History-Revisited

My First Buck Bow Harvest

2011-11-06T15:19:00.003-06:00

Yesterday morning was a cold, beautiful fall morning here in Ken-tuc-ky. It was a good morning to be in the woods, where I was able to take my first buck with my bow. This eight pointer walked up and gave me a great broadside shot at about 15 yards. He didn't have the biggest rack, but seeing that the deer meat just ran out in the freezer and he gave me such a good shot, I took it. Hope to get out there for some more does soon!

Update from the Taylors

2011-04-26T19:57:00.002-05:00

Kind of like everyone else, I am still here, just haven't posted in a while. I have been working on a post about Gen. Grant and the colossal waste of life that was his campaign against Gen. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia leading up to the siege of Petersburg. Coming soon...

Everything is going well in Louisville, KY. Spring has arrived along with almost 5 inches of rain this past Easter weekend alone. We were in Nashville, visiting family and going to church at the Nashville Reformed Baptist Church.

We have been visiting Auburndale Baptist Church here in Louisville and so far have been really helped. We are getting ready to plant a big garden in a couple of weeks, we are gonna have Okra, green beans, cucumbers, squash, onions, carrots, cantaloupe, beets, green peppers, jalapeno peppers, and tomatoes, tomatoes and more tomatoes! We are hoping to do some canning and freezing this year, and with prices rising at the grocery store like they are, why not!

Ruth Anne Virginia is doing excellent, she had a rough time with eczema this winter, but has been looking so much better now that we have been able to turn the heat off! She is 6 months old and that is so hard to believe! I think she is going to be a runner, softball or soccer player, or all three! she is rolling over all over the place and scooting backwards, hasn't got the hang of going forward yet... Its amazing how much she has already grown and Ashley and I are very thankful to the Lord for blessing us with her.

Hopefully some post are coming soon!

Prompt Obedience

2011-02-09T15:10:00.002-06:00

Here is another excellent story and quote from the life of Gen. Stonewall Jackson and Gen. Lee. This story is told by Rev. Dr. James P. Smith. The account is from Life and Letters of General Lee by John William Jones.

"Rev. Dr. James P. Smith, editor of the Central Presbyterian, Richmond, Virginia, who served gallantly on Stonewall Jackson's staff, relates the following incident illustrating Jackson's habit of prompt obedience to the smallest request of his chief.

One day when he was at Lee's headquarters the General told Captain Smith to say to General Jackson that the first time he rode in that direction he would be glad to see him on a matter of no great importance, which could await his convenience.

When the message was delivered Jackson promptly said, "I will go tomorrow morning at 6 o'clock, Captain Smith, and I wish you to accompany me." At 5 o'clock the next morning Captain Smith looked out of his tent, and finding a driving snow storm raging, took for granted that his chief would not go to General Lee's headquarters in such weather, as Lee had sent him word that it was a matter of no great importance and could await his convenience. Accordingly he went to sleep again, and was greatly enjoying his morning nap when his servant rudely awakened him by saying, " Captain Smith, de General done got he breakfast, and is gettin' ready to start."

The gallant Captain hustled out of bed, dressed while his boy was saddling his horse, and, without his breakfast, galloped after his General, whom he found it difficult to overtake, or to keep up with, as he faced the storm and rode eight miles to General Lee's quarters.

The Chief had just come out from his breakfast, and greeted his great lieutenant with the question, "Why, General, what stirred you out at this hour, and in this fearful weather? Are those people across the river moving?"

"No, not that I am aware of," replied Jackson, "but you said that you wished to see me."

"But I told Captain Smith to tell you that it was a matter of no great importance, and could await your convenience. I had no idea of bringing you out such weather as this."

Jackson promptly replied in those emphatic, crisp words so characteristic of the man, "General Lee's lightest wish is a supreme command to me, and I always take pleasure in prompt obedience." "

Grand Tetons

2011-01-21T16:43:00.002-06:00

Just reminiscing about sitting in front of a campfire, watching the sun go down over the Teton Valley, the Snake River and the Grand Tetons. Every time you look up the view is even more spectacular than the look before. Hanging out with good friends and getting ready for our backpack trip up there, in that view your looking at in this picture.... good times!

"Duty first"

2010-12-29T06:31:00.004-06:00

I came across a very moving story while reading Life and Letters of Gen. Robert Edward Lee. The story was told by Col. Walter H. Taylor, who was Gen. Lee's adjutant throughout the war in his book, Four Years with Lee. I have that book as well, but its been a while since I have read it, but was reminded of this story as it was recounted by John William Jones. The timeline is after the Army of Northern Virginia has returned to Virginia after the Battle of Sharpsburg, MD, (Bull Run) as called in the North. There Lee and the Confederate Army held off an army far outnumbering that of their own army, and waiting a whole day, the next day, for another attack from the enemy. When that attack never came, and news of massive reinforcements on the side of the north were reported, Lee moved the army across the Potomac River and back into Virginia. Some time after that movement, this story took place.

Walter Taylor writes:

"Tidings reached General Lee soon after his return to Virginia from Maryland of the serious illness of one of his daughters, the darling of his flock. For several days apprehensions were entertained that the next intelligence would be of her death. One morning the mail was received, and the private letters were distributed, as was the custom, but no one knew whether any home news had been received by the General. At the usual hour he summoned me to his presence to know if there were any matters of army routine upon which his judgment and action were desired. The papers containing a few such cases were presented to him; he reviewed and gave his orders in regard to them. I then left him, but for some cause returned in a few moments, and with my accustomed freedom entered his tent without announcement or ceremony, when I was startled and shocked to see him overcome with grief, an open letter in his hands. That letter contained the sad intelligence of his daughter's death....

His army demanded his first thought and care; to his men, to their needs, he must first attend, and then he could surrender himself to his private, personal affairs. Who can tell with what anguish of soul he endeavored to control himself and to maintain a calm exterior, and who can estimate the immense effort necessary to still the heart filled to overflowing with tenderest emotions and to give attention to the important trusts committed to him, before permitting the more selfish indulgence of private meditation, grief, and prayer? "Duty first" was the rule of his life, and his every thought, word, and action was made to square with duty's inexorable demands."

Ruth Anne pics

2010-12-22T06:34:00.004-06:00

Well, I thought it would be a good time to share some more pictures of half-pint!

They've been piling up on the computer, and well, here they are.

Ruth Anne and her proud poppa in their overalls!

Ruth Anne with Uncle Adam.

Ruth Anne with Aunt Hillary.

Ruth Anne in her Pooh hat.

Ruth Anne with her pacie.

Ruth Anne, well, without her pacie!

Sleeping...

With Daddy, he wasn't having a good hair day...

With Mommy! Those are two, too cute, girls!

'The recognition of your birthright- community independence'

2010-12-16T06:09:00.003-06:00

After the 'Seven days battle' outside Richmond in 1862, Gen. Lee and President Davis sent orders to the Confederate troops congratulating them on the success of repulsing Gen. McClellan's army at all points. It was a brilliant victory, that saw the likes of Gen. Jackson surprise the enemy by coming from the Shenandoah Valley, after just defeating three armies and alarming Lincoln that Washington could be attacked next, to McClellan's flank outside of Richmond. I give to you here President Davis's orders to the troops, Mr. Davis, having been with the army constantly during the whole battle. The final words are very interesting, with Davis telling them to remember why they have fought and must continue to fight, for 'constitutional liberty' and 'community independence'. From Life and Letters of Gen. Robert Edward Lee, by Dr. John William Jones.

"Richmond, July 5, 1862.

To the Army in Eastern Virginia.

"Soldiers: I congratulate you on the series of brilliant victories which, under the favor of Divine Providence, you have lately won; and, as the President of the Confederate States, do heartily tender to you the thanks of the country whose just cause you have so skilfully and heroically served. Ten days ago an invading army, greatly superior to you in numbers and in the material of war, closely beleaguered your Capital and vauntingly proclaimed its speedy conquest; you marched to attack the enemy in his entrenchments; with well-directed movements and death-defying valor you charged upon him in his strong positions, drove him from field to field over a distance of more than thirty-five miles, and, despite his reinforcements, compelled him to seek safety under cover of his gunboats, where he now lies cowering before the army so lately derided and threatened with entire subjugation. The fortitude with which you have borne toil and privation, the gallantry with which you have entered into each successive battle, must have been witnessed to be fully appreciated; but a grateful people will not fail to recognize your deeds and to bear you in their loved remembrance. Well may it be said of you that you have "done enough for glory," but duty to a suffering country and to the cause of constitutional liberty claims from you yet further effort. Let it be your pride to relax in nothing which can promote your future efficiency- your one great object being to drive the invader from your soil, and, carrying your standards beyond the outer boundaries of the Confederacy, to wring from an unscrupulous foe the recognition of your birthright-- community independence."

Jefferson Davis"

Some quotes from Thomas Jefferson

2010-12-11T15:05:00.003-06:00

I've been doing a little reading in Jefferson by Albert Jay Nock, about Thomas Jefferson's presidency. I cam across some really good quotes I thought I would share.

Concerning making public appearances as President, Jefferson wrote,"not reconciled to the idea of a chief magistrate parading himself through the several States as an object of public gaze and in quest of an applause which, to be valuable, should be purely voluntary. I had rather acquire silent good will by a faithful discharge of my duties than owe expressions of it to my putting myself in the way of receiving them."

At the beginning of his first term as President, Jefferson said this,"the path we have to pursue is so quiet that we have nothing scarcely to propose to our Legislature. A noiseless course, not meddling with the affairs of others, unattractive of notice, is a mark that society is going on in happiness."

Here is a great quote from Jefferson about seeking office. Jefferson said, "whenever a man has cast a longing eye on offices, a rottenness begins in his conduct."

Jefferson told this to James Madison before he became President, "the accounts of the United States ought to be, and may be, made as simple as those of a common farmer, and capable of being understood by common farmers."

And later to another, "the finances of the Union as clear and intelligible as a merchant's books, so that every member of Congress and every man of any mind in the Union, should be able to comprehend them, to investigate abuses and consequently to control them."

Wouldn't it be nice to see our Governments financial records that simple and clear? Our own Congressmen do not understand the finances of our government, and the finances are so complicated how could they?

Thanksgiving Day Proclamation

2010-11-25T08:44:00.002-06:00

I re-post an old post this day, a Thanksgiving Day Proclamation worthy of being read again and again. Please consider the words spoken here!

"[Proclamation by the President of the Confederate States of America]

"The Senate and House of Representatives of the Confederate States of America have signified their desire that a day may be recommended to the people, to be set apart and observed as a day of humiliation, fasting and prayer, in the language following, to wit:

'Reverently recognizing the Providence of God in the affairs of man, and gratefully remembering the guidance, support and deliverance granted to our patriot fathers in the memorable war which resulted in the independence of the American colonies, and now reposing in Him our supreme confidence and hope in the present struggle for civil and religious freedom, and for the right to live under a government of our own choice, and deeply impressed with the conviction that without Him nothing is strong, nothing wise and nothing enduring; in order that the people of this confederacy may have the opportunity, at the same time, of offering their adoration to the great Sovereign of the Universe, of penitently confessing their sins and strengthening their vows and purposes of amendment, in humble reliance upon His gracious and almighty power.
'The Congress of the Confederate States of America do Resolve, That it is recommended to the people of these States, that Friday, the 8th day of April next, be set apart and observed as a day of humiliation, fasting and prayer that Almighty God would so preside over our public councils and authorities; that He would so inspire our armies and their leaders with wisdom, courage and perseverance, and so manifest Himself in the greatness of His goodness and majesty of His power, that we may be safely and successfully led through the chastening to which we are being subjected, to the attainment of an honorable peace; so that, while we enjoy the blessings of a free and happy government, we may ascribe to Him the honor and the glory of our independence and prosperity.'
"A recommendation so congenial to the feelings of the people will receive their hearty concurrence; and it is a grateful duty to the Executive to unite with their representatives in inviting them to meet in the courts of the Most High. Recent events awaken fresh gratitude to the Supreme Ruler of nations. Our enemies have suffered repeated defeats, and a nefarious scheme to burn and plunder our capital, and to destroy our civil government by putting to death the chosen servants of the people, has been baffled and set at naught. Our armies have been strengthened; our finances promise rapid progress to a satisfactory condition; and our whole country is animated with a hopeful spirit and a fixed determination to achieve independence.
"In these circumstances it becomes us, with thankful hearts, to bow ourselves before the throne of the Most High, and, while gratefully acknowledging so many mercies, confess that our sins as a people have justly exposed us to His chastisement. Let us recognize the sufferings which we have been called upon to endure, as administered by a fatherly hand for our improvement, and with resolute courage and patient endurance let us wait on Him for our deliverance.
"In furtherance of these objects, now, therefore, I, Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America, do issue this, my proclamation, calling upon the people of the said States, in conformity with the desire expressed by their representatives, to set apart Friday, the 8th day of April, as a day of humiliation, fasting and prayer, and I do hereby invite them on that day to repair to their several places of public worship and beseech Almighty God 'to preside over our public councils and so inspire our armies and leaders with wisdom, courage and perseverance; and so to manifest Himself in the greatness of His goodness and in the majesty of His power, that we may secure the blessings of an honorable peace and of free government; and that we, as a people, may ascribe all to the honor and glory of His name.'
"Given under my hand and the seal of the Confederate States of America, at the city of Richmond, on this 12th day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-four.

Jefferson Davis."

Here is what Gen. Lee added to this Proclamation in announcement to the soldiers.

"Head-Quarters, A.N. Va., March 30, 1864.

"General Order No. 23.
"In compliance with the recommendations of the Senate and House of Representatives, His Excellency the President has issued his proclamation calling upon the people to set apart Friday, the 8th of April, as a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer. The commanding general invites the army to join in the observance of the day. He directs due preparation to be made in all departments to anticipate the wants of the several commands, so that it may be strictly observed. All military duties, except such as are absolutely necessary, will be suspended. The chaplains are desired to hold services in their regiments and brigades. The officers and men are requested to attend.
"Soldiers! let us humble ourselves before the Lord our God, asking through Christ the forgiveness of our sins, beseeching the aid of the God of our forefathers in the defence of our homes and our liberties, thanking Him for His past blessings, and imploring their continuance upon our cause and our people.

"R. E. Lee, General."

Pictures from Ruth Anne's birth.

2010-10-24T16:03:00.004-05:00

Here are some pictures from Ruth Anne's delivery. Ashley did an amazing job of laboring for over nine hours with no medication, until it was clear that she was face up and had not dialated at all in over 4 hours. It was a very intense time, with her contractions being so close for so long, I was worn out just being there.

Two proud Grandparents! This is very special for me, Ruth, was my dad, Phil's, mother's name was Ruth. She was a very special and sweet lady and I was so happy and honored to use her name. Anne (with an 'E') was always in my top 3 or 4 girls names and we eventually thought of Ruth Anne and loved it immediately. Virginia, for me, of course, has always had a place in my heart, being the honorable state that she is, with all her beauty, and the noble men and women that are her ancestors and bearers of Constitutional Liberty. Then Ashley reminded me that Virginia is her Great-Grandmother's name on her mothers side. So that was perfect!

Me and Ruth Anne with Ashley's Father Robb. A very proud new grandpa.

Going HOME!! Finally!

Say hello to our daughter!

2010-10-22T07:58:00.003-05:00

Ruth Anne Virginia Taylor was born on October 20th 2010 at 7:13 pm. She weighed 6 lbs 10 oz. It has been a long week, and hopefully today we get to go home! Ashley is doing great, we are both just very tired and ready to get out of the hospital! More pics to come!

The Baby Bump

2010-10-16T10:02:00.002-05:00

Well, here is the Baby bump. Sorry haven't posted many of these, and hopefully this will be the last one. The baby, Pumpkin, as called by some, until the real name is to be revealed, is due tomorrow! Ashley's folks and brother are here now, and we are just waiting for the action to begin.

Nursery Pictures!

2010-10-07T06:26:00.004-05:00

Well, here are some long awaited pictures of the baby nursery! We have finally started to make some sense of whats going on in there. We had the help of my dad and Ashley's dad and brother one weekend to paint. And thanks to my sister and brother-in-law, and my folks, who I think owned the furniture first, I got that painted as well. It was all bare wood, and looks so different now painted and distressed! We went with the classic Winnie the Pooh theme, of course. I know some people haven't been able to be here to see it, but it looks great.

Ashley is well, and ready to have a BABY! Hopefully some more post will come soon, I have a lot of catching up to do on here.

apples and bloggin

2010-09-01T11:13:00.008-05:00

I was walking to work this morning, (and that is amazing that I walk to work) just looking at the fields and the sun coming up, thinking how much I love the job that I have! I mean, I can pick an apple off a tree for breakfast! You can't do that at most jobs. I haven't been keeping up with my blog lately, and I decided I want to do better. I walked around this morning and took some pictures around the gardens and thought I would share them.

Kentucky Happenings

2010-08-12T20:47:00.002-05:00

I know it has been a while since my last post. I haven't been reading much lately, maybe all the hot weather has been draining my creative juices. No, its not global warming, its just summer, its supposed to be hot. I know I probably complain about that to Ashley too much, but, it has been hot! Really, the last few days, I don't think I could get any wetter if I were to jump in the pool.

Things have been going well here in Kentucky. We just had another visit to the doctor about the baby today and everything is going well. Sorry no names... although I will say that if it is a girl, I am calling her 'half-pint', and if its a boy, I am thinking 'little man'. We did find out that planning a home birth here in Kentucky is a felony? How crazy. Don't worry, even though Ashley would love to have the baby at home, this state doesn't even certify mid-wives, so there are very few to be found. Oh to be back in Tennessee, in the South! I have been watching the Sound of Music, for the first time, and I think if we have more children we will be looking into hiring Ashley a 'Fraulein' (governess)! Maybe they could help us figure out a color for the nursery!

The vegetable garden is doing great. We have given tomatoes away left and right. Okra is coming in and green beans, and the yams and sweet potato vines are covering the ground. It is so wonderful to get vegetables from your own garden, it really shows how the Lord provides!

Well, hopefully some more quotes will be coming soon. I am still reading about General Robert E. Lee and there have been some great things he has said to his children that I want to post.

Do you know what our government is doing?

