What The Confederate Stranger and A Small Town in Maine Can Teach Us About Human Decency

In 1862, a man named Lt. Charles H. Colley of Gray, ME was killed during the Battle of Cedar Mountain. When his grieving family opened up the casket that was supposed to contain their son, they were stunned to discover that a fully uniformed Confederate soldier had been shipped to them instead. Having no way to identify the soldier, and also lacking the means to ship him back to Virginia, Lt. Colley's family decided to bury him in Gray Village Cemetery alongside the Union soldiers who had been killed in the war. They figured that this unknown Confederate's family would appreciate the gesture, even though they'd never find out about it. The Ladies of Gray, a group of mothers whose sons were either missing, injured, or killed in the war, paid to put up a headstone for this unknown Confederate.

The headstone's inscription is simple and gut-wrenching: "Stranger. A soldier of the late war. Erected by the Ladies of Gray."

For the first 90-something years after Stranger's most unexpected arrival in Maine, his headstone was treated the same as all of the other veterans buried at the cemetery. Since 1956, however, a Confederate battle flag has been placed next to Stranger's gravesite each Memorial Day--a pop of solid red amidst a sea of American flags.

This past Father's Day, while visiting family back in my home state of Maine, I had the chance to pay a visit to the Confederate Stranger's grave, and seeing the stone was a very sobering experience. Gray sent more people to fight for the Union Army per capita than any small town in Maine, and nearly 200 of them didn't get to come home. The people of Gray, especially mothers whose sons could have been shot at or killed by Stranger, had every right to have simply buried Stranger in an unmarked grave in a field somewhere in the town. It would have been completely understandable--this person was, after all, an enemy soldier during a time of war. Instead, they recognized their shared humanity with this unknown man, and buried him alongside local heroes and treated him like one of their own.

Which brings me to today. While the nation certainly isn't as polarized as it was during the 1860s, the situation is pretty bad. People are going out of their way to isolate themselves in a bubble of only their own views. Take a look at what people are saying on Facebook about people they once called their friends: (language warning)

We've come a long way from 1862, but not entirely in a good way. People are quick to use a person's political beliefs to define them as a person, when in reality, politics are just a piece of the puzzle that makes people, people. We're all different, and somehow in the last 150 years it has become acceptable to completely remove someone from your life (or ask them to remove themselves) because of political differences. That's insane.

As a society, we should look to the actions of the Ladies of Gray for inspiration on how to behave with decency and respect in times of fighting and conflict. In 1862, America was at a war with itself--it doesn't get more polarized than that. If the Ladies of Gray could find it within themselves to create and maintain a dignified memorial to a man who was quite literally trying to kill their sons before he died, there's no excuse for the rest of us to not get along.

This election cycle has been a doozy, there's no denying that. The rhetoric being spewed by both sides is borderline nasty, and we're a nation divided once again. Despite this, it's important to remember that we have more commonalities than differences--and that through it all, we're all still human beings...regardless of who receives our vote in November.

I'm 65 yo now and can remember the day when doors were left unlocked, keys left in ignitions, everybody had a gun and nobody was shot. I can remember when we prayed in school, but the atheist just looked out the window and kept quiet. I can remember when you got your butt whipped if you disrespected the flag or a female. You opened the door for her and gave her your seat if they needed one.

It was a different world back then. Everyone felt like an American, ....everyone. Children were taught how to shoot and handle guns safely, even at school or the Boy Scouts, which were welcome back then. I was a member of the NRA shooting club at 10 yo and carried my gun to the abandoned ice house to shoot targets in competition. I still have my jacket full of expert and marksman patches. I've shown it to my daughter that is now 31. She has heard me speak about the US her whole life, yet it seems she can't even imagine a world that thought the way we did then. She has no idea what it was like as she has never had a day when she wasn't in this hellish nightmare we call "modern culture".

As we watch mass shootings today, the "modern culture" ping pongs around from gun control to terrorism, to mental illness, ect. We have so many regulations today that the Second Amendment almost means nothing anymore. As we see here, if the authorities wanted your gun, you are most likely on some obscure list gathered up over the decades. What we are told is if you own a Confederate flag, you are a risk to society. If you are a Christian, you are a danger to abortion clinics and gay bars. If you have a gun, you are liable to go mental some morning and shoot your family and neighbors. What they always seem to miss is it's not guns,...we need better people. The people I grew up with all had guns, yet shootings were rare. There was mental illness, but it was rare. Keeping your baby was a given, because killing it was unthinkable.

What has changed from then till now? God has been removed from society, especially schools. Just a couple of generations since God has been banned and men have gone insane. They can't even decide if they are men or women by looking in their pants. Even apes realize what they are at an early age. We have no respect for life because we have murdered 65 million babies and now are considering killing old people that are no longer productive. We have many people blind to the difference between a "god" that murders Jews, infidels, homosexuals, women, and even others of the same belief, and the real God that loved mankind enough to give His own Son for them.

The bottom line is there is no amount of laws and regulations that can tame an individual full of demons. Banning the Confederate flag won't change any hearts and it boggles the mind that anyone thinks it can. Our system of maximum freedom is based on a religious and moral people. Anarchy is by definition freedom without moral limits. America will never be "America" again unless God is honored and revered and is put first above the "freedom" people seem to think they are due. As we get farther from God, it harder and harder to even find Christians to agree what "Christian" even means. What made America exceptional for over 230 years was the blessing of God, not smart politicians. As we reject God and His wisdom as a nation, there is nothing left but Satan and chaos. Thinking we are somehow different than Israel over thousands of years is ludicrous. Idols and immorality reaps bad kings and destruction and slavery.

Reading Leviticus 18:22-30 pretty much covers what's coming and we follow like lemmings to our own destruction. It has nothing to do with more gun laws. 2 Chron 7:13-22 pretty much spells it out and reveals the answer to the problems. What we need is better people to get less regulation and oppressive laws and to live in the peace of God.

Well yes

Liberal New York Jew

Damn Yankee liberal

Union Yankee thug

Massachusetts do gooder or Minnesota naive Lutheran Yankee

Yes I do see Yankee bashing but for me it’s reactive to a smal group of race baiting south bashing Neo abolitionists

I cede your point

I try to acknowledge Yankees and good Jews even good Yankee wimmin here

In fact I adore the exceptions and will defend them like their were my own

I lived in Manhattan a long time

I fit right in at Bensonhurst or Bay Ridge

Not so much upper west side

There is a group of GOPe south haters here I’d need rope for a hundred years ago

A short rope

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