Salon.com May 8, 2011
The foolishness of Civil War reenactors
By Glenn W. LaFantasie
http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2011/05/08/civil_war_sesquicentennial&source=newsletter&utm_source=contactology&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Salon_Daily%20Newsletter%20%28Not%20Premium%29_7_30_110

Last month, the Civil War sesquicentennial began with a bang with a "living
history" event in Charleston, S.C., that commemorated the firing on Fort
Sumter, the momentous act of violence that started the war.

If you’re not familiar with what "living history" means, this is a term that
Civil War reenactors use to describe their hobby of dressing up in Union and
Confederate uniforms and acting out battles and other significant events
that occurred between 1861 and 1865. On April 12, 1861, Confederate forces
fired (for real) on Fort Sumter, a military installation manned by federal
troops, and continued the bombardment for more than 30 hours, when,
outgunned and almost out of supplies, the Union commander, Major Robert
Anderson, surrendered the fort and its garrison. It was the fall of Fort
Sumter that began the Civil War, and modern reenactors pretended to do it
all over again, only this time they did not use live ammunition, did not
keep modern Charlestonians from getting their sleep by sustaining the
thunder of cannons through the night, and presumably did no damage to the
preserved stone walls of the Fort Sumter National Monument, which is located
on an island in the middle of Charleston harbor.

In fact, the "living historians" at Charleston fudged the history more than
a little by firing their first shot at the fort at 6:45 in the morning
rather than at the very famous historical time of 4:30 a.m. Presumably, this
enabled the reenactors to sleep a little later than their historical
counterparts did 150 years ago. Then, when the mortar shot was finally fired
to begin the reenactment, it barely sailed up 40 yards or so into the sky,
although the noise it made was, according to the Charleston Post and
Courier, "thunderous." But the newspaper also reported that the pyrotechnics
left something to be desired: Rather than the "star shell" of a century and
a half ago, the explosion seemed more like a "bottle rocket." The fireworks
technician in charge of the mortar shot explained that the burst was
"intentionally weak, as a safety precaution to the crowds of people on hand
to witness the waterfront ceremony." So much for historical accuracy.

The promoters of this observance insisted that their event was not a
"reenactment," but a moment of "living history." Although I’ve been a
practicing Civil War historian for quite some time, I’ve never quite
understood why reenactors dislike being called reenactors. They almost
universally claim to be "living historians" or to be engaged in "living
history." But I find these terms mystifying. For one thing, I think that I
am a living historian; if not, someone should inform my loved ones of my
passing. For another thing, "living history" makes me think of apparitions,
like ghosts possessing the living and walking about historical sites in the
manner of zombies, wide-eyed, with arms outstretched and flesh dangling off
their faces. But if reenactors wish to be called living historians, so be
it.

At any rate, the commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the Civil War is
off and running (with the Union "living historians" dutifully surrendering
Fort Sumter to Confederate "living historians" in a pageant held on April
14, fraught with high seriousness and furrowed brows suitable to the
occasion. To a very large degree, I confess to some unease about all this
playacting . . .
Jon Kukla
________________
www.JonKukla.com <http://www.jonkukla.com/>

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