33RD ALABAMA INFANTRY
The 33rd Alabama Volunteer Infantry Regiment is an organization of "living historians", who create authentic impressions of soldiers of the War between the States. Our organization professes no political or social ideals other than those expressed in the United States Constitution. We are a non-profit organization that exists for the enjoyment of our members, the education of the public, and the preservation of our heritage.
Joining our ranks will enable you to feel the excitement of the charge; smell the smoke of battle; enjoy the camarade-rie of camp life; drill in the same maneuvers; march in the same formations used by our ancestors. In other words, actually do the things you've only read about before.
You will meet people from all walks of life and every part of the country who share common interests in history. You will discover a sense of pride when you walk over an original battlefield in the uniform of a soldier who fought and even died there; when you fire a salute over the grave of a veteran or at the site of a monument; when you see the expression on the face of a youngster you have educated by your knowledge and historical impression.
"Who knows but it may be given to us, after this life, to meet again in the old quarters, to play chess and draughts, to get up soon to answer the morning roll call, to fall in at the tap of the drum for drill and dress parade, and again to hastily don our war gear while the monotonous patterns of the long roll summons to battle? Who knows but again the old flags, ragged and torn, snapping in the wind, may face each other and flutter, pursuing and pursued, while the cries of victory fill a summer day? And after the battle, the wounded and slain will arise and all will meet together under the two flags, all sound and well and there will be talking and laughter; and cheers, and all will say, "Did it not seem real? Was it not as in the old days?”
Pvt. Berry Benson, 1st South Carolina Rifles Regiment; Berry Benson’s Reminiscences of the Civil War, S.W. Benson, editor, 1962.