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ELIZABETHTON, Tenn. -- The battle over a confederate flag at an Elizabethton cemetery wages on...and this time, the Sons of Confederate Veterans are on the defensive. The group filed a police report Sunday after they said someone stole their flag. A member of the group says they've since put up a new, more recognizable confederate flag at Green Hill Cemetery in the other flag's absence. The Sons of Confederate Veterans held a ceremony to dedicate the previous flag last month in recognition of lieutenant Robert J. Tipton and three other confederate veterans buried there. The Watauga Historical Association fought that...

"After all, I think Forrest as the most remarkable man our 'Civil War' produced on either side.”

Today marks the 150th anniversary of Jefferson Davis' inauguration as the president of the Confederate States of America. On Saturday, the occasion will be celebrated by the Sons of Confederate Veterans with their Confederate Heritage Rally 2011 at the Alabama State Capitol at noon. The group will commemorate the founding of the CSA, the inauguration of Davis and the raising of the first Confederate Flag and will involve re-enactments, cannon fire and speeches. Davis was elected provisional president of the CSA at a congress held in Montgomery on Feb. 9, 1861.

JACKSON, Miss. – Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said Tuesday he won't denounce a Southern heritage group's proposal for a state-issued license plate that would honor Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, who was an early leader of the Ku Klux Klan. Barbour is a potential 2012 Republican presidential candidate. Questioned by reporters Tuesday after an energy speech in Jackson, Barbour said he doesn't think Mississippi legislators will approve the Forrest license plate proposed by the Mississippi Division of Sons of Confederate Veterans.

Would you support a car tag featuring Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest?

The Georgia Division Sons of Confederate Veterans will sponsor their 24th Annual Robert E. Lee birthday celebration on Saturday, January 22, 2011, in the Legislative Chambers of Georgia’s Old Capitol in Milledgeville, Georgia that will begin with a parade to the Old Capitol at 10:45 AM.

It was 150 years ago today that Florida declared itself sovereign from the United States. Some Southern states have marked the anniversaries of secession with celebrations; in South Carolina, a secession gala was met with protests and controversy. In Florida, a reenactment was quietly held by the Sons of Confederate Veterans in Tallahassee on Saturday, where about 40 volunteers dressed in period attire performed a condensed version of the convention. It was at that convention where a 62-7 vote led to secession in 1861, making Florida the third state to leave and later join the Confederate States of America.

Event marks war's anniversary CHARLESTON -- The shots are solely verbal -- and expected to remain that way -- but at least one Civil War Sesquicentennial event is triggering conflict. The Sons of Confederate Veterans plan to hold a $100-per-person "Secession Ball" on Dec. 20 in Gaillard Municipal Auditorium. It will feature a play highlighting key moments from the signing of South Carolina's Ordinance of Secession 150 years ago, an act that severed the state's ties to the Union and put the nation on the path to the Civil War. Jeff Antley, who is organizing the event, said the Secession...

Shortly after 10 o'clock on a crisp Saturday morning two weeks ago, 75 folks solemnly clutching small American flags and digital cameras assembled in a grove of young pines at a modest farm in the Zion community, tucked into in the soft hills west of downtown Rockingham. Their objective was to honor five forgotten Union soldiers who died in a skirmish only days before the end of the Civil War. Until now, the solders' remains have lain in hand-dug graves marked only by small piles of white stones for 145 years, their identities unknown. The event, sponsored by the Richmond...

The New Intolerance by Patrick J. Buchanan 04/09/2010 "This was a recognition of American terrorists." That is CNN's Roland Martin's summary judgment of the 258,000 men and boys who fell fighting for the Confederacy in a war that cost as many American lives as World Wars I and II, Korea, Vietnam and Iraq combined. Martin reflects the hysteria that seized Obamaville on hearing that Gov. Bob McDonnell had declared Confederate History Month in the Old Dominion. Virginia leads the nation in Civil War battlefields. So loud was the howling that in 24 hours McDonnell had backpedaled and issued an apology...

April is a time to remember the men and women of the Confederacy and those who kept their memory eternal

The Sons of Confederate Veterans (S.C.V.) is a fraternal organization composed of male descendents of the men who served in the Confederate Armed Forces during the War for Southern Independence. Their emblems include the controversial Confederate battle flag. Their core responsibility is articulated in a charge given to them by Lt. General Stephen D. Lee which calls on them to defend the heritage, honor, and reputation of the Confederate soldier and the Cause they fought for. The Cause they fought for was individual liberty, state's rights, the original Constitution and the right to secede. In essence, Confederates fought an aggressive...

