At his day job, Bloom is a typical federal employee, managing a Social Security office that serves Carroll County. But on certain days of historic significance in America, Bloom dons 1860s military garb and joins about 30 other “members” of the 3rd Maryland Regiment and re-enacts events from the Civil War.
Why did you start re-enacting?
My great-grandfather, John Bloom, who lived just across the Mason Dixon Line, went to Williamsport, Md., to join the Union Army in September of 1861. That piqued my interest in genealogy and then eventually got me started in re-enacting.
What kind of re-enacting do you typically do?
The events that we do on the battlefield sites themselves are more living history, the difference being interaction and human demonstration, but not running around shooting at folks. Essentially for us for the weekend, what we like to do is immerse ourselves in the past and try to live in a way that was roughly comparable to the life of the Union infantry soldier.
What’s it like interacting with spectators?
We are going to try to be fairly true [to] what life was like in order that when we start talking to the public, we can explain things from a first person account, and we can say ‘yeah, here’s what it feels like.’ We’re never so foolish as to think we know what it’s like to have been a soldier during the war, but at least we can relate to some of the experiences they had because we’re trying to do the same sort of thing.
What kind of men are in your regiment?
Fellas many times have different specialties, things they’re very interested in. Some of us get into it like I did, with genealogy, and others like military history, so it pulls a lot of different people into the hobby.
— Ben Giles