2010-07-26T16:05:00.003-05:00

I just read an article in the local paper from the Washington Post that will shock you, if you don't already know how out-of-control the Federal Government has become just concerning "National Security" since 9/11. There is so much hidden from citizens of this country about what our government is doing and how money and waste are no issue when it comes to supposedly 'keeping us safe' here in America. Here is one more instance where the Founders would be appalled. This article has a few inappropriate words, so I will warn you, but the light this article sheds on a secretive part of government that is supposed to get its consent from 'those that it governs' is doing things that none of us had any idea. Here is the link: Top Secret America

'To Apply What I Already Know'

2010-07-13T15:56:00.004-05:00

I have been reading a new book I purchased on our trip to Virginia, and yes, another book on Gen. Robert E. Lee. This one is entitled Life and Letters of Gen. Robert Edward Lee by Dr. John William Jones, who also wrote Christ in the Camp. I have barely started and it has already had several good quotes that I want to share, but don't want to ruin the book if anyone were to read it! This quote is from a letter Captain Robert E. Lee wrote to his wife on October 16, 1837 from St. Louis, Missouri, where he had been stationed while in charge of a corps of engineers. It is a excellent letter, dealing with the raising of one of their children. With our first little one on the way, this chapter has been very interesting, getting a glimpse of how the Lee's raised their children.

Lee writes: "Our dear little boy seems to have among his friends the reputation of being hard to manage, - a distinction not at all desirable, as it indicates self-will and obstinacy. Perhaps these are qualities which he really possesses, and he may have a better right to them than I am willing to acknowledge; but it is our duty, if possible, to counteract them and assist him to bring them under his control. I have endeavored in my intercourse with him, to require nothing but what was in my opinion necessary or proper, and to explain to him temperately its propriety, at a time when he could listen to my arguments, and not at the moment of his being vexed and his little faculties warped by passion. I have also tried to show him that I was firm in my demands, and constant in their enforcement, and that he must comply with them; and I let him see that I look to their execution in order to relieve him, as much as possible, from the temptation to break them. Since my efforts have been so unsuccessful, I fear I have altogether failed in accomplishing my purpose, but I hope to be able to profit by my experience. You must assist me in my attempts and we must endeavor to combine the mildness and forbearance of the mother with the sternness and, perhaps, unreasonableness of the father. This is a subject on which I think much, though M- may blame me for not reading more. I am ready to acknowledge the good advice contained in the text books, and believe that I see the merit of their reasoning generally; but what I want to learn is to apply what I already know. I pray God to watch over and direct our efforts in guarding our dear little son that we may bring him up in the way he should go."

Day 2: Lexington, VA "Do it Well"

2010-07-01T13:13:00.012-05:00

On our second day, we were in Lexington most of the day. We started out at Washington and Lee University, where Gen. Robert E. Lee became President after the War. I had never seen the Presidents Mansion, which Lee himself designed and lived in until his death. I don't believe you can tour this one, I think it is still the residence of the University President. After we saw Lee's House, we walked toward Lee's Chapel, took some pictures and then walked down the street to VMI or Virginia Military Institute. Both campuses are right next to each other. We walked around the parade grounds and then into the VMI Chapel. In the basement of the Chapel is the new gift shop and museum. There you can see things like Stonewall Jacksons VMI uniform he wore at the first battle of Manassas, His horse 'Little Sorrel' who is mounted, and saddle, and also the raincoat Jackson was wearing when shot by his own men at Chancellorsville. There are also some very interesting exhibits from the history of VMI. The gift shop was probably the best one we encountered on the entire trip. At noon, everyday, there is a cadet guided tour of VMI that meets in the gift shop. This is one thing I have never done at VMI and I have always wanted my father to go on, so we did that. We were taken around by Cadet McFather, who was sharply dressed wearing his dress white uniform. One of the most impressive scenes of the whole trip happened on this tour. While walking outside the Chapel, an older gentleman walked by in a shirt and shorts, and as Cadet McFather was talking to us, he stopped and said "How are you today Sir?" in which the older gentleman replied, "Well, how are you?" Cadet McFather then replied, "Doing my job, Sir." and then the other gentleman said, "Do it well." Cadet McFather said, "Yes sir." This man must have been a superior and at least professor, but the whole scene was very impressive. I can only say, if you have a son, especially in his teenage years, visiting and touring VMI should leave a mark. The organization and discipline of the young men and women there is outstanding. We also learned of their 'Honor Code' and unlike West Point Academy, who gives three strikes, VMI only gives one. In the first picture below, is inside the VMI Chapel. The flags hanging from the ceiling are those states that composed of the Union when VMI was founded. The Painting on the wall is of the Battle of New Market, where VMI cadets were marched and called to battle, charging an artillery battery and helped to win the battle.

From there we walked back to Lee's Chapel, which Gen. Lee had built at Washington and Lee University while President. Inside is a life size sculpture of Gen. Lee resting on his camp cot. It is a beautiful marble statue, which I wish you could take pictures of, but none are allowed. Underneath this statue, downstairs is the Lee family crypt. Gen. Lee, his wife and sons and daughters, and also his father, Revolutionary War hero, Gen. 'Lighthorse' Harry Lee are all buried there. Lee's office is also intact the way he left it, and Traveller is buried right outside the back door.

After touring VMI and Washington and Lee University, we took a tour of Stonewall Jackson's house in town. Again, no photography is allowed inside. I have toured this house before, and I have to say the tour this time was a little disappointing. We were told during the tour, that we don't really know what Gen. Jackson believed about slavery, and also that we didn't know exactly why he fought in the War, other than he was a member of the Virginia State Militia. I had to bite my tongue, because if you have ever read R.L. Dabney's book or his Life and Letters, by his wife, Mary Anna, I believe that we do know what he thought and why he fought. Anyway, the other thing I noticed, and it wasn't just here, but they would say things like Jackson had a 'strong belief in his faith', which may be nothing, but I wish they would say 'his faith in God and the Lord Jesus Christ.' These men's faith was not in their faith, it was in Almighty God and they found their rest in His Son, Jesus Christ. I just find it heartbreaking, and I believe a dishonor to these men and to God, to not tell the whole truth. Maybe it is the 'politically correct' thing to say, but I don't agree. But I would recommend the tour, it is the only one in Lexington that we took that you had to actually pay to tour, but just to see the house where Jackson and his wife lived is worth it.

Back home from Virginia! Day 1

2010-06-30T15:53:00.013-05:00

We are back in Nashville after our Virginia, Shenandoah Valley trip. I am sure more post are to come and pictures! We had a great time, and saw some really amazing things and places. Its amazing that I have been to some of these places several times now, yet every new time there is something to see that I didn't know about before. We started off in Lexington, Va on Friday afternoon and our first stop was Stonewall Jackson Cemetery. I obviously knew about Stonewall Jackson's grave and monument there, but since my last visit I found out that others like, 'Sandy' Pendelton, Jackson's adjutant and also William Pendelton, Sandy's father, who was an Artillery Commander under Jackson are buried there as well. Also, Governor Letcher, who was the Governor of Virginia when she seceded from the Union was from Lexington and is buried there as well. There were many more and what a beautiful setting for these very important people to rest.

The first stop on our way to Virginia was Rutledge, TN which is north of Knoxville in East Tennessee. My mother's family is from there and our family cemetery is there. I have not been there in probably five years or so and with my parents with us, I thought it would be great for Ashley to see where my family was from. My mother informed me on our way that the day we were visiting the cemetery was the same day my brother Brian died. So I think that was good for my parents, especially my father who hadn't been to the cemetery there almost as long as I. His mother is also buried there. It is a beautifully situated location, being in the Clinch Mountains, it is so peaceful there. We also stopped at Breedings Restaurant, which is in Blaine, a place that has not changed since I was a boy. The food was exactly the same, I got my BLT, which is what I always got as a boy, and my folks got the open faced hot roast beef with mashed potatoes and gravy, just like it always was. I was so excited for Ashley to see just a little bit of some places that I spent so much time at as I grew up!

Getting ready to return to Virginia that "Mother of States"

2010-06-22T14:57:00.009-05:00

R.L. Dabney writes in The Life and Campaigns of Lt. Gen. T. J. (Stonewall) Jackson, about the series of events that led to secession in Virginia, one of the last straws being Lincoln's resupplying Ft. Sumter, which is an act of war, and then declaring war without the proper Constitutional authority. Virginia could no longer stay in a union that would tear the binding compact in two, and then try to coerce a sovereign state back into a voluntary union. I thought Dabney's words on these events were very moving and inspiring, I wish we had MEN enough to stand up today for what is just and right! R. L. Dabney writes:

"But they did not stop here: on April 14th, Lincoln made a proclamation, without the authority of a shadow of law from Congress, declaring war against South Carolina and the Confederate Government, and calling upon the States for seventy-five thousand soldiers to invade them. The Governors of all the Southern States, except Maryland, refused compliance. In Virginia all remains of hesitation were instantly extinguished; the Convention, which was in session, on the 17th of April, passed an ordinance resuming the seperate independence of the State; and the Governor immediately began to prepare for war."

..."They said, the old "Mother of States and statesmen" was decrepit, that her genius was turned to dotage, that her breasts were dry of that milk which suckled her Henrys and Washingtons. They thought her little more than a cowering beldame, whom a timely threat would reduce to utter submissiveness. And thus they dared to stretch over her head the minatory rod. But when the tyrant tried the perilous experiment, he was startled by a result as unexpected as that which followed the touch of Ithuriel's spear. She, whom he thought a patient, hesitating, helpless paralytic, flamed up at the insolent touch, like a pyramid of fire, and Virginia stood forth again in her immortal youth, the unterrified Commonwealth of 1776, a Minerva radiant with the terrible glories of policy and war, wielding that sword which ever flashed before the eyes of her aggressors, the "Sic semper Tyrannis."

Just getting home from grocery shopping and...

2010-06-21T18:43:00.003-05:00

O.K... I just felt and saw the baby (half-pint) (if its a girl) move for the first time! Oh My... What an amazing work that God is doing inside Ashley's womb! Lots of smiles for that.

The Creature of the Sovereign States

2010-06-16T10:59:00.011-05:00

I am continually amazed while reading books written by those people who were actually there during the events in our nations history, how they describe the beauty of the way our government is suppose to function. How completely misled and mis-taught we have been in our own country about our own history is heart-breaking. This quote is a little lengthy, but I believe very important and relevant today, seeing that the Founders were trying to avoid the type of authoritarian government we now have and how our own government breaks its own rule of law everyday. I also believe more and more that it is our duty, especially if we are believers in Christ, to understand how our governments are supposed to function. I would try to sum up this quote, but it is so simple and straight to the point that I thought it speaks for itself. R.L. Dabney, while writing about Gen. Stonewall Jackson and his political views as a 'States Rights Democrat' says this:

"This name did not denote the attachment of those who bore it to the dogmas of universal suffrage and radical democracy, as concerned the State Governments; but their advocacy of republican rights for these Governments, and a limited construction of the powers conferred by them on the Federal Government. Their view of those powers was founded on the following historical facts, which no well-informed American hazards his credit of disputing: - That the former colonies of Great Britain emerged from the Revolutionary War distinct and sovereign political communities or commonwealths, in a word, separate nations, though allied together, and as such were recognized by all the European powers: That, after some years' existence as such, they voluntarily formed a covenant, called the Constitution of the United States, which created a species of government resting upon this compact for its existence and rights; a government which was the creature of the sovereign States, acting as independent nations in forming it: That this compact conferred certain defined powers and duties upon the Central Government, for purposes common to all the States alike, and expressly reserved and prohibited the exercise of all other powers, leaving to the States the management of their own affairs. They, therefore, did not sacrifice their nature as sovereignties, by acceding to the Federal Union; but, by compact, they conceded some of the functions of an independent nation, particularly defined, to the Central Government, retaining all the rest as before. These facts and this inference were uniformly held by the Commonwealth of Virginia at all times, being solemnly asserted when she joined the copartnership, and frequently reaffirmed by her Government down to the present day. They were, in substance, embodied in the Constitution of the United States itself, by a formal amendment, immediately after it went into effect. Since the era of the elder Adams, when the centralizing doctrine was utterly overwhelmed by the election of Mr. Jefferson, they have been professed in theory, though often violated in act, by every Administration of whatever party it might be, and by nearly every State."

"The party of the States'-Rights usually taught, from these principles, that the Federal Government ought to continue what it was in the purer days of Washington and Jefferson, unambitious in its claims of jurisdiction, simple and modest in its bearing, restricted in its wealth and patronage, and economical of expenditures, save in the common defense against external enemies. They held that all acts of legislation which interfered with those functions appropriate to the States as Commonwealths, and all those acts which turned aside from the general interests common to the States alike, to promote particular or local interests, were partial, usurping, and in virtual violation of the spirit of the Constitution. Among these, they classed all bounty laws designed to favor the inhabitants of a section, all protective tariffs, the chartering of a vast Banking Corporation in one of the States, and all meddling with the institution of domestic slavery in the States. They also held that the very Government, being the creation of commonwealths which acted as independent nations in forming it, and originating in a covenant which they voluntarily formed as such, derived its whole authority from its conformity to the terms of that covenant: that, if the covenant were destroyed, the Government was destroyed, and its rightful title of allegiance from any person was annihilated- that being gone which was the sole basis of it; and that, in the dernier ressort upon any vital instance of usurpation, the States themselves must be the judges whether the covenant was destroyed, and judges too of the necessity and nature of their redress. This right, to be exercised, indeed, under those moral obligations which should govern all international intercourse, they held to be inherent in the States as originally sovereign; while to suppose their federal compact divested them of it was preposterous, and what was, in the nature of the case, impossible. It would represent their voluntary act in acceding to the covenant as a political suicide. And it would have been equally preposterous for the Federal Constitution formally to confer it; it would have been the absurdity of the offspring's attempting to confer on its own parent the rights of paternity. Hence the absolute silence of the Federal Constitution concerning this inalienable right of the States was logically consistent, and is as incapable of implying anything against, as for, its just exercise." -R.L. Dabney

Quote is from Life and Campaigns of Lt. Gen. Thomas (Stonewall) Jackson by R. L. Dabney

The superintendence of God

2010-05-31T19:39:00.002-05:00

I came across this passage as I have been re-reading The Life and Campaigns of Lieut.-General Jackson. I thought it was very helpful and worth sharing. R.L. Dabney, speaking of Jackson writes:

"There was another trait of his religious character so conspicuous, that it demands here full illustration,- his constant recognition of a particular Providence. No man ever lived who seemed to have a more practical and living sense of this truth of Christianity. He earned, indeed, thereby, the title of superstitious, from some of the unthinking, and of fatalist from others. But he was neither: his belief in the control of Divine Providence was most rational and scriptural. The only difference between him and other enlightened Christians here was, that his faith was "the substance of things anticipated, and the evidence of things not seen;" while theirs is, so largely, an impractical theory...

His belief in the superintendence of God was equal to his industry. In every blessing or calamity of private life, as well as in every order or despatch announcing a victory, he was prompt to ascribe the result to the Lord of Hosts; and these brief devout ascriptions were with him no unmeaning formalities. In the very flush of triumph he has been known to seize the juncture for the earnest inculcation of this truth upon the minds of his subordinates; and, in the anxieties of great and critical moments, his soul drew composure and assurance from it. Especially did he love to recognize the hand of God in the results of strategy and battles. While the most pains-taking of commanders, he well knew that in these great operations many things must be done beyond the oversight of the commander, each of which by the manner of its performance may absolutely determine the event. Hence when the issue was according to his prayers, he recognized the presence of an Eye more comprehensive than that of any creature, and ascribed all wisdom, power, and glory to it."

'Ripe meat off the bone"

2010-05-20T16:05:00.002-05:00

Well, its been a little while since my last post, but its been a busy couple of weeks. I have a couple of posts in mind, but what we received today, I just had to post about. We have a wonderful, local butcher shop called Crestwood Meats and we just purchased a freezer bundle with enough meat to last our growing family for a while. Most everything they have is raised locally and has no steroids or any other additives. I was very excited when we got to put it in the awesome freezer my in-laws are letting us use. If you live here in Louisville, I highly recommend you check them out, everyone there is so friendly and knowledgeable. So anyone else that wants to make a trip to Louisville, come on, and we'll feed ya well.

Looking to the brightness ahead

2010-04-27T15:21:00.004-05:00

As my wife and I are contemplating a short little excursion to that most beautiful place, indeed the most beautiful land I know of, the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia, I am re-reading Life and Campaigns of Lt. General T.J. Stonewall Jackson. I have wanted so much to write often of how much I have learned about the true Southern Confederacy and the goodness, justice and integrity of many of its people and leaders and the manliness of its men. It seems even now, this day there is constantly some false thing said about the South and its Cause, mainly from people, I would dare to say, have not read hardly a single thing, South or North, for that matter, from someone who actually was there during that most critical time. One thing that has been a constant in whoever I have read from that time, is that they believed that one day the truth would once again prevail, and that their actions would be vindicated when the truth was taught. Unfortunately that truth is still hidden even from people who would see it. Yet, I can say that for me the 'beacons have been lit'. Yet as I say that, as much as I have seen and learned from the honesty of those Southerners of how our constituted government is supposed to function, the truth about slavery, the truth about Lincoln, yet the most amazing thing is how gracious the Lord's presence was to those people. The Lord God Almighty moved amongst those people, and how they speak of Christ is more impressive than any other thing that can be learned. Here is a short piece of a letter Jackson wrote to his wife on May 11th, 1859.

Jackson writes, "Try to look up and be cheerful, and not desponding. Trust our kind heavenly Father, and by the eye of faith see that all things with you are right, and for your best interest... The clouds come, pass over us, and are followed by bright sunshine; so, in God's moral dealings with us, He permits us to have trouble awhile, but let us, even in the most trying dispensations of His providence, be cheered by the brightness which is a little ahead. Try to live near to Jesus, and secure that peace which flows like a river."

Catchn' up

2010-04-19T16:27:00.002-05:00

Well, its been a busy couple of weeks and I haven't had anything to post about lately. Or if I have, I forgot about it by the time I made it to the computer, or when I have tried to use the Internet, it usually decides not to work. We have now been to our second baby doctor visit, and we heard the heart beat loud and clear! Sorry to disappoint, but I believe we have decided to keep the baby's gender a surprise until it is born, but we may decide to shed some light on names....maybe. It has been a busy few weeks at work, today our garden designers were in town and we are planting roses and perennials and I know not what! We have plenty of work to do, and if I can get some sleep tonight I might do some turkey hunting in the morning. I was able to go Saturday morning with a friend, and it was beautiful. Turkey were gobbling all around, but none for the table yet. We also received Julia Childs Mastering the Art of French Cooking! How exciting. It looks like some fun cooking in the future for the Taylor's!

What is Reform?

2010-03-31T11:48:00.006-05:00

I am currently reading a book called Democratic Despotism by Raoul E. Desvernine in 1936. I found it at a used book sale here in Louisville a few weeks ago, and it has so far proven to be an excellent $2 buy. From what little I can find out, Mr. Desvernine was a lawyer for the American Liberty League, that spoke out against Roosevelt's New Deal. I thought this little exerpt was intersting, keeping in mind that this was written 60 years ago, but relevant seeing that the 'New Deal' was not what I was taught it was growing up and how it did not bring this country out of the depression.

