Battle flag waves to restore pride in Southern Heritage (HK Edgerton)

VA-NC News ^ | April 30, 2005 | Luci Weldon

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If you were driving down the road and saw a black man carrying a Confederate flag, what would your reaction be?

Many of us would have to admit that we would be surprised to say the least because the sight of a Confederate flag is likely to spark strong emotions. To some, the symbol represents a part of the honorable history of people who held high principles. To others, the flag represents only hatred and oppression.

At times, these opposing viewpoints reach the forefront of discussion such as in the case of whether clothing depicting the Confederate flag is appropriate to wear to public school.

Asheville resident H.K. Edgerton, a black man, has proudly carried the Confederate flag over many, many miles in his mission to educate people of all races and ages about southern history so that southerners will be proud of their heritage.

On Monday, that mission brought him to Littleton and the start of a 160-mile march to Richmond, Va. He plans to travel about 15 miles a day, five days per week, all while carrying a Confederate flag.

"In Richmond, Virginia, the DuPont Company has banned Confederate symbols from their plant and have ignored requests to honor Confederate soldiers buried on their property, and this in the former capital city of the Confederate States of America," he said.

Edgerton serves as chairman of the board of advisors of Southern Legal Resource Center, Inc., which has an office in Black Mountain, and has been active with that organization for about seven years. He is also the immediate past president of the Asheville NAACP and is a life member of the NAACP.

A retired engineer, Edgerton and his brother later owned and operated an office products company in Fullerton, Calif.

Edgerton chose to begin his march at a monument located at Mosby Avenue in Littleton which honors Confederate Private John Leach, described as a pioneer in southern race relations. The monument is inscribed, "This is what he meant - All men up! Erected by his Colored Friends."

"I am very proud to call myself a Confederate American," he said. "I want to educate folks about our wonderful heritage. You can't find more honorable people than southerners."

He added that others are "trying to divide black people and white people."

"We are a family in the Southland of America," Edgerton said. "I caution you that if you don't know your history, you can't know where you are going."

As he began his march on Monday morning, he wore a Dixie Outfitters shirt and Dixie Outfitters jeans.

"What they want to do is tell the truth about southern heritage," he said, describing the owner of the company as "one of the finest gentlemen that I know."

Perhaps most of all, Edgerton hopes that young people of all races in the south will learn more about their history and be proud of that history.

"Our babies now don't know history," he said. "Southern people have always been some of the most patriotic, God-loving people in the country."

The journey which began Monday is not Edgerton's first march. In fact, he completed a 1,600-mile March across Dixie as well as a 260-mile march to attend the Confederate submarine Hunley funeral in South Carolina.

"When I walked to Texas, the deeper I traveled in the south, more black people came out to recall history, to talk about their heritage and their love for the south, all the black men who played a part in the (Civil) war, honorable men in the war," Edgerton said. "Black Confederates who earned places of honor are not talked about in the Civil War. It baffles me how you can talk about Black History Month and not Confederate History Month."

He noted that the heritage of southerners includes helping one another.

"The people of the south have always been a family together, then people tried to separate us," Edgerton said. "We are still a family here."

He went on to praise the "Christian white folks of the south."

"Blacks and whites are a family in the south," he said. "Whites have always been proud to see black people advance. It is now time for people to know our honorable heritage. I'm going to Richmond to reclaim the heritage of our honorable people."

Edgerton, describing the Confederate flag as the Christian cross of St. Andrew, added that others, such as the Ku Klux Klan, have caused an incorrect meaning to be associated with this symbol.

"History has been twisted around," he said. "It is time for all to know the truth, and our black babies to know that there is a place of honor under this flag for them."

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Asheville resident H.K. Edgerton (seated), chairman of the Southern Legal Resource Center, Inc. board of directors, prepares to begin a 160 mile march to Richmond, Va. on Monday morning as members of two Sons of Confederate Veterans camps provide support. Standing, from the left, are Oliver Wells of the Old Brunswick Camp; Tommy Ferguson of the Old Brunswick Camp; Tracy Clary, commander of the Old Brunswick Camp; Doug Winn of the Old Brunswick Camp; Van Wright, 1st Lt. Commander of the Old Brunswick Camp; and Fred Taylor of the Tom Smith Camp of Suffolk, Va. (who has family members living in Warren County). Edgerton hopes to increase awareness about the history of the south. PHOTO: Luci Weldon/The Warren Record

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HK -Dixie- ping

[PistolPaknMama]

God bless HK. One of the finest men I know.

[ryan71]

God bless this wise gentleman.

[onyx]

God Bless this man, indeed! And you know him? That's wonderful.

He could teach a number of folks here a thing or two!

[ryan71]

""Blacks and whites are a family in the south," he said. "Whites have always been proud to see black people advance. It is now time for people to know our honorable heritage."

For the vast majority, this is true. There are some bad eggs...

[SWAMPSNIPER]

Way back in My Family history the name Mungin, or Mongin shows up. It is the part of the Family that once owned Dafuskie Island. If You go looking for Mungins, or Mongins, up around Savannah, or Beaufort, and find some, They are likely to be Black. I have no idea which directions genes flowed, but, no matter, these Folks are likely cousins of Mine, and I have absolutely no problem with that.
You can pick Your nose, but You can't pick Your relatives!
One of these days, We are going to get organized, and kick all the Carpetbaggers off of Our islands, golf courses, and all.
Mr. Edgerton is one of Our own.
http://photobucket.com/albums/v244/tsiya/

[mlc9852]

This guy is great. I see him around town sometimes and always honk and wave. (I live in Asheville).

[PistolPaknMama]

Blacks and whites are a family in the south

I would venture to say that most of the children of the intergration era escaped what we read in the news. When the black kids first came to my school, these were kids we already knew because we were a community. What went on in some parts of the south did not go on in *most* of the south.

As a life long southerner, I know blacks that would help me any time of the night or day, just as I would help them. I also know white people I wouldn't trust with my daughter or my dog. HK is right. It's about character, not color.

[PistolPaknMama]

I see him around town sometimes and always honk and wave.

Well pull over and talk to him! He's the most down to earth, sweet man. He'd be delighted to talk to you.

[Capriole]

I have read about and admired Mr Edgerton for a long time. I wish that someday I might have the honor of meeting him. He seems like a wonderful person and a splendid Christian.

[ZULU]

I have insomnia.

I may be a northerner, but I resent the hatred and opprobrium directed at a symbol which represents true Constitutional rights. This brave man is to be saluted for defending his heritage and a flag under which many brave men suffered, fought and died.

I suppose with the dawn, the currrent crop of Yankee Shermanites and Sheridanites will appear to launch their customary baseless attacks.

Until then....... Good Night!!!

[lentulusgracchus]

Yankee Shermanites and Sheridanites......

HEYYYY.....y'know, that one could stick!

Shermanites. As in, Amalekites. As in, Edomites. As in, Jebusites and Canaanites and Midianites.

Philistines, all of them!!

What do you think? "Shermanites", for people who are always dumping on the South and, when you poke them with a stick, tell you they wish the rest of it had been burnt down, and all the people done away with? That Sherman didn't hang enough Southerners?

Shermanites. Kinda rhymes with "termites".

[TexConfederate1861]

ROTFLMAO! hehehehehehe!

[SouthernFreebird]

I always beep and wave also. I get chills when I see that man holding the Confederate flag. Black people are a part of that flag and I hope we get to the point where many more realize what they have allowed to be taken from their history.

[rebelyell]

South Carolinians....killing Shermanites since 1860!

[Capriole]

Thank you.

As it happens, I was born and for the most part raised it northern Illinois. Like most Illinoisians, I was taught from infancy to worship at the shrine of St. Lincoln and knew little of my mother's family roots in the South. It wasn't until I had some spare time at the end of graduate school and signed up for a year's worth of graduate seminars in history that I had the opportunity to do some research in the archives of the University of Chicago and the University of Illinois. What I found there was astonishing.

I learned that the perspective on the nation was different back then, before the so-called Civil War, so that Americans did not consider themselves part of a monolithic entity as we do today, and the idea of seceding from this relatively new experiment was not such a horror. I learned that the idea of secession was based on economics, not slavery, for the South had for a long time been providing 70% of the money in the federal exchequer and receiving 30% of the benefits. I learned too, from reading the originals of Northern newspapers, that Northern editorialists whipped up the Northern populace with horror stories about what was going to happen to the Northern economy if the South were permitted to secede, and it was to a great extent for this reason that Northern men flocked to enlist.

I was also bemused to learn from the original letters of the time that Northern men did not "jine up" because they so ardently wanted their sable brethren in the South to breathe the pure air of freedom. Probably not one man in ten thousand joined the Union Army to die for the freedom of black people. In fact, there were riots among Union soldiers when the Emancipation Proclamation was issued, and one Yankee general wrote in bitterness that most of the men would never have signed up if they'd known this was going to turn into a battle to free the slaves. No, they joined for the same reason Southerners did: they were told their beloved nation and their lifestyles were threatened by the other guys.

It was a great tragedy, one of the greatest of history. But it's over now, and Southerners have picked up the pieces and rebuilt their broken homeland. While Yankees often abjure Southerners to "get over it," today it's the North that can't get over it, the Northerners who keep on jumping up and down screaming, "WE WON! WE WON! WE WON! ACCEPT OUR CULTURE AND VALUES, SUPPRESS YOUR OWN, 'CAUSE WE WON!" Their contempt for the states and people they vanquished never stops, even after 150 years have passed. The hatred that fuels this is astonishing.

[stand watie]

HK, fyi, is my BROTHER-in-arms AND a TRUE dixie PATRIOT.

HUZZAHs for HK!

free dixie,sw

[stand watie]

rotflmRao!

free dixie,sw

[4CJ]

Shermanites. Kinda rhymes with "termites".

ROTFL!