Well, yeah, it does sound rather messy. This is probably gonna get me in trouble but I just gotta go there. In the late 1960's this nation was the recepient of one big PC enema. Ugly as it sounds, the truth is just as nasty. In order to promote one 'truth' the history of 13 states was given a cleaning out to try to delete anything in the 1860's. There's room for the truth and discussion of both but it wouldn't work that way because the 'powers that be' (whoever the heck that was) decided there would be no real facts taught on the Confederate side. Just a few Union victory cheers could pretty much tell the story. That was the wrong thing to do. That was the wrong way to deal with it. That is still the wrong way to handle it. Our ancestors existed. Our ancestors tried something but it just didn't work. They did understand there would be the hot place to pay if they lost. They just didn't understand it would be the erasure of their existance. That is too high a price. We will not forget them. We do honor them. We do understand why they did it because we are seeing the same thing happen again. Seems like history does repeat itself even if you are supposed to have learned from it. Oh, wait, this particular chapter wasn't taught so no lesson was learned.
I am so very proud of the home of some of my ancestors. I love Virginia, Georgia and any other state that comes back out of hiding.

Pam