Something Old, Something New: Telling the Stories of the Civil War in New Mexico

By Robert Pahre
National Parks Traveler

This weekend marks the anniversary of the Battle of Glorieta Pass (March 26-28, 1862), the decisive battle of the Civil War in New Mexico. While the battlefield has had historical markers since 1939, the stories you learn on the field have changed since the National Park Service took over in 1993. The landscape of interpretation tells not only the story of a battlefield, but the story of how we tell the story of a battlefield.

The battle marked the end of the Confederacy’s New Mexico campaign. Their plan for the campaign was pretty straightforward. Brigadier General Henry Hopkins Sibley and his Texan volunteers would advance up the Rio Grande from El Paso to Albuquerque and Santa Fe. From there, they would move eastward along the Santa Fe Trail, crossing the mountains at Glorieta Pass, and then turn north. After seizing the supply base at Fort Union, Sibley would take the mines of Colorado while disrupting federal communications with California, Nevada, and Oregon.

CSA Brigadier General Henry Hopkins Sibley/Palace of the Governors Neg. 050541

The key to the campaign was logistics. The Confederates would have a long supply train stretching back to El Paso, and they needed Fort Union’s supplies to make the plan work. The Union commander, Colonel Edward R. S. Canby, “lost” every battle, but won the campaign because he focused on the Confederate supply problem.

They fought various engagements up the Rio Grande before arriving at the Glorieta Pass region in March. On the third and decisive day, Canby split his forces. The larger part fought a delaying action near Pigeon’s Ranch. They gradually gave ground to Sibley’s Texans while remaining in good order astride the Santa Fe Trail.

Canby sent about two-fifths of his troops over Glorieta Mesa to the Confederate rear, where they found and destroyed the rebel supply train. Without supplies, the Confederates had to retreat to El Paso, using a difficult route through the mountains. Fewer than half found their way back.

When interpreting the battle, the National Park Service defines it as a tactical Confederate victory. After all, the rebels held the ground at the end of the day. The park also notes that “the Confederate victory was short lived” because Sibley no longer had his supply train.

That perspective is understandable. It rests on the fight around Pigeon’s Ranch, Glorieta Pass, and the Santa Fe Trail. That fight features two opposing forces, facing each other, trying to take or defend ground. It feels like a battle should feel—and, of course, it was a genuine battle.

Not only do visitors expect a battlefield to involve military units moving around a battlefield, but many military historians would also tell the story exactly that way. We see that perspective in a lesson plan the park developed for students: “the Battle of Glorieta Pass represented the high-water mark for a bold Confederate offensive into Union Territory on the western frontier. Here volunteers from Colorado clashed with tough Texans intent on conquering New Mexico.” Tough soldiers fought bravely on both sides.

Painting depicting the burning of the Confederate wagon supply train near Apache Canyon/NPS Image, Roy Andersen

A focus on brave soldiers also produced the first interpretation on the site. In 1866, New Mexico recognized its soldiers on one side of an obelisk in downtown Santa Fe, honoring “the heros of the Federal Army who fell at the battles of Cañon del Apache and Pigeon’s Rancho (La Glorieta), fought with the Rebels March 28, 1862.” Protestors tore the obelisk down in 2020, for reasons unrelated to Glorieta Pass. That’s a story for a different time.

The Texas Division of The United Daughters of the Confederacy raised the first monument on the battlefield itself, in 1939. They Thousands of years of rich history have been preserved at Pecos National Historical Park which has served as scenery for Pueblo and Plains Indians, Spanish conquerors, Santa Fe trail settlers, railroad workers, and even Route 66 travelers. Discover more about this historic location in the book Pecos National Historical Park Ancestral Sites Trail Guide or bring home an official park product from Western National Parks Association.intended the marker to help recognize the Texan centennial, but they were a few years late in getting the job done. It took Colorado even longer, since its State Historical Society erected a Colorado monument only in 1993.

Remembering battlefield bravery motivated park advocates. The Glorieta Battlefield Preservation Society, a group of regional Civil War reenactors, worked to preserve the site, which had remained in private hands. The Council of America’s Military Past, the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC), and other military heritage groups worked with them to convince Congress to establish the Glorieta Battlefield Unit of Pecos National Historical Park.

The NPS then began to update this landscape of memorialization it had inherited. In addition to leaving the stone memorials in place, the historical park installed a collection of modern interpretive signs on the Glorieta Battlefield Trail. The trail makes a lovely hike today.

