Mistaken Identities

The faded remnants of the 14^th Brooklyn marched across a freshly harvested cornfield, the dried stalks stabbing at their legs.  Beetles and aphids, stink bugs and mosquitoes, rose from the rotting husks. And dust. Dust lifted with every step, covering the blue woolen tunics already damp with sweat in the heat of this Indian summer.  Across the line was heard heavy breathing, whether from the heat, the march, or the objective across the field it was hard to say. Probably all of that and their evident physical condition. These were not like the youth who’d rallied to the call in ’61. These men weren’t the elite, not professional soldiers, though sometimes lying down at night in their dream they might think they were.
The grey hair, double chins, belts hidden by overhanging bellies told another story.
            They stared across to the other side of the field, many through progressive lenses fitted to small steel frames, when the officer in charge, younger than most, ordered them to halt, then load – “don’t touch those ramrods” — then ready arms.  The 11^th Alabama that made up the ragged grey line presented a mirror image of this action.  Another drum roll came from somewhere. The grey line tried to hoot, sounding like a group of Arab women ululating, and the blue line returned with a tired set of huzzahs. Orders came again, muskets moved to shoulders, and the veterans who had been at this for a while shouted, “aim high.” And then, “FIRE.”
            Flames and smoke shot several feet out from the barrels.  A few men, and one woman, in blue, fell to the ground.  Fewer in grey fell, but there were fewer of them to begin with.  The volleys continued for twenty minutes.  More fell to the ground, some whining in apparent pain, others uncorking tin canteens and taking swigs until, finally, another drum roll and the grey line backed off waving flags in contempt of the blue victors.
Then came another command, “about-face” and the blue line turned around, the fallen rose as best they could from the ground, picked up their rifles, and stumbled exhausted away from the battleground.  One man, younger than most, brought up the rear using his flagpole as a hiking stick. He smiled as he lifted the stars and stripes to the gentle breeze, letting it wag as tired as the troops.  It had done its job, too.
            Their pace picked up as they closed in on the tables set out at the edge of the field for grub and sustenance or maybe a return to the relief of air conditioning in idling cars.  The same thing was happening across the field, but the Rebs had outflanked the Yankees and were enfilading the refreshment stand. They’d nearly bought out all the corndogs before the sides met up.  The Boys in Blue had done their own damage, clearing out much of the sweating bottles of iced tea the Boy Scouts were selling as a fundraiser.  Within the hour most of the refreshments had disappeared down the accepting gullets of the mostly middle-aged, late middle-aged, men, the white powder of sugared donuts more evident on the dark tunics of the Yankees than on the Rebs though the latter had grabbed more with their left hands because their rights had those corndogs.
In addition to a love for history, for playing soldier, what they shared, what they had in common, was a complete lack of need for those high-caloric victuals. Salad with low-fat dressing would have been more sensible, certainly healthier, and if continued as a regimen create a somewhat more authentic reenactor.  It’s a historical fact that the average Union soldier weighed 133 pounds and likely the Confederates carried somewhat less. 
During the war, the Southerners told themselves and anyone who would listen that a Southern boy was worth two Yankees.  That was an exaggeration on many levels, but the Yankees, and Rebs, engaged in this particular battle were a safe 40% heavier, on average, than the soldiers they hoped to emulate. That’s why an EMT team was on call and each unit brought along a defibrillator tucked into a perfect replica of a surgeon’s pack kept close by.  They had come in handy.
The undead could pick themselves up to fight another day. This was both a good thing for reenactors in that they were just playing at fighting the Civil War, and for the hobby itself; the ranks of the aging baby boomers willing to don tight-fitting wool uniforms were thinning out even as waistlines expanded.  There was a renaissance in the early 1960s during the Centennial when widows and children of actual veterans were still around.  The last verified veteran, a Union man, had died in 1956.  The last Confederate, Pleasant Crump, a name a writer of fiction wouldn’t dare create, died in 1951.  The Bicentennial inspired a surge of interest in reenacting the wars and a cottage industry in as-authentic-as-can-be uniforms, muskets, and accouterments.  Authenticity was the key down to those beastly wool uniforms worn in the height of reenacting season, the summer, which is where the EMTs came in if at a respectful distance.
The middle-aged white men who led the charge were early on the inclusion theme.  They brought their wives who dressed up as nurses and camp followers, encouraged black men to reform black units, and, yes, not a few women dressed as men to carry a musket for either side.  Curiously, this also happened in the Civil War.
But the reenactment game had fallen on hard times. The baby boomers were older and running around hot fields in the blistering heat had lost allure. Younger folks, i.e. recruits, tended to be more urban, more urbane, and had more realistic battle options on video games without having a plumber yell at them for putting their right foot forward when everyone else led with their left. Wives had grown bored, too; women in their 50s and 60s felt self-conscious mimicking soiled doves flirting in bloomers with the crowd.
            Gone, too, was the respect. Respect if not for the reenactors’ performance but for the history they portrayed and, to give them their due, their knowledge, and love of the history.  Questions about the time, the characters, the life of a soldier had given way to derision from a few in the audience and a few pretty much made up the crowd. 
            “We are rather pathetic,” announced Owen Higgins, the one reenactor who could claim a relative who’d actually fought in the war.  He was loading his car with gear, happy to remove the sweat-soaked blue tunic and call it a day.  He was helping Vincent Canistraro dump out residual black powder from his rifle barrel while Vinnie closed his eyes and leaned against the side of the truck. “I’m getting old for this,” he said.
            Two young people, 20-somethings, ambled up.  “Do you fellows smell rotten eggs?” said one in a soft feminine voice. The pair of reenactors looked up, curious, and stared. Owen managed to spit out that it was the gun powder they used, black powder.  Vinnie feigned smelling his armpits and confirmed it must be the gun powder, laughed, then tried not to stare at the couple.
The blonde with the bare midriff asked what all the noise had been about.  Owen, trying to distract himself with the gear, pulled out his musket.  “We’re Civil War reenactors. We just had a battle. Well, more a skirmish. We don’t have battles very much these days.”
            He held out the musket to the rosy-cheeked one in skinny jeans who sniffed the barrel. “Ick, it does smell like bad eggs.” Owen pulled the gun away.  “Listen, son, never hold a gun like that. You don’t know if it’s loaded.”  He handed it back.
            “They,” said they said in unison. 
            “Huh?” said Owen.
            “You said son. I identify as they.”
            Vinnie muffled a guffaw which caught all their attention.  They turned away. All three of them.
“Oh, okay,” said Owen.  “Didn’t mean any offense.  What’s the right word for son in this circumstance?”
            They, the non-reenactors, looked to each other for guidance. They’d, plural, never been asked the question.
            “What about child?” asked Vinnie.
“Age-deterministic,” said the blonde who acknowledged their name as Pat.  “It implies a chronological power hierarchy. You know, child versus adult.”
            “Offspring?” offered Owen.
            “That implies a dominant biological connection,” said the rouged one, self-identified as Les. “The term offspring also establishes an air of superiority. I don’t like it.”
            “Me neither,” said Pat.
            “Me too,” said Vinnie.  “Hell, offspring implies I’ll be paying for something!  Three college educations is enough. Get a job kid, I say.”
“Kid works. A little condescending but it could be affectionate in the right context,” said Pat. 
“Okay then. So, kid, don’t point a gun at your face. It could go off,” said Owen.
Pat and Les nodded their heads in ready agreement, though Les added they didn’t much like guns but thought muskets were adorable in a retro fashion. A one-sided discussion of the Second Amendment ensued, the upshot of which was that the Founding Parents of the country didn’t anticipate advancements in firearm technology and that muskets were fine, at least acceptable, if you had to own a gun. Pat asked Owen and Vinnie if there were reenactors of more recent wars, like WW2, or Vietnam, which would require more threatening gun ownership.
