The Atlanta constitution. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1885-19??, 1888-08-21
A FEW LOST FACTS.

It is no wonder that artificial systems Of
memory arc popular these days.
There never was a time, perhaps, when there
was more intellectual activity than there Is At
present; and there never was a time when
men were so forgetful.
II you feol like testing the matter, all you
have to do is to hunt up an old pioneer, and
put few questions to him about Atlanta's
early history. Beyond few well known facts
already in print il is impossible to get any
thing out OF him. That is to say, any
thing definite. He will mix mp names and
dates in such a whirl OF confusion as to render
his "reminiscences almost yalueleSs.
But the old pioneers have better memories
than their sons. Our middle-aged men are
more defective in this respect than their
fathers Only the other day a con-
troversy started in Richmond over the question
whether cOlored men were ever mustered into
the confederate service Now, there is no
point easier to settle. Shortly before the fall
OF Richmond both the confederate congress
and the Virginia legislature passed bills put
ting negroes in the army. Toall who enlisted,
or TO their families was offered freedom as a
bounty, and pension in land for home.
Several negro companies were at once Or
ganzed, and there are citizens in Atlanta who
remember seeing them drilling in the streets
Of the confederate capital. There was at least
one such company in Petersburg, and if the
war had been prolonged thousands of negroes
would have enlisted. The younger negroes
were pleased with the idea and they would
have fought the federals very willingly.
There is a strange forgetfulness, also, about
other matters Twenty-four years ago every
body knew who William T. Sherman was, but
today hardly n week passes that this paper does
not receive postal cards asking whether 1T was
William or John Sherman who made the
march from Atlanta to the sea. Such is fame.
The conquerng chief, who was once known IN
the south as "the modern Attila." is now con-
foun1pI hN m n
with his bloodless, parchment-faced, red-tape
brother.
When an editor receives a war Renaissance
from an esteemed correspondent, there is
trouble in the sanctum. Last week gentle
man sent us q brief sketch Of one of General
Phil Sheridan's adventures in Burke county,
when Sherman was marching to Savannah.
The writer was in dead earnest, so much so
that il is hardly worth while TO Inform him
that Sheridan did not participate in the Geor-
gia campaign, and was never in Burke
county.
A citizen who has a good average memory
informed this scribbler not long ago that he
was the first man to enter Atlanta after it was
destroyed He said that the ruins were still
smoking, and that it was in the spring of
sixty-fve. When reminded that the burning
OF the city took place about the middle of No
vember, In sixty-four lie readily admitted
that no was not good on dates.
Perhaps the war affected mems faculties,
and especially the faculty of memory A gal
liant ex-confederate, whose photography is
about as bad as it could be. once assured an
editor that he had been absolutely perfect in
the matter of spelling, but had lost the accom-
plishment in the war. AS matter of course,
a war that could smash q man photography
could cripple his memory.
Sometimes the forgetful man is very anus
ing. The Atlanta gentleman who met Edgar
Allen Poe in a Whitehall street bookstore in
1852 ten years after the poets death, belongs
to this class.