PREFACE.
When one considers what it is and what it stands for, there is no object in or near Washington City better worth a visit and a careful study than the Confederate Monument in the National Cemetery at Arlington. This booklet is intended to give concisely the data from which such a study can be made, not only by those who are’; fortunate enough themselves to see the monument, but by those also who must rely on descriptive statements and pictures.
In its origin and in itself this memorial is entirely without a parallel in history. Its story has been here carefully told, and every effort has been made in the narrative to do justice to all the organizations that have co-operated patriotically in the production of the monument. For its full significance the writer relies much on the carefully prepared address of President Taft, welcoming the U. D. C. in 1912 to the National Capital; that of Mrs. McClurg in reply; that of Mrs. Stevens, the President-General of the U. D. C, when she presented the memorial to the President of the United States in 1914, and that of President Wilson in reply. These speeches are here given in full, as are also all the addresses delivered at the laying of the corner-stone and at the unveiling of the monument. Each presents a separate study of the meaning of the monument made from a separate angle. The two women, whose addresses are given, Mrs. Stevens and Mrs. McClurg, are representative Southerners. President Taft and President Wilson in their speeches are at their best. Mr. Bryan’s address at the laying of the corner-stone was from the standpoint of a statesman. The Master of Ceremonies and Corporal Tanner, who spoke on that occasion, had fought each other at the Second Manassas where Mr. Tanner lost both legs. The representatives of the Union and Confederate armies, General Bennett H. Young and General Washington
Gardner, who spoke at the unveiling, made carefully prepared speeches that stand for the best sentiment of their respective organizations, and Colonel Robert E. Lee’s eloquent speech was like an echo from his noble grandfather, many of whose noted sayings he repeated and emphasized. To carefully read all these speeches will be to appreciate the blessings of American institutions, and to understand how a grandson of General Lee could say at the unveiling, “There is no firmer foundation for the hopes of the Nation than this monument at Arlington.”
Chapter I is largely a reproduction of the story of the monument given by the author to the public as a prospectus of the unveiling.
Chapter II is an attempt to picture as a body the United Daughters of the Confederacy who, with the loving co-operation of Veterans and Sons of Veterans, built and presented the monument to the Nation.
The monument itself is a group of 33 figures, pedestal and all in bronze. Chapter V contains four pictures of it, one each from the South, North, East and West, together with an effort by the author to explain; the figures composing the monument.
Three full months have now passed since the monument was unveiled, and so (far as is known it has been universally commended. It is perhaps not too much to hope that in the great future, when art lovers have become familiar with it, the Confederate Monument in the National Cemetery at Arlington will rank among the famous art works of the world.
Hilary A. Herbert.
Washington, D. C, October, 1914.
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA ORGANIZATION.
- December, 1906.
- President Mrs. Magnus S. Thompson
- First Vice-President Colonel Hilary A. Herbert
- Second Vice-President
- Recording Secretary Mrs. Drury C. Ludlow
- Corresponding Secretary Miss Mary Desha
- Treasurer Rev. Dr. Randolph H. McKim
- Executive Board:
- Colonel Hilary A. Herbert. Hon. Francis M. Cockrell
- Hon. Seth Shepard. Hon. Charles J. Faulkner.
- Rev. Dr. R. H. McKim. Captain John M. Hickey.
- General Frank C. Armstrong (Deceased)
Members:
- Seven, each, from Camp 171, U. C. V.; Sons of Veterans District, Colonel Stonewall Jackson Chapter, U. D. C.;
- R. E. Lee Chapter, U. D. C.;
- Southern Cross Chapter, U. D. C.;
- Albert Sidney Johnston Chapter, U. D. C.
ARLINGTON CONFEDERATE MONUMENT ASSOCIATION,
- U. D. C. Organization, November, 1907.
- Membership, 1914.
- Mrs. Daisy McLaurin Stevens, President-General, U. D. C, President ex-oficio.
- In January, 1907, Mrs. Ralph Walsh, being newly elected President D. C. U. D. C, became ex-oficio President, vice Mrs. Thompson, retiring D. C. President U. D. C.
DIRECTORS.
- Alabama — Mrs. Clifford A. Lanier.
- Arizona — Miss Salome Townsend.
- Arkansas — Mrs. Clementine Boles.
- California — Miss Bessie Topp.
- Colorado— Mrs. J. A. Lovell.
- Florida — Mrs. John W. Tench.
- Georgia — Mrs. James A. Rounsaville.
- Illinois— Mrs. John Willis Heatfield.
- Indiana — Mrs. James T. Cabiness.
- Kentucky — Miss Caby M. Froman.
- Louisiana — Miss Doriska Gautreaux.
- Maryland — Mrs. Frank G. Odenheimer.
- Mexico— Mrs. J. R. Stamford.
- Minnesota— Mrs. Helen G. M. Paul.
- Mississippi — Mrs. Lillie F. Worthington.
- Missouri — Mrs. James Britton Gantt.
- Montana — Mrs. Georgia Young.
- Nebraska — Mrs. Elijah Conklin.
- New Mexico — Mrs. Jo Cato.
- New York — Mrs. Chas. B. Goldsborough.
- North Carolina — Mrs. I. W. Faison.
- Ohio— Mrs. Mary E. Wiltberger.
- Oklahoma — Mrs. Ruth Clement.
- Oregon — Mrs. Nannie Duff Silva.
- Pennsylvania — Mrs. T. Ashby Blythe.
- South Carolina— Mrs. Thos. W. Keitt.
- Tennessee — Mrs. J. W. Clapp.
- Texas— Mrs. J. B. Dibrell.
- Utah — Mrs. Ada Atkins Schooling.
- Virginia — Mrs. Thos. S. Bocock.
- Washington — Mrs. Marie B. Sayre.
- West Virginia — Mrs. Ben Davis.
The following served terms as Directors, several of them with great zeal and efficiency:
- Alabama, Mrs. Chappell Cory;
- California, Mrs. F. D. Johnston, Mrs. W. N. Perry;
- Colorado, Mrs. A. J. Emerson;
- Illinois, Mrs. G. J. Grommet;
- Louisiana, Mrs. I). A.. S. Vaught, Mrs. George B. Dermody;
- Minnesota, Mrs. Frank L. Burnett;
- Mississippi, Miss Olivia H. Champion;
- New Mexico, Mrs. Robert Bradley;
- New York, Mrs. John J. Crawford;
- Pennsylvania. Mrs. Charles R. Robinson;
- West Virginia, Miss Charlotte Lee Wilson, Mrs. John Davis Greenwade, Mrs. Dudlev, Mrs. Walter C. Pollock.
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE A. C. M. ASSOCIATION, U. D. C.
- Colonel Hilary A. Herbert, Chairman
- Mrs. Marion Butler, Vice-Chairman
- Mr. Wallace Streater, Treasurer
- Mrs. Driiry Conway Ludlow, Rec. Secretary
- Mrs. Wm. Oscar Roome, Cor. Secretary
- Hon. Seth Shepard. Miss Mary R. Wilcox.
- # Captain John M. Hickey. Mrs. Jennie L. Munroe.
- Mr. Abner H. Ferguson. Mrs. Leonard G. Hoffman.
- Mrs. Magnus S. Thompson. Mrs. Marcus J. Wright.
- Mrs. Rust Smith. Mrs. Lindley L. Lomax.
- * Mrs. Jas. E. Mulcare. Mrs. Wm. Anthony Wayne.
- * Mrs. Archibald Young. Miss Fannie W. Weeks.
- Mrs. B. Claughton West. Mr. F. R. Fravel.
Those marked * have served continuously from the beginning.
ADVISORY BOARD, A. C. M. ASSOCIATION.
- * Rev. Dr. Randolph H. McKim. * General Francis M. Cockrell
- * Hon. Chas. J. Faulkner. * Hon. J. J. Darlington.
- * Hon. Seth Shepard. * General Marcus J. Wright.
- * Dr. Thomas Nelson Page, L.L.D. * Mr. J. T. Callaghan
- Hon. Thomas Caffey. Dr. thos. M. Owen, LL.D.
Those marked * have served continuously from the beginning.
J. H. Britt served a term on the Executive Committee, resigned.
Chapters sometimes rotated representatives. The following served terms on the Executive Committee :
- Mrs. R. H. Bocock. Mrs. Helen B. Kendig.
- Mrs. William Youngblood. Mrs. C. C. Calhoun.
- Miss Mary Desha (Deceased). Mr. J. M. Britt.
- Mrs. A. E. Johnson. Mr. Geo. S. Covington.
- Mrs. Mattie Ashley Birney.
COMMITTEE ON DESIGN.
- Appointed November, 1909.
- Chainnaii, Mrs. Cornelia Branch Stone.
- Rev. Randolph H. McKim, D.D., LL.D.
- Mrs. Marion Butler.
- Hon. Seth Shepard, Chief Justice Court of Appeals, Dist. Col.
- * Colonel Hilary A. Herbert.
- Mrs. Thos. W. Keitt.
- Mr. Wallace Streater.
- ^ Appointed by Mrs. McSherry, who, on her election as President-General, resigned her place on the Board to make the vacancy.
COMMITTEE ON PUBLICATION. ^
- Miss Mary R. Wilcox, Chairman.
- Mrs. James E. Mulcare.
- Mrs. Rust Smith.
DAISY MCLAURIN STEVENS, PRESIDENT-GENERAL U. D. C.
MRS. CORNELIA BRANCH STONE, PRESIDENT DENT- GENERAL 1907-9, AND CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEE ON DESIGN
MRS. VIRGINlA FAULKNER MCSHERRY, PRESIDENT-GENERAL 1909-11
MRS. ALEXANDERS WHITE, PRESIDENT-GENERAL 1911-13
MISS SALOME TOWNSEND. ARIZONA
MRS. .J. A. L0VELL. COLORADO
MRS. JAS. T. CABINESS, MRS. JOHN W. TENCH, MRS.CLEMENTINE BOLES
INDIANA, FLORIDA, ARKANSAS
MRS. JOHN WILLIS HEATFIELD. MRS.CABY M.FROMAN, ILLINOIS, KENTUCKY
DIRECTORS.
MISS DORIS K AGAUTREAUX, LOUISIANA
MRS. HELEN G.M.PAUL, MINNESOTA
MRS. ELIJAH CONKUN, MRS. JAMES BRINONGANTT, MRS. FRANK G. ODENHEIMER
NEBRASKA, MISSOURI, MARYLAND
MRS. GEORGIA YOUNG, MONTANA
MRS. I. W. FAIS0N, NORTH CAROLINA
DIRECTORS.
MRS. NANNY DUFF SUVA, OREGON
MRS. IASH BYBLYTHE, PENNSYLVANIA
MRS.J.B.DIBRELL, TEXAS
MRS.TH0S.W.KEITT, SOUTH CAROLINA
MRS.ADA ATKINS SCHOOLING, UTAH
DIRECTORS.
MRS. CLIFFORD A. LANIER, ALABAMA
MRS. JAMES A. ROUNSAVILLE, GEORGIA
MRS. J. W. CUPP, TENNESSEE
MRS. CHAS. B. GOLDSBOROUGH, NEW YORK
MRS. TH0S.. S. BOCOCK, VIRGINIA
MRS. BEN DAVIS, WEST VIRGINIA
MRS. MARIE B. SAYRE, WASHINGTON
DIRECTORS.
MISS BESSIE TOPP, CALIFORNIA
MRS. MARION BUTLER, VICE-CHAIRMAN
MRS. JO CATO, DIRECTOR, NEW MEXICO
MRS. DRURY CONWAY LUDLOW, RECORDING SECRETARY
MRS. WILLIAM OSCAR ROONIE, CORRESPONDING SECRETARY
MR. WALLACE STREATER, TREASURER, A.C.M. A.
M. EZEKIEL, SCULPTOR.
SOUTH FRONT.
CHAPTER I.
A CONFEDERATE MONUMENT IN A NATIONAL CEMETERY, AND WHY.
“But monuments themselves memorials need.” — Crabbe.
The Washington Monument, to an untutored savage, would be a stupendous pile — and nothing more. To him who is versed in history, especially if he be an American, it is the noblest structure in the Universe. Its towering height, its noble proportions, its strength, its symmetry, these tell the story of Washington’s life — of the Revolution, of which Washington was the soul — of our Federal Constitution, over the framing and adoption of which Washington was the presiding genius — of the first eight years of our Government under the new
Constitution, through the perils of which Washington safely guided it — of Washington’s Farewell Address, in which his memorable appeal for the perpetuity of the Union showed how anxious and fearful he was lest that new Constitution of government might not be able to hold the States together. This is the story the Washington Monument recalls to every intelligent American who visits the Capital of his country.
Within plain sight of the Washington Monument, on a hill across the Potomac, at Arlington, there stands today another monument, and the tale it tells will be no less thrilling and no less interesting to future generations than is the story of George Washington ; it tells the story of how great the people grew to be for whom Washington spent his life — of how fiercely they fought each other over the disputed question that had been bequeathed to them by their ancestors, who could not themselves settle it, and how, out of their fratricidal war, that was the most desperate the world has ever seen, there emerged a completed nationality that Washington and others
of the fathers had wrought for, and prayed for, but had never lived to see.
This monument, standing in the National Cemetery at Arlington, takes up the story of our country where the Washington Monument leaves off; its unveiling was epochal. The first speaker was General Bennett Young, Commander of the United Confederate Veterans; the next, General Washington Gardner, Commander-in-Chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, followed by Colonel Robert E. Lee, grandson of the great Confederate General. Then Colonel Hilary A. Herbert, as Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Arlington Confederate
Monument Association, presented the monument to Mrs. Daisy McLaurin Stevens, President of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. She turned it over to the President of the United States who received it for the United States.
The Constitution.
Gladstone, a great Englishman, said in an article entitled “Kin beyond the Sea,” North American Reviczv, Sept., 1878, “The American Constitution is, so far as I can see, the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man.” But wise as that Constitution was, this is the view of it taken by the fathers, according to an authoritative American historian, Henry Cabot Lodge: “When the Constitution was adopted by the votes of States in popular conventions, it is safe to say there was not a man in the country, from Washington and Hamilton, on the one side, to George Clinton and George Mason on the other, who regarded the new system as anything but an experiment, entered into by the States and from which each and every State had the right to withdraw, a right which was likely to be exercised.”
What caused the fathers of the Constitution to regard it as an experiment was their inability to settle in it the question whether a state could withdraw from the Union.
The material progress of the country under that Constitution was so amazing as to cause Charles Darwin, who accounted for he progress of all animated creatures by his theory of natural selection, to say, in his Descent of Man:
“There is apparently much truth in the belief that the wonderful progress of the United States, as well as the
character of the people, are the result of natural selection; for the more energetic, restless, and courageous men from all parts of Europe have emigrated during the last ten or twelve generations to that great country, and have there succeeded best. Looking to the distant future, I do not think that the Rev. Mr. Zincke takes an exaggerated view when he says : ‘All other series of events — as that which resulted in the culture of mind in Greece, and that which resulted in the empire of Rome — only appear to have purpose and value when viewed in connection with, or rather as subsidiary to * * * the great stream of Anglo-Saxon emigration to the west.”
Secession.
With the wonderful growth of our country in material prosperity and prestige and power, love of the Union, at the North, ripened, until people there forgot the beliefs of their fathers, and came to look upon the Union as indissoluble, and upon secession as a crime. This the fathers had hoped would be universal.
But a long controversy over slavery had checked the growth of Union sentiment in the South, and in 1860-1861 eleven Southern States, adhering to the beliefs of the fathers, seceded from the Union, set up the old Constitution, amended so as to express what they believed the fathers meant, and sought to maintain it in a separate government. Issue was joined, Confederates and Federals were fighting for the preservation of the
same constitution — one side, under a government at Richmond, the other, under the old government at Washington.
The people who, Darwin said, had broken the world’s record in progress, were now to make a world’s record in war.
War.
The war that followed was a death-grapple — a question, not of courage, but of endurance, of superior numbers and resources, and was fought out for four long years, and decided, not on one, or on a hundred, but on a thousand battlefields. It was the bloodiest war in history. Captain Battine, an English expert, in the “Crisis of the Confederacy,” 1905, writing after the Russo-Japanese war, says:
“The American soldier” — speaking of Federals and Confederates — “still holds the world’s record for hard
Fighting.”
Restoration in England.
Oliver Cromwell died in 1759, and then came the Restoration. The Royalists exhumed his body, hanged it on a gibbet and stuck his head up on a pole. What had been done for his bones, malignity and ignorance did for his reputation for nearly two centuries. Then came Carlyle, the great historian, and public opinion in England now does full justice to Cromwell and his motives.
Reconciliation in America.
Within a single generation we in America have been able as among ourselves, “To reap the harvest of perpetual peace, By this our bloody trial of sharp war.”
After our war, passion and prejudice also, but only for a time, ran riot.
In 1867 the seceding States were subjected to the horrors of Congressional Reconstruction, but in a few years American manhood had triumphed ; Anglo-Saxon civilization had been saved ; local self-government under the Constitution had been restored ; ex-Confederates were serving the National Government, and true patriots. North and South, were addressing themselves to the noble task of restoring fraternal feeling between the sections.
Within a generation after Congressional Reconstruction, American historians condemned it, as unqualifiedly as Carlyle, after a lapse of 175 years, did the treatment of Cromwell’s memory. James Ford Rhodes has denominated Congressional Reconstruction as “a crime against civilization,” and public opinion seems to have approved the verdict.
Many causes had conduced to the fraternal relations that existed between the North and South when the war came on with Spain in 1898 — the exchange of visits between Union and Confederate organizations, the erection in 1895 of a Confederate monument in Chicago, the writings and speeches of broad-minded historians, editors, orators and statesmen, but more fundamental than all else had been two factors: One, the memory of the once much misunderstood Abraham Lincoln and his policies ; the other, the Federal Constitution.
Abraham Lincoln.
All men, South as well as North, after the grave had closed over Abraham Lincoln, came to see him as he was. He had warred for the Union “with charity for all and malice toward none.” To him the Confederates had always been his “erring fellow-citiizens.” He had been the avowed foe of the policy of Reconstruction, that was adopted by Congress when he was in his grave and could not longer combat it, and, always, he was for a Union of co-equal States.
The South once looked upon Abraham Lincoln as the impersonation of all that was odious. Two years ago, although there was difference of opinion as to the shape it should take, there was not a single voice, Northern or Southern, in Congress against granting him the most costly memorial ever voted by that body.
The Federal Constitution.
The other factor, the Federal Constitution, was more often than even the memory of Abraham Lincoln. Its bed-
rock is the equality of the States — home rule. It was love of, and reverence for, home-rule under that Constitution, that caused intelligent patriots everywhere to exult when the people of the seceding States recovered finally, in the seventies, their right of self-government.
They were not Southerners chafing under the domination of the alien and the freedman, but Southerners rejoicing in the restoration of home-rule, who were seen flocking to defend the flag of the Union in the war with Spain.
Prior to that war, not only had the Southern States reacquired the right to govern themselves under the Constitution, but during the two terms of Grover Cleveland as President the Southern people had come to feel that they once more had their fair share in the administration of the Federal Government, and the effect upon them was magnetic. They were once more in the home of their fathers.
The enthusiasm of the South for the flag in the war with Spain electrified the North, and when that war was over.
President McKinley, who had himself been a gallant Union soldier, made a speech at Atlanta, December 21, 1898, that touched the heart of the South as it never had been touched before. In it he said:
“Sectional lines no longer mar the map of the United States, sectional feeling no longer holds back the love we
bear each other. Fraternity is the National anthem, sung by a chorus of 45 States and our Territories at home and beyond the seas. The Union is once more the common altar of our love and loyalty, our devotion and sacrifice. The old flag once again waves over us in peace with new glories which your sons and ours have this year added to its “sacred folds.”
Genesis of the Monument.
Further on he said: “And the time has now come, in the evolution of public sentiment and feeling under the Providence of God, when in the spirit of fraternity we should share with you in the care of the graves of Confederate soldiers.”
This thought was like a seed sown in rich, warm soil; it took root at once; then came the plant and its growth, and now we have, in this monument, the full flower, already fruiting into a generous harvest of fraternal feeling.
On the same trip South at Macon, Georgia, an enthusiastic Southerner insisted on pinning a Confederate badge on the lapel of Mr. McKinley’s coat. The President smilingly wore it.
Following President McKinley’s Speech.
In their Annual Reunion at Charleston in 1899 the United Confederate Veterans thanked the President for his utterances at Atlanta.
In Washington, D. C, a committee of the “Broadway Rouss Camp” of Confederate Veterans, of which Dr. Samuel E. Lewis was chairman, and two members of which belonged also to “Camp 171,” began very early to investigate the graves, of Confederates in Washington City and its environs.
General Marcus J. Wright, an ex-Confederate, prepared a bill which, on motion of Senator Hawley, of Connecticut, an ex-Union soldier, became a law June 6, 1900, under which the bodies of 267 Confederate soldiers were gathered into a beautiful section of the National Cemetery at Arlington, adorned with walks and trees, and the name of every soldier, where available, was inscribed on a marble headstone.
The blue-print of the plot of this section, as it came from the hands of the officers of the War Department, had the round plot in the center marked conspicuously “M.”
The “Broadway Rouss” Committee had co-operated faithfully with the Department officials throughout all this work.
On the “Memorial Day,” next after the completion of the Confederate Section, the ex-Confederate organizations of Washington City, after decorating their own graves, “marched slowly over to the granite monument representing 2111 Union dead, and placed a tribute to Northern valor in the form of a large floral shield containing the words from President McKinley’s address, “In the Name of Fraternity,” June 7, 1903.
And President Roosevelt on that day sent as his tribute to the ex-Confederate dead a bountiful supply of beautiful flowers from the White House.
But all this had not come about without some opposition. The scars left by four years of war were deep, particularly at Richmond and New Orleans, and the efforts made by politicians, just after the war, to inflame the minds of Northern soldiers against their late adversaries, had not been without effect. In March, 1901, two prominent Southern women, one from Richmond and one from New Orleans, each representing what she insisted was the sentiment of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, had protested to the Secretary of War that the South did not wish its heroes interred at Arlington, but intended to remove their remains to its own soil ; and to support their protest these ladies cited resolutions by a Post of the G. A. R. in Philadelphia, insisting that no monuments or inscriptions be permitted in the National Cemetery “that were not in honor of the National flag.”
Secretary Root halted the re-interment.
But soon there came from the Confederate Veterans in Annual Reunion at Memphis an unqualified and unanimous endorsement of the Act of Congress, and from the U. D. C. throughout the country abundant evidence that they, too, desired the Department to carry on the good work. That “the thoughts of men are widened, with the process of the suns” is beautifully illustrated by what followed.
When the week in which the corner-stone of the Confederate Monument was laid at Arlington in November, 1912,
with its many patriotic ceremonials, was over, the two protesting ladies of 1901 expressed themselves as delighted ; and in the wonderful Gettysburg Reunion in June, 1913, all the Philadelphia G. A. R. Posts joined enthusiastically with their comrades throughout the great State of Pennsylvania, in welcoming and heaping honors on ex-Confederates as their guests. There was no objection to inscriptions or to Confederate flags
or uniforms.
After the Confederate section had been completed, with a mound in the center for a monument, the monument became a certainty.
A noble rivalry sprang up among Southerners and Southern organizations in the District of Columbia as to who should be first in the good work of erecting a monument to the Confederate dead at Arlington. Every State and large city in the South already had its memorials to the Confederate Soldier; it was the duty of Southerners in Washington City to look after their dead, now gathered into that Confederate Section at Arlington.
Mrs. Magnus Thompson, President of the Stonewall Jackson Chapter U. D. C, urged the matter of a monument at Arlington on the United Daughters of the Confederacy in their Annual Convention of 1902, and again in 1903 and 1905, but the U. D. C. then had their hands full of other matters. The time had not yet come for them to take up this work.
In 1904, the Robert E. Lee Chapter of Washington City, Mrs. John M. Hickey, President, began to collect money for it. By the 24th of February it had in hand $111.34, and later raised this sum to $1,000. The Stonewall Jackson Chapter soon afterwards raised $1,000.
On the 4th of March, 1906, Mrs. Magnus Thompson, District President U. D. C, through the Hon. John Sharp
Williams, obtained from the Hon. William H. Taft, who as Secretary of War was officially in charge of National Cemeteries, permission to erect the monument. Secretary Taft, to guard against any memorial that might give cause of complaint to any section of the country, or any inscription that might not be acceptable, reserved to the War Department the right to supervise both monument and inscription.
On the 13th of March, 1906, Mrs. Lizzie George Henderson, President-General U. D. C, replying to the Secretary
and fully recognizing the patriotic purpose that had inspired Mr. Taft, thanked him in the name of the U. D. C, adding: “And I wish to assure you that the U. D. C, an association of fifty thousand women, living in twenty-seven States of this Union, will do what they can to foster the kindly feelings for all our countrymen now growing up in the hearts of us all.”
The time had come to form an organization, and Camp 171, U. C. v., on the 7th of June, 1906, under a resolution
moved by Comrade John M. Hickey, appointed a committee to “provide ways and means to erect a monument in the Confederate Section at Arlington.” The committee was composed of Comrades Hickey, Herbert, Shepard, McKim, Callaghan, Hare and Carrington. Then on behalf of that committee, Comrade H. A. Herbert by letter requested Mrs. Magnus Thompson, as Division President of the U. D. C, to call upon the various Southern organizations in the District of Columbia to send delegations to a joint meeting for the purpose of forwarding a monument association. The call was made, the result was the “Arlington Confederate Monument Association,”
the personnel of which is given, pp. v, vi, vii, and the work of building a Confederate monument at Arlington was now under way.
EAST FRONT.
CHAPTER II.
The Arlington Confederate Monument Association.
At the Gulfport Convention, of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, in November, 1906, the Arlington Confederate Monument Association, which had been founded, as stated in Chapter I, at Washington City, appeared by the Chairman of its Executive Committee, who presented a petition asking the Convention to assist in the construction of the monument. The petition was signed by Mrs. Magnus Thompson, President, District of Columbia Division, U. D. C, the Presidents of five local Chapters, U. D. C, the representatives of Camp 305,
United Sons of Confederate Veterans and Camp ‘171, U. C. V. The scheme was approved by the Convention and $500.00 subscribed.
On the 19th of June, 1907, Mrs. Lizzie George Henderson, as President-General of the U. D. C, appeared before the Washington A. C. M. Association, and suggested to it in writing a plan : “The Arlington Confederate Monument Association to go before the U. D. C. Convention in Norfolk and ask the U. D. C. to take the work of erecting the monument,” the U. D. C, and the Veterans and Sons of Veterans in the District reserving to themselves certain powers and privileges.
The A. C. M. A. at Washington, had in November, 1907, accumulated, counting two sums of $1,000.00 each raised by the R. E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson Chapters, $3,460.00, but, as they worked, the magnitude and real import of the great task they had undertaken grew upon them. The monument was to be in the National Cemetery, near the National Capital at the former home of Robert E. Lee, and in memory of all the Confederate dead. There was wisdom in ]Mrs. Henderson’s suggestion. When, therefore, the U. D. C. Convention next assembled the A. C. M. A. was again before it. at Norfolk, by the Chairman of its ‘Executive Committee, Colonel Hilary A. Herbert, this time asking that body to take over the work without restriction. The trust was accepted unanimously. A committee was appointed to draft’ a plan for the reorganization of the Arlington Confederate Monument Association. This committee consisted of Mrs. Augustine T. Smythe, Mrs. Norman V. Randolph and Mrs. Ralph Walsh. The plan provided that : The President-General U. D. C, was to be ex-officio President. One Director was to be appointed in each State, in which, the U. D. C. had an organization by the President-General, on the recommendation of the State Division President.
An Executive Committee at Washington City, to be formed of three members from each of the two Camps U. C. V., one Camp Sons of Veterans, and three from, each of the five Chapters U. D. C. then in the District of Columbia.
The Executive Committee was empowered to appoint an Advisory Board of nine members, the President-General concurring.
Mrs. Cornelia Branch Stone was elected President-General at the Norfolk Convention. Directors were all promptly appointed, as provided for in the above scheme, and Mrs. Stone went from Norfolk immediately to Washington City where, during a stay of two weeks, she put into operation the remainder of the plans for the reorganization of the A. C. M. A. as provided for by the Convention. Members of an Advisory Board were appointed and regulations and by-laws formulated by the Executive Committee as then constituted,
all with the approval of the President-General.
The personnel of the Association is given on pp. v, vi, vii, as of the date of, and prior to the reorganization, and changes since made are noted.
Mrs. Stone was President-General for two years. During this period the monument fund had increased rapidly, and, at the Houston Convention U. D. C. in 1909, to the retiring President the time seemed to have arrived for the appointment of a Committee on Design. Mrs. Stone therefore in her final report presented six names for ratification as members of a Committee on Design, with a recommendation that the Convention should nominate and elect a seventh member, who should act as Chairman ; that this Committee should have plenary power to select and commission a sculptor and turn over the agreement with him to the Executive Committee, which was to carry out such agreement in all its details, as prescribed by the Committee on Design.
The Convention adopted this report and elected Mrs. Stone as seventh member and Chairman of the Committee on Design.
On the fifth day of November, 1910, in strict accordance with the powers that had been granted, a contract was made with Sir Moses Ezekiel to complete at his studio in Rome, Italy, within three years, a monument according to a design which he had orally outlined to the Committee : price and dates of payment being specified in the contract.
The contract when reported by Mrs. Stone to the U. D. C. Convention at Little Rock, Arkansas, in November, 1910, was enthusiastically ratified, and a resolution was passed directing that the cost price of the monument as expressed in the contract should be increased by $15,000.00, with “hopes of increasing” it by the further sum of $25,000.
The contract for the monument was soon afterwards modified by the Executive Committee and the artist as provided in this resolution of the Convention.
The genius of the artist was, under the original contract, fettered by nothing except cost price. The enlargement gave him wider scope and for three years he devoted himself to his great task, working through the summers in the hot climate of Rome. The studio in which he had fashioned the creations that had made him world-famous was commodious, but for this, his “chef-d’oeuvre,” he was compelled to erect a special building.
The Sculptor.
For a brief sketch of the Sculptor we take the following extracts from a beautiful paper by Mrs. Charles Herbert
Silliman entitled “Moses Ezekiel, Sculptor.”
“In Richmond, Va., on the 28th of October, 1844, Ezekiel was born.
At seventeen he went to Virginia Military Institute, Lexington. From there in 1864 lie marched with the 225 cadets the 100 miles to ‘Newmarket,’ where — side by side with seasoned veterans — these boys planted their company’s victorious flag upon the caisson of splendid Federal forces. All the experiences of active service, victory, defeat, feasting upon the full garner of the enemy and fasting on their own empty one, made impressions upon the youthful patriot that future years were to bring forth in deathless marble.
* * * Above the Speaker’s desk in Washington is his head of Jefferson; in the Navy Yard there is his Farragut; in the niches on the outside of the Corcoran Art Gallery are his colossal statues of great artists.
* * * In front of the rotunda of the University of Virginia is his Jefferson — spirited, refined, exalted in expression
— Jefferson in his young manhood, for he was only thirty-three when he wrote the Declaration of Independence.
His Mrs. Fisk and his exquisite recumbent statue of Mrs. Andrew D. White, are at Cornell University. So, in many
places in America, in homes, parks, galleries and institutions, his work is found and honored.
Abroad it is even more widely known and is found in every country in Europe.
The Emperor of Germany and the Grand Duke of Saxe Meiningen have conferred upon him the Cavalier Crosses; and the King of Italy the Cross of an Officer of the Crown. He has been honored and feted in all possible ways in appreciation and admiration of his surpassing genius and as a mark of the great esteem and love in which he is universally held.
“In Paris his ‘Christ Entombed’ reposes in the chapel built as a memorial to the victims of that frightful bazaar fire
which staggered humanity some years ago. One stands in awe and silence before this figure of majestic serenity — the power of final triumph is upon the beautiful face, and your heart is filled with the love that is past understanding. Sir Moses always puts the finishing touches himself upon the marble, and he devoted three years of patient labor to this one.
His Napoleon has been called the ‘History of Napoleon,’ so comprehensive is it, and it is now in Los Angeles, California.”
The artist had never sought the committee, but when called before it he had a design already in mind. This he outlined as a heroic-sized figure, typifying the South ; in her extended left hand a laurel wreath with which to crown the dead; her right hand resting on a plow-stock, and underneath, on a circular base, figures representing the heroism and sacrifices of the men and women of the South. The contract gave the artist a free hand.
While the artist was busy on his task at Rome the work of securing funds was being carried on by the splendid body of Directors, each in her own State. Every Chapter of the U. D. C, was appealed to, and although there were many other calls upon them, memorial, educational and charitable, it is believed that none failed to respond. Activities in different localities were various and continuous. A generous rivalry between Directors had sprung up and the work was always superintended and encouraged by the Presidents-General. The Executive Committee at Washington, all the Chapters of the U. D. C, in the District of Columbia, and Camp 171 U. C. V.,
were also helping to raise moneys for the monument.
Some liberal, but no very large, sums were subscribed. Small contributions were everywhere encouraged. Many thousands put in their mites. Here and there came voluntary donations from Union soldiers, but the Arlington Mounment is the work of Southern people.
Mrs. Lizzie George Henderson was President-General U. D. C, when the Convention at Gulfport made its first
contribution to the monument. Following her as Presidents-General came successively Mrs. Cornelia Branch Stone, Mrs. Virginia Faulkner McSherry, Mrs. Alexander White, and Mrs. Daisy McLaurin Stevens, who officiated at the unveiling. All these Presidents-General exercising a general superintendence over the work kept themselves in constant touch with the Executive Committee, cooperating with the Directors, and there were always funds on hand to meet every requirement.
WEST FRONT.
CHAPTER III.
The U. D. C. at Washington : Laying the Corner-Stone.
The gathering, in 1912, of the U. D. C. in their annual Convention at the National Capital to lay the corner-stone of
their monument, and their wonderful welcome, was a Reunion as notable and as fruitful in happy results as was the Gettysburg Reunion during the same year.
It was the first time the Daughters of the Confederacy had convened outside of Dixie. Washington City officially and socially flung its doors wide open. That Nation-wide organization, the Daughters of the American Revolution, also opened its doors. Through their patriotic President, Mrs. Matthew T. Scott, their home, the beautiful Continental Hall, was tendered, and there the Hon. Cuno H. Rudolph, President of the District Board of Commissioners, welcomed the U. D. C. to Washington City, and the President of the United States welcomed them to the Nation’s Capital. Mr. Taft’s speech went home to the hearts of the Daughters; it was history-making; the press throughout the Union published it, and the Senate of the United States had it printed as a public document.
The speeches of the evening were all received with enthusiasm by the audience that filled the building to overflowing. The hall was decorated with alternating Confederate and Federal flags, and an immense Union banner, all tastefully draped and grouped by United States sailors ; flowers came from Confederate organizations, private individuals, and the White House, and the Marine Band played “Dixie,” “The Star-Spangled Banner,” “My Old Kentucky Home.” “America,” and other appropriate selections.
The corner-stone of the monument at Arlington had been laid in the afternoon, and the Reception of the U. D. C. was at Continental Hall.
Evening, November 12, 1912.
Mrs. Marion Butler, President of the District of Columbia Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, introduced the President of the Board of Commissioners of the District of Columbia, who heartily welcomed the Daughters to the city in glowing words.
Mrs. Butler next introduced the President of the United States, Mr. Taft, saying:
“This is the first time the Daughters of the Confederacy have held an Annual Convention out of the South. We have assembled here to lay the corner-stone of a Confederate monument, to be erected at Arlington, the Federal Cemetery, the former home of Lee. Permission to build this monument was granted to the Daughters of the District of Columbia and the Confederate Veterans by Mr. Taft when Secretary of War. We deem it most fortunate and propitious that we are assembled in the National Capital for such a purpose and are to be welcomed by the same distinguished citizen, who is now President of the United States. We trust that the building of this
monument will be the keystone of the arch of a reunited country.
Ladies, the President.”
The President replied as follows : “Ladies of the United Daughters of the Confederacy:
I beg to welcome you to Washington. You have captured this city beautiful and made it more lovely by your presence. As its temporary head, I give you the freedom of the city, and recognize that in what you have done, you have founded a shrine and an altar here which will be visited in the future by many a faithful pilgrim.
f the occasion which brings you here were the mourning at the bier of a lost cause, I know that the nice sense of
propriety of a fine old social school would have prevented you from inviting me, as the President of the United States, to be present. You are not here to mourn or support a cause.
You are here to celebrate, and justly to celebrate, the heroism, the courage and the sacrifice to the uttermost of your fathers and your brothers and your mothers and your sisters, and of all your kin, in a cause which they believed in their hearts to be right, and for which they were willing to lay down their lives. That cause ceased to be, except in history, now more than half a century ago. It was one which could elicit from half a nation, and brave and warlike race, a four year struggle in which lives, property, and everything save honor were willingly parted with for its sake. So great was the genius for military leadership of many of your generals, so adaptable was the individual of your race to effective warlike training, so full of patriotic sacrifice were your people that
now when all the bitterness of the struggle on our part of the North has passed away, we are able to share with you of the South your just pride in your men and women who carried on the unexampled contest to an exhaustion that few countries ever suffered. The calm observer and historian, whatever his origin, may now rejoice in his heart that the Lord ordained it as it is. But no son of the South and no son of the North, with any spark in him of pride of race, can fail to rejoice in that common heritage of courage and glorious sacrifice that we have in the story of the Civil War and on both sides in the Civil War.
It has naturally taken a long time for the spirit of hostility that such an internecine struggle develops completely to die away. Of course it has lasted a less time with those who were the victors and into whose homes and domestic lives the borrows of war were not directly thrust. The physical evidences of war were traceable in the South for decades after they had utterly disappeared in the North in the few places in which they existed. Then there are conditions in the South which are a constant reminder of the history of the past. Until within recent decades, prosperity has not shed her boon of comfort upon the South with as generous a hand as upon the North. Hence those of us at the North who have been sometimes impatient at a little flash now and then of the
old sectional antagonism are unreasonable in our failure to appreciate these marked differences.
For years after the war, the Republican Party, which had carried the nation through the war to its successful conclusion, was in control of the administration of the Government, and it was impossible for the Southerner to escape the feeling that he was linked in his allegiance to an alien nation and one with whose destiny he found it difficult to identify himself. Time, however, cures much, and after awhile there came a Democratic Administration of four years, and then another one of four years. Southerners were called to Federal offices,
they came to have more and more influence in the halls of Congress and in the Senate, and the responsibility of the Government brought with it a sense of closer relationship to it and to all the people for whom the Government was carried on.
I speak for my immediate Republican predecessors in office when I say that they all labored to bring the sections more closely together. I am sure I can say that, so far as in me has lain, I have left nothing undone to reduce the sectional feelings and to make the divisions of this country geographical only. But I am free to admit that circumstances have rendered it more difficult for a Republican Administration than for a Democratic Administration, to give to our Southern brothers and sisters the feeling of close relationship and ownership in
the Government of the United States. Therefore, in solving” the mystery of that Providential dispensation which now brings on a Democratic Administration to succeed this, we must admit the good that will come to the whole country in a more confirmed sense of partnership in this Government which our brothers and sisters of the Southland will enjoy in an Administration, in which Southern opinion will naturally have greater influence, and the South greater proportionate representation in the Cabinet, in Congress, and in other high official stations.
While I rejoice in the steps that I have been able to take to heal the wounds of sectionalism and to convey to the Southern people, as far as I could, my earnest desire to make this country one, I can not deny that my worthy and distinguished successor has a greater opportunity, and I doubt not he will use it for the benefit of the nation at large.
It fell to my official lot, with universal popular approval, to issue the order which made it possible to erect, in the National Cemetery of Arlington, the beautiful monument to the heroic dead of the South that you founded today. The event in itself speaks volumes as to the oblivion of sectionalism. It gives me not only great pleasure and great honor, but it gives me the greatest satisfaction as a lover of my country, to be present, as President of the United States, and pronounce upon this occasion the benediction of all true Americans.”
The President was given an ovation, the convention rising in appreciation of his greeting.
Mrs. Frank G. Odenheimer of the Maryland Division, First Vice-President, U. D. C, expressing regret at the absence of the President-General, Mrs. White, introduced Mrs. Monroe McClurg, of Mississippi, who responded to the welcome as follows:
Across the radiance of this brilliant occasion one shadow rests, caused by the absence of our President-General, Mrs. Alexander B. White, who is kept away from her beloved Daughters by the demands of a closer love, a love that binds with hooks of steel. She has given me the happy privilege of expressing the appreciation of the United Daughters of the Confederacy for the golden words of welcome which have greeted us to night.
In the name of the President-General and her loyal Daughters, permit me, Mr. President, to assure, you that we appreciate highly the honor of having you with us tonight. We will keep you in our hearts, not only for your gracious words of welcome, but because it was your act as Secretary of War that made possible the beautiful ceremonies out at Arlington this afternoon.
We knew that our Veterans and our sister Daughters would greet us with outstretched hands and joyous words of welcome, because we come from the land of Dixie.
Mr. Commissioner, you have told well the story of the glory of your city.
In the past the South has often sent to you of her best — • to occupy the White House, to sit on the Supreme Bench and to fill many other positions of honor and trust. But tonight she has sent and placed within your tender care her crown jewels, her women, the flower of Southern womanhood, the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
All around us “Old Glory” waves. Our flag, that flag which was baptized in Southern blood, and the stars which the South added in the field of blue, shed splendor on the Nation’s glory. On every side we hear familiar names, household words — Washington, Arlington, Mount Vernon, Alexandria, Georgetown, which make us feel very much at home.
And as this royal welcome is given because we are the United Daughters of the Confederacy, it will not be amiss to speak briefly of our work, and it must necessarily be a general statement.
We know that it is difficult for those not allied to us by ties of blood to understand how we Southern women, American women, teaching our children the loftiest patriotism — to glory in, to honor and support the Stars and Stripes — yet fold close to their hearts and swear eternal allegiance to a bloodstained banner forever furled, “for of all the instincts of the human heart there is none more difficult of analysis than love of country, altogether inscrutable, altogether beyond the power of description, is that silent voice. Vague it may be, vague as the pale gray smoke of fire, drifting on an Indian summer’s evening along the hillsides, mysterious as the glint of the
moon rays through barren, wind-swayed branches, subtle as the sound of moving waters, but he must be blind or deaf indeed who would deny it the mighty strength of a passion woven from the fibers of the first heart that ever throbbed in the misty dawn of time.” This passionate love the United Daughters of the Confederacy have for the South — a love beyond analysis.
We stand a patriotic society unique in the history of the world. And our objects First, That the truths of history, shall be taught to the youth of our land. And, while we would not needlessly stir the embers of a settled strife or reopen the graves of buried issues or by one word revive the bitter memories of the stormy past, it is due the truth of history that the fundamental principles for which our fathers contended should be often reiterated, in
order that the purpose which inspired them may be correctly-estimated and the purity of their motives vindicated. If one has a clear and accurate knowledge of the nature and character of the Federal Government, together with the rights of the States under the Constitution, we need not fear the judgments that may be formed and the conclusions that will be reached. So the United Daughters of the Confederacy stand for the truths of history.
Second. Memorial. Poor is the country that boasts no heroes, but beggared is that people who, having them, forget. The South has her heroes, her immortals who add glory to American history, and ”we of the .South remember; we of the South revere.”
The Daughters are making it a historic land, filling it with monuments of granite and marble, tablets of bronze and brass that say to the world of the Confederate soldier, the Confederate sailor and the Confederate statesman. “They shall be remembered forever; they shall live forever; they shall be speaking forever: the people shall know them forever.”
Just across the river lies beautiful Arlington. Arlington! The very name will be a memorial forever to the South’s
knightliest son. General Robert E. Lee. Third. Benevolence. With our Veterans it is “sunset and evening star.” We, their Daughters, keep ever in our hearts the sacred duty we owe. We see that comfortable homes are
provided for those in need and tender care given to the helpless.
Fourth. Educational. Chapters, Divisions and the General Organization are establishing and maintaining scholarships for the descendants of Confederate Veterans, for the Daughters believe that an education is the best asset that a boy or girl can have, and that an intelligent citizenship is the best asset that a nation can have.
Fifth. Social. To keep alive the ties of friendship between the women of the South, that, no matter how far they roam, they will have a common interest — their proudest heritage — “Our fathers wore the Southern cross of honor.” And this great organization of women, who appreciate so deeply the welcome given them tonight, hold fast to the priceless heritage — love, honor, cherish it — say reverently, in spirit and truth: “We humbly thank Thee, Almighty Father, for the past history of our country and for the inspiring reflection that, notwithstanding the disappointments and sorrows of our Confederate history, we came through its great trial and struggle
with our battered shields pure, our characters as a brave and courageous people untarnished and nothing to regret in our faithful defense of the honor and rights of our Southland.”
These two speeches were eloquent and they were dramatic. Mr. Taft stood for the North and the Nation; Mrs. McClurg stood for the South.
And the setting was dramatic. The Daughters of the American Revolution, an Association born of the War for American Independence, had invited into their home the Daughters of the Confederacy, a body born of the War between the States.
These two bodies of noble women are akin; each traces its lineage back to a heroic struggle for human rights ; each is animated by ancestral pride and the loftiest patriotism, and both stand for the truths of history. But they differ in this: there has been nothing to arouse in the D. A. R., as an organization, the mother instinct — no call on their sympathies. The struggle, out of which, they were born, established independent States to provide for the wants of free and happy peoples. But the Confederacy had established no government to care for those who were left destitute and bereft ; the mother instinct in the hearts of the Daughters of the Confederacy was
enkindled, and they stand not only for the high and noble purposes that animate the Daughters of the American Revolution, but also for the education of the orphan, for the care of the veteran in the sunset of life.
It was the mother instinct, the love of the living and the desire to care for them, as much as the wish to perpetuate the memory of the dead, that brought together the Daughters of the Confederacy. At the cry of the destitute, no matter what the cost.
“A mother is a mother still. The holiest thing alive.”
Mr. Tait happily spoke of the Daughters of the Confederacy as belonging to “a fine old social school,” and Mrs.
McClurg aptly denominated them as “the flower of Southern womanhood.” They are the descendants and typical representatives of the men who controlled the Government at Washington for many years before the war, of the soldiers who fought the battles of the Confederacy and of those who, by their courage and devotion during the two decades after the war, were the saviors of Anglo-Saxon civilization in their section.
Of the four who have been Presidents-General of the organization since it took up the monument, the first, Mrs. Cornelia Branch Stone, a daughter of Edward T. Branch a distinguished Congressman and Supreme Court Judge of the Republic of Texas.
The next in order was Mrs. Virginia Faulkner McSherry, whose father, Charles James Faulkner, was a noted Virginian statesman and diplomat before the war. Then came Mrs. Alexander B. White.
Mrs. Alexander White’s father was E. Hopkins, Captain in the celebrated 38th Mississippi Volunteers and every
male of the family was in the Confederate service. The present incumbent is the daughter of Senator McLaurin, of Mississippi.
Anselm Joseph McLaurin enlisted in 1864 as a Confederate Soldier at sixteen and served till the close of the war between the States, was Governor of Mississippi and twice elected as United States Senator, dying in office.
Of the old Southern strain are not only the heads of the Chapters and other officials of the U. D. C, but every member is and must be of blood kin to some soldier of the Confederacy. It was this representative body of women that was now at the National Capital to lay the corner-stone of the monument, which, as General Bennett Young said when it was unveiled, “promises a blessed future in which sectional hate shall be fully translated into fraternity and good will.”
On the morning after their reception at Continental Hall the regular proceedings of the Convention began at the New Willard Hotel, ending on the 16th of November. No body of women ever made a deeper impression on the Washington public and the newspaper men than did the U. D. C, and no small part of the commendation they received was due to the dignity and ability of Mrs. F. S. Odenheimer, First Vice-President, who presided in place of Mrs. Alexander B. White, detained at home by the critical illness of her husband. Throughout the week, during every interval of business, all the delegates, and even in business hours such delegates as had leisure, were busy in attending hospitalities extended by citizens and officials in Washington, and even in Maryland. Receptions were given at the White House by the President and Mrs. Taft ; at the beautiful Congressional Library, at the New Willard by the U. D. C. officials, and finally, on invitation of the Representatives of the Central and South American States, there was on Friday evening a brilliant gathering of Daughters of the Confederacy, Veterans and Sons of Veterans, society folk and national officials, at the magnificent Pan-American Building.
It was a week that brought home to the heart of every U. D. C. delegate the feeling that beautiful Washington City
is the Capital of all the people and dear to the heart of every citizen in the land.
That the Convention was appreciative fully appears in the eloquent report of its Committee on Thanks, read by Mrs. Eugenia Dorothy Blount Lamar. It occupies three and a half pages of the printed ”Minutes.” The report named the great speech of the President, and those of Mr. Bryan, Mr. Tanner, and of the Master of Ceremonies at the laying of the cornerstone. As specimens the following paragraphs are copied:
“The good fellowship and glory in a common heritage of American valor has been strengthened during this week, by the gracious hospitality extended by the Daughters of the American Revolution to the United Daughters of the Confederacy and we would heartily thank them and their magnificent leader, Mrs. Matthew T. Scott.
