Historic Interpretation
Fort Delaware State Park is a center of historic Civil War interpretation. Award winning reenactors provide a glimpse into the past of Pea Patch Island. Visitors to the park may have the chance to watch a blacksmith at work, take part in the firing of a gunpowder charge of an 8-inch (20 cm) Columbiad gun or assist a laundress at work.
A group of reenactors pays special attention to Captain George Ahl and his band of former confederate soldiers who formed the 1st Delaware Heavy Artillery. Captain Ahl obtained permission from the War Department to form a battery of Confederate prisoners who could prove they had been conscripted into the Confederate Army. Upon taking an oath of allegiance they were permitted to join the Federal Army. Volunteers have recreated Ahl's Battery at Fort Delaware State Park. They have assumed the identities of members of the battery. The reenactors give demonstrations of what life was like for the members of the 1st Delaware Heavy Artillery.
The Fort Delaware State Park Gift Shop in Delaware City is the only Civil War gift shop in Delaware, and has a wide variety of books and souvenirs are available. The Fort Delaware Society is a non-profit group dedicated to the preservation and historical interpretation of Fort Delaware.
Read more about this topic: Fort Delaware State Park
Famous quotes containing the word historic:
“Never is a historic deed already completed when it is done but always only when it is handed down to posterity. What we call “history” by no means represents the sum total of all significant deeds.... World history ... only comprises that tiny lighted sector which chanced to be placed in the spotlight by poetic or scholarly depictions.”
—Stefan Zweig (18811942)