comes simply from firing the $6,500 cannon he and his crew have built."

That part does sound like lots of fun. I'm amazed the Democrats even let you go around building cannons, black powder or no.

I voted "no" in your reparations poll, though I believe it should have a "hell no" option.

"In a mainstream camp, you're likely to see a Confederate infantryman drinking Dr. Pepper from a plastic bottle."

I bet the average reenactment soldier, due to a lifetime of consuming sugary stuff like Dr. Pepper, is a little heavier than his historical counterparts. In the 1800's very little sugar was consumed, compared to now.

The photo of Tunnel Hill shows the guys blasting away from what looks to be very close range. I suppose it must have been done that way? Brutal.

Interesting article, fascinating to get a glimpse of the past, thanks.

In any given endeavor, you will have amateurs and professionals. In sailing you have day trippers and blue-water sailers. Some have auxillary motors while others regard such as an abomination. At Star Trek conventions you have Trekkies and Trekkors. Knowing that such exists within the Civil War Re-enactor community just adds spice to my world view.

Yep, I was one of them hard cores at one time. I used an 1846 Grimsley or 1859 McClellan with original buckles handstitched with linen. My headstall used Civil war period buckles and I used an 1851 cavalry bit or the 1859 US bit. I carried a Tiffany Sabre and CW period colt and Sharps/or musketoon. Now most of my equipment is in a museum. Once at the 1988 demonstration of artillery in front of the Pennsylvania Monument at Gettysburg where we were putting on demonstrations in front of >5000 visitors, the park rangers stated that the harness on my hitch was in better shape and were better period relics than what was on display in their museum. I went to great pains to have a six horse artillery hitch using CW items and was successful at it. I sold the hitch back in 1996.

Your stories are facinating - I appreciate you always sharing them. Being a horseman myself, I can appreciate the period harness and tack (especially for 6 horses!). Awesome.

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