A marker honors the Texas mounted volunteers/Robert Pahre

Park advocates helped fund the new interpretive trail and most of the signs the visitor sees.  Signs funded by Texan and Confederate groups highlight the bravery of Sibley’s troops. Signs placed by the State of New Mexico highlight the role of Hispanos, New Mexican Volunteers, and U.S. Regulars. While they also discuss how the Union soldiers burned the Confederate wagons, those signs place greater weight on the fight around Pigeon’s Ranch at Glorieta Pass. Again, the action on a conventional battlefield seems more important.

Taken as a whole, those signs tell a richer version of the story than the stone markers do, and a more accurate one. Still, one might go further, and turn current interpretation on its head. By dividing his force in the face of the enemy, General Canby had clearly decided to make the wagon train central to his battle plan. The 750 troops near Pigeon’s Ranch needed only to protect Union lines of communication behind them while the other 500 men circled behind Confederate lines. On this alternative perspective, the ground of Glorieta Pass mattered much less than the supply train—making this a decisive Union victory.

A second feature of the campaign also contributed to the Union victory. Well before the battle itself, the Union had won the battle for the hearts and minds of New Mexico’s citizens. The Confederates supposed that the locals, having become involuntary subjects of the United States in 1846, might welcome “liberation.” The rebels hoped they could rely on those locals for some supplies along the way. As it turns, New Mexicans liked Texans even less than they liked gringos, and were not inclined to help out.

The battle for hearts and minds also brought New Mexican volunteers to Canby’s side at Glorieta. Lt. Colonel Manuel Chavez, who led those volunteers, had the local knowledge to guide the Union forces over the mesa to the Texans’ wagons. The Confederates had no good local sources of supplies once the wagons were gone.

In short, the battle in Glorieta Pass is less important than both the supply wagons and the contest for local political support. Bravery, heroism, perseverance, and determination are all important military qualities—but don’t forget to make friends and burn the wagon train.

Thousands of years of rich history have been preserved at Pecos National Historical Park which has served as scenery for Pueblo and Plains Indians, Spanish conquerors, Santa Fe trail settlers, railroad workers, and even Route 66 travelers. Discover more about this historic location in the book Pecos National Historical Park Ancestral Sites Trail Guide or bring home an official park product from Western National Parks Association.

Robert Pahre is a professor of political science at the University of Illinois, where he teaches and researches the politics of national parks. This article is part of his current book project, entitled Telling America’s Stories.

This story was made possible in part by the support of Western National Parks Association.

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Glory: History or Just a Good Story?

54th Massachusetts

Laurence D. Schiller, March 29, 2021
(originally published January 3, 2020)
www.blueandgrayeducation.org

  A great deal of what we call "history" is composed of a variety of narratives. These might be primary sources, such as journals, letters, diaries, collected speeches, oral history, contemporary newspaper stories, etc., or they might be secondary narratives written by historians or others who interpret historical events and narratives to create their own telling of history. In the modern era, we have added electronic narratives to our list, including movies, TV, YouTube, podcasts, and the like. Professional historians rely heavily on such narratives to create their own works, but, as we have learned from the internet, not every narrative that is created is accurate or complete, whether primary or secondary. Among other things, we have to look at a narrative’s biases, what audience was it written for, the extent of the narrator’s knowledge of the events being described, and so forth. As a rule, primary narratives are all valid historical sources but must be used carefully with their strengths and weaknesses noted and put into context with other sources and narratives.

  In 1989 the movie Glory was released to critical acclaim. Its narrative was the story of the 54th Massachusetts, the first African-American regiment raised in the northern states. For most Americans, this was the first time they had become aware that there were black soldiers in the Federal army during the Civil War, not just auxiliary forces, but units that fought regular battles. The movie traced the story of this “Brave Black Regiment” from its recruitment and training outside of Boston, its voyage to South Carolina, and eventually its first taste of combat. Although the 54th was involved in combat operations until the end of the Civil War, the movie ends with its climatic, and unsuccessful, assault on Fort (or Battery) Wagner on Morris Island outside Charleston harbor on July 18, 1863, which resulted in the deaths of four officers, including its Col. Robert Gould Shaw, and a total casualties of 281 out of 624 engaged.  

