Private James D. Faires C.S.A. -- Thrice Wounded Confederate Veteran

Private James D. Faires
Company H, 18th S.C. Infantry Regiment, C.S.A.
shown here after his capture in March 1865 with a terrible
bullet wound that split his head -- his third wound during
his 8 months as a Confederate soldier.

Born on November 11, 1846, young James Daniel Faires of York, South Carolina was just a farm boy of 17 years when he joined the Catawba Light Infantry, Company H, 18th South Carolina Infantry in August of 1864 -- less than a year before the bloody War Between The States would formally end.

Faires joined his new regiment along with General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia during the nine-month-long Siege of Petersburg, Virginia (June 15, 1864 - April 2, 1865) where the young recruit would soon be introduced to the horrors of prolonged trench warfare.

Just over two months there, Faires received his first wound, being shot in the chest and sent to Jackson Hospital in Richmond. He soon recovered and rejoined the 18th S.C. where he would again be wounded in the trenches before Petersburg with a gunshot wound to the face in March of 1865.

Young Faires would again return to his regiment just as Petersburg fell and arrived in time for the Battle of Five Forks (April 1, 1865) where the regiment left the trenches with Major General George E. Pickett’s Division to defend a vital crossroads southwest of Petersburg from the combined forces of Major General Gouverneur K. Warren’s 5th Corps and Phillip Sheridan’s Cavalry Corps. Outnumbered and eventually outflanked, the Confederates fought hard, but were ultimately overwhelmed. As a result, Lee’s Army was soon forced to abandon Petersburg and Richmond the next day and retreat west towards Appomattox Court House where Lee would surrender to Lieutenant General U.S. Grant just over a week later.

The grave of Pvt. James D. Faires
at Christian Cemetery
in Nacogdoches, Texas.

It was during the battle that Faires was shot for the third, and final time, receiving a ghastly bullet wound in the head that nearly split his skull open. He would be captured along with over 2,000 other Confederate soldiers that day.

The wounded Faires was sent to Lincoln General Hospital in Washington City where Union Surgeon J.C. McKee would remove shattered bone fragments from his skull and replaced with a steel plate on April 20th.

After signing his Oath of Allegiance to the Union in June 1865, Faires was released from the hospital and walked home from Virginia. He returned to his family farm and then later married his wife, Martha Jane Campbell, in 1878 and started his own family farm at Steele Creek, North Carolina where they would live for a time before moving to Nacogdoches, Texas. He and Martha would eventually have six children.

Faires would continue to suffer the painful effects of his final wound his whole life with off and on headaches. By 1910, the then 63 year old Confederate veteran would go blind.

He died on June 5, 1914 at the age of 67 and is buried in Christian Cemetery in Nacogdoches with his wife and other family members.

Sketch by Alfred Waud, "Last Stand of Pickett’s Men" at the Battle of Five Forks (April 1, 1865).

Ragged Old Flag -- Poems -- Honoring June 14th U.S. Flag Day

The Flag of the United States of America (USA) flying over Chimney Rock State Park, North Carolina.

Ragged Old Flag

By Johnny R. Cash


 I walked through a county courthouse square,
On a park bench an old man was sitting there.
I said, "Your old courthouse is kinda run down."
He said, "Naw, it'll do for our little town."
I said, "Your flagpole has leaned a little bit,
And that's a Ragged Old Flag you got hanging on it."

He said, "Have a seat", and I sat down.
"Is this the first time you've been to our little town?"
I said, "I think it is." He said, "I don't like to brag,
But we're kinda proud of that Ragged Old Flag.

"You see, we got a little hole in that flag there
When Washington took it across the Delaware.
And it got powder-burned the night Francis Scott Key
Sat watching it writing 'Oh Say Can You See.'
And it got a bad rip in New Orleans
With Packingham and Jackson tuggin' at its seams.

