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First off, this is inspired by a recent post by my friend Stephen over at the Full Chisel wood working blog, hope neither of you mind.  He talks about something known among living history and re-enactor circles by many different names:  ’getting into the moment,’ a ‘period rush (as is mentioned inTony Horwitz’s book Confederates in the Attic),’ and many other names.  In my experience, there are a couple different types of these ‘moments.’  The first type is the rarer of the two, where you completely forget what century it is, where you are so immersed that the line between past and present is, mentally at least, not only crossed, but destroyed.  The second is more common, and easier to achieve, but spectacular nonetheless, it is when you’re still conscious of what time period you are in, but something is so overpowering that you get a feeling deep down inside that something is exactly how it was in the era you’re portraying.  It comes in many different forms, but essentially it’s when one sense is completely overpowered, be it sight, sound, smells, etc., whereas the first type is the combination of all the senses, and then some.

My best experience with the first type may seem insignificant, or trivial, but it was powerful!  Back in April I went to a civil war event with some friends of mine in Tennessee.  It was a hardcore campaigner event, meaning nothing that was non-period, from underwear to food, and you carried everything on your back.  Well on these sorts of events, they post pickets.  The last night of the event, I was dehydrated, tired from marching all day alternately in the sun and rain, I was caked in mud, and very  sleep deprived.  We had no idea when the confeds were going to attack, and my company was in charge of pickets that night, so we weren’t aloud to take our gear off (i.e. cartridge box, bayonet scabbard, haversack, etc.) and we had hour breaks between picket shifts.  I was so tired, and on the verge of vomiting, praying that no confederates would attack, because that would mean movement.  I was so tired and  cold that I’d fall on my back (with all kinds of things jabbing me when I’d lay down) next to the fire, and fall asleep instantly.  My ‘moment’ came after one of these awful picket shifts.  I was nearly asleep on my feet, straining my eyes in the pitch black night, trying not to trip on a tree branch or a soldier, groping my way back to the fire.  Upon arrival, I leaned my musket up against the tree, along with about 10 others.  For some reason unbeknownst to me, that really did it for me, seeing all those muskets leaning against the tree, and seeing everyone else’s weary faces looking up at me, looking like death, it was just a total sensory overload for me, I literally forgot what century I was in.

Next, is the second type.  My experience comes from the 145th anniversary of the battle of Gettysburg re-enacment.  It was during Picket’s Charge.  For this one, we were the confederates.  The morning of the charge, they gave us all little slips of paper saying something like “get shot in the leg halfway there,” or “make it to the wall, and get captured,” or “die in the beginning.”  They asked us not to share what ours said with any of our comrades-in-arms.  At the time, I thought that was pointless, but followed their council regardless.  When the charge started, I understood.  As the cannon started firing on us as soon as we stepped off, people started to fall.  I kept looking to my left and my right.  As I looked, I saw some of my best friends fall to the earth with (fake) wounds.  Rex got shot in the face, Russ took some shrapnel to the leg, Jake went down with some lead in his gut, etc..  At that moment, I got the feeling, if and ever so small portion of it, of what it would be like to be in a massed infantry charge that was doomed to fail.  You see your friends mowed down around you, and that means your chances of survival are slim to none, and there’s nothing you can do about it at this point.

Well I hope this all makes sense, and it’s not too long, and that I didn’t ramble too much, also, hope you enjoyed.

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