Reenactor Groups Come Together

Originally published January 2017 · p. 14

PERRYVILLE, Ky. – On the very ground where Americans fought Americans over their discontent for each other, a group of Federal Civil War reenactors put aside differences they might have and resolved to work together to strengthen the hobby west of the Appalachians by forming the Grand Armies of the Republic (GAR). The goal of the pact is to preserve history and educate the public about the Civil War. In the spirit of President Abraham Lincoln’s words of binding up the nation’s wounds, this group of reenactors representing nine Midwestern umbrella organizations, intend to mend hard feelings that have festered and eroded the reenacting community. In a hobby that has grown more divisive through the last two decades, punctuated by groups boycotting other’s events for command and control, this newly formed group pledged to support one another’s events and resolve differences without creating fissures that have weakened the hobby over the years, which has directly resulted in diluting the hobby.

The group also pledged to work with like-minded reenacting groups with Confederate impressions. The group plans to support regional and national events. Additionally, the group plans to cooperate to eliminate conflicting regional events that fall on the same weekend, which has the effect of weakening both events. It is hoped that these efforts will bolster promising regional events, returning them to days when a thousand or more reenactors attended these homegrown history lessons, which now often receive no more than living historians measured in the hundreds. Participating organizations to date include; Army of the French

Broad, Army of the Wabash, Black Hat Battalion (2nd Wisconsin), Cumberland Guard, Federal Calvary Association, First Federal Division, Military Division of the Mississippi, Muddy River Battalion, Western Artillery Reserve, 1st Brigade Illinois Volunteers, and the 49th New York. The GAR is focused on growth and welcomes additional, like-minded organizations to join. The GAR will be supporting, as well as in full Federal Command of the 2017 Shiloh event hosted by the Atlanta Campaign, Inc. For more information, contact: Bob Minton, 419-420-2673 ([email protected]) or Rob Van, 317-557-2244 ([email protected])