Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1914-12-04
The Battle of Franklyn.

A reunion Of the Blue and the
Gray was held, Monday, Novem-
Der 30th, at Franklin, Tonnes
see to commemorate the Fiftieth
anniversary of the battle fought
there in 1864.
General Isaac N. Sherwood, M.
c., from Ohio. who commanded
a Federal brigade there, on the
hardest fought part of the line,
was selected to represent the
Blue, and Colonel R. W. Banks,
of this state, was chosen to rep
resent the Gray, the honor COM
ing to Mississippi by reason of
the fact that she lost more ofic-
ers and men in the battle than
did any other state. 1t was on
the fortified works, near the his.
toric gin house which was in
the rear Of the left center Of the
Federal line, that Colonel Banks,
then adiutant of the 10Th Alaba-
ma Infantry, planted the colors
of his regiment
There was a large gathering of
old soldiers survivors of the bat
tie present.
Of the occasion, the Nashville
Tennesseean in it's issue of De-
cember |, under the caption, ION
Franklin Field" says:
The surviving remnants Of the Blue
and the Gray met yesterday, in com
radeship and the bonds of brotherhood,
on the most desperate field that their
enmitv drenched a half century ago.
For Franklin was bloodier than Gettys-
burg. Climbing the breastworks by
the Carter house ard down by the cot
ton gin was more desperate business
than c charging over the crater
At Petersburg. We believe that it is
not too much to say that, when the
story of that battle is fully appreciated,
It will come very near to standing out
IS the most desperate and the most
leroic Of the worlds battles. For dash
I'd daring 1t goes beyond Balaklava. |
'or desl crate Get 4rmination and un-
II ching aJl'd!ty. il surpasses the last
5tal d at Waterloo.
We b%eIlcyr, loJ. that were Greasy
1--WE and seeking for the turning point
n the war between the states, he would
write down Franklin as the decisive
|attle of that Il Had Hood not bat
cred his army to death against those
'r%lstIing WORKS at Franklin, had his
nen not charged up and over the ram
'arts of destruction for thirteen brutal.
'~utchering times till one might have
for half a mile with dead bodies
8 stepping stones and "all the field
red and wet'-had the army of
'ennessee not been riddled to rags at
rankin, the surrender Of Lee would
OF have ended the war. 1t would have
urned the Confederate capital into the
ands of the enemy but with the army
hat the two Johnstons had commanded
1tact and III heart, the seat of govern
lent would have been moved back into
he interior of the south and the war
you'd have continued indefinitely.
Hood has been gravely criticized for
hrowing his army into that grim val
ey, not of the shadow of death but the
alley of death itself, but heavily as it
enal zed the south and particularly
'ennessee in the spilling of its best
Hood, it may have been for the best.
he ultimate outcome was. by that
ime, well nigh inevitable. Without
franklin, there would have been furth-
r dragging out of desperation, more
battles would have been fought.
nd both sides would have suffered
more.
The real point at this time is that. at
rankin, both the Blue and the GRAY
cached the high tide of their glory as
men. Though the world brew
vars for a million years, there will be
10 higher exemplifcation of soldiery
han both armies made on that field in
he dark of a November night fifty
ears ago. Tennessee was spilling the
Hood of her heart of hearts that night
o drive the northern soldiers off of her
and. Yesterday. she welcomed them
With all the warmth of a great hospit-
A year ago the Blue and the GRAY
net at Gettysburg, the only stricken
leld that lies on northern ground. Ii
$ appropriate that they should have
gathered, too. on the bloodiest of a
hundred bloody fields here at the south.
All Of them are friends now, as thew