A Rebel Yell welcome, hikers

Once I was properly equipped to die for the cause,  Cpl. Mouser took me over to the Corporal whose task it would be to train me. 

Corporal Mat Sturman is a trim, bearded and – like the rest of the Fighting 7th Florida -  is totally in to the art and theater of reenacting.  A retired Navy Master Blaster, Sturman now serves his profession as an instructor at the Explosive Ordnance Disposal School in Pensacola, FL. 

Together we set up my quarters, a period pup-style tent.  Cpl. Sterman helped me spread straw beneath it for insulation.  For warmth Sterman issued me one blanket.  5-Star luxury, nothing but the best for the 7th’s newest shavetail Private.

The day and a good part of the night was spent learning the basics of handling the musket, both in battle and while marching.  I worked hard at it and there was no shortage of my fellow soldiers who gave generously of their time to help me.  Most important was the Manual of Arms, which is somewhat different than that I learned at the feet of my Drill Instructors lo those many years ago.  The Enfield is every bit of a foot longer than an M-16 and three pounds heavier.  Add the pig-sticker bayonet and you’re talking a weapons system that measures over five feet in length. 

We practiced by the light of the campfire.  “Po-art.. Arms!”  Snatch, snap, pop!

“Right Shoul-der.. Arms!” Pop, snatch, snap, pop! You catch my drift.  And ohh yeah, I was diggin’ it. 

The firelight casts long shadows.  Some of my companions huddled around the fire while others gathered around me to lend their help. Some had their faces wrapped in woolen scarves, others turned up their collars against the bracing chill of night. 

I’ll be dipped in grits if we all weren’t as authentic as we could be.  Modern conveniences such as flashlights and wristwatches and the like are strictly forbidden inside the boundary of the camp.  Such contrivances are called “anachronisms” and one sees no such thing here. 

I carried my musket everywhere. I strived to prove myself to be worthy of the 7th Florida.  I felt a genuine sense of pride at their cautious acceptance of me and I feared letting them down.  And of course, there was no friggin’ way that was going to happen.

Like the Civil War paintings in the history books I read as a boy, I wanted to BE one of those countless anonymous faces in that long grey line of fixed bayonets and hanging gun smoke.  If this be the War Between the States, and be these excellent men to my right and left, then let me selflessly and bravely serve the cause.  That’s what I was thinking, even more, that’s what I was feeling. 

The next morning we formed for “colors,” the morning flag ceremony.  We formed up and marched to the memorial obelisk in the park.  We synchronized perfectly the strike of our left heels on the roadway with the cadence of the drum corps.  We were four abreast,  shoulder to shoulder, and armed to the teeth. And guess what we passed as we marched to colors.  That’s right hikers, we marched passed the beautiful orange blazes of the Florida Trail.  Woohoo!  (and just a little freaky).

Colors was colors.  It was the leaving of colors that stands out in my mind.  The order came to forward march. As we passed, the band struck up “Dixie.”  The hairs on my neck stood at attention and I felt the unmistakable surge of honorable purpose.  It was at that moment that I knew I had been fully sheep dipped into the Military Order of the Orange Blaze, C.S.A., Nomenclature Mk 1 Mod 1.  Somewhere back in camp my hiking gear was squirreled away in the quartermaster’s tent.  Just few hundred yards away, it was.  But right then, right there? Well, hikers, it was every bit of one hundred fifty years away.  And I was, too.

After colors, we boarded a convoy of buses for Lake City and marched in the Battle of Olustee Parade. As we stood at ease waiting for the parade to commence, I heard my commanding officer, Lt. Van Leuven call Cpl. Sterman into his presence. 

“Corporal,” I heard the lieutenant say as he drew on his pipe, “Ask Private DeWitt if he would do us the honor of joining the company in battle today.”

Hikers, it was all I could do to calmly accept Cpl. Sterman’s offer.  Inside that scratchy jeanscloth uniform I was exploding with pure, unvarnished glee.  I was gonna be runnin’ and gunnin’ with the boys today!  The Saturday battle, hikers, the one emphatically denied to this boot Private over and over again.  Now I would be in the ranks.  I would fight.

General Jessee - our supremely authentic and photogenic commanding general - mounted his beautiful horse and led our grey legions down Main Street…And the crowds cheered us.

Note:

There is something I want to add here so that there is no misunderstanding of the reenactment hobby.

Reenacting is a dynamic display of living history.  Although I requested to serve with the Confederate forces for my story in the Tampa Tribune (after all, I live in Florida and am hiking the Florida Trail), virtually all of the reenactors of the 7th Florida come to each event fully prepared to serve as Union troops.  They pack Union uniforms and learn to portray the Union cause with the same commitment they bring to the Confederate reenactment.  The term for this is “galvanizing.”  This term comes from the Union policy of allowing Confederate soldiers to repatriate themselves under the Union flag by agreeing to serve in the Union Cavalry out west.  As a rule, galvanized soldiers did not serve in the Civil War - for obvious reasons. 

The point of battle reenactment is to bring alive a time and place in history to the benefit of those who are interested in learning more about it.  Just a few months ago, several of my comrades of the 7th portrayed Union captives at Andersonville, the notorious Confederate POW camp in Georgia.

During my time at Olustee I heard no racial slurs and no discussion of reviving the secessionist movement.  Reenactment is historical theater played on a grand scale. These men and women strive mightily to portray as accurately as possible the life and times of those who were called to fight the Civil War and the families they left behind.  The scale is decidedly human, not political.

And I have a confession to make. I have been incurably bitten by the Civil War reenactment bug.  The men and women who participate in these events are as fine a people as I have ever had the privilege to know.  They spend vast amounts of their time and money to bring alive this period in our history with an excitement and scale that no museum or book can hope to muster. 

If you haven’t yet attended a Civil War reenactment, I recommend it highly.  Heck, you never know… the bug just might bite you, too.

White Elephant cheers from the Florida Trail ! Mike

PS.. What’s a white elephant in Civil War-speak?  I’ve left you some homework, haven’t I?