The Battle Of Fishing Creek: "Blood Ban" Tarleton Routes Sumter -- August 18, 1780

Tarleton's British Legion Cavalry attacking Sumter's men at Catawba Ford along the Catawba River
in Chester County, SC.

 The Battle of Fishing Creek

"Bloody Ban" Tarleton Routes Sumter

Friday, August 18, 1780 

By: C.W. Roden 

(Part 10 of a 15 part series)

Heading north along the western bank of the Catawba River at a leisurely pace, Brigadier General Thomas Sumter was unaware of the disastrous outcome at Camden, unaware that Major General Horatio Gates, the so-called "Hero of Saratoga" had abandoned his own army and retreated into North Carolina to avoid being captured. 

It wasn't until the evening of Wednesday, August 16th that a dispatch rider, 13-year-old Andrew Jackson, from Major William Richardson Davie informed Sumter of the disaster at Camden and the disgraceful retreat of General Gates -- whom Davie had encountered only hours before.

Despite this alarming news, Sumter did not increase his pace.

Among Sumter's force were about 700 mounted militia and 100 Maryland Continentals and two artillery pieces detached to his force by Gates only a few days before. Traveling with Sumter's force were also fifty wagons full of captured British supplies and about 250 prisoners of war. The latter was severely slowing Sumter's usual quick progress.

Unwilling to abandon his captured plunder, Sumter and his men continued to move slowly north along the river towards Charlotte and safety.

The Pursuit of Sumter

In the immediate aftermath of his decisive victory just north of Camden, Lieutenant General Charles Lord Cornwallis gave orders to the Loyalist British Legion commander Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton to pursue Sumter's backcountry militia and recapture the prisoners and supplies taken by the Patriot leader.

Lord Cornwallis considered Sumter such an annoyance that he called him one of his "great plagues" -- an accurate description given the work that Patriot militia under his command had accomplished disrupting British outposts in the backcountry over the course of the summer. He gave Tarleton orders to capture, or kill, Sumter if possible.

The British Legion had just returned to camp following their pursuit and slaughter of routed Patriot militia and Continentals following the retreat from Camden. Tarleton was more than eager to take up his mission and immediately set out up the eastern bank of the Catawba River with about 350 men -- including a detachment of the 71st Regiment of Foot (Fraser's Highlanders) riding double with the Legion cavalry.

The proud English aristocrat sought revenge for the defeat of a detachment of his own British Legion under Captain Christian Huck at Williamson's Plantation the month before at the hands of Patriot militia from Sumter's command. It had been a blow to the reputation of his Legion as a force to be feared in the backcountry. 

By the evening of Thursday, August 17th, Sumter had crossed the rover and only moved as far as Rocky Mount, setting up camp in the open along the riverbank not far from the now abandoned British outpost. From the other side of the river, Tarleton could easily spot the partisan camp, seeing their cooking fires in the darkness. To keep his own position secret, Tarleton ordered his own men not to build fires. Crossing over the next morning and moving with characteristic speed, he reached the site of Sumter's camp, once again finding that Sumter had already moved on. Picking around 160 dragoons from his Legion and leaving the infantry to cover his rear and follow at their own pace, Tarleton continued the pursuit.

The stifling 90F degree August heat and the difficult conditions continued to slow Sumter's progress. About noon, after an eight-mile march, Sumter halted his force near Catawba Ford (in modern-day Chester County), where Fishing Creek feeds into the Catawba River.

In spite of warnings he had received, Sumter took no special security precautions, save for a few sentries posted along the road. Most of his men were using the halt in the march for rest and recreation. They stacked arms and relaxed, many taking the opportunity to swim and bathe in the creek, while others, including Sumter himself, decided to take a nap in whatever shade they could find. Sumter rested underneath one of the captured wagons.

Fishing Creek in Chester County, South Carolina as it would
have appeared in mid-to-late August in the summer of 1780.

The Battle

Tarleton's dragoons finally caught up to Sumter that afternoon, overwhelming the posted sentries before they could raise the alarm. He quickly formed them for attack. Despite being outnumbered about four-to-one, Colonel Tarleton and the British Legion dragoons charged into the Patriot camp, catching the militia and Sumter completely by surprise and quickly gaining control of the stacked arms.

The Patriot militia, many of which were caught literally with their pants down, were completely routed. Sumter woke from underneath the wagon as the green-coated Legion cavalry swept into the camp. Unable to get to his own horse, he cut the harness of a draft horse from the wagon and, riding bareback, tried to rally his panicked men. Ultimately, this proved futile as the Patriots were routed; each man for himself in the escaped. General Sumter fled into the nearby woods half-dressed, leaving behind his hat, coat, and boots; barely escaping capture himself. Sumter was picked up by Captain John Steele and carried to another horse. Riding nonstop, Sumter reached the American Major William Richardson Davie’s camp at Charlotte, North Carolina two days later.

The British Legion cavalry virtually decimated the militia and Continentals. The losses were one-sided and severe. The Patriots lost about 150 men killed and wounded, and more than 300 prisoners were taken. The Legion also freed the 250 captured British prisoners and captured all of Sumter's supplies and captured war material, including: 800 horses, 1,000 individual weapons, and his two artillery pieces. Tarleton himself only lost 16 men killed and wounded.

Perhaps the only positive story to come of the affair for the Patriots was the daring escape of militia officers Lieutenant Colonel Henry Hampton and Colonel Thomas Taylor. Both officers had been taken prisoner by Tarleton, but managed to cut through their rope-tied hands with a pocketed knife and flee into the swamp. Colonel Hampton was the brother of Lieutenant Colonal Wade Hampton of the 2nd South Carolina Regiment and the grandfather of future Confederate General Wade Hampton III.

Not long after the battle, the rest of the British Legion infantry and the detachment of Highlanders that had been left behind arrived to help take charge of the prisoners and recaptured supplies.

"Blood Ban" Tarleton and his British Legion had their vengeance.


Aftermath

Two days later, following the battle at Fishing Creek (also known as the Battle of Catawba Ford) Sumter arrived in Charlotte and joined up with Major Davie's militia. He was a brigadier general without servant, soldiers, or baggage. He would soon gather another force of upcountry militia for the coming campaign that many of them now dreaded. Many of the Patriot militiamen from the District Between the Broad and Catawba Rivers who'd avoided capture by Tarleton's Legion would continue to resist the Loyalist militias and their British allies on their own over the course of the next couple of months.

The defeat of Gates at Camden and the routing of Sumter at Fishing Creek were terrible blows to the morale of the upcountry partisans. Lord Cornwallis, on the other hand, was jubilant. The news of the twin defeats would reach London, making the earl the toast of the capital. When the Comte de Vergennes, King Louie XVI's foreign minister, learned of the defeats, he believed that the American cause was lost. He floated a peace feeler based on uti possidetis ("as you possess") that would have left South Carolina and Georgia as British colonies.

Tarleton himself believed that the defeat of Sumter would be enough to eliminate any further organized resistance to the Crown in the upcountry. Lord Cornwallis himself was not as certain of that since Sumter himself had not been captured, or killed. None-the-less, the British general now felt that the time was right to begin the next step in the conquest of the American South -- the invasion of North Carolina.

However, all was not lost to the upcountry South Carolina Patriots. Help would soon come from an unexpected ally from the North Carolina Appalachians and the British Southern strategy would find itself coming to a grinding halt -- the beginning of which will be discussed in detail in the next chapter of this series.

Monument near the site of the Battle of Fishing Creek
(also known as the Battle of Catawba Ford) near Great Falls,
SC in Chester County.

