This my G Grandfather's grave. He served with the 6th Florida, an outfit which was in nearly every famous battle. I doubt he would have minded a respectful monument to Yankees being at the battlefields he fought at.
Posted on 01/25/2014 6:38:12 PM PST by Colonel Kangaroo
Florida’s first state park has become ground zero for a raging political fight to establish a monument honoring Union Army soldiers who died during the Civil War.
The three-acre Olustee Battlefield Historic State Park currently includes three monuments honoring Confederate soldiers who died fighting to secede from the country.
The park, first established in 1912, was the site of Florida’s largest and bloodiest Civil War battle that killed 3,000 Union and 1,000 Confederate soldiers. It occurred on February 20, 1864, and raged on for four hours.
With no marker respecting the sacrifice of so many northern men, the Florida chapter of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War asked the state parks department last year for permission to place an obelisk to honor Union soldiers.
State officials agreed that the park needed some historic balance. They held a public hearing about the new monument and chose a location within the park for it.
But those actions angered the Sons of Confederate Veterans, which called the proposed monument a “Darth Vader-esque obscene obsidian obelisk.”
Opponents enlisted the help of key politicians, like State Representative Dennis Baxley, the Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, to stop the addition to the park. “There is a sacred trust that's being violated when you go in and change an historic site from the way it was commemorated by those who established (it),” Baxley told the News Service of Florida.
“Putting a Union monument at Olustee would be like placing a memorial to Jane Fonda at the entrance to the Vietnam memorial,” added Leon Duke, a wounded veteran.
Longtime historical park exhibitor Mike Farrell, who is a descendent of a Union soldier who died at Olustee, said that park visitors often seek out a Union memorial at the site. “I always have the visiting public approach me and ask me where the Union monument is on the battlefield, and I often tell them, ‘There isn't any,’” he told the News Service. “I'm not talking about…a cemetery marker to the dead. What I'm talking about is a battlefield monument.”
Ancestors of Charles Custer fought on both sides of the war, and he favors a Union monument. “There were twice as many Union casualties there as Confederate,” he told The New York Times. “They fought. They bled. And they are really not recognized anywhere.”
The battle of Olustee is reenacted each year, making it one of the Southeast’s largest Civil War re-enactments.
Although it was not nearly as large as many other Civil War battles, the Olustee one was significant because the South’s victory denied the North from establishing a government in Florida and cutting off supplies to the Confederate army.
Kudos for your comments.
Most of those who fought on either side, IMO, were men of honor who deserve to be honored as American patriots, regardless of whether we today agree fully with the cause for which they fought.
There were also, of course, opportunists and scoundrels on both sides, as there have been in every war. But let’s give them too the benefit of the doubt and honor their sacrifice.
I think any reasonable American of today should be able to recognize that neither cause was unmixed evil, nor was it undiluted good. In fact, no war in history has ever been fought on such a basis, and none ever will be.
How about Nathan Forrest, chaining northern captives to burning logs at Fort Pillow? He had a lot of Mandela in him.
FDR never lost a southern state.
In 1913, not 1861. That's when freedom was doomed, and with a pro-south president, Wilson.
Protectionism. Unions.
I don't know what you mean by "downtown Atlanta" but the city (not just the metropolitan area) has been growing over the last 20 years. The White population in particular has been growing in the actual city of Atlanta. Indeed, most American cities have been growing in population lately.
The South is not real interested in putting up Yankee monuments for reconciliation and national unity. Thats the kind of rhetoric you hear spouted from the Left wing Dems every time they want to force something on the rest of us.
There was a lot of rhetoric about reconciliation and national unity when ex-Confederates were trying to force Jim Crow on the rest of us. It's nice to know that the rhetoric was never sincere.
I don't know what you mean by "the South" either. Surely there are a lot of people there who aren't living back in the 19th century and licking their ancestors' wounds. African-Americans, the White descendants of unionists, people whose families moved to the region in more recent times, and younger people who weren't raised Confederate may add up to a significant proportion of the Southern population.
Secession may start at the state level but would advance to the congressional level before completion. But that’s a moot point in the hypothetical event of a tyrant suspending law since the likelihood is that his interventions would occur at all levels, not just federal.
That's because there never was a Civil War battle that took place on Minnesota soil that would have called for memorializing those who died......
Not really if you have a sense of history and a compassion for both sides of the argument.........
The war is over, lives were lost defending both sides and neither one should be denied the honor they deserved........
And yet there is a jefferson davis memorial parkway that runs from Canada to Mexico.
Since Truman was not a Japanese citizen and WW-II was not an internal war in Japan, it's likely your statement is accurate......
I have nothing to do with unions, never have never will.
Both parties are for both open borders and for no significant import tariffs. The are identical in every way - The UniParty.
Jeff Davis Hwy ends in Crystal City Va. and proceeding north it is just U.S. Route 1.
That’s the other jeff davis parkway.
I agree Wilson was bad news, however the states losing rights started with the civil war. Wilson’s doing led Germany into world war 2. What I don’t get is, U.S. Troops were barely there before the war was won. The Commonwealth had already broken Germany’s back, so why did the president get to set the rules. I think even then higher powers were at work.
It depends on what state you are in. Some states have changed more than others. Florida has changed a lot but not North Fla.
Downtown Atlanta is not a great place. There are certain what we call in-town neighborhoods like Midtown and Buckhead that are affluent but their taxes are through the roof to pay for the rest of Atlanta. Lots of crime. White flight out to the outer suburbs and bedroom communities has been going on for years.
I personally believe that a lot of the Civil War sentiment has morphed into a modern antagonism of conservative vs progressive. People are tending to somewhat go back to identifying more with their region than with their country due to the ideological war that is dividing the country. I see this as ongoing and probably getting worse especially with 3 more years of you know who.
The last time some Southern States pretended to secede, Jefferson Davis claimed it was to preserve liberty. Of course, when you read what the "secessionists" wrote at the time, in their own declarations of secession, you will learn that "secession" was really all about slavery and had nothing to do with anyone's liberty.
And, when you get a chance to study the income tax, you will learn that the Confederate States of America adopted an income tax for the people of the South.
Finally, as I've shown you before, the Southern States were at the the front of the line in support of the Sixteenth Amendment (our current income tax). Southern States were the first to ratify the Sixteenth Amendment because they could hardly wait to bring back an income tax.
When the Southern States pretended to "secede," it had nothing to do with liberty. It was all about slavery.
And, most people now accept that slavery was wrong, that it is dead and that it isn't coming back, ever.
Thank to the Illinois Butcher™ were all slaves now. The republic is dead long live the empire.
None of your three premises are true.
This my G Grandfather's grave. He served with the 6th Florida, an outfit which was in nearly every famous battle. I doubt he would have minded a respectful monument to Yankees being at the battlefields he fought at.
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