Glory revolved around a few specific characters, white and black. Gov. John A. Andrews approached the son of a wealthy Boston abolitionist family, Robert Gould Shaw, and promoted him from captain in a white Massachusetts regiment to colonel of the 54th. His side kick, Cabot Forbes, becomes the major while an educated black family friend of the Shaw’s, Thomas Searles, joins the rank and file. Soon we meet other enlisted members, most particularly a gravedigger, John Rawlins, who will become the sergeant major of the regiment, and a bitter escaped enslaved person, Silas Trip, who hates the world and….
Interested in more? see Blue and Gray education…

Fearing a Smallpox Epidemic, Civil War Troops Tried to Self-Vaccinate

A field hospital in Virginia, photographed in 1862, shows the grim conditions during the Civil War. (Library of Congress; Photo by James Gibson)

People knew that inoculation could prevent you from catching smallpox. It was how Civil War soldiers did it that caused problems

By Kat Eschner

SMITHSONIANMAG.COM
MAY 1, 2017

At the battle of Chancellorsville, fought this week in 1862, nearly 5,000 Confederate troops were unable to take their posts as the result of trying to protect themselves from smallpox.

And it wasn’t just the South. “Although they fought on opposite sides of the trenches, the Union and Confederate forces shared a common enemy: smallpox,” writes Carole Emberton for The New York Times.

Smallpox may not have been as virulent as measles, Emberton writes, but over the course of the war it killed almost forty per cent of the Union soldiers who contracted it, while measles—which many more soldiers caught—killed far fewer of its sufferers.

There was one defense against the illness: inoculation. Doctors from both sides, relying on existing medical knowledge, tried to find healthy children to inoculate, which at the time meant taking a small amount of pus from a sick person and injecting it into the well person.

The inoculated children would suffer a mild case of smallpox—as had the children of the Princess of Wales in the 1722 case that popularized inoculation—and thereafter be immune to smallpox. Then, their scabs would be used to produce what doctors called a “pure vaccine,” uninfected by blood-borne ailments like syphilis and gangrene that commonly affected soldiers.

But there was never enough for everyone. Fearing the “speckled monster,” Emberton writes, soldiers would try to use the pus and scabs of their sick comrades to self-inoculate. The method of delivery was grisly, writes Mariana Zapata for Slate. "With the doctor too busy or completely absent, soldiers resulted to performing vaccination with whatever they had at hand. Using pocket knives, clothespins and even rusty nails... they would cut themselves to make a deep wound, usually in the arm. They would then puncture their fellow soldier's pustule and coat their wound with the overflowing lymph."

The risk of getting smallpox was bigger to the soldiers than the risk of bad infections from this treatment. But besides the lack of sanitation, the big problem was that their comrades might well have other had other ailments or even not had smallpox at all. “The resulting infections incapacitated thousands of soldiers for weeks and sometimes months,” Emberton writes.

Smallpox was just one note in a symphony of terrifying diseases that killed more Civil War soldiers than bullets, cannon balls and bayonets ever did. Although estimates vary on the number of soldiers who died during the war, even the most recent holds that about two of every three men who died were slain by disease.

That’s not hard to understand, given the conditions of the camps and the fact that the idea of doctors washing their hands hadn’t reached North America yet. There’s a reason that the Civil War period is often referred to as a medical Middle Ages.

“Medicine in the United States was woefully behind Europe,” writes the Ohio State University department of history. “Harvard Medical School did not even own a single stethoscope or microscope until after the war. Most Civil War surgeons had never treated a gunshot wound and many had never performed surgery.” That changed during the course of the war, revolutionizing American medicine, writes Emberton: but it didn’t change anything for those who died along the way.

Bomb squad safely detonates Civil War cannonball found in Maryland

By Alaa Elassar, CNN
Click here for original story
Sun March 28, 2021

(CNN)Bomb squad technicians have safely disposed of a Civil War-era ordnance found in Frederick County, Maryland.

The technicians identified the unexploded ordnance as a live cannonball round used during the Civil War and determined its fusing mechanism was still intact, the state's Office of the State Fire Marshal (OSFM) said in a statement on Tuesday.

A resident of Glen Hill Court in Jefferson contacted the state fire marshal after receiving the cannonball from a family member who had found it while metal detecting near Monocacy National Battlefield, Senior Deputy State Fire Marshal Oliver Alkire told CNN. The cannonball sat in the resident's home for several months before it was reported.

