Posted on 08/31/2006 9:07:31 AM PDT by stainlessbanner
On Sunday afternoon at Old Union Cemetery in southern White County, over 180 people gathered to pay a debt owed nearly 80 years. The group included members of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Sons of Confederate Veterans, family and friends, all there to memorialize the service of Pvt. Henry Henderson, a black Confederate soldier.
Henderson was born in 1849 in Davidson County, NC. He was 11 years old when he entered service with the Confederate States of America as a cook and servant to Colonel William F. Henderson, a medical doctor. Records show Henry was wounded during his service, but he continued to serve until the war's end in 1865. He was discharged in Salem, NC, age 16.
After the war, Henry married Miranda Shockley, of White County, TN. The couple raised five children.
"We're here to honor him," said his great-grandson, Oscar Fingers, of Evansville, IN. "I think he would be proud his family has come this far and to know all we have done." Several other family members made the trip with Fingers from Indiana for Sunday's ceremony.
Sons Dalton and Lee received Henderson's first and last Tennessee Colored Confederate pension check upon their father's death in September 1926. The check provided enough funds to bury their father, but not enough to buy a headstone for his grave.
The 60,000-90,000 black Confederate soldiers are often called "the forgotten Confederates," but through the concerted efforts of the Capt. Sally Tompkins Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy along with the Sons of the Confederate Veterans, several graves have been found in the Upper Cumberland and have been or will be marked.
Pvt. Henry Henderson's service was finally recognized and his grave officially marked on Sunday, all to the snap of salutes from the grandsons of fellow Confederates, volleys of gunfire and cannons shot toward the distant hillsides of his final resting place.
Official U.S. government grave markers are available to all Confederate veterans. For additional information, contact Barbara Parsons, 484-5501.
you may NOT like that INFORMATION,"1854' but it is DOCUMENTED FACT! (i would suggest to you that ALL the other state's CSA Pension Records would reveal the same thing had the states listed RACE as one of their "pieces of identification". ONLY Kentucky used "RACE or COLOUR".)
also there are MANY Black CSA veterans who "fell in the defense of Atlanta", who are buried UNDER Graves Hall at Morehouse College. the SCV is planning a JOINT memorial with the college administration, to those HONORABLE Soldiers, who fell, BRAVELY in battle, for LIBERTY & defense of their home & state.
free dixie,sw
So tell me, who politicized this man's memorial service here first? The fact that you're the one posting the thread answers the question. Then you try to shut down any opposition to the agenda you're advancing by crying that we're trashing the service. That's a liberal trick.
The trashing of memorial services, or using it for political gain, has long been a traditon, or so it seems of the Democrats. Specifically:
Ron Brown -- Remember Bill yucking it up off camera then faking the tears when on camera?
Paul Wellstone -- Bill, Mondale yucking it up, then speaker after speaker using the service as a politcal pep rally.
Coretta King -- Jimmy Carter using her funeral as an opportunity to trash President Bush.
Well for what it's worth I didn't set out to annoy you. However I do find when people do post links to articles and then try and disavow them when challenged on their content to be somewhat dishonest. I always feel that if I can't stand behind it then I won't post it.
Uh huh. Sure. For the record, the full name of Graves Hall is "Samuel T. Graves Hall," named for the second president of Morehouse.
Oh let's be honest now. It was a nice quite southron love-fest until during1854 came into the picture and stirred things up. If they want to recognize the dead guy now in ways they never would have dreamed of doing 140 years ago then I say let 'em do it. I stayed out until they posted that idiotic Walter Williams POS.
Apparently anything that disagrees with your position is "not a credible source." Remember the discussion we once had that I summarized as follows?
- You claimed that President Johnson's policy toward the Southern states was not Lincoln's policy.
- I cited a Republican Congressman saying it was.
- You said the Congressman was wrong.
- I cited a Republican Cabinet member (Welles) saying that it was.
- You argued that Lincoln agreed with Radical Republican Stanton's Reconstruction plan, whatever that was.
- I pointed out that the account of the last cabinet meeting didn't support your position.
- You argued that the notion that Lincoln and the Radicals were enemies was a fiction concocted by Democrat historians.
