Anybody watching the Civil War on PBS this week?

[WyandotteTX]

I have watched this show many times but has been quite a while since I watched it. I have forgotten what a great show this is, so informative and yet so tragic........a horrible time, a wondrous time in American History.
Sorry my History nerdness is showing but I cant help but be moved by the stories told in this wonderful piece.

 

[redhen]

Whens it on! I looove history...

I'mma nerd too..

 

[KristyHall]

Me too. I love all sides of it, spent years working/ volunteering with museums, Indian ed programs, re-enactment groups, and traveling in local areas and speaking on certain Native right issues and certain historical issues. ( I am NOT an expert)

Still I take all those shows, and read all those books with a grain of salt, everyone puts their own spin on things.

Still sooo much fun. Shame I don't get to see the show. Tell me how it is!

 

[EweSheep]

I agree with Kristie, I am an Civil War reenactor and these series are wonderful to watch!

However I don't like the photographs of dead soldiers, mouth and eyes agaping open or guts missing or soldiers knowing they will die from gut shot, by ripping up their shirts to see where they were shot....death is near. How horrible.

The carcass of dead horses....ugh!

Bloated bodies of Gettysburg, I could imagine the stench!

 

[KristyHall]

Quote:
I never got to do the civil war re-enactments. Mostly the colonial period, and various other time periods, mostly demonstrating cooking, particularly native cooking, of the time period.

The civil war re-enactments are particularly difficult I hear. Kudos to you.

 

[redhen]

I'd loooove to see a re-enactment...

 

[KristyHall]

Quote:
Oh they're fun! even more fun to be a part of! some places love it if you have animals, like chickens, you can bring with you to add authenticity, or fresh eggs and so on.

 

[EweSheep]

Really not that difficult. I would say not any more than the Colonial ones.

We "cheat" sometimes for the undergarments...I am not crazy wearing all those underpinnings on a very HOT day. No thank you! Just shorts and good cotton socks and boots or slippers will do me just fine. Swing the hooped dress back and forth! Sit on a ice pad or slip the ice pack on your lap under your hoops to keep cool. It can be miserable for some of us but one event, I over did it, was heat exhaustion. Bad idea! Since then I coul d not cope the heat as well as I used to.

Some of the girls in events wear tacky dresses and with white blouses, you would see their bras. They didn't have bras but if they need to wear bras have a light shawl or jacket to cover the "modern" wear that is so obvious tothe public.

All in all, its not too bad and it was fun. As we have gotten older, most of our friends gone to other hobbies or retired, the numbers of reenactors were at their lowest...due to job and gas prices. Others moved on to better hobbies. We will be getting out of reenactments in two years but still do living history and daytime things around town and places to go.

I do cook things over the fire and it is challenging. I love it, nothing taste like a good dinner over a campfire!

 

[KristyHall]

Quote:
I had heat exhaustion during a re-enactment. I was in a basic buckskin dress, during an Alabama summer, over a cook fire (they wanted my dress to be completely authentic for the tribes in the area but I explained to them that it would involved me being arrested for indecent exposure so we settled on a simple, hand tied and tanned buckskin work dress).

But that isn't the first time I've had heat exhaustion/stroke in a buckskin dress. It stinks when it happens. Makes you sick for days.

 

[WyandotteTX]

Kristy, if you have never seen the Civil War documentary by Ken Burns you truly are missing something if you like history. It is very impartial, looks at both sides and tells the story of the war thru individuals who experienced the war. Being someone who studied/studies history most all of my life...this story is epic....it is momentous to all of us as Americans how brother fought brother in such horrific ways but yet when it was all done we stand together again as Americans all.
There are such great stories told within this show. Like Confederate General Joe Johnston standing as pall bearer to Union General Sherman, his old adversary, at well over 80 years of age.....caught pneumonia and died 10 days later.......
A regiment of Confederates from Knoxville that numbered 968 men, only had 3 that were still alive after the Battle of Gettysburg. Such tragedy.
Did you know that Arlington National Cemetary is placed upon the home and farm of Confederate General Robert E Lee?

A reunion of veterans of Gettysburg 50 years later....Confederate soldiers re enacted the Picketts Charge with a Rebel yell...upon hearing the yell the Union veterans let out a great moan breaking their position falling upon their brothers as they had years before not with force but with an embrace of countrymen. Can you imagine seeing that and not being brought to tears at seeing men relive such a horrific moment in their lives.........extraordinary in every sense of that word.


I too like to study alot about Native Americans, growing up in Texas you learn of the Apaches and Comanches. My great, great grandfather who I am named after was part of the expidition that defeated the Cheyenne and Comanche in Palo Duro Canyon in West Texas. We all have a past entwined with our own American History.