The technicians removed and transported the cannonball on Monday to Beaver Creek Quarry in Hagerstown, where it was safely detonated, Alkire said.

The cannonball was powerful enough to have caused significant damage.

"It could have easily killed someone or multiple people if mishandled," Alkire said.

Maryland was the site of some of the Civil War's fiercest battles.

Union and Confederate armies clashed in the summer of 1864 at Monocacy, according to the National Park Service (NPS). Union soldiers fought to prevent a Confederate takeover of Washington, DC.

The Confederates ultimately won the battle, but Union solders were able to delay them long enough for reinforcements to reach Washington and safeguard the capital. An estimated 2,200 men were killed, wounded, captured or listed as missing during the Battle of Monocacy, according to NPS.

"The finding of military ordnance from the Civil War is not uncommon in Maryland, and these devices pose the same threat as the day they were initially manufactured," OSFM said in its statement on Facebook.

Alkire encouraged Maryland residents who find ordnance to "follow the three Rs -- recognize the device, retreat to safety and report it to 911."

Gettysburg NMP Plans Prescribed Fires at Little Round Top and Munshower Field

2017 Prescribed Fire

Gettysburg National Military Park plans prescribed fires at Little Round Top and Munshower field in early to mid-April 2021 

Contact: Jason Martz, Jason_Martz@nps.gov, 717-338-4423  

GETTYSBURG, Pa. – Gettysburg National Military Park is preparing to conduct a prescribed fire in early to mid-April, weather permitting. The park plans to burn portions of the west slope of Little Round Top (52 acres) and the Munshower field (36 acres) immediately north of Little Round Top. Prescribed fire activity will be completed no later than April 30. 

Park’s overall objectives are to maintain the conditions of the battlefield as experienced by the soldiers who fought here; perpetuate the open space character of the landscape; maintain wildlife habitat; control exotic invasive species; reduce shrub and woody species components; and reduce fuels in wooded areas to reduce fire hazard. The park contains over 1,000 acres of open grassland and prescribed fire is a successful tool in managing invasive plants and promoting native species, especially when used in conjunction with other treatments. Several national parks in Pennsylvania and Civil War battlefields regularly utilize prescribed fire, including Valley Forge National Historical Park, Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area, Monocacy National Battlefield, Antietam National Battlefield, and Manassas National Battlefield Park. 

Field and weather conditions will ultimately determine the exact dates and duration of the operation, as we only conduct prescribed fires under specific parameters to ensure public safety. Vehicle traffic in the area may experience delays due to smoke, but fire operations will be scheduled to minimize impacts. Some visitor facilities, trails, and public roads will be temporarily closed during the prescribed fire. 

Temporary Road Closures 

To ensure the safety of all firefighters and park visitors, multiple roads will be closed to all traffic for the day(s) of the prescribed fires and possibly for multiple days after the fires. These will include: 

·       South Confederate Avenue. 

·       Sykes Avenue. 

·       Warren Avenue. 

·       Crawford Avenue. 

·       Wright Avenue. 

·       Sedgwick Avenue. 

·       Wheatfield Road will be closed to all vehicles from the Peach Orchard at Sickles Avenue to Taneytown Road.  

·       Additional roads and trails may need to close temporarily if smoke conditions reduce visibility to ensure firefighter and public safety.  

·       See attached map for more details.  

Temporary Hiking and Horse Trail Closures 

·       All hiking and horse trails to the east of Sykes and Sedgwick Avenues will be closed for visitor and animal safety.  

·       The horse trail that runs south of United States Avenue from the Trostle farm to the intersection of United States Avenue and Sedgwick Avenue will also be closed. 

·       See attached map for more details.  

News Media Parking 

·       For interviews and coverage of the Little Round Top prescribed fire, the designated area will be on Ayres Avenue. Please park along Ayers Avenue only.  

·       See attached map for more details. 

Learn More 

Learn more about our long-range fire management plan and view photo albums and videos of past prescribed fires on our Prescribed Fire web page at https://go.nps.gov/PrescribedFires. 

National Park Service expands protected historic battlefields in Pennsylvania by 73 acres

National Park Service expands protected historic battlefields in Pennsylvania by 73 acres

By Marcus Schneck | mschneck@pennlive.com

The National Park Service has announced $2,188,052.50 in grants from the American Battlefield Protection Program to protect 225.33 acres at three Civil War and Revolutionary War battlefields.