"And it almost fell at the Alamo
Beside the Texas flag, but she waved on through.
She got cut with a sword at Chancellorsville,
And she got cut again at Shiloh Hill.
There was Robert E. Lee, Beauregard, and Bragg,
And the south wind blew hard on that Ragged Old Flag.

"On Flanders Field in World War I
She got a big hole from a Bertha gun.
She turned blood red in World War II.
She hung limp and low by the time it was through.
She was in Korea and Vietnam.
She went where she was sent by her Uncle Sam.

"She waved from our ships upon the briny foam,
And now they've about quit waving her back here at home.
In her own good land she's been abused--
She's been burned, dishonored, denied, and refused.

"And the government for which she stands
Is scandalized throughout the land.
And she's getting threadbare and wearing thin,
But she's in good shape for the shape she's in.
'Cause she's been through the fire before,
And I believe she can take a whole lot more.

"So we raise her up every morning,
Take her down every night.
We don't let her touch the ground,
And we fold her up right.
On second thought I do like to brag,
'Cause I'm mighty proud of that Ragged Old Flag."

Flag Day is celebrated in the United States of America every year on June 14 commemorating the adoption of the original flag of the United States on Saturday, June 14, 1777, by resolution of the Second Continental Congress.

Ragged Old Flag is a popular patriotic song written by American country music singer John R. "Johnny" Cash in 1974, and is the title song on his 47th album of the same name.

As an American who is also mighty proud of that ragged old flag, this blogger would like to wish each and every one of y'all a Happy Flag Day today.

"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

Private Thomas S. Burgess -- Confederate Sharpshooter

 

Approximately 157 years ago, around 9 A.M. on the morning of Tuesday, May 9, 1864 during the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, a Union officer dismounted from his horse and walked among men manning an artillery battery aimed at hastily erected Confederate earthworks just over 1,000 yards distance.

The commander of the Army of the Potomac's VI Corps, Major General John Sedgwick, known affectionately as "Uncle John" by his men, was directing the placement of the artillery battery against the left flank of the Confederate earthworks. In the distance, single shots rang out from Confederate sharpshooters sitting in trees and hiding behind the earthworks.

One of these sharpshooters was a 35 year old Confederate private from Jonesville, South Carolina named Thomas S. Burgess. He was among the skirmishers trading shots with members of the invading Union army's VI Corps along with the rest of Company F, 15th S.C. Infantry Regiment.

As a sharpshooter, his primary targets in combat were Yankee officers, easily identifiable by the rank insignia on the shoulders of their dark blue uniforms.

Most of the sharpshooters in the Army of Northern Virginia carried the new British-made Whitworth Rifle, one of the world's first real sniper weapons, equipped with a long brass telescopic scope for long range targets. Shots from the Whitworth rifles, easily identifiable due to the shrill whistling noises their hexagonal bullets made in flight, flew all around the artillery battery, causing members of Sedgwick's staff and nearby artillerymen to duck for cover.

Union Major General John Sedgwick.
Photo courtesy of the U.S. Library of Congress.

In both a show to contempt for the Southern "rebels" and an attempt to boost the morale of his men, Sedgwick strode around in the open. He reportedly looked down at an artillery sergeant who ducked behind his cannon and, with a good-natured laugh, was quoted as saying what would probably become one of the best examples of cruel irony in the war, "What? Men dodging this way for single bullets? What will you do when they open fire along the whole line? I am ashamed of you! They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance!"

A second later came the shrill sound of a Whitworth bullet in flight, followed by the sickening sound of a bullet finding its mark and "Uncle John" Sedgwick fell forward with a bullet just under his left eye and never regained consciousness.

The death of General Sedgwick made him, along with Major Generals James Birdseye McPherson, Joseph K. Mansfield, and John F. Reynolds, among the highest-ranking Union officers to be killed in the war. Of the four men mentioned Sedgwick was the most senior in rank in terms of commission.

Although five different (surviving) Confederate sharpshooters were claimed to have been responsible for killing Sedgwick, it has never been officially confirmed who actually took the most famous shot ever fired from a Whitworth rifle during the war.