Did you know that Paul Revere, Betsy Ross, Martin Luther King and Robert E. Lee were born during the month of January?

ALBANY, N.Y. | They made it through Shiloh, Antietam and Gettysburg, but many of the Civil War battle flags sitting in the nation's state-owned collections might not survive the budget battles being waged in some statehouses. > break < In New York, home to the nation's largest state-owned collection of Civil War battle flags, money for a preservation project is being cut from Gov. David A. Paterson's proposed budget. Indiana's funding for flag conservation has been returned to the state's general fund. Ohio hasn't provided government funding for its 400-plus Civil War battles flags in nearly a decade. > break...

Help, Please Gentlemen, A compatriot and collector in my brigade was robbed. Many items, particularly antique firearms, were stolen from his home. Since SCV members and reenactors will be a likely market for these items, please be on the lookout for them. Please forward this e-mail to anyone or any list that you think would be helpful. If you have any information about them, please contact me below. Here is a list of the stolen firearms: 1- 75 cal. Pedersoli (Flintlock) Brown Bess type Indian trade musket 30” barrel 1- 58 cal. Model 1853 Euroarms 3 band Enfield (percussion) 1-...

ORLANDO, Fla. -- A federal judge has issued an order that will make way for a Confederate heritage specialty license plate from the state of Florida's Department of Motor Vehicles. Confederate license plate Sons Of Confederate Veterans The proposed Confederate flag. In a lawsuit filed nearly one year ago after two years of Florida legislative inaction to approve the plate, a federal Middle District judge upheld the First Amendment right to have a plate issued by the DMV. "We followed all the procedures, paid the fees required by the state, and did absolutely everything that was required by law, and...

The Morehead chapter of the Sons of Confederate Veterans have been denied a request to march in the Ironton Lawrence County Memorial Day Parade. The 5th Kentucky Infantry Camp #2122 received a letter from Arthur J. Pierson, parade grand marshal, rejecting the group’s request to participate in the parade, without giving any reasons why. “Your parade request for SCV, 5th Kentucky Infantry camp #2122 Morehead, KY, has been considered and NOT APPROVED,” the letter stated. The 5th Kentucky wanted to march with a color guard that would feature two Confederate flags – the Kentucky Confederate flag and the Confederate battle...

Frustration and disappointment that have arisen out of the town of Jonesborough’s decision to not allow bricks honoring Confederate soldiers to be placed in the Veterans Memorial Park have spread beyond the town limits. The Southern Legal Resource Center, a nonprofit organization based in Black Mountain, N.C., that advocates in matters involving Southern history, heritage and culture, has contacted Jonesborough officials cautioning them about excluding the Confederate soldiers and urging them to reconsider the town’s current policy. The town decided nearly a decade ago, when the park was originally built, that the park would honor soldiers who served in the...

An advisory board that addressed racial issues in Homestead and Florida City has been dissolved, leading some residents to question whether the move was an attempt to stop their fight against the Confederate Flag. Led by Homestead Mayor Lynda Bell, all seven members of the Homestead City Council voted on April 20 to shut down the Homestead/Florida City Human Relations Board (HRB).

TAMPA - A park memorializing Confederate veterans will officially open April 25 with cannon fire, live music and re-enactors impersonating famous Southern generals. The park, near the junction of Interstates 4 and 75, gained notoriety last summer when the Sons of Confederate Veterans raised a 30-by-50-foot Confederate flag there. In October, the group replaced the first flag with a larger one. The veterans group said they raised the flag to draw attention to the 1.9-acre memorial park at its base. David McCallister, a lawyer and officer with the Sons of Confederate Veterans, said the park was built to relate the...

Confederate Heroes’ Day commemorates those who died fighting for the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. An official state holiday in Texas, Confederate Heroes’ Day has fallen annually on January 19th — the birthday of Robert E. Lee — since its approval on January 30, 1931. The Sons of Confederate Veterans and the United Daughters of the Confederacy sponsor the annual celebration of the holiday, which includes parades, reenactments in honor of past Confederate heroes, and other events. http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/ref/abouttx/holidays.html

I see that the Curator of African-American & Community History for the North Carolina Museum of History, Mr. Earl Ijames, is back in the news. Mr. Ijames was recently the keynote speaker at a new Confederate monument dedication in North Carolina. A news story quotes Mr. Ijames as saying: "We need to present a more balanced history," he said, adding that the black Confederate soldier has been lost to history. "They never got recognized, but we are starting to change that," Ijames said.

