A re-enactment of the Battle of Tunnel Hill takes place at Tunnel Hill Hill Heritage Center.
SATURDAY-SUNDAY
More than 150 years after the Battle of Tunnel Hill, mounted cavalry will again charge across the grounds of Tunnel Hill near the historic Western & Atlantic railroad tunnel and Clisby Austin House. Cannons will boom and bugles sound as Union and Confederate soldiers again clash in North Georgia.
The Civil War’s Battle of Tunnel Hill is annually re-enacted on the weekend following Labor Day. Ken Sumner, who coordinates re-enactors and sutlers, says there will be as many as 350 re-enactors at the North Georgia site, along with two dozen mounted cavalry and 10 to 12 cannons.
Sumner says the purpose of the re-enactment is strictly educational. It’s to “tell the story of the citizen soldier.”
For example, six to eight sutlers will be set up at the re-enactment. Visitors can see authentic uniforms and muskets, see the type of metal plates and forks that soldiers carried with them. There will also be a blacksmith giving demonstrations.
Re-enactors’ camps will be set up Friday through Sunday, Sept. 8-10. Gates open to the public Saturday and Sunday at 9 a.m. Visitors are welcome to visit the camps, talk to these living historians about their gear and weapons and learn more about camp life.
The battle is re-enacted Saturday and Sunday at 2 p.m. Campsites will close to the public at 1 p.m. so re-enactors may prepare.
Bob Ault, president of the sponsoring Tunnel Hill Historical Foundation, says about 1,000 people will visit each day. On Friday, another 1,000 fourth- and fifth-graders from Whitfield County schools, as well as some homeschoolers, will visit the battle site to supplement what they are learning in their study of the Civil War.
“They go through 10 stations to learn about the area’s history. They’ll see a musket, shown how it’s fired. A cavalry officer will show them his horse and discuss its role in the war. They hear about the history of the Clisby Austin house,” says Ault. “We have a lot of these children come back for the battles and bring their parents.”
Admission to the re-enactment also allows entry to the Tunnel Hill Heritage Center and Museum, the Western & Atlantic railroad tunnel and the Clisby Austin House. All are within walking distance of each other, says Ault.
Built in 1848, the house served as a hospital during the Battle of Chickamauga. Confederate Gen. John Bell Hood recuperated at the house after his leg was amputated, and the leg is buried nearby. The house later served as Gen. William T. Sherman’s headquarters.
Sumner says seven skirmishes occurred in the Tunnel Hill area, so the re-enactment doesn’t portray a specific one, but is an example of troop movement during the war.
“The Confederates will win on Saturday and, on Sunday, the Federals will attack the Confederates and drive them off and plant the U.S. flag to take the day.”