Week Three: Labor Day Weekend

Labor Day Weekend

Just like that, I am officially a North Carolinian! This past long weekend I was able to help my family move from our home in Fort Myers to a new location in Murphy, North Carolina. My parents have been wanting to move once they retired and this year they were able to find a house nested in the southern point of Appalachia in the Smoky mountains. Not only is the view gorgeous, but its right in the middle of Civil War history and memory.

Andersonville and Veterans History

    As I was driving home Monday, Memorial Day, my parents ironically stopped for gas in Andersonville, GA. Unknown to the dark history of the town, I explained how the largest (and most famous) Civil War prison had been located in the town with many Union soldiers meeting their fate in the prison. Camp Sumter, commonly known as Andersonville, was the deadliest landscape of the Civil War. NPS cites that of the 45,000 Union soldiers imprisoned here, nearly 13,000 died with overcrowding worsening the conditions of those who lived (NPS, 2019). Had we not been in a rush to get back to Florida, I would've liked to experience the daunting rows of graves located in the now national park. Like last week, I begun to contemplate the important of not just living history, but the mass of history that had been silenced by death in circumstances unknown to the common man. Soldiers, both old and new, crowd rows of graves with important stories unlike those who lived that would never be told. 

    Another level of importance must be realized in the history of Veterans. One will never know the pain and suffering experienced by those who paid the price of freedom with their lives. Logs, records, and personal journal entries truly only offer a glimpse into what the human mind can comprehend and express. Only through oral history can emotion, tone, and quality of life be truly determined.  I truly believe that if we wish to fully understand the history lost in mass graves and abandoned battle sites, we must learn and understand every aspect of those that evaded death and lived to tell the tale. Veterans history must not account only for those who lived, but also for those who never got to tell their story. 

Next week I'll begin the interview process. I've never felt more prepared and ready to commemorate another's memory. 

Bibliography

“Camp Sumter / Andersonville Prison.” National Parks Service. U.S. Department of the Interior, October 21, 2019. https://www.nps.gov/ande/learn/historyculture/camp_sumter.htm.