Lexington, Kentucky preserves the home of Confederate General John Hunt Morgan

Visitors to the lovely city of Lexington, Kentucky are able to tour the Hunt Morgan House. The home, also known as Hopemont, is located near the downtown area at Lexington's Gratz Park. A favorite tourist attraction, it was once the home of Confederate General John Hunt Morgan.

Hunt-Morgan House, Lexington, Kentucky

This historic marker, number 3 in the Kentucky Historical Highway Marker Program. was placed beside the house more than half a century ago.  It reads:

"MORGAN HOUSE  -Home of John Hunt Morgan, "Thunderbolt of the Confederacy." Born Huntsville, Alabama, June 1, 1825. Killed Greeneville, Tennessee, September 4, 1864. Lieutenant, Kentucky Volunteers in Mexican War 1846-1847. Major General, C.S.A., 1861-1864.:"


. 

Ohio Bicentennial Marker dedicated to Confederate General

From the Mount Vernon News
Mount Vernon, Ohio

CENTERBURG, OHIO — A little bit of “Dixie” was on hand in Centerburg, Saturday, Nov. 12, as the Ohio Historical Society marker honoring Centerburg native Brig. Gen. Daniel Harris Reynolds, C.S.A., was unveiled in the village park at the corner of Main and Clayton streets.

Members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, Roswell S. Ripley Camp 1535, the group that sponsored the marker, were joined by members of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Civil War re-enactors, and many members of the community. Also present were several members of the Reynolds family.

The marker honoring Reynolds is the fourth sponsored by the local SCV group and the third to honor one of the six Ohio-born generals that served the Southern cause during the Civil War, or as is known in the South, “The War for Southern Independence.” Other markers sponsored by the group include one marking the escape of Gen. John Hunt Morgan from the Ohio Penitentiary, located in Columbus’ arena district; one honoring Gen. Roswell S. Ripley, located in Worthington; and in Malta, a marker honors Gen. Otho Strahl, who was also a close friend of Gen. Reynolds.


Read more: Bicentennial marker dedicated to Confederate general / Mount Vernon News http://www.mountvernonnews.com/local/11/11/17/bicentennial-marker-dedicated-to-confederate-general#ixzz1eMWne49z

The War for Southern Independence and the University of Georgia

Near the 1857 Arch which marks the main entrance to the campus of the University of Georgia, at the intersection of Broad Street and College Avenue, Athens, Georgia, this historical marker gives a brief history of the university and bears silent witness to the impact of the War of 1861-1865, which is here named the War for Southern Independence.  The marker reads:

Endowed with 40,000 acres of land in 1784 and chartered in 1785, the charter was the first granted by a state for a government controlled university. After Louisville and the Greensboro were first selected, the current site was chosen.

The first president, and author of the school's charter, Abraham Baldwin, resigned when the doors opened, and was succeeded by Josiah Meigs. The University first began to thrive under Moses Waddel, who became president in 1819. Alonzo Church was president in 1829-1859.

During the War for Southern Independence, most of the students entered the Confederate Army. The University closed its doors in 1864, and did not open again until January 1866. After the war many Confederate veterans became students.

Famous pre-war professors were John and Joseph LeConte and Charles F. McCay, while famous students were Robert Toombs, Alexander H Stephens, Howell Cobb, and Crawford W. Long.

Plans for a modern university were first developed by Walter B. Hill and realized under Harmon W. Caldwell. The best known of the post-war presidents (now chancellors) was David C. Barrow. The Builder of the modern plant was Chancellor Steadman V Sanford.

In Georgia it's the "War Between the States"

The thing about this plaque which caught my eye is that America's war of 1861-1865 is properly called the "War Between the States."

While on a trip to visit my grandchildren in Georgia over the Robert E. Lee/Martin Luther King Jr. long weekend, we stopped at a rest area on I-75 in Gordon County, north Georgia, where I saw the plaque honoring Georgia veterans, and all American soldiers who have been POWs (prisoners of war) or MIAs (missing in action). Interestingly, this rest area is directly on the route General William T. Sherman took when his invading Union army marched south on their way to plunder and burn Atlanta.

