Battleground comes alive.

Byline: Jim Feehan The Register-Guard

SPRINGFIELD - Abigail and Sierra Oldham's front-row seat to a Civil War re-enactment Sunday was a little too lifelike.

A ground charge - intended to simulate the strike of a cannonball - misfired near the grandstand, sending pebble-sized shrapnel into the crowd at the conclusion of a 45-minute battle re-enactment at the Dorris Ranch Living History Festival in Springfield.

"You have your first battle wounds," Sean Oldham of Creswell told his daughters, Abigail, 8, and Sierra, 10.

No one required medical attention.

The senior Oldham, a history devotee who's visited the Gettysburg battle site in Pennsylvania, said he was impressed with the attention to detail in a war where the sides were identifiable by their colors: blue, gray and green.

Green?

Four soldiers in green represented Company D of the 2nd U.S. Sharpshooters. The company was the brainchild of Hiram Berdan, who realized at the start of the war that infantry tactics were outdated and so set about forming a specialized unit of sharpshooters for the Union forces.

The Sharpshooter uniform was a standard U.S. Army wool. It had a distinctive green color to blend in with trees and foliage, said Derrick Sturgill of Portland, who portrayed one of the sharpshooters Sunday.

"They were a special elite unit that was both feared and respected by the Confederates," said Sturgill, a cardiac care technician in real life. "Union forces thought we were cowards hiding behind bushes. But we were smart enough not to march in straight lines."

Sturgill was among about 120 members of the Northwest Civil War Council who dressed the part of Union and Confederate soldiers to re-create a battle scene that included cavalry units. The council, which researches and re-creates Civil War skirmishes, was not depicting a particular battle in Sunday's demonstration, organizers said.

About 500 people lined one side of the battlefield, sitting on bleacher seats, plastic folding chairs or hay bales. A concessionaire sold bottled water, soft drinks and peanut butter and oatmeal and chocolate chip cookies to eager history buffs.

In the re-enactment, the Confederate forces came up short in the cannon gap - fielding two big guns to the Union's three. The battle began with a cannon blast that reverberated off a nearby hillside, followed by the clickety-clack sound of a horse-drawn cart carrying two Union soldiers to the front line.

Columns of combatants on both sides would then line up single file, drop to a kneeling position and fire.

"Dad, it's just like Stratego," said 7-year-old Jordan Betschart of Eugene, referring to the board game. His parents, Dan and Cheryl Betschart, said they wanted to expose Jordan and his brother, Josh, to a bit of U.S. history.

Ultimately, a unit of Union soldiers circled around a slope and surrounded the Confederate forces. A decidedly partisan crowd cheered as Confederate men slumped to the ground. After the battle, the field was littered with "the dead" from both sides.

From the rear flank, Steve Betschart - no relation to Jordan and family - peered through a pair of binoculars to review the battlefield. A retired high school U.S. history teacher from Dallas, Ore., Betschart served as the Union troops' commanding officer.

In the real Civil War, about 620,000 soldiers died and another 1 million were injured or missing, Betschart said. "It was a tremendous price," he said. "They poured out their blood in buckets."

CAPTION(S):

Members of the Northwest Civil War Council stage a skirmish Sunday between Union and Confederate troops at the Dorris Ranch Living History Festival. A re-enactor takes a break at the encampment, where Native American and Lewis and Clark areas added to the living history festival. Thomas Boyd / The Register-Guard Cannons boom during a Civil War battlefield re-enactment Sunday at the Dorris Ranch Living History Festival.