MY RIVERSIDE CEMETERY TOMBSTONE
INSCRIPTIONS SCRAPBOOK PART II
By Jonathan K. T. Smith
Copyright, Jonathan K. T. Smith, 1992

(Page 20)

A STRONG CONFEDERATE HERITAGE

WHIG-TRIBUNE, Jackson, April 25, 1862:

THE MARTYRS OF JACKSON In common with many others, our own community has been made to feel the discomforting ills of this cruel war, in the loss of several of our most promising youth. They fell on the battle field of Shiloh, nobly and valiantly contending for the rights of freemen and the maintenance of their country's institutions. In our endeavour to relieve the suffering of the sick and wounded in our midst, we are apt to forget those brave martyrs who sacrificed their young lives on the altar of Southern independence. They have gone from among us, some of them in the pride of youth when life was in its spring, full of hope and virtue resolutions. Let us revive their memories; and in after years let the names of Joseph Freeman, Isaac Jackson, John Campbell. Thomas McCorry, James Haddaway and Augustus Eppinger, be mentioned to our children to inspire them with true courage and patriotism.

 

            Beginning in the spring at 1871 and for years afterwards, the people of the Jackson community celebrated their Memorial or Decoration Day, usually in mid-May. They were following a custom established several years before, in the South, when Confederate veterans, especially those who died during the war, were honored; on the graves of the latter were placed flowers or wreaths. Former Confederates, lead by some of their former officers, would march from the courthouse square to Riverside Cemetery, where some inspiring and appropriate remarks were given; on the graves "floral offerings" were laid, usually by the ladies, who took a great hand in planning the day's activities. A cenotaph, apparently a temporary arboreal creation, was duly regarded, emblematic as it was of the supreme sacrifice of the war veterans. Back in or near the town squares large dinner was served; people, young and old, chatted and discussed whatever seemed important to them. The penance people paid for these lovely occasions was having to listen, about meal-time, to some long-winded worthy or worthies orate.

            On the occasion of the 1876 observance, it was noted that flowers were placed on the graves of the federal soldiers in Riverside whose remains had not been moved elsewhere. It "was the conduct of the ladies and soldiers at the cemetery. There in the same cemetery were the graves of only two federal soldiers whom the fortunes of war had buried here beyond the reach of the tender and loving offices of family and friends." (THE JACKSON SUN, May 19, 1876)

            A description of the CENOTAPH was given in THE JACKSON SUN, May 18, 1877. "The Cenotaph was exquisitely dressed in immortelles' buds and blossoms, and the names of soldiers whose deeds and death it commemorated, never looked from sweeter surroundings and spoke their voiceless eloquence to hearts sore true. The base of the cenotaph was formed of crosses, the largest and most beautiful being dedicated to Albert Sidney Johnston, who fell at Shiloh. On the top of this monument of evergreens and flowers was an immense cross bearing the deathless legend, 'immortal are the names and deeds of our Southern dead.' And true the motto. . . . But we will not linger upon this idea. It is enough for Southern men and women to know and feel that it is impossible for history and song, to do otherwise than exalt the valor and patriotism of the soldiers of the South."

            In the North, similar observances were held for many years in communities. The meetings and celebrations of the Grand Army of the Republic kept alive the northern memory of the Civil War just as the memorial days did in the southern states.

            In 1888, a tall monument was erected on the northwest corner of the courthouse lawn in Jackson, appropriately inscribed and atop all was placed in stone a figure of a confederate soldier.

            As the families of Joseph Freeman and Ike Jackson were able to have their bodies brought to Jackson from the battlefield at Shiloh, it seems logical that the others who fell there from the city were brought home, or most of them. Freeman was buried among kindred but Jackson and the others from Shiloh probably lie among the Confederate dead in the lots set aside for them — the Rebel patriots — at Riverside.

 

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