For more information about the Battle of Rocky Mount and its significance to American history please consult the following sources that were used to help with this blog post:

 Partisans & Redcoats: The Southern Conflict That Turned The Tide of the American Revolution  

by Walter Edgar (2001) ISBN 0-308-97760-5

Honoring 250 Years Of America Independence 1776 - 2026 -- The Declaration Of Independence

 

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

The signers of the Declaration of Independence of the original thirteen American States ratified by the Second Continental Congress at Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on Thursday, July 4, 1776: 

Georgia:  

Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

North Carolina:  

William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn 

South Carolina:  

Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward Jr., Thomas Lynch Jr., Arthur Middleton

Massachusetts:
John Hancock

Maryland: Samual Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll 

Delaware: 

Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean

New York:

William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris 

New Jersey:

Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark

New Hampshire:  

Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple

Massachusetts:

 Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry 

 Rhode Island: 

Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery

Connecticut: 

Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott

New Hampshire: 

Matthew Thornton    

Virginia:
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson Jr.,
Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton

Pennsylvania:

Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor,
James Wilson, George Ross

Declaration of Independence by American artist John Trumbull. (1826)

From one of the original thirteen independent American States, 
this blogger would like to wish each and every one of my fellow Americans across these United States a very
 Happy Independence Day and Happy 250th Birthday America! 

Sergeant Gilbert H. Bates U.S.A. (1836 - 1917) -- The Union Veteran Who Carried Old Glory Through Unreconstructed Dixie & England

Sergeant Gilbert H. Bates
(February 13, 1836 - February 17, 1917).

 

Perhaps there is no better story of national reconciliation and personal patriotism in the years immediately following the aftermath of the War Between The States than the story of Sergeant Gilbert Bates, a former Union veteran who carried the flag of the United States unafraid through the then unreconstructed Deep South and then across England several years later.

Gilbert Henderson Bates was born on Saturday, February 13, 1836 in the town of Springwater, Livingston County, New York. Sometime in his late teens, Bates moved to the small town of Albion, near Edgerton, Wisconsin and became a farmer.

Bates was 25 years old when the American Civil War (1861-1865) broke out on the morning of Friday, April 12, 1861. He answered the State of Wisconsin and his nation's call for volunteers and served in the Union Army as a sergeant in Company H of the 1st Wisconsin Heavy Artillery Regiment.

For most of the war, Company H was assigned to Fort Lyon outside Alexandra, Virginia as part of the defenses of Washington City (D.C.) guarding against possible Confederate attack against the capitol. He returned home following the end of the war and resumed his civilian occupation.

Bates married his wife, Ann E. Noe, on Wednesday, December 23, 1863 and the couple would raise four children: Hattie, Nellie, Frank, and Addie.


The First Bet

In November of 1867, a Radical Republican neighbor of Bates was telling stories about rumors that the South would be rising once more in rebellion and that any Northerner was not safe down there. This neighbor told Bates that anti-Union feeling was so strong in the South that no representative of the United States was safe in the former Confederate States, and declared that disloyalty to the Union was still rampant in the deep South and that a man could not take the Stars and Stripes onto Southern soil without being murdered.

Sergeant Bates, who was a staunch Democrat, completely disagreed and made a wager with his Republican neighbor that he could walk the entire length of the Southern States completely unscathed while carrying the flag of the United States. He wagered a dollar a day from his neighbor for his family that he would start in Vicksburg, Mississippi and march without money and unarmed, and arrive safely in Washington City with himself unscathed and his flag unmolested on, or before the 4th of July, Independence Day. The neighbor took up his wager, thinking Bates was a complete fool.

Bates' Wisconsin neighbor was far from alone in his belief that it was not safe for anyone who supported the occupied former Confederate States. His wife was concerned for the safety of her husband as he prepared to leave home for his journey, though she offered him her full support.

Sergeant Bates feat of courage was soon the talk of the country. He took photographs of himself in his old uniform with a U.S. flag, which he autographed and offered to sell for a quarter a piece with the proceeds to be donated to charity.


Sergeant Bates' March Begins

Bates arrived in Vicksburg, Mississippi on the evening of Friday, January 24, 1868, wearing coarse, heavy garments, cowhide boots, and a slouch hat. The city along the Mississippi River had been the scene on a great siege by Union forces in 1863, and it was thought that anti-Union sentiment would be very strong here despite several years of Union occupation.

Sergeant Bates in uniform with the
U.S. Flag he carried from Vicksburg,
Mississippi, to Washington D.C. in 1868.
Photo courtesy National Archives.

On his way South he met one Mr. Frank Howard. Upon learning of Bates' daring bet, Mr. Howard secured for him quarters at the Prentiss House (the famous home of former Mississippi U.S. Representative Sergeant Smith Prentiss) and arranged to take care of his bills.

News of his plans spread quickly throughout the city. Next morning there was a stream of visitors and well-wishers, among them the town’s most prominent citizens and a number of Union soldiers stationed in the city. The representatives of a women’s organization called on him to announce that a U.S. flag was being made for him.

On Bates’ fourth and last day, in a ceremony at the Prentiss House, a "neat silk flag," five feet long and three wide, attached to a regulation staff was presented to him. Bates was also presented with a velvet uniform bearing his regimental insignia. The clothes and uniform, Bates would later note, had been sewn by the same hands that only years before sewn Rebel uniforms and flags.

Thus began Bates' march on Tuesday, January 28th, which would be widely reported at the time in numerous local and national newspapers. Sergeant Bates' march through Dixie received so much notoriety at the time that it became a national news story, some of which was scornful and predicted that the brave Union veteran was setting himself up for a very rough time, or worse.

On Thursday, February 27, 1868, author and humorist Samuel Clemens (writing under his famous pen name, Mark Twain) published the following about Bates in his Territorial Enterprise:

Sergeant Gilbert H. Bates of Wisconsin is the last candidate for pedestrian notoriety. He has made a bet that he will walk, alone, unarmed, and without a cent in his pocket, and bearing aloft the American flag, through the late Southern Confederacy, from Vicksburg to Washington. He is already on his way, and the telegraph is noting his progress. The Mayor and a large portion of the population of Vicksburg ushered him out of that city with a grand demonstration. He proposes to sell photographs of himself at 25 cent apiece, all along his route, and convert the proceeds into a fund to be devoted to the aid and comfort of widows and orphans of soldiers who fought in the late war, irrespective of flag or politics.

And then, I suppose, when he gets a good round sum together for the widows and orphans, he will hang up his flag and go and have a champagne blow-out. I don't believe in people who collect money for benevolent purposes and don't charge for it. I don't have full confidence in people who walk a thousand miles for the benefit of widows and orphans and don't get a cent for it. I question the uprightness of people who peddle their own photographs, anyhow, whether they carry flags or not. In my opinion a man might as well start his name with an initial and spell his middle name out and hope to be virtuous. But this fellow will get more black eyes, down there among those unreconstructed rebels than he can ever carry along with him without breaking his back. I expect to see him coming into Washington some day on one leg and with one eye out and an arm gone. He won't amount to more than an interesting relic by the time he gets here and then he will have to hire out for a sign for the Anatomical Museum. Those fellows down there have no sentiment in them. They won't buy his picture. They will be more likely to take his scalp.

Clemens and everyone who predicted his inevitable demise turned out to be very wrong in their assessment. Although to be fair to Mr. Clemens and those who lamented the brave Union veteran could be putting himself in serious danger, those fears -- if slightly exaggerated -- were not entirely without merit.