The death of John Sedgwick at the Battle of Spotsylvania,
Tuesday, May 9, 1864.
Artwork courtesy of the U.S. National Park Service (NPS).

Of all the candidates who likely took the shot, Private Thomas Burgess was the only one who didn't brag about his actions during the battle. If he did in fact fire the shot that ended Sedgwick's life, the reasons he would not talk about it probably fell under several possibilities.

The main one being that most Civil War combat was blind with soldiers in massed groups firing wildly through a smoke-covered battlefield never truly being sure if they actually hit their target. This was not always true, of course, but for the most part a soldier will fire in the general direction of a target but never get confirmation they actually hit another enemy soldier.

With snipers, particularly those armed with a rifle with a scope, they usually get to bear witness to the results of their actions all too well. Like many other Southern-born men in the 19th century, Burgess was fighting because he felt it was his duty, but likely regarded this method of warfare as murder, and the idea of bragging about killing another man simply sickened him.

Or it could have been he feared some sort of retaliation after the war. Being responsible for killing one of the highest ranking Union officers of the war might have made him famous among fellow Confederate Veterans, but might also earn him scrutiny from other quarters he would have rather avoided.

Or perhaps he simply didn't want to talk about it because the memories were haunting to him, as they are to many veterans of warfare. There are many former soldiers and service-persons who will never speak of what they saw or did in war, probably for very good reasons given what we know today of PTSD.

For whatever reason, if Thomas Burgess was in fact the man who fired the shot that fell the Yankee general, he kept that detail to himself till the day he died.

Thomas Burgess survived the war, formally surrendering along with 161 other surviving members of the 15th South Carolina Infantry on Wednesday, April 26, 1865 at Bennett Place near Greensboro, North Carolina. He would return home to Union County, South Carolina where he would later marry his wife, Rachael Ward Burgess and have three sons: James, Hughes, and Oscar.

Burgess died on Saturday, April 4, 1908 (aged 79 years) and is buried in the graveyard at Gilead Baptist Church in Jonesville, South Carolina.

The grave of Private Thomas S. Burgess, Confederate sharpshooter,
Co. F, 15th SC Infantry Regiment at Gilead Baptist Church in Jonesville, SC.
Photo taken by C.W. Roden.

Taking The Buzzfeed Privilege Test -- With Surprising Results!

 

Greetings and Salutations, Y'all!

If I had a quarter for how many times over the last few years some internet troll has told me I should "check my privilege" then I would never have to worry about financial debts ever again.

Okay, I exaggerate just a bit, but at the very least it would have paid my household bills for the next month or two.

No kidding, especially when dealing with people on the internet who disagree with my on just about everything imaginable, the fallback line is often Why don't you check your privilege! Sometimes some ethnic and sexist epitaphs are thrown in for good measure.

Whenever I am confronted with this sort of behavior, I often times I ask myself "What 'privilege' they are referring to? I certainly don't feel privileged, or entitled to anything. I've certainly never had anything just handed to me, even as a child. I sure as hell don't have anything given to me now as a pseudo-adult.

So, like most denizens of the internet, I went to the source of all knowledge and opinion online -- Buzzfeed -- and found the Check Your Privilege Test.

This test is pretty straight-forward, answer all the questions that apply to you and then check the results. So I too the advise of all those over the years who challenged me to "check my (white/male/other) privilege" and the results....well, the results were pretty funny.

The following are the questions on the test, with the ones I answered that applied to me highlighted in red.

1. Check off all the statements that apply to you.

    I am white.

    I have never been discriminated against because of my skin color.

    I have never been the only person of my race in a room.

    I have never been mocked for my accent.

    I have never been told I am attractive "for my race."

    I have never been a victim of violence because of my race.

    I have never been called a racial slur.

    I have never been told I "sound white."

    A stranger has never asked to touch my hair, or asked if it is real.

    I am heterosexual.

