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An Open Letter / March Into Washington, D.C./ March Across Dixie– The Re-Union


As I look forward to the resurgence of the activity necessary to
complete the March Across Virginia on into the Nations Capitol on
Saturday morning September 29, 2007, and the imminent March Across
Dixie Re-Union March commencement on Friday October 19, 2007, I
can’t help but to reflect on the events of days past that compel
me to this undertaking.

So far from engaging in a war to perpetuate slavery. I am rejoiced
that slavery is abolished. I believe that it will be greatly for
the interest of the South. So fully am I satisfied of this that
I would have cheerfully lost all that I have suffered to have
this object attained. These were the words from a man whose very
own daughter on June 13, 1902 while sitting in the Negro section
of a streetcar in Alexandria, Virginia , was told to move by the
Conductor , he later returned and found out that she had not moved,
and again demanded that she move ; again she refused, and was
carted off to the police station for not complying ; not the daughter
of Rosa Parks grandfather, but Ms.Mary Custis Lee , daughter of
the Honorable General Robert E. Lee.

I only have to look back to the recent events in Mobile Alabama
as the Sons of Confederate Veterans culminated its’ Convention
early to allow its’ members to participate in the historic burial
of an unknown Confederate Soldier . In lieu of all the love that
was and is always shown to my brother and I whenever we gathered
at gatherings of our Southern family; there was those who would
come forward and tell us both that there were those among us who
did not want us there. It would be easy to deem them bigoted or
racist . However, my dear mother who is now in Heaven would have
said to me and Terry Lee ; sons’ , please never forget the events
of reconstruction in the South , and the animus ( deep seated
resentment and hostility ) caused by those who look just like
you who climbed into bed with the Northern conqueror hell bent
on fratricide , and who became nothing less himself than a free
booter (pirate). Never let these people make you feel derogated
, fortify yourself in the spirit of God and those men and women
of the South who looked just like you , and gave their all , loyally
and honorably and in so many cases their lives and that of their
children, time after time as they were terrorized by the Union
League and the Union Army who shot so many of them whenever they
faced capture , nor forget those who rode alongside General Cleyburn,
General Lee, General Jackson or the men under their commands or
their courageous and loving wives left behind who faced daily
rape, murder and robbery, and whose first line of defense was
a man or woman who looks just like you , one she would also lay
down her life for . This thought only brought back the memories
of the beautiful Anna Warnke from Cummings, Georgia, who had stood
before me at the doors of the Semmes home waiting to attend the
wake of the unknown soldier of the CSS Alabama alongside her brother,
General Joe and the rest of her family. Anna like her peers Candice
Harwick of Latta, South Carolina, Amiee Roberson from Blount County,
Tennessee, Katelynn Skillas of Eutis, Florida , or my little Black
baby girl, La Deidra Dukes from Alabama are the epitome of the
brave and courageous Southern woman ,whose tenacity is legendary
, and in spite of all odds stacked against them , came and come
forward for their homeland, the Southland of America ; how could
I do less ?

Thereby, I again I make a plea to those who seek the vindication
of the terrible wrong heaped upon the region of this Nation known
as the Southland of America to give of your humane and fiscal
resources to make these marches successful.

Your Brother,
H.K. Edgerton