The Tupelo journal., 1913-05-16
Address by MIR. Norfleet.

Nv MT. u. Z. NOTlleeJ, Ol pltS,
Commander in Chief of the United
Sons of Confederate Veterans,
at the recent meeting of the State
Convention of the United Daughters OF
the C~onfederacy. held in Tupelo:
Mr.. Chairman, Daughters of the
Confederacy, Ladies and Gentlemen:
Along the lines that your Chairman
has just spoken l might explain that
when / took my grip up this morning it
was with fear that my trip might be
misunderstood, and my creditors swoop
down upon me, but as the little boy
said | took my nerve in both hands and
came on anyway.
l first wish to thank you for your
. very kind invitation to be with you on
this suspicious occasion, and more es-
pecially for giving me the opportunity
to make a few remarks. 1t is always
a pleasure for me to speak on any sub
ject pertaining to things confederate,
but tonight it is doubly so, realizing as
/ do that, being deeply attached to the
Lost Cause yourselves, anything / may
say must needs find an echo IN your
hearts.
| think it is a grand and glorious
work the Daughters of the C~onfederacy
are doing, | mean the work of erecting
monuments to the Confederate dead,
and | am proud that the women of the
great State of Mississippi { the State
in which it was my good fortune to be
born) are devoting so much of their
time, their energy and their love to
this particular work. In the years to
come when the true history of the
South has been written, which | regret
to say has not been done as yet, the
women of the C~onfederacy and their
daughters will at last be accorded their
rightful place on its pages, and when
the historian points out with commend
able pride all the beautiful shafts that
have been erected by the Daught-
ers of the Confederacy, we { if we be
living them who have seen their work
and sympathized with them in their
difficulties, will be proud that they are
) our mothers, sisters, daughters and
friends.
will not take up all of your time
with a discussion of the civil war, as
much as | would like to do so. / MOTTO
ed in the opening prayer your minister
said that the men of the South fought
for what they thought to be right. |
want to pause just long enough to OBJ
iect to that statement, by saying that
they fought for what they knew to be
right, and subsequest history has prov
en- it. The weight of arms and over
whelming odds against which they
fought, and to which they were ultim-
ately forced to yield, only proved one
~thing-that there is an end to human
endurance.
When we stop to think the entire
mustered force of the South only num-
bered about 600, 900, and against over
W million from the North. my only
wonder is how they lasted as long as
they did. And when it was over, what did
our fathers and mothers have to con-
tend with? You have heard how DR..
Talmage drew, with a masters hand,
the picture of the return of the North
ern army, how in the pomp and cir
! cumstance of wary they came back,
marching with proud and victorious
tread, reading their glory in a Nations
i, ewes! But will you bear with me as |
recall those wonderful words of Henry
Grady when he said: Let me tell you
of another army that sought its home
at the close of the late war-an army
! that marched home in defeat and not
/ in v%ictory-in pathos and not in splen-
dor, but in glory that equalled yours,
to hearts as loving as ever welcomed
heroes home" Let me picture to you
the footsore Confederate Soldiers, as
! buttoning up in his faded Jacket the
4 parole which was to bear testimony to
his children of his fidelity and faith. he
turned his face Southwark from Apo
/ mattox in April 1865. Think of him
as ragged, half starved, heavy hearted,
enfeebled by want and wounds. having
fought to exhaustion, he surrenders
| his gun, wrings the hands of his com
rades in silence, and lifting his tear
J stained and pallid face for the last time
) to the graves that dot the old Virginia
hills, pulls his gray cap over his brow
and begins the slow and painful jour-
ney. What does he find? Let me ask
YOU who went to your homes eager to
find in the welcome you had justly earn
ed, full payment for yourfour years OF
& sacrifice. What does he find? when