Transcripts For CSPAN3 Q A 20150321

Intense strife that had been left out of the story. And a moment that resonates into the present day. With Union Victory in confederate defeat that first week of april 1865, everything was at stake. Black freedom had been seized and delivered, but would it last . Peace would soon be declared but coded into her could it endure . Where and how would former slaves live and work, could they become citizens . What kind of nation with the people and their leaders create . Two days after lees surrender president lincoln addressed a crowd at the white house. No one knew at the time that this would be his last speech. Reflecting on the nations reconstruction, lincoln stated that he would prefer his word the Voting Rights be extended to black men who were very intelligence and who serve our cause as soldiers. This cautious suggestion irritated abolitionists heard as one white new england are in her diary, why cant he cut down the whole tree instead of just lopping off the branches. Unsurprisingly, the same suggestion that suