Rasp
Senior Editor
April declared Confederate History Month
April declared Confederate History Month
Following their predecessors' examples, the mayors of Shreveport and Bossier City have joined the state of Louisiana in declaring April Confederate History Month.
The proclamation was signed by Shreveport Mayor Cedric Glover and Bossier City Mayor Lorenz Walker last week, according to David Hill, commander of the Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor Camp of the Sons of Confederate Veterans.
April 1861 was when the Civil War began with bombardment of Fort Sumter, S.C., and the war ended for most of the nation in April 1865 with the surrender of Confederate armies to Union commanders Lt. Gen. U.S. Grant and Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman.
However, the war did not end in the region west of the Mississippi River until early June 1865, with the surrender of Confederate Lt. Gen. E. Kirby Smith's Department of the Trans-Mississippi and the lowering of the last Confederate battle flag in Shreveport.
Several events mark commemoration of Confederate History Month in Northwest Louisiana, starting with re-enactment of the April 9, 1864 Battle of Pleasant Hill this weekend.
Friday from 10 a.m. to noon there will be special activities for school children, while camps and many activities will open to the public at 9 a.m.
Saturday and Sunday.
"Area schools come for live demos on just about everything dealing with the time and the war," event planner Scott Solice said, noting the big re-enactments will be Saturday and Sunday. "Battles on both days are at 2 p.m. and there is a parade on Saturday at 10 a.m. in Pleasant Hill."
The back-to-back battles of Mansfield and Pleasant Hill blunted a Federal campaign to capture Shreveport, the Confederate capital of Louisiana and the entire district's military headquarters. The campaign, designed by Union President Abraham Lincoln to force Texas out of the conflict, proved a disaster and almost ended with capture of the entire inland U.S. Navy on the Red River at Alexandria.
The other Confederate History Month event scheduled in a 2 p.m., April 21, rededication ceremony in the Keatchie Confederate Cemetery. That's off state Highway 172, a quarter-mile west of Keatchie.
There, members of the Taylor Camp, joined by the SCV's Col. James Hamilton Beard Camp and Shreveport Chapter 237 of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, will stage a memorial to dedicate a new flagpole, a monument and 103 new VA markers on the graves of Confederate soldiers buried there.
The graves mark the last resting sites of soldiers mortally wounded in the April 8, 1864, Battle of Mansfield and taken to a makeshift hospital in Keatchie for treatment.
Most of the graves are for unknown soldiers whose names are lost in time.
"I have done some research over the past few months to locate names of men that were actually buried in the cemetery," Hill, who researches local Civil War history, told The Times. "Unfortunately, these records were lost, but I was able to find five."
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:confed: 2007 Confederate Heritage Month Proclamations :confed:
April declared Confederate History Month
Following their predecessors' examples, the mayors of Shreveport and Bossier City have joined the state of Louisiana in declaring April Confederate History Month.
The proclamation was signed by Shreveport Mayor Cedric Glover and Bossier City Mayor Lorenz Walker last week, according to David Hill, commander of the Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor Camp of the Sons of Confederate Veterans.
April 1861 was when the Civil War began with bombardment of Fort Sumter, S.C., and the war ended for most of the nation in April 1865 with the surrender of Confederate armies to Union commanders Lt. Gen. U.S. Grant and Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman.
However, the war did not end in the region west of the Mississippi River until early June 1865, with the surrender of Confederate Lt. Gen. E. Kirby Smith's Department of the Trans-Mississippi and the lowering of the last Confederate battle flag in Shreveport.
Several events mark commemoration of Confederate History Month in Northwest Louisiana, starting with re-enactment of the April 9, 1864 Battle of Pleasant Hill this weekend.
Friday from 10 a.m. to noon there will be special activities for school children, while camps and many activities will open to the public at 9 a.m.
Saturday and Sunday.
"Area schools come for live demos on just about everything dealing with the time and the war," event planner Scott Solice said, noting the big re-enactments will be Saturday and Sunday. "Battles on both days are at 2 p.m. and there is a parade on Saturday at 10 a.m. in Pleasant Hill."
The back-to-back battles of Mansfield and Pleasant Hill blunted a Federal campaign to capture Shreveport, the Confederate capital of Louisiana and the entire district's military headquarters. The campaign, designed by Union President Abraham Lincoln to force Texas out of the conflict, proved a disaster and almost ended with capture of the entire inland U.S. Navy on the Red River at Alexandria.
The other Confederate History Month event scheduled in a 2 p.m., April 21, rededication ceremony in the Keatchie Confederate Cemetery. That's off state Highway 172, a quarter-mile west of Keatchie.
There, members of the Taylor Camp, joined by the SCV's Col. James Hamilton Beard Camp and Shreveport Chapter 237 of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, will stage a memorial to dedicate a new flagpole, a monument and 103 new VA markers on the graves of Confederate soldiers buried there.
The graves mark the last resting sites of soldiers mortally wounded in the April 8, 1864, Battle of Mansfield and taken to a makeshift hospital in Keatchie for treatment.
Most of the graves are for unknown soldiers whose names are lost in time.
"I have done some research over the past few months to locate names of men that were actually buried in the cemetery," Hill, who researches local Civil War history, told The Times. "Unfortunately, these records were lost, but I was able to find five."
---------------------------------
:confed: 2007 Confederate Heritage Month Proclamations :confed: