Archive Record
Images
Metadata
Title |
Flowers for Dead Heroes by Rev. William H. Platt |
Dates of Creation |
June 10, 1894 |
Scope & Content |
The twenty-eighth observance of Memorial Day is the basis of this newspaper article. The paper is badly damaged and split at the folds where it was folded and stored. The first part of the article pertains to the ceremony itself and is followed by the oration of the Reverend Platt. Petersburg was attacked thirty years ago by the Union cavalry of General Kautz, held at bay by 125 citizen soldiers under the command of Colonel Archer until reinforcements arrived from General Lee. The first commemoration of the 9th of June to honor the Confederate dead took place in 1866 and it has been observed for 28 years since. For the ceremony there was a large turnout. Several merchants closed their doors in the afternoon. About 9:30 AM, 60 veterans from the Soldiers' Home near Richmond came to participate. The veterans, headed by the First Virginia drum corps, were met by the A. P. Hill Camp and escorted to their hall. They received lots of attention as they marched through the streets. The march to the cemetery was made at 5 o'clock and started with bicyclists with decorated wheels, mounted police, Chief Marshal Field, First Virginia drum corps, veterans from the Soldier's Home, 300 school girls and boys carrying flags, A.P. Hill Camp, the Petersburg Greys, carriages for Mayor Colier, the Reverend Platt, the Reverend Starr, Colonel Archer, and carriages for the Ladies Memorial Association. The procession reached the cemetery about half past five, marched to Cemetery Hill, and was called to order. The Reverend Starr opened with a prayer, which was followed by singing. The Reverend Platt, the orator, spoke next. (The following extract is taken from his speech.) "Let us put the past behind us. I speak today of political philosophy, and not that of sectional feeling. Honor our dead sons and bury all sectional prejudice. In the mind of God there is no south and no north. In considering and readjusting the once disturbed relations of the political units of this country, we are not expected to admit a conquest where there was only exhaustion. In the power of overwhelming numbers there may be national results but no glory. Our dead sleep around us in graves of unsuccessful patriotism." *Platt then turns to his political philosophy in his oratory. "One from many and many in one is God's way. ...where is the unity of the center. The curse of political centralization is despotism, as the curse of political decentralization is disintegration and confusion. The sectional interests conflict. If you grant protective tariffs for the iron of Pennsylvania why should you refuse it to the sugar of Louisiana. .... The only just principle is to protect all and to favor none. The war forever suppressed the hope of successful resistance of conflicting sections. The South needs its future sons to rebuild its future interests, to lift up its prostrate form, to rebuild its despoiled temples and to repeople its desolate homes. The time for the new South is coming; its soil may be tired but not exhausted ... The possibilities of the South are great. .... Long Island, with its 266 people to the square mile, can take no more. Kentucky has but 47 people to the square mile. Kentucky, like other western and southern states, can and will grow. Growth is not for the east. ...Slavery being no more, the east will be exposed to the consequences of its own past policy. ... It is the vital interest of the South to preserve the union - it will be too profitable to break it up." * Platt then talks about the foreign population increases in northern states which is 350 per cent compared to 743 per cent in Delaware, Washington D. C., Maryland and the southern states. "The wheels of government are now locked by the conflict of interests. The vital interests of the country await the action of a Congress, handicapped by sectional strife. ... The South will never first take the field again. But the West, as well as the East, presses its control at the centre, will assert its rights, in war if need be. ... The East would have all power at the center; where it may control it; the West would and will have it balanced and distributed among the states, where it can be controlled by the people. The closing of the war opened a greater question than all others - the conflict of races. ... One race cannot absorb the other. The white crossed upon the black produces a scrofulous mulatto, which does not endure. ... one race will go away and leave the country to the other race; ... The Negro is made by present circumstances a competing man ... for the whites and the blacks are fast friends. The white man has too much land for his labor. He must have less land or more labor. The Negro may do the labor, but cannot buy the land. The European offers to do both. The question will be settled by the doctrine of the survival of the fittest. ... the Negro is exhibiting earnestness in the struggle for the exaltation of his race, aided or unaided. He has colleges, academies, high schools, and teachers. Education will not bring social equality. Like the white man, competition is his field of life. ... the white man prefers the Negro, to whom he has been accustomed, to any foreigner who can come into the land. What happens will happen by the irresistible laws of providence. ... The future is not in the hands of the past. ... We are more prosperous than we were before the war. In our products in the field, our fabrics in the shop, our political status, in the condition of the Negro, in the golden hopes of the white man, we have been wondrously favored. Let us be just to all, leaving the past to God." At the close of Platt's address, the graves of the Confederate dead were strewn with flowers, the decorating being done by the Ladies Memorial Association. The Petersburg Greys fired three volleys and the ceremony ended. |
Year Range from |
1894 |
Creator |
The Daily Index (Newspaper) |
Year Range to |
1894 |
Subjects |
Academies Address ( Oration ) African Americans Afro-Americans Anniversaries Army Attack Battle Bayonets Bicycles & tricycles Black Black Americans Bugles Capital Carriage and horses Cavalry Centrists Citizen Coal Colleges Commemoration Confederate flags Confederate officers Confederate soldiers Confederate veterans Congress Conventions Cotton Cotton mills Country Crowds Currency Dead persons Depots Education Emancipation Engagement Experiments Exterminating Fabrics Federal Federal cavalry Federal troops Field Flowers Foe Foreigners Friends Future Glory Government Grains Graves Guns Handicapped persons Headquarters, Military Heroes High school History Honors Humanity Interest Iron Isolation Labor Land Law Legislation Liberty Merchants Monuments Mulatto Nature Navy Negro Negroes Oration Orators Oratory Pastors Patriotic societies Patriotism Philosophy Police Population Prayer Prejudice Procession Progress Question Races Racial equality Racially mixed people Regiments Reinforcements (military) Rule Sashes Schools Sections Shoemakers Silver mining Slavery Soil Streets Sugar Tariffs Teachers Theory Union Veterans Veterans' homes Veterans' organizations Wheels White |
Search Terms |
1st Virginia Drum Corps A & E Baldwin, Manufacturers A. P. Hill Camp of Confederate Veterans Appomattox Blandford Cemetery Bollingbrook Street Cemetery Hill [Petersburg, Virginia] Charleston, South Carolina Civil War Confederacy, the Confederate Army Confederate Infantry Confederate Veterans Connecticut Daily Appeal Daily Index Delaware District of Columbia First Virginia Drum Corps Florida Georgia Hartford, Connecticut Kentucky Ladies Memorial Association Long Island Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Memorial Day New Hampshire New Jersey New York State North Carolina Page County Pennsylvania Petersburg Greys Petersburg, Virginia Prince George County, Virginia Rhode Island Richmond, Virginia Rives Farm Russia Soldiers Home, Richmond, Virginia South Carolina United States Vermont Virginia War Between the States War Talks of Confederate Veterans Washington City D.C. Washington Street West Virginia |
People |
Archer, Fletcher H. Bernard, Geo. S. Bernard, George S. Bigger,Charles B. Collier, Charles F. Field, E. M. Kautz, Alfred Lee, Robert Edward McCabe, W. Gordon Muirhead, James Platt, William H. Starr, W. G. |
Event |
Civil War |
Collection |
George S. Bernard Collection |
Imagefile |
024\200975078.JPG |
Number of images |
2 |
Object Name |
Letter |
Object ID |
2009.75.078 |
Extent of Description |
2 pages, size 7 1/2" x 26" |