The path that Sergeant Bates in his blue uniform and carrying his U.S. Flag was taking in his solo march would take him through places that had seen the most brutal and destructive effects of the Union invasion of the Deep South in the final years of the war.

Bates would literally be walking through a land physically devastated by the hardships of war. Through towns full of defeated surviving Confederate veterans, many of them still bearing the scars and missing limbs of their experience. Past graveyards full of the sons, fathers, and husbands of many men who'd stood opposite Bates in the war and didn't survive. Not to mention the surviving families of those same men and boys who would no doubt be less than pleased at the sight of him and his flag waving in the breeze.

During the three-month march Sergeant Bates would walk 1,400 miles across the Southern States of Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia, carrying his Stars and Stripes. He was granted a great deal of hospitality and goodwill all along the way. People offered him food, places to stay for the night, church bells rang at his arrival and departure for towns, and several major cities even allowed the brave Union sergeant to actually hoist his flag over important official buildings where the Confederate Stars and Bars and the Stainless Banner once flew earlier that same decade!

Sergeant Bates recorded his journey in a 35 page pamphlet which he had published in June 1868 titled: The Triumphal March of Sergeant Bates from Vicksburg to Washington. Many of the stories in his telling of his experiences are very moving.

In Tuskegee, Alabama, an eight-year-old girl named Hattie, upon hearing that Sergeant Bates also had a little daughter called Hattie, gave him her newest doll and asked him to send it home to her. At the State capital of Montgomery he was presented with a pink silk sash for his uniform which he described as: "heavily fringed with gold bullion and beautifully inscribed in gilt letters, 'Presented by the Ladies of Montgomery, Ala., Mrs. Vernon Vaughn, president, Mrs. A. L. O’Brien, secretary.'"

One story in particular stands out, an encounter while walking through the State of Georgia that touched Bates most profoundly.

While walking on a lonely stretch of dirt road between Sparta and Augusta, he came upon a young farmer who was chopping wood. The farmer said he’d been watching for Bates and wished to extend the hospitality of his home, two miles away. On their way to the house, the men stopped at a roadside mound where the farmer’s brother, a Confederate soldier killed during the war, lay buried under a plain wooden head board marked with his name since granite headstones were hard to come by for poor people during the Reconstruction Era. The farmer stood upon one side of the grave and Bates on the other. Unconsciously both men removed their hats and bowed their heads in respect for the dead, then the farmer reached his hand over the grave of his brother and clasped Bates' hand.

Sergeant Bates and his flag were both well received throughout the so-called "unreconstructed South" where towns and communities treated him with more than generous hospitality. School children were recessed to meet him as he walked by. Women prepared him meals and people offered him the hospitality of their spare rooms, or barns to sleep for the night. Confederate veterans would travel as far as forth miles just to meet with him and shake his hand as he went by. Government officials including: judges, mayors, and even governors, greeted him and even held short speeches commending the sergeant for his efforts at fostering national goodwill.

His only real difficulties on his journey would be rainy weather and muddy roads. Throughout his journey, Sergeant Bates would encounter several more profound moments of humanity and mutual respect from his former Southern enemies and fellow Americans.


Sergeant Bates in South Carolina and Charlotte

When he crossed the Savannah River into South Carolina on Monday, March 16th, Sergeant Bates was met with good wishes from the people of the town of Hamburg (near modern-day North Augusta). He briefly stopped to shake hands with people before continuing east.

Two days later on Wednesday, March 18th, Sergeant Bates crossed the Congraee River by ferry boat and was again welcomed warmly by the mayor and people of the State capital of Columbia -- which at the time was still largely burned out (allegedly) by General William T. Sherman's invading Union soldiers only three years before. He remained there for four days before resuming his march north towards Washington City. The South Carolina State House building in Columbia still bears the marks where Sherman's cannons struck it.

In the town of Winnsboro, he was greeted by the whole town, including about 75 former Confederate soldiers who took him to the bedside of a former Confederate officer that was dying and wanted to meet and talk with Bates before he passed on. Bates would learn that the officer passed away a short time after speaking to him. 

When he reached the town of Fort Mill on the border between the two Carolinas (and where Confederate President Jefferson Davis and his cabinet held one of the last full meetings as they fled south in 1865) on Wednesday, March 25th, he was greeted by 25 Confederate veterans who had assembled in their ragged gray uniforms to give Sergeant Bates and his flag an "escort of honor" as he passed from South Carolina into North Carolina. The Confederate honor guard cheered him the way fellow soldiers cheer as the Union veteran waved them goodbye at the border.

He arrived in Charlotte later that same day where he was greeted by the city's major and town council who offered Bates their city's hospitality. Sergeant Bates remained in Charlotte for a couple of days while he was getting new shoes made as his old ones were worn out. While there he was also called on by more Confederate veterans, including some former Southern officers.

Another rather interesting event occurred during Sergeant Bates' stay in Charlotte.

On Friday, March 27th, he was visited by a young man named James Orr, another Confederate veterans who'd served in General Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. Mr. Orr presented Sergeant Bates a bundle which held a Union army flag that had previously been captured during the war and which the young man had obtained from the Confederate archives during the fall of Richmond in April, 1865. Mr. Orr told Bates that its capture by the Confederates had cost a good many lives; but that Bates had "recaptured it without firing a gun" and presented it to the sergeant in peaceful triumph.


Richmond and Washington City

Less than two weeks later, at 4 P.M. EST on the afternoon of Wednesday, April 8th, Sergeant Bates and his flag crossed the Richmond and Danville Railroad bridge into the former capital of the Confederacy, Richmond, Virginia. An increasingly large crowd gathered to meet him and cheer him on as he made his way to the Exchange Hotel where he rested briefly and had dinner.

Afterwards he made his way to the Virginia State Capitol building and ascended to the rotunda where he waved his flag over the capital of what had been an enemy nation only a few years before and almost three years to the day of General Robert E. Lee's surrender of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox Court House while people cheered him and city church bells rang.

He remained in Richmond for two days before making the final length of his trek north.

A sketch of Sergeant Bates arrival at the Virginia State Capitol in Richmond.

At 9 A.M. on the morning of Tuesday, April 14th -- seven years to the day that Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina surrendered and the War Between The States began -- Sergeant Bates descended Arlington Heights to the Long Bridge and crossed the Potomac River and entered Washington City.

After a walk of 1,400 miles and crossing through six Southern States, Bates won his bet with his Radical Republican neighbor, arriving at the nation's capital completely unscathed from his journey through the still unreconstructed Southland. He accomplished his walk three months ahead of schedule in and had been met throughout by former Confederates who saluted his flag, provided hospitality, and more than demonstrated a desire for national reconciliation.

Again Bates was met by cheering crowds, as well as the Washington City Brass Band in full uniform played patriotic music. He proceeded through the city making his way though the crowds down Pennsylvania Avenue and Fourteenth Street, flanked by two military officers detailed to escort him to the White House where Sergeant Bates was greeted by U.S. President Andrew Johnson.

President Johnson is reported to have said to Sergeant Bates and the gathered throngs: "I merely desire to sincerely and cordially welcome you and your flag, with which you have traveled so many miles. I have no address or speech to make, but wish to testify my gratification at seeing you in Washington."

The president then invited him into the Executive Mansion and conducted him to the East Room where they conversed for a few moments. Johnson's daughter presented Bates with a magnificent bouquet of flowers. Three years before (again almost to the day) U.S. President Abraham Lincoln had been assassinated and had lain in state in the same room. Bates now stood in that same room after his incredible journey as a testament to the spirit of union and reconciliation.