    I have never lied about my sexuality

    I never had to "come out."

    I never doubted my parents’ acceptance of my sexuality.

    I have never been called "f*g."

    I have never been called "d*ke."

    I have never been called a "f**ry," or any other derogatory slur for homosexuals.

    I have never tried to hide my sexuality.

    I am always comfortable with P.D.A. with my partner in public.

    I have never pretended to be "just friends" with my significant other.

    I have never been ostracized by my religion for my sexual orientation.

    I have never been told I would "burn in hell" for my sexual orientation.

    I have never been told that my sexuality is "just a phase."

    I have never been violently threatened because of my sexuality.

    I am a man.

    I feel comfortable in the gender I was born as.

    I still identify as the gender I was born in.

    I have never tried to change my gender.

    I have never been denied an opportunity because of my gender.

    I make more money than my professional counterparts of a different gender.

    I have never felt unsafe because of my gender.

    I have never been catcalled.

    I have never been sexually harassed or assaulted.

    I have never been raped.

    I work in a salaried job.

    My family and I have never lived below the poverty line.

    I don’t have any student loans.

    I have never gone to bed hungry.

    I have never been homeless.

    My parents pay some of my bills.

    My parents pay all of my bills.

    I don’t rely on public transportation.

    I buy new clothes at least once a month.

    I have never done my taxes myself.

    I have never felt poor.

    I have never had to worry about making rent.

    I have never worked as a waiter, barista, bartender, or salesperson.

    I have had an unpaid internship.

    I have had multiple unpaid internships.

    I went to summer camp.

    I went to private school.

    I graduated high school.

    I went to an elite college.

    I graduated college.

    My parents paid (at least some of) my tuition.

    I had a car in high school.

    I’ve never had a roommate.

    I've always had cable.

    I have traveled internationally.

    I travel internationally at least once a year.

    I studied abroad.

    I’ve never skipped a meal to save money.

    I don’t know what “Sallie Mae” is.

    I spent Spring Breaks abroad.

    I have frequent flier miles.

    My parents are heterosexual.

    My parents are both alive.

    My parents are still married.

    I do not have any physical disabilities.

    I do not have any social disabilities.

    I do not have any learning disabilities.

    I have never had an eating disorder.

    I have never been depressed.

    I have never considered suicide.

    I have never attempted suicide.

    I have never taken medication for my mental health.

    I can afford medication if/when I need it.

    I have never been told I’m overweight or "too skinny."

    I have never felt overweight or underweight or "too skinny."

    I have never been shamed for my body type.

    I consider myself to be physically attractive.

    I can afford a therapist.

    I’ve used prescription drugs recreationally.

    I have never had an addiction.

    I have never been shamed for my religious beliefs.

    I have never been violently threatened for my religious beliefs.

    I have never been violently attacked for my religious beliefs.

    There is a place of worship for my religion in my town.

    I have never lied about my ethnicity as self-defense.

    I have never lied about my religion as self-defense.

    All my jobs have been accommodating of my religious practices.

    I am not nervous in airport security lines.

    I have never heard this statement: "You have been randomly selected for secondary passport control."

    I have never been called a terrorist.

    Nobody has ever tried to "save" me for my religious beliefs.

    I have never been cyber-bullied for any of my identities.

    I was not bullied as a child for any of my identities.

    I have never tried to distance myself from any of my identities.

    I have never been self-conscious about any of my identities.

    I have never questioned any of my identities.

    I feel privileged because of the identities I was born with.

And here are the official results of my Buzzfeed Privilege Test:

Well there y'all have it, I "checked me privilege" and found out that, at least according to Buzzfeed, I have no privilege at all. Very interesting indeed.

So next time someone asks you to "check your privilege" you tell them to take this test and challenge them to find out how privileged they are themselves. The results might be just as surprising.

Let me know what y'all think in the comments below, and if y'all take the test too, leave the results there as well. As always have a wonderful Dixie Day, and y'all come back now, ya hear!