To Mr. Wallace Streater, Treasurer of the Arlington Monument Association, for untiring efforts in behalf of our great project and for continuous service to this organization.
“To Mrs. Marion Butler, for head and heart can find nothing lacking in what she, as representative of the District of Columbia Division, has done for making this the red-letter occasion in the life of the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
Every woman of this organization would exclaim, “She has done great things for us and for our people.”
To the President and Mrs. Taft for the beautiful reception tendered us in the White House.
To Camp 171, U. C. V., Washington, D. C, to the Annapolis Chapter, U. D. C, to the Governor of Maryland and Mrs.
Goldsborough, to Alexandria Chapter, U. D. C, to Mrs. William C. Story, to Miss Nannie Heth, President of South-
Relief Society, to Mrs. Posalia Bocock, and the members of the Committee on Entertainment, to Mr. John Barrett, Director-General of the Pan-American Union, the Southern Society of Washington, and the Southern Commercial Congress, to all Chapter Presidents and members of the District of Columbia, to Mrs. Drury C. Ludlow, Chairman of Credential Committee and Second Vice-President, we hereby express profound gratitude for generous courtesies.
Thanks to Governor Goldsborough, Annapolis Chapter, for luncheon at Carvel Club; Alexandria Chapter for lunch while visiting historic Alexandria.
For delightful social functions we thank Miss Alice Bristol, Mrs. Marion Butler, Colonel Hilary A. Herbert, Mrs. Benjamin Micou, Mrs. S. A. Willis, Mrs. Phoebe Seabrook, Mrs. Harriet Turner. Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Johnson, Mrs. Samuel Spencer.
In the language of a psychologist and dramatist of modern times, ‘Thanks for everything.’ ”
Laying the Corner-Stone.
On a lovely autumn day, amid enthusiastic thousands, with Federal and Confederate flags flying overhead and tastefully festooned round about, with the speakers’ stand and grounds decorated with flowers from U. D. C. Chapters, U. C. V, and S. C. V. Camps, from private individuals, and the White House, and with the shouts of the multitude greeting the speakers and mingling with the patriotic music, the following program was carried out:
Program.
Program of the Laying of the Corner-Stone of the Arlington
Monument, Arlington, Virginia, Tuesday, November 12, 1912, 2 P.M.
Mrs. F. G. Odenheimer, First Vice-President U. D. C. Presiding Officer.
Colonel Hilary A. Herbert, Master of Ceremonies.
Musical Program to be Given by the Fifteenth Cavalry Band, Arthur Whitcomb, Band Master.
1. Grand Selection. “Southern Melodies” Lampe
2. Invocation Bishop Robert A. Gibson, of Virginia
3. Paraphrase, ”Nearer My God to Thee.”
4. List of articles placed in box for corner-stone, Mr. Wallace Streater
5. Laying Corner-Stone Colonel Hilary A. Herbert
6. Cornet solo, “The Lost Chord” Sullivan
7. Introduction of Mr. Bryan, By Mrs. Alexander B. White, President-General, U. D. C.
Address Colonel William Jennings Bryan
8. National Air, “My Country ‘Tis of Thee.”
9. Benediction Dr. Randolph H. McKim
“Star-Spangled Banner.”
The invocation by Bishop Gibson was deeply impressive, and when the strains of “Nearer My God to Thee,” by the band had died away, Colonel Herbert, Master of Ceremonies, before laying the corner-stone, spoke as follows:
‘Daughters of the Confederacy, Comrades, Fellow Americans: “The Constitution of the United States was a new experiment in government. It undertook to divide sovereignty between the States and the Federal Government. For twelve years the question as to who should decide between the Federal Government and a State when a dispute should arise gave trouble. It seriously threatened the perpetuity of the Union. But it was at last settled to the satisfaction of a majority of the people of that day by the election of Thomas Jefferson to the Presidency. For twenty-four years Jefferson, Madison nd Monroe administered the Government upon the State rights theory, the theory that had been propounded by Jefferson himself, the author of the Declaration of Independence, and
by Madison, that the Constitution created a union of co-equal States, each giveth the right to judge for itself of infractions of the Constitution and of the mode and manner of redress. Here was the germ of secession. Under this theory the Government possessed no power to protect itself against disintegration. Jefferson, Madison and Monroe loved the Union. They all hoped that it would be perpetual; that it would grow in favor, and there would never be reason for secession. It was a beautiful theory, and was perhaps, for the time being, the salvation of the Union. It restored contentment and brought in the ‘era of good feeling.’ Only one electoral vote was cast against Monroe at his last election.
“The next notable period lasted from 1830 to 1860. It was an era of unrest and discord. Slavery, an institution that
came from the colonies, had drifted into the South. A dispute involving the morality of slavery and of slaveholders and many constitutional questions now arises between the North and South. It continues for many years. During all this time Union sentiment is growing at the North, the State rights theory in the South, and finally a storm of passion and prejudice drives the Southern States into secession and the country into the vortex of war. These States set up the Constitution of the fathers over themselves and seek to maintain it. The
North fights to maintain that same Constitution over the whole Union. The stern arbiter that has decided vexed questions since nations began ; that has settled every boundary between the nations in Europe — war — war that made independent States of thirteen British colonies, now settles forever the question of secession. Incidentally, thank God, slavery disappears.
“Then comes in another era. the period from 1865 to the great peace jubilee in 1899. The States, when they seceded, did not consider that withdrawal from the Union was rebellion or revolution. They had based their action on Jefferson’s idea that the Constitution was a compact ; that each party to it had the right to judge for itself of an infraction of that compact and of the mode and manner of redress. But now they accept without question the decision of the arbiter to which they had submitted their contention, and slowly they tread the
thorny path of reconstruction back into the Union.
“Time is the blessed mother of reconciliation. The embers of passion die out. The kindly winds of heaven blow away the smoke of battle. Everywhere our people are engaged in the arts of peace. The bright sunshine falls upon green fields and growing crops. Trade flows where armies trod. Commerce floats where ships of war sailed. Respect, confidence, and mutual admiration take the place of hatred and distrust. Ex-Confederates in Congress help to maintain the army and build up the navy. The questions that once divided the North
and the South are settled forever. People North and South see each other as they are, and the Union is more complete than ever before.
“Note the difference between the old and the new era. Against the declaration of war with Great Britain in 1812
there were thirty-two votes in the House of Representatives. When Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma had already been fought there were in that same body fourteen votes negativing even the existence of war with Mexico. But now, when Mr. Cleveland sends in his Venezuelan message, in which the honor of the country is concerned, every vote in the House and Senate maintains it.
“Now look again. War is declared against Spain and the vote in Congress is unanimous. In this era, when questions confront us involving the honor of the flag, there are no parties — Democrats and Republicans all are for our country, and in the war with Spain, Butler and Wheeler and Fitz Lee, ex-Confederate veterans, are wearing the blue as generals alongside of their former foes. Shafter, Brooke and Miles.
“That was a great jubilee at Washington in 1899. It marked, not only peace with Spain, but signified everlasting
peace between the North and South.
“The present is the era, not only of honors to the dead, but of justice to the motives and patriotism of both Union and Confederate soldiers. The historian no longer repeats the falsehood that the men who lie here before us and their comrades who sleep on a thousand battlefields died that slavery might live, or that the soldiers who rest in those graves over there enlisted to set the negroes free. That was not the issue upon which war between the North and South was fought.
Four-fifths of the Confederate soldiers were non-slaveholders, and the soldiers in blue did not enlist to emancipate the slave. They fought for the Union; the Confederates for independence. All were freemen, fighting for the perpetuity of free institutions. The survivors of the two armies, and civilians as well. North and South, now vie with each other in honoring both the Federal and Confederate dead. Robert E. Lee, once called a traitor because he resigned from the old army to offer his service to his native State, is now recognized as one of Nature’s noblemen. His name adorns the Hall of Fame in the city of New York. His statue is in the Capitol at Washington. Charles Francis Adams, in his noble eulogy at Lexington, Virginia, Morris Schaff, another brave Union general, in his ‘Sunset of the Confederacy,’ and many others have joined in the chorus that is coming up from the North of praise for Lee and his soldiers.
“It is to these soldiers that we are to erect this monument — the rank and file of the Confederate armies — the men whose courage and devotion lifted Robert E. Lee, Albert Sidney Johnston, Joseph E. Johnston and Stonewall Jackson higher and higher till they wrote their names among the stars. The rank and file of the Grand Army of the Republic are joining Northern orators and historians. A typical instance is a monument erected in 1907 on the hard-fought battlefield of Salem Church, Va., by the Survivors’ Association of the brave Twenty-third New Jersey Regiment. On one side is an appropriate inscription to their own gallant comrades; on the other
a tablet with the inscription: ” ‘To the brave Alabama boys who were our opponents on this field, and whose memory we honor, this tablet is dedicated.’
“Magnanimity that is unparalleled in history!
“Contributions toward the monument, excepting one generous gift of $500, have come in little by little, from many thousands. The money has come chiefly from Southern sources. The memorial will thus represent Confederate sentiment. But it represents even more than that. The survivors of the Twenty-third New Jersey Regiment, unsolicited, sent in $100. Other contributions have been voluntarily made by Union soldiers.
“The memorial is being constructed on his own design at Rome, Italy, by the great artist. Sir Moses Ezekiel. The chief figure is that of a woman, representing the South; her extended left hand holds a wreath of laurel with which to crown the Confederate dead ; her right rests upon a plow stock, on which is a pruning hook. Underneath an inscription reads: ‘They have beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.’
“Our hope is to unveil the completed monument on one of the last days of June next year, just prior to the great reunion between the survivors of both armies on the battlefield of Gettysburg, that begins on the first of July, 1913.
“We are in America’s second era of good feeling. In the first it was only a dream of the fathers that the Union would be perpetual, a dream inspired by the belief that because the theory of State rights was then generally accepted there never would be cause for secession. Now we know that the Union is to be perpetual, because there never can be secession, that question having been settled forever. To us has come, instead of uncertainty, certainty. Ours is the substance of what the fathers only hoped for. It has been given to us to see with
our own eyes what their prophetic vision could not have forecast — the material prosperity, the grandeur, the power of this united Republic as it is today. Our eyes have seen, too, the unspeakable horrors of disunion — an outpouring during four years of war of blood and treasure which it never could have entered into the imagination of our ancestors to conceive, and for which nothing could atone except the exaltation of this hour, in which there comes to us from every battlefield of our great war memories of heroic deeds that have brought us closer
together in a union to present which our posterity will never be called upon to make sacrifices.
“And now, speaking for myself and my surviving comrades, we thank the noble body of women who have made sure the noble monument that is soon to rise on this spot. We thank the Giver of all good that He has bounteously lengthened out our lives that we might behold this glorious day, and that He gave us the courage to stand in the day of battle by the side of, and be able to claim comradeship with, the soldiers in whose
memory I am about to lay this corner-stone. Before doing it let me read a telegram just received from our artist at Rome.
It is in Latin. I translate it thus: “‘Rome, November 11, 1912. ” ‘Where the eternal spirit of the Father of his Country still watches, announce to the nations that you have seen lying here heroes who nobly died that the majesty of the law and our republican institutions might stand. Ezekiel.’
Here a box was placed beneath the resting place of the corner-stone before it was laid, by Mr. Wallace Streater, who read aloud the contents of the box as follows:
1. Certified copy of that portion of the Act of Congress approved June 6, 1900, Chapter 791, which authorized the reburial of the remains of certain Confederate soldiers in Arlington National Cemetery.
2. History of the Confederate section, Arlington National Cemetery, with list of dead therein buried, by Dr. Samuel E. Lewis.
3. Early history of Arlington Confederate Monument Association.
4. Transcript of the minutes of the Norfolk Convention of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, 1907, creating the Arlington Confederate Monument Association and defining its duties and scope of authority.
5. Roster of Arlington Confederate Monument Association.
6. Letter from William Howard Taft, Secretary of War, giving authority to build monument.
7. Duplicate of receipt No. 1, given by Wallace Streater, Treasurer Arlington Confederate Monument Association, to Robert E. Lee Chapter No. 644, United Daughters of the Confederacy, Washington, D. C, for $1,000.
8. Samples of official stationery of Arlington Confederate Monument Association.
9. Photograph of models of monument so far as completed, made in the studio of Sir Moses Ezekiel, sculptor, Rome, Italy.
10. Minutes of the Richmond Convention, 1911, United Daughters of the Confederacy.
11. Complete roster of Chapters, United Daughters of the Confederacy, of the District of Columbia.
12. Complete roster of the Camps of the United Confederate Veterans of the District of Columbia.
13. Complete roster of Washington Camp No. 305, United Sons of Confederate Veterans, of the District of Columbia.
14. Roster of the Southern Relief Society of the District of Columbia.
15. United States flag.
16. The flag of the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
17. Flags of States wherein Chapters of the United Daughters of the Confederacy are located, Alabama, Arizona,
Arkansas, California, Colorado, District of Columbia, Florida, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mexico, Mississippi, Missouri, Minnesota, Nebraska, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Virginia.
18. Facsimile of the Declaration of Independence, 1776.
19. Plaster cast of the great seal of the Confederate States.
20. Specimens of Confederate money from 50 cents to $100.
21. Twenty-five-cent shinplaster of South Carolina.
22. Confederate bill — $10 — with poem by Jonah, printed on reverse.
23. Confederate stamps.
24. The James Confederate stamp seal.
25. Small coin of the year when Arlington Confederate Monument Association was organized (1907).
26. Small coin made in 1912.
27. Names of President and Cabinet in 1906, when permission was granted to build monument.
28. Names of President and Cabinet in 1912, when cornerstone of monument was laid.
29. Copy of Act of March 9, 1906, providing for the marking of the graves of the soldiers and sailors of the Confederate Amy and Navy who died in Northern prisons and were buried near the prisons where they died, and the report of the Senate Committee thereon.
30. Life of the youngest Confederate soldier.
31. Washington Evening Star, November 11, 1912.
32. Washington Times, November 11, 1912.
33. Washington Herald, November 11, 1912.
34. Washington Post, November 11, 1912.
35. Sheet of paper on which in the handwriting of Colonel William Jennings Bryan, the speaker at laying of cornerstone, is given the text of his remarks. “A man deviseth his way, but the Lord directeth his steps.” Proverbs. 16-9.
36. Official tickets and badges in use at the Nineteenth Annual Convention of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Washington, D. C, November 12-16, 1912.
37. Official program of the Nineteenth Annual Convention, United Daughters of the Confederacy.
38. Official program of exercises coincident to laying cornerstone Arlington Confederate Monument, November 12, 1912.
39. List of articles placed in corner-stone.
Mrs. F. G. Odenheimer, Vice-President-General J. D. C.; Miss Mary Custis Lee, daughter of General Lee; Mr. Wallace Streater and Colonel Herbert, Master of Ceremonies, then laid the cornerstone.
“Corporal James Tanner,” ex-Commander in Chief of the G. A. R., assisted, and while they were engaged in this task Colonel Herbert asked Mr. Tanner and he consented to speak briefly after Mr. Bryan.
Hon. William Jennings Bryan then delivered an address, which unfortunately was not fully reported.
He said ‘in part:
“This is an occasion that brings gladness to my heart.” said Colonel Bryan. “I have welcomed every evidence of a reuniting country, and there is nO occasion in which I could participate with more pleasure than one like this.
‘It is appropriate that the erection of this’ monument should be intrusted to the United Daughters of the Confederacy — that splendid organization which has called forth the energies of the women of the ‘South and brought them into co-operation in the doing of so much for the welfare of their sections and the country.
“Woman — last at the cross ‘and first at the sepulcher — holds undisputed sway on occasions like this. Her ministrations invoke the sweet and sacred memories that link us to a brilliant past, while she points us ‘to the brighter visions of the future.
“It is fitting, too, that the Daughters of the Revolution should participate in these exercises, for both North and
South inherit from the patriots of ‘colonial days.
“And it is entirely proper that the President of the United States should welcome to the’ National Capital those who come upon so laudable a mission as that which inspires the city’s guests.
“The North and South ‘jointly contributed to the causes that produced the war between the States. They share together the responsibility for the introduction of slavery; they bore together the awful sacrifices that the conflict compelled and they inherit together the glories of the struggle, written in bravery and devotion. Enormous as was the cost and bitter as were ‘the animosities that were aroused, charity and forgiveness have sprung up like flowers from the battlefields and their fragrance will endure.
