Posted on 02/28/2005 3:36:36 AM PST by WKB
WASHINGTON -- America has no more than 20 years before the last of the unprotected but critical Civil War battlefields are "preserved or paved over," the president of the Civil War Preservation Trust said Thursday.
Revealing a list of the 10 most-endangered battlefields at a news conference with country musician Darryl Worley, trust president O. James Lighthizer called the hallowed acreage "outdoor classrooms" under serious threat of development.
Although the trust has had success in preserving more than 18,000 acres of critical battlefields, including parts of Shiloh in Tennessee, Iuka and Corinth in Mississippi and Antietam in Maryland, important tracts are in imminent danger of being lost, Lighthizer said.
The ten most important right now, he said, are:
- Franklin, Tenn.
- Morris Island, S.C.
- Manassas, Va.
- Bermuda Hundred, Va.
- Kennesaw Mountain, Ga.
- Knoxville, Tenn.
- Mansfield, La.
- Raymond, Miss.
- Spotsylvania County, Va.
- Wilson's Creek, Mo.
History Channel vice president and historian Libby O'Donnell spelled out the specific development threat to several of the battlefields, including Morris Island, where members of the black 54th Massachusetts Regiment fought during the siege of Charleston.
She said a developer has offered the island for sale on e-Bay so that, "in addition to gently used Prada bags ... an irreplaceable landmark of black history is now up for grabs."
Worley, who sang of Shiloh on his 2003 album "Have You Forgotten?" told the news gathering Thursday of standing on his back porch near Savannah, Tenn., and feeling the rumble of Civil War cannons fired by re-enactors at Shiloh, across the Tennessee River.
Worley added, "I'll be glad to help you guys standing guard over history."
(E-mail Bartholomew Sullivan at
Ping
Anything for a buck, huh?
Disgraceful.
It instances like these when I wish we were all rich,
and I mean filthy rich.
I don't know why Franklin TN is on the list. The main battlefield is now part of the town...houses, stores, warehouses etc. Only a couple of houses from the battle site are preserved, most notably, the Carter House.
Can we really save every battlefiedld? How many is too many? If we were Germany, Belgium, or France, would we stop and and all development everywhere?
Same comment about Spotsylvania. The Courthouse and environs are a Federal something or other. The rest of the area is slowly developing.
preservation ping
I am surprised that Manassas has not been bulldozed already.
Raymond, MS? I didn't know it was a battlefield.
In my humble opinion, were it not for our common national history, we would not be as unified a nation as we are, and it is our responsibility, as the caretakers of our national history to preserve what we can for future generations. We vacation in Franklin, TN and we have relatives in Corinth, MS (as a matter of fact, I donated two contemporary artifacts to the museum in Corinth) and I know how strongly this issue is felt. Santayana wrote, ” Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” To me, preserving these battlefields is one way of keeping that history alive and ensuring that every generation of Americans has a tangible link to our past.
"why do we preserve baseball memories with such meticulous care, yet fail to preserve where the founder of baseball fought and gained his place in history?"
Retarmy, I presume you are talking about General Abner Doubleday and Morris Island. Contrary to legend, Doubleday was NOT the founder of baseball, "gained his place in history" (if at all) at Gettysburg, and didn't have anything to do with Morris Island (he served at Fort Sumter, instead).
The inclusion of Kennesaw Mountain on the list is misleading. Virtually all of the property outside the park boundries has been developed, mostly as residential. I can't think of anyplace where there is much to preserve. Based on my knowledge of that site, I would question their credibility.
Add in to that NCLA's comments on Franklin in post 4, and the whole report begins to smell.
Perhaps I should have written: Why does American culture hold sports, sporting figures, and sporting venues in greater regard than the heroes, hallowed places, and the history that shaped American society?
Add in to that NCLA's comments on Franklin in post 4, and the whole report begins to smell.
I tend to agree with you very strongly
All those so-called Black Leaders ought to use their considerable power to get the money together to buy the Morris Island property if their history is important to them. Sounds like a better cause than the perceived grievances on which they expend their energies right now.
I think they are talking about Resaca near Dalton.
I know several battle sites there have been in the news
here as being in a struggle for preservation.
The three were privates in Company D (Capt. Isacc Fisher) of the 7th West Virginia Volunteer Infantry (Lt. Col. Jonathan Lockwood) which was a regiment attached to 3rd Brigade (Colonel Samuel S. Carroll), 2nd Division (Brigadier General John Gibbon), of the 2nd Army Corps (Major General Winfield S. Hancock)of the Army of the Potomac. I wrote a narrative incorporating some battle history available for view at
www.rootsweb.com/~wvwetzel/Starkey.htm
under the title
"The Blood of Farmers."
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