Desvernine writes:

"It needs no argument to prove that some reform is imperative, for to deny that reform is necessary is to suggest the absurdity that perfection has already been attained, and to close one's eyes as well to many glaring examples of its need. Reform must, however, be distinguished from Revolution. Reform is the correction of abuses, the prevention of their recurrence, the adaptation of the existing State to changed conditions; it is not the discarding of the existing order and the susbstituting of a different system. It is the objective sought which supplies the rest of the social value of the effort, but we must be careful, that in our enthusiasm to attain this objective, and in our righteous indignation against abuses, we do not even unconsciously select and pursue methods which alter all our accepted concepts of government.

Nor has it yet been demonstrated by the New Dealers, or by anybody else, that our political institutions are substantially outmoded, that malpractices and abuses cannot be corrected, and that all adjustments needed to square them with progress, cannot be made within the framework of our institutions. Moreover, we need not look far to see that the ultimate fulfillment of the "reforms" which are being proposed leads to a system even more tyrannous and class-privileged than that which these Minor Prophets claim the present system to be."

Retreating from Freedom

2010-03-24T16:05:00.003-05:00

When I was reading End the Fed by Ron Paul, he mentioned one of the first books he had read that had really gotten him to thinking about economics and government, to my surprise it was one of the first books I read! It is called The Road to Serfdom by F.A. Hayek. I highly recommend this book. Hayek wrote this book from 1940 to 1943 while in England. I believe these quotes offered from it, are fitting for the times today.

"The statesman who should attempt to direct private people in what manner they ought to employ their capitals, would not only load himself with a most unnecessary attention, but assume an authority which could safely be trusted to no council and senate whatever, and which would nowhere be so dangerous as in the hands of a man who had folly and presumption enough to fancy himself fit to exercise it." -Adam Smith from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations

"the generation to which we belong is now learning from experience what happens when men retreat from freedom to a coercive organization of their affairs. Though they promise themselves a more abundant life, they must in practice renounce it; as the organized direction increases, the variety of ends must give way to uniformity. That is the nemesis of the planned society and the authoritarian principle in human affairs." -Walter Lippmann,"The Government of Posterity," The Atlantic, vol.158, November 1936.

"We have progressively abandoned that freedom in economic affairs without which personal and political freedom has never existed in the past. Although we had been warned by some of the greatest political thinkers of the nineteenth century, by Tocqueville and Lord Acton, that socialism means slavery, we have steadily moved in the direction of socialism." -F.A. Hayek

"It is rarely remembered now that socialism in its beginnings was frankly authoritarian." -F.A. Hayek

An Old Post; Re-visited.

2010-03-23T10:45:00.003-05:00

I have been thinking about some quotes I posted last year some time and thought I would share them again, since I didn't have anyone reading my blog back then, and probably still do not, yet these quotes are very moving and have a romantic quality about them. Hearing the news of so much deception and trickery and immorality coming from that little hill in Washington, it is good to look back to a nobler time, when once this nation was led by real MEN, men with principles, men of honor, men of truth.

"In those days men were sent to the Senate because of their ability and their purity of character, and not because of great wealth or capacity as political tricksters and successful partisans." - John William Jones

Written about Jefferson Davis after his death : "His lofty patriotism, immaculate integrity, and firmness of purpose, which never yielded principle for expediency nor abandoned the right for success will be held up for emulation by the aspiring youth of Texas who would achieve an honorable distinction among their fellow-men." -Gov. L. S. Ross, in Austin, Texas

A dispatch sent on the day of Jefferson Davis's death said this:
"He was a leading man in the Senate, and gave every one who saw him the impression that he was a born leader. He was not a demagogue, and would always take the unpopular side of any question when he believed he was right."

This quote is about the Senate of 1850:
"Never before at one time did so many illustrious men sit in the highest council of the nation. The States sent their foremost men to the Senate. Few were sent to the Senate for their wealth, or family or party influence. Ability, Experience and integrity were the tests by which the perspective States tried the men who were to represent them in that then truly venerable and venerated august body." -John William Jones

These quotes from Mr. Frank H. Alfriend are about the speeches Mr. Davis was apt to give while in the Senate:
"Never for one instant varying from the principles of his creed, he never doubted as to the course of duty; profound, accurate in information, there was no question pertaining to the science of government or its administration that he did not illuminate with a light clear, powerful and original."

and again, "For mere rhetorical glitter, Mr. Davis's speeches afford but poor models, but for clear logic and convincing argument, apt illustration, bold and original imagery, and genuine pathos, they are unsurpassed by any ever delivered in the American Senate."

Here Mr. Alfriend was comparing Stephen A. Douglas and Jefferson Davis:
"For mere party success Douglas cared everything, and Davis nothing, save as it insured the triumph of constitutional principles."

All quotes were taken from: Jefferson Davis and the World's Tribute to his Memory- Memorial Volume 1890. written by J.W.M. Jones.

2010-03-22T15:20:00.003-05:00

Here are a few excerpts from a letter written to the Central Presbyterian by Rev. Dr. Wm. J. Hoge, describing a scene he encountered while serving as a chaplain in the Army of Northern Virginia near Fredericksburg, VA. From Christ in the Camp by J.W. Jones.

"A prayer meeting had been appointed for the half hour before public worship, and the house was already full: so full that it was not without difficulty that I made my way to the pulpit; so full that when General Jackson and General Paxton came to the door, they modestly retired, least they should displace some already within; so full that one of the men aptly compared the close packing to that of 'herrings in a barrel.'
"One could not sit in that pulpit and meet the concentrated gaze of those men, without deep emotion. I remembered that they were veterans of many a bloody field. The eyes which looked into mine, waiting for the Gospel of peace, had looked as steadfastly into eyes which burned with deadly hate, and upon whatever is terrible in war. The voices which now poured out their strength in singing the songs of 'Zion' had shouted in the charge and the victory. I thought of their privations and their perils, of the cause for which they had suffered, of the service they had rendered the country, the Church of God, and whatever I hold personally dear, and what could I do but honor them, love them, and count it all joy to serve them in the Gospel?"....
"While preaching to these men, their earnestness of aspect constantly impressed me; the absence of that rather comfortable and well-satisfied air which often pervades our congregations, as if mere custom or prospect of entertainment had assembled us. These men looked as if they had come on business, and a very important business; and the preacher could scarcely do otherwise than feel that he too, had business of moment there!"

I think about these things I have read quite often, and I know I probably annoy and bore everyone, but Oh, how I feel these men should be honored! When I discover some new, yet old truth, that has been buried deep from most of us, and how honorable men like these were, how they gave their lives, their fortunes, their liberties, their blood, so that I could be handed down liberty, it stirs my blood to desire the truth to prevail. These books I have read, other than the Holy Scriptures, I can think of nothing more romantic or stirring in fictional work, though I have not read much fiction, than to read these real stories of our own history and how honorable, and usually believers, lived and died.

Baby Doctors and the 'Bourne Pursuit'

2010-03-17T20:33:00.004-05:00

Today was a very interesting day to say the least. Ashley and I went to the Doctor for her and the baby's first visit. Everything looked great and everyone is healthy! That was very interesting in itself and exciting, but oh that would not be the end of this story. I had to post about what happened when we left the doctor's office and headed into Louisville. Now, as far as I know I didn't nothing to provoke this guy. We were sitting at a red light, waiting to cross over some railroad tracks to take a right onto Frankfort Ave. (If you are not from Louisville, a major street) when all of a sudden I felt a nudge. I thought at first the car had crept forward until I looked into the rear view mirror and there was a ford truck right up against the bumper. Trying to assess the situation, I noticed the driver pointing at us, and knew something wasn't right. The light turned green and I turned onto Frankfort Ave. and this guy kept speeding up like he was going to hit us, thinking this can't be happening and then he actually hit us! I was trying to figure out what to do, if I stopped, I didn't want him to ram into us again or block us in, so I sped up and tried to lose him. Darting through traffic, I made a sharp left onto some side street, now I can get around Louisville a little, but I know nothing about side streets, so back to the story. This guy pursued after us, and I believe at this point I had Ashley call the police. I made another sharp turn to the left into some alley, and then another smaller one, with this guy close behind. I thought this last turn was it for us, it looked like a dead in with no room to get away, just at the last moment I saw a smaller street to the left and shot through, I don't think this guy could get his big truck through, and we lost him. It was the craziest thing I have seen in a while, and I did some shaking afterwards. The police came when we could pull off down the road, but what could we do? No licence plate, just a description of the truck. So, long story, everyone ok and the car as well. I never thought I would be glad to have a little car, even though when I hit the gas to go, there wasn't much there. So I will keep the truck! Laughing about it now, it reminded me of one of the chases in the 'Bourne' movies. I asked Ashley if she "took care of her car, the tires felt a little splashy." Considering the circumstances, I believe I took the right course of action, not knowing if this guy was drunk or what, I definitely didn't want to let him hit us again. I bet you thought most of this article was going to be about the doctor! I feel like I need to see one myself now. Or at least get a carry permit.

'A Cow and a Churn'

2010-03-11T16:24:00.012-06:00

I am back to reading Recollections and Letters of General Lee by his son Robert E. Lee Jr. I thought I would share a few lines that I found very pleasing to read.

This first quote is from a letter to his son Robert advising him of his affairs on his new farm in King William County, Virginia after the war. Gen. Lee writes:

"I am clear for your doing everything to improve your property and make it remunerative as far as you can. You know my objection to incurring debt. I cannot overcome it... I hope you will overcome your chills, and by next winter you must patch up your new house, and get a sweet wife. You will be more comfortable, and not so lonesome. Let her bring a cow and a churn. That will be all you will want..."

Here is a sweet letter Lee wrote to his one of his daughters. His nickname for her was "My precious Life." Lee again is advising one of his children to make themselves useful. Gen. Lee writes:

"Camp Petersburg, November 6, 1864."
"My Precious Life: This is the first day I have had leisure to answer your letter. I enjoyed it very much at the time of its reception, and have enjoyed it since, but I have often thought of you in the meantime, and have seen you besides. Indeed, I may say, you are never out of my thoughts. I hope you think of me often, and if you could know how earnestly I desire your true happiness, how ardently I pray you may be directed to every good and saved from every evil, you would as sincerely strive for its accomplishment. Now in your youth you must be careful to discipline your thoughts, words and actions. Habituate yourself to useful employment, regular improvement, and to the benefit of all those around you. You have had some opportunity of learning the rudiments of your education- not as good as I should have desired, but I am much cheered by the belief that you availed yourself of it- and I think you are now prepared by diligence and study to learn whatever you desire. Do not allow yourself to forget what you have spent so much time and labour in acquiring, but increase it every day by extended application. I hope you will embrace in your studies all useful acquisitions. I was much pleased to hear that while at 'Bremo' you passed much of your time in reading and music. All accomplishments will enable you to give pleasure, and thus exert a wholesome influence. Never neglect the means of making yourself useful in the world..."

'You've Got Internet'

2010-03-09T18:36:00.003-06:00

Well, I am sitting at the kitchen table, on the Internet! This is the first time I have had Internet at home in probably five years. I am hoping I will be able to blog more, and hopefully read more of everyone else's and comment! The weather in Louisville, Kentucky is warming up, and things are getting busier in the gardens. We have already had a few little bulbs blooming. Exciting! Married life is awesome, and oh by the way, if anyone doesn't have my wife's blog or already know, Ashley is pregnant! Its amazing! We joke about how a year ago neither of us thought we would be married, much less having a baby! I am ready teach some young'ns the truth about sooo many things! Currently I am breezing through End the Fed by Ron Paul. How amazingly simple the truths are in this little book. I know, for some this topic sounds dull, but when you understand how much power the Federal Reserve has and how immoral the things they do are, lets just say, when this book was written last year, I believe, our dollar was worth $0.05 of what the original worth was in 1913 when this dollar was created. Unbelievable. And there is a simple reason why this has happened, so read it!

Sacred Principles

2010-02-20T16:25:00.005-06:00

I have been trying to keep up with something great that has been happening in the state of Mississippi. The citizens there have been working very hard to get the 89,000 signatures needed to begin the process of amending their state constitution to define personhood as beginning at conception. They are fighting for the unalienable rights of the unborn children in that state. It has been inspiring and convicting, to me to read how the Lord is honoring the work that is being done there and the sacrifices that many have made to travel the state to get the signatures needed. I read this first quote from Gen. Lee and thought it was very fitting. These men were fighting for liberty, justice and truth at a different time in history and in a different way, but nevertheless these quotes are about the duty of the people, when they see the need, to fight for what is right no matter what the outcome.

A day or two before the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, General Lee said this to General Pendleton:

“... I have never believed we could, against the gigantic combination for our subjugation, make good in the long run our independence unless foreign powers should, directly or indirectly, assist us... But such considerations really made with me no difference. We had, I was satisfied, sacred principles to maintain and rights to defend, for which we were in duty bound to do our best, even if we perished in the endeavour.”

From Recollections and Letters of General Lee by his son, Robert E. Lee Jr..

Jefferson Davis, in his ‘second’ inaugural address, had this to say:

“...It was to be expected, when we entered upon this war, that it would expose our people to sacrifices, and cost them much both of money and blood. But we knew the value of the object for which we struggled, and understood the nature of the war in which we were engaged. Nothing could be so bad as failure, and any sacrifice would be cheap as the price of success in such a contest.
But the picture has its lights as well as its shadows. This great strife has awakened in the people the highest emotions and qualities of the human soul. It is cultivating feelings of patriotism, virtue and courage. Instances of self-sacrifice and of generous devotion to the noble cause for which we are contending are rife throughout the land. Never has a people evinced a more determined spirit than that now animating men, women, and children in every part of our country. Upon the first call, the men fly to arms; and wives and mothers send their husbands and sons to battle without a murmur of regret.
It was, perhaps, in the ordination of Providence that we were to be taught the value of our liberties by the price which we pay for them.”

From Jefferson Davis and the World’s Tribute to His Memory-Memorial Volume 1890 by John W. Jones.

Here is a link to the Personhood Mississippi site.

No Word Magician

2010-01-28T15:25:00.002-06:00

I was looking back over a book I have about Jefferson Davis today, entitled: "Jefferson Davis and the World's Tribute to His Memory-Memorial Volume 1890", by John William Jones, who wrote Christ in the Camp, and came across a few lines that I wanted to share. I came across a speech given to the General Assembly of Virginia on January 25, 1890 by Senator John W. Daniel. Mr. Daniel goes on to talk about the character of Jefferson Davis and the man of principle that he was. With so many things going on in Washington and even here in Kentucky, and after another speech last night that makes you scratch your head at what was just said... I thought these few lines to be helpful and so needed now in this Country again. Yet always remembering that it is Christ who is our perfect example of a King that rules justly.

John W. Daniel writes of Jefferson Davis:

"Sternly did he stand for principle. He was no courtier, no flatterer, no word magician, no time-server, no demagogue unless that word shakes from it the contaminations of its abuse and return to its pristine meaning- a leader of the people. Like King David's was his command, 'There shall no deceitful man dwell in my house.' A pure and lofty spirit breathed through his every utterance, which, like the Parian stone, revealed in its polish the fineness of the grain. I can recall no public man who, in the midst of such shifting and perplexing scenes of strife, maintained so firmly the consistency of his principles, and who, despite the shower of darts that hurtled around his head, triumphed so completely over every dishonoring imputation."

"He was always ready to follow his principles to their logical conclusion, to become at any sacrifice their champion; to face defeat in their defense, and to die, if need be, rather than disguise or recant them."

On receiving a commission as brigadier-general by President Polk for his actions in the Mexican War, Daniel writes: "But he had taught the doctrine that the State, and not the Federal government, was the true constitutional fountain of such an honor, and from another hand he would not bend his knightly brow to receive it."

"It was fortunate for the South, for America, and for humanity that at the head of the South in war was a true type of its honor, character, and history- a man whose clear rectitude preserved every complication from impeachment of bad faith; a patriot whose love of law and liberty were paramount to all expediencies; a commander whose moderation and firmness could restrain, and whose lofty passion and courage could inspire; a publicist whose intellectual powers and attainments made him the peer of any statesman who has championed the rights of commonwealths in debate, or stood at the helm when the ship of State encountered the tempest of civil commotion. In the tremendous storm which has scarce yet subsided Jefferson Davis never once forgot that he was a constitutional President under the limits of the fundamental law of the Confederate republic."

2010-01-23T09:20:00.003-06:00

"For our knowledge of history teaches us this much: that the object of public education in the American Colonies and the later states up to 1865, was to produce good men. The system may have been imperfect in detail, but its aim was correct. Today the object of American education is to turn out graduates-whether good, bad, or indifferent we neither know nor care. Formerly, quantity had to give place to quality; today it is the reverse." -John Gould Fletcher

From an essay entitled "Education, Past and Present. In I'll Take My Stand from the 1930's.

A visit from ' three little women'

2010-01-19T15:35:00.002-06:00

In light of it being the day on which Robert E. Lee was born, and seeing that I am currently reading some of his letters, which have been a great delight to read, I thought I would give a quote from this good man. I read this one a few days ago, and thought is was very sweet, this is an account of a visit he had from "three little women" in January of 1865.

Lee writes:

"....Yesterday afternoon three little girls walked into my room, each with a small basket. The eldest carried some fresh eggs, laid by her own hens; the second, some pickles made by her mother; the third, some popcorn grown in her garden. They were accompanied by a young maid with a block of soap made by her mother. They were the daughters of a Mrs. Nottingham, a refugee from Northampton County, who lived near Eastville, not far from 'old Arlington'. The eldest of the girls, whose age did not exceed eight years, had a small wheel on which she spun for her mother, who wove all the cloth for her two brothers-boys of twelve and fourteen years. I have not had so pleasant a visit for a long time. I fortunately was able to fill their baskets with apples, which distressed poor Bryan (his mess-steward), and I begged them to bring me nothing but kisses and to keep the eggs, corn, etc., for themselves. I pray daily and almost hourly to our Heavenly Father to come to the relief of you and our afflicted country. I know He will order all things for our good, and we must be content."

From Recollections and Letters of General Lee by his son R.E. Lee

Get ready to hear about General Lee!

2010-01-08T15:49:00.003-06:00

Well, it has been a while since my last post, needless to say it has been a very busy month. My sweet new 'esposita' and I are settling in nicely, not yet warmly, because it is very cold and snowy!! right now in Louisville. I hope to post some pictures of Florida and post about all the big corporate bank buildings in Naples soon! I have been reading The Recollections and Letters of General Lee, by his son of the same name, Robert E. Lee. I found it for $15 at a great little used book store in LaGrange! There is one small quote here taken from a letter Gen. Lee wrote that I think is very profound, yet simple, and applicable especially as a believer in Christ. The other is an entire letter that was very moving to read and I thought would be excellent to post. Enjoy!