<p>Every January, descendants of Confederate soldiers gather in Wyman Park to...lay wreaths at the monument to Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, legendary generals of the Confederate States of America. And afterward, for 20 years now, everyone has gone across the street to the Johns Hopkins University for coffee and refreshments...Hopkins has informed the Maryland divisions of the United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Sons of Confederate Veterans that it will not rent space to them.</p>

Valdosta State professor pens ‘Bitterly Divided: The South’s Inner Civil War’ Generations of students have been taught that the South lost the Civil War because of the North’s superior industry and population. A new book suggests another reason: Southerners were largely responsible for defeating the Confederacy. In “Bitterly Divided: The South’s Inner Civil War” (New Press, $27.95), historian David Williams of Valdosta State University lays out some tradition-upsetting arguments that might make the granite brow of Jefferson Davis crack on Stone Mountain. “With this book,” wrote Publishers Weekly, “the history of the Civil War will never be the same again.”...

...The decision comes with no guarantee of where or whether the statue might be displayed or how it is interpreted.

TEMPLE TERRACE — Bart Siegel, an outspoken advocate for the display of the giant Confederate flag near the intersection of Interstate 4 and I-75, was found dead of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot in his Temple Terrace home Thursday. Siegel, 50, was a Republican accountant who penned long letters to newspapers and verbally sparred with columnists. In 2000, he announced his desire to "stir things up" by running against then-Hillsborough Clerk of the Circuit Court Richard Ake, a Democrat unopposed since 1986. Siegel lost, but kept stirring things up. In the face of a protest, Siegel professed his love for the...

Chip Witte doesn't consider himself a Rebel. He doesn't hang Dixie battle flags in his living room, nor does he wear one on the back of his leather jacket. Yet when the Tampa motorcycle mechanic saw the world's largest Confederate battle flag unfurl above the intersection of I-10 and I-4 in June, he felt a jolt of solidarity with the lost cause and lost rights that he says the battle flag represents. "I think it's great that they're allowed to fly it," says Mr. Witte. Despite years of boycotts, schoolyard bans, and banishment from capitol domes, the Southern battle colors...

MONROE – At first glance, it’s an unlikely combination. A black family seated under a tent facing a line of Civil War re-enactors, proudly holding Confederate flags and gripping their weapons. But what lies between these two groups is what brought them together: An unmarked grave about to get its due, belonging to a slave who fought for the Confederacy. Weary Clyburn was best friends with his master’s son, Frank. When Frank left the plantation to fight in the Civil War, Clyburn followed him. He fought alongside Frank and even saved his life on two occasions. On July 18, the...

The Sons of Confederate Veterans say they will permanently install a giant Confederate flag near the junction of Interstates 4 and 75 to counter what they consider increasing slights to Southern heritage. But the group, founded 112 years ago to protect all that is noble about the South, is itself racked by angry divisions. Since the 1990s, clusters of Sons members have aligned themselves with "heritage groups" like the League of the South and the Council of Conservative Citizens, both considered hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center. The law center says the Sons may have been taken over...

TAMPA, Fla. -- A giant Confederate battle flag -- believed to be the world's largest -- may soon be flying near a Tampa highway intersection. A Confederate heritage group called the Sons of Confederate Veterans plans to fly the flag that measures 30 feet tall and 50 feet wide. The group said it expects to have its flag in place by 2009. "I'm surprised that they would allow something like this to go on in Hillsborough County," county NAACP President Curtis Stokes told the St. Petersburg Times. The group has building permits but still needs $30,000 to complete the project,...

TAMPA — Next year, a giant Confederate flag may tower above the tree line near the junction of Interstate 75 and Interstate 4. The Sons of Confederate Veterans wants drivers in the Tampa area to see the massive flag — 30 feet high and 50 feet long — atop a 139-foot pole, the highest the Federal Aviation Authority would allow. It would be lit at night. With the pole already in the ground and building permits in hand, the group is on its way to having what it calls the "world's largest" Confederate flag in place by mid 2009. The...