“The Capital City is the place for such a -monument and we must confess that it is not complimentary to us that its building has been so long delayed. In ‘this throbbing heart of the nation’s political life the monument whose corner-stone we lay today will stand as a visible roof of the harmony and concord that make ‘our nation one.
Pledge of Peace.
“On the summit of the Andes, where Argentina and Chile meet, the representatives of the two countries have ‘placed a bronze statue of Christ. It is a heroic figure and represents the Prince of Peace, one hand holding aloft the cross, ‘the other stretched forth as if invoking a benediction. Around it are the snowclad peaks of that lofty mountain range. It embodies a sublime sentiment, and the monument is in itself a pledge of perpetual peace between the nations.
“So let this monument be emblematic of our nation’s unity of aim and purpose. Standing on the line that once separated two unfriendly sections, it becomes a bond of unity, and, breathing the spirit of Ilini who laid ‘the foundations of a universal brotherhood, it will be to the country a promise of never-ending good will.”
Mr. Bryan was loudly applauded.
“Corporal James Tanner” was here introduced by the Master of Ceremonies, and said:
“I would have serious reproach to make of my friend, Herbert, for drafting me on this occasion if I did not know that his act, which places me before you, to your surprise and mine, was born out of the generous impulse of his heart. I could have wished in justice to myself that I could have had a little more notice — an hour or so — that I was to have this honor, for it is a fact that it was only when we stood down there laying the corner-stone that he told me he was not going to close the exercises until ‘he had called on me to say something. I felt that I could not decently say No,’ and I had no disposition so to do. I accept his detail; I obey ‘his order.
“I expected when I came here to remain a quiet spectator and listener, glad to be here, cordially approving with all my heart the purpose and the occasion which has brought us together. I recall as I stand before you that just after the bill’ was introduced in Congress, setting aside this plot in which to inter the remains of the Confederate dead, ‘when our latest martyr President, the lovable McKinley, was in the White House. I had business with him one evening and when we had finished the matter in hand and I arose to depart, he detained me and asked if I had noticed the bill in question. I answered that I had. He asked me what I thought of it. I answered him that he and I served and fought and that we did not make war upon dead men nor bear animosity toward them; that I
hoped and believed that the bill would pass unanimously; and that if I sat where he did, I would certainly sign it. His hand came out in a warm grasp as he said: ‘I am glad to hear you talk like that, Tanner. I shall sign it as soon as it reaches my desk.’
“I am happy in the knowledge, standing in this presence today and on an occasion bound to be of historic note in all the future of our nation, that I have not to attune my tongue to any new line of thought to express to you, no new ideas to present on the subject of the South erecting memorials to her battlefield heroes. Years ago I expressed myself clearly and unmistakably on this subject. The time I did so some of you can locate easier than I. It was when the news went out on the wings of the press that it was proposed to erect in Chicago a monument in memory of the six thousand Southern dead buried there.
“This notice brought to me a much inflamed letter from one who claimed to be a Union veteran. He was very peremptory in his demand to know what I thought of ‘this proposed outrage of erecting on Northern soil a monument in memory of Rebel dead ;’ and he demanded that my ‘voice ring out in denunciation thereof.’ I answered him at once and I said to him as I say to you today that wherever on this broad earth there exists a people who will encourage their manhood of any and all ages to go out and battle for a cause and then
will permit those who gave their lives in sacrifice to that cause to lie in unmarked sepulcher and the memory of them to die out, they are a people regarding whom I have no power of expression with which to convey to you the measure of scorn and contempt I feel therefor; and I gave my correspondent full permission to ring those sentiments out as loud and as far as he cared or could.
“In my library there is a small but treasured volume, rich in its expression of lofty sentiment, which came to me from the author thereof, who, I am frank to confess, was one of the loves of my life among men. He wore the gray; I wore the blue. But on the fly-leaf of that volume he inscribed the sentiment — ‘All brave men are true comrades.’ The signature was that of the lion-hearted, sweet-souled John W. Daniel of Virginia. He and I had much in common, symbolized in part by his crutch and my cane.
“As we sat at times in social converse, though each carried physical reminders of the searing effects of the contest which would remain with us until the grave should close over us, and though our brows might be furrowed with pain, there was never a moan in our hearts. We had each played our part in the mighty game of the 60’s and if to us had fallen the rough end of it, still it was in the game. We resolutely set our faces to the front for the speedy restoration of unity, good feeling, and perfect peace between the hitherto discordant sections of
our country. Daniel kept his face consistently that way until God took him. I face that way yet and shall until the end comes. And it is that spirit which has so readily brought me to my feet here today.
“We of both sides, as we were aligned of old, want you young men — the men of today — to bear in mind that we old fellows met these issues in the long ago and we fought them out ; we settled them for all time. Today the feet of innocent children picking flowers press the sod once torn by the ruthless wheels of artillery. Cannons rusting in disuse are enmeshed in clinging vines, and the birds in safety build their nests in the mouths that once belched death and destruction. We have brought to you a great united nation, a republic founded on principles that shall carry it along ’til the end of time. Thirty millions in the 60’s are an hundred millions today. The United
States, a fourth rate power then, is in the front rank now, and your Uncle Sam in the Parliament of the world occupies a front seat, coequal with all the monarchs of the earth.”
An eloquent benediction by Rev. Dr. R. H. McKim followed, and the audience dispersed while the band played “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
COLONEL HILARY A. HERBERT
MASTER 0F CEREMONIES
CHAPTER IV.
The Unveiling.
The Confederate Section is on the highest level of the National Cemetery at Arlington. The graves of the Con-
federate dead surrounding the monument are all marked by marble headstones of uniform size. The trees with which the plot is ornamented, though flourishing, are still small and the spot is therefore in full view of the Washington Monument, less than a mile away across the Potomac, there, on the 4th of June, 1914, the unveiling took place. The grounds had been elaborately and beautifully decorated with Union and Confederate flags and with flowers from the White House, patriotic organizations and Washington Conservatories. Distinguished guests from far and near, statesmen, judges, representatives of the Army and Navy, veterans. Confederate and Federal, and an immense number of entitled citizens had come as guests of the Daughters of the Confederacy, who were present in large numbers, when the following program was carried out:
Program:
MRS. DAISY McLAURIN STEVENS, President-General. Presiding
COLONEL HILARY A. HERBERT, Master of Ceremonies
CAPTAIN JOHN H. HICKEY
COLONEL JOHN J. CLEM
Marshals of the Day
Musical Program given by the Fifth Cavalry Band, William J. Cain, Band Master
1. Grand Selection — “Southern Airs.” Conterno
2. Invocation Dr. Randolph T. McKim
3. Address General Bennett H. Young, Commander-in-Chief, U. C. V.
4. Address General Washington Gardner, Commander-in-Chief , G. A. R.
5. Cornet Solo The Holy City
6. Address Colonel Robert E. Lee
7. Address Colonel Hilary A. Herbert
Bugle Call
8. Unveiling of Monument Paul Micou
Grandson of Colonel Hilary A. Herbert
9. Salute— 21 guns Battery of Artillery
10. Introduction of the Sculptor Sir Moses Ezekiel
11. Presentation of Monument to the United States, Mrs. Daisy McLaurin Stevens
President-General United Daughters of the Confederacy
12. Address The President of the United States
13. “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee,” Fifth Cavalry Band
“Star Spangled Banner
14. Placing of Floral Tributes
15. Benediction – Rev. Andrew R. Bird
16. Decoration, Tomb of Unknown Union Dead
Mr. Wallace Streater.
When the tones of the sweet music given by the band had ceased and the hum of the vast audience had hushed. Rev. Dr. Randolph H. McKim pronounced the following invocation:
“O God, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy, we invoke Thy presence and benediction upon the exercises of this hour. Let Thy blessing rest on all that is said and done here today. Come down from the throne of Thy holiness and Thy glory, and hallow this spot to us and to our children forever. May we feel the good hand of our God upon us as we dedicate this memorial of the valor and virtue of our comrades in arms.
“Blessed be Thy Name for the zeal and devotion of the women of the South, through which the building of this monument has been achieved. Blessed be Thy Name, that, as Thou did’st endue Bazaleel, the Son of Uri, with the spirit of wisdom and understanding to devise skillful works in brass for the Mosaic Tabernacle, so Thou hast, in our day, anointed Thy servant Ezekiel with a like skill for the fashioning of this monument.
“Grant, O Lord, that this enduring bronze may speak to the generations to come of the intense love of liberty that animated our brothers who fought and fell under the banner of the Southern Cross. May it be a perpetual reminder of their unquenchable valor — of their lofty patriotism — of their heroic constancy — of their unswerving loyalty — of their splendid response to the stern call of duty — of their patient endurance of every hardship — of their unfaltering courage in every danger — of the exalted spirit of self-sacrifice with which they gave themselves to the defense of their homes and their firesides.
“Blessed be Thy name that we are now able to recognize that their valor and their devotion were not in vain — that their heroic blood was not shed to no purpose. Though their banner sank in defeat, we believe, O Lord, that they won a sublime moral victory, whose luster will never grow dim. They have left us an immortal heritage of glory which can never be taken from us. May we and those who come after us, read aright the lesson of their unselfish devotion. Though dead, yet let them speak to us! Let their example of courage and self-sacrifice and loyalty to conscience, be a perpetual inspiration to the young men of our country. North and South, in generations to come ! Let our children, and our children’s children, as they stand before this memorial of the Confederate Soldier, have borne in upon their spirits the sublime truth that fidelity is better than success, and that, though the patriot’s banner may go down in disaster, and he himself may perish, yet his memory and his example will remain a benediction to his people.
“So may it be, O God of Truth and Grace, with the memory of these, our comrades! May it shine as the stars, with a deathless Height, above the sordid and selfish aims of men! May it inspire Americans in the years to come with an aim as high and as pure as theirs, to suffer, to dare, and to die, not for fame or for reward, not for place or for power, not lured by ambition or goaded by necessity, but in simple obedience to duty as God shall give them to see it. And as the blue and the gray mingle their dust on this consecrated hill, may the men of the North and the men of the South join hands and hearts in the labors and sacrifices which must be undertaken in the years to come, for the honor, the happiness and the glory of our country.
“Grant, also, O Lord, that this monument may stand as a perpetual memorial of the reconciliation between the people of the States once arrayed against each other in deadly conflict. Let it stand as the embodiment of the high and pure ideals of the Confederate Soldier, who fought, not for conquest, or for glory, but for the sacred right of self-government. Let it stand as a witness to their valor, and as a pledge that the men of the South in the generations to come will emulate their superb courage and their whole-hearted devotion, should any foreign foe assail the Republic.
“O Son of God, and Prince of Peace, our help in ages past, cur hope for years to come, we bless Thee that the spirit of brotherly love has been poured out upon our people, and that men who once met in wrath on the field of battle meet here today as friends and brothers in the great enterprises of peace.
“We who fought for Southern Independence bow reverently, O Lord, to Thy Divine Will. Henceforth, we pray and labor for the good and the glory of our reunited country. We have beat our swords into ploughshares, and our spears into pruning hooks. Ours it shall be to strive in fraternal emulation with our Northern brothers, in all undertakings for the common weal. Use us most gracious God, survivors by Thy mercy of the Confederate Army — use us and our children, — yea, use the whole Southern people, as co-workers with Thyself in fulfilling the bright designs of Thy Providence for this great Republic and for the Anglo-Saxon race.
“And now, O Lord, our heavenly Father, the high and mighty Ruler of the universe, we pray Thee to bless our whole land, and all our people. Pardon our sins. Lead us in the paths of righteousness and justice. Give peace in our time, we beseech Thee, O Lord. And especially we pray that Thou wilt bless Thy servant, the President of the United States.
“Strengthen his hand, and his heart for the great tasks entrusted to him. Give him a right judgment in all the difficult problems that he must face. Anoint him with wisdom and courage for his solemn responsibilities.
“These and all other blessings of Thy Providence and Thy Grace, we humbly ask in the name and through the merits of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen.”
Colonel Herbert here introduced General Bennett H. Young, Commander of the United Confederate Veterans, who spoke as follows:
“Forty and nine years ago Divine Providence furled the Confederate banner, and with it shrouded a young Nation’s life and hopes ; but sacred memories abide in the Southern heart, while the bravery and chivalry, the daring and the doing, from Sumter to Appomattox, have challenged the gaze and evoked the admiration of both the nearer and the farther world. The young Nation perished, but poetry and pathos, honor and heroism, inspiration and lesson, linger in the golden urn that holds it’s cherished ashes. An immortal crown is its
heritage of defeat and death.
“For ages to come the story of the valor of the men who fought from 1861 to 1865, on both sides, will stir the patriotism and quicken the pride of the American people. Money can not buy heroism. It can not create standards. Lives of courage — men broad breasted, like gates of brass and mighty thewed with faith and conviction — alone can make lofty ideals, create high aspirations, inspire noble thoughts, incite boldest
action, and cause a people to lift its eye to those heights where stars shine and comets come and go. Not bonds and stocks, not lands and things, but those topless characters which live the truth and die for the right make the human heart beat quick, and a nation’s career resplendent with deeds and illustrious with fame.
“Today we have come together — Blue and Gray — to dedicate a Monument, and empty a goblet upon that federal soil beneath which sleeps a number of Confederate dead. If the world’s most learned and profound student of history could stand on the towers that overlook the battlefield of Gettysburg, and catch from its blood-stained soil, the echoes of death and wounding which fifty-one years ago were witnessed there, and be asked if the happenings of this afternoon were possible, he would quickly declare such things to be inconceivable.
“If he should move southward and take his place on Lookout Mountain with its heights lifted above the clouds, and catch the murmurings that come up from the rippling currents of ‘Chickamauga Creek,’ ages ago christened by the Red Man ‘The Stream of Death,’ and read from the records of the past the ghastly story of Snodgrass Hill and its 25,000 of wounded and dead in its thickets and on its hillsides in September, 1863, and then be inquired of whether the men who were there and so fiercely and desperately fought, could, half a century later, stand in this, the Nation’s greatest military burying place, and see men from both armies unite in dedicating a monument to Confederate dead, he would cry out with fierce emphasis, ‘Such an occurrence is not only unbelievable, but preposterous.’
“If he should go still further west, and take his place in the Government park at Shiloh, on the fateful field of April, 1862, where Albert Sidney Johnston gave his magnificent life for the Southland, and with the pictures on his brain of the tremendous mortality and indescribable suffering that filled those ravines where 110,000 men so vehemently and furiously contended for mastery, and be asked if the ceremonies of this hour could ever be — if asked whether the men from both armies who fought in that conflict would ever assemble for unveiling a Confederate memorial under the very shadow of the dome of the Nation’s Capitol, commemorating the heroism
and courage of the men on the Southern side, he would exclaim : ‘An event like that can never happen.’
“If such a seer had the mystical lore and the prophetic knowledge that the evening of life brings to the wisest of
men, he would have no ken that would enable him to catch the full conception of the justice and reasonableness of the mind and heart of a nation, which has felt the impulse and the power that come from the uplifting forces of a Republic, where there stands as the real keystone of the arch of liberty the greatest of all formulated political truths, “Equality before the Law.”
“Men who hold the inalienable right of suffrage, enlarged and strengthened by universal education, feel strong personal responsibility for the policy and government of the land they claim for their home, and they grow broad in their judgments and just in their conclusions.
“There have been so many surprises in the life and career of our Republic, that thoughtful men are ever looking out for the extraordinary and unusual. Nothing more strange and unwonted has ever happened in national life than the exercises of this afternoon. Its happening marks another step in the complete elimination of sectional passions, suspicions, or prejudice. This monument is a history, a pledge, and a prophecy: as a history, it memorializes the devotion of a people to a cause that was lost ; as a pledge, it gives assurance that North and South have clasped hands across a fratricidal grave; as a prophecy, it promises a blessed future in which sectional hate shall be fully transmuted into fraternity and good will.
“As one looks around in this Federal cemetery he can but question if the exercises of this hour are real, or if they be but the phantom of some dreamer’s imagination. We are here to dedicate on the Nation’s ground, on the space reserved for its most renowned and illustrious dead, a Confederate monument. In its inception, its construction, its location, and in its mission, this structure stands in a class by itself.