Gen. Lee was sent to South Carolina for a time before he took command of the Army of Northern Virginia, which I did not know, and wrote this statement in a letter talking about how difficult it is to get the people to understand their need to make their city, Charleston, ready for defense. Lee writes:

“But it is difficult to arouse ourselves from ease and comfort to labour and self-denial.”- Robert E. Lee Recollections and Letters of General Lee by Robert E. Lee Jr.

After the Battle of Fredericksburg in 1862, Gen. Lee wrote to his wife:

“.... I will commence this holy day by writing to you. My heart is filled with gratitude to Almighty God for His unspeakable mercies with which He has blessed us in this day, for those He has granted us from the beginning of life, and particularly for those He has vouchsafed us during the past year. What should have become of us without His crowning help and protection? Oh, if our people would only recognize it and cease from vain self-boasting and adulation, how strong would be my belief in final success and happiness to our country! But what a cruel thing is war; to separate and destroy families and friends, and mar the purest joys and happiness God has granted us in this world; to fill our hearts with hatred instead of love for our neighbours, and to devastate the fair face of this beautiful world! I pray that, on this day when only peace and good-will are preached to mankind, better thoughts may fill the hearts of our enemies and turn them to peace. Our army was never in such good health and condition since I have been attached to it. I believe they share with me my disappointment that the enemy did not renew the combat on the 13th. I was holding back all day and husbanding our strength and ammunition for the great struggle, for which I thought I was preparing. Had I divined that was to have been his only effort, he would have had more of it. My heart bleeds at the death of every one of our gallant men.”

By the help of Almighty God

2009-12-01T22:20:00.003-06:00

Another great leader and soldier that has been misrepresented by many today is Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest. Forrest was a brilliant commander in the Confederate Cavalry and was also a professing believer some time before his death. I came across this quote in Christ in the Camp.

"(By a Colonel.)"

"God our Helper."

"An incident occurring the night ensuing the recent battle of "Tishamingo Creek" illustrates alike the desperate character of the contest and the feelings of the general commanding, in an hour of excessive trial.

At a late hour of the night he ceased for a few hours the pursuit of the enemy, and we found him seated in earnest thought, in a log hut on the side of the road-his exhausted staff asleep all around him. A staff officer of General S.D. Lee had just arrived, to inquire after the fate of the day. General Forrest was dictating a despatch in answer to his inquiry, and closed it with the expression: "By the help of Almighty God we have won one of the most complete victories of the war." Some one present hinted that hard fighting had a good deal to do with the victory. After a style usual to the general, when deeply in earnest, he brought his clenched fist down on his thigh, exclaiming,"I say by the help of God, and it was by His help; for without it we never could have whipped in the fight with the odds against us."

Oh that this were our Thanksgiving Day Proclamation

2009-11-25T22:56:00.004-06:00

I have been looking back over Christ in the Camp and while in the appendix, which deals with other accounts of the Revival work in other parts of the Confederate Armies, I came across another Proclamation for a day of Prayer and Fasting, this one issued by the Confederate Congress and President Davis. I also flipped back to look at some quotes from Gen. Robert E. Lee and found that an order issued to the soldiers, was given for this very Proclamation handed down by the Government. Oh that the Lord would cause His people in this day, to turn towards Him and spend a 'Day of Thanksgiving' to Him who is the source for thankfulness and goodness.

"[Proclamation by the President of the Confederate States of America]

"The Senate and House of Representatives of the Confederate States of America have signified their desire that a day may be recommended to the people, to be set apart and observed as a day of humiliation, fasting and prayer, in the language following, to wit:
'Reverently recognizing the Providence of God in the affairs of man, and gratefully remembering the guidance, support and deliverance granted to our patriot fathers in the memorable war which resulted in the independence of the American colonies, and now reposing in Him our supreme confidence and hope in the present struggle for civil and religious freedom, and for the right to live under a government of our own choice, and deeply impressed with the conviction that without Him nothing is strong, nothing wise and nothing enduring; in order that the people of this confederacy may have the opportunity, at the same time, of offering their adoration to the great Sovereign of the Universe, of penitently confessing their sins and strengthening their vows and purposes of amendment, in humble reliance upon His gracious and almighty power.
'The Congress of the Confederate States of America do Resolve, That it is recommended to the people of these States, that Friday, the 8th day of April next, be set apart and observed as a day of humiliation, fasting and prayer that Almighty God would so preside over our public councils and authorities; that He would so inspire our armies and their leaders with wisdom, courage and perseverance, and so manifest Himself in the greatness of His goodness and majesty of His power, that we may be safely and successfully led through the chastening to which we are being subjected, to the attainment of an honorable peace; so that, while we enjoy the blessings of a free and happy government, we may ascribe to Him the honor and the glory of our independence and prosperity.'
"A recommendation so congenial to the feelings of the people will receive their hearty concurrence; and it is a grateful duty to the Executive to unite with their representatives in inviting them to meet in the courts of the Most High. Recent events awaken fresh gratitude to the Supreme Ruler of nations. Our enemies have suffered repeated defeats, and a nefarious scheme to burn and plunder our capital, and to destroy our civil government by putting to death the chosen servants of the people, has been baffled and set at naught. Our armies have been strengthened; our finances promise rapid progress to a satisfactory condition; and our whole country is animated with a hopeful spirit and a fixed determination to achieve independence.
"In these circumstances it becomes us, with thankful hearts, to bow ourselves before the throne of the Most High, and, while gratefully acknowledging so many mercies, confess that our sins as a people have justly exposed us to His chastisement. Let us recognize the sufferings which we have been called upon to endure, as administered by a fatherly hand for our improvement, and with resolute courage and patient endurance let us wait on Him for our deliverance.
"In furtherance of these objects, now, therefore, I, Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America, do issue this, my proclamation, calling upon the people of the said States, in conformity with the desire expressed by their representatives, to set apart Friday, the 8th day of April, as a day of humiliation, fasting and prayer, and I do hereby invite them on that day to repair to their several places of public worship and beseech Almighty God 'to preside over our public councils and so inspire our armies and leaders with wisdom, courage and perseverance; and so to manifest Himself in the greatness of His goodness and in the majesty of His power, that we may secure the blessings of an honorable peace and of free government; and that we, as a people, may ascribe all to the honor and glory of His name.'
"Given under my hand and the seal of the Confederate States of America, at the city of Richmond, on this 12th day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-four.

Jefferson Davis."

Here is what Gen. Lee added to this Proclamation in announcement to the soldiers.

"Head-Quarters, A.N. Va., March 30, 1864.

"General Order No. 23.
"In compliance with the recommendations of the Senate and House of Representatives, His Excellency the President has issued his proclamation calling upon the people to set apart Friday, the 8th of April, as a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer. The commanding general invites the army to join in the observance of the day. He directs due preparation to be made in all departments to anticipate the wants of the several commands, so that it may be strictly observed. All military duties, except such as are absolutely necessary, will be suspended. The chaplains are desired to hold services in their regiments and brigades. The officers and men are requested to attend.
"Soldiers! let us humble ourselves before the Lord our God, asking through Christ the forgiveness of our sins, beseeching the aid of the God of our forefathers in the defence of our homes and our liberties, thanking Him for His past blessings, and imploring their continuance upon our cause and our people.

"R. E. Lee, General."

A Speech from Mississippi

2009-11-14T16:22:00.009-06:00

This is a Tea Party speech given by a friend in Mississippi, Mr. Lesley Riley. I have watched a couple of times and thought that I would like to post it here, so some that probably would never come across it might have an opportunity to watch. It is in three parts. The link to the Mississippi Personhood website mentioned in the speech is: http://www.personhoodmississippi.com/

So that we may turn from evil paths

2009-11-06T22:08:00.003-06:00

Proclamation Appointing a Day of Public Worship

"It is meet that the people of the Confederate States should, from time to time, assemble to acknowledge their dependence on Almighty God; to render devout thanks for His manifold blessings; to worship His holy name; to bend in prayer at His footstool; and to accept, with reverent submission, the chastening of His all-wise and all-merciful providence.
"Let us, then, in temples and in the field, unite our voices in recognizing, with adoring gratitude, the manifestations of His protecting care in the many signal victories with which our arms have been crowned; in the fruitfulness with which He has inspired our hearts, and strengthened our arms, in resistance to the iniquitous designs of our enemies.
"And let us not forget that, while graciously vouchsafing to us His protection, our sins have merited and received grievous chastisement; that many of our best and bravest have fallen in battle; that many others are still held in foreign prisons; that large districts of our country have been devastated with savage ferocity, the peaceful homes destroyed, and helpless women and children driven away in destitution; and that, with fiendish malignity, the passions of a servile race have been excited by our foes into the commission of atrocities from which death was a welcome escape.
"Now, therefore, I, Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America, do issue this my proclamation, setting apart Wednesday, the 16th day of November next, as a day to be specially devoted to the worship of Almighty God. And I do invite and invoke all the people of these Confederate States to assemble on the day aforesaid, in their respective places of public worship, there to unite in prayer to our Heavenly Father, that He bestow His favor upon us; that He extend over us His protection of His almighty arm; that He sanctify His chastisement to our improvement, so that we may turn away from evil paths and walk righteously in His sight; and that He may restore peace to our beloved country, healing its bleeding wounds, and securing to us the continued enjoyment of our own right of self-government and independence; and that He will graciously hearken to us, while we ascribe to Him the power and the glory of our deliverance.
"Given under my hand and the seal of the Confederate States, at Richmond, this 26th day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-four."

Jefferson Davis.

taken from Christ in the Camp.

The most rudimental facts of all

2009-10-23T22:10:00.005-05:00

"Political and ethical philosophers have been perpetually victims to the notion, that because theirs are natural sciences, as distinguished from revealed or theological, therefore they must banish from them all reference to God, his nature, his acts, and his will, and our relations to it. The true inference should be, only, that they must abstain from the introduction of those peculiar revealed facts, which belong to man as an object of redemption and subject of the Church of Christ. If we are not atheists, the facts that God is, that our being proceeds from his act, that we are his property, are as truly natural as man and his attributes are. They should therefore be embraced as a part of the facts of the case, to be treated just as all other natural facts, save that these are the most rudimental of all. For, how can that treatment be truly scientific, which proceeds upon a partial induction of the facts of the case, leaving out the most primary? It is this illusion which has led so many moralists to attempt the discussion of the nature and origin of moral distinctions, without introducing a Creator, or a divine will. Whereas, a true science accepts God as the first fact in ethics; his attributes as the primary standard of the moral distinction; his will as the fountain of moral obligation. What wretched impotency and confusion has not this omission caused in ethical discussions!" -R.L. Dabney

This quote was written by Dabney in 1867 in A Defense of Virginia and the South.

What confidence in these FACTS, and how truly they are needed so very much today in this country.

Suprise! A new post!

2009-09-26T07:38:00.004-05:00

It has been quite a while since my last post, I think around two months! I have been delayed for several reasons, one very important one, which I can refer you to another blog to read that wonderful story! I have been looking back over Mrs. Varina Howell Davis's memoir of her husband Jefferson Davis and really been inspired to quote some lines from Mrs. Davis's pen. She is such a descriptive writer, and the way she describes friends and aquaintsances is so charming! I wanted to just give a few examples, and even more astounding, I believe, is her memory. I believe this memoir was written well after the war, and many described here were actually people she met as early as the 1840's or 50's.

"Mrs. Gaines, then a laughing, brown-eyed little woman, unwhipped of social conventionalities, not because she did not understand them, but because she understood them and was naturally lawless, was very attentive to her feeble old hero."

Of Mr. Davis's sisters she writes, "His sisters were both like him, and were spirited, intelligent women, with strong convictions of duty and a wonderful inborn dignity that is not to be acquired by education: it is a gift."

This is quite sweet, this was a letter Mrs. Davis wrote about Mr. Davis describing him the first time she met him to her mother. She wrote:

"I do not know whether this Mr. Jefferson Davis is young or old. He looks both at times; but I believe he is old, for from what I hear he is only two years younger than you are. He impresses me as a remarkable kind of man, but of uncertain temper, and has a way of taking for granted that everybody agrees with him when he expresses an opinion, which offends me; yet he is most agreeable and has a peculiarly sweet voice and a winning manner of asserting himself. The fact is, he is the kind of person I should expect to rescue one from a mad dog at any risk, but to insist upon a stoical indifference to the fright afterward. I do not think I shall ever like him as I do his brother Joe. Would you believe it, he is refined and cultivated, and yet he is a Democrat!"

Of arriving in Washington D.C. for the first time she writes,"How grand and blase the people all looked to these weary country girls, who had never seen anything more worldly than their domestic mothers!"

"Mr. Dallas always wore a spotless white cravat. He was tall and well proportioned, his eyes and eyebrows were quite black, and his hair, which was inclined to curl, was snowy white. There was a certain nice, delicate, sense of harmony and propriety about everything he did. For instance, if he wrote a note it was without erasures, placed in the most graceful manner on the paper, and sealed with care. He considered the peculiarities of every one as worthy of his notice, and never mortified the sensibilities of the most uneducated."

"Mr. Cass, who was a very large, fleshy person, always warm, and obliged to use a fan, which was the largest palm-leaf that I ever saw, fanned himself industriously until some one either attacked his resolutions or his political record; then, in clear, statesmanlike logic, very devoid of ornamentation or rhetoric, he said what he thought; but, if one after another sprung into the debate, the contention somewhat confused him and he was not at his best."

Of Sam Houston she writes, "His manner was very swelling and formal. When he met a lady he took a step forward, then bowed very low, and in a deep voice said,"Lady, I salute you." It was an embarrassing kind of thing, for it was performed with the several motions of a fencing lesson. If she chanced to please him, at the same or the next interview he generally took a small snakeskin pouch from his pocket and pulled from it a little wooden heart, the size of a twenty-five cent piece, and presented it with, "Lady, let me give you my heart." These hearts he whittled all day long in the Senate, and had a jeweller to put a little ring in them."

Uncle Matt!

2009-08-04T08:57:00.011-05:00

Well, yesterday at 4:48 pm, my sister Meagan gave birth to Whitney Belle Rose Anderson. She is a beautiful, healthy baby with a head full of blonde hair! I am so happy to be an uncle and I pray that Chris and Meagan will be wonderful parents. My pictures did not come out very well, I didn't want to use the flash, so most of them are blurry, but my dad and Chris took several so I am going to use some of theirs.

Proud new Grand pops

Excited Grand mom and Great-Grand momma

Meagan and Chris with their new baby girl!

The Immorality of Taxpayer Funded Abortion

2009-07-28T08:02:00.002-05:00

The Immorality of Taxpayer Funded Abortion

Shared via AddThis

Here is a link to an article written by Congressman and Dr. Ron Paul about the so-called healthcare reform, and how there is a hidden measure for taxpayer funded abortions. Also this link is to the Campaign for Liberty website, which I would encourage all to look at. This is a great resource for what is really going on inside the Government. Also Ron Paul's bill to audit the Federal Reserve is now in the Senate as S 604. There are 276 cosponsors in the House and already 19 in the Senate. They also make it easy to contact your representatives in Congress.

My trip to Boston

2009-07-26T15:56:00.013-05:00

Inside Faneuil Hall

I just returned from my trip to Boston with my good friends Adam and Hillary. I wish we would have had more time to see all the rich history there associated with our Nations founding. I believe my favorite sites we were able to see in only a couple of short days were Faneuil Hall and the old South Church. I had meant to post a little before we left for our trip, quoting a speech given by Jefferson Davis at Faneuil Hall on October 12th, 1858. I realized that a few past quotes I have posted from Mr. Davis are also from this same speech. I wanted to quote what Davis said about Boston, and particularly Faneuil Hall. As I sat inside this historic building, I tried to call to mind what Jefferson Davis had said about the patriotism of many of those men who had spoken there before him leading up to the Revolution. Here is part of that speech, given three years before the 'Second War for Independence' was fought.

"When I see Faneuil Hall thus thronged it reminds me of another meeting when it was found too small to contain the assembly that met here, on the call of the people, to know what should be done in relation to the tea-tax, and when, Faneuil Hall being too small, they went to the old South Church, which still stands a monument of your early day. I hope the time will soon come when many Democratic meetings in Boston will be too large for Faneuil Hall. I am welcomed to this hall, so venerable for all the associations of our early history; to this hall of which you are so justly proud, and the memories of which are part of the inheritance of every American citizen; and I felt, as I looked upon it, and remembered how many voices of patriotic fervor have filled it; how here the first movement originated from which the Revolution sprang; how here began the system of town meetings, and free discussion- that, though my theme was more humble than theirs, as befitted my humbler powers, I had enough to warn me that I was assuming much to speak in this sacred chamber. But, when I heard your distinguished orator say that words uttered here could never die, that they lived and became a part of the circumambient air, I felt a hesitation which increases upon me with the remembrance of his expressions. But, if those voices which breathed the first impulse into colonies- now the United States- to proclaim independence, and to unite for resistance against the power of the mother-country; if those voices live here still, how must they fare who come here to preach treason to the Constitution and to assail the union of these States? It would seem that their criminal hearts would fear that those voices, so long slumbering, would break silence, that those forms which hang upon these walls behind me might come forth, and that the sabres so long sheathed would leap from their scabbards to drive from this sacred temple those who desecrate it as did the money-changers who sold doves in the temple of the living God.
Here you have, to remind you, and to remind all who enter this hall, the portraits of those men who are dear to every lover of liberty, and part and parcel of the memory of every American citizen; and highest among them all I see you have placed Samuel Adams and John Hancock.....
But it is not here alone, nor in reminiscences connected with the objects which present themselves within this hall, that the people of Boston have much to excite their patriotism and carry them back to the great principles of the Revolutionary struggle. Where will you go and not meet some monument to inspire such sentiments? Go to Lexington and Concord, where sixty brave countrymen came with their fowling-pieces to oppose six hundred veterans- where they forced those veterans back, pursuing them on the road, fighting from every barn, and bush, and stock, and stone, till they drove them retreating to the ships from which they went forth. And there stand those monuments of your early patriotism, Breed's and Bunker's Hills, whose soil drank the martyr-blood of men who lived for their country and died for mankind! Can it be that any of you should tread that soil and forget the great purposes for which these men died?"

