Southern Patriotic Appeal at Wilmington, 1862

North Carolina War Between the States Sesquicentennial
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"The Official Website of the North Carolina WBTS Sesquicentennial Commission"
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“During a dress parade [at Camp Davis, near Wilmington] on the evening of May, 31 [1862], [Col. Collett Leventhorpe] read the infamous “Woman’s Order” (General Orders No. 28), issued by the Union commander of occupied New Orleans, Maj. Gen. Benjamin “Beast” Butler, in response to various indignities – spitting, curses, hateful glances, etc. – heaped upon the Yankee soldiers there. Leventhorpe told his troops [of the 11th, 43rd and 51st North Carolina Regiments]:

“Fellow soldiers: The infamous order which you have just heard, proceeds from the General, whom fortune of war has placed in possession of one of the noblest cities of the South. The base enemy we oppose, not content with crimes of invasion, with insurrectionary attempts among our domestic population, and with pillaging the fairest regions of our country, has now openly dared the threaten our most sacred relations, and to place our wives and daughters upon the footing of common prostitutes of the town.

Gentlemen of North Carolina, the debased passions of soldiery need no such incentive. The records of crime written in the sad annals of Maryland, and in those other unfortunate portions of our country which have been polluted by the enemy’s feet, prove but too well the fate, worse than death, which awaits those most dear to us in the event of his conquest and our humiliation.

But, fellow soldiers, with the blessing of god, we need fear no such destiny for our country. Relying then on that blessing, let us resolve as one man that Wilmington shall not be reached by the invader, and, in the hour or trial, recalling these scandalous threats against our wives and daughters of New Orleans, let us meet him sternly and hurl him back upon his beats at the point of a bayonet.” Read more at: http://www.ncwbts150.com/AtWarBattlegroundsHomefront.php

(Collett Leventhorpe, the English Confederate, Cole & Foley, McFarland & Co., 2007, pp. 70-71)
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Southern Patriotic Appeal at Wilmington, 1862