THE RECONSTRUCTION MILITARY GOVERNOR HAD THREATENED TO SHOOT ANYONE WHO GATHERED TO MEMORIALIZE OUR CONFEDERATE DEAD IN 1866…and they wonder why resentment lingers 150 years later.

In North Carolina May 10th, the date of the death of Gen.Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson, was originally named by the members of the Wake County Ladies' Memorial Association as the day of remembrance. 

On that first Confederate Memorial Day, the citizens of Wake County secretly made their way to Raleigh's Oakwood Cemetery, since the Reconstruction military governor had threatened to shoot anyone who gathered for such a purpose. Nevertheless, Raleigh citizens assembled then, as they have every year since, to honor North Carolinians who wore the Confederate uniform.

Photo:  Using the bed of a flatbed truck for a stage...