This is only a small part of this beautiful speech that goes on to talk about community independence, and state sovereignty. I found myself at times, visiting these truly historic sites of our liberty wondering what these great men and women that Mr. Davis refers to would think of this country now. I can only think that they would be disappointed that we have squandered so much of what they bravely fought and died defending. So many places preserved from our history, only seem like more of a theme park for many people. It struck me as very weighty ground that I stood upon. The bravery of these men, to do more than just talk, but to act upon those principles they lived by in the face of the might of England, ought to make us brave to act peaceably to see that our government honors and lives by these same principles.

Quote is taken from Jefferson Davis, Ex-President of The Confederate States of America Volume 1: A Memoir By His Wife by Varina Howell Davis.

Old South Meeting House

Fenway Park

Old North Church

Faneuil Hall

Old State House

Obtaining Liberty and Peace

2009-07-11T08:50:00.002-05:00

I have come across another letter describing the Lord's work in Revival in the Confederate Army. This man raises a concern that should be on our hearts today, for our own military and our governments. This is an extract from a letter written while near Fredericksburg by a chaplain. This minister writes:

" A deep and powerful conviction of sin prevails, and religion has become the chief topic of conversation with many. Many of the noble sons of Alabama, who have stemmed the tide of man battles in defence of civil liberty, are now bowing humbly at the Cross, endeavoring to throw off the shackles of sin, and seeking liberty from the thraldom of Satan. How many parents' hearts will be gladdened when the glorious news of a revival in our camp reaches them! We feel assured that we have the prayers of the parents and friends of these noble soldier boys, and we ask an interest in your prayers and the prayers of all true lovers of religion, that God will carry on the good work he has so graciously begun until this entire brigade and entire army shall become the followers of the meek and lowly Jesus, and our every heart shall be attuned to His praise. O, for an humble, Christian army! We can never obtain liberty and peace until we humble ourselves in the dust before God. Should we not strive earnestly and faithfully for this end? Let us all strive faithfully for this glorious result, and peace will wreathe our banners here, and unalloyed happiness be our portion in the life to come." J.W.H.

A scene of Revival

2009-07-06T16:20:00.003-05:00

I have been reading back over some of Christ in the Camp by John William Jones about the Revival in the Army of Northern Virginia. I came across a letter written by Rev. Dr. Wm. J. Hoge that described his experiences of the Lord's work around Fredericksburg. This quote is long, but I didn't put the whole letter here just part. Rev. Hoge writes:

"In my last visit, it was my high privilege to preach six times to crowds of men eager to hear the Gospel. Five of these sermons were to the Stonewall Brigade; the first, Saturday night. The camp was muddy, the air harsh, the night dark- just the night to chill the preacher with forebodings of empty seats and cheerless services. But as I made my way through the streets of the tented city to the substantial church erected by this enterprising brigade, I was suddenly greeted by a burst of sacred song which lifted my heart. It sounded over the camp like a bell. A prayer-meeting had been appointed for the half hour before public worship, and the house was already full: so full that its was not without difficulty that I made my way to the pulpit; so full that when General Jackson and General Paxton came to the door, they modestly retired, least they should displace some already within; so full that one of the men aptly compared the close packing to that of 'herrings in a barrel.'
One could not sit in that pulpit and meet the concentrated gaze of those men, without deep emotion. I remembered that they were veterans of many a bloody field. The eyes which looked into mine, waiting for the Gospel of peace, had looked as steadfastly into eyes which burned with deadly hate, and upon whatever is terrible in war. The voices which now poured out their strength in singing the songs of 'Zion' had shouted in the charge and the victory. I thought of their privations and their perils, of the cause for which they had suffered, of the service they had rendered the country, the Church of God, and whatever I hold personally dear, and what could I do but honor them, lobe them, and count it all joy to serve them in the Gospel?
I missed, indeed, some faces which would have beamed their welcome upon me; some voices with which, in other days, mine had joined in family worship and 'in the great congregation.' But I remembered how they lived, how they fought, how they died- in faith, the blessed faith of Christ; that 'all the ends they aimed at were their country's, their God's, and truth's, and that they are now enrolled in 'the noble army of martyrs.' I remembered, too, with just gratification, that their rallying, charging and dying at the very crisis of our fate, at Manassas, contributed not a little towards earning for their brigade its immortal name, 'Stonewall'.
While we were singing, one thought frequently came to me: If such meetings were common throughout the army, what a school of sacred music it would be! Surely men thus trained, returning to their homes, would break up that slothful and wicked habit, so prevalent in our Churches, of the men remaining stupidly mute while God's praises are sung.
While preaching to these men, their earnestness of aspect constantly impressed me; the absence of that rather comfortable and well-satisfied air which often pervades our congregations, as if mere custom or prospect of entertainment had assembled us. These men looked as if they had come on business, and a very important business; and the preacher could scarcely do otherwise than feel that he too, had business of moment there!"

Concerning Prayer

2009-06-27T10:23:00.004-05:00

John Angell James, in his book The Anxious Inquirer, has pointed out some very helpful instructions for prayer. He is speaking, again, mainly to unbelievers that are anxious about their soul and about salvation, but I believe these words of advice are helpful for us all as well. James writes:

"Attend with regularity and seriousness upon the preaching of the gospel. Sermons are invaluable helps to the anxious inquirer. Hear the word preached with a deep conviction that it will do you no good but as God blesses it, and therefore look above the minister to God. Pray before you go to hear sermons; pray while you hear; and pray after you have heard. Go from the closet of private prayer to the place of public worship, and from the place of public worship back again to prayer. Apply the word as you hear it to yourself; hear with attention, hear as for your life, hear as for salvation."

And again:

"Attend meetings for social prayer. The prayers of good men not only bring down blessings from God, but breathe the spirit of true piety. The prayer-meeting is an atmosphere of devotion. Inquirer, frequent prayer-meetings, then; it is there the solemn impressions of sacred things are strengthened. You are there prayed with, and prayed for; you there learn what advanced Christians feel and desire, and their prayers are some of the best instructions you can receive; there you may find your own heart knit together in love with the people of God."

Concerning Faith

2009-06-24T16:02:00.004-05:00

I have recently started reading through Being Born Again by John Angell James. This book was a little hard to find, it was originally titled The Anxious Inquirer. This book was given to soldiers in the Confederate Army along with many other tracks and books. This book is meant to be used to point someone who is anxious about their soul to the Scriptures. I have found many things the author points out are good for someone who has already placed their hope in Christ as well. Here are a few lines starting with some words on faith. James writes:

"See then the importance, the tremendous importance, of faith in Christ. It is the hinge on which salvation turns; it is that, without which all knowledge, and all impressions, and all convictions, and all duties, will leave us short of heaven at last. Fix it deeply in your mind, therefore, that FAITH IS THE SAVING GRACE, or in other words, it is that state of mind with which salvation is connected; being brought into this state, you would be saved though you died the next hour, and without this you would not be saved, even had you been for years under the deepest concern."

"Faith is not a belief in your own personal religion--this is the assurance of hope--but it is a belief that God loves sinners, and that Christ died for sinners, and for you among the rest; it is not a belief that you are a real Christian, but that Christ is willing to give you all the blessings included in that term; it is the belief of something out of yourself, but still of something concerning yourself. The object of faith is the work of Christ for you, not the work of the Spirit in you. It is of great consequence that you should attend to this, because many are apt to confound these things. If I promise a man alms, and he really believes what I say, and expects relief, I, in the act of promising him, am the object of his faith, and not the state of his own mind in the act of believing. If therefore you would have faith, or possessing it, would have it strengthened, you must fix and keep your eye on the testimony of Christ which you find in the gospel."

Lastly James writes about prayer:

"Prayer is the first step in the divine life, prayer the second, prayer the third, and indeed it is necessary through the whole Christian course."

A few garden pictures

2009-06-13T09:34:00.006-05:00

Should I not consider it a blessing?

2009-06-08T15:23:00.004-05:00

I have been thinking about what Gen. Thomas 'Stonewall' Jackson said after he was wounded by his own men during the victorious battle of Chancellorsville. Gen. Jackson had just led one of the most daring flanking maneuvers of any army up until that time and trying to follow up the day's victory he pressed for a night attack. Venturing beyond his own lines he and his staff were mistaken for the enemy and Jackson was shot, I believe, twice. One of Jackson's arms had to be amputated below the shoulder and this is where I will pick up the story. R.L. Dabney in the Life and Campaigns of Lt. General T.J. (Stonewall Jackson) says this:

"His first act, after receiving refreshments, was to request Lieut. Morrison to go to Richmond, and bring Mrs. Jackson to his bedside. He then admitted his chaplain, Rev. Mr. Lacy, who had just arrived, and learned his misfortune, to his tent. As he entered, and saw the stump where the left arm had lately been, he exclaimed in distress, "Oh, General! what a calamity!" Jackson first thanked him, with his usual courtesy, for his sympathy, and then proceeded, with marked deliberation and emphasis, as though delivering his Christian testimony touching God's dealing with him, to speak in substance thus; and at a length which was unusual with his taciturn habits. "You see me severely wounded, but not depressed; not unhappy. I believe that it has been done according to God's holy will, and I acquiesce entirely in it. You may think it strange; but you never saw me more perfectly contented than I am to-day; for I am sure that my Heavenly Father designs this affliction for my good. I am perfectly satisfied, that either in this life, or in that which is to come, I shall discover that what is now regarded as a calamity, is a blessing. And if it appears a great calamity, (as it surely will be a great inconvenience, to be deprived of my arm,) it will result in a great blessing. I can wait, until God, in his own time, shall make known to me the object he has in thus afflicting me. But why should I not rather rejoice in it as a blessing, and not look on it as a calamity at all? If it were in my power to replace my arm, I would not dare to do it, unless I could know it was the will of my Heavenly Father."

Oh that we could look upon our own trials with this peace and confidence in the wisdom of God. Do we not think of so many things that are hindrances in our own minds? Yet, if we are thinking rightly about Christ and resting in Him, those same burdens could truly be blessings. For in Christ we have a joy set before us, and a joy we can experience now.

The entire National Anthem

2009-06-06T22:54:00.003-05:00

Well, it has been a while since I have posted anything, partly because I haven't had anything to post. I have thought about posting something on the National Anthem for some time now and remembered to look it up and post it now. I was able to go to the first and only political rally for who else but Dr. Ron Paul last year when he came through Louisville. Before Dr. Paul spoke, I believe, three girls stood up and sang the national anthem. Well, when I thought they would stop because it was over, they kept going. I thought that was strange it only has one verse right? Well, come to find out it has more to it, we just don't sing it. Of course, it was written by Francis Scott Key originally as a poem titled "Defence of Fort McHenry" in 1814 about the war of 1812. I think it is very interesting with the last verse, that God is acknowledged and praised. I wonder if that has anything to do with why we have only ever sung the first verse. Here are the full lyrics:

O! say can you see by the dawn's early light
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming.
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming.
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
O! say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
'Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more!
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: 'In God is our trust.'
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

Community Independence

2009-05-09T21:44:00.006-05:00

Here is part of a speech Jefferson Davis gave while serving Mississippi in the United States Senate. I never really understood how important 'States rights' or a State's soveriegnty was to the Constitution. The whole union hinges on that one thing, that the several states have the right to run themselves, not a coercive Federal Government in Washington that doesn't even know what the people need being so disconnected from them. These words of Davis have great weight, especially today with the huge and out of control Federal Government in Washington right now. Davis writes:

"In the beginning the founders of this Government were true democratic State-rights men. Democracy was State-rights, and State-rights was democracy, and it is so to-day. Your resolutions breathe it. The Declaration of Independence embodied the sentiments which had lived in the hearts of the country for many years before its formal assertion. Our fathers asserted the great principle- the right of the people to choose their own government- and that government rested upon the consent of the governed. In every form of expression it uttered the same idea, community independence and the dependence of the Union upon the communities of which it consisted. It was an American declaration of the unalienable rights of man; it was a general truth, and I wish it were accepted by all men. But I have said that this State sovereignty- this community independence- has never been surrendered, and that there is no power in the Federal Government to coerce a State. Will anyone ask me, then, how a State is to be held to the fulfilment of its obligations? My answer is, by its honor. The obligation is the more sacred to observe every feature of the compact, because there is no power to enforce it. The great error of the Confederation(Articles of Confederation) was, that it attempted to act upon the States. It was found impracticable, and our present form of government was adopted, which acts upon individuals, and is not designed to act upon States. The question of State coercion was raised in the Convention which framed the Constitution, and , after discussion, the proposition to give power to the General Government to enforce against any State obedience to the Laws was rejected. It is upon the ground that a State cannot be coerced that observance of the compact is a sacred obligation. It was upon this principle that our fathers depended for the perpetuity of a fraternal Union, and for the security of the rights that the Constitution was designed to preserve.....

"And among the things most odious to my mind is to find a man who enters upon a public office under the sanction of the Constitution, and taking an oath to support the Constitution- the compact between the States binding each for the common defence and general welfare of the other- and retaining to himself a mental reservation that he will war upon the institutions and the property of any of the States of the Union. It is a crime too low to characterize as it deserves before this assembly. It is one which would disgrace a gentleman- one which a man with self-respect would never commit. To swear that he will support the Constitution, to take an office which belongs in many of its relations to all the States, and to use it as a means of injuring a portion of the States of whom he is thus an agent, is treason to everything that is honorable in man. It is the base and cowardly attack of him who gains the confidence of another in order that he may wound him."

Getting the word out about Rand Paul

2009-05-09T21:17:00.004-05:00

Yes, that is RAND Paul, not Dr. Ron Paul, its not a typo. There is a very good possibility that the son of Congressman Ron Paul may run for the U.S. Senate from Kentucky. This is great news and I just found a link that will give you some more information about him. It is: http://www.rand2010.com/rand_paul

All of us that live in the state of Kentucky have a duty to elect representatives that have integrity and stand on principles, namely that have read and will truly uphold the Constitution. From what little I have read and seen so far Rand Paul could be one of these people. If you live in Kentucky I recommend you check out some of the videos and stories about Rand Paul as I am.

Just a little more Stonewall Jackson

2009-05-04T16:16:00.002-05:00

Alright, I have finally finished reading my second book on Stonewall Jackson. I highly recommend The Life and Letters of Stonewall Jackson. I just wanted to give a few more quotes, hopefully short but sweet. There is just so much to learn about this great man, how fiery he was in battle, yet how reserved and humble he was at all times always thinking of what he could do for others. Like many other believers in the past the most profound thing about Thomas Jackson was his love for Christ. It was above all other things and that love moved him in every area of his life. It is just so sad that the history that is told largely today is void of this most important trait of Jackson, his christian character. Well, I will not ramble more, here are some more quotes:

After a hard fought victory Mrs. Jackson writes, "The medical director, Doctor McGuire, in speaking of the terrible conflict, said: "General, this day has been won by nothing but stark and stern fighting." "No," replied Jackson, "it has been won by nothing but the blessing and protection of Providence."

In a letter to his friend Gen. Jackson writes, "I greatly desire to see peace- blessed peace. And I am persuaded that if God's people throughout the Confederacy will earnestly and perseveringly unite in imploring His interposition for peace, we may expect it. Let our government acknowledge the God of the Bible as its God, and we may expect soon to be a happy and independent people......Let the framework of our government show that we are not ungrateful to Him."

In a letter to his wife Jackson writes, "Don't trouble yourself about representations that are made of your husband. These things are earthly and transitory. There are real and glorious blessings, I trust, in reserve for us beyond this life. It is best for us to keep our eyes fixed upon the throne of God and the realities of a more glorious existence beyond the verge of time. It is gratifying to be beloved and to have our conduct approved by our fellow-men, but this is not worthy to be compared with the glory that is in reservation for us in the presence of our glorified Redeemer. Let us endeavor to adorn the doctrine of Christ our Saviour in all things, knowing that there awaits us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.' I would not relinquish the slightest diminution of that glory for all this world can give. My prayer is that such may ever be the feeling of my heart."

A favorite hymn of Stonewall Jackson

2009-04-29T17:11:00.003-05:00

Here is another hymn by John Newton, one that Mrs. Mary Anna Jackson said was one of her husband's favorites. I have not heard it before, but it happened to be in this wonderful little hymnal I have, so here it is.

Glorious things of thee are spoken,
Zion, city of our God!
He, whose word cannot be broken,
Formed thee for His own abode.
On the Rock of Ages founded,
What can shake thy sure repose?
With salvation's walls surrounded,
Thou may'st smile at all thy foes.

See! the streams of living waters,
Springing from eternal love,
Well supply thy sons and daughters,
And all fear of want remove:
Who can faint while such a river
Ever flows their thirst to assuage-
Grace which, like the Lord the Giver,
Never fails from age to age?

Round each habitation hovering,
See! the cloud and fire appear,
For a glory and a covering,
Showing that the Lord is near:
Blest inhabitants of Zion,
Washed in the Redeemer's blood-
Jesus, whom their souls rely on,
Makes them kings and priests to God.

Saviour, if of Zion's city
I through grace a member am,
Let the world deride or pity,
I will glory in Thy Name:
Fading is the worldling's pleasure,
All his boasted pomp and show;
Solid joys and lasting treasure
None but Zion's children know.

2009-04-20T15:32:00.003-05:00

"I asked the Lord that I might grow
In faith, and love, and every grace,
Might more of His salvation know,
And seek more earnestly His face.

'Twas He who taught me thus to pray,
And He, I trust, has answered prayer;
But it has been in such a way
As almost drove me to despair.

I hoped that in some favoured hour
At once He'd answer my request;
And, by His love's constraining power,
Subdue my sins, and give me rest.

Instead of this, He made me feel
The hidden evils of my heart,
And let the angry powers of hell
Assault my soul in every part.

Yea, more, with His own hand He seemed
Intent to aggravate my woe,
Crossed all the fair designs I schemed,
Blasted my gourds, and laid me low.

'Lord, why is this?' I trembling cried,
'Wilt Thou pursue Thy worm to death?'
'Tis in this way', the Lord replied,
'I answer prayer for grace and faith.

'These inward trials I employ,
From self and pride to set thee free,
And break thy schemes of earthly joy,
That thou mayest seek thy all in Me.'

John Newton

A people whose God is the Lord

2009-04-20T15:23:00.003-05:00

O how wonderful it would be if we had leaders who would acknowledge the authority of the Lord. Here is a small quote from 'Stonewall' Jackson after his troops had been victorious after the battle at McDowell's Station in Virginia. This quote is taken from Life and Letters of Stonewall Jackson written by Mary Anna Jackson. Jackson writes:

"Soldiers of the Army of the Valley and Northwest:

I congratulate you on your recent victory at McDowell. I request you to unite with me this morning in thanksgiving to Almighty God for thus having crowned your arms with success, and in praying that He will continue to lead you on from victory to victory, until our independence shall be established, and make us that people whose God is the Lord. The chaplains will hold divine service at ten o'clock A.M. this day in their respective regiments."