The grants will be used to acquire portions of Brandywine and Gettysburg battlefields in Pennsylvania and Shepherdstown Battlefield in West Virginia.

The Battlefield Land Acquisition Grant program, administered by the American Battlefield Protection Program, provides up to 50 percent in matching funds to state and local governments to acquire and preserve threatened Revolutionary War, War of 1812, and Civil War battlefield lands through fee-simple and permanent, protective interest acquisitions at eligible properties.

Eligible battlefields are listed in the Civil War Sites Advisory Commission’s 1993 “Report on the Nation’s Civil War Battlefields” and American Battlefield Protection Program’s 2007 “Report to Congress on the Historic Preservation of Revolutionary War and War of 1812 Sites in the United States.”

In Chadds Ford Township, $1,883,725 will be awarded to add 72.23 acres to the Brandywine Battlefield.

Here’s the history:

Late in the afternoon of Sept. 11, 1777, the American Army under General George Washington was desperately trying to form an effective rear-guard against the British Army along the Brandywine River in southeastern Pennsylvania. After enduring over 3 hours of constant attack, most of the American Army was in full retreat as British Grenadiers and troops of the British 4th Brigade attempted to cut off their escape. A counterattack of American cavalry, led by Count Casimir Pulaski, and the stubborn resistance of troops under Major General Nathaniel Greene slowed the British advance until nightfall, allowing Washington’s Army to withdraw and fight another day while the British Army marched toward Philadelphia and, two weeks later, captured the U.S. capital.

Grant funds will be used to acquire and preserve a significant portion of the battlefield where the 4th British Brigade began its attack against Greene.

At the Gettysburg Battlefield in Adams County, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission will use $79,297.50 to buy 1.1 acres.

Here’s the history:

At twilight on July 2, 1863, James McKnight’s Gettysburg farmhouse was lit up by the intense artillery fire of Captain Greenlief Stevens’ 5th Maine Battery of the Union Army. Firing in support of Brig. General Adelbert Ames’ division on nearby Cemetery Hill, Stevens’ guns helped to slow a Confederate attack and allow time for Union reinforcements to arrive. Facing superior numbers, the Confederates were forced to withdraw from the sloping fields of the McKnight Farm.

Grant Funds will be used to protect the McKnight farmhouse and surrounding lands traversed by Union forces in defense of Cemetery Hill during the Battle of Gettysburg.

In West Virginia, the Jefferson County Farmland Protection Board will use $225,030 to preserve 152 acres of the Shepherdstown Battlefield.

Here’s the history:

Three days after the battle of Antietam, regular troops under the command of Major Charles Lovell crossed a shallow ford in the Potomac River to determine the whereabouts of the Confederate Army under General Robert E. Lee. The night before, lead elements of this Union force made contact with the Confederate artillery and captured 4 guns before being recalled back across the river. Returning to the ground they had gained only a few hours before on the morning of Sept. 20, 1862, the Union troops were attacked by a larger force of Confederates and forced to withdraw.

Grant funds will be used to increase acreage under preservation easement and maintain open-space and agricultural uses.

Gettysburg NMP Winter Lecture Series - ONLINE!

2021 Winter Lecture Series

Full details about our 2021 Winter Lecture Series can be found here.

We will make these programs available here as soon as they are ready.

• 2021 Winter Lecture Series - Iron Hooks and Steel Constitutions

  Education Specialist Barbara Sanders presents "Iron Hooks and Steel Constitutions," examining one of the most poignant artifacts in the collection of Gettysburg National Military Park. Used to remove bodies from their temporary battlefield graves, a set of iron hooks currently on display reminds us of the grisly aftermath of Civil War combat. Join Barb as she presents from the galleries in the Gettysburg Museum of the American Civil War.

  DURATION:20 minutes, 52 seconds

• 2021 Winter Lecture Series - Daniel Reigle's Colt revolver

  Carried home as a souvenir of war, a Colt revolver belonging to Adams County soldier Daniel Reigle is prominently displayed within the National Park Service Museum and Visitor Center. Who was this local soldier and what is the story behind the most famous sidearm of the conflict? Ranger Bert Barnett will explore this and more from the galleries of the Gettysburg Museum of the American Civil War.

