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An Open Letter & Open Report / My Last Day In Florida
From: HK Edgerton [hk.edgerton@gmail.com]
Date: Tue, Feb 6, 2018
Subject: An Open Letter & Open Report / My Last Day In Florida
To: siegels1 [siegels1@mindspring.com]Dear Ms. Lunelle,
As you know, I would spend my last day in the great state of Florida standing before many young students on school day at the annual historical re-enactment of the Battle of Brooksville in Brooksville, Florida.
My task was to highlight the Black Confederate soldier, especially those of Florida like the Honorable Dr. Alexander Darnes, Aid de Camp and childhood friend of the Honorable General Kirby Smith, of whom a monument to them both stands in the yard of their childhood home in St. Augustine, and is on the chopping blocks for removal.
Before I would respond to a litany of questions that would follow this declaration, I would read the following letter from a very prominent lady from my home town of Asheville, North Carolina as printed in the book titled, “Black Southerners In Confederate Armies,” authored by past Commander in Chief of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, the Honorable Charles Kelly Barrows ….
A Monument to the faithful Old Slaves As the President of the North Carolina Division, United Daughters of the Confederacy, I heartily endorse the following letter from Mrs. Aston, and hope the Daughters will take some decisive action in the October convention looking to the erection of this monument. The letter is addresed to “the Daughters of the Confederacy and all the women of the South”. Mrs. Fred A. Olds.
Mrs. Aston’s Letter
My Dear Sisters: Will not everyone of you raise your voice with mine in making amends for a long-neglected duty in rearing a monument to our faithful old slaves?
Of all people that dwell upon the earth, I think these deserve the grandest monument. Soon all this generation will have passed away. Let us hasten with the work while some of us still survive.
Confederate veterans have for some time been speaking of raising a monument to the Southern women. We appreciate this, and thank them for their remembrance of our self denials and hardships which tried women’s souls; but what else could have been expected of us when our dear ones were at the front? While this was the case we felt we were enduring this for sacred ties of kindred and country. How different with the faithful slaves! They did it for love of masters, mistresses and their children. How nobly did they perform their tasks! Their devotion to their owners, their faithfulness in performing their labors and caring for us during these terribly disastrous years, and their kindness at the surrender, while we were powerless and helpless, have never been surpassed or equaled.
At the time of the surrender we were entirely defenseless. Our noble, famished, ragged patriots were still away from their homes, and among us was a band of robbers who were bad counselors to our slaves. Their kindness and their devotion to us was the most beautiful this earth has ever witnessed.
From the Mason and Dixon line to the Gulf and from the Atlantic to the Gulf there was not a massacre, house-burning, or one of those unmentionable crimes which now are so common in the whole country. Think of this; ’tis wonderful. Our gratitude to God and love for the old-time servants should be boundless.
Who will say they do not deserve the greatest monument that has ever been erected? This acknowledgement from us to them of our appreciation of kindness and devotion shown by them to their former owners would be in their last days a beautiful thought. To those of their race of the present generation it would verify the character of the Southern people, their former owners, and also show the true relation that existed between master and servant.
Would it not be an act of justice for the women of the South to ask our noble men if we may not be permitted to turn this monument over to those who, if not more deserving, are equally so with our Southern sisters? I would suggest that when it is erected a tablet might be inserted bearing this inscription: “Given by the Confederate veterans as a memorial to the women of the South, and given by them in memory of the faithfulness of our former servants.”
Mrs. C. Gilliland Aston
49 Church St., Asheville, N.C,
(volume XII , 1904)Build Monument To Faithful Slaves
Mrs. Edward Carter, of Warrenton, Va., writes: “I see in the September VETERAN the suggestion of a monument being erected in memory of the old-time Southern negroes. I hope very much that such amonument will be erected. I believe there would be a liberal response throughout the entire South to such an appeal. No people could be more faithful and more deserving of appreciation. I have the deepest veneration for their memory. Of all the monuments erected in the South, none would appeal to my heart more feelingly. Such a monument would also show to the world the devotion which existed in the South between master and servant.
I would spend the rest of the time trying to articulate the spoken fear of Nikki Haley of the domestic terrorist, and the fake news press that decended upon the Capitol of South Carolina, first attacking the Sons and Daughters of the Confederacy for not having the Southern Cross on the Confederate soldiers monument, for not being posted at half mast (a flag is lowered as a mark of respect for the dead) like every other flag in the State.
After they found that the Battle flag was only part of an outside exhibit, and could only be touched by the Governor or Legislator, and that the other flags were at half mast because a State Legislator had been killed, they went looking elsewhere for their attack on the Southern Cross; photoshopping a picture with the Southern Cross in one of Roof’s hands, and the pistol Roof presumabbly used for his insane assault.
This was enough for the terrified Governor at the urging of Lindsay Graham to serve up the Southern Cross which would act as a catalyst for the greatest sacriledge and witch hunt in American history as domestic terrorist aided by hite folk guilt, and damn yankees who now sit on Southern school boards, councils and commissioners, along with the NAACP, who began the attack on the Southern Cross to fill its depleting coffers and memberships, and not to forget the Southern Poverty Law Center who for years have joined in with the many other hate organizations in their attempts to destroy our heritage and culture by attacking the one symbol that defines us as Southern. And have posted on their website just how to respond to boards, commissions and councils to acheived their goals of Southern, social and cultural genocide.
I would leave Florida and head to Knoxville, Tennessee to the Lee/Jackson Banquet where I would be made privy to the keynote speech of Ms. Barbara Marthadal. A speech that I wish the whole of America could have heard, especially those who keep crying about slavery. God bless you!
Your brother,
HK
President, Southern Heritage 411
