Local Reenactment Groups Try to Keep It Real

Reenactment groups attract all kinds of people from all kinds of professions for all kinds of reasons: the search for military camaraderie, the quest for a wholly authentic experience and just about everything in between.

While some reenactors are content simply to wear period garb, others swear off all modern conveniences and focus on a painstaking re-creation of battles and marches. To get as close to the real thing as possible, they'll do everything short of giving themselves dysentery.

"I'm not there to have a good time. I'm there to learn and be miserable," says Mike "Dusty" Chapman, 41, an accountant at the National Gallery of Art and a member of Virginia's well-reputed Stonewall Brigade.

Eating period food for a weekend can be a challenge, but think about marching barefoot 10 to 15 miles a day in the rain, says S. Chris Anders, 35, a member of the Chesapeake Volunteer Guard and a sales director in Hagerstown, Md.

"We've done picket post events where we've stood in the snow all night long in five-degree temperatures," Anders says. "It's about having a deeper understanding. Today, everybody lives in climate-controlled environments with very little physical labor, for the most part, and you tend to lose touch with history in situations like that."

To find a group in your area, consult Civil War News ( http://www.civilwarnews.com), which publishes a comprehensive list of reenactment units across the country at the beginning of the year and has event listings every month. Also try the Authentic Campaigner ( http://www.authentic-campaigner.com), or contact a local group, which can provide an entree into the world of Civil War reenacting. Here are just six of the many units in the area:

1ST MARYLAND VOLUNTEER INFANTRY. The original unit guarded the upper Potomac and C&O Canal for the Union starting in 1861.

"We're kind of a fun group overall," says Eugene Nash III, 37, webmaster for the group and a historic preservation architect in Georgetown. "We fall toward the hard-core range but not that hard-core, nothing extreme. Some units only do battles, some only do parades -- we try to spread it out."

The regiment has about 30 members, mostly from central and eastern Maryland, and is under the umbrella organization the National Regiment ( http://www.cwreenactors.com/~nationalregiment). There's usually one event per month, and meetings are held at Fort McHenry in Baltimore.

E-mail firstmdus@comcast.net or visit http://www.firstmdus.org.

3RD MARYLAND VOLUNTEER INFANTRY. Hailing from western Maryland, Virginia, the District and Pennsylvania, members in this re-created Union unit range in age from 15 to 80-something.

Like the 1st, the 3rd aims to be accessible. "We lean toward the authentic without getting crazy about it," says David Bloom, 56, president of the group and manager of a Social Security field office by day. "It's a nice mix of people, many of whom I would never rub elbows with if not for this common interest."