Prattville Dragoons SCV Camp 1524 Participate in Millbrook Mardi Gras Parade and Festival

The Dragoons of Sons of Confederate Veterans Camp 1524 "laissez les bon temps" at the Revelers Millbrook Mardi Gras parade and festival on Saturday February 19th.  Camp Commander Stuart Waldo, 1st Lt Harold Grooms, 2nd Lt Karl Wade, Quartermaster Bill Myrick, Adjutant Wayne Sutherland and compatriot Rob Schwartz helped set up the canopy and tables for the booth at the festival that morning at the Village Green Park greeting early passers-by on this chilly winter morning.  Chaplain Brantley joined early that morning also and helped man the booth with Karl and Wayne thru the parade conclusion.  They were joined that afternoon after the parade by more members of the camp.  2nd Lt Wade reported the festival booth was a great success with many historic Confederate flags, car tags and mugs sold and contacts made with a number of prospective new camp members.  He stated most everyone who came by the Dragoons booth displayed a very positive supportive attitude toward the Cause and even the couple not outwardly supportive were engaged and their questions answered for their information and knowledge so that hopefully they left with a more positive image of who the Dragoons and the SCV are. 

A little before noon everyone started lining up at the Millcreek Park about a mile down Main Street from the Village Green.  The Dragoons had a great entry including two trucks, one carrying the camp's Mardi Gras banner and another carrying a display of flags including the Confederate Battle flag, the Gadsden banner and First National stars and bars.  Commander Waldo's purple Charger was adorned with Mardi Gras decorations as well as a pair of window sized Confederate Battle flags.  Six members of the Alabama Division Mechanized Cavalry also participated with the camp as part of the entry which always makes for an awesome sound out of their Harleys making their way down the parade route.  Hundreds of mini-Battle flags, SCV coins and of course loads of candy and moon pies were handed to spectators all down Main Street to the review stand at the Village Green where the announcer recognized the Sons of Confederate Veterans Camp 1524 Prattville Dragoons.  The Millbrook Mardi Gras parade is the largest such parade north of Mobile according to the Reveler organizers.  Thousands line Main Street and thousands more enjoy the crafts and food at the festival throughout the day.  This is a terrific event to celebrate Mardi Gras, have fun and get the Confederate Battle Flag colors out in front of our friends and neighbors.  

Prattville Dragoons SCV Camp 1524 Meeting for February 2022

Twenty compatriots gathered Thursday evening February 10th to enjoy the monthly camp meeting which featured former Alabama Division Commander Gary Carlyle.  Compatriot Rob Schwartz played his guitar during the fellowship hour before the meeting and then, in the absence of Chaplain Brantley, opened with an Invocation.  Color Sgt John Dennis led everyone in the pledges and salutes to the flags and Commander Waldo then recited the SCV Charge.  Upcoming events were highlighted including the upcoming Millbrook Mardi Gras parade and festival, a cemetery workday at Pea Ridge in Burnsville, and flag settings for Confederate History and Heritage month.  Quartermaster Myrick also mentioned a car race at Montgomery Motor Speedway on March 6th which will feature Gene Paul sponsored by the SCV. 

Gary Carlyle always provides a fast paced informative and entertaining presentation and this discussion was about Southern heritage and culture. We are all blood brothers and sisters, kinfolk.  Our Confederate ancestors dodged the same bullets during the War for Southern Independence.  Robert E. Lee's father was a famous Revolutionary military leader earning the nickname Light-Horse Harry Lee but, it is not widely known that Anne Hill Carter Lee, mother of Robert was an invalid and he largely cared for her throughout his formative years.  She wa said to have prayed and wept in raising her great son.  Much is said of Lee as a great military commander but he may have been one of the preeminent educators in American history, commandant of West Point and later president of Washington College after the War.  Lee and Stonewall Jackson were both devout Christians and both believed supremely in doing one's duty.  Jackson said that a man with words and no deeds is like a garden with just weeds.  