“It has been said, and it is probably true, that there are more monuments erected to commemorate Confederate valor and sacrifice than were ever built to any cause, civil, political, or religious. Whether this be correct or not, it can be asserted without possible contradiction, that in proportion to population, the Confederate states have more memorials to their dead than any kingdom or commonwealth that has ever maintained, or sought to create, a national life. A Republic alone could foster, or permit those who lost in a great, prolonged struggle, to erect in such a place as this a tribute to the dead, who for four years battled against the flag that floats above a place
of sepulture like this.
“The past half century has softened and removed the aspirates of the American war. It has blotted out the real bitterness of conflict. It has created a transcendent patriotism by according survivors full liberty in dealing with the past of those who on either side took part in its campaigns.
“At this hour I represent the survivors of the Southern army. Though this Confederate monument is erected on Federal ground, which makes it unusual and remarkable, yet the men from whom I hold commission would only have me come without apologies or regrets for the past. Those for whom 1 speak gave the best they had to their land and country. They spared no sacrifice and no privation to win for the Southland national independence.
/ “I am sure that I shall not offend the proprieties of either the hour or the occasion when I say that we still glory in the records of our beloved and immortal dead. The dead, for which this monument stands sponsor, died for what they believed to be right. Their surviving comrades and their children still believe, that that for which they suffered and laid down their lives was just — that their premises in the civil war were according to our Constitution. The men of the Confederacy submit, but they have no words to recall nor history to change. They are unwilling to depreciate caught of the sacrifices of the Confederate people. The South gave 200,000 lives, the best and most precious offering it had, as an assurance of honesty of conviction, unfaltering faith, and integrity of purpose.
“The sword said the South was wrong, but the sword is not necessarily guided by conscience and reason. The power of numbers and the longest guns can not destroy principle, nor obliterate truth. Right lives forever. It survives battles, failures, conflicts and death. There is no human power, however mighty, that can in the end annihilate truth.
“To accept a situation the sword created, and bow gracefully and promptly to the inevitable decrees of force, is one of the highest evidences of great manhood and superb valor.
“When Robert E. Lee, at Appomattox, conceded defeat, and advised his tired, hungry, ragged followers to accept the orderings of a relentless destiny, and to assume without mental reservation or reluctance the duties and obligations of American citizens, and begin anew the struggle for support of them- selves and their families, and to aid in building up the government they had so bravely fought, he reached not only the apex of human greatness, but also of human courage.
“No man can stand on this hill and look southward, without feeling his heart glow with wonder and admiration and pride, as he reviews what the soldiers of the Army of the Potomac and the Army of Northern Virginia wrought out in heroism and valor between Arlington and Richmond. The skill of the leaders, the patience, perseverance and valor of the soldiers on both sides, have crowned the American volunteer with a history that will brighten as centuries come and go.
“Less than 300 Confederates have found their last resting place about the monument that will shortly be unveiled. There were no men of high rank among the sleepers, but they were none the less heroes for lack of badges of authority. The noblest dead are not always the men who held the offices. The most heroic men in the Confederate army were the men who carried the guns. They marched, they starved, they suffered,
they hungered, and they fought many great battles, but they never complained. They were brave and loyal, hopeful and courageous to the end. They never faltered in their fidelity to country and duty.
“We are almost in sight of the spot where General Lee witnessed the most wonderful evidence of devotion and loyalty that ever came into the life of a commander. History tells of nothing grander in all its annals. In the desperate struggle at and about Spottsylvania Court House, three times the Confederate chieftain started to the front, in apparent crises, to lead his legions. Three times, these men, who never quailed before any foe, and who had never grounded their arms in the face of any odds, stood still in their ranks exposed to a withering storm of shot and shell, and refused to go forward one step until General Lee had removed himself from immediate danger. Above the din and crash of the cannons’ roar and the muskets’ flash, was heard from these men of Texas, Georgia, Maryland, Florida, Virginia, Louisiana, the Carolinas, Alabama, Tennessee, Mississippi, the cry: “General Lee to the rear! General Lee to the rear!” It was not only the shout of protest ; it was the voice of love. Every man refused to lift a gun, or to advance an inch, until their beloved leader obeyed their tender but firm demand. There was no man in that army who would not have given his own life to have spared a wound or harm to Robert E. Lee. At the last, when John B. Gordon, with that voice which thrilled and enthused all who heard it either in peace or in war, with a distinctness that rose above the discord of battle, cried out: “General Lee,
these men have never failed you before, and they will not fail you now, but they will not advance until you go to the rear,”
General Lee rode away, and the Confederates, who forced him to a safer position redeemed their promise, and compelled their enemies to retire.
“Mr. Chairman, some of those who spoke at that fateful moment that message of love and devotion, now sleep in this circle. There are some here who climbed up the heights of Gettysburg and wrote in their blood upon its pitiless rocks the story of Southern manhood.
“Some of those, who here rest under the shadow of this beautiful monument, were at Sharpsburg, and Fredericksburg, and Cold Harbor, and there stood unmoved and unbalanced in a storm of shot and shell, that was so fierce that it eliminated hope for the instant from the hearts of all who witnessed those scenes of havoc and desolation.
“There are some here who rode with Stuart at Fleetwood Hill, and saw Ashby die. Those who are here were made of the same stuff as the Virginia boy, who, finding his shoes, which had lately been brought over from England by blockade, pinching his feet as he climbed Gulp’s Hill, calmly sat down and removing them tied them together, strung them over his arm, and, barefooted, with his shoes dangling at his side, went down in the forefront of the last charge.
“There are men sleeping here, who have the same spirit as the brave lad on the Arkansas River, who, marching with General Shelby to surprise and attack a gunboat, took his coat from his back to lessen the rumble of the wheels of the artillery that was stealthily and silently moving to find die Federal enemy, but realizing that his coat was not enough, took his only shirt and bound it around the spindles of the moving gun, and, with his brawny arms and sturdy chest uncovered, marched on. His commander, observing his spirit and sacrifice, promised him half a dozen shirts when the battle was over, but when the conflict was ended he needed no garment. He found a grave with not even a blanket to protect his wan face, or cover his pale hands that were folded across his stilled bosom, when he was laid away in a trench on that battlefield which his courage had helped to make glorious.
“To understand the spirit that animated the heroes that this monument commemorates, we must get some idea of what they were, of the timber of which they were made. After all, war is not an unmixed evil. Wars of necessity create standards of courage and manhood, that inspire men hundreds of years after the actors have disappeared from the conflict. The men who fought on both sides, everybody now concedes, believed they were fighting for principle. They looked at the Nation’s rights from different angles, but they were willing to die for the truth as it appeared to their vision. This is why so large a number of men fell under their respective standards on the battlefield. Eleven out of every hundred men that enlisted in the Confederate army perished under the Confederate flag in the storm of conflict. Four and seventy-five one hundredths of the men who enlisted in the Federal army likewise died under the national emblem. No such percentage of men ever laid down their lives in any war under their standards in battle.
“When the youth of this country understand and appreciate these figures, the fidelity they signify, then must come into their minds a fervor and an intensity of patriotism, that will make a superb citizenship, and give to the American Republic those elements which must raise it to highest rank among the world’s nations.
“The men buried here represent all the men who wore the gray. The glories of the Confederate armies are a common heritage of the South, and these beautiful and attractive memorials stand as a tribute to all who followed the stars and bars. The record of the Confederate armies, from the Atlantic to the Rio Grande, is a common fund of glory, which endures for the benefit of all, however humble, who shared in the service that won its renown and created its fame.
“True patriotism does not require that either the North or South should give up its ideals. Are they not stronger and better for each maintaining its devotion to the history and achievements of those who fought? The South is none the less patriotic because it had as its ideals Lee, Jackson, the Johnstons, Kirby Smith, Breckinridge, Stuart, Hampton, the ?Tills, Bragg, Polk, Hardee, Forrest, Wheeler, Green, Marmaduke. Shelby, and thousands of other defenders, who gave it all that there was of greatness and worth in human character. Some think they were mistaken in judgment; all know they were devoted to conscience and conviction.
“There are no surviving Confederates, and none who sympathize with them, that would care to lessen the estimate that the North put on men like General Grant and those who wrought with him. There is glory enough on both sides to fill any Nation with pride in their triumphs and labors. North and South, there were great actors, and what they did and what they dared will inspire and thrill the people, and create loftiest patriotic devotion in the men and women of America for all ages to come. The United States need not go to other lands for heroes. There is an unlimited supply at home.
“The Confederates can never forswear their flag. It represents that which is most sacred to them. Those who followed it — the blood which coursed through their veins bore upon its crimson tides the embellishing glory of a noble ancestry, and the performances of their hands they have bequeathed, for lesson and inspiration, to all this United Commonwealth.
“The survivors of either army can not remain very much longer. Speeding years bring shortening steps, wrinkled faces, and decrepit limbs. Soon the last actor in the civil drama will be below the sod, and history and story, poetry and song, sculpture and art, will be left to immortalize their names, and preach their sermons to generations to come.
” ‘Year by year they’re growing older, Year by year they’re marching slower. Year by year the lilting music stirs the hearts of older men. Year by year the flag above them seems to bend and bless and love them ss if grieving for the future when they’ll never march again. Yes, the shores of life are shifting every year; And we are starward drifting Every year. Old places, changing, fret us; The living more forget us; There are fewer to regret us; Every year.
But the truer life draws nigher. Every year; And its morning star climbs higher. Every year; Earth’s hold on us grows slighter. And the heavy burden lighter. And the Dawn Immortal brighter. Every year.’
“All the South thanks you, Mr. Chairman, and your associates, for this magnificent testimonial to its soldiers and its cherished Cause. We are glad that this monument is the product, not only of a great artist, but of one who wore the gray, one who proudly and justly claims a share in the renown of the men who followed its adored standard.
“We rejoice to see these last days, the great days when men are big enough and broad enough and wise enough and patriotic enough, for their country’s good and for their country’s glory, to blot out every trace of bitterness or of unjustness, and while ignoring and forgetting none of the memories of the past, to look forward with transcendent visions of the future splendor of our common country. Thank God, in doing so we sacrifice nothing of our loyalty to the glory of the past.
We simply lock arms with our fellow citizens in faith and hope for the accomplishment of the great work Providence has assigned a free people under the impulses of a popular government.
“We are glad that this hour has come, Mr. Chairman. It witnesses the full consummation of your task. It is fragrant of that which is heroic and grand. Forty thousand survivors of Confederate armies appreciate the beauty of this Monument, and say “Amen” to the splendid message of fraternity and good-will spoken by this scene today. To posterity, the South bequeaths the story of how 600,000 of the pride and flower of her sons struggled with the awful enginery of horrid war, to maintain her political faith and integrity. May the hands that fought be the hands that clasp, and the hearts that bled be the hearts that rejoice!”
General Washington Gardner, Commander-in-Chief of the G. A. R., was introduced and spoke as follows:
“It seems fitting that here in this place and on these grounds, once the home of Robert E. Lee, there should rest the remains of some of the gallant men who followed that great soldier even unto death. It is fitting here, in sight of the Nation’s Capital, and in this vast burial plot consecrated to American valor that some of our fellow-countrymen, the representatives of once hostile armies whose unsurpassed bravery is now a common heritage and pride, should rest in undisturbed slumber, and that the place of final sepulture should be under the
supervision and care of the National Government.
“The presence of the Chief Magistrate of the Nation, Members of his Cabinet, and of others high in the councils of the Government with that of representatives from every section of the country, participating in these dedicatory exercises serve to illustrate anew that the sectional bitterness and hate long preceding and which culminated in the great war no longer find a place in the hearts nor expression upon the lips of our countrymen.
Monuments of whatever enduring material are the visible expression of appreciation, of gratitude, or of affection. A monumentless people is either a people without a history or else a people without a heart.
“This memorial structure speaks the language of peace and good-will. It says to all who come hither and read the superscription that the swords and bayonets that once gleamed along the battle’s fiery front have been ‘beaten into plowshares and pruning hooks.’ It declares through the symbolical wreath of unfading laurel held in outstretched hand above the sleeping dead that the spirit of heroic devotion and lofty self-sacrifice which they manifested is held in grateful and affectionate memory.
“There is room in the hearts of the people of all the land for cherished recollections of the valorous dead and, at the same time, for the most unfaltering love and loyalty and devotion to the Union of all the States. Without the existence of the former we should be disposed to doubt the sincerity or steadfastness of the latter.
“In the perspective of the receding years, the war looms in increasing proportions along the national horizon. Its great and beneficent results now everywhere recognized are gradually settling into the abiding convictions of all intelligent men. For full eighty years the system of government founded by our fathers was regarded by many as an experiment. Doubting patriots at home and unfriendly critics abroad foretold the coming certain dissolution of the Union. With much show of reason they declared our government rested upon an insecure foundation. The recognized fundamental weakness was a constant menace to the permanency of the superstructure. Prior to the war, the existence of this weakness had with portentous threatenings repeatedly manifested itself both in the
North and the South. In the light of the past the war for the preservation of the Union and for the settlement by the arbitrament of arms of the great constitutional question involved seemed inevitable. In that stupendous conflict neither side will ever have to apologize for the sincerity or the devotion of its adherents.
“When the battle clouds lifted and the light of peace shone in; when the people had again become settled in their wonted avocations and dispassionately surveyed the results, it was found that the menace which had so long disturbed the tranquility of the people and threatened the existence of the Union had been forever removed. It was found that the fundamental issues involved had been irrevocably settled and that the foundation stones upon which the Republic rested had been cemented anew by the shed blood of our countrymen from the
North and from the South. Now, we are indeed “an indestructible Union of indestructible States.” We are in very
truth, “a government of the people, by the people, and for the people,” resting on an enduring foundation. As the fast vanishing lines of the surviving Federal and Confederate soldiers marching side by side in peace and amity enter the twilight in the fading afterglow of life’s long day, soon to be forever lost to mortal sight, of one thing we may rest assured, and that is, that whenever and wherever in future the battle line is drawn, there will be found the sons of these heroic lathers and of their scarcely less heroic mothers, standing side by side, shoulder to shoulder, in defense of the Union and for the perpetuity of the government founded by our fathers.
“The contemplation of a glorious past stirs the blood in an hour like this, while the thought of a limitless future with all its possibilities, its hopes and fears, beckons our countrymen to the discharge of every duty and fidelity to every trust in peace even as the fathers were vigilant and faithful in war.”
Colonel Robert E. Lee, grandson of General R. E. Lee, was here introduced and spoke as follows:
“One of the greatest orators of the South has told us, that: ‘When the Athenian orator of old ascended the rostrum to address the popular assembly of Athens he was wont, first to offer up the prayer to the immortal gods that no unworthy word might escape his lips.’ How much more should I today, painfully conscious of my inability to meet the task before me, humbly pray the true God that no unworthy word should fall from me on this holy occasion.
“There is no firmer foundation for the hopes of the Nation than the Confederate Monument at Arlington. It is a Confederate Monument. Raised by the glorious women of the South, designed by one of the boy heroes of New Market, built on the Herculean pillars, ‘the learning of the wise, the justice of the great, the prayers of the good, and the valor of the brave ;’ it commemorates the deathless deeds of the Confederate Soldier.
” ‘On this green bank by this fair stream We set to-day a votive stone, That memory may his deeds redeem
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.’
“We are not concerned today with deducing lessons from the war; nor are we agitated over justifications or vindications, the truth wherever found has been bravely asserted, and:
” ‘Today they stand.
These martial chiefs in fields afar And read the right or wrong of war, From God’s own hands; God who lights the stars o’er heights Where fame and victory meet, God, who lights the stars that shine O’er valleys of defeat.’
“But we come to rejoice that nowhere, except in our own country, could such a scene as this be witnessed.
“As we stand in this sainted campground of the dead, the days of doubt and dread of ’61 to ’65 live again, for a moment in the sublime unity of their anguish, and their history passes before us in a great panoramic review. We see two great armies introduced on the plains of Manassas, witness them trying each other’s mettle for three days in the hills of Pennsylvania, watch them in a death grapple in the tangled wilderness, and wonder as they separate forever at Appomattox.
There was wafted from the North on the breezes of that April day the patriotic prayer, “Let us have peace.” There came back from the South, strong and clear, on the startled air the Divine notes of hope. ‘God disposes, let this satisfy us.’ ‘Human fortitude should be equal to human adversity.’
‘AH good citizens must unite in honest efforts to obliterate the effects of the war, and to restore the blessings of peace. They must not abandon their country, but go to work and build up its prosperity.’ ‘The young men especially must stay at home, bearing themselves in such a manner as to gain the esteem of every one, at the same time they maintain their own respect.” ‘It should be the object of all to avoid controversy, to allay passion, and give scope to every kindly feeling.’ ‘True patriotism sometimes requires of men to act exactly contrary at one period to that which it does at another, and the motive that impels them, the desire to do right, is precisely the same. * * *’ Thus the South stopped fighting, not another ‘shot did she fire; but closed her lips, saluted
fate, and from the chivalry of war enlisted in the chivalry of labor,’ and there will be found no word in her vocabulary, nor act in her demeanor inconsistent with the peace, progress and perpetuity of a reunited country.
