The Marietta journal. [volume] (Marietta, Ga.) 1866-1909, 1902-05-01
TRIBUTE TO THE UNNAMED
HEROES.

EDITORS JOURNAL 1T was n beauti-
ful tribute paid, on Friday by Eon.
Henry Richardson to the silent Sleep
ers out at the Confederate cemetery.
1t is beautiful custom, this placing of
flowers on the graves of those who. as
Mr.. Richardson said, Gin double sense
died for us" and for the South, and
"o'er the bones of the bold be that
story long told,
And on Fame's golden tablets their
trlumphs enrolled"
To strangers, these graves are only the
mounds of dead mems bones to South
erners, they are sacred shrines, where
are barred and bowed heads in rever-
ence; they are bands unbreakable
which bind Southern hearts to South
ern homes; they are magic marks, the
sight of which causes the mystic
streams of the past to burst the flood
gates OF memory, engulting the hopes
and fears of what is to be in the mingled
joys and sorrows of what has been, for
in these graves repose our unnamed
heroes, and, too, lies buried there the
lost cause.
Their bodies have persisted, but their
memory still lives, and is today as
refulgent as the Southern sun in n
cloudless sky, and still it fires our souls
with feelings as holy as those awakened
in the breasts of the enravished shep-
herds on the plain of Judea, by the
beaming of the star of the new Re-
deemer. with forced fingers rude" |
would not pluck one poor leaf from the
victor's wreath which deck the brows
of those who wore the blue, nor should
we allow hostile hand to wither by
its poisonous touch the chaplet which
encircles the brows of those who wore
the gray. True, they are defeated, but
all they lost was victory, and in such
defeat there is no disgrace. The story
of their struggle is the Souths heritage,
nor would we exchange it for all 1.-THE
glory that was Greece, and the grandeur
that was Rome" Before the deeds of
these heroes old Marathon and Water
loo, when France was left undone, must
seem but mimic trays, 'ere soldiers
fought, clad in the gray that Southern
matrons wrought"
But turn the page; let wars dread.
name
BE buried with his dead"
The long struggle is ended the wall
OF humiliation is hushed the proud
huzza of triumph is over. The cypress
has draped the collins of the vahquished
and the laurel has crowned the victor's
brow The lost cause is but memory :;
its starry cross flag, sanctified by the
blood of the loved and the brave, is
cherished as relic of past day, glo-
rious to fame, but forever more depart
cd. The reality of its existence was
like that of its lone bark, the Alabama,
which fearlessly went forth upon the
worlds broad Iocean, clearing n way to
historic glory, but at last going down
before the guns of her enemy, carrying
with her, her flag, but leaving behind
name whose like the stars have never
shone upon. SO beneath the waters let
the strife land woes of the past be
buried.
The tempest has ceased its sulphu-
rious clouds have rolled away, and from
100000 souls arises the silent prayer
that the smiling face of the sun of peace
may never again be clouded by the
cruel clouds of civil contest. 1t is my
fondest dream that at day not far
distant, when reason has become
stronger and prejudice weaker, the men
and women of the North and South will
demolish the narrow walls by which
they have surrounded themselves
and accord with equal love cheers for
the blue and cheers for the gray.
believe in a time when there will
be no North and South, and the be-
ginning of this end in already here,
since we have undertaken and finished
the humane task of freeing Cuba from
the coils of Spanish cruelty, tyranny
and death, and during that brief strug-
gle, led by our beloved Lee,. the sons
of those who wore the Gray, proved
afresh that none are more loyal to our
country's common flag than those born
in Dixie. b. +. G., Marietta, Ga.