Vinnie looked down at his feet when he replied that some people did reenact later wars, though not Vietnam, but not many, and, naturally, they use blanks.  Owen quickly added that most reenactors stopped at the Civil War. “The Revolution and Civil War are about the love of history more than the fighting,” he said, which was not entirely true.  A lot of reenactors just liked dressing up and shooting off clouds of stinking smoke but needed a mature rationale to get the requisite municipal permits. “And it’s not easy getting people to play Nazis.”
            Vinnie added, “Or Japs…Japanese…or Viet Cong.  Not a lot of Orientals are into this stuff.” 
“Asians,” Owen corrected.
            Les’ tweaked eyebrows rose. “That’s cool,” he said looking around at the rapidly dispersing four score of reenactors.
 Owen brightened with an idea. “This used to be a family thing. We had our wives…or significant others…helping out. It was like a grand picnic really.”
“Your partners, would play soldier?” asked Pat.
            “Some. Mostly not. The ladies would hang out at the tents or play nurses.  Mostly though they played camp-followers. You know, hookers,” said Vinnie.
            “Hookers? Honestly?” asked Les.
            “Yeah, well. Did you know the word hooker comes from a General Hooker?  He encouraged camp-followers. Had an eye for them apparently.  Took a cut for all I know.”
“Sounds like sexual exploitation,” said a pouting Pat.
            “The oldest profession predated the Civil War.  But bearing in mind six-hundred thousand men.”
“And women,” interjected Les.
            “And LGBTQ,” offered Pat. “Lincoln was gay you know.”
            “And women, and LGBTQ, people, and Lincoln died. There was a lot of tragedy to go around,” said Owen. “But I don’t think Lincoln was gay. That’s just one guy’s theory and not credited by most historians. But J. Edgar Hoover was a crossdresser. I think that’s right.”
“Where are the camp-followers now,” asked Pat. “I just see,” – he swept his arm in an arc – “you two. Or should I say ‘y’all?
“You guys is good enough,” said Vinnie.
            “I didn’t want to be presumptuous,” said Pat.
“Wait a sec,” said Owen.  He bent into the depth of his car rummaged around for an uncomfortably long before standing erect with an exclamation of pain and a handful of pamphlets.  One hand was on his lower back, a grimace on his face, while the other hand offered the paper to Les.  “These are…” he scrunched his forehead into a set of taut wrinkles, “A brochure on us. Lists the website. And a sutler’s catalog; shows you how much we spend on this hobby and it ain’t cheap. If you’re interested. Or maybe you can just throw them away.”
            “Recycle,” said Pat.
            “Sure,” wailed Owen, leaning against the car.
            “Hold on,” said Les, who clapped his hands, rubbed them together like a sumo wrestler before a bout, and place them on the small of Owen’s back. He pushed gently, helped Owen twist one way, manipulating his muscles with the movement.  After a few minutes of this, Owen was able to stand upright with an “Oh my God!”
“Energy work. I’m a Reiki therapist,” said Les.
            “Miracle worker is more like it,” said Owen.
            “Do me,” said Vincent. “Shoulder.” A series of oohs and ahhs ensued.
Pat watched from the sidelines, a contented look overseeing the events. “They’re very good,” said Pat.
The thermometer had eased by the time the 14^th Brooklyn got together again that fall, which got a few more reenactors out for what would be a two-day event.  Some of the Confederate reenactors had come from as far away as Exit 40 on the Garden State.  Tents were put up though RVs and campers were notable in the parking lot of the park that allowed the event.  The reenactment was scheduled for the afternoon, all 30 minutes of it, to allow time for the faux soldiers to walk about, mix with the thin crowd, and tell the stories they had to tell, in character, as if it was 1863 and their average age and size didn’t demand the sort of suspension of disbelief more akin to an SNL spoof than the Twilight Zone. Or maybe a drag queen review.             