Upon leaving the White House, Sergeant Bates made his way though the procession to the nearby Metropolitan Hotel where he would stay during his six-day visit to the capitol. There was a brief ceremony, where Bates stood on the front balcony and U.S. Representative Charles A. Eldredge of Bates' home State of Wisconsin delivering the main speech in his honor.

The following was the conclusion to that speech:

"My friends, I cannot forget the fact that it is just seven years this day since the flag of the Republic was lowered in humility and sorrow from the battlements of Sumter. The flag that Major Anderson was then forced to take down now floats proudly over every foot of our land, respected and honored by all. And this young man, who, without money and alone, and on foot, has carried it for more than fourteen hundred miles will now plant it in glory and triumph upon the dome of the National Capitol."

Great applause followed from the crowd, after which Sergeant Bates and the members of the procession trudged eastward in the now pouring rain. The Superintendent of Public Buildings had granted permission for Bates to unfurl his flag from the dome of the Capitol, but on the east steps of that Capitol Building, he was not allowed to enter or fly his flag from the rotunda by the capitol police under orders from the Radical Republican members of Congress who disapproved of his message of reconciliation with the South.

Remember that, in April of 1868, the radical wing of the Republican Party which controlled congress and wished to impose harsh Reconstruction Era policies on the defeated Southern "rebels" was in the process of their three-month-long impeachment of President Johnson. An effort which would ultimately fall short of his removal from office. Sergeant Bates journey and message of reconciliation, which received widespread publicity and praise from much of the country, was looked upon by these men in high office with unveiled disgust.

Although Sergeant Bates was allowed to raise his flag over numerous official buildings in the South at the welcoming hospitality of former Confederates -- including the former capital of the Confederacy -- he was not granted permission to fly his flag, which had been cheered on and saluted by millions on his journey, at the Capitol of his own country.

An American flag which had not been insulted once during a walk through unreconstructed Dixie, and carried by a man who served the cause of the Union during the war; had at last been insulted in the final moments of the journey by those who held political power. If that wasn't a sign of the times, nothing else could have said it better.

Someone in the crowd suggested that Sergeant Bates should wave his flag over the nearby Washington Monument, which was still being constructed. Bates would do to more approval of the crowd and a band playing more patriotic music. It was there at the memorial to America's greatest Founding Father that Sergeant Bates first journey truly came to an end.

He returned home to his relieved wife and family, as well as to his disgruntled and completely chagrined Radical Republican neighbor, from whom he'd won a grand total of $80 dollars. 

Photo of Sergeant Gilbert Bates with his flag taken
in his full Union army uniform and war medals in
1868 just after he completed his march across the
Reconstruction Era South.
Photo courtesy of the National Archives.

An American Sergeant In England

Four years later, in 1872, Sergeant Bates would again engage in a wager involving the flag of the United States. This time his walk would take him across the Atlantic Ocean to Great Britain.

During the War Between The States, many Englishmen supported Southern independence because almost all raw cotton, so vital to the enormous British mill industry, came from the American Southern states. When the North blockaded the Confederacy cutting off the trade routes, the resulting "cotton famine" put thousands of lower class English textile workers out of work and economic hardships for the British mill industry.

Also in August of 1872, an international arbitration tribunal ordered England to pay the United States a restitution of $15 million dollars for damages does to American merchant shipping by Confederate cruisers like the CSS Alabama and CSS Shenandoah, which had both been built, registered, and equipped in British ports. 

As a result of these developments there was a widely-held general belief in the United States that dangerous anti-American feeling was rife in England.

By 1872, Sergeant Bates and his family had relocated to the town of Saybrook, Illinois. Bates made a friendly wager with a friend who was a wealthy Saybrook merchant that he could carry the Stars and Stripes through England as he had through the Southern States and that he and his flag would not be molested in any way. Bates bet the merchant $100 against his friend's $1,000 to demonstrate that Great Britain and the United States were friendly despite Britain's former support of the Confederacy and that the British people would hail him as the Southerners had in 1868 when he arrived in London.

Thus Sergeant Gilbert Bates arrived in Great Britain in November of 1872 to prove that he could walk the length of England with his flag and not even be insulted by the British people.

On Tuesday, November 5, 1872, Sergeant Bates, in his full Union Army uniform and carrying a full-sized, 6 1/2 x 6 foot United States flag on a 9 foot staff, began a 332 mile march from the Scottish border town of Gretna Green; crossing the River Sark into England to his ultimate destination: the Guildhall in London, the capital of United Kingdom.

Sergeant Bates' prediction that the English people would treat him well was again spot on. In fact it was better than even the Union war veteran could have realized as people along his march took the brave American into their hearts, and like the Southerners four years before, were welcoming in all respects. Everywhere he traveled in England he was overwhelmed by the enthusiasm and kindness of the villagers. Hoteliers refused to let him pay and people offered him meals. Newspapers across Great Britain were all unified in their praise of Sergeant Bates and his convictions.

Sergeant Bates obituary in the
Bloomington (Illinois) Pantagraph
published on
Monday, February 19, 1917.

His only serious difficulties along his journey south to London were provided by the weather. For instance when he passed the granite quarries near the village of Shap, in Cumbra County, Sergeant Bates had to travel for some miles on his knees to keep his large banner aloft in nearly gale-force wind.

When Sergeant Bates reached on Saturday, November 30th -- less than a month after he started out -- the City of London gave him a roaring reception. In fact the crowds were so great he had to be driven in an open carriage to the Guildhall, where he ceremoniously hung the unsullied Stars and Stripes next to the British Union Jack. 

While in London he was approached by a group of British showmen who offered Sergeant Bates £60 (then the equivalent of about $300) a night for five weeks of vaudeville appearances. These and other offers to exploit his national flag were politely turned down by Bates.

Even before starting the march, he had rescinded the wager; telegramming his rich Saybook friend and refusing to take the thousand dollars he had won on the grounds that the good will he had helped engender between England and America was reward enough. Bates even donated the proceeds from his book describing his English march to the Infant Orphan Asylum at Wanstead.  

Afterwards

Gilbert Bates wrote well-received books about his walks and became a famed public speaker. He appeared in William "Buffalo Bill" Cody's famous Wild West Show. In his later years, he authored letters to the editor critical of what he deemed threats to America, including immigration and labor unions.

Sergeant Bates' lone marches across the South and England were widely reported in national newspaper articles at the time, but are today largely forgotten outside of serious historical roundtables and war enthusiast circles. His efforts to foster goodwill and reconciliation are a testament to the national spirit of the American people.

Sergeant Gilbert H. Bates died on Saturday, February 17, 1917 (just four days after his 71st birthday) and is buried in Cheney's Grove Township Cemetery in Saybrook, McLean County, Illinois. 

The Union Veterans headstone of Sergeant Bates
at Cheney's Grove Township Cemetery,
Saybrook, Illinois, USA.

The Brief History Of The Cherokee War of 1776

A portrait of Cherokee Chief Dragging Canoe by
Cherokee artist Talmadge Davi.

On this day in U.S. history, July 1, 1776, The Second Cherokee War (or Cherokee War of 1776) campaign against the Southern colonies began.

The Cherokee tribe was traditionally located in the area of what is now northern Georgia, western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee. Warfare arose periodically between the Cherokee and the encroaching white settlers from the time of their first contact, but a new wave of conflict arose after the French and Indian War (1754-1763).

The Proclamation Line of 1763 forbade British settlers from settling west of the Appalachians in an effort to limit conflict between settlers and Indians who had supported the British against the French during the war. Some settlers had other ideas though and tried to settle in the area.

