Just returned from the Abbeville Institute conference at Stone Mountain and was able to visit the new Memorial Walk on the lawn in front of the huge carving of Davis, Lee and Jackson. The Walk contains stops for each State in the American Confederacy, and I was deeply honored to assist Dr. Clyde Wilson with the text and images of the North Carolina block pictured below. The image of Captain Claudius Denson’s “Duplin Greys” [which later became Company E, 20th North Carolina Regiment] was used; and we also noted Major Charles M. Stedman, the last Southern veteran to serve in Congress. Many thanks to Dr. Don Livingston of the Abbeville Institute for his herding the Memorial Walk project along.
Born in Pittsboro, Stedman enlisted in the Fayetteville Light Infantry in 1861 and campaigned with Lee and Jackson -- wounded three times. At the sad retreat of Lee’s army from Petersburg to Appomattox in 1865, General Louis G. Young of Georgia said of Major Stedman: “In my memory is vividly stamped the face and figure of Major C. M. Stedman, of the 44th North Carolina Regiment, as he advanced to meet me, his sword drawn and raised, saying in loud tones: “Our men are ready to advance and only await the command.” I was very much tempted to give the command, and many a time since wished I had.”
After the war Stedman married Katherine DeRosset Wright, daughter of Joshua Grainger Wright. He established the law practice of Wright & Stedman in 1867, was elected lieutenant-governor of North Carolina in 1884, serving from 1885-1889, and in 1898 moved to Greensboro. He owned the impressive Taylor home on Market Street which he sold to the Wilmington Light Infantry in the early 1890’s. He is buried in Fayetteville’s Cross Creek Cemetery.
Both the Duplin Greys and Stedman are now properly immortalized in Georgia granite at the Stone Mountain memorial.
Bernhard Thuersam
Brock:
ReplyDeleteWOW ! ! !
How do you DO it?
You post so much interesting stuff, and do it so quickly, I can't even BEGIN to keep track of it all!
You must have a humongous professional staff, working in a warehouse filled with banks of computers, running twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.
How in the world do you manage it all?
I'm lucky if I can post one item every few days on my own web site, and even with that, my physical health is totally wrecked from spending too much time on my computer.
Because I'm so slow, it literally takes me several HOURS just to create one post, which being a finicky perfectionist, I then have to go back and edit, over and over.
How am I ever going to be able to sort through and read all this stuff you post several times a day, each and every day?
You sure as Sam Hill ain't no ordinary Tar Heel.
Thank you.
John Robert Mallernee
Armed Forces Retirement Home
Gulfport, Mississippi 39507
Brock, Et Alia:
ReplyDeleteOne of the memories of my childhood was our annual vacation, when we'd drive in the Chevrolet from Spring Lake, North Carolina to Jasper, Alabama to visit Grammaw and Grampaw.
Daddy was a Master Sergeant at Fort Bragg, so he got a paid thirty day leave every year.
This was before the freeways were built, so whenever we made that trip, whether we were going to Alabama, or returning to North Carolina, we always went past Stone Mountain, and I'd stare at the carvings and wonder about it.
In later years, I learned that Mama and Daddy were not sympathetic to the Confederacy, and that's why they never talked about it to us kids.
I also remember travelling through downtown Atlanta, Georgia, and seeing the railroad tracks and the huge "MERITA" sign on a bakery, which made me hope I'd get to see the Lone Ranger riding on his horse in downtown Atlanta, for as you may remember, "THE LONE RANGER" television series was sponsored by Merita bread, and being a kid, I thought it was real, and didn't know any better.
Another scene I distinctly remember from those days, which when driving that route, I never see anymore, was the huge Seaboard and Atlantic Coast Line railroad yards in South Carolina, not too many miles from the North Carolina state line.
Do you remember any of those things?
Thank you.
John Robert Mallernee
Armed Forces Retirement Home
Gulfport, Mississippi 39507
:)
ReplyDeleteCertainly do, especially walking to my friend's house down the block from me in Burlington every Saturday night to listen to the Lone Ranger at 6 because we didn't have a radio. I was living with my grandparent's then.:)
My grandfather was a character!:)
Chahttp://www.namsouth.com/viewtopic.php?t=837&highlight=kooncerles Franklin Koonce
My grandfather was a big boozer and gambler. Once he was drinking and playing cards with his cronies when the subject of the election for the Raleigh Police Chief came up. Somehow, my grandfather took a bet that he could win it, which he did. However, he resigned after only 18 months, because he said he couldn't keep arresting his best friends, the bootleggers! This was in 1917.
Years later when he was on an extended drinking spree, my grandmother took over management of Panacea Springs Hotel outside of Littleton, NC. Once the doctor came and told my grandmother that my grandfather would have to be put in the hospital, but she didn't understand why. The doctor told her that my grandfather didn't even know where he was, and needed to dry out for a while!
Evidently, my father and my uncle took after him, as they would drive from town to town in NC taking bets between the two of them as to who could drink the most beers during each trip!