PRAIRIE GROVE -- Reenactors portraying Company B of the 34th Arkansas Infantry with the Confederate Army were reminded Saturday that they were representing soldiers who lived in the area trying to protect their homes during the Battle of Prairie Grove.
Rusty Guenard, with the Arkansas Confederate Guards in the Arkansas Battalion, served as commander for Company B and he gave his men instructions as they drilled prior to the actual reenactment.
Guenard, who was portraying Earl Fontaine of Cane Hill, said the men in Company B would have been from Washington County, including Cane Hill, Fayetteville and Prairie Grove area.
"It's really special to actually be on this ground," Guenard said, noting his unit would be stationed in the area where Company B was fighting on Dec. 7, 1862.
"I get a little emotional about it, actually," said Guenard, who has been reenacting for 22 years. "It's a horrible, horrible, terrible struggle that happened here. We have fun with our hobby but I want my men to remember what really happened here and who they are representing. The lives that were lost here a lot of times get lumped into large numbers of people. But each one of those represents loved ones who had aspirations, had things they loved, favorite foods. They had various reasons for why they were fighting but it all happened here."
For these men, Guenard said the fighting was personal, not political.
"Right now the Federal Army is between me and my home and all that matters to me is defeating them," Guenard said. "And that's probably all that would have mattered to these men."
Blue skies and crisp temperatures welcomed spectators and reenactors who were commemorating the 160th anniversary of the Battle of Prairie Grove on Saturday. The event continued Sunday with cloudy skies and cool temperatures.
Multiple white tents filled the park from one side to the other.
Park officials said close to 1,000 reenactors from five to six states registered for the first reenactment in four years. The park hosts a reenactment every two years and the last one was in 2018. The park canceled the 2020 enactment because of the covid-19 pandemic.
Thousands of spectators showed up over the weekend to visit with reenactors, watch them drill, view Confederate, Union and civilian camps and then watch the actual reenactments take place in the valley below the Borden House, up the hill and into the apple orchard behind the house.
Rick Love, pastor of Mount Zion Baptist Church in Searcy County, served as a fighting chaplain with the 3rd Arkansas out of southeast Arkansas. In addition to fighting in the reenactment, Love held a church service Sunday morning for the reenactors and the public.
Chaplains played an important role in the Civil War, Love said.
"War started out with these young guys, 18 and 19 years old, joining a company of 80 to 100 men, and they would know almost everyone because it was their nephews, brothers and neighbors."
The young men thought they were going to war to be a hero, he said.
"The first battle, the reality of war set in, and then people realized that death is reality. I think that opened up the door for chaplains," Love said.
As the course of the war progressed, interest in chaplains, what they had to say and interest in Bible tracts grew.
Love said revival broke out on both sides of the war and estimates are that 150,000 Confederates came to faith during the war.
"The chaplains' faith was a simple faith but a strong faith," Love added.
Bill Schwartz, who lives north of Pea Ridge, was serving with the teamsters to bring in supplies for the Confederate Army.
After seeing that many of the reenactments did not have wagons, Schwartz started building wagons about eight years ago. He also builds Army bread boxes, ammunition boxes and baskets that are about 90-95% accurate.
For the first time, the Battle of Prairie Grove reenactment had these wagons parked at the headquarters for the Confederate Army. Schwartz brought in the wagons on 22-foot trailers.
"We need wagons. There were lots of wagons (in the war)," Schwartz said.
He's taken his wagons mostly to the Battle of Pea Ridge reenactment and also to the Shiloh Battlefield.
On the other side of Prairie Grove Battlefield State Park, next to the Latta Barn, Roger Hanson with the Federal Army was preparing beans and beef stew to feed 116 men Saturday night.
"This is the meal they had before the battle," Hansen said. "Everything we give them is based on what they had."
Hansen, who has been in reenactments for more than 40 years, said he used to fight in the battles but changed roles as he got older.
He said about half of the cooking gear hanging over his fire is original to the Civil War and about 150 years old. About eight people were helping Hansen with the commissary for the 19th Iowa.
This was Hansen's second time to participate in the Battle of Prairie Grove reenactment. He traveled to Northwest Arkansas from north Georgia.
"It's interesting," Hansen said about the Prairie Grove reenactment. "It's good that the state does something like this and keeps some of the history. People come through and are talking to us. It's an educational event. That's how we look at it."
One of the youngest reenactors Saturday probably was Jackson Richmond, 14, of Texas. Jackson said he became interested in reenactments after he saw a living history event at the Shiloh Battlefield.
"I've always wanted to do it but that jumpstarted it."
Jackson said he was excited to be able to go on the field and be on the grounds where the battle was actually fought.
Jackson's father said he drove about eight hours to Prairie Grove so his son could participate in the battle reenactment.
The Battle of Prairie Grove was fought on Dec. 7, 1862, with the Confederate Army of the Trans-Mississippi clashing with the Union Army of the Frontier.
The battle is described by historians as one of the bloodiest and most intense Civil War battles. About 22,000 soldiers fought for most of the day and, at the end, about 2,700 had been killed, wounded or were missing.
A timeline of the battle shows the first skirmish was at 7 a.m. that day when the Confederate cavalry surprised the Federal cavalry near Muddy Fork. The battle was over at 5:15 p.m. when fighting died out due to darkness.
A truce was called at 10 p.m. in order to care for the wounded and at midnight, the Confederate Army began withdrawing from the field.