Tennessee National Park Offers Special Tour Where Visitors Can Meet Figures From Civil War History

Visitors at Shiloh National Military Park in Tennessee can take a bus across the battlefield this month and stop along the way to meet five people from Civil War history. The park is bringing back its “Meet the Past” living history tour on October 17.

According to the National Park Service, living historians will tell the stories of people who experienced the Battle of Shiloh using letters, diaries and other historical records.

The tour is free, but reservations are required. Buses will leave the Shiloh Battlefield Visitor Center at 2, 2:30, 3:50 and 4:20 p.m., and each tour lasts about one hour and 45 minutes.

This is only the second time the park has offered the event. The first one in 2024 was almost completely booked, according to NPS.

Visitors will meet five people from Shiloh history

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The five people are Sam Houston Jr., Belle Reynolds, Leander Stillwell, Ann Dickey Wallace and Cyrus Boyd.

Houston was a Texas soldier who was wounded during the battle. Reynolds was a Union nurse who cared for wounded soldiers at Pittsburg Landing.

The Library of Congress has more of Reynolds’ story. She was with the 17th Illinois Infantry and spent the battle tending wounded men aboard the steamer Emerald and in field hospitals.

Ann Dickey Wallace was the wife of Union General W.H.L. Wallace. NPS says she was waiting aboard a boat at Pittsburg Landing during the fighting while her husband was on the battlefield, where he was mortally wounded.

Stillwell served with the 61st Illinois Infantry and later wrote about his Civil War service. His 1917 memoir is now available through the Library of Congress.

The tour was originally planned for September

The October event was supposed to happen on September 12. NPS postponed it because of forecast high temperatures and moved it to October 17.

Visitors will travel by bus to different locations around the battlefield, where each living historian will share the story of the person they are portraying.

More than 23,000 soldiers became casualties at Shiloh

The Battle of Shiloh took place April 6 and 7, 1862, around Shiloh Church and Pittsburg Landing (near southwestern Tennessee).

Nearly 110,000 Union and Confederate troops fought there. NPS says 23,746 became casualties during the two-day battle.

Anyone who wants a seat on the October 17 tour needs to call the park at 731-689-5696 to make a reservation.