Because just after lunch and before the troops would gather for their march to the field of battle, a Mercedes Sprinter van pulled into the parking lots, horn ahonking, and kisses blown from its tinted windows.  The door opened and out poured a dozen or so reenactors of a different kind.  Waving to the gathering troops and buffs, to the families, and to the vendors, were very authentically outfitted camp followers and nurses, one with a remarkable resemblance to Clara Barton down to her medical carpetbag and an armload of bloodied towels, one of which contained a detached arm dripping blood.
Clara went up to Owen who by then had closed his gaping mouth. 
            “I saved it from an amputation,” she said with a wink.  “How’s the back doing?”
Les winked once more and ushered their flock around the camp, engaging onlookers with their own stories; of the role of camp followers, of how hookers got that name, and of the vital role nurses played on and off the battlefield. A few words were exchanged between the two campy camps such as one nurse sniping “bitch” to an artificially buxomed camp followers in bloomers and over-the-top makeup, and the latter hissing “goody-two-shoes” back. 
The crowd cheered until a drum rolled, the men with muskets gathered, formed, and began the march to battle.        
Pat followed alongside the men of the 14^th Brooklyn, wailing with crocodile tears and matching crocodile shoes care of a Brooklyn thrift shop.  Each man Pat hugged stiffened, whether from discomfort or pride it was hard to say.  “They identify as Union men,” said Pat to the crowd, more engaged than usual in the display.  Across the field, a camp follower dressed only in billowing bloomers walked with the men in grey and butternut. “Give ‘em hell Johnny Reb.  They can’t mess with our rights!”  
            Les and three other nurses ran onto the field as men fell, offering succor in the form of canteens filled with beer, a light shoulder massage, and a hand to lift them up and off the field. The Rebs proudly retreated in defeat, they’d lost the coin toss, shouting the “woo-hoo” of the Rebel yell though they were overshadowed by the wailings of the ladies on their side of the field. The limping men in grey looked at each other as the entourage came to the field to escort them off with surprising strength and, to the discomfort of some, rather attractive physiques.
The addition of the parading damsels had brought on a larger crowd of the curious who heretofore could have cared less about the reenactment.  The performance brought on cheers and applause and the attention of a reporter and camera crew from MSNBC which had gotten itself lost in bowels of New Jersey working on a story to be called “The Real Tony Soprano” when they heard the gunshots.
They started shooting the scene, interviewing embarrassed reenactors who’d never encountered attention of this sort. Pat and Les waved in their friends having had more media attention or at least craving it.  They explained with details what the reenactment was all about far better than the soldiers who’d been doing it for decades could and what the addition of men-in-drag meant for the hobby. 
“We all identify as something perhaps different from our birth designation,” said Les to an audience of millions later that evening.  “The men (Les offered air quotes) identify as Civil War soldiers and aren’t they wonderful!  Isn’t it logical when people can identify that way?”                   Owen nodded in agreement. To the reporter’s query, “And you are?” Owen said he identified as a Union officer but sometimes flirted with being a Confederate. “I’m fluid especially if we don’t get enough Rebels at an event.”  He said identifying as a hooker hadn’t crossed his mind. Yet.
            MSNBC ate it up. The reenactors, the veterans, looked at their feet as the cameras pointed their way. Those downward gazes hid the deep shades of red that came when Les and crew provided the most generous kisses. Tucker Carlson on Fox News decried transgendered questionables using American history to market their abomination calling it more cancel culture to deprive women of their legitimate roles as caregivers without mentioning what camp followers actually did. Rachel Madow interviewing LGBTQ authorities applauded their love of history and bringing new life into the hobby.  The reenactor’s bible, The Camp Chase Gazette – the self-described “Voice of Civil War Reenacting” – printed a special edition taking a neutral view but trebled its subscriber base.
There were roughly 4,000 spectators at the next reenactment, an event picked up by the weekend section of the New York Times. There were 400 soldiers, evenly divided, on either side of the great conflict, along with 600 people of various orientations playing the female leads. About a dozen Black men, two women and one who chose not to be identified wore grey tunics.  When asked why by an NPR reporter, their sergeant said it was better than portraying a slave, and “it made the white guys really uncomfortable.”