CHARLESTON, S.C. — Mel Reid slipped on a pair of wool pants and tucked in his striped blouse, suspenders snapped on tight. Later, he buttoned up a wool navy blue coat and attached a scabbard around his waist.
His rifle, a replica 1859 Enfield rifle, never left his side as he stood at attention next to 11 other black men on a scruffy island in Charleston Harbor last week to pay tribute to the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment, one of the most celebrated African-American units that fought in the Civil War.
Nearly 10,000 Civil War re-enactors have descended upon Manassas, Va., this weekend to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Bull Run. The vast majority will be white. But across the country, hundreds of African-Americans like Reid travel across the South and mid-Atlantic to commemorate battles in which black Civil War soldiers fought from 1863 to 1865.
Their mission: to let it be known that African- Americans were an essential part of the Civil War and the Union’s victory. “When I was growing up, the only thing we heard was: ‘Lincoln freed the slaves, Lincoln freed the slaves,’ ” said Reid, a retired National Park Service manager whose home is filled with souvenirs and memorabilia illustrating black Civil War fighters. “But if you look, you’ll see that most historians now say that if it wasn’t for these black soldiers, the North might not have won the war. These guys were freedom fighters. That’s what our people should know . . . and that’s why we do this.”
At its peak in the 1990s, there were no more than 1,000 black re-enactors across the country, said Hari Jones, curator of the African-American Civil War Museum in Washington. The U.S. has about 50,000 Civil War re-enactors overall, according to Dana Shoaf, editor of Civil War Times.
Many re-enactors are avid history buffs, schoolteachers, retirees and descendents of Civil War veterans. They are often older — retired or over 50, which usually invokes some soul searching about how accurate their re-enactments can actually be: Most Civil War soldiers were between 18 and 30.
But there is the added challenge of explaining to the black community at large what could be redeeming about portraying a period in history when many black men and women were in bondage.
Bobbie Cole, 65, a female re-enactor from Washington, helped start Female Re-enactors of Distinction, whose members portray nurses and teachers. “When I started looking at pictures of enslaved people, there was just something about their faces,” she said. “If you look into their eyes, you see this intensity — not fear. It’s intriguing why the stories haven’t been taught. Why are we so ashamed?”