Mrs. Jackson's arrival at Winchester

2009-04-13T15:24:00.004-05:00

As you are probably aware I have been reading The Life and Letters of Stonewall Jackson by Mary Anna Jackson. I have posted several quotes from Stonewall Jackson but none from Mrs. Jackson. Like Mrs. Davis, Mrs. Jackson is a wonderful writer herself. The stories both of these ladies write are very descriptive and usually give you the feeling like you are there. I read this portion of text today while on my lunch break and I thought it was such a charming story, I had to post it. I believe this story took place in the winter of 1861. Mrs. Jackson was able to travel to Winchester where her husband was stationed to see him after the war started. It was an awkward time to travel alone as a lady, with so much in confusion in the country. Here is were her story picks up. Mrs. Jackson writes:

"It can readily be imagined with what delight General Jackson's domestic plans for the winter were hailed by me, and without waiting for the promised "aide" to be sent on as my escort, I joined some friends who were going to Richmond, where I spent a few days to shop, procure a passport, and to wait an escort to Winchester. The latter was soon found in a kind-hearted but absent-minded old clergyman, who occupied himself so assiduously in taking care of the little woman he had in charge that he entirely forgot to look after her baggage (a very necessary precaution in the upturned and disjointed condition in which the country then was), and the result was a lost trunk! We travelled by stage-coach from Strasburg, and were told, before reaching Winchester, that General Jackson was not there, having gone with his command on an expedition to demolish Dam No. 5 on the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. It was therefore with a feeling of sad disappointment and loneliness that I alighted from the stage-coach in front of Taylor's Hotel at midnight in the early part of dreary, cold December, and no husband to meet me with a glad welcome. By the dim lamp-light I noticed a small group of soldiers standing on the sidewalk, but they remained as silent spectators, and my escort led me up the long stairway, doubtless feeling disappointed himself that he still had me on his hands. Just before reaching the landing I turned to look back, for one figure among that group looked startlingly familiar, but as he had not come forward, I felt that I must be mistaken. However, my backward glance did reveal an officer muffled up in a military overcoat, and cap drawn down over his eyes, following us in rapid pursuit, and by the time we were upon the top step a pair of strong arms caught me in the rear; the captive's head was thrown back, and she was kissed again and again by her husband, before she could realize the delightful surprise he had given her. The good old minister chuckled gleefully, and was no doubt a sincere sharer in the joy and relief experienced by his charge. When I asked my husband why he did not come forward when I got out of the coach, he said he wanted to assure himself that it was his own wife, as he didn't want to commit the blunder of kissing anybody else's esposa. He had returned but a few hours before to spend the Sabbath in Winchester, and with the hope of my arrival upon the midnight stage."

Some more quotes from Jackson

2009-04-11T22:04:00.002-05:00

Here are just a few quotes from Thomas J. Jackson taken from Life and Letters of "Stonewall" Jackson by his wife Mary Anna Jackson. They shed some light on his character. This first quote is from a letter to his wife which he wrote while he was organizing troops at Harper's Ferry. This little quote shows how charitable he was. Jackson writes:

"I am very thankful to an ever-kind Providence for enabling you so satisfactorily to arrange our home matters. I just love my business little woman. Let Mr. Tebbs have the horse and rockaway at his own price; and if he is not able to pay for them, you may give them to him, as he is a minister of the Gospel...."

This next quote is also from a letter written to his wife while encamped at Winchester in July of 1861. Again Jackson writes:

"God will, I am well satisfied, in His own good time and way, give us the victory.... In reply to your queries, I am sleeping on the floor of a good room, but I have been sleeping out in camp several weeks, and generally found that it agreed with me well, except when it rained, and even then it was but slightly objectionable. I find that sleeping in the open air, with no covering but my blankets and the blue sky for a canopy, is more refreshing than sleeping in a room."

Mrs. Jackson quoted a notebook entry of her husband he had written after the death of his first wife Ellie. He wrote:

"Objects to be effected by Ellie's death: To eradicate ambition; to eradicate resentment; to produce humility. If you desire to be more heavenly-minded, think more of the things of heaven, and less of the things of earth."

Spring in Kentucky!

2009-04-10T22:27:00.010-05:00

Things are really starting to bloom here in Kentucky. I have been going around when I have time to take some pictures and I thought I would share a few here.

Stonewall Jackson

2009-04-06T15:47:00.003-05:00

Alright, its been a little while, for different reasons I haven't posted in a while. Last time I made it to the computer, I spent most of the time ordering some more books thanks to my tax refund! Right now I am about half way through the Life and Letters of Stonewall Jackson by his wife Mary Anna Jackson. I have to say that Jackson was a very interesting man. Darren, my roommate, and I talk about some of the similarities of his personality to that of Jackson. We joked this weekend though when I read that he enjoyed gardening and his desire to always be punctual and on those points they at least have differed! Reading Mrs. Jackson's description of Lexington, VA has really made me want to visit there again. For those that love the movie "Gods and Generals" they show at least one scene in the Jackson home. One thing interesting having visited the real home, is that it looks very different (on the inside) from the house they used in the movie. I believe that it is owned privately and they will not let you take pictures in the house and they would not let the filmmakers use it for the movie either. Anyways, here is just a little piece of a letter that Major Jackson wrote to his wife in the summer of 1859. This has to do with a sermon he was able to hear. Jackson writes:

"August 15th. Last night I enjoyed what I have long desired-listening to a sermon from the Rev. Dr. Thornwell, of South Carolina....After concluding his introductory remarks, he took his text from Genesis, seventeenth chapter, seventh verse, which he presented in a bold, profound, and to me original manner. I felt what a privilege it was to listen to such an exposition of God's truth. He showed that in Adam's fall we had been raised from the position of servants to that of children of God. He gave a brief account of his own difficulties when a college student, in comprehending his relation to God. He represented man as a redeemed being at the day of judgment, standing nearest to the throne, the angels being farther removed. And why? Because his Brother is sitting upon the throne he is a nearer relation to Christ than the angels. And his righteousness is superior to that of the angels-his being the righteousness of God himself. I don't recollect having ever before felt such love to God. I was rather surprised at seeing so much grace and gesture in Dr. Thornwell. I hope and pray that much good will result from this great exposition of Bible truth....."

Shedding some light on Liberty

2009-03-19T15:13:00.003-05:00

I am currently finishing up my reading of Jefferson Davis, Ex-President of the Confederate States of America Part Two V2 A Memior by his Wife by Varina Howell Davis. After Jefferson Davis was released from being in prison for at least a year and a half with no trial, him and his family spent time in Canada, New Orleans, and Europe before eventually settling at the Beauvoir House near the Gulf Coast. Mr. Davis tried his best to stay away from politics, being disfranchised by the Federal Government and not being able to hold office, he did not want to influence what he could not be a part of. At this time around 1887, the state of Texas was debating the question of prohibition. I think Mr. Davis's response to a letter seeking his opinion by his friend F. R. Lubbock is brilliant. If you, like me are trying to understand the meaning behind the Constitution and Constitutional liberty, this letter has helped shed light on some of the same type of issues today. So, here is the letter in full:

"Beauvoir, Miss, June 20, 1887.

"Colonel F. R. Lubbock.
"My Dear Friend.... My reason for not replying was an unwillingness to enter into a controversy in which my friends in Texas stood arrayed against each other.
In departing from the rule heretofore observed, I trust that it will not be an unwarrantable intrusion.
Reared in the creed of Democracy, my faith in its tenets has grown with its growth, and I adhere to the maxim that 'the world is governed too much.'
When our fathers achieved their independence, the corner-stone of the governments they constructed was individual liberty, and the social organizations they established were not for the surrender, but for the protection, of natural rights. For this, governments were established deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. This was not to subject themselves to the will of the majority, as appears from the fact that each community inserted in its fundamental law a bill of rights to guard the inalienable privileges of the individual.
There was then a two-fold purpose in Government: protection and prevention against trespass by the strong upon the weak, the many on the few.
The world had long suffered from the oppressions of government under the pretext of ruling by divine right, and excusing the invasion into private and domestic affairs on the plea of paternal care for the morals and good order of the people.
Our sires rejected all such pretensions, their system being: Government by the people for the people, and resting on the basis of natural inalienable rights. Upon the basis of these general propositions I will briefly answer the inquiry in regard to the prohibition amendment at issue.
'Be ye temperate in all things,' was a wise injunction, and would apply to intolerance as well as to drunkenness. That the intemperate use of intoxicating liquors is an evil, few, if any, would deny.
That it is the root of many social disorders is conceded, but then the question arises, what is the appropriate remedy, and what the present necessity? To destroy individual liberty and moral responsibility would be to eradicate one evil by the substitution of another, which it is submitted would be more fatal than that for which it was offered as a remedy. The abuse, and not the use, of stimulants, it must be confessed, is the evil to be remedied. Then it clearly follows that action should clearly be directed against the abuse rather than the use. If drunkenness be the cause of disorder and crime, why not pronounce drunkenness itself to be a crime, and attach to it proper and adequate penalties? If it be objected that the penalties could not be enforced, that is an admission that popular opinion would be opposed to the law; but if it be true that juries could not be impanelled who would convict so degraded a criminal as a drunkard, it necessarily follows that a statutory prohibition against the sale and use of intoxicants would be a dead letter.
The next branch of the inquiry is as to the present necessity. I might appeal to men not as old as myself to sustain the assertion that the convivial use of intoxicants, and the occurrence of drunkenness, had become less frequent within the last twenty years than it was before. The refining influences of education and Christianity may be credited with this result. Why not allow these blessed handmaidens of virtue and morality to continue unembarrassed in their civilizing work. The parties to this discussion in your State have no doubt brought forward the statistical facts in regard to the effect produced in other States by this effort to control morals by legislation, and I will not encumber this letter by any reference to those facts.
You have already provision for local prohibition. If it has proven the wooden horse in which a disguised enemy to State sovereignty as the guardian of individual liberty was introduced, then let it be a warning that the progressive march would probably be from village to State, and from State to United States.
A Governmental supervision and paternity, instead of the liberty the heroes of 1776 left as a legacy to their posterity. Impelled by the affection and gratitude I feel for the people of Texas, and the belief that a great question of American policy is involved in the issue you have before you, the silence I had hoped to observe has been broken. If the utterance shall avail anything for good, it will compensate me for the objurgations with which I shall doubtless be pursued by the followers of popularism of the day.
I hope the many who have addressed me letters of inquiry on the same subject will accept this as an answer, though somewhat long delayed. Faithfully yours,
"Jefferson Davis."

A few more words from Jefferson Davis

2009-03-16T15:14:00.003-05:00

I finished reading Four Years With Lee by Walter Taylor a couple of weeks ago. It was a quick read, mainly dealing with the strength of numbers known to both sides of the Army of Northern Virginia and that of the Army of the Potomac under its various leaders. The one striking thing about these numbers was just how outnumbered the Confederate Armies were, though they never seemed to make that a hindrance to success in the field. Their victories are all the more brilliant knowing how decidedly disadvantaged they were as far as men available. Well, the point of this post was to highlight a quote from Jefferson Davis. I finally received the last part of Volume 2 of Varina Howell Davis's Memoir of her husband.

This quote is from a conversation that Jefferson Davis had with his wife shortly before the fall of Richmond. This is Mrs. Davis's account of that time when she would soon depart from her husband and go toward Charlotte, North Carolina and safety as Mr. Davis would continue the fight for the South's independence. Mrs. Davis writes:

"Darkness seemed now to close swiftly over the Confederacy, and about a week before the evacuation of Richmond, Mr. Davis came to me and gently, but decidedly, announced the necessity for our departure. He said for the future his headquarters must be in the field, and that our presence would only embarrass and grieve, instead of comforting him. Very averse to flight, and unwilling at all times to leave him, I argued the question with him and pleaded to be permitted to remain, until he said: "I have confidence in your capacity to take care of our babies, and understand your desire to assist and comfort me, but you can do this in but one way, and that is by going yourself and taking our children to a place of safety." He was very much affected and said,"If I live you can come to me when the struggle is ended, but I do not expect to survive the destruction of constitutional liberty."

What I had not realized was that the Confederate Government was trying to uphold the principles of the Constitution and that it was a radical and tyrannical government in Washington that they faced. There are many good books to read about how President Lincoln and his staff destroyed the Constitution in the North during the war. When one understands more what truly happened at that time, this quote from Jefferson Davis is very heartbreaking. For we have not seen real constitutional liberty in this country since that time and the rights of states to govern themselves is becoming more clear as each day passes while this Federal Government usurps more and more power that by the Rule of Law they do not have.

The progress must be foward

2009-03-02T15:22:00.006-06:00

It seems that many people are waking up to the fact that this Federal Government has stepped way beyond its delegated powers. With eleven states at least telling the Federal Government they must respect the Constitution and States Sovereignty maybe the love for Constitutional Liberty is catching sail. Also I saw a report this weekend, and this is good news for those in Kentucky and all other states for that matter, it looks like Rand Paul, Congressman Ron Paul's son may run for the United States Senate in Kentucky. With all this said I have started reading Four Years with General Lee by Walter H. Taylor. Here is a 'Special Order' given by General Lee before a battle at Cheat Mountain in Northwestern Virginia. The battle never really fully took place but I thought this was somewhat relevant today to encourage all those who would stand for Constitution Liberty to 'Press On'.

"Headquarters, Valley Mountain, September 8, 1861.

[Special Order No. -.]

The forward movement announced to the Army of the Northwest in Special Order NO. 28, from its headquarters, of this date, gives the general commanding the opportunity of exhorting the troops to keep steadily in view the great principles for which they contend, and to manifest to the world their determination to maintain them. The eyes of the country are upon you. The safety of your homes, and the lives of all you hold dear, depend upon your courage and exertions. Let each man resolve to be victorious, and that the right of self-government, liberty and peace, shall in him find a defender. The progress of this army must be forward.

R. E. Lee,

General commanding."

Winter in Kentucky

2009-02-28T10:26:00.008-06:00

This is a little late but I am not able to put pictures on here until I am at my family's home in Nashville. Here are some pictures I took during the winter storm that blew through Kentucky at the end of January-beginning of February.

This is a picture of the pond where I live.

This is looking off the back porch at sunrise down to the pond.

I took a walk one day around the pond, it was pretty exhausting after a hard days work. The snow, as lovely as it looks, was covered in a layer of ice and was so deep (at least 7 or 8 inches) that each step felt like you had weights attached to your feet. This is the side of the dock.

This was actually after the first day of snow, the freezing rain had just started to fall and I had the bright idea when I got off work to just walk down through the fields and woods to the creek bottom. It was really too beautiful to put into words, and the exhausting hike back up the hill was well worth it.

The Warrior

2009-02-23T15:15:00.003-06:00

"The LORD is a warrior; The LORD is His name." Exodus 15:3

While reading about Stonewall Jackson, I came across a few lines that made me think of this verse. Not to compare Gen. Jackson to the Lord, but I think the descriptions of his victories helps illustrate this scripture. Moses said this about God after He had brought the people out of Egypt and delivered them from the hand of Pharaoh. The mere name of the Lord would invoke fear from all around after hearing what He had done for the Israelites. After the Valley Campaign in 1862 R.L. Dabney says this about Gen. Jackson.:

"But enough was accomplished to cover General Jackson with a blaze of glory. Fifteen days before, he was a hundred miles from his base, with a little army of fifteen thousand men, while forty thousand enemies were on his immediate front and flanks. Now, he was disembarrassed of them all, with a loss of not more than one thousand five hundred men; while two armies, whose aggregate was double his own, were flying from him, quivering with disaster, leaving his victorious hands full of trophies. From this hour, doubt and detraction were silenced; he stood forth acknowledged by all as a General of transcendent abilities. His mere name, henceforth, brought assurance of triumph to his friends, and panic to his enemies. Within forty days he had marched four hundred miles, fought four pitched battles, - defeating four separate armies,- with numerous combats and skirmishes, sent to the rear three thousand five hundred prisoners, killed and wounded a still larger number of the enemy, and defeated or neutralized forces three times as numerous as his own, upon his proper theatre of war, besides the corps of McDowell, which was rendered inactive at Fredericksburg by the fear of his prowess."

Again, after a brilliant plan and march conceived by General Lee and Jackson, General Jackson marched his force to Richmond to help defeat Gen. McClellan's army. Dabney again says:

"But the arrival of General Jackson brought a strength to the Confederates beyond that of his numbers. His fame as a warrior had just risen to the zenith; while all the other armies of the Confederacy had been retreating before the enemy, or at best holding the defensive with difficulty, his alone had marched, and attacked, and conquered. A disaster had never alighted on his banners. His assault was regarded by friends and foes as the stroke of doom, and his presence gave assurance of victory. Hence, when the army before Richmond learned that he was with them, they were filled with unbounded joy and confidence, while their enemies were struck with a corresponding panic."

Yet, with these victories and the fame that it brought him, here his true Christian character showed brightly. Later in the war he had a conversation with another officer on a rainy night which Dabney describes here:

" The conversation was soon insensibly turned on the things of Redemption. His friend related how Dr. S.,- the eminent minister mentioned in the last letter,-had been understood by him to declare, that the fear of wrath did not enter at all as an element of that godly sorrow of sin, which marks true repentance; but that it was prompted solely by love and gratitude. The General answered, that the doctrine intended by Dr. S. had probably been misapprehended by him. For his part, he supposed that, in the new-born believer, both fear and love actuated his repentance. But as his assurance became more clear of the Redeemer's mercy to his soul, his obedience became less servile, and more affectionate; until, in the most favored saints, perfect love cast out fear. He then declared that he had been, himself, for a long time, a stranger to fear of wrath; because he knew and was assured of the love of Christ to his soul; that he felt not the faintest dread that he should ever fall under the wrath of God, although a great sinner; because he knew that it was forever reconciled by the righteousness of Christ, and that love for God and Christ was now the practical spring of all his penitence. Speaking thus, Jackson arose from his seat, and, with an impressive union of humility and solemn elation, continued in substance thus: "Nothing earthly can mar my happiness. I know that heaven is in store for me; and I should rejoice in the prospect of going there to-morrow. Understand me: I am not sick; I am not sad; God has greatly blessed me; and I have as much to love here as any man, and life is very bright to me. But, still, I am ready to leave it any day, without trepidation or regret, for that heaven which I know awaits me, through the mercy of my Heavenly Father. And I would not agree to the slightest diminution of one shade of my glory there" [Here he paused, as though to consider what terrestrial measure he might best select to express the largeness of his joys] - "No: not for all the fame which I have acquired, or shall ever win in this world." With these words he sunk into his chair, and his friend retired- awe-struck, as though he had seen the face of an angel. But he did not fail to notice the revelation made of Jackson's master-passion by nature, in the object he had chosen to express the value of his heavenly inheritance. It was fame! Not wealth, nor domestic joys, nor literature- but well-earned fame. Let the young aspirant consider also, how even this passion, which the world calls the most honorable of all, was chastened and crucified in him by a nobler longing."

