 Save 1,573 Acres at 8 Battlefields
As 2013 comes to a close, the Civil War Trust continues our campaign to save 1,573 acres at eight battlefields in three different states: Missouri, North Carolina, and Virginia. These are battles in the east and west, in every year of the war, fought by men under the command of Lee, Sherman, Early, Longstreet, Hancock... the list goes on.
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From Our President 
January 2014
Dear Civil War Preservationist,
Here's to a new year! Thanks to the generous contributions and unwavering support and dedication of each and every one of you, 2013 was a remarkable year for our organization, along with the battlefield preservation movement in general. As our country commemorated the sesquicentennials of some of the Civil War's most significant battles, including Gettysburg and Chickamauga, the Trust worked to save several sites on these unforgettable battlefields. Thanks to your help, in 2013 we preserved 2,738 acres at 30 individual battlefields in 10 states! That's a combined total of more than 36,500 acres of battlefield land we've saved in a quarter of a century. Now that's progress.
But, as always, our work isn't complete. We still have seemingly countless acres of land to protect at battlefields across the country, including our campaign to save 1,573 acres at eight battlefields in three different states. It's very rare that we have a chance to save so much important land in so many different places, all in one fell swoop, and I can take every $1.00 you send today and turn it into $30.53! That is powerful! And so are these battlefields, including Bentonville, Second Manassas, Cool Spring and Kelly's Ford the final fight for the "Gallant" John Pelham.
Friends, let me reassure you we're on the right track, but with your help, we can count these acres among the more than 36,500 already saved as a testament to those who fought and fell there. Help Save 8 Battlefields! »
- Jim Lighthizer, Civil War Trust President
Saving the Gateway to Harpers Ferry The Civil War Trust and the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) announced a successful public-private partnership to preserve the western gateway of Harpers Ferry National Historical Park. The crucial four acres preserved played a pivotal role in in the September 1862 siege of Harpers Ferry. Give With Confidence to the Trust As the year comes to a close, give with confidence to the Civil War Trust. Two of the nation's leading charity evaluators and watchdogs, Charity Navigator and GreatNonprofits, recently commended the Trust for its sound fiscal management and commitment to top-notch donor relations. Lee and Grant In4 Videos Have eight minutes to spare? Learn more about two of the most recognizable figures of the Civil War: General Ulysses S. Grant and Confederate General Robert E. Lee. The two newest installments of the Trust's Civil War In4 video series feature descriptions of the lives and accomplishments of these Civil War icons. Visit the Civil War Discovery Trail Visit the online home for Civil War exploration and adventure, the Civil War Discovery Trail. Learn about more than 600 historic sites associated with the Civil War on this recently updated and optimized website. The website now includes an interactive map, stunning photographs and much more. Give a History Tribute Would you like to make a gift in memory of someone who loved the Civil War? Or do you have someone special in your life who enjoys history whom you would like to honor? You can now make a donation to the Civil War Trust in memory or in honor of someone special. Your gift goes towards saving hallowed ground and promoting Civil War education. January Civil War Battles Expand your knowledge of the Civil War by learning more about some of the great Civil War battles that occurred in the month of January. Access our history articles, photos, maps, and links for the battles listed below: Dispatches from the Front Lines
Civil War preservation news from around the country
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Tuesday, January 7, 2014
Preservation News - January 2014
Monday, January 6, 2014
Reconstruction's Poisoned Air
From: bernhard1848@att.net
The immense racial discord and animosity sown by the Republican party's Union League was incalculable and much of its sad residue remains with us today. With their military victory over Americans in the South complete, and to rule the desolated South politically, Republicans used the black race to deliver their votes to unscrupulous Northern men and scalawags who plundered what was left and impoverish future generations.
Bernhard Thuersam, Chairman
North Carolina War Between the States Sesquicentennial Commission
"Unsurpassed Valor, Courage and Devotion to Liberty"
www.ncwbts150.com
"The Official Website of the North Carolina WBTS Sesquicentennial"
Reconstruction's Poisoned Air
"The freeing of the slaves left a strong impression upon Clarence [Dixon], Tom's older brother, who said many years later: "It was a pathetic occasion when father told the slaves they were free. But the most pathetic part was nearly a year afterwards when they sent a committee to beg father to take them back on the plantation on the old terms, and look after them as he had done before."
