Hello,

The November, 2007 meeting of the Clarksville Civil War Roundtable will be held Wednesday, November 14th, 2007 at 7 PM in the cafe of Borders Books store in Governor's Square Mall. This is located on Wilma Rudolph Highway (US 79) just south of Exit 4 off I-24 in Clarksville, TN. The meeting is always open to interested members of the public and you do not need to be an expert to attend!. We are meeting on this special Second Wednesday of the Month due to the early Thanksgiving Holiday. We normally meet on the Third Wednesday of each month.

This month we welcome Rex Felton of the Johnson's Island Civil War Roundtable in Tiffin, Ohio. His program will be, "The Confederate Postal Service."

As with the United States government, one of the main functions of the Confederate States of America was a postal service headed by someone with a cabinet level rank. Postmaster General of the Confederacy was John Reagan of Texas, who became a U.S. Senator of note from Texas after the war writing the Interstate Commerce Act.

The US Post Office still ran mails into the seceded states until June, 1861 and Southerners used US stamps to mail things. After this time the Confederate Post Office began to run things in the Confederacy keeping as their labor force the very same people that were doing these jobs before the war. Thus, this became probably the easiest infrastructure to set up and run with the creation of the new nation since it was mostly based on what was already ongoing. Under Reagan's care, the Confederate Post Office secured something in American postal history which the US Post Office has yet to match - run without a deficit budget and, in fact, even earn a profit!

This is a little known, and yet important, aspect of the Confederate government and we are pleased to have an expert on the topic present this program to our members.

Rex Felton is a CPA in Tiffin, OH and a member of a number of CPA-related organizations. He is also a Life Member of the Confederate Stamp Alliance, a national organization of collectors of Confederate postal ephemera. Additionally, Rex is also a member of a number of Civil War Roundtables in Ohio, the Civil War Education Association, The Longstreet Society, Civil War Institute of Ohio, Friends and Descendents of Johnson's Island, Blue & Gray Education Society and other related organizations. He has had articles published in the "Ohio Civil War Genealogy Journal" and other publications

Please join us as Rex Felton speaks on the "Confederate Postal Service."

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