The Real Fort Stevens - "Get DownYou Fool!"

It is only six miles away from where we live. Fort Stevens is located just off Georgia Avenue in NW DC. Yesterday we visited Fort Ward in Alexandria, Virginia to watch a reenactment of the Battle of Fort Stevens - complete with muskets and cannon fire. Today I wanted to see the real location. There are no actual remains of the Fort, it is reconstructed. But it gives you an idea how close all this action was just outside the Capitol. And it is the only time a sitting president was directly in the line of enemy fire while standing on a parapet. Luckily someone told him to duck. Because it is the 150th anniversary of this particular event and the Civil War in general, there have been a lot of activities centered around the Civil War over the last few years, including a Library of Congress exhibit and many major battlefield reenactments. We have visited most of the battlefields over the years up and down the eastern seaboard starting as a child with my family until now, but at a much slower pace. Since we moved to DC from Wisconsin, we have only driven to Bull Run a couple times, and we visited a high school friend who lives in Gettysburg. I belonged to the Milwaukee Civil War Round Table for many years, went to many dress balls, and thought about finding one here to join but never did. It's funny that when you live away from all if this you want to visit the historic sites.  But when you live in the same place, it doesn't seem as interesting. We made a couple exceptions this weekend, and it was worth the trip. 

The Battle of Fort Stevens Reenactment at Fort Ward in Alexandria

I was a member of the Milwaukee Civil War Round Table for many years. Since we moved to DC we haven't gone to a lot of Civil War sites - we visited most of them long before that. Yesterday I read in the Washington Post that there was going to be a reenactment in Alexandria today. So after lunch we decided to check it out. I can't imagine wearing a wool uniform in the 90 degree heat, but that was the least of the inconvenience of camp life. My interest in the time period was more of a social nature and not the battles - in particular the nursing and the medical care, as well as how people lived. We visited the union encampment but somehow missed the Confederate side! I thought the civilian looking "soldiers" were confederates but they were union townspeople recruited to defend Washington. Mr. Lincoln was with Mary Todd and he gave a pep talk to the troops. The reenactors are oh so serious. I really liked the artist sketching the events for the local paper. By the time the "battle" began the crowd had grown to a reasonable size. We haven't been to one of these since the Wade House reenactment in Wisconsin. That one was quite impressive with cavalry, many more cannon, and many more participants. Nevertheless it was an interesting way to spend the afternoon in spite of the heat. I was going to major in history - this is a great way to experience it.