Of course, the poverty-stricken Mr. [Thomas] Dixon [Sr.] could not see means of supporting his own family, to say nothing of the numerous Negro families now asking aid. In the fall of 1865, the Dixons, now stripped of all their possessions, not knowing how or where to find the necessaries of life from day to day, and faced with the prospect of no harvest because of a lack of laborers to till the soil, gave up the farm and moved to an old-fashioned white house facing the public square in Shelby [North Carolina].
Then came the terrors of Reconstruction. The young Thomas Dixon was never to forget the impressions he received during this chaotic period, for he was to say over three-quarters of a century later: "The dawn of my conscious life begins in this strange world of poisoned air. My first memories still vibrate with its tense excitement."
When Lincoln was assassinated, the most powerful political figure among the Northern leaders was Thaddeus Stevens . . . [and his] determination to subjugate the South became almost an obsession. The two main instruments by which Stevens hoped to bring about the subjugation were the "Union League" and the "Freedmen's Bureau." Stevens planned to confiscate the farms of the South and give them to the Negroes. By offering food, clothing, and free land, the agents hoped to induce the poverty-stricken Negro to cease working for the white man.
In the fall of 1866 throughout the next year, many men from the Union League of Philadelphia and New York filtered through the Negro population, sowing discontent. [In] an effort to consolidate their [Republican] party, they were seeking the Negro vote in the South. The agents of the Leagues wandered about the plantations, seeking the Negro in field and cabin, promising him preposterous wealth and privilege if he would turn against his white neighbor and vote himself free of the [Southern] white man's restraint.
Unscrupulous agents took advantage of the ignorant, illiterate Negro populace, often inciting it to acts of treachery and violence. The enmity, fear and distrust thus aroused between the white and Negro populations resulted in a reign of terror that is still remembered as one of the darkest periods in American history.
The corruption of the Reconstruction period can scarcely be exaggerated. [Thomas] Dixon said in his old age, "We are too close to realize the tragedy. The scholar and historian must have the perspective of a hundred years in which to tell this story to make it credible." Unscrupulous political leaders, interested only in the wealth they could obtain from the disrupted government of the south, aroused antagonisms that never died among those who experienced the terrible years after the Civil War."
(Fire from the Flint, The Amazing Careers of Thomas Dixon, Raymond Allen Cook, John F. Blair, Publisher, 1968, pp. 9-13)
Sunday, January 5, 2014
Va Flaggers: Sharpsburg Memorial Illumination
From: info@vaflaggers.com
On Saturday, December 7th, several Va Flaggers traveled to Sharpsburg, MD for the 25th Annual Sharpsburg Memorial Illumination.
Every year, hundreds gather to honor each of the 23,110 soldiers killed, wounded, or captured during the Battle of Sharpsburg. A candle is set and lit for each one. As the sun sets, the sight is one that is hard to describe...and offers a glimpse of the magnitude of the sacrifice of the men who fought there.
It was our second year attending, and as was the case last year, we were invited by a local Boy Scout Troop to assist the hundreds of volunteers who set up and light the 23,110 candles, and wanted to ensure a Confederate representation during the event.
With the temperature hovering around 30 degrees and a stiff wind, lighting the candles was a challenge, to be sure.
We took stick CBF flags to pass out and as soon as we passed out the first one, we were bombarded by requests and quickly gave out the first 2 dozen that we had with us.
When it came time for the ceremony, which is attended by the volunteers just before dusk, we went back to our vehicle and got our full sized flags to carry, and another 3 dozen stick flags. As we approached the gathering, several people stopped to greet us and thank us for forwarding the colors. One man came up to us and shook our hand as we arrived and said "thank goodness SOMEONE brought the OTHER American flag". It turns out the gentleman was a member of the SCV. He and his wife had traveled from Oklahoma to attend the event and he stood with us, holding two stick flags for the duration of the ceremony.
We passed out the rest of the stick flags... and seeing all of those Battle Flags waving in the crowd, a large number of whom were young Boy Scout volunteers, was a beautiful sight to behold!
We were pleased to learn that the featured speaker was none other than Jeff Shaara, the author of Gods and Generals! One of the volunteer speakers recognized our flags in his remarks, as a representation of the 10,316 Confederate casualties.
After the ceremony, we posed for a few photos and made our way back to our vehicle, to make the tour of the candlelit battle field. One cannot help but be moved to tears at the sight...and the thought of the life that each candle represented...and the honor and sacrifice that we must NEVER forget.
Many thanks to the folks who work so hard to make this event possible. Without exception, everyone, including NPS employees, welcomed us, and our flags warmly and there seemed to be a respectful understanding of the fact that Confederate soldiers deserve and should be afforded the same honor and reverence shown to their Union counterparts.