“We live in a wonderful age, and in a great country are words so often heard that we fail to appreciate their true meaning. It was America who announced in the time of the Revolution that there would be no taxing without the consent of the taxed ; it was for her to discover in the Constitution Construction period a new theory in Political Science. The Constitution, the creator of the Body Politic, is supreme. Government, the creature of the Body Politic, is subordinate; and as the result of the war, none but she could have exhibited, for the admiration and wonder of the world, and the guarantee of the stability of Representative Government, the Great American Paradox, a quarrel in which both sides were right: the North had no doubt about her position, and the South knew she was right. Strange spectacle this, that even the sledge hammer of time could have welded such diametrically opposed positions, and yet not strange when we consider the justice, patriotism and greatness of the whole American people.
“All that is asked is, that the Confederate Soldier be known. It can be said of him, as a class, as a distinguished Boston author said of one of them, that he started to study the career of this soldier as a critic, and he ended by loving him. Those who faced him on the firing line, and those to whom he has been revealed by the searchlight of true history, have never failed to admire him. General Chas. A. Whittier of the Union Army says: ‘The Confederate Army will deserve to rank as the best which has existed on this continent.’ General Piatt of the same service tells us ‘How these rebels fought the world never knew. For two years they kept back an army that girt their borders, with a fire that shriveled our forces as they march in like tissue paper in a flame. * * * The Northern Army had more killed than the Confederate Generals had in command.’ General Hooker observes ‘that army has * * * acquired a character for steadiness and efficiency unsurpassed, in my judgment, in ancient or modern times.
We have not been able to rival it.’ The Hon. Chas. Francis Adams, whose generosity and breadth of views have placed him a century ahead of his time, says, ‘I doubt if a hostile force of an equal size ever advanced into an enemy’s country, or fell back from it in retreat, leaving behind less cause of hate and bitterness than the Army of Northern Virginia in that memorable campaign which culminated at Gettysburg,’ and the great Federal Commander’s desire is ‘for perpetual peace and harmony with an enemy whose manhood * * * drew forth such Herculean deeds of valor.’ Oh “Johnny Reb” what a noble army praise thee. There is nothing here unworthy of the highest ideals of American manhood. There is no lowering of standards. There is no trailing of banners in the dust of despair. There is no sinking in the quagmire of disgrace and dishonor. These are men ‘for Nations to trust and reverence, and for heroes and ruler to copy.’ These men march down the high road of history with a swing of victory and there is emblazoned on their banners the ancient proverb, ‘There is no Conqueror but God.’ Now we see why the soldier President, William McKinley, a son of Ohio, he delighted to call himself the grandson of Old Virginia, the great pacificator, who did more to bring about ‘the era of good feeling’ than any other President of his day, he was big enough to see across the Potomac and great enough to become the President of the whole country. We now begin to appreciate why he inaugurated, and a Country’s Congress authorized, the movement which we crown to-day with everlasting bronze. It is meet and right, and the custom will be observed as long as the last old soldier lives, that the North should honor her sons as Federal Soldiers, and the South should place her wreath of memory’s sweet immortals on the venerable brow of gray, but when we come on the Nation’s soil, we hail them both as Americans. Captain Cecil Battine, of the English Army, speaking of them both in this connection, says: ‘The Americans still hold the world’s record for hard fighting.’ Thus the South places the Confederate Soldiers as one of the brightest jewels in the diadem that encircles the Nation’s brow to shed undying luster on American arms.
“In the time of peace we find the sons of the South occupying the highest positions in the land in all departments. A very distinguished gentleman. Southern born, is in the White House. The young men of the South are wearing the red badge of courage in the Nation’s ranks. Dear old Dixie has become a national anthem. Under yonder dome there sits a Confederate Soldier at the head of the highest tribunal this side of Heaven.
“As we loiter in the precious precincts of an old Southern home, we hear the last voices of a civilization such as the world will never see again, dying through the corridors of time, as a last sweet note recedes through the recesses of a cathedral. There stood around the massive mansions of the South live oaks, which timbered the old ship of state and saw her through many a tempestuous sea, and there grew under their protection, as do sweet violets under the shadow of great trees, the fairest and purest womanhood the world has or will ever see. True it is that the domestic light of the South shone through the dark veil of slavery, hut that darkness was not great ; it was a slavery but not a serfdom, the dwelling together of two unequal races, without a familiarity; it was the good old-fashioned patriarchal bondsmen and bondsmaids, and not medieval chattels or Roman villains. These old Southern plantations were the realms of the courtly gentlemen, the home of the contented servant and the kingdom of the white woman. If it ever becomes necessary to point cut model womanhood all that will be required is to open the doors of one of these old Southern homes and behold the true woman, enthroned by love, admiration and adoration; ‘her virtues still smell sweet and blossom in the dust,’ and wherever her hallowed bones lie buried, earth has the care of the ashes of one as good and self-sacrificing as any who lay in
an unmarked grave of an African jungle, having fallen under the banner of the cross, or as royal and as regal as those who sleep under the spires of Westminster or the dome of St. Paul’s.
“We come now to ask the question which the great LawGiver of Israel told his people would be asked of them by their children, when they celebrated the Passover in the Promised Land — ‘ What mean ye by this service ?’ It means: ” ‘There is a true glory and a true honor; the glory of duty done, the honor of integrity of principle.’ It means: “That there burns pure and bright in the heart of the Southern woman the celestial fire of love for the Confederate soldier. It means: ” ‘That the South is great among the greatest; and that her people are as true and brave a people as ever guarded the dust of heroes, or kept pure and bright the vestal fires of fame. It means:
” ‘That all the States stand once more under one grand glorious national emblem ‘with a star for every State and a State for every star.’
” ‘Your flag and my flag how it flies today O’er your land and my land and half the world away, Rose red, and blood red, its stripes forever gleam Snow white, and soul white, the great forefathers’ dream. Sky blue and true blue, with stars that beam aright, A glorious guidon by the day, a shelter through the night. Your flag and my flag and oh, how much it holds Your land and my land secure within its folds. Your heart and my heart beat quicker at the sight, Sun-kissed and wind-tossed, the red, the blue, the white. The one flag, the great flag, the flag for me and you. Glorified all else beside, the red, the white, the blue.’ ”
The Master of Ceremonies, Colonel Hilary A. Herbert, then spoke as follows:
“Madam PRESIDENTGENERAL: “The monument, which, in behalf of your Executive Committee and your Committee on Design, I am about to present to you is as unique in its origin as it is in design, but I need
not give you its history; others have already told it. And I shall not attempt to describe it ; when that veil is lifted it will speak for itself.
“A monument to the Confederate dead, it stands here in this National Cemetery, alongside of monuments to the Union dead, and when you have received it at my hand, you will turn it over to the head of the Government against which these Confederates fought, to be cared for by that Government forever; and in that act soldiers against whom these men fought are participating. To one unfamiliar with our people and the workings of our institutions all this no doubt seems strange, and strange, too, he must think it, that in this unveiling you should be representing the public sentiment of today in the State of Mississippi as faithfully as did that immaculate statesman, Jefferson Davis, when he drew tears from his audience as he bade farewell to the Senate of the United States in 1861. To Americans this is no miracle; it is the result of natural causes — the liberalizing influences of free institutions and of modern education ; the unpretentious, but real chivalry of the American soldier. Federal and Confederate; foes on the picket line saluting, instead of shooting, each other ; men risking life in battle to give water to a wounded enemy, or to drag him out of the line of fire. Such things as these occurred during our war. A living witness is our Marshal of the day, this one-legged Confederate soldier here by my side, Captain Hickey. As he lay, wounded and helpless on the field of Corinth, where shot and shell were flying fast, a Union soldier, at the risk of his own, saved Captain Hickey’s life by dragging him out of the way of rushing artillery wagons. That Union soldier is now Congressman Kirkpatrick of Iowa. The memory of incidents like this has helped to make possible this monument. Since the war we have had from old soldiers hearty
acknowledgment of each other’s purity of motive, patriotism and courage ; interchanges between Federal and Confederate organizations of courtesies and hospitalities; speeches like those you have just heard from General Young and General Gardner and Colonel Lee. The words of such men are golden.
General Young and General Gardner represent their great organizations, because they have proven themselves worthy in war and in peace. Colonel Lee’s noble words come as an echo from our great chieftain who, after winning immortality as a soldier, did so much by precept and example to bring about the happy conditions of today.
“But, surveying the whole field, cold reason tells us that the chiefest factor in our wonderful coming together as one people has been our old Federal Constitution for the preservation of the fundamental ideas of which both sides were fighting. That Constitution rests, and it can exist only, on the basis of co-equal self-governing States. That Constitution for more than a hundred years has never for a moment, either in peace or war, been entirely out of the mind of the American people. It secured to them the home-rule their ancestors had won in the battles of the Revolution. Even in the day of Congressional reconstruction, when Abraham Lincoln, who alone could and would have saved the South from that awful calamity, was in his grave, even in that, the maddest hour the country has ever known. Congress rejected the idea of keeping the South in a territorial condition until everything Southern was educated out of her; public sentiment, even then, demanded that the forms of the Constitution be complied with. Entities that had the forms of self-governing states were set up. Southern manhood did the rest, converted semblance into realties; the Supreme Court held that the States were as indestructible as the Union; it stood firmly by this holding, and the Confederate States were thus enabled to
eventually regain their places as co-equals with the other States under the broad shield of the Constitution. Their countrymen, and especially the soldiers of the Union, have welcomed the Southern people back into a constitutional Union, and here they are today, perfectly content and as virile as when, for four years, they kept at bay immensely superior numbers of the finest fighters in the world, backed by an invincible navy. These Southern States are all prospering, every element of their population, white and black, and they are not only profoundly desirous of peace in the Union which is now assured, but of peace with all the world ; and yet, if need be, they are ready to stand with their sister States against a world in arms.
“Under our Federal Constitution our country grew to greatness. Under it our prosperity has been absolutely without a parallel, in spite of our fratricidal war. To preserve that Constitution these soldiers in gray, here at our feet, died; to preserve it those men in blue over there died. There has been more blood shed, and more treasure expended, for that instrument, than for any and all the charters of government that ever were written. It was ordained 125 years ago. There have been but six amendments to it, and three of those were incident to our war. That our Union under it is to be perpetual this monument we unveil today is a token. But today there are pending, in the name of Progress, in yonder Capitol, over seventy propositions to amend that old Constitution — seventy efforts to modify or eliminate some one or more of these monuments of life, liberty and property which have stood guard over the American people while they were working out their wonderful prosperity. God save the Constitution! And God grant that the monument we now unveil may contribute to the lasting peace and happiness of our country.”
Paul Herbert Micou, the little grandson of Colonel Herbert, then pulled the cord, the veil dropped gracefully, and the monument as it appeared in its beautiful proportions, was greeted with tremendous applause.
The blaster of Ceremonies now introduced the artist, Sir Moses Ezekiel, who bowed modestly and was greeted with prolonged applause.
A salute of 21 guns, according to the program, was to be fired here, but was omitted on account of the approaching storm.
Mrs. Daisy McLaurin Stevens, the President-General, U. D. C, then spoke as follows:
“Behold its glorious beauty, one moment moving us to ecstasies of delight, and again touched by its soulful pathos wringing from our eyes tears for the anguish that has been!
President-General United Daughters of the Confederacy, I would that I could find words to express for our organization the deep gratitude we feel to the Arlington Confederate Monument Association of the United Daughters of the Confederacy for their untiring efforts in harmonious love to give for us to the nation this exquisitely magnificent monument, wrought by our own, the South’s greatest sculptor, Sir Moses Ezekiel. Colonel Herbert, in receiving this monument from your hands I am not unmindful of the labor of love that has
been yours, and must needs breathe a prayer to the Great God that the sunset rays of the evening of life have lengthened out your blessed days that you may praise with us.
Hail, hail, hail auspicious morning! Yon lofty column, reared in air To him who made our country great, Can almost cast its shadow where The victims of a grand despair. In long, long ranks of death await
The last loud trump, the Judgment-Sun, Which comes for all, and, soon or late, Will come for those at Arlington.
“Today marks the completion of our seven years of patriotic toil. Ours is the rapture born of duty done, of hope deferred but at last fulfilled. We present today this monument in memory of our Confederate dead, though they need no pyramid to lift them to the ages. Though nearly half a hundred years have passed since they gave their souls back to the God of battles, they are as alive in our hearts and memories as when first with glad faces they marched forth to the wild, sweet music of war beneath the Stars and Bars.
“They sleep within the shadow of the home of Lee and in sight of the dome of the capitol of their fathers and their sons. Above floats the flag they fought, but it does not wave above their dust in jeering triumph, but in loving protection. It seems to send from each stripe and star benediction upon their graves.
“We have erected to their memory a monument unsurpassed in beauty in all the world. But fair and noble as its beauty, that beauty is less fair and noble than the lives and deeds of those whose memory it proclaims and commemorates. Staunch and strong as its enduring bronze were their undaunted hearts. Lasting as its material, matched with their memory, it is as fading mists of morn on mountain top.
“In this universe of chance and change, in this world of birth and death, nothing material is immortal. Mountains
sink to level lands, and stars grow cold and die. Great ideas and righteous ideals are alone immortal. The eternal years of God are theirs. The ideas our heroes cherished were and are beneficial as they are everlasting. These were living then, they are alive to-day, and shall live to-morrow and work the betterment of mankind. Thus our heroes are of those who, though dead, still toil for man, through the arms and brains of those their examples have inspired and quickened to nobler things.
“Across the river stands the Congressional Library, domed with gold. Leading American artists were commissioned to decorate its marble walls. Their pictures were not only to charm the eye with the lure of color and the grace of form, but were also to purify the soul and touch the heart by the ideals they symbolized and portrayed.
“None of these frescoes attract more than Alexander’s curtain series illustrating the evolution of the book. In the first picture of the series we see half-clad semi-savage men building with rough unhewn stones a monument to some dead seeking’s life and deeds. From the dawn of time, until the present men and women have built memorials to those they esteemed great, to those whose memories they hoped to perpetuate.
“Dull and hectic reds proclaim upon the pyramids the triumph of long forgotten kings, but bleeding prisoners walk between the chariot wheels. At Rome the Trajan column strives to lift unto the stars the buried Caesar’s name, but around its haggard shaft great trains of captives wind in sculptured grief, and wring from gazing eyes the sympathetic tear. In Paris in their marble Mausoleum at last the ashes of the great Napoleon are at rest, in a sarcophagus “fit for a dead deity,” but the torn and blood-stained banners waving there show that his towering throne was built upon the bleeding hearts of men.
“Such monuments mock and sadden each thoughtful heart. They hold aloft ideals of force and fraud. They show how in a pitiless, mistaken past success could gild a crime. They teach that great talent even selfishly used could evoke men’s applause, and shut the ‘gates of mercy on mankind.’
“But not all monuments are like these. Some are like the monument the Daughters of the Confederacy dedicate today. They show the future how noble the past has been, and place it under bond to prove of equal worth.
“More than two thousand years ago Aeschines standing in the Agora of Athens warned the citizens that they would be judged by the men they honored. Seven decades since Wendell Phillips, standing in Boston, said The honors we grant mark how we stand.’
“We of the South accept the test. We are willing to be judged by the honors we accord today. All government be-
fore America’s birth rested on the principle that the masses of men were unfit to govern themselves. All past government had gone upon the idea that certain men were by divine rights another’s lord. Our fathers believed that the aim of government was not the upholding of the throne of certain kinds, not the carrying of banners to unconquered lands, but that the sole, legitimate aim was the promotion of the welfare of its citizens. They believed there was no treason except disobedience to duty, no disloyalty except disloyalty to noble
ideals and institutions nobly won.
“They had seen these American ideals of self-government and freedom of thought not only at home, but they had seen them leap the sea and topple down the throne of Bourbon kings, in France, and where the Bastile loomed they behold a shaft with freedom’s statute crowned.
“They had seen these ideas shake the stolid Englishman from his lethargy, and kings and parliament grant an ever widening right of suffrage, with ever resultant good. They saw these ideals light again in Grecian hearts the fires that burned so brightly at Thermopylae and Salamis, and beheld the opening of the conflict that yet shall cast the Turk across the Syrian sea and place the cross of Constantine on Stamboul’s towers.
