Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1892-06-17
THE CONFEDERACY

'>NANA GOO VI b1uJOi OuO. w. Ounl0l al
New Orleans:
Whatever else mankind may say oil
the Southern Confederacy, it's move
mept, its aspiration, it's deeds-his
tory spoke its unalterable decree re-
speeding the Confederate soldier
while yet the field was red. Youl
comrades have covered you with to
kens of their faith in you, of their
love and ycneiation for you. Mutron
and maid, sire and son, CID and
young have said to you, well DONE
The outside world, who knew YOU
only by your deeds have said "well
done Your foes that were have
been just to your vulor and generous
in its expressions. Glory las wrap o.
ped you iii its arms and bound your
brows with wrcaths us green as the
leaves of your magnolia trees and as
fragrant as their blooms. The Con
fcderate soldier is honored because
he made it manifest that he was hon.
est aud honorable and true aud brave,
The strongest instinct l see in m
ture is the moral instinct, the thirst
tor truth, the passion for justice.
Truth sticks and stays and tongues
and grooves with I'LL things, and
truth has stood by you and spoken
for you. You were not soldiers of
conquest. You did not seek to add
an acre to your empire. You were
not soldiers of greed; your months
pay scarce bought a dinner. You
were not soldiers of ambition; titles
did not dance i'll your vision. You
were soldiers of principle, and that
principle the right of people to
mako government TO suit themselves,
and pursue happiness to suit them.
selves; to create their own temple of
liberty, and to worship therein the
God OF their own conscience. If the
principle be wrong your education
was wrong and tho Declaration of
Independence was not M immortal
truth, but only special plea. You
were soldiers of home, for we'll being
of homo. Napoleon said to his SOL
diers, "Behold Italy Conquer md
take the spoils.' Your general said,
behold home Defend it." Lot who
will say you erred; it is his priv
lege to think so and ito say So
Thought is free, speech is free. but
this remains: you were truo to home
rs you loved it; true to manhood MS
you possessed it, and the everlasting
veritles of nature envelop you liz ar.
NOR bright as the FURNISHED steel,
and stronger. And now / am done.
l came from old Virginia, where were
fought SO many battles, whose very
dust is quick with your heroic blood,
to have the pleasure of looking again
upon your faces, of shaking once
more your hands, and to stimulate
myself for the remaining battles of
life by qnaffng of the noble spirit of
this reunion i'll your society. We
owe 1T to ourselves and our children.
to justice and to truth, that the sac
rifces made, the glorious deeds done
and the great names of our history
shall not perish from earth, but be
handed down NJ n heritage to oui
race, our children and to mankind
And first, it seems TO me fit to the
old South.
1t lies far off in the bygones years
under the cypress trees aud the ivy
vines, with broken shaft upon its
'A"oiS iiLhO' IL WdS IL lHDQ OF TRUE
men and modest women. It Law
aside from the great highways beat
en- down with the tread of the myr.
lads following westward the star of
empire. On the broad acres of IFS
plantations were the homes of its
people. In groves and fields and by
pure waters were it's affairs. It's pop.
ulation was not croweed in tenement
houses. It had few cities, and of
them New Orleans, Richmond. Mo.
bile, Charleston and Savannah were
the greatest. Commerce and manu-
features had not kept pace with ag
ricultnre. It had little or no shin.
ping. There were but three rolling
mills IN the entire South, but agri.
culture flourished. Cotton, suga,
and rico fields, corn, wheat and to
bacco fields were it's great resources