True American history should highlight Southern history which was the foundation of our country.  The first permanent settlement in America was at Jamestown VA.  The first Thanksgiving was in 1622 at Berkley Plantation.  Most of the important battle of the Revolutionary War were in the South including Kings Mountain and Cowpens (in SC) and of course at Yorktown (VA) which forced the surrender of the British army.  George Washington of course was a Southerner.   Andrew Jackson had no Yankees helping in his defense of New Orleans in January 1815 and great victory over the British in the War of 1812.  But in 1861, there was no stopping the Yankees determined confiscation of the wealth of the Southern states and only Johnny Reb stood in the way, defending our true Constitutional Republic principles and ideals.  Gary then sand a tune to Danny Boy changing the words to tell of the hardships and sacrifices of the Confederate soldiers like Johnny Reb.  

Commander Carlyle then gave a striking graphic accounting of the Confederate soldiers heading off to War.  From the jubilant send-offs and drilling to long marches without sleep and food thru mud and weather, seeing their first combat and losing brothers and friends. He told of the story of Colonel Battles and the trial for desertion of Edward Cooper.  Cooper deserted to return home after he received letters from his wife saying his family was starving to death. It was not just soldiers who were starving on rations of hardtack but families too.  But his wife told him to return to the army to save the honor of his name and upon return, he was arrested and court martialed for desertion. Even though his story was heart wrenching and legitimate, by the facts found by the court, he was found guilty by Col. Battle. The verdict and sentence were sent to the commanding officer who while recognizing the findings of the court, pardoned him and returned him to his company.  That general officer was Lee.  Some months later after Battle was promoted to General, during the chaos of a battle, he came upon an artillery placement where all were dead save one young man who was single-handedly loading a cannon.  Battle recognized the man as Cooper and before he fired the shot for which the recoil flung him backwards dead turned to him and asked, "General, have I saved my honor?" 

Was the War to form a more perfect union?  Ot a more tyrannical omnipotent federal government?  From that point til today, all governing policies have been passed down by ruling elites.  Carpetbagger invaded the South to confiscate what was left of the wealth and resources.  Lee said we all had to do our duty and return home.  Our ancestors erected monuments to pay tribute to the sacrifices of the Confederate soldiers.  They founded churches.  They worked the land.  72% of Southerners were sharecroppers for decades after the War.  This is the true history of American history, a history of the South.  The meeting concluded with a heartfelt rendition of "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" with everyone joining in singing, the SCV closing and a Benediction. 

Prattville Dragoons SCV Camp 1524 Chaplain's Column for January 2022 - Calm in Life's Storms thru Faith

 

"He (Jesus) said to the disciples, why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?'"

Mark 4:40

 

As part of my New Testament class through Samford online, we are studying the 4 gospels. Mark is immediately my favorite because he portrays Jesus as He was, a servant.  Mark also uses parables and stories more than the other gospels. So, when I was studying the book of Mark, I came across this lesson and had to share.

 

The crises of life have often been compared to stormy seas. They come upon us whether we like it or not. They terrify us. They knock us around and threaten to destroy all our stability and security. We don’t know whether we can survive them. And we don’t know how long they will last. At least, that’s how a storm at sea would be for most of us. For Jesus, it was just a chance to grab 40 winks.

 

That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”

He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.

He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”

They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”

 

As Mark tells the story, the disciples were terrified that the boat was going to break up and everyone would die. But Jesus was asleep (on a cushion no less, Mark notes, adding to the contrast between Jesus’ tranquility and the disciples’ panic), apparently oblivious to their pending doom. They roust him and cry, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” (v. 38). Of course, Jesus quiets the storm with a word, but then he chides the disciples: “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” (v. 40).

 

Some of the lessons in the story are obvious. Jesus has power over the storms of life, experiences them alongside us, loves us, saves us from them and wants us to trust him more than we do.

 

Let’s look at a lesson that might not be so obvious. Storms don’t worry Jesus. He’s right there with us during them, but he’s perfectly calm about them. He isn’t terrified; he isn’t impatient; he isn’t worried. In fact, he’s so calm, he’s asleep. To us, he seems to be asleep at the switch. We wonder why on earth he doesn’t get up and do something. We start to wonder whether he even knows the trouble we’re in. Whether he cares. Whether he even can do anything about it. Whether he’s really all he’s cracked up to be.

