University Of Arkansas Professor Helps Put Confederate Soldiers To Rest

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. - On April 9, 1865, after substantial losses, General Robert E. Lee surrendered his troops to Union commander Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox, Va. One hundred and thirty-five years later, a University of Arkansas professor is still working to put Confederate soldiers to rest.

For more than a decade, William A. Myers, assistant department head of chemical engineering, has worked with the Maj. Fontaine Earl Camp of the Sons of Confederate Veterans to identify and mark the graves of Confederate Army soldiers. Though their work centers around Washington, Madison and Benton counties, their efforts represent a national attempt to recognize the southern men who fought and died in the Civil War.

"At the rate we’re going, it will take the next 200 years just to complete Northwest Arkansas," Myers said. "We put out about a dozen stones per year, and there’s at least a couple thousand Confederate veterans buried in this area."

Whereas Confederate soldiers once were banned from burial at national cemeteries, the federal government now honors them as veterans of a great and tragic war. But bestowing that honor can be a difficult task, said Myers. In order to erect the special Veterans’ Administration headstone, two items of information must be pieced together - the soldier’s identity and the location of his grave.

Families often recall a great-grandfather or distant uncle who fought for the southern states, but few know where their ancestors rest. Additionally, thousands of Confederate graves lie unmarked or unidentified even when located in formal cemeteries. This crowd of unknown soldiers resulted from numerous factors according to Daniel Sutherland, professor of history.

"At the outset of the war, men were buried in mass graves at the site of the battle. Officers were interred individually, and sometimes enlisted men would recognize friends and bury them apart. But even those graves were poorly marked," said Sutherland.

More confusion arose from the movement of troops. As battalions abandoned battlefields, they entrusted wounded soldiers to the care of local farmers and townspeople. Often, these citizens did not know their patients’ names, though they could identify a soldier’s home state by the buttons on his uniform. When such soldiers died, the farmers buried them on their own land, leaving little more than family legend to mark their presence and passing.

More gruesome factors also contributed to the confusion. Blasts from artillery shells mutilated bodies beyond recognition. And even after the battle, those wounded and slain were not safe from disfiguration. Hogs from local farmyards frequently rooted for bodies, and wounded men not rescued promptly could fall victim to voracious pigs.

By 1865, thousands of Confederate graves lay scattered across the countryside as obscure as they were anonymous. But the war was not long ended before communities began the arduous task of collecting and commemorating their dead. Women who had lost husbands or fathers gave their own time and money to found Confederate cemeteries, many of which still exist, privately maintained by such organizations as the Southern Memorial Society.

"These charitable ladies were the force behind the first efforts to memorialize southern soldiers," said Myers. "They hired people to find Confederate graves and paid them the handsome price of $1.25 per body - providing they furnished the coffin."

They then interred the bodies together, sometimes grouping them by state, erecting blank headstones to mark the graves. Where a soldier’s name was known, they engraved it on the marker, but many of these have faded past recognition, said Myers.

"We’re always looking for information," he said, "hoping to identify another veteran."

Though few records exist, Myers said that families often approach the Sons of Confederate Veterans with photographs, census forms or pension applications that link their ancestors to the army. One elderly woman recently sent Myers the records of her grandfather’s service and was able to identify his grave by two X’s, which she had carved into his headstone at the age of 18.

Such cases mark the poignancy that people attach to the Civil War even more than a century after its end. When asked if the work to honor Confederate soldiers represented an ongoing healing process for the nation and for the South, Myers demurred - saying that such a question was too complex to be answered by a single person.

Nevertheless, he understands why the Civil War remains such a prominent preoccupation for the South. "Just look at the numbers," he said. "About one tenth of the entire white, male population of the southern states died in that war. That’s devastation. That makes an impact."

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