In the late 1760s and early 1770s, the first several settlements began in what is now eastern Tennessee in Cherokee territory. The settlers believed they were in western Virginia, but a survey proved they were actually outside colonial territory. They were ordered to leave the Cherokee territory by the British Superintendent of Indian Affairs. The Cherokee chiefs, however, said they could stay as long as no more settlers came.

In 1775, Richard Henderson of North Carolina made a deal with Cherokee leaders to purchase most of modern day Kentucky. The sale did not take into account the fact that other tribes claimed this land, nor the fact that it was illegal according to British law as defined by the Proclamation Line of 1763.

The "sale" caused a rift in the Cherokee tribe. A young rebel Cherokee war chief (skiagusta) named Dragging Canoe angrily challenged the older leaders who made the deal and started gathering a coalition around him of those who were disenchanted with their elders for making deals with and selling land to the settlers.

When the American Revolution broke out, the settlers in Cherokee territory decided that British law no longer applied to them and they could live wherever they wanted. Since they had made a treaty with the Cherokee, they were on the land legitimately in their view. In May of 1776, a coalition of northern tribes allied with the British convinced Dragging Canoe and his band to join them in fighting the colonists.

A plan was hatched whereby simultaneous raids would be led against the settlers in Cherokee territory, as well as on frontier settlements in Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia. The campaign began on July 1, 1776 with a series of raids against the trans-Appalachian settlements. In some places, settlers had been warned and took refuge in various forts. In other places, settlers were massacred and homes and villages were destroyed.

The Cherokee attack led to a massive response from the combined colonial militias of the attacked colonies. Thousands of Patriot militia members marched on Cherokee territory, burned dozens of villages, destroyed crops and killed those who resisted. Even those who were not involved in the attacks suffered.

In retaliation for the attacks made against the American settlements of the Watauga Association in what is now modern-day eastern Tennessee, a force of settlers under the Command of General Griffith Rutherford and Captain William Moore of the 2nd Rowan County Regiment led attacks against the Cherokee in July 1776 during what became known as the Rutherford Light Horse Expedition, resulting in the destruction of six Cherokee towns, ran for just over a month from October 17 until November 16, 1776 and resulted in the killing of around 50-60 Cherokees with only minor losses for the militia.

During the expedition, Rutherford also led militia men to the Cherokee town of Too-Cowee. Most of the people had fled the village being over-powered and out-numbered, and the militia burned the homes.

Not long after this the Cherokee people offered peace to the newly independent American States. After the destruction and loss that the Cherokee people endured and continued American militia victory led to peace treaties established with the older and wiser Cherokee chiefs who understood they could not win this fight. The majority of the Cherokee settlements signed the Treaty of Dewitt's Corner in May of 1777.

Refusing to sign the treaty, Dragging Canoe Dragging and his large group of followers moved further down the Tennessee River in order to resist the Americans from a more secure position. They settled in the Chickamauga Creek area near present-day Chattanooga, an association which caused them for a time to be referred to as the "Chickamauga Cherokee." He continued to work with the British and launch attacks against white settlers for years to come. These would become known as the Chickamauga Wars (or Cherokee-American Wars) which would continue off-and-on until November of 1794 with the Treaty of Tellico Blockhouse.

Dragging Canoe died on February 29, 1792 of a heart attack following a victory against American forces at Running Water Town (modern-day Whiteside, Tennessee).

George Washington's Thanksgiving Day Proclamation 1789 -- America's First Thanksgiving Day

The Prayer At Valley Forge by Arnold Friberg (1976).

Exactly 230 years ago today in American history, President George Washington issued the following proclamation on Saturday, October 3, 1789, designating Thursday, November 26th of that year as a national day of thanks. 

In his proclamation, Washington declared that the necessity for such a day sprung from the Almighty’s care of Americans prior to the Revolution, assistance to them in achieving independence, and help in establishing the constitutional government. 

George Washington was the first United States president to issue a Thanksgiving proclamation. This was the first official American Thanksgiving Day as a nation under the US Constitution.

  

Thanksgiving Proclamation
New York, 3 October 1789

By the President of the United States of America, a Proclamation.

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor -- and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me "to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness."

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be -- That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks -- for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation—for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war—for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed -- for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted -- for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.

And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions -- to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually -- to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed -- to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord -- To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and us -- and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.

Given under my hand at the City of New York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.

Go: Washington

Source: Thanksgiving Proclamation, 3 October 1789, Founders Online, National Archives, last modified June 29, 2017.

Why I - And Many Other Southerners - Still Honor Confederate Memorial Day

Credit: Columbus State University Archives

Here's a trivia question for armchair historians: Was the first Memorial Day celebrated in Columbus, Georgia, or Columbus, Mississippi?
According to strict calendric interpretation, Columbus, Mississippi, celebrated the holiday first, on April 25, 1866, but only because newspaper editors fudged the date, said Richard Gardiner, an associate professor of history education at Columbus State University in Georgia, and co-author of "The Genesis of the Memorial Day Holiday" (Columbus State University, 2014).
Columbus, Georgia, where the concept of honoring the soldiers who died in the American Civil War originated, celebrated it a day later, on April 26, 1866, along with dozens of other cities, Gardiner said. [6 Civil War Myths, Busted]
Columbus, Mississippi, may have celebrated Memorial Day first, but "what's not true is that they came up with the idea," Gardiner told Live Science.
In fact, there are many contenders for where Memorial Day started. Some say it started in Waterloo, New York, in 1866, and President Lyndon B. Johnson even signed a proclamation saying so in 1966. But historians have since discredited that claim, Gardiner said. Still, some people still trumpet the claim, including the village of Waterloo itself.
Here's why: In the 1880s, a reporter interviewed a source who thought that Waterloo celebrated the day in 1866, but the newspaper later ran a correction saying it was actually 1868. Still, not every newspaper that ran the story included the correction, leading some people to think that Waterloo was the first to celebrate the holiday that Americans call Memorial Day, Gardiner said.
Others, including David Blight, a professor of history at Yale University, say the first Memorial Day happened in Charleston, South Carolina, according to The New York Times. On May 1, 1865, workmen honored and buried dead soldiers from the Union Army at a racetrack that had been turned into a war prison, Blight told The New York Times.
However, there's no evidence that this event sparked the national holiday, Gardiner said. People have honored dead soldiers and decorated their graves since the beginning of time, he added.
"It's not a question of who was the first person to decorate a grave," Gardiner said. "That does not create a holiday."

How Memorial Day started

Memorial Day's date has changed over the years, but the very first holiday was planned for April 26, 1866, in the wake of the American Civil War.
In January 1866, the Ladies' Memorial Association in Columbus, Georgia, passed a motion agreeing that they would designate a day to throw flowers on the graves of fallen soldiers buried at the cemetery, Gardiner said.
However, the ladies didn't want this to be an isolated event, so Mary Ann Williams, the group's secretary, wrote a letter and sent it to newspapers all over the United States.
"You'll find that letter in dozens of newspapers," Gardiner said. "It got out, and it was republished everywhere in the country."
In the letter, the ladies asked people to celebrate the war's fallen soldiers on April 26 — the day the bulk of Confederate soldiers surrendered in North Carolina in 1865.
"That's what many people in the South considered to be the end of the war," Gardiner said. Even though Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered on April 9, "there were still90,000 people ready to fight. And until those 90,000 surrendered on April 26, the war was effectively still going on," Gardiner said. [Album: Faces and Injuries of the Civil War]
But the date wasn't printed correctly in every newspaper, which led Columbus, Mississippi, to celebrate the holiday a day earlier, on April 25. Despite the mix-up, Columbus, Mississippi, is often credited as the birthplace of Memorial Day, Gardiner said.
In one of his 2010 weekly addresses, President Barack Obama said just that: "On April 25, 1866, about a year after the Civil War ended, a group of women visited a cemetery in Columbus, Mississippi, to place flowers by the graves of Confederate soldiers who had fallen at Shiloh," he said.
Gardiner said, "I don't contest that. But the evidence is abundantly clear that they were simply following what the newspaper had suggested that they do." Rather, it was the women of Columbus, Georgia, who thought of the idea, he said.

Flowers for all

On April 26, 1866, people across the South heeded Williams' letter and threw flowers on the graves of Civil War soldiers. Some Southern women noticed that Yankee graves, interspersed with the graves of their loved ones, sat untended, Gardiner said.
"They start to see these Union graves that are just laying there, kind of barren," he said. "Their hearts are warmed. Their hearts start to feel bad for the mothers who have lost these children. So, they start to throw flowers on the Yankee graves. And then that story gets published everywhere."
- See more at: http://www.livescience.com/54919-true-story-behind-first-memorial-day.html#sthash.01gkZPos.dpuf

Confederate descendants placing Dixie Cross banners on the graves of Confederate soldiers.
April 2012.

Why I -- And Many Other Southerners -- Still Honor Confederate Memorial Day

By: C.W. Roden 

The following is the short story and the war service record of my paternal great-great-grandfather, Sergeant Jackson S. Roden.

Mr. Jackson Roden was born in Blount County, Alabama to Thomas L. Roden & Sevilla Roden in the year 1829. He was a poor farmer and a non-slaveowner. He had a wife: Nancy Jane Buchannan (Married in 1857); and two children: Lougany Isabell Roden (born in 1858) and my great-grandfather Thomas Benton Roden (born in 1860). 

On April 7, 1862, Jackson Roden joined Company A of the 48th Alabama Infantry CSA commanded by Captain A.J. Alldredge. The 48th served in General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia in the 2nd Corps under Lt. General Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson in General Evander M. Law's Brigade at all the major battles of the Eastern Theater of the War.

Credit: Columbus State University Archives

Here's a trivia question for armchair historians: Was the first Memorial Day celebrated in Columbus, Georgia, or Columbus, Mississippi?
According to strict calendric interpretation, Columbus, Mississippi, celebrated the holiday first, on April 25, 1866, but only because newspaper editors fudged the date, said Richard Gardiner, an associate professor of history education at Columbus State University in Georgia, and co-author of "The Genesis of the Memorial Day Holiday" (Columbus State University, 2014).
Columbus, Georgia, where the concept of honoring the soldiers who died in the American Civil War originated, celebrated it a day later, on April 26, 1866, along with dozens of other cities, Gardiner said. [6 Civil War Myths, Busted]
Columbus, Mississippi, may have celebrated Memorial Day first, but "what's not true is that they came up with the idea," Gardiner told Live Science.
In fact, there are many contenders for where Memorial Day started. Some say it started in Waterloo, New York, in 1866, and President Lyndon B. Johnson even signed a proclamation saying so in 1966. But historians have since discredited that claim, Gardiner said. Still, some people still trumpet the claim, including the village of Waterloo itself.
Here's why: In the 1880s, a reporter interviewed a source who thought that Waterloo celebrated the day in 1866, but the newspaper later ran a correction saying it was actually 1868. Still, not every newspaper that ran the story included the correction, leading some people to think that Waterloo was the first to celebrate the holiday that Americans call Memorial Day, Gardiner said.
Others, including David Blight, a professor of history at Yale University, say the first Memorial Day happened in Charleston, South Carolina, according to The New York Times. On May 1, 1865, workmen honored and buried dead soldiers from the Union Army at a racetrack that had been turned into a war prison, Blight told The New York Times.
However, there's no evidence that this event sparked the national holiday, Gardiner said. People have honored dead soldiers and decorated their graves since the beginning of time, he added.
"It's not a question of who was the first person to decorate a grave," Gardiner said. "That does not create a holiday."

How Memorial Day started

Memorial Day's date has changed over the years, but the very first holiday was planned for April 26, 1866, in the wake of the American Civil War.
In January 1866, the Ladies' Memorial Association in Columbus, Georgia, passed a motion agreeing that they would designate a day to throw flowers on the graves of fallen soldiers buried at the cemetery, Gardiner said.
However, the ladies didn't want this to be an isolated event, so Mary Ann Williams, the group's secretary, wrote a letter and sent it to newspapers all over the United States.
"You'll find that letter in dozens of newspapers," Gardiner said. "It got out, and it was republished everywhere in the country."
In the letter, the ladies asked people to celebrate the war's fallen soldiers on April 26 — the day the bulk of Confederate soldiers surrendered in North Carolina in 1865.
"That's what many people in the South considered to be the end of the war," Gardiner said. Even though Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered on April 9, "there were still90,000 people ready to fight. And until those 90,000 surrendered on April 26, the war was effectively still going on," Gardiner said. [Album: Faces and Injuries of the Civil War]
But the date wasn't printed correctly in every newspaper, which led Columbus, Mississippi, to celebrate the holiday a day earlier, on April 25. Despite the mix-up, Columbus, Mississippi, is often credited as the birthplace of Memorial Day, Gardiner said.
In one of his 2010 weekly addresses, President Barack Obama said just that: "On April 25, 1866, about a year after the Civil War ended, a group of women visited a cemetery in Columbus, Mississippi, to place flowers by the graves of Confederate soldiers who had fallen at Shiloh," he said.
Gardiner said, "I don't contest that. But the evidence is abundantly clear that they were simply following what the newspaper had suggested that they do." Rather, it was the women of Columbus, Georgia, who thought of the idea, he said.

Flowers for all

On April 26, 1866, people across the South heeded Williams' letter and threw flowers on the graves of Civil War soldiers. Some Southern women noticed that Yankee graves, interspersed with the graves of their loved ones, sat untended, Gardiner said.
"They start to see these Union graves that are just laying there, kind of barren," he said. "Their hearts are warmed. Their hearts start to feel bad for the mothers who have lost these children. So, they start to throw flowers on the Yankee graves. And then that story gets published everywhere."
- See more at: http://www.livescience.com/54919-true-story-behind-first-memorial-day.html#sthash.01gkZPos.dpufThe following are copies of the service record of my paternal great-great grandfather and Confederate soldier Sergeant Jackson S. Roden, Company A, 48th Alabama Infantry Regiment, CSA. Mr. Jackson Roden was born in Blount County, Alabama to Thomas L. Roden & Sevilla Roden in the year 1829. He was a poor farmer and a non-slaveowner. He had a wife: Nancy Jane Buchannan (Married in 1857); and two children: Lougany Isabell Roden (born in 1858) and my great-grandfather Thomas Benton Roden (born in 1860). On April 7, 1862, Jackson Roden joined Company A of the 48th Alabama Infantry CSA commanded by Captain A.J. Alldredge.

The 48th served in General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia in the 2nd Corps under Lt. General Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson in General Evander M. Law's Brigade at all the major battles of the Eastern Theater of the War. 

He would fight throwing rocks at the Yankee invaders in the railroad cut at the Battle of 2nd Manassas. Struggle through the smoke in the cornfields at Sharpsburg. Stand tall against the Federals at Fredericksburg -- where he would be wounded and miss the Battle of Chancellorsville and the unfortunate death of Stonewall Jackson. He would crawl through the rocks and the oppressive summer heat in Devils Den at the Battle of Gettsyburg -- now under General James Longstreet's command. Then finally he would travel to the west with the rest of Laws Brigade to help stop the Yankees with the Confederate Army of Tennessee at a place in northern Georgia called Chickamauga -- "The River of Death" -- where at the ripe old age of 34 he would be killed in battle along with just over 11,300 other brave Confederate soldiers killed and wounded between September 19 & 20, 1863. 