Most people nowadays call that darkest hour in the history of the United States the "Civil War." Few who do so realize they are parroting a bit of propaganda first used by Abraham Lincoln in an effort to put a better face on a brutal war of aggression which was both unnecessary and illegal.

A true civil war is one in which two or more opposing sides fight for control over the government of a single country. That was definitely not the case in the War Between the States. The South had no more desire to conquer Washington than the colonies wanted to rule London during the American Revolution. Believing that the United States had departed from the original intent of the Constitution, the people of the seceding states in the South saw themselves as fighting a war for indepencence -a Second American Revolution.

During and after the War Between the States, the government in Washington called it the "War of the Rebellion," which is reflected to this day on countless monuments throughout the northern states. "War Between the States" was a term popularized by Alexander H. Stephens, a constitutional authority, former Governor of Georgia, and Vice President of the Confederate States of America.

Abraham Lincoln, who was a master of political spin, used the term "civil war" during his Gettysburg Address, but it took many more decades of "politically correct" revisionism before the term came into general use. There has never been an American Civil War, and every time I see the term I cringe a bit at the erroneous message it sends.

Many other terms have been used to label America's war of 1861-1865. I'll talk about a few more of them in a later post.

Click on the photo above to enlarge it for much easier reading.

-

Photo and Article by J. Stephen Conn

North Texas Tales - Confederate Lady

By Gay Schlitter Storms
The Graham Leader

A Texas Historical marker near Denison praises the exploits of a “Confederate Lady Paul Revere.” The full name of the daring Texas heroine was Sophia Aughinbaugh-Coffee-Butts-Porter. The marker states that Sophia Butts (at the time) wined and dined Federal scouts in her home. She found out they were looking for Col. James Bourland, “defender of the Texas frontier.” While her guests were busy talking, she snuck out, “swam her horse across the icy Red River, warned Col. Bourland, helped prevent federal invasion of North Texas.”The truth is that Sophia did not warn Bourland — he warned her that federal troops were invading North Texas. She was ready for them when they arrived. She invited the federal visitors to dinner, got them drunk, somehow lured them to her wine cellar and locked them in.

She didn’t have the luxury of a horse but saddled up a mule to cross the Red River, which was only three to four feet deep. Once she got to Bourland’s camp, Sophia left word for him to pick up her prisoners, who probably would have been content to stay in the wine cellar.From information about her life, Sophia seems daring enough to do whatever was demanded of her.

Sophia first stepped onto Texas soil in Nacogdoches in 1835. She liked to brag that she was the first woman after Gen. Sam Houston defeated Santa Anna at San Jacinto in 1836. She nursed the wounded Texas hero and established a lifelong friendship.North Texas militiamen named a beautiful pool of water “Sophia Lake” after her because “it was a heavenly body... Historians speculate that her heavenly body was once for rent,” according to a historical column by Kent Biffle, in a June 27, 1993, issue of the Dallas Morning News.After Sophia Coffee became a widow for the second time, she operated the famous Coffee Trading Co. at the Preston Bend of the Red River. In the 1840s, she entertained local settlers and such military officers as R. B. Marcy and other army personnel traveling on the Texas Military Road or the Butterfield Trail. None other than James Bourland, who lived eight miles away, was one of her admirers and main suitors. (His wife, the mother of his seven children, refused to move to “uncivilized” Texas.)

The notorious William Clarke Quantrill, who fought and tried to gain a criminal stronghold in Texas during the Civil War, visited Sophia’s Glen Eden home frequently. In February 1864, one of Quantrill’s Raiders killed Sophia’s third husband, G.N. Butts. The killer, Fletcher Taylor, claimed that he had committed the murder on Quantrill’s orders. The loss to the Texas Confederate cause was significant. Butts acted as a major Confederate recruiter in his county and was a friend of Bourland.Sophia Aughinbaugh-Coffee-Butts-Porter died peacefully in her sleep at the age of 82. Given the chances she took, a long life seems a surprising accomplishment.

(Patricia Adkins Rochelle, “Bourland in North Texas & Indian Territory During the Civil War: Fort Cobb, Fort Arbuckle and the Wichita Mountains,” vol. 1, 2006)

For the Graham Leader story go to: http://www.grahamleader.com/news/get-news.asp?id=14274&catid=5&cpg=get-news.asp