Wearing a bloody apron and playing a surgeon, a lone Civil War re-enactor educated the hundreds who visited Union Mills on Sunday.
Jim Townsend, of Glen Rock, Pa., started re-creating Civil War history as an archer at Union Mills Homestead ? where both Federal and Confederate soldiers camped ? 15 years ago. At that time, “this whole field was filled with [actors], and the next farm over, and everywhere you looked,” he said, sitting underneath his field hospital tent, shaded from the day?s sunshine.
But participation in the Union Mills re-enactment has dwindled over the years due to increased competition with other war heritage sites in Maryland and Gettysburg, Pa.
The event?s actor population was particularly reduced this year due to the rain postponement of the popular Gettysburg Battle re-enactment from the Fourth of July holiday to this weekend, said Jane Sewell, executive director of Union Mills Homestead.
The surge in the number of towns throughout Maryland and Pennsylvania trying to capitalize on Civil War heritage dollars means the same amount of actors are spread around more events, she said. The Westminster area alone boasts three Civil War events.
“There are an awful lot of events now, and a lot of actors find it hard to do weekend after weekend,” Sewell said.
To take advantage of Union Mills? close proximity to Gettysburg without competing directly with it, Sewell said she would like to pick a new date next year for Union Mills? re-encampment, preferably a weekend between April and September that doesn?t fall so close to the area?s other living history events.
Some of Sunday?s visitors said it was Union Mills? more intimate nature that attracted them.
“Gettysburg is too crowded,” said Floyd McCurdy, of Pleasant Valley, who brought his 11-year-old grandson, Patrick, to the Homestead, which also featured an ice cream social Sunday as a fundraiser to preserve the site?s 200-year-old Shriver home and mill.
And still others are attracted to the historically themed events, no matter what size.
Richard Ousley, of Mount Airy, who said his family fought on both sides of the war, brought his wife, Liz, and their son, Chris.
“I feel drawn to things like this,” he said.
