How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

[Tyler Underwood]

Each one of us has a story of how we got started in the authentic side of the hobby. I started the hobby back in 1994 when I was 14 years old. My first kit was far from authentic, and like every other 14 year old money was tight and my knowledge of what was authentic was pretty much nonexistent.

Despite these short comings I was observant of what others in the hobby were doing. While participating at the 130th of Franklin, I noticed a large group of these insane guys sleeping out on the ground with nothing more than ground cloths and blanket. Seeing this made my 15 year old self do some soul searching start and asking myself a few questions about how I was interpreting history.

A few years later a friend from my mainstream unit told me about this fantastic website called the Authentic Campaigner forum. Through this site I began reading and learning as much as could about how to research, and improve my impression. This was also the around the same time I first met the big bug himself, Mr. Eric Tipton!

As I furthered my knowledge of material culture and learned what was appropriate for different impressions I began to replace my gear with more authentically reproduced items. After some time I finely felt like it was time to take the plunge, and in either 2000 or 2001 (I cannot remember which) I went to my first immersion event, TAG.

My friend Kent and I found our homes for the weekend in the GHTI Company with Capt. Matt Caldwell and Orderly Sgt. Justin Runyon. We had an absolute blast! Seeing everyone doing things by the book, caring about the little details, being freezing cold and scared out of my wits while on picket plus being given the order to “fix bayonets” (which was followed) as we were being overrun by Pat Craddock’s boys made an everlasting impression on me.

That’s the story of my transition into the authentic side of the hobby. What is yours?

[the Tennessee Confederate]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

I have not yet participated in an reenactment but have been going through the process of getting rid of my main stream gear and replacing it with authentic gear. I started buying gear about 2 or 3 years ago, not knowing the difference, but since then I found the authentic campaigner and have been studying, researching, and learning. I haven't found a unit yet but I am glad that I have had the time to learn a bit more and replace some of my main stream gear with authentic gear.

My first thought of the the authentic side of the hobby was that it was a little extreme. But since then I have found that it would be more fun and it can make you feel proud that you can come a little bit closer portraying the boys of 1861-65. But alas we will never know what it was really like, we can only hope we come close.

[Jeremy Bevard]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

I started in the hobby in 2001 eating poptack in a shelter tent with brass grommets and triangle ends. In 2002 I tried to carry everything on my back refusing to drive the car into camp. Not even sure I remember why. However, the pack was so overloaded (see above tent) that the back straps started to tear out and I couldn't stand up straight. But I made it in and out of camp! Years start to get fuzzy for me for a couple. After that I went to Perryville with my correctly made tent from Wambaugh & White. From there it just kept getting stepped up for me. I just had a drive to keep doing better. At some point the representing history correctly became important. But really in the beginning it was all about my experience and drive. I think in 2004 I found this site while bored at work. The drive started to increase. I saw an event being planned at Fort Wayne, Detroit by Pat Price. I was nervous but I reached out to him via email. Asking questions and saying I didn't know if I could meet the requirements. He sent back a long, detailed, helpful and receptive reply. The event was cancelled however we are still good friends today. He invited me that next May to to go to Conner Prairie with the GHTI. I met Paul there. I remember thinking how neat to be sitting around the fire with the AC founder guy! In 2007 Sean Collicott and I went to September Storm. We decided we would share a shelter tent, get items to set it up in camp, carry everything on our backs and eat period food. We survived while having an amazing time. Many stories from that event! That October I went to my first progressive event, Outpost III. I met men there I hope to see at every event I go to still today. From there the rest is history and future!

[beltplate53]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

I started in 1983 while a LCpl in the USMC stationed in NC. I had a good friend who grew up in Civil War Reenacting with his whole family involved with movies. Before the Marine Corps he had worked for The Smithsonian in collections. He was my mentor and together we did living history events, lectures, etc.. I distinctly remember him telling me not to take the Mainstream route but he used a different term which I wish memory would recall. He was a member of a South Carolina unit that featured a Palmetto. In the field he carried an original M1855 Harper's Ferry musket that was in excellent condition. In his home he had a period trunk that he would store his uniform, cap, and other personal effects. He would always stress authenticity and ask me sources for my conclusions. When we did living history, we would do a Union vs. Confederate presentation. All clothing then had to be hand sewn at home (his wife doing the honors) with cloth, which was as close to authentic that he could find. Though my Civil War studies continued, my being sent to foreign lands precluded from being involved with reenacting or living history until my retirement. I now concentrate on what I love and that is American History. My responsibilities include Docent, Museum Visitor Services, Civil War Reenacting, and living history. Life is good.

[DougCooper]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

I owe it all to James Owens. I had the great fortune to walk into his camp at the 125th Antietam and he recruited me. He was a campaigner before it was fashionable and never let me buy crap, learn crap, or believe crap...and always keep learning Thanks Sarge!

