celebration set for Monday

By JAINE TREADWELL

Features Editor

The Private Augustus Braddy Camp 385 of the Sons of the Confederacy will host a Confederate Memorial Day program at 2 p.m. Monday, April 23 on the square in downtown Troy.

Michael Berry, brigade commander, said the program is being held in conjunction with Confederate History Month.

"Confederate Memorial Day is a day set aside in the South to pay tribute to those who served with the Confederate forces during the American Civil War," Berry said. "Many of us have ancestors who fought in the War Between the States and many of them died on the battlefield. We should honor them just as we honor all men and women who have served our country with courage and pride."

Berry said Gen. John A. Logan, the founder of the Federal Memorial Day, was so impressed with with the way the South honored their dead with a special day, he became convinced that such a day should

be created to honor Union soldiers.

"The battlefield graves around Richmond were marked with little white flags and faded wreaths that had been placed there by family members and friends of Confederate soldiers," Berry said. "Logan said the ancients honored their heroes with laurels and flowers and that was a fitting tribute. As Commander in Chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, he said he wanted to issue an order that would designate a day for decorating the grave of every soldier in our country. If he could have, he said he would have made it a holiday."

Logan’s dream came true many years later when National Memorial Day was proclaimed.

"Confederate Memorial Day has special significance for us in the South because so many of our ancestors did fight for a cause they believed to be just and true," Berry said. "We want to honor them on Monday and we invite anyone who would like to join us to do so."

To become a member of the Sons of the Confederacy a candidate must show that his heritage can be traced back to a Confederate soldier.

Pike County Camp 385 of the Sons of the Confederacy was reorganized in 1999 as the Private Augustus Braddy Camp 385 and presently has 10 members.

Camp 385 meets at 7 p.m. the first Tuesday of each month at the Pioneer Museum of Alabama. Interested persons are invited to attend.