His family was fortunate enough to have his body recovered and sent home to Alabama where Jackson was laid to rest beneath a tree in a family cemetery near Guntersville, Alabama. 

Page 1 of my ancestor's service record. 
Courtesy State of Alabama Dept. of Archives

Page 2 of my ancestor's service record.
Courtesy State of Alabama Dept. of Archives

The gravestone of Sgt. Jackson S. Roden, Co. A, 48th Alabama Infantry
Regiment, Laws Brigade, Army of Northern Virginia, CSA.
The grave is located at Roden Cemetery near Guntersville, Alabama, USA.
Photo courtesy of Find A Grave.

Though I have never met him, nor even managed to find the time to take the long trek to northern Alabama from upstate South Carolina to visit his grave, nor even visited the battlefield and where he died over 153 years ago; I am proud of him for his service in defense of his home and native Southland. I am honored to be his descendant and proud to know that the same blood that spirit that helped him through battle lives on in me and my siblings and their children. 

Someday soon -- probably in the next year or two, God willing when I have the financial means to do so -- I will take the trip to visit his grave in Alabama and visit the Chickamauga & Chattanooga National Military Park, and will of course chronicle the journey here at Southern Fried Common Sense & Stuff. 


Celebrating Confederate Memorial Day on May 10th

Every first Saturday in May, I open an old family trunk and pull out a folded medium Confederate gray wool uniform coat, pants and brown wide-brimmed hat (or a gray kepi cap). I carefully place a small black cockade with a weathered droopy-winged eagle button with the letters "AVC" sewn in the middle onto the right breast of the jacket. I usually just wear the replica uniform and no other military equipment save for a carpetbag haversack of a type used by soldiers at the time and maybe a belt with a square brass CSA buckle.

After dressing up in period costume I get into my car and make a yearly trip to Columbia, South Carolina to attend an annual event sponsored by the South Carolina Divisions of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SC SCV) and United Daughters of the Confederacy (SC UDC) honoring over 18,600 Southern men and boys from my home state who -- like my great-great-grandfather -- in devotion to duty, fought and died in moral defense of home, family, native land, and Southern independence (in that order). 

The weekends both before and after the 10th of May every year see dozens of large and small services across both Carolinas in honor of Confederate Memorial Day. These services include church services and speeches talking about the lives of those who came before us and why remembering them is important. Graves of the honored Confederate dead being cleared of weeds, cleaned and honored with fresh flowers and small Dixie Cross banners placed by men, women and children by the tombstones. "Widows" in period mourning attire setting black roses on stone cemetery walls, or local Confederate monuments. Rifle and cannon salutes fired over, or near the graves of the dead by reenactors clad in reproductions of the hallowed gray and butternut uniforms worn by the Confederate citizen soldier. More gray-clad reenactors sharing drinks from their canteens and cups over the headstones of the honored dead. Finally, several of these services continue, or conclude, with parades of Confederate descendants in uniform, period clothes (or just their plain Sunday best at times) marching to a drumbeat beneath one of the several types of Confederate battle flags and former Confederate national banners.

Confederate soldier reenactors of the 16th SC Color Guard
preforming a "canteen ceremony" at the graves of Confederate dead in
Greenville, South Carolina in May 2016.

To many living today -- especially those who have little knowledge of the history of Confederate Memorial Day and its origins -- the act of honoring soldiers who fought and died in a lost cause (and some would say an "unworthy" one, even a "treasonous" one) might seem a bit strange, perhaps even suspicious? So much pomp simply to honor men who lost a war? Why? 

To answer that question, I need to first tell y'all the story of the very first Confederate Memorial Day and the history of why it is celebrated on May 10th in North and South Carolina. 


The Significance of May 10th

The 10th of May is the date of two very significant major events in Southern-Confederate history. 

The first event took place on Sunday, May 10, 1863, when Lt. General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson died from complications due to pneumonia eight days after he was shot and his left arm amputated during the Battle of Chancellorsville, VA. 

His tragic death (accidentally shot by some of his own soldiers in the confusion of night on the battlefield while scouting ahead and his staff being mistaken for Union cavalrymen) was a crippling blow to the Army of Northern Virginia, and is believed by many historians to be the turning point in the fortunes of Lee's Confederate army prior to the decisive Battle of Gettysburg on July 1-3, 1863. 

The second event took place two years later on Wednesday, May 10, 1865 when Union cavalrymen raided a Confederate encampment near Irwinsville, Georgia and captured Confederate President Jefferson Davis, who was attempting to flee with his family and others to Texas to continue the fight. 

The capture and later imprisonment of Davis is considered by many of have been the official defeat of the Confederate government itself, despite the fact that the two main Confederate armies themselves surrendered the month before, and other Southern forces were surrendering to federal control. The Confederate States government in reality had already fallen apart and virtually ceased to exist by that point. Davis' capture itself was largely a formality, but a significant one for the Republican-controlled Union government.  

Only the former Confederate States of North and South Carolina recognize May 10th as Confederate Memorial Day. Other Southern States recognize the holiday both officially and unofficially on other days, the reason for which will be explained later in this post.


In Honor Of The Confederate Dead

Southern ladies decorating the graves of Confederate General Thomas J. "Stonewall"
Jackson and family in Lexington, Virginia in the late 19th century.

At the end of the War in 1865, the women of the Soldier's Aid Society of Columbus, Georgia began the practice of caring for the graves of Confederate dead buried in Linwood Cemetery. 

In the spring of 1866, Mrs. Elizabeth "Lizzie" Rutherford Ellis inspired by a novel she had been reading (The Initials by Baroness Jemima von Tautphoeus) which mentioned the custom of caring for the graves of dead heroes, suggested that a special day be set aside yearly in order to decorate Confederate soldiers' graves and honor them. Her suggestion was warmly received by the women of the Columbus Soldier' Aid Society, and they reorganized their group into the Ladies' Memorial Association.

The new group's first act was to pass a resolution to set aside one day annually to memorialize the Confederate dead. The date for the new holiday decided on was April 26, the first anniversary of Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston's final surrender to Union Major General William T. Sherman at Bennett Place, North Carolina. For many in the South at the time, that marked the official end of the War.

Historic marker dedicated to the first Confederate Decoration Day
in Columbus, GA.

Additionally, the secretary of the association, Mrs. Mary Ann Williams was directed to author a letter inviting the ladies in every Southern state to join them in the observance. The letter was written in March of 1866 and sent to all of the principal cities in the South, including: Atlanta, Montgomery, Memphis, Richmond, St. Louis, Alexandria, Columbia, New Orleans, and ect. 

The women wrote, "We can keep alive the memory of debt we owe [the fallen soldiers] by dedicating at least one day in each year, by embellishing their humble graves with flowers. Therefore we beg the assistance of the press and the ladies throughout the South to help us in the effort to set apart a certain day to be observed." 

Photograph showing the first Confederate Decoration Day officially
being honored at Linwood Cemetery in Columbus, GA in April 1866.