All quotes are from Life and Campaigns of Lt. General T.J. (Stonewall) Jackson by R.L. Dabney.

The Spiritual Life of Stonewall Jackson

2009-02-19T15:11:00.004-06:00

Gen. Robert E. Lee made his first move of the war to move the fighting out of Virginia in which the battle of Antietam was fought and won in by the Confederate army, not the Union army as some would say (you can read the book about that). This battle occurred in September of 1862. Gen. Lee moved back across the Potomac River into Virginia and in his columns rear was fought a little known battle of Boteler's Ford. At this point Gen. McClellan's advanced force crossed the river in order to engage the Confederate Army. He was met by Gen. Jackson who turned and destroyed this body of men and sent them swimming back across the river. After this battle was won and the months of hard fighting had finally been silenced Gen. Jackson and his men found themselves back near Winchester to rest and be resupplied. Here among other places began the work of the Lord amongst the soldiers and officers that other books have been dedicated to. As I read today I came across a few letters written to his wife that show how the Lord was working. It may also help to read these knowing that this man had obtained a great reputation as a leader of men and warrior to those at home, the enemy and those overseas.

From Bunker Hill, October 13th he writes:
"Mr. G- invited me to be present at communion in his church yesterday, but I was prevented from enjoying the privilege. But I heard an excellent sermon from the Rev. Dr. S-. His text was I Timothy, chap. ii: 5th and 6th verses." ("For there is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.") "It was a powerful exposition of the word of God. He is a great revival minister; and when he came to the word 'himself', he placed an emphasis on it, and gave to it, through God's blessing, a power that I never before felt.... And I felt, with an intensity that I never before recollect having realized, that truly the sinner who does not, under gospel privileges, turn to God, deserves the agonies of perdition. The Doctor several times in appealing to the sinner, repeated the sixth verse 'Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time,' What more could God do than give himself a ransom?....He is laboring in a revival in General Ewell's division. Oh, it is a glorious privilege to be a minister of the gospel of the Prince of Peace! There is no equal position in this world."

Several days later on October 27th Gen. Jackson wrote his wife again:

"Our God makes me so many friends! I mention these things in order that you may see how much kindness has been shown me; and to express things for which I should be more grateful, and to give you renewed cause for gratitude."......"Don't trouble yourself about representations that are made of me. These things are earthly and transitory. There are real and glorious blessings, I trust, in reserve for us, beyond this life. It is best for us to keep our eyes fixed upon the throne of God, and the realities of a more glorious existence beyond the verge of time. It is gratifying to be beloved, and to have our conduct approved by our fellow men; but this is not worthy to be compared with the glory that is in reservation for us, in the presence of the glorified Redeemer. Let us endeavor to adorn the doctrine of Christ our Saviour, in all things; knowing that there awaits us 'a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.' I would not relinquish the slightest diminution of that glory, for all this world, and all that it can give. My prayer is, that such may ever be the feeling of my heart. It appears to me that it would be better for you not to have any thing written about me. Let us follow the teaching of inspiration: 'Let another praise thee, and not thyself.' I appreciate the loving interest that prompted the desire."

These quote are taken from Life and Campaigns of Lt. General T. J. (Stonewall) Jackson by R.L. Dabney.

2009-02-17T15:13:00.005-06:00

"And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose." Romans 8:28

As I have been reading Life and Campaigns of Lt. General T.J. (Stonewall) Jackson by R. L. Dabney I have noticed a simple theme throughout the life of this great man, Gen. Jackson. I have come across many times in writing to his wife and with friends reminds them of this truth. I must admit this has been an easy truth when my circumstances are good, but when the Lord is not near, or when circumstances are not what we would desire, this is a much harder truth to find comfort in. Jackson's life, especially after Virginia seceded and those brave patriots that called her home prepared to defend all that they held dear, was approaching a very difficult road, yet he held this truth and found comfort and joy in it. Gen. Jackson told a friend before the war, "Why should the peace of a true Christian be disturbed by anything which man can do unto him? Has not God promised to make all things work together for good to them that love him?"

While reading this book and others I have read in great detail the position of the Southern Confederacy and the truth about who the real defenders of the constitution were. It has been hard these last few days, and it will be hard this entire year here in Kentucky, seeing that Lincoln is being celebrated and Kentucky claims him, one cannot avoid hearing the things that are said about this man, praising him. I thought Dabney put it well when he spoke of the Lincoln administration, "and to crown all, the Constitution of the United States was rent in fragments by the assumption of the President to levy new forces, to wage war, without authority of any law of Congress, and to coerce sovereign States into adhesion, in the utter absence of all intentions and powers to that effect, in the Federal Compact." This war was no Civil War, it was not a rebellion, it was rightly what those in the South called it, the second war of independence. No law was broken, no treason committed by those of the South and when it came time to decide to stand with the Founders and the patriots who gave their lives and blood for liberty and freedom Dabney says this, "nearly all accepted the stern conclusion, that nothing remained except that alternative between base submission or resistance, in which no honest man ever hesitates." All the South loved the Union and held the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence in the highest place.

All this said to show why men like Gen. Jackson fought so hard and for so long, even with all the odds against them. I end with this quote taken from a letter Gen. Jackson wrote to his wife. Jackson's valley campaign had been a huge success and without even knowing he was gone Jackson joined his forces to those of Gen. Lee at Richmond where they struck a heavy blow to Gen. McClellan's army on the peninsula. Gen. Jackson then returned to the Valley and struck out at Gen. Pope at Cedar Run and won yet another brilliant victory. After the battle he wrote his wife:

" On last Saturday our God again crowned our arms with victory, about six miles from Culpepper Court House. All glory be to God for his unnumbered blessings.
I can hardly think of the fall of Brigadier-General C.S. Winder, without tearful eyes. Let us all unite more earnestly in imploring God's aid in fighting our battles for us. The thought that there are so many of God's people praying for His blessing upon the army, which, in His providence, is with me, greatly strengthens me. If God be for us, who can be against us? That He will still be with us, and give us victory after victory, until our independence shall be established, and that He will make our nation that people whose God is the Lord, is my earnest and oft-repeated prayer. Whilst we attach so much importance to being free from temporal bondage, we must attach far more to being free from the bondage of sin."

2009-02-10T15:35:00.004-06:00

Well, here in Kentucky the clean up continues, to correct an error in my last post, we lost power for almost six full days, not seven, sorry for the error, they start running together. In September with the windstorm the power was out for eight days and I believe some hanging limbs finally dislodged with the ice last week. Most of the damage occurred to the maples, at least on the farm where I work. Many wagon loads of limbs have been taken to the burn pile, which ought to be a sight when it is set to blaze. We have a very large oak tree, the largest I have ever seen, and with its perfect canopy didn't have damage at all. It is such a great tree, so when I ventured down the path to see how it fared, it goes on steady and sure. There will be more about this tree later, when I can post a picture of it. Some of our garden beds took a hit, some areas that are meant to be mostly shade, unfortunately will now be mostly sun. But over all most of the big limbs missed the plants that we don't cut back in the winter. Hopefully next time I will have some quotes on Thomas J. Stonewall Jackson. I have finished three books on Jefferson Davis and have gone on to finishing The Life and Campaigns of Gen. Jackson. Which has given me the urge to travel back to Virginia and follow some of the route that the great general took in the winter of 1861 and the beginning of 1862 through the Shenandoah Valley in which he had brilliant success and that of Turner Ashby, whom I did not know much about but have been impressed to read about. The process is just at figuring out when to go and what route to take. That is all for now.

2009-02-02T15:16:00.006-06:00

I have just gotten off work and sat down at the library computer, to write about how we have been out of power here in Louisville, at least where I live for almost seven days now due to the ice/snowstorm that hit our area last week. The good news I just received from my roommate, Darren, who has diligently kept a fire going in the fireplace for these last seven days, that our power is now back on! Honestly though, I meant to write how really nice for us it has been not to have power this last week not to mention how beautiful it has been with snow and ice covering every tree and fence and anything it could cling to. Many here have found this beauty to be a big hindrance, but it has helped us to realize that there are many, many things that we think are necessities but really are just luxuries or hindrances from being able to see the kindness and goodness of God's creation and to read! The history of New England in the 1640's has received some consideration these last few days. Now, it has been work, cutting, splitting, hauling lots of firewood, waking every couple of hours to stoke the fire, cooking on the fire, waking as soon as the sun starts coming up to prepare things at home just to be able to go to work and shovel snow. One really learns how to take advantage of the daylight. All to us has been enjoyable as well. I guess you could say we have been quite content.

It was difficult to keep up with current events, namely the passage of this supposed stimulus bill in the U.S. House of Representatives last week. The more I read about the Founders and the Constitution and what true Liberty really is, the more these things are apt to make one angry and yet what can we do? Over 600 pages of this legislation, all of which should be read carefully and come to the floor as separate pieces of legislature to be debated and if our Constitution was followed they would not be passed. Sadly, this does not happen. I have read recently many statements that have started ' In those days', well in 'these days' our government is a very sad picture of the ideas and PRINCIPLES that were once very important for our government officials to have. Here are a few things written about the government and what kind of MEN were recommended for office in the 1800's. Sorry that many of these are still about Jefferson Davis, that is currently where I am reading and there is just so much that I have never heard before and want to share it.

"In those days men were sent to the Senate because of their ability and their purity of character, and not because of great wealth or capacity as political tricksters and successful partisans." - John William Jones

Written about Jefferson Davis after his death : "His lofty patriotism, immaculate integrity, and firmness of purpose, which never yielded principle for expediency nor abandoned the right for success will be held up for emulation by the aspiring youth of Texas who would achieve an honorable distinction among their fellow-men." -Gov. L. S. Ross, in Austin, Texas

A dispatch sent on the day of Jefferson Davis's death said this:
"He was a leading man in the Senate, and gave every one who saw him the impression that he was a born leader. He was not a demagogue, and would always take the unpopular side of any question when he believed he was right."

This quote is about the Senate of 1850:
"Never before at one time did so many illustrious men sit in the highest council of the nation. The States sent their foremost men to the Senate. Few were sent to the Senate for their wealth, or family or party influence. Ability, Experience and integrity were the tests by which the perspective States tried the men who were to represent them in that then truly venerable and venerated august body." -John William Jones

These quotes from Mr. Frank H. Alfriend are about the speeches Mr. Davis was apt to give while in the Senate:
"Never for one instant varying from the principles of his creed, he never doubted as to the course of duty; profound, accurate in information, there was no question pertaining to the science of government or its administration that he did not illuminate with a light clear, powerful and original."

and again, "For mere rhetorical glitter, Mr. Davis's speeches afford but poor models, but for clear logic and convincing argument, apt illustration, bold and original imagery, and genuine pathos, they are unsurpassed by any ever delivered in the American Senate."

Here Mr. Alfriend was comparing Stephen A. Douglas and Jefferson Davis:
"For mere party success Douglas cared everything, and Davis nothing, save as it insured the triumph of constitutional principles."

All quotes were taken from: Jefferson Davis and the World's Tribute to his Memory- Memorial Volume 1890. written by J.W.M. Jones.

A man may be a great man...

2009-01-26T15:29:00.003-06:00

This quote,which I will get to in a second, is part of what makes looking at history, especially because there have been so many Godly examples to read about, help us to look to Christ even while reading about someone else. I know many people, thanks to the providence and kindness of the Lord, have spent years reading about great people in history and have had wonderful examples of true christian character from others around them. Even though my eyes have been opened much later in life, it is that same providence and kindness of the Lord who has brought me now to be able to read about the truth of the Scriptures and of history. One man whom I have had a very wrong idea of probably much of which I learned from my public education, is Jefferson Davis. Many have been taught much that is far from the truth about the 'War between the states', the causes of that war, what happened before and after, and the character of some of those that were made famous by those times. I have come to believe that Jefferson Davis should be regarded with the founders as a patriot and defender of true constitutional liberty and a man whom demonstrated true christian character in a most perilous time and in times of peace.

This quote is from Bishop J.C. Kenner of the Methodist Episcipal Church South. Bishop Kenner, at the end of his sermon in Felicity Street Church in New Orleans on December 8th, 1889, gave a tribute to Jefferson Davis, whose hope was in Christ for salvation, after he had died.

"A man may be a great man, a magistrate; he may be the centre of all thought and all eyes; he may be a great figure in history, and yet when he comes to die he dies like any one else; he is only a man; has to have the same repentance, the same assurance, the same faith in Christ; goes out the same way, passes through the same passages the Saviour passed through; is in all points a man; and as Christ was the Son of Man, it is essentially all that can be said; he is a man saved by Christ."

Jefferson Davis and the World's Tribute to His Memory- Memorial Volume 1890 J.W.M. Jones

2009-01-20T15:14:00.004-06:00

As we have come to this day when the new president is inaugurated we are reminded of how much energy and money is spent on just one occasion. I have heard that this inauguration is by far the most expensive we have ever seen covering three days, and as you could see how excessive were the guards and police as they were everywhere. I went back and found some accounts I recently came across that dealt with Jefferson Davis concerning some of these matters.

This first account if from the Richmond Dispatch:
"Proud of becoming the capital of the Confederacy, desirous to do honour to President Davis, and anxious to give him the heartiest possible welcome here, the city council purchased and furnished what was ever afterwards known as 'the Jeff. Davis mansion,' and offered it to him as a free gift.
"He declined it.
"He would not accept any present of value; but he agreed to make the house his home upon condition that the city should receive from the government, whose duty it was to furnish him a home, rent therefor. He occupied the house in the early summer of 1861, and bade farewell to it April 2, 1865."

This next account comes from the recollections of Hon. George Davis, of North Carolina, Confederate Attorney-General about his time with Jefferson Davis as President.

"I never saw a man more simple in his habits of life. He surrounded himself with no barriers of forms and ceremonies. The humblest soldier in the ranks, the plainest citizen in the Confederacy, could have as easy access to him as the members of his cabinet when such demands on his time were consistent with the interests of his country. No man ever lived who more thoroughly despised the mere show and tinsel of state and power, and the trappings of office."
"Mr. Davis was at the head of one of the grandest armies that the world ever saw in a time when 'laws were silenced in the midst of arms,' and I give you my word I never saw him attended by a guard or by an orderly. His domestic servants were all that were needed and all that he would have. I say he was never attended by a guard; he was once, and I shall never forget his delight when he told me of it. When General Lee was encamped on the banks of the Chickahominy near Richmond, Mr. Davis was in the habit every afternoon after the business of his office was over of riding out to his headquarters. Upon these visits he always went on horseback and generally alone. Upon one occasion he was detained later than usual, and night had fallen before he left General Lee's tent. As he rode along he heard a horse approaching rapidly and presently a cheery young voice called out 'Good evening,' and, as he turned to salute, a young lad rode up to his side-a young boy of some 16 or 17 years of age, but he wore the gray jacket, and had his rifle on his shoulder and his revolver in his belt. 'Good evening. Is your name Davis- Jefferson Davis?' 'Yes.' 'Well, don't you think you are doing very wrong to be riding around in the dark by yourself?' Mr. Davis said he was within our lines and had nothing to fear from Confederate soldiers. 'It ain't right,' said the boy, 'for there are bad men in our army as well as in all armies.' When about two miles from Richmond and the outposts were reached he said: 'Well, I reckon I'll go back now.' The brave lad thought of the President as in danger and he made himself his body guard, determined to see him through; and he would have died for him there upon that lonely road with as much bravery and cheerfulness as thousands of his comrades were dying every day for the cause Mr. Davis represented."

All these accounts are from Jefferson Davis and the World's Tribute to His Memory- Memorial Volume 1890 by J.W.M. Jones.

Revival in the Confederate Army

2009-01-12T15:15:00.004-06:00

Well, the last couple of quotes have been rather lengthy, as a friend recently gave me some helpful comments about my attempt at blogging. I will try and keep them a little less lengthy. Oh, and sometimes the whole quote is in italics, I have no idea how it happened or how to correct it, so I do apologize for that.

This quote is again from Christ in the Camp from Rev. J.C. Clopton while he was laboring at the Rockbridge Hospitals.

"As I go along among the hospitals my heart is pained at seeing so much to be done and so few laborers. Sometimes I see several physicians going around together to consult about the physical man- to see if the body can be saved from the power of disease, while scarcely any one seems to be concerned about the disease of sin or the death which never dies." p.212

This next quote is from the same book and is an account of the conversion of Lieutenant-General Ewell.