  DURATION:14 minutes, 55 seconds

• 2021 Winter Lecture Series - Emmor Cope Map

  In 1904 Gettysburg National Park Commission engineer Emmor B. Cope created a massive relief map depicting the Gettysburg Battlefield. Displayed at the St. Louis Exposition, all who saw it were "filled with admiration." Join Ranger Troy Harman as he chronicles this extraordinary artifact and the Gettysburg veteran who created it.

  DURATION:24 minutes, 15 seconds

• 2021 Winter Lecture Series - Medical Kit

  Few artifacts in the collection of the Gettysburg Museum of the American Civil War garner more shocked fascination than the medical instruments on display. From bone saws to tenaculums and scalpels, they painted a chilling picture of the aftermath of Civil War combat. Join Ranger Tom Holbrook as he examines these instruments, and the men and women that used them.

  DURATION:35 minutes, 24 seconds

• 2021 Winter Lecture Series - John Brown: Patriot or Seditionist

  More than a century and a half after his execution, John Brown remains a polarizing figure. Was he a murder and traitor, or a heroic aboloitionist and martyr? Join Ranger Matt Atkinson as he explores the legacy of John Brown, and highlights some of the priceless artifacts connected with this story.

  DURATION:21 minutes, 25 seconds

• 2021 Winter Lecture Series - Tavern Chairs

  Did Union General John F. Reynolds spend the last night of his life stretched out across four chairs at a tavern south of Gettysburg? Join Historian Christopher Gwinn in the Gettysburg Museum of the American Civil War and separate fact from fiction.

  DURATION:15 minutes, 6 seconds

• 2021 Winter Lecture Series - Lt. Bayard Wilkeson's Sash and Kepi

  Among the treasured objects in the Gettysburg Museum of the American Civil War are a kepi and sash belonging to a young Union artilleryman, Bayard Wilkeson. Join Ranger John Hoptak as he explores the tragic story of Lt. Wilkeson and his father, newspaper correspondent Samuel Wilkeson.

  DURATION:35 minutes, 49 seconds

The Black Influence in Gettysburg - The Series Begins

Gettysburg Connection is pleased to publish today the first in a series of articles called The Black Influence. The series focuses on the African American experience in and around Gettysburg, traveling back to the 1780s and expanding to the present time, each article providing descriptions of local African American people and events that shaped Gettysburg and Adams County. 

This week’s article is by Gettysburg Connection contributor Jenine Weaver.

__________________________________________
In 1780, Pennsylvania lawmakers passed “An Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery.” The Act stated people born into slavery in 1780 and after, would be freed when they turned 28 years old. However, people born into slavery before 1780 were still enslaved for life. For the time, this was a progressive step, but don’t let this cloud the view of the Black reality. Local people still owned slaves, those that were free lived restricted, segregated lives, and very few slave owners were willing to give them up, even when they turned 28. Slavery did not end in Adams County until the 1840s.

Known as the first African American resident of Gettysburg, Sydney O’Brien was freed from slavery in 1833. She purchased a home on South Washington Street. She was born the slave of Isabelle & James Gettys Sr., the founder of the Borough of Gettysburg. Sydney is recorded as being “mulatto”, but her parentage is not traceable. It’s rumored she could be the child of James Gettys Sr. and his wife’s slave “Old Doll”. It is also rumored that her daughter, Getty Ann, could have been the child of James Gettys Jr. With limited records, the truth is not known. *Important note: do not romanticize a relationship between slave owners and their slaves. Most mixed race children born to female slaves were the result of rape and abuse of power by the slave owner.*

Although it is recorded that African American children in Gettysburg attended schools as early as 1824, the Pennsylvania Free School Act required schools for African Americans. The 5th school in Gettysburg was designated as the Colored school, on the corner of… Read article in The Gettysburg Connection

Op-Ed from National Parks Traveler ~ Confederate Memorials Serve A Role In National Parks

Op-Ed from National Parks Traveler - click here for link

NPT Editor's note: The following op-ed is from Harry Butowsky, who spent more than three decades working for the National Park Service as a historian. He's worked for a handful of directors and seen much change in the agency. Understandably, he has an interesting perspective on the current state of history in the National Park Service. 

