I participated in my very first Civil War reenactment today with the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Poison Spring in Camden, AR. A guy I work with has some family-friends who do this as a hobby and thought I'd be interested, so I said "shoot yeah" as they were looking for a few extra bodies. I joined up with the 18th Iowa Infantry Regiment on the Union side (the losers of this particular battle). There were about 60 reenactors and some 700 spectators out to watch on the park grounds (the History Channel was also seen filming for a bit). Learned a lot of the local history that I wasn't aware of:
General Steele of the North was supposed to launch a pincer attack from his base in Little Rock, AR that was supposed to meet up with another force out of Shreveport, LA, the idea being to crush the Confederate forces of southern Arkansas, northern Louisiana and eastern Texas. Steele's forces occupied Camden when it was discovered that the Confederates had pulled out and learned of a rebel cache of corn 20 miles to the south. Critically low on supplies, he sent a foraging party with 200 wagons to capture the corn stash. On the return trip, the Yankees were ambushed by a large contingency of rebel soldiers, resulting in a loss of around 300 men and nearly all of the corn wagons. This became known as the Battle of Poison Spring - which got its name because it had been thought that the Confederates had poisoned the local "white oak creek" (Today, it is believed that the heat-stressed Yankee soldiers merely made themselves sick by drinking from the cold spring water). A few day's later, Steel withdrew from Camden and made his way back to his base in Little Rock. Along the way, he was dogged again by the pursuing Southern forces at Jenkin's Ferry while trying to cross the flooded Saline River. Overall it was a Confederate victory as they prevented the North from carrying out their crushing pincer move to end the Red River campaign, but the South missed an opportunity to destroy Steele's army at Jenkin's Ferry - allowing personnel and material to escape.
I'll post some pictures as they become available. Anybody else carry out these military reenactments? I still do more paintball than anything but this is definitely more involved and true to life for the scenario driven mind.