"I have it from a well-authenticated source that the conversion of Lieutenant-General Ewell, Jackson's able lieutenant, was on this wise: At a council of war, one night, Jackson had listened very attentively to the views of his subordinates, and asked until the next morning to present his own. As they came away, A. P. Hill laughingly said to Ewell, "Well! I suppose Jackson wants time to pray over it." Having occasion to return to his quarters again a short time after, Ewell found Jackson on his knees and heard his ejaculatory prayers for God's guidance in the perplexing movements then before him. The sturdy veteran Ewell was so deeply impressed by this incident and by Jackson's general religious character, that he said: "If that is religion, I must have it;" and in making a profession of faith not long afterwards he attributed his conviction to the influence of Jackson's piety."
-J.W. Jones

Revival in Confederate Army

2009-01-05T15:15:00.005-06:00

"Suffer hardship with me, as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No
soldier in active service entangles himself in the affairs of everyday life, so
that he may please the one who enlisted him as a soldier." 2 Timothy 2:3&4
I recently heard a sermon that included this text, and as I have read have found a few quotes from the Lord's work in the Confederate Army that help understand or illustrate this text. This first account is described by Rev. Dr. M.D. Hoge about a Captain in the Fifty-sixth Virginia Infantry named Rev. Dabney Carr Harrison. Dabney Harrison seemed to be called to the ministry and after seeing I believe his own brother and three cousins killed early in the war, decided he himself must take up arms and join the ranks. I pick up with this,
Rev. Hoge writes, "It is unnecessary to dwell on the hardships of Captain Harrison's winter campaign in the West- hard fare and harder lodging, and constant exposure to the wet and cold. Whatever he bore, many thousands bore with him; and there are multitudes of whom that may be said which is so true of him- no one ever saw him falter, no one ever heard him murmur. A brief extract from one of his letters may serve to show the pleasant spirit in which all these privations and annoyances were met:
" 'Bowling Green, Kentucky, January 18, 1862. "My Dear Father: I have been forcibly reminded to-day of an incident in Ruxton's travels. Out on a prairie he found a wretched-looking man, all alone in a pouring rain, stooping over a few smouldering embers, and singing:
"How happy are we, who from care are free. Oh! why are not all Contented like me?"
" My tent is on a hill-side, and has a flue instead of a chimney. It rained hard all last night, has rained all of to-day, and is raining yet. The water has risen in my tent, the fire has been drowned out, the floor is nearly all mud, and I have been writing all the morning in a chair stuck deep in this mud. My bed is kept out of it by some fence rails, and my larder is a basket on the ground at the bed's head, containing a piece of pork and a bag of flour. There is not a negro in Virginia that would not despise such lodgings, but I am "contented." I sleep soundly, work hard, eat heartily, and am fattening.'
"A day or two later he writes: 'I have just finished a large stone chimney to my tent, and shall have it floored with poles to-morrow; then I shall be in great state.'
"On Monday night, February 10, six days before his death, he thus closes a long letter from the camp before Fort Donelson; 'Oh, how all these adventures, with their perils and deliverance's, their privations and blessings, do drive us to our God! I want no other strength than the Lord Jehovah; no other Redeemer than our blessed Saviour; no other Comforter than His Holy Spirit. I believe that when we do our duty the Lord will fight for us. I feel a constant, bright and cheery trust in Him. I think of my precious wife and little ones, and long for their society and caresses; but I am satisfied that it is right that I should be here, and I await the development of His will. I think His mercy in making us His children, in spite of all our ill-desert, ought to make us willing meekly to bear all that He chooses to lay upon us.' " p.122-126 Christ in the Camp. J. William Jones, D.D.
Here is one more quote that I believe helps understand this text as well. This is a letter that Gen. Robert E. Lee wrote to his son, W.H.F. Lee, after he was released from a Northern Prison about the recent death of his wife.
"Camp, Orange County, April 24, 1864.
" I received last night, my dear son, your letter of the 22d. It has given me great comfort. God knows how I loved your dear, dear wife, how sweet her memory is to me, and how I mourn her loss. My grief could not be greater if you had been taken from me. You were both equally dear to me. My heart is too full to speak on this subject, nor can I write. But my grief is for ourselves, not for her. She is brighter and happier than ever--safe from all evil, and awaiting us in her heavenly abode. May God in His mercy enable us to join her in eternal praise to our Lord and Saviour. Let us humbly bow ourselves before Him, and offer perpetual prayer for pardon and forgiveness. But we cannot indulge in grief, however mournfully pleasing. Our country demands all our strength, all our energies. To resist the powerful combination now forming against us will require every man at his place. If victorious, we have everything to hope for in the future. If defeated, nothing will be left us to live for. I have not heard what action has been taken by the department in reference to my recommendations concerning the organization of the cavalry. But we have no time to wait, and you had better join your brigade. This week will, in all probability, bring us active work, and we must strike fast and strong. My whole trust is in God, and I am ready for whatever He may ordain. May He guide, guard and strengthen us, is my constant prayer.
Your devoted father, R. E. Lee."
Christ in the Camp J.William Jones p.p. 74-75

Jefferson Davis: Second Inaugural Address

2008-12-25T18:47:00.008-06:00

This quote is rather long, but I think carries the most weight when read in full. The southern states having left the Union came together in Convention and formed the Provisional Confederate States Government located at Montgomery, Alabama on a temporary basis. Jefferson Davis was unanimously selected by the states to become the President of the new Confederacy. Davis was inaugurated and hoped that his role would only be temporary until the permanent government was established. Jefferson Davis was again selected to remain as the President of the newly formed government and commenced to give his second inaugural address on the 22nd of February, 1862 in front of a monument to George Washington at Richmond, Virginia.

"Fellow-citizens: On this, the birthday of the man most identified with the establishment of American independence, and beneath the monument erected to commemorate his heroic virtues and those of his compatriots, we have assembled, to usher into existence the permanent government of the Confederate States. Through this instrumentality, under the favor of Divine Providence, we hope to perpetuate the principles of our revolutionary fathers. The day, the memory, and the purpose seem fitly associated.
"It is with mingled feelings of humility and pride that I appear to take, in the presence of the people, and before high Heaven, the oath prescribed as a qualification for the exalted station to which the unanimous voice of the people has called me. Deeply sensible of all that is implied by this manifestation of the people's confidence, I am yet more profoundly impressed by the vast responsibility of the office, and humbly feel my own unworthiness.
"In return for their kindness, I can only offer assurances of the gratitude with which it is received, and can but pledge a zealous devotion of every faculty to the service of those who have chosen me as their chief magistrate.
"When a long course of class legislation, directed not to the general welfare, but to the aggrandizement of the northern section of the Union, culminated in a warfare on the domestic institutions of the Southern States; when the dogmas of a sectional party, substituted for the provisions of the constitutional compact, threatened to destroy the sovereign rights of the States, six of those States, withdrawing from the Union, confederated together to exercise the right and perform the duty of instituting a government which would better secure the liberties for the preservation of which that Union was established.
"Whatever of hope some may have entertained that a returning sense of justice would remove the danger with which our rights were threatened, and render it possible to preserve the union of the constitution, must have been dispelled by the malignity and barbarity of the Northern States in the prosecution of the existing war. The confidence of the most hopeful among us must have been destroyed by the disregard they have recently exhibited for all the time-honored bulwarks of civil and religious liberty. Bastiles filled with prisoners, arrested without civil process, or indictment duly found; the writ of habeas corpus suspended by executive mandate; a State legislature controlled by the imprisonment of members whose avowed principles suggested to the Federal executive that there might be another added to the list of seceded States; elections held under threats of a military power; civil officers, peaceful citizens, and gentle women incarcerated for opinion's sake, proclaimed the incapacity of our late associates to administer a government as free, liberal, and humane as that established for our common use.
"For proof of the sincerity of our purpose to maintain our ancient institutions, we may point to the constitution of the Confederacy and the laws enacted under it, as well as to the fact that, through all the necessities of an unequal struggle, there has been no act, on our part, to impair personal liberty or the freedom of speech, of thought, or of the press. The courts have been open, the judicial functions fully executed, and every right of the peaceful citizen maintained as securely as if a war of invasion had not disturbed the land.
"The people of the States now confederated became convinced that the government of the United States had fallen into the hands of a sectional majority, who would pervert the most sacred of all trusts to the destruction of the rights which it was pledged to protect. They believed that to remain longer in the Union would subject them to a continuance of a disparaging discrimination, submission to which would be inconsistent with their welfare and intolerable to a proud people. They, therefore, determined to sever its bonds, and establish a new confederacy for themselves.
"The experiment, instituted by our revolutionary fathers, of a voluntary union of sovereign States, for purposes specified in a solemn compact, had been prevented by those who, feeling power and forgetting right, were determined to respect no law but their own will. The government had ceased to answer the ends for which it had been ordained and established. To save ourselves from a revolution which, in its silent but rapid progress, was about to place us under the despotism of numbers, and to preserve, in spirit as well as in form, a system of government we believed to be peculiarly fitted to our condition and full of promise for mankind, we determined to make a new association, composed of States homogeneous in interest, in policy, and in feeling.
"True to our traditions of peace and love of justice, we sent commissioners to the United States to propose a fair and amicable settlement of all questions of public debt or property which might be in dispute. But the government at Washington, denying our right to self-government, refused even to listen to any proposals for a peaceful separation. Nothing was then left to us but to prepare for war.
"The first year in our history has been the most eventful in the annals of this continent. A new government has been established, and its machinery put in operation, over an area exceeding seven hundred thousand square miles. The great principles upon which we have been willing to hazard every thing that is dear to man have made conquests for us which could never have been achieved by the sword. Our Confederacy has grown from six to thirteen States; and Maryland, already united to us by hallowed memories and material interests, will, I believe, when able to speak with unstifled voice, connect her destiny with the South. Our people have rallied, with unexampled unanimity, to the support of the great principles of constitutional government, with firm resolve to perpetuate by arms the rights which they could not peacefully secure. A million of men, it is estimated, are now standing in hostile array, and waging war along a frontier of thousands of miles; battles have been fought, sieges have been conducted, and, although the contest is not ended, and the tide for this moment is against us, the final result in our favor is not doubtful.
"The period is near at hand when our foes must sink under the immense load of debt which they have incurred-a debt which, in their efforts to subjugate us, has already attained such fearful dimensions as will subject them to burdens which must continue to oppress them for generations to come.
"We, too, have had our trials and difficulties. That we are to escape them in the future is not to be hoped. It was to be expected, when we entered upon this war, that it would expose our people to sacrifices, and cost them much both of money and blood. But we knew the value of the object for which we struggled, and understood the nature of the war in which we were engaged. Nothing could be so bad as failure, and any sacrifice would be cheap as the price of success in such a contest.
"But the picture has its lights as well as its shadows. This great strife has awakened in the people the highest emotions and qualities of the human soul. It is cultivating feelings of patriotism, virtue and courage. Instances of self-sacrifice and of generous devotion to the noble cause for which we are contending are rife throughout the land. Never has a people evinced a more determined spirit than that now animating men, women, and children in every part of our country. Upon the first call, the men fly to arms; and wives and mothers send their husbands and sons to battle without a murmur of regret.
"It was, perhaps, in the ordination of Providence that we were to be taught the value of our liberties by the price which we pay for them.
"The recollections of this great contest, with all its common traditions of glory, of sacrifices and of blood, will be the bond of harmony and enduring affection amongst the people, producing unit in policy, fraternity in sentiment, and joint effort in war.
"Nor have the material sacrifices of the past year been made without some corresponding benefits. If the acquiescence of foreign nations in a pretended blockade has deprived us of our commerce with them, it is fast making us a self-supporting and an independent people. The blockade, if effectual and permanent, could only serve to divert our industry from the production of articles for export, and employ it in supplying commodities for domestic use.
"It is a satisfaction that we have maintained the war by our unaided exertions. We have neither asked nor received assistance from any quarter. Yet the interest involved is not wholly our own. The world at large is concerned in opening our markets to its commerce. When the independence of the Confederate States is recognized by the nations of the earth, and we are free to follow our interests and inclinations by cultivating foreign trade, the Southern States will offer to manufacturing nations the most favorable markets which ever invited their commerce. Cotton, sugar, tobacco, provisions, timber, and naval stores will furnish attractive exchanges. Nor would the constancy of these supplies be likely to be disturbed by war. Our confederate strength will be too great to attempt aggression; and never was there a people whose interests and principles committed them so fully to a peaceful policy as those of the Confederate States. By the character of their productions, they are too deeply interested in foreign commerce wantonly to disturb it. War of conquest they cannot wage, because the constitution of their Confederacy admits of no coerced association. Civil war there cannot be between States held together by their volition only. This rule of voluntary association, which cannot fail to be conservative, by securing just and impartial government at home, does not diminish the security of the obligations by which the Confederate States may be bound to foreign nations. In proof of this, it is remembered that, at the first moment of asserting their right of secession, these States proposed a settlement on the basis of a common liability for the obligations of the general government.
"Fellow-citizens, after the struggles of ages had consecrated the right of the Englishman to constitutional representative government, our colonial ancestors were forced to vindicate that birthright by an appeal to arms. Success crowned their efforts, and they provided for their posterity a peaceful remedy against future aggression.
"The tyranny of an unbridled majority, the most odious and least responsible form of despotism, has denied us both the right and the remedy. Therefore we are in arms to renew such sacrifices as our fathers made to the holy cause of constitutional liberty. At the darkest hour of our struggle, this provisional gives place to the permanent government. After a series of successes and victories, which covered our arms with glory, we have recently met with serious disasters. But, in the heart of a people resolved to be free, these disasters tend but to stimulate to increased resistance.
"To show ourselves worthy of the inheritance bequeathed to us by the patriots of the Revolution, we must emulate that heroic devotion which made reverse to them but the crucible in which their patriotism was refined.
"With confidence in the wisdom and virtue of those who will share with me the responsibility and aid me in the conduct of public affairs; securely relying on the patriotism and courage of the people, of which the present war has furnished so many examples, I deeply feel the weight of the responsibilities I now, with unaffected diffidence, am about to assume; and, fully realizing the inadequacy of human power to guide and sustain, my hope is reverently fixed on Him, whose favor is ever vouchsafed to the cause which is just. With humble gratitude and adoration, acknowledging the Providence which has so visibly protected the Confederacy during its brief but eventful career, to Thee, O God! I trustingly commit myself, and prayerfully invoke Thy blessing on my country and its cause."

-Jefferson Davis from Jefferson Davis and the World's Tribute to His Memory-Memorial Volume 1890 by J.W.M. Jones. pp.319-324.

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"Those who undertake to write histories do not, I perceive, take that trouble on one and the same account, but for many reasons, and those such as are very different one from another. For some of them apply themselves to this part of learning to show their great skill in composition, and that they may therein acquire a reputation for speaking finely. Others of them there are
who write histories in order to gratify those that happen to be concerned in them; and on that account have spared no pains, but rather gone beyond their own abilities in the performance. But others there are who, of necessity and by force, are driven to write history, because they were concerned in the facts, and so cannot excuse themselves from committing them to writing,
for the advantage of posterity. Nay, there are not few who are induced to draw their historical facts out of darkness into light, and to produce them for the benefit of the public, on account of the great importance of the facts themselves with which they have been concerned. Now, of these several reasons for writing history, I must profess the last two were my own reasons
also."-Josephus

from the Acknowledgements in Four Years with General Lee by Walter H. Taylor Adjutant-General, Army of Northern Virginia

2008-12-25T17:30:00.000-06:00

2008-12-15T15:11:00.005-06:00

I am currently reading "Jefferson Davis, Ex-President of the Confederate States of America Part One Volume 2: A Memoir By His Wife" written by Varina Howell Davis. I have had a hard time putting it down, for Mrs. Davis has given such a lively account of the times and her husband's life, most of which I have never encountered before. Here are a few accounts given by Mrs. Davis that I found very warm and personal.

Mrs. Davis writes: "In one of the most disheartening periods of the War, when Norfolk had been evacuated and the Virginia destroyed, he (Jefferson Davis) came home, about seven o'clock, from his office, and laid down. He declined dinner, and I remained by his side, anxious and afraid to ask what was the trouble which so oppressed him. In an hour or two he told me that the weight of responsibility oppressed him so, that he felt he would give all his limbs to have someone with whom he could share it. I found that nothing comforted him, and at last picked up Lawrence's "Guy Livingstone." Knowing the he had not read it, I thought it might distract his mind. The descriptions of the horses and the beau sabreur Guy interested him at first, in a vague kind of way, but gradually he became absorbed, and I read on until the sky became gray and then pink. He was so wrapped in the story that he took no notice of time. When Guy's back was broken, and when Cyril Brandon in the interview that followed, struck him, my husband rose up, in the highest state of excitement, and called out,"I should like to have been there to punish the scoundrel who would strike a helpless man when he was down."p.301-302

Later Mrs. Davis writes,"Novels were to him only a means of driving out thoughts of more serious things."p.302

While Jefferson Davis and his wife lived in Richmond shortly after the first battle of Manassas many wounded men had been sent to the city to recover in hospitals. Mrs. Davis gives a very touching account that she witnessed. Mrs. Davis writes," Here I saw a remarkable instance of the position our private soldiers occupied at home. Some money had been sent to me from Vicksburg to relieve the "boys from Warren County." Hearing that there were several at this hospital, I walked from one end to the other and tried in vain to find a man who desired pecuniary aid. One fair-haired boy, with emaciated face and armless sleeve, looked up and whispered,"There is a poor fellow on the other side who I think will take a little, I am afraid he has no money; my father gives me all I want." I crossed the room and asked the sufferer, who had neither hand, if I could not get him something he craved. He flushed and said,"I thank you, madam, for your visit, but I do better than that poor fellow over there; he has lost his leg and suffers dreadfully." And so on to the end of the ward."p.205

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"Soldiers! let us humble ourselves before the Lord our God, asking through Christ the forgiveness of our sins, beseeching the aid of the God of our forefathers in the defence of our homes and our liberties, thanking Him for His past blessings, and imploring their continuance upon our cause and our people."

Gen. Robert E. Lee. General Order No. 23 Christ in the Camp. p. 58

"It was a solemn sight to see one of those earnest, crowded congregations by our feeble light in that rude chapel. We had no brilliant gas-jets, softened by shaded or stained glass. The light was reflected from no polished surface or snowy wall; one or two rough-looking specimens of candles (we thought them magnificent) adorned the pulpit, and perhaps, three others were in the room, subject to the caprices of the wind. But there was a sort of spell in the flicker of those lights and the solemn stillness of the vast crowds, and as they would flare the lurid gleam would reveal many an earnest face and brimming eye."

Rev. W.S. Lacy speaking of the Forty-Seventh N.C.. Christ in the Camp p.261

2008-12-02T15:58:00.003-06:00

Here are a few quotes that deal with the Revival in the Confederate Army during the Civil War. Hopefully these will be helpful to show how the Lord worked in that great Revival.

"Denominational distinctions should be kept out of view, and not touched upon. And as a general rule, I do not think that a chaplain who would preach denominational sermons should be in the army. His congregation is his regiment, and it is composed of various denominations. I would like to see no question asked in the army of what denomination a chaplain belongs to; but let the question be, Does he preach the Gospel?"
Gen. Stonewall Jackson - letter to the Southern Presbyterian Gen. Assembly concerning the need for Chaplains in the Army. Christ in the Camp p.94
"We want our best men here- men of courage, faith, experience- holy men- hard working men- sympathizing men- self-denying men- men baptized afresh every day by the Holy Ghost for the work. No place here for slow men, mere reasoners and expositors, however learned or eloquent; war has no time to wait for such men- the soldier has no time to wait for such men- he may die tomorrow."
Rev. Dr. Rosser while in Ewell's Corp. Christ in the Camp p.339
"At the Union prayer-meeting, one afternoon, that gallant soldier and pious man, Gen. Stonewall Jackson, was present, and led in prayer. At the supper table some professing Christians, when told of it, expressed regret at not having been present. Had they known that Gen. Jackson was to have been there, they would certainly have gone. Alas! they forgot that a greater than Jackson or any other mere man, had promised to meet with His people, even the Lord of Life and Glory."
Rev. Dr. James B. Taylor. Christ in the Camp p.215

First entry

2008-11-26T22:44:00.000-06:00

Hello, I hope to have here in the near future some quotes and entries in some books I have been reading. I have found some very interesting reading from books by first-hand accounts dealing with the Revival in the Southern Army during the Civil War, and other American History topics and writings by Christians or whatever I may be reading at the time. Many of these have been helpful to read and may give a more honest look into some of the people and events that have been forgotten or disregarded as important.