 

Like the disciples, we believe he’s there. In the disciples’ case, they could actually see him lying there asleep. We don’t have that luxury. We believe he’s there, but most of the time he seems just as asleep as he was during the storm that day on the Sea of Galilee. The psalmist had the same lament in Psalm 44:23-24: “Awake, Lord! Why do you sleep? Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever. Why do you hide your face and forget our misery and oppression?”

 

Maybe that’s why Mark included this story. The not-so-obvious lesson is that Jesus was just as much in control, and the disciples were just as safe in his hands, while he was asleep as while he was awake. Most of the time, life seems like a relentless voyage from one storm to the next. At least it does for me, and I expect it’s the same for you. One thing I’ve learned about myself is that during storms I’m usually a scared rabbit just like Jesus’ disciples were.

 

But I’m also learning that I can take heart in knowing that Jesus isn’t scared, and he isn’t depressed. He might be asleep, or he might not be, but either way, like the song says, “He’s got the whole world in his hands.” Even if he doesn’t wake up and quiet the storm, I’m safe with him. And if he does wake up and quiet the storm, he’s probably going to say: “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”

 

And I can live with that. Amen.

 

Author: J. Michael Feazell

Grace Communion International

Remember those on our prayer list.  

Prattville Dragoons SCV Camp 1524 Commander's Column for January 2022 - Modern Yankees

Prattville’s population has grown by about 1% per year over the last decade.  There is a population migration from Northern states to the South as many flee the progressive socialist local and state governments in New England and the Midwest.  As is the case across the country, many of Prattville’s  new residents come from out of state.   Prattville’s proximity to Montgomery and the seat of the government bureaucracy in Alabama as well as the Maxwell and Gunter Air Force bases attract a “diverse” group of immigrants to this part of Alabama.  Unfortunately, not all who settle in Prattville are of like mind with our conservative values nor share an appreciation of our Southern heritage.  These are modern carpetbaggers who bring their twisted socialist dystopian ideals with them.  Modern Yankees. 

Brion McClanahan posted a podcast recently where he clarified that Yankees are a cultural peculiarity and not simply a Northerner.  The Yankees of the 17th century were the Puritans, “born and bred in New England (who) eventually found his way into virtually every part of the United States, and like a horde of locusts, plunders and consumes everything he deems unholy.  Dissent (was) not tolerated.”   https://mailchi.mp/6ad6d5b09045/what-is-a-yankee   “Secularized in the modern age, the new left (are) the "political puritans."  Yankees demand you wear your mask at outdoor gatherings or place it on your nose in between bites on an airplane.  They are the Karens that berate a black man for bird watching in a park because they don't want him around.  They are the idiots who want to remove every Confederate monument, rename professional sports teams, and insist on "equity" in society.  They are the busybodies, the self-righteous moralists who revel in their own hypocritical superiority and consider those who disagree with them to be "deplorable."”

Brion cited articles written in 2014 entitled “Those People” by Clyde Wilson (https://www.abbevilleinstitute.org/those-people-part-1/) who gave an historical account of the Yankees of 17th, 18th and 19th century America.  “For a long time most Americans, including most Northerners, regarded New England, not the South, as the peculiar, out-of-step section of the country. Yankees were the outsiders who thought and behaved differently from everyone else, and usually in disagreeable ways. In fact, the South, in the times of Washington, Jefferson, and Jackson, was the generally accepted model of what was “American.”  Even as late as the eve of The War, the Democratic governor of New York, Horatio Seymour, blamed sectional conflict on New England fanaticism.  One can understand a great deal of American history by remembering New England Puritans came to America to get away from a world of sinners and to construct “a shining City upon a Hill” which would be an example for all mankind of a superior commonwealth. The Yankee elite kept all of their over-developed and self-centered righteousness after they lost their Christianity and replaced it with the imported German philosophy of Transcendentalism. By contrast, people who came to settle the South saw America as a promising garden to be cultivated, a place where land could be had and personal honour and independence be established.  The leaders of the South (Jefferson Davis, R.E. Lee, J.E. Johnston, and many others) were actual sons of the founding generation. They knew that their fathers had created the Union for the benefit of their own people. Southerners came to secession as they realised that being under a government controlled by people who were constantly “insulting our feelings” and “exhausting our strength and substance” defeated the purposes for which the Union had been made. Portions of the North had been waging a cold war against the South from the very beginning.  (Noah Webster, Connecticut State Representative and author) in his diary wrote, “O New England! How superior are thy inhabitants in morals, literature, civility, and industry!””

The Yankee program of dominance succeeded largely thru an indoctrination using the state education system.  Our children learn of “the “Pilgrim Fathers” at Plymouth and little about Jamestown (the site of the first lasting settlement and the real First Thanksgiving). They know all about Paul Revere and next to nothing of the vital history of the War of Independence in the South.”  Today the South is politically dismissed as fly-over country.  The New England Ivy League elites make careers in Washington DC fabricating laws to further their own personal interests and fatten their pocketbooks thru a socialist redistribution to the central government’s and lobbyist’s chosen projects in the military industrial complex and more recently the biopharmaceutical industry.  Yankees today are the "(Neo)capitalists who wish to use the federal government in ways to enhance their wealth (which they present as necessary to the prosperity and progress of the whole country)." eg. mask and vax mandates, revolutionizing and electrifying the transportation sector and eliminating coal energy to fight global warming, multi-national supply chains, trillions in welfare and affirmative action programs to establish “equitable” outcomes.  The ruling elites’ desires of secular globalism begin with the destruction of the Southern ideals of limited self-governance, heritage and liberty.  

Upcoming Events for Confederate Compatriots

                              Upcoming Events for Confederate Compatriots

Prattville Dragoons February Camp Meeting – Thursday, February 11th, at 6:45 pm at the Masonic Lodge, 100 Maple St

Stephen Dill Lee Institute Lectures – Friday and Saturday Feb 18-19^th at Beauvoir in Biloxi MS

Millbrook Revelers Mardi Gras Parade and Festival – Saturday Feb 19^th, 9am festival, noon parade, Millbrook AL

Cemetery Workday – Saturday in Feb TBD, Indian Hill and Pea Ridge Cemeteries 

Dragoons Spring Picnic and CMP Living History – Saturday April 23rd at Confederate Memorial Park

Living History Winter Quarters at Confederate Memorial Park

Prattville Dragoons Camp 1524 member Tyrone Crowley and compatriot Al Booth and their wives attended the Winter Quarters reenactment event at Confederate Memorial Park on Saturday, January 29. The temperatures were certainly appropriate for Winter Quarters:  in the 20s both Friday and Saturday nights and quite chilly and windy on Saturday. 

Following is a review of the day offered with info provided by Park Director Calvin Chappelle, who is also a fine fifer who was part of the music provided. 

Confederate Memorial Park, a historical property of the Alabama Historical Commission, hosted their Winter Quarters living history from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.  Using authentically reconstructed 1860s-era barracks, approximately 100 living historians provided an immersive experience for visitors of all ages. Winter weather during the War Between The States created impassable roads and other harsh conditions that significantly slowed most campaigns. Soldiers busied themselves with a variety of duties including drill, work detail, music, and games. This living history event provided visitors a glimpse into this daily life.

Spread over 102 acres of rolling wooded countryside near the center of the state, Confederate Memorial Park incorporates the site of Alabama’s only Confederate veterans’ home. Life for the old soldiers, called “inmates” at the Home, was better than most had known before their admission. The Home provided housing, meals, clothing, allowances, medical care and, for many, a place to die and be buried with dignity. The museum offers exhibits on the life of an Alabama Confederate veteran from recruitment to old age, including hundreds of artifacts from the War Between The States and the Soldiers' Home.

Mark your calendar for the next living history at Confederate Memorial Park, scheduled for Saturday, April 23, 2022, also the date of the Dragoons’ annual picnic at Pavilion 3 at the Park. Learn more about the Park by visiting https://www.facebook.com/ConfederateMemorial and about the picnic by reading your Camp Dispatch newsletter.

After enjoying the living history event, the Crowleys also visited the Confederate Research Library, at the Park.  The Library has a collection of about two thousand books and is a valued resource for researching ancestors, battles, leaders, and other subjects related to the War Between The States.