LEST WE FORGET!
Susan Hathaway
Va Flaggers
Va Flaggers
Va Flaggers Upcoming Events:
Friday, January 17th - Saturday, January 18th, 2014: Lee-Jackson State Holiday/Flagging/Memorial Events, Lexington, Va. The Va Flaggers will be flagging Lexington all day Friday, for the Lee-Jackson State Holiday, and participating in the Memorial Services and parade on Saturday, with more flagging Saturday afternoon. We invite all to join us! More details soon. Info from the Stonewall Brigade here: http://leejacksonday.webs.com/
Saturday, February 1st, 2014: Susan will travel to Statesboro, GA to speak at the Lee-Jackson Banquet, held by the Ogeechee Rifles, Camp #941, SCV. RJ's Restaurant, 454 South Main St. (US 301 S.) @ 6 pm for the meal, preliminaries @ 7 pm and the program immediately following. Seating limited to 125. Ticket information forthcoming at a later date.
Saturday, February 22nd, 2014: Susan will be speaking at the February meeting of the Rev. Beverly Tucker Lacy Camp #2141, SCV, Fredericksburg, VA. 4:00 p.m., Perkins Restaurant, 10 Simpson Rd.
Tuesday, March 4th, 2014: Susan will be speaking at the March meeting of the R.E Lee Camp #1589, SCV. Dolce Vita Italian Restaurant, 2401 Colony Crossing Place, Midlothian, VA 23112. Dinner at 6:00 p.m. and meeting at 7:00 p.m.
Thursday, March 20th, 2014: Susan will be traveling to Columbia, SC to speak at the March meeting of the Lt. Gen. Wade Hampton Camp #273, SCV, Columbia SC. Seawell's Banquet Hall, 1125 Rosewood DR. Dinner at 6:00, Meeting at 7:00.
April 19, 2014, 2014: Susan will be traveling to Quincy, FL to speak at the Confederate Memorial Day Service at the Soldier's Cemetery, sponsored by the Finley's Brigade, SCV.
Saturday, April 26th, 2014: Susan will be speaking at the Delaware Confederate Memorial Ceremony, Marvel Carriage Museum, 510 South Bedford Street, Georgetown, Delaware, Time: 11AM - 2PM
Contributions to the I-95 Memorial Battle Flag projects may be mailed to:
Va Flaggers
P.O. Box 547
Sandston VA 23150
P.O. Box 547
Sandston VA 23150
Payable to Va Flaggers
or through PayPal:
http://www.vaflaggers.com/i95flagdonate.html
http://www.vaflaggers.com/i95flagdonate.html
Saturday, January 4, 2014
Confederate Flag-Reasons to Fly It by James W. King
From: jkingantiquearms@bellsouth.net
There are numerous reasons to fly the Confederate flag based on the fact that the flag represents the principles this nation was founded upon: Constitutional limited federal government, states' rights, Christian values and principles, and resistance to government tyranny. The Confederate flag is 180 degrees diametrically opposed to secular humanism and Socialism. It serves as a guardian and keystone to remind Americans of the principles this nation was founded upon, which the Confederate soldier was fighting to preserve and protect. It should be flown to remind Americans on a daily basis that America was founded as a Constitutional Federal Republic composed of Sovereign States and a Limited Federal Government. This is extremely important as America experiments with secular humanism (the belief that there is no God and that man, science, and government can solve all problems) and Socialism and moves ever closer toward eventual participation in a one world government. In this respect the Confederate flag is the guardian of the U.S. flag and the principles it originally represented at the time of the adoption of the U.S. Betsy Ross flag. Lincoln's Gettysburg Address was no more than poetry from the lips of a lawyer and it was a lie. It was the Confederate soldier who was fighting for "government of, for, and by the people". As former Confederate president Jefferson Davis said years after the war "I am tired of hearing Southerners apologize for fighting for our inheritance".
It also represents the valor and bravery of our ancestors in the face of overwhelming numbers and resources. And finally it represents Southern pride in our section of America. The War For Southern Independence of 1861-1865 (Civil War) was a noble effort to form a new nation free of Northern tyranny, despotism, and dictatorship. Slavery was already a dying institution prior to the war and most Southerners were in favor of gradual emancipation. On March 2, 1861 the North offered the Southern states the Corwin Amendment to the U.S. Constitution if they would rejoin the Union. This amendment would have made slavery permanently legal in America. Therefore if slavery was all the South wanted they could have kept it without firing a shot or having a war. The goal was Independence.
