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On this weekend, present reality blends with the realism of a past that is gone but-to all appearances-certainly not forgotten. The time machines are angle-parked around the square while orators declaim on the relative merits of Mr. Lincoln and Gen. George B. McClellan, opposing candidates for the presidency of the Federal Republic. A band of ladies rallies against the evils of demon spirits as a little girl in wide skirt and pantaloons clasps a can of Coke in her hand.
Crowds of spectators-estimated at 1,000 Saturday and well over 2,000 Sunday-line up three and four deep behind rope barricades to witness the make-believe carnage. Just as they did on the morning of Sept. 20, 1864, the Confederate "bushwhackers" rode into town via Main Street from the direction of Rocheport. Back then, a trigger-happy guerrilla alerted the Federal garrison by firing on a blue-uniformed Negro he saw on the street. Now, a black policeman directs traffic at the corner of Church Street and Morrison and playfully motions a black family away from the scene of the forthcoming rebel attack.
Pandemonium breaks loose at the courthouse as guerrillas and Federal troops trade fire. Long-time Fayette residents will show you chinks in the north-side wall left by Confederate bullets. Never mind that the old courthouse burned to the ground and the new one was raised on the old foundations in 1888. Just as their counterparts did 118 years ago, the guerrillas race through town, separate into two groups, then rejoin to attack a row of Federal blockhouses on what is now the Central Methodist College campus. There were only 50 defenders in the original Union garrison, but they were well fortified. There were barely half that number now, and instead of thick railroad ties with narrow slits to fire through, the Federals have merely a snow fence with gaping spaces between the slats to protect them. It is protection enough. The rebels do not stand a chance.
The guerrillas charge, fall back and charge again-firing black powder blank charges. Rifles and pistols boom, horses whinny with fright and great clouds of smoke momentarily obscure the scene. Many guerrillas fall among the trees, and others creep forth to recover the dead and wounded. Two TV crews roam about in search of angles to capture the "bang-bang". Loudspeakers atop a sound truck keep up a running commentary, explaining that three assaults were made in all before the guerrillas retreated in the direction of Glasgow. Depending on which version you prefer, the guerrillas lost either 13 or 18 dead and had 30 or 40 wounded.
The fighting subsides. The federals venture forth cautiously from their stronghold. One turns over a body and exhaults, "It's McCorkle! McCorkle is dead! We'll share the bounty on his dead!"
Two women burst through the crowd. One, in a hooped skirt of gold and mauve tartan plaid, falls sobbing on the corpse. She turns her tear-streaked face toward the soldiers standing above her and screams, "It's my husband! You've killed my husband!" Her companion comforts her as the grinning soldier replies, "He's guerrilla scum, ma'am. Now he's with his father-the devil."
The tableau is a fictitious one, improvised on the spot. But it contains a few grains of fact. Many of the bushwhackers hailed from local families. And the real Col. John McCorkle fought with famed guerrilla leader William Quantrill, one of the raid's leaders. McCorkle settled in Howard County after the war and lived to write his memoirs-including an account of the Fayette assault.
Sponsored by the Missouri Civil War Reenactors Association, Fayette's "living history" weekend drew about 140 reenactors from at least eight different units in Missouri and neighboring states. They pitched their tents, ate their meals, cared for their horses, sang Civil War vintage songs around the campfire and drilled under conditions as close to the real thing as is possible in the 20th century.