(Representative) Brown says it would give motorists a way to show pride in their heritage, but that flag represents a heritage of treason, bigotry, hostility, division and an overall ugly time in American history. No way should his plate proposal become No. 110.

Some things that are blatantly offensive, such as a Nazi swastika, incite a visceral reaction. The Confederate flag is one of them, too. It's a symbol of a time when our nation was split into two warring factions. The Confederates, the folks who advocated slavery, lost.

The controversial stars and bars of the Confederate Flag could soon find their way to Florida license plates. State Rep. Don Brown, R-DeFuniak Springs, has worked with the Sons of Confederate Veterans to sponsor a bill that would allow the group to create a non-profit license plate that bears the Dixie flag. The tag would cost roughly $25 from the Department of Motor Vehicles. SCV Executive Director Ben Sewell said his organization has been successful in the past at getting the license plates in numerous states and feels they’ve met the requirements in the state of Florida to acquire the...

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- A Panhandle legislator wants Florida to issue license tags honoring "Confederate Heritage" -- complete with images of Dixie flags and buttons from Rebel uniforms. "It's a part of our history, whether we like it or not," Rep. Don Brown, R-DeFuniak Springs, said in an interview with Local 6 News partner Florida Today. "I appreciate the heritage and the good things that people feel about our past." Motorists could pay $25 for the tag, with proceeds going to education programs run by Sons of Confederate Veterans, graveyard location and maintenance, museum exhibits and other cultural activities. The current...

Ringgold City Council is facing potential legal action based on its 2005 decision to remove the Confederate Battle Flag from the Ringgold Depot Civil War Memorial. The Southern Legal Resource Center notified the city Feb. 11 by letter from SLRC chief trial counsel Kirk D. Lyons that it will face legal action unless it replaces the battle flag within 10 days. According to Roger McCredie, Southern Legal Resource Center executive director, the letter puts the city on notice that its clients, the Georgia Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans and its local Joseph McConnell Sons of Confederate Veterans Camp...

Nelson Winbush is intent on defending the flag of his grandfather. It's just surprising which flag that is. ___ KISSIMMEE -- Nelson Winbush rotates a miniature flag holder he keeps on his mantel, imagining how the banners would appear in a Civil War battle. The Stars and Bars, he explains, looked too much like the Union flag to prevent friendly fire. The Confederacy responded by fashioning the distinctive Southern Cross -- better known as the rebel flag. Winbush, 78, is a retired assistant principal with a master's degree, a thoughtful man whose world view developed from listening to his grandfather's...

The Sons of Confederate Veterans are demanding that Sen. George Allen apologize for apologizing. Allen has tried to mend fences with minorities over his use of the word "macaca," a racially-charged word, in part by saying he has regretted his infatuation with the Confederate flag. That touched off an angry response Thursday from two leaders of the 4,000-member Confederate group, who said Allen has turned his back on them. "We feel he's using our flag to wipe the muck from his shoes that he's now stepped in," said Frank Earnest of Virginia Beach, state division commander of the group.

On Sunday afternoon at Old Union Cemetery in southern White County, over 180 people gathered to pay a debt owed nearly 80 years. The group included members of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Sons of Confederate Veterans, family and friends, all there to memorialize the service of Pvt. Henry Henderson, a black Confederate soldier. Henderson was born in 1849 in Davidson County, NC. He was 11 years old when he entered service with the Confederate States of America as a cook and servant to Colonel William F. Henderson, a medical doctor. Records show Henry was wounded during his service,...

UDC marks another black Confederate grave By Clayta Richards / Chronicle staffwriter On Sunday afternoon at Old Union Cemetery in southern White County, over 180 people gathered to pay a debt owed nearly 80 years. The group included members of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Sons of Confederate Veterans, family and friends, all there to memorialize the service of Pvt. Henry Henderson, a black Confederate soldier. Henderson was born in 1849 in Davidson County, NC. He was 11 years old when he entered service with the Confederate States of America as a cook and servant to Colonel William F....

The group Sons of Confederate Veterans met at Orlando's Lake Eola Park to show off their proposed personalized tag late Friday morning. They said it's simply a matter of time before the plate becomes one of the many you can purchase as a specialty license plate. The group said the plate honors Florida's heritage by showing all five flags of the confederate army, including their battle flag. But it's a heritage some say simply represents hate. Standing below the memorial for confederate soldiers, a small but vocal group made their point Friday. They want Floridians to learn that the Civil...