James King
Camp Commander
Sons of Confederate Veterans organization
Albany, Georgia
Friday, January 3, 2014
Bernard Baruch, Solid South Democrat
From: bernhard1848@att.net
Bernard M. Baruch was born in Camden, South Carolina on 19 August 1870, and grew up shooting muzzle loaders and picking cotton. His father Simon was born in East Prussia in 1840 and came to Camden in 1855 '€“ later to attend South Carolina Medical College at Charleston and the Medical College of Virginia. Surgeon Baruch served in the Third South Carolina Battalion from Second Manassas through Gettysburg, and the Thirteenth Mississippi in July 1864 through the end of the war. In the postwar Dr. Baruch was known to emit loud rebel yells when '€œDixie'€ was played or if a theatrical performance he was attending was deserving of such.
Bernhard Thuersam, Chairman
North Carolina War Between the States Sesquicentennial Commission
"Unsurpassed Valor, Courage and Devotion to Liberty"
www.ncwbts150.com
"The Official Website of the North Carolina WBTS Sesquicentennial"
Bernard Baruch, Solid South Democrat
'€œ[Bernard] Baruch was not a Democrat on specific issues. On the contrary, he had made a fortune at least once because the Republican view on the tariff had prevailed. [But] He was a Democrat and would contribute generously to a Democratic Party campaign regardless of what he thought the issues or, for that matter, about the candidates. And he would vote the Democratic ticket '€“ straight.
The party regularity dated back to his childhood. He had been raised on Confederate war stories and his whole family was devoted to the Confederate cause. Years after the Baruch [family] had moved to New York [his father] Dr. Baruch embarrassed [mother Miss Belle] frightfully by giving the rebel yell in the crowded Metropolitan Opera House.
But it was not the war or even his mother'€™s story of how her home had been burnt by Sherman'€™s men so much as it was Reconstruction that turned Baruch and thousands of other Southerners into such fervid partisan Democrats that the '€œsolid South'€ has been at once a conundrum and problem to most residents of other parts of the country since. {Reconstruction] . . . with all its terrible connotations, bred hatred for the Republican party.
The terrors of Reconstruction lasted from shortly after the close of the war until 1877, when Baruch was seven years old. In that year Federal troops were withdrawn from the South. Then came the struggle to turn the rascals out, now that they were no longer protected by Federal bayonets '€“ followed by the long uphill battle to work order out of the chaos they had left. Not much of this progress was made by the time the Baruch family moved to New York [in 1881].
In those first eleven years of his life Baruch heard constantly of Republican misrule of his town and county and State, misrule seemingly directed and certainly protected by soldiers sent by a Republican administration in Washington. The stories told of how the Republican carpetbaggers looted the State and local treasuries, of how they prevented Confederate veterans from voting, while the Negroes, directed by Republicans from the North and local scalawags who had turned Republican for the easy graft involved, elected officials whose only thought was to line their pockets.
Money was extorted from the helpless local whites, and more was obtained by the sale of bonds, some of which were later repudiated, to innocent investors, not only in the north, but abroad! All this left the South not only in unspeakable poverty and want, but under a mountain of debt [and impairing the future credit worthiness of the South]. This last phase was impressed on Baruch in his financial dealings on Wall Street.
March 4, 1913, was a great day for the Democrats. The troops marched into Washington from far and near, but particularly from the South, for the inauguration of their second president since '€œthe War.'€ Baruch trooped with them. Bands in the inauguration parade played '€œDixie'€ and '€œBonnie Blue Flag'€ and '€œMy Maryland.'€ Southerners cheered the West Point cadets not only because they marched so true, but because they wore the Confederate gray.'€
(Bernard Baruch, Park Bench Statesman, Carter Field, McGraw Hill, 1944, excerpts, pp. 89-98)
Thursday, January 2, 2014
New England Federalists and their Secession Doctrine
From: bernhard1848@att.net
An irony in American history has the doctrine of secession originating in the South when it was first advanced by New England over the issue of Louisiana'€™s admission to Statehood. Jefferson and Madison, both Southerners, opposed secession; New England Federalists demanded it.
Bernhard Thuersam, Chairman
North Carolina War Between the States Sesquicentennial Commission
"Unsurpassed Valor, Courage and Devotion to Liberty"
www.ncwbts150.com
"The Official Website of the North Carolina WBTS Sesquicentennial"
New England Federalists and their Secession Doctrine
'€œThe final political phenomenon to arise out of the North-South competition of the 1790s was the doctrine of Secession. It represented the death rattle of the Federalist party. The pivotal year was 1800 when the Democratic leaders Jefferson and Burr succeeded in putting together a coalition of the have-nots of the country '€“ the agriculturalists of the South and the proletarians of the Northern cities. They won control of the nation.
