Hearthside - The House That Love Built

CIVIL WAR LIVING HISTORY EVENT ON MAY 6TH HIGHLIGHTS NATIONAL PRESERVATION MONTH

The month of May has been proclaimed as National Preservation Month across the country and to help highlight the importance of preserving not only our historic buildings and rural landscapes, but our country’s heritage, the Friends of Hearthside is hosting a Civil War Living History Event on Sunday, May 6th. This ideal family outing offers an opportunity to travel back in time to the early 1860s to experience what life was like during the Civil War, all in the historic, rural setting of the Great Road Historic District and Chase Farm Park. It is part of a weekend-long School of Instruction and Confederate Memorial Day celebration being sponsored by the Liberty Greys, a New England based living history organization dedicated to the preservation of American Civil War history.

Civil War re-enactors are really historians who portray with amazing accuracy the everyday life of both citizens and soldiers during the period of the Civil War. Re-enactors serve to educate people who may not otherwise understand or appreciate the sacrifices that volunteer soldiers endured for this country. The re-enactors impressions are so realistic because they carefully study every detail of what life was like during the 19th century. The School of Instruction offers them an opportunity to enhance their knowledge and skills to become even better at their hobby.

Over 100 re-enactors are expected to set up camp at Chase Farm Park during the weekend of May 5-6th for their School of Instruction. A series of classes will be held throughout the day on Saturday which are designed to hone the re-enactors skills as both soldiers and civilians. They will be instructed in such areas as artillery and cavalry safety, military drills, first person impression, and 19th century life lessons. These classes are strictly for the re-enactors and will not be open to the public.

On Sunday, May 6th, the public is invited to share in this trip back to Civil War times. The Civil War Living History Day will take place at Chase Farm Park and at the historic Hearthside Homestead. The day starts with a company drill from 8:00 a.m. – 9:00 a.m. on the grounds of Chase Farm Park, followed by a Dress Parade at 10:00 a.m., during which the soldiers move into formation and are inspected by the General. This will immediately lead into a moving ceremony that ties the past to the present. To commemorate the history of Confederate Memorial Day, the re-enactors will perform a remembrance service to those they have lost in the past year, as well as the Civil War soldiers and current soldiers who are fighting for our freedoms. A widow in mourning,  Heather Wasielewski, will lay a lavender wreath, to represent civilians, widows who lost their husbands, brothers, uncles and cousins during the war, while Tim Perkins, adjutant and a veteran, will lay another lavender wreath to represent soldiers that fell and also those who have fallen in subsequent wars.

The public is invited throughout the day to stroll among the military and civilian campsites and talk with the re-enactors to learn about all aspects of the Civil War, and life on and off the battlefields. Visitors are strongly encouraged to interact with the re-enactors and ask questions so that they can get a feel for what it must have been like to have lived during that period of time. A company drill will take place in the afternoon, and there will be mounted cavalry on site. A payroll scenario will take place as well.

Also being featured are sutlers, or traveling peddlers, who during the 1800s sold provisions to military posts. The sutlers will be selling wooden items, tables, chairs, writing desks, fabrics, period toiletries, clothing, uniforms and accessories. A Civil War Re-enactment experience is made even more realistic by the impressive array of hoop dresses and period clothing worn by the re-enactors, providing yet another aspect of life during those times.

Hearthside, located next to Chase Farm Park, will offer tours of the 10-room mansion while re-enactors provide demonstrations and various displays of 19th century artifacts such as period photographs, haircombs, clothing and period toys, while providing history behind the artifacts.

The day’s activities conclude at 3:00 p.m. Admission is free, but donations are strongly encouraged.

A special guest at this Living History Event will be a portrayal of Confederate General Robert E. Lee, Commander of the Army of Northern Virginia by Kent Sinram, who has been studying the history of the 1860s since 1990 and has been re-enacting for the past 17 years. Joining General Lee will be Lt. Col. Walter H. Taylor, Jr., portrayed by Tom Bailey. A retiree from 30 years of service in public schools, Bailey decided to bring to the public the voices, experiences and history of southern men who can no longer speak for themselves. He chose to speak through Lt. Col. Walter Taylor, who served General Robert E. Lee as his chief of staff during the War Between the States.

The Liberty Greys will be back in town later this year, along with the New England Brigade, and 32nd Mass Field Hospital on September 15-16th with a full-scale Civil War Re-enactment, complete with battles at Chase Farm Park and a field hospital at Hearthside.

For more information on the Civil War events, visit www.cwevents.org or the Liberty Greys website at www.libertygreys.org.

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