The battle between heritage and hate is erupting again. A state appeals court now says a Confederate heritage group can sue the state over removal of controversial memorial plaques in the Texas Supreme Court. As long as the plaques that barely mention the Confederacy hang in the Texas Supreme Court, Terry Ayers says the state is slighting his and others' ancestors who fought in the Civil War. "I want to take my grandchildren down to the supreme court and show them, 'Look, your great, great grandfather, this building was dedicated to him.' Of course it's personal," Ayers said. The Texas...

A Confederate heritage group says its free-speech rights were violated when a landowner removed a billboard promoting Southern history near the famed Darlington Raceway. The Sons of Confederate Veterans plans to demonstrate at the State House next month and buy radio advertisements to complain about losing its billboard on U.S. 52, about two miles from the racetrack. “This is the most chilling thing I’ve seen against freedom of speech,” spokesman Don Gordon said. The Sons of Confederate Veterans bought the billboard this spring in response to remarks by a NASCAR executive about the rebel flag. The billboard featured a Confederate...

SUMMERVILLE (AP) (--) The Dorchester County Library Board is on the front lines of a fight to put a book refuting current history written about the Civil War on its shelves. "The South Was Right!," written by Sons of Confederate Veterans members and brothers James Ronald Kennedy and Walter Donald Kennedy of Louisiana, states the Confederacy had the right to be a free nation and most of what is taught in this country is false and misleading. A crowd of about 50 people, mostly members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans in St. George and Moncks Corner, pleaded for the ...

One of the most divisive symbols of the country's racist past — the Confederate flag — flew over Lake Worth City Hall on Wednesday without raising a peep of protest. Mayor Marc Drautz, who cleared the way for the symbol of the South to be hoisted, suggested that would-be protestors may not have recognized the red-and-white-striped flag for what it was. And, he acknowledged, that's just the way he wanted it. When the mayor, for a second year, gave Palm Beach County members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans the go-ahead to raise a flag to mark Confederate Memorial Day,...

Man Wins Case After Firing Over Confederate Flag Worker Refused To Remove Confederate License Plate POSTED: 7:50 am EDT April 21, 2006 TAMPA, Fla. -- A man who was fired by the city of Tampa for refusing to remove his Confederate flag license plate has settled a lawsuit against the city. Larry Carpenter will receive $4,500. But Carpenter, an employee in good standing for six years, won't get his job back as a traffic maintenance specialist. The paper reported that Carpenter's case began in January 2002, when his boss told him to remove the tag because someone had complained. Carpenter...

TALLAHASSEE -- It's time for Florida to authorize a specialty license plate displaying the Confederate battle flag to honor the heritage of participants in the Civil War, a Sons of Confederate Veterans organization said Friday. The proposed plate would feature the rebel flag centered between black numerals with "Florida" in red above and "Confederate Heritage" in red along the bottom. "It is not racist to promote a common heritage," said H.K. Edgerton, former NAACP president in Asheville, N.C., who led the group in a rousing version of "Dixie" before introducing the proposal. "There will be those uninformed individuals who will...

Many southern states and their political subdivisions, including Texas and Grimes County, recognize April as Confederate History and Heritage Month. The war had many causes, including slavery and tariffs. In March 1861, the U.S. Senate passed the Morrill Tariff, which immediately raised the average tariff rate from about 15 percent to 37.5 percent, but with a greatly expanded list of covered items. Soon thereafter, a second tariff increased the average rate to 47.06 percent. President Lincoln hinted very strongly in his first inaugural address a military invasion was possible if the tripled tariff was not collected. At that time the...

The removal of the Confederate flag from Amherst County's official seal has upset Southern heritage groups, who contend residents weren't told of the change. County officials acknowledge the image was quietly removed in August 2004 to avoid an uproar.

University of Georgia archaeologists have been puzzling over finding an apparent manmade object buried in a historic Civil War cemetery. Ground-penetrating radar on parts of Myrtle Hill Cemetery, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, found a reflection that did not look like a grave during a scan of two Civil War grave sites earlier this month. "There definitely is something manmade there, something big and metal," said Sheldon Skaggs, a member of the archaeologist team. "Now we have to determine what it is." Rumors have existed since the 1960s over what happened to two large cannons after the...