The Federalist party survived another sixteen years, although it never again won control of the House, Senate or presidency. It did not take defeat well.
Barely three years after the Democratic rout, Northern Federalists began arguing for the secession of the New England States from the Union. There was nothing understated about their secessionist position. It was widespread, and if it could not be done peaceably, they said, it should be done violently.
Listen to one of the many secessionists, Josiah Quincy III, scion of the New England Quincy'€™s, future mayor of Boston and future president of Harvard University. In 1811 he was a thirty-eight-year-old congressman standing opposed to the admission of Louisiana as a State:
'€œIt is my deliberate opinion,'€ he said, '€œthat if this bill passes, the bonds of this union are virtually dissolved, that the States which compose it are free from their moral obligations, and that as it will be the right of all, so it will be the duty of some to prepare, definitely, for a separation; amicably if they can; violently if they must.'€
One man who listened carefully that year was a freshman congressman from South Carolina. He was John C. Calhoun, who had been taught the secessionist doctrine in the law schools of New England, who had listened to it in the Congress, and who would one day carry it back down South . . . . Meanwhile, it is an unfair stroke that history has identified the South with secession when in fact the earliest and clearest arguments against it were proposed by Jefferson and Madison.
The creators of secession doctrine, and the teachers of it from 1800 to 1817, were New England Federalists.'€
(The Natural Superiority of Southern Politicians, A Revisionist History, David Leon Chandler, Doubleday & Company, 1977, pp. 114-116)
Wednesday, January 1, 2014
Exterminate the White People of the South
Raised in poverty in Reconstruction North Carolina, Thomas Dixon became a State legislator before he was old enough to vote, practiced law, was a noted minister, and author of "The Clansman" at age thirty-eight. He was determined to one day write the story of Reconstruction to allow the victims side be heard. The Parson Brownlow quoted below did not advance any practical or peaceful proposals to end slavery in the South, if that was his intent and had he wanted to save lives.
Bernhard Thuersam, Chairman
North Carolina War Between the States Sesquicentennial Commission
"Unsurpassed Valor, Courage and Devotion to Liberty"
www.ncwbts150.com
"The Official Website of the North Carolina WBTS Sesquicentennial"
Exterminate the White People of the South
"[Many] corrupt [Northern] leaders sought means to give vent to hatreds that had been aroused by the war. William G. Brownlow, better known as "Parson Brownlow," a preacher who became Governor of Tennessee during the Reconstruction era, had declared in a speech to a convention in New York in 1862:
"If I had the power, I would arm every wolf, panther, catamount and bear in the mountains of America, every crocodile in the swamps of Florida, every Negro in the South, every fiend in hell, clothe them all in the uniforms of the Federal army and turn them loose on the rebels of the South and exterminate every man, woman and child south of the Mason Dixon line. I would like to see especially the Negro troops, marching under Ben Butler, crowd the last rebel into the Gulf of Mexico and drown them as the Devil did the hogs in the Sea of Galilee."
Such fanaticism from influential leaders was not conducive to soothing the wounds of the war. In Dixon's native State of North Carolina, as a result of proceedings brought by Dixon's uncle, Colonel [Lee Roy] McAfee, William W. Holden became the first governor to be impeached in an American commonwealth when his corrupt practices could no longer be borne by the people.
Many sane, responsible men, such as Dixon's father and Colonel McAfee, took part in the Ku Klux Klan in an effort to bring some sort of order out of the tragedy of Reconstruction. These men did not tolerate injustice, and when they saw that the Klan had served its purpose, they immediately wanted to disband it.
In later years, Dixon wondered how any person could have lived through Reconstruction and still have retained his sanity. Lawlessness was, for a period of many months, the rule rather than the exception.
One of the brightest periods in Thomas's childhood began on the day a young Negro boy, bloody, unconscious and almost dead, was brought to the home of the Dixon's. The boy's father, in a drunken fit, had tried to kill him with an axe. [The Dixon's legally adopted him] and from that day forward young Dixon and little Dick were inseparable companions."
(Fire from the Flint, The Amazing Careers of Thomas Dixon, Raymond Allen Cook, John F. Blair, Publisher, 1968, pp. 13-14)
From: bernhard1848@att.net
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