On Thursday, April 26, 1866, tens of thousands of Southern women across Dixie commemorated the first Confederate Memorial Day (then known as Confederate Decoration Day). However, some in the northernmost portions of the Southland did not participate because their spring flowers were not yet in bloom. Consequently, they selected dates later in the spring to hold their first Confederate Memorial Days. For example, parts of Virginia chose May 10, commemorating Stonewall Jackson's death. Near Petersburg, VA, they chose June 9, the anniversary of a significant battle there. Others opted for Confederate President Jefferson Davis' birthday, June 3. By the end of the 19th century many southern communities were observing the event, and the formation of the Confederated Southern Memorial Association in Louisville, Kentucky, in May 1900 led to the widespread adoption of Confederate Memorial Day across the South on various days.

Honoring Confederate Memorial Day In The 21st Century

The State of South Carolina honors Confederate Memorial Day on May 10th every year as an official State Holiday. The State of North Carolina flies a Confederate 1st National Banner ("The Stars & Bars") on top of its State Capitol Building for four hours that morning. 

The States of Georgia, Alabama, and Florida honors Confederate Memorial Day on April 26th -- the historic date of the first Confederate Decoration Day. 

The States of Mississippi honors Confederate Memorial Day on the last Monday in April.

The States of Kentucky, Louisiana, and Tennessee honors Confederate Memorial Day on June 3rd -- the date of Confederate President Jefferson Davis' birthday (June 3, 1808).   

The States of Texas and Arkansas honors Confederate Heroes Day (also called Confederate Memorial Day) on January 19th -- the date of Confederate General Robert E. Lee's birthday (January 19, 1807). 

The State of Virginia honors the Confederate dead on May 30th, usually in conjunction with US Memorial Day.

Despite the alleged "controversial" nature of displaying Confederate symbols and honoring the Southern dead from the War Between the States (1861-1865) in America today due to the widespread regressive hatred towards Southern-Confederate historical heritage, the practice of honoring the Confederate dead by some Confederate ancestors still bravely continues. 

Confederate graves and monuments are decorated with flags, flowers and memorial wreaths out of respect for the soldiers who died. Hundreds of smaller, but still significant, ceremonies by proud Confederate descendants still take place annually across the American Southland.

A reenactor places Dixie Cross banners on the graves of Confederate dead.

UDC members portraying grieving "widows"
lay a memorial wreath at a Confederate marker.

Southern ladies wearing 19th century period attire.

A Southern boy paying respect to his Confederate ancestor.

A memorial wreath and flags placed at a
Confederate Soldier's Monument in Lancaster, SC. May 2017.

A rifle volley fired over Confederate graves in honor of the dead.
A soldier's salute.

SCV and UDC members - many reenactors in gray uniforms -
marching in a parade carrying Southern banners through downtown
Columbia, SC to the State Capitol grounds on May 6, 2017.

Young Southern ladies helping to decorate the graves of the Confederate dead.

Cannon salute during a Confederate Memorial Day service
in North Carolina in 2016.

Why do you ask?

Speaking as a proud descendant of one at least one of those men, I can tell you that it is not about honoring a war, or a "rebel" government, or even the causes of Southern secession. It is not even just about taking one day out of the year to publicly wearing itchy Confederate gray uniforms, waving Southern battle flags, special church services, or singing "Dixie". 

It is about honoring the dead and our own link to those soldiers -- those recognized American Veterans -- many of whom share our last names. Their blood and courage are our birthrights. We honor them because they are family and there is no statue of limitations on respect, honor and love. They are a part of who we are, a link of where we came from. There is no forgetting that without losing your sense of who you are and where you are going.

Its as simple as that. No more and never less.

Deo Vindice!

Credit: Columbus State University Archives

Here's a trivia question for armchair historians: Was the first Memorial Day celebrated in Columbus, Georgia, or Columbus, Mississippi?
According to strict calendric interpretation, Columbus, Mississippi, celebrated the holiday first, on April 25, 1866, but only because newspaper editors fudged the date, said Richard Gardiner, an associate professor of history education at Columbus State University in Georgia, and co-author of "The Genesis of the Memorial Day Holiday" (Columbus State University, 2014).
Columbus, Georgia, where the concept of honoring the soldiers who died in the American Civil War originated, celebrated it a day later, on April 26, 1866, along with dozens of other cities, Gardiner said. [6 Civil War Myths, Busted]
Columbus, Mississippi, may have celebrated Memorial Day first, but "what's not true is that they came up with the idea," Gardiner told Live Science.
In fact, there are many contenders for where Memorial Day started. Some say it started in Waterloo, New York, in 1866, and President Lyndon B. Johnson even signed a proclamation saying so in 1966. But historians have since discredited that claim, Gardiner said. Still, some people still trumpet the claim, including the village of Waterloo itself.
Here's why: In the 1880s, a reporter interviewed a source who thought that Waterloo celebrated the day in 1866, but the newspaper later ran a correction saying it was actually 1868. Still, not every newspaper that ran the story included the correction, leading some people to think that Waterloo was the first to celebrate the holiday that Americans call Memorial Day, Gardiner said.
Others, including David Blight, a professor of history at Yale University, say the first Memorial Day happened in Charleston, South Carolina, according to The New York Times. On May 1, 1865, workmen honored and buried dead soldiers from the Union Army at a racetrack that had been turned into a war prison, Blight told The New York Times.
However, there's no evidence that this event sparked the national holiday, Gardiner said. People have honored dead soldiers and decorated their graves since the beginning of time, he added.
"It's not a question of who was the first person to decorate a grave," Gardiner said. "That does not create a holiday."

How Memorial Day started

Memorial Day's date has changed over the years, but the very first holiday was planned for April 26, 1866, in the wake of the American Civil War.
In January 1866, the Ladies' Memorial Association in Columbus, Georgia, passed a motion agreeing that they would designate a day to throw flowers on the graves of fallen soldiers buried at the cemetery, Gardiner said.
However, the ladies didn't want this to be an isolated event, so Mary Ann Williams, the group's secretary, wrote a letter and sent it to newspapers all over the United States.
"You'll find that letter in dozens of newspapers," Gardiner said. "It got out, and it was republished everywhere in the country."
In the letter, the ladies asked people to celebrate the war's fallen soldiers on April 26 — the day the bulk of Confederate soldiers surrendered in North Carolina in 1865.
"That's what many people in the South considered to be the end of the war," Gardiner said. Even though Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered on April 9, "there were still90,000 people ready to fight. And until those 90,000 surrendered on April 26, the war was effectively still going on," Gardiner said. [Album: Faces and Injuries of the Civil War]
But the date wasn't printed correctly in every newspaper, which led Columbus, Mississippi, to celebrate the holiday a day earlier, on April 25. Despite the mix-up, Columbus, Mississippi, is often credited as the birthplace of Memorial Day, Gardiner said.
In one of his 2010 weekly addresses, President Barack Obama said just that: "On April 25, 1866, about a year after the Civil War ended, a group of women visited a cemetery in Columbus, Mississippi, to place flowers by the graves of Confederate soldiers who had fallen at Shiloh," he said.
Gardiner said, "I don't contest that. But the evidence is abundantly clear that they were simply following what the newspaper had suggested that they do." Rather, it was the women of Columbus, Georgia, who thought of the idea, he said.

Flowers for all

On April 26, 1866, people across the South heeded Williams' letter and threw flowers on the graves of Civil War soldiers. Some Southern women noticed that Yankee graves, interspersed with the graves of their loved ones, sat untended, Gardiner said.
"They start to see these Union graves that are just laying there, kind of barren," he said. "Their hearts are warmed. Their hearts start to feel bad for the mothers who have lost these children. So, they start to throw flowers on the Yankee graves. And then that story gets published everywhere."
- See more at: http://www.livescience.com/54919-true-story-behind-first-memorial-day.html#sth