- I cited reports of disagreement over Reconstruction between Lincoln and the Radicals.
- I cited the Wade-Davis Manifesto as evidence of the deep division between Radicals and Lincoln.
- At this point you claimed I was making stuff up, then left the thread.
You are consistent, Partisan, I'll say that. You haven't changed your posting style even though you've changed the name you post under.
I'm sorry, I missed the part of the article that says there was anyone actually in attendance protesting the ceremony. But given that FR is a political website, aren't you the one trying to use this funeral for political gain by posting it, just like each of the examples you cite?
Sorry, I thought you were stainless with the posting bit. But who politicized this event first?
I simply asked for a comment.
Forrest didn't murder black Union POWs. Some of his Tennesse troops might have since the black Federal soldiers had reportedly been molesting and shaking down their families, but not Forrest. Here is report about Fort Pillow in the Memphis Argus shortly after Forrest's troops routed the Federals there. Memphis was at that time in Northern hands:
[US] Capt. Young, Provost Marshall, was taken prisoner, slightly wounded, and paroled the liberty of their camps, and allowed to see his wife. He says that our troops [the Federals] behaved gallantly throughout the whole action, that our loss [Federals again] in killed will exceed 200; he also stated that Gen. Forrest shot one of his own men for refusing quarters to our men.
That was apparently not the first time Forrest shot one of his own men for disobeying an order. He had quite a temper. From Wythe in That Devil Forrest, page 488, paperback:
During the stampede or retreat, which almost amounted to a panic, Forrest rode in among the infantry, and ordering the men to rally, and doing all in his power to stop the retreat. He rode up and down the lines, shouting, 'Rally, men -- for God's sake, rally!' The panic stricken soldiers, however, paid no attention to the general. Rushing toward a color-bearer, he ordered him to halt. Failing to have his command obeyed, he drew his pistol and shot the retreating soldier down. Dismounting, Forrest took the colors, remounted his horse, and, riding in front of the soldiers, waved their colors at them and finally succeeded in rallying them to do their duty.
According to what I've read on the web (always take such with a grain of salt), Forrest reportedly gave his own slaves a choice. Serve with me, and if we win, I'll make you free. If the Yankees win, you'll be free. If the Yankees lose and you do not serve with me, you'll still be a slave. Something to that effect anyway. Why wouldn't they come with him -- it was a path to freedom. I also gather that he freed them before the war ended.
Your comment to me: But who politicized this event first?
Perhaps I am missing something here, but I fail to see how placing a headstone on the grave of a deceased veteran and inviting his family to attend the ceremony is "politicizing" said event.
Recently, some remains were found of a WWII pilot whose plane crashed on an island in the South Pacific. His remains were interred at Arlington with appropriate salutations given. Would you consider that to have been politicized?
I consider Cindy Sheehands actions to be a politicalization of the death of a soldier and is a misdirection of her grief. The religious fanatics who protest at military funerals are wholly inappropriate and the contempt I have for them exceeds that which I hold for Cindy Sheehan.
Am I missing something as to the event in this post? If so, enlighten me.
It isn't, although the presence of the SCV, given their current direction, gives me pause.
No, what I think is that by posting the thread here, on a forum that is, at it's heart (and despite all the fluff), political, it's the Lost Causers who have politicized it, using this service to advance their agenda, which seeks to portray the Civil War as having nothing to do with slavery ("Look! See the black man who served in the Confederate Army, and pay no attention to the fact that he was an 11 year old slave at the time. That proves that it wasn't about slavery, or that slavery wasn't so bad, or something like that!"). For those same southern partisans to then complain that any dissent from this opinion means that we're disrespecting the dead is simply a familiar pattern and a sign of a weak argument.
Patriots, Americans, and conservatives will enjoy this story. If you don't like, find another thread, pal.
Get past your racism and read about an uplifting story and memorial befitting an honorable man.
What is so honorable, patriotic, American, and conservative about killing 400,000 U.S. troops?
The fact you don't know who posted the article probably means you didn't read it either. Just trolling for attention is my guess.
You're the only one here doing so, this man was resting peacefully in his grave until someone decided to make him into a confederate soldier.
Did FR ban you for using this forum to sell stuff?
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