Thursday, October 16, 2014

Prattville Dragoons Camp News

From the October issue of the Camp 1524 Dispatch:

Indian Hills Cemetery Cleanup - The Dragoons condicted their fourth cleanup day at the Indian Hills Cemetery in Prattville on Saturday September 27th.  The effort is being coordinated and spearheaded by Dragoon Benny Harris who led the Raspberry Family Cemetery restoration in Chilton County.  Indian Hills serves as the final resting place of many Confederate veterans including a large number of the original Prattville Dragoons who marched off to war in 1861 after being organized and equipped by Daniel Pratt for whom our city is named. Benny Harris, Allen Herrod, Wayne Sutherland, Louis Turner (gets Harold Grooms Award for hardest worker), Paul Whaley, Tom Snowden, Bill Branch, Tyrone Crowley and his brother Tom participated in this workday.  Good progress was made clearing undergrowth in the northeast corner of the cemetery and in the Smith-McKeithen-Graham family plot (A. Y. Smith was the Dragoon who accepted the Dragoon Flag from the local ladies in April 1861 is buried here). Benny estimates the project which includes clearing the underbrush, restoring the grave stones and rebuilding the brick wall should be complete by this spring and a rededication is being planned for Confederate Memorial Day in April 2015. 

Communications Officer Crowley Speaks To UDC State Convention - At the State Convention of the Alabama Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy on Saturday 20 September 2014 and at the invitation of State President Donna Clark, Dragoon Communications Officer Tyrone Crowley presented a talk on Jefferson Davis, ending with a speech Jefferson Davis made before a joint session of the Mississippi Legislature in March 1884, near the end of his life.  The Mississippi legislature had called a joint session specifically to honor him, and this speech represents Jefferson Davis's final words on his status as the living embodiment of the Confederacy.  The presentation was well-received by the ladies of the UDC.

No comments:

Post a Comment