Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 31.djvu/180

 172 Southern Historical Society Papers.

and the erection of a suitable monument to these dead, who for more than forty years seem to have been lost to Confederate recognition.

As we sat on a log under Zollicotfer's tree by little Dorothea Burton, she asked me if I knew or loved any of those men who were killed and buried there. I replied that I did not know them, but they were my comrades, and I loved them, and as I described how brave and noble they were, and how their homes were made desolate and their mothers and sisters mourned for them when they knew they would never come home any more, and how thousands of people would love her for putting the wreath on the oak and flowers in the trenches, her bosom heaved with sorrow and tears streamed down her sunburned cheeks. I kissed the little mountain girl for the sake of mothers, sisters, fathers and comrades who would appreciate the noble, tender, Christ-like spirit which filled the soul of this mountain child, and found utterance in this loving tribute to unknown dead.

It is now proposed to inclose an acre of ground around Zollicoffer's oak and two of the trenches; to build about it a substantial stone wall, and under the oak to erect a simple and tasteful monument to the memory of the men of Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama, who there, on January 19, 1862, gave their lives for the cause of Southern independence.

Through Miss Ellanetta Harrison's superb gift, and some other contributions, this has been made possible, and the work will be undertaken at once.

No contributions are asked for, but if any friends of these dead heroes in Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama desire to send any money to make the monument more imposing, it will be received and used for that purpose.

To Miss Ellanetta Harrison, of Somerset, author of The Stage of Life, belongs the major part of the credil for this effort to com- memorate the sacrifices of these brave and gallant men.

When the leaves of the trees on the mountain sides of the battle- field fall, or, at least, when the violets come, in the spring, there will be a monument to tell who died at Fishing creek. We will never know who they were, but what they were the whole world knows. The name of Ellanetta Harrison ought to live always with hallowed memories amongst the survivors of the Confederate army of Ten- nessee and their descendants, and the tender, sweet, loving tribute of little Dorothea Burton, of Nancy Postoffice, Pulaski county, Ky., to the neglected Confederate heroes, should give her an abiding place in the hearts of all who loved the South and its glorious cause, and make the whole world nobler, better, kinder.