“They saw these ideas working in the industrial world a change yet more marvelous. They saw the human mind unchained at last from restraining fetters, display itself in a thousand material conquests. They saw all things that ministered to the comforts and luxuries of the common, greater advances made during the seventy years following the proclamation of the Declaration of Independence than had been achieved in all the thousand years of the past. Freedom of thought, freedom of expression proved, as Jefferson predicted, a magic key that opened a thousand doors, where for centuries hidden treasures had lain untouched and unknown.
“Rights so valuable they would not lose. Such rights they felt should be prized by all and made everlasting. Strange as it may seem, the great mass of soldiers in both armies of the war between the States fought for the same ideals. Thus our war presents the unique spectacle of men fighting in opposite ranks for ideals with like courage and persistence.
“As they fought for the same ideals, as they each displayed courage, as they won immortality of fame, is it not well that their dust is laid side by side under the same flag? Is it not also well, that to-day their sons and their grandsons are wearing the same uniform, and not only in America, but in the distant islands of the sea are fighting for their fathers form of government and their ideals? Is it not also well that the representatives of the survivors of both armies are with us here to-day? Is it not also well that there comes from the White House a President, Southern by birth and breeding and Northern by choice of residence and training?
“It would be both useless and impertinent for me to try to praise or appraise our Southern dead. Useless, because the world has done and will do that. Soldiers have laid laurels on their biers. Divines have quickened listening multitudes to nobler things by the recital of their deeds. Poets have embalmed their memory in the honey of immortal verse. It would be impertinent, because only lips inspired of God could tell how Southern hearts feel unto their Southern dead.
“And now, Mr. President, I surrender this monument into your keeping, and through you to that of the nation. When Jefferson was contemplating the Louisiana purchase did he think of the material greatness it would add to the Republic? Did he think of its mountains breasted with marble and veined with gold? Did he think of the living gold of wheat and corn that would flash on its bosom, capable of supporting an army that could dwarf to nothingness a dream of Ceasar’s or Napoleon’s? Not so! He said he desired this territory in order that it might become the home of happy men and women living under American institutions. Yours, Mr. President, was
Jefferson’s spirit when at ]Mobile you said the United States had no interest in Mexico or any other foreign lands except to see that the citizens enjoyed the right to the pursuit of happiness under a constitutional and just government. As long as the Government shall rest in your hands and hands like ours, we feel sure American institutions will not pass from the earth, and that this monument will be not only a memorial of the past, but a symbol of the present and the future.
“In after years when American boys and girls shall look with reverence upon this bronze they shall thank God that they are Americans and shall resolve, that whether our flag shall float from pole to pole, whether our drum beat circles the sea, at least American ideals shall shape the future and the empire of civic world be ours.”
As Mrs. Stevens closed her speech, Hon. John Sharp Williams, in behalf of the U. D. C. of Mississippi, in a few
graceful words, presented to her an exquisite bouquet of American Beauty roses. These the President General of the U. D. C, amid the applause of the audience, graciously presented to the President of the United States.
In reply, the President of the United States said:
“I assure you that I am profoundly aware of the solemn significance of the thing that has now taken place. The
Daughters of the Confederacy have presented a memorial of their dead to the Government of the United States. I hope that you have noted the history of the conception of this idea. It was suggested by a President of the United States, who had himself been a distinguished officer in the Union Army. That was authorized by an act of Congress of the United States. “The corner-stone of the monument was laid during the term of a President of the United States, elevated to his high position by the votes of the party which had chiefly prided itself upon sustaining the war for the Union, and who, while Secretary of War, had given authority to erect it. And, now, it has fallen to my lot to accept in the name of the great Government, which I am privileged for the time to represent, this emblem of a reunited people.
“I am not so much happy as proud to participate in this capacity on such an occasion; proud that I should represent such a people. Am I mistaken, ladies and gentlemen, in supposing that nothing of this sort could have occurred in anything but a democracy? The people of a democracy are not related to their rulers as subjects are related to a government. They are themselves the sovereign, authority, and as they are neighbors of each other, quickened by the same passions and moved by the same motives, they can understand each other.
“They are shot through with some of the deepest and profoundest instincts of human sympathy. They choose their governments; they consult their rulers; they live their own life, and they will not have that life disturbed and discolored by fraternal misunderstandings. I know that a reuniting of spirits like this can take place more quickly in our time than in any other, because men are now united by an easier transmission of those influences which make up the foundations of peace and of mutual understanding; but no process can work these effects unless it is a conducting medium. The conducting medium in this instance is the united heart of a great people.
“I am not going to detain you by trying to repeat any of the eloquent thoughts which have moved us this afternoon, for I rejoice in the simplicity of the task which is assigned to me. That task is this, ladies and gentlemen. This chapter in the history of the United States is now closed, and I can bid you turn with me your faces to the future, quickened by the memories of the past, but with nothing to do with the contests of the past, knowing as we have shed our blood upon opposite sides, we now face and admire one another.
“I do not know how many years ago it was that the Century Dictionary was published, but I remember one day in the Century Cyclopedia of Names I had occasion to turn to the name of Robert E. Lee, and I found him there in that book published in New York City, simply described as a great American general.
”The generosity of our judgment did not begin today. The generosity of our judgment was made up soon after this great struggle was over, when men came and sat together again in the Congress and united in all the efforts of peace and of government ; and our solemn duty is to see that each one of us is in his own consciousness and in his own conduct, a replica of this great reunited people.
“It is our duty and our privilege to be like the country we represent, and, speaking no word of malice, no word of criticism even, standing shoulder to shoulder to lift the burdens of mankind in the future and show the paths of freedom to all the world.”
The speech of the President was followed and had been frequently interrupted by loud applause and this was true of all the speeches. From the first word spoken by General Bennett Young until the last word that fell from the President the entire audience of not less than 10,000 people, fully half of them standing, were in entire sympathy with the speakers and the proceedings were considerably prolonged by the applause that
interrupted the orators.
After the President’s speech came the placing of the many beautiful wreaths that had been contributed. The program contemplated that ladies previously selected for the purpose were to come forward and deposit these wreaths one after another in the following order:
1. The United Daughters of the Confederacy.
2. Camp 171. The Confederate Veterans.
3. Washington Camp No. 305, S. C. V.
4. State designs, as follows :
(a) South Carolina.
(b) Mississippi.
(c) Florida.
(d) Alabama.
(e) Georgia.
(f) Texas.
(g) Arkansas.
(h) North Carolina.
(i) Tennessee.
(j) Missouri.
(k) Kentucky.
(1) District of Columbia.
(m) Illinois.
(n) Philadelphia.
(o) New York City.
(p) Maryland.
(q) Virginia.
(r) Louisiana.
(s) Colorado.
(t) Washington.
(u) California.
(v) General Ell Torrance (large floral design).
A terrific storm, however, now began to burst over the grounds. The wreaths, nevertheless, were all deposited, and the wreath which had been prepared for the grave where so many unknown Union Soldiers are buried, though at some distance off, was also placed in spite of the storm by the committee appointed for that purpose.
Reception at the Pan-American Building.
By night the storm had passed away and the Reception held according to program at the beautiful Pan-American building was largely attended, and was altogether a brilliant affair.
The receiving party consisted of Mrs. Daisy McLaurin Stevens, President General, U. D. C.; Sir Moses Ezekiel, the artist; the Honorable Secretary of State and Mrs. Bryan; Mrs. Cornelia Branch Stone, and Mrs. Marion Butler. Mrs. Virginia F. McSherry and Colonel Herbert were also to have been in the receiving line, but on account of the fatigues of the day neither of them was able to attend. The Marine Band played, there was dancing, and a handsome supper was served in the Fountain Room.
Conclusion.
The above is not a stenographic report of the proceedings at the unveiling, but the speeches, which were all enthusiastically received by the audience, the order in which they were delivered, and the events of the day, are given.
The purpose was at the conclusion of the ceremonies to have the national anthem “America” sung by the whole audience, the band leading, and to this end printed slips, containing the words of the song, had been distributed, but the storm rendered it impossible to carry out this part of the program.
The following beautiful lines by Mrs. F. P. Hosea, wife of Judge Flosea of Cincinnati, Ohio, have been kindly fur-
by the artist, to whom they were written:
Sir Moses Ezekiel.
Arlington Monument.
“Peace ! Divine message to the North!
Brought by the glorious Woman, olive-crowned.
Who, from her war-swept South comes nobly forth
To plant the olive on her victor’s ground.
Is this the age foretold by Prophet old?
Her sword is made a plow, her spear
A sickle, reaping blessings manifold.
Promised to those who great Jehovah fear.
She stands majestic ‘bove her base, where live
In speaking bronze her heroes’ moving story,
A woman, not an angel, sent to give
The message : “Peace on Earth, to God give glory.”
Thus shall thy new South, Ezekiel, ever be
A symbol of our Southern chivalry!
F. P. Hosea.
CHAPTER V.
The Monument — What It Means.
The writer is not an art critic, but for the benefit of the thousands who are interested in, but who may never see it, and as a help to the many who may hereafter see and not have time to examine it carefully, he ventures here a description, the result of a careful study he has made of the Confederate monument at Arlington.
The monument with all its figures, plinth, pedestal and all, is of bronze. No other monument entirely of bronze, approximating this in size, is believed to exist in America, and none has been heard of in Europe, except that of Frederick the Great, at Berlin.
The broad base upon which the pedestal of the monument stands is of polished granite, some three feet high. The altitude of the whole structure is 323.4 feet. The thirty-two figures around the plinth are all of life-size. Rising in strength and beauty above all is the colossal figure of the South. Her head is crowned with olive leaves, the emblem of peace. In her extended left hand is a wreath of laurel to crown her fallen sons, in memory of their heroism ; her strong right hand rests upon a plow-stock, on which is a pruning hook. Underneath is the verse from Isaac, out of which the artist’s conception grew: “They have beat their swords into plow-shares and their spears into pruning hooks.” This means, of course, peace between the sections — lasting peace.
The chief figure, of heroic size, is a woman typifying the South. Graciousness seems to be the dominant expression in this figure, that stands for the mother of free peoples and their statesmen and heroes ; but there is also a tinge of sorrow about it, for the figure, before it was mounted in its place, brought tears to the eyes of beholders. She has survived her struggle for constitutional rights, and returns to the pursuits of peace.
The plinth upon which she stands, adorned with four cinerary urns, one for each year of the war, “1861,” “1862,” “1863,” “1864-5,” is supported by a frieze of inched shields on which are the coats of arms of the several Southern States, each wrought out in every detail of figure and inscription. The support by these State shields of the whole structure upon which the figure of the South stands, like every touch of the plastic hand of our artist, is full of deep meaning to every one who comprehends the history of our country. The States seceded as such, and as States they combined to uphold the South in her struggle for constitutional right. There are fourteen shields on the monument, that of Maryland having been added to the thirteen Confederate States, as Maryland troops
fought gallantly with the seceded States throughout the war.
The plinth on which the chief figure stands, as appears in the photograph, is round. Supported by a rectangular base of polished dark gray granite, it stands upon a cylindrical mound around which runs a broad circular walk. Around the whole plot is a circular carriage drive. Thus all may see the monument from all sides, and from every viewpoint it is attractive.
The dominant figure faces south, that the sun may shine upon it from morning till night. That dominant figure is no “new South.” It is the South that is the mother of Washington and Jefterson, of Clay and Calhoun, of Jefterson Davis and Robert E. Lee ; of the heroes, who died for their convictions from 1861 to 1865, and of the heroes who have survived that conflict and who have, since Appomattox, with the implements of peace won glorious victories.
But our sculptor, who is writing history in bronze, also pictures the South in another attitude, the South as she was in 1861-1865. For decades she had been contending for her constitutional rights, before popular assemblies, in Congress, and in the courts. Here in the forefront of the memorial she is depicted as a beautiful woman, sinking down almost helpless, still holding her shield with “The Constitution” written upon it, the full-panoplied Minerva, the Goddess of War and of Wisdom, compassionately upholding her. In the rear, and beyond the mountains, the Spirits of Avar are blowing their trumpets, turning them in every direction to call the sons and
daughters of the South to the aid of their struggling mother. The Furies of War also appear in the background, one with the terrific hair of a Gordon, another in funereal drapery upholding a cinerary urn.
Then the sons and daughters of the South are seen coming from every direction. The manner in which they crowd enthusiastically upon each other is one of the most impressive features of this colossal work. There they come, representing every branch of the service, and in proper garb; soldiers, sailors, sappers and miners, all typified. On the right is a faithful negro body-servant following his young master, Mr. Thomas Nelson Page’s realistic “Marse Chan” over again.
The artist had grown up, like Page, in that embattled old Virginia where “Marse Chan” was so often enacted.
And there is another story told here, illustrating the kindly relations that existed all over the South between the master and the slave — a story that can not be too often repeated to generations in which “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” survives and is still manufacturing false ideas as to the South and slavery in the “fifties.” The astonishing fidelity of the slaves everywhere during the war to the wives and children of those who were absent in the army was convincing proof of the kindly relations between master and slave in the old South. One leading purpose of the U. D. C. is to correct history. Ezekiel is here writing it for them, in characters that will tell their story to generation after generation. Still to the right of the young soldier and his body-servant is an officer, kissing his child in the arms of an old negro “mammy.” Another child holds on to the skirts of “mammy” and is crying, perhaps
without knowing why.
Then there is the workingman. the blacksmith, with determination in his face, trying on his sword, leaving his bellows and his workshop, while his wife, with sorrow in her eyes, her hand on the anvil, seems to be asking what is to become of her and the children.
There is no allegory in all this, no wings of angels, no imaginary beings are anywhere in all the memorial, excepting only the classic and familiar ‘Minerva and the Furies’; the memorial is a faithful picture of real things — things that actually happened.
There is also the clergyman in his robes, his hand resting tenderly on the shoulder of his weeping wife, who holds her school-boy son’s right hand in her own, as he goes off from his books and his home to the war. The boy’s gun is on his shoulder, while his father’s hand rests with a blessing on his head. This typifies the deep religious feeling that penaded the Confederate armies, the soldiers, who knelt in prayer and rose, musket in hand, to go forward into line of battle. A strong oak tree overshadows with its branches at the same time the two groups, the preacher and his wife taking leave of their schoolboy son, and the blacksmith bidding good-bye to
his forge and his loved ones.
Another group is the young bride of war times, her bridal gown hooped and flounced as in those days, binding his sword and sash around her lover’s waist, as he tenderly bends his head towards her.
Inscriptions
The frontal inscription is the text from Isaiah, out of which the conception of the artist grew and which was
selected by him. “They have beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning-hooks.” On another face is “To our Dead Heroes — by — The United Daughters of the Confederacy.” And “Victrix causa Diis placuit, sed victa Catoni.”
The other beautiful inscription which is on the North side is:
- Not for fame or reward:
- Not for place or rank:
- Not lured by ambition.
- Or goaded by necessity;
- But in simple
- Obedience to duty,
- As they understood it.
- These men suffered all.
- Sacrificed all,
- Dared all, and died.
Even this somewhat extended notice is but an outline sketch. Every group, every single figure is in itself a study, as is the relation of each figure and each group to the whole of this wonderful structure.
Great artists have often, with pencil and with brush, given to the world striking pictures of historic happenings as they have succeeded each other in human experiences, pictures that once seen are never forgotten, such as Hogarth’s “Rake’s Progress” and some of those period sketches that adorn the rotunda of our Capitol.
But no sculptor, so far as known, has ever, in any one memorial told as much history as has Ezekiel in his monument at Arlington ; and every human figure in it, as well as every symbol, is in and of itself a work of art.
That monument owes its existence in part to the North, in part to the South. In form and substance it came from the brain and hand of a great artist whose genius has illuminated many of the salons and galleries of the Old World, and has adorned many of the great institutions of the New. For three years he put his heart, his mind and his soul into it, sparing no effort and no expense;the Daughters of the Confederacy, through their President-General, turned it over, an emblem of a reunited people, into the keeping of the National Government, the Government of more than a hundred millions of happy and contented people who while these words are
being written, October, 1914, are enjoying the blessings of peace. May that peace last as long as bronze endures or the sun shines!
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Michael Robert Patterson was born in Arlington and is the son of a former officer of the US Army. So it was no wonder that sooner or later his interests drew him to American history and especially to American military history. Many of his articles can be found on renowned portals like the New York Times, Washingtonpost or Wikipedia.
Reviewed by: Michael Howard