IUKA, Miss. (WTVA)-Re-enactor Barry Ayers says preparing for a battle takes a year to get things all together, but now that the first re-enactment of The Battle of Iuka in 25 years is just days away all the details are falling into place.
"We carry both color uniforms, but we will be Federal this weekend because we are the host unit," says Ayers.
Ayers has traveled the country going to re-enact various Battles of the Civil War, and says after so many battle he now gets his enjoyment from watching younger people, or those new to the world of re-enactment getting the feeling he says most re-enactors feel is very close to what Civil War Soliders felt.
"We are play-acting, but if you stand in one of our battle lines shooting blanks at the enemy," says Ayers. "You can get close to the feeling that those guys had to stand their ground and fight."
The re-enactors are portraying history, but Ayers says it's more than what is written in books, they want to give spectators a personal side of the Civil War.
"In modern military today a unit may have men from all 50 states in that unit," says Ayers. "A Civil War unit would have been local men. It would have been uncle, father, brothers, cousins, or neighbors. You all grouped together and went. So, you were friends and families out there killing each other."