Monument to Confederate Gen. Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson at Manassas National Battlefield Park/Kurt Repanshek

The question of what to do with the many Confederate Memorials has come to the attention of the public recently. These memorials were originally established in National Military Parks. The War Department  designated four Civil War battlefields —Shiloh, Vicksburg, Gettysburg and Chickamauga and Chattanooga—as National Military Parks after 1890. These battles were considered by the War Department to be of exceptional political and military importance and interest, that had far-reaching effects, that were worthy of preservation for detailed military study, and that were suitable to serve as memorials to the armies engaged. They were marked and improved to indicate the lines of battle between the two armies. They were heavily monumented and served as lasting memorials to the men who fought there. They were designed for the student of military history and the historian who came to the park to study the battle. These parks have a strong educational value

If you knew nothing about the Battle of Gettysburg and visited the park, you would be exposed to the true history and meaning of one of the most pivotal battles of the Civil War. The value of these parks derives not from the size or the number of statues present, but from the interpretation we place of the history of the event that is marked.

The history of the Civil War is perhaps the most dramatic and significant event in the history of the United States as an independent nation. It was the climax of a half-century of social, political, and economic rivalries growing out of an economy half-slave, half-free. In the race for territorial expansion in the West, in the evolution of the theories of centralized government, and in the conception of the rights of the individual, these rivalries became so intense as to find a solution only in the grim realities of civil strife.

It was on the great battlefields of this war, stretching from the Mexican border to Pennsylvania, that these differences were resolved in a new concept of national unity and an extension of freedom. In the scope of its operations, in the magnitude of its cost in human life and financial resources, the war had few, if any, parallels in the past. Its imprint upon the future was deep and lasting, its heroic sacrifice an inspiring tribute to the courage and valor of the American people.

The national attention of the issue of Confederate monuments is giving Americans the opportunity to debate the intricacies of history and historic preservation and decide what course to support for the future. Through telling the stories of the Civil War battles and individual preservation struggles at our parks, we examine the complexity of the idea of historic preservation as it has been practiced during the 150 years since the end of the war.

These parks with their associated monuments, literature, films, and interpretive tours tell the story about previous generations of Americans and how they looked at their history and decided what to preserve and why the preservation of Civil War battlefields are important. The National Park Service is perfectly capable of interpreting the history of Gettysburg and the creation of the park without offending any visitors.

Just because Robert E. Lee was a slave owner does nothing to diminish his pivotal role in the war, and especially the battle of Gettysburg. If the statue to Lee is large and imposing, this tells us about how he was viewed by the generations of Americans who erected it. 

Park preservation is defined by its sometimes conflicting roles of protecting a resource and using the resource to educate the public about its significance. Park preservation and interpretation work because they require vigilance and commitment on the part of all Americans.

Yes, we can say that the previous generations of Americans were racist, xenophobic, and intolerant. But are we any better today? Have we created a perfect non-racial society, or is the march to equality and true history ended.

The removal of existing statues in our Civil War parks will not change our history, but make it more difficult to confront and examine our history. National parks are the great American classroom where American history is taught. As a nation, we need to remember our history with all of its warts, blemishes, and great achievements. The answer is not to take down statues, but to improve our interpretation and understanding of history. This is the great role for our national parks and one that is increasing in danger of being lost in what passes for education today in our schools and universities.

The national parks are for the American people—all the American people. They form the common bond of our shared heritage and should not be diminished to achieve political correctness. Our parks need to be preserved intact. The existing monuments and memorials need to be preserved.

To remove the Confederate statues would diminish the educational value and historic significance of the parks. Keep all the existing monuments intact. They have educational value. Improve the interpretation as needed to include information about slavery and secession, but keep the parks and monuments intact.

Relocating a Confederate Statue - One Town's Plan

Posted on February 27, 2021 by Emerging Civil War
https://emergingcivilwar.com/

The following original press release was dated February 6, 2021, from Dalton, Georgia. It offers details about a solution found for moving and preserving a Civil War statue in a way agreeable to many in that local community.

On July 8, 2020, following 30 days of several marches and demonstrations, a town hall meeting in which a number of persons spoke to the Council of Dalton about the removal of the Joseph E. Johnston Statue from public property, a Facebook petition to move to statue and another Facebook petition to not move the statue, the City of Dalton notified the local Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy (hereinafter “UDC”) that the UDC needed to make arrangements to move the statue as any permissive easement to allow its continued placement on the public right of way of the intersection of Crawford and Hamilton Streets were no longer permitted.  The City of Dalton gave the UDC a reasonable time period within which to arrange to move the statue. Continue reading →