[CompanyWag]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

I started back in 1969, showing up to an event with my high school pal wearing homemade uniforms made out of blue denim, but totin' original muskets and a combination of original leather and homemade accouterments cobbled together from scraps from Tandy Leather. It was at that first event that I met Steven Osman who was at the time a bit of a renegade in his mainstream unit. He was the one who first primed my mind to be open to more authentic experiences. Within a year or so, I was exposed to the old Sherman's Bummers and immediately I recognized the difference. I abandoned my mainstreamer local unit and joined with the likes of Larry Strayer and Rick Baumgartner with the western Bummers. I've always gravitated to those folks who were pushing the envelope in doing better drill, better material culture, better living history, and living the life campaign-style. In 1982 I joined up with Thomas' Mudsills, eventually having the honor of commanding that organization for two terms up until the turn of the millennium.

[MarkTK36thIL]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

I remember showing up to my first event thinking all my inaccuracies can be excused by saying, "It's private purchase." Then, I looked at my uniform, then at the other guys in my unit, and just knew something wasn't "right." First event was the Shiloh LH in April of 2005. Then it steamrolled ever since.

[RSchuda]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

I first decided that I wanted to get to the more authentic side wayyyy back in 2014, after realizing I wanted more from my reenacting experience. I was kinda shrugged off by the "hardcore" unit in my area beforehand, so I went it alone in my current unit. Sleeping on the ground next to a bunch of A-Frames was kinda weird at first.
Currently, while I'll admit don't have all the best equipment yet, I do enjoy the luxury of being able to walk in with little more than what I comfortably carry, and then walk out as I please; I'm basically at the stage of "do the best I can with what I have".
I even got a pard to start down the same path.

[Palmyra Possum]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

For me, it is difficult to pinpoint exactly when I made the transition to a more authentic impression, but I do know a couple of things that helped me in the process.

First, I had the good fortune to fall in with a unit that from the start wanted to do things right even if we didn’t always know what “right” was. I got in the hobby just as CW reenacting was really beginning to start up in northern California. At my first “battle” reenactment, I think we had 5 guys on a side. We were young and ignorant.

Like many reenactors, in the beginning we learned how to do things from other reenactors, only to find out later that we had been taught wrong. (Company! Ready. Ripple fire from the right. Fire!) So, we read the drill manuals to find out what they really said. We read a lot of books, studied lots of pictures, did our best to keep up with the latest research (no internet then) and shared what we learned with each other. Most importantly, we regularly updated out authenticity standards as we learned more, and as better gear became readily available. We were never content with the way we did things. There was always room for improvement.

Second, I had to take a hiatus from reenacting for a couple of years due to stint out of the country with the green army. The longer I was away from reenacting, the better I wanted the experience to be when I got back into it. So, I took this time to improve the quality of my personal impression in anticipation of my return. Shortly after returning to the states, I attended a reenactment near where I was stationed at the time with some guys I had never met before. I decided that no matter how good these guys were I was going to be at least as good, if not better, in every aspect of reenacting. I was not going to drag anyone down. It turned out their idea of authentic rations was heating a can of Dinty Moore over a fire. After they saw what I was eating, they got a pool going as to when I was going to throw up. Seriously!

With my time in the green army coming to a conclusion, I went back home and fell in with my old unit and was back with like-minded reenactors. We were campaigners before the term came into vogue. When people asked why our camp looked like piles of blankets compared to all these neat rows of canvas, chairs, tables, boxes, cooking gear, etc., we would just tell them that we had out-marched our supply wagons and that this is how we lived when on the march. When we formed up for battle, our camp literally disappeared because we were wearing it.

To each other, we joked that we did it because we were just too lazy to haul all that crap to an event and then pack it back up at the end of the weekend. When the event was over, we would be well into our second round of beers at a local pizzeria long before the other units were even thinking of leaving.

[Ken Cornett]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

In 1999 I was President of my town's historical society. We had a program given by a local reenactor who still plays today. My wife hit me in the ribs and said "you have that look"...I said I was interested in it and needed a new hobby anyhow. Being still in the Army at the time, it seemed like a natural thing to try. I searched for local groups in Ohio and came real close to joining the 6th Ohio Cav out of Columbus, but having recently sold my Tennessee Walker, I was without horse. so I kept looking and found the 6th Ohio Volunteer Infantry in Cincinnati. I met them in April of 2000. This group had been around since the centennial days and is still going strong. On my first weekend with them at Camp Dennison, I met guys with names like John Crabb, Joe Liechty, and Rick Musseleman. I was also introduced to a man that instantly jolted me. I was looking at my former battalion commander Mike Hernandez whom I served under in Central America in the '80's. That awkward moment of two pretend privates turned into a fifteen year friendship until he passed a couple years ago. Really strange how things go in life.

Well, it wasn't but a month or so when Crabby asked me to join a new mess he was forming called the Buckeye Mess, which in turn was a founding mess for the GHTI. He thought I would not have any problem learning the "dark side" being a fifteen year Army ground pounder. I had no problem, but I was still new and only did a handful of things with that Mess. Things got slow for the BM and I was already an NCO in the 6th, so that's where a lot of my time was spent. In 2003, four of us from the 6th decided to form a new mess, but still stay with the 6th. Something that was unheard of at that time. People said you can't mix mainstream and hardcore. It's still going strong 14 years later. Anyhow while at a Buffington Island event in 2003, myself, Joe Liechty, Eric Tipton and Evan Zimmerman formed Mess No.1. The name supplied by Joe because it was how messes were recognized during the period.

Since then the Mess has been to 12 different states and still rolling. We have put on two mega events in Rich Mountain and Bummers with joint efforts from great friends. We have raised over 25K towards preservation. Something we are very proud of. In the 6th we have done several preservation rallies and will continue to do so. In seventeen years I've been every NCO rank multiple times and an officer for the 6th for several years now. I've been a sergeant major for two groups, including the Western Independent Greys for two years. Enjoyed all of it.

As I've gotten older, I have often thought about hanging it up. But I can't. Mess No.1 has many things still to accomplish and I've made life long friends all over the country from this hobby. Representing the old boys is one of the best things I've ever done with my life.

[LeftCoastYank]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

Wow, these are great stories fellas! For me, the path to authenticity started with a boring combination of practicality and pragmatism. My father and I got into Civil War reenacting around 1993 or '94. As many reenactors were apt to do in the heady day of the early 1990's, we bought every conceivable piece of "period" camping equipment imaginable. Tents, camp cots, stools, mountains of blankets and quilts, wooden crates (to haul and store all our junk), lamps in staggering quantity: oh what a shining beacon of kerosene and candle glow our tent was at night!

Then one day around 1995 or '96 (while schlepping our gear to the family station wagon) it dawned on my Dad and I that we routinely went backpacking on 1-week fishing excursions with nothing more than what we carried in our backpacks. We though to ourselves "why is it that we can survive a week in the rugged Sierra Nevada high country with nothing more than the bare essentials but we need everything but the kitchen sink at a 2-day reenactment?" After that we began to assess all our gear and minimize what we took to events. For whatever reason, from there it wasn't a big leap to also start improving the authenticity of our impressions either. However, the genesis for us was a desire not to spend hours packing and unpacking the car!

[PrivateDean]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

I started reenacting back in 2009 and like everyone who starts out i was farby. Then about one or two years a go i got an amazing NJ knapsack and soon got all the correct and most authentic contents for it. Then i started to replace my haversack and got a missouri boot and shoe one and replaced my leathers with c and d jarnagins amazing leathers. Then after i replaced my gear i started to stock up on period food and snacks to keep in my haversack so i can actually eat. Then last year or so I stopped sleeping in a tent and started to live out of my knapsack and slept on my gum blanket or under my one shelter half. I realized that if soldiers lived out of there knapsack for years im sure i can for one weekend so i did just that. Then i started to eat my meals out of my haversack and didnt eat food out of a cooler or from a vendor by sutler row. I truley believe that giving up your cot and A frame tent for one weekend and living out of your knapsack and your haversack isnt that bad. I truley believe that being authentic is the only way to teach the public how it really was to be a federal soldier who is fighting to preserve the union during the Civil war.


Pvt. Dean Mantas

[Sackcoat]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

Started out reenacting with a authentic minded unit, 24th Missouri USVI, at Wilson's Creek in 2011.

Certainly did not take long in the hobby before realizing how lucky I was to start out with a unit that does it right.

Joe

[cmccurley33]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

Sure, why not?
My twinbrother and I started when we were 15 years old, in Feb., 1995 out here in California. I knew pretty quick that our uniforms and whatnot didn't look right. Before we ever got into the hobby, my Dad had bought the William C. Davis books "Leaders of the Civil War" and "Fighting Men of the Civil War". I wanted my uniforms and equipment to look more like the stuff in the books. Of course this was before the Internet was really what it is today; added to that fact, I wasn't in most authenticly minded CW organization in Northern California, so I had a hard time finding the right stuff. I was in a bit of a vacuum. My brother, buddies and I started overdying our own sutler row uniforms with rit dye in order to get better coloring (if not better texture).
Shortly after that, a kid who would end up becoming one of my best friends, moved here from Virginia and started coming to events with us. He had been in the hobby out there, so he had a better idea of how to do things. We started sleeping under the stars, cooking our own food, etc. We were the West Coast hardcores with crappy uniforms, haha!
Eventually, I got in touch with Bob Denton of the old 37th Va, and he started teaching me a lot. Learned a ton from that guy. Shortly before that, we started getting our hands on old Charlie swatches, and whatnot. Got in touch with folks who were making good uniforms, etc., and the rest is history.
That pretty much all happened between '95-'99 for us. My brother and I are still deep in. I'm still out here in California, doing Civil War and other eras. I usually end up back east once a year, or so, to do artillery with my brother Paul. When he moved permanent back to NC, he took our 6lb field gun with him. He now runs Starr's Light Battery with a bunch of great guys.

[mike44thva]

Re: How did you get started in authentic reenacting?

Well, mine is a bit silly, but sometimes its the little things.

Talking canteen string with Tim @ S&S
&
Learning about blankets from Matt Woodburn when I bought my first 2 authentic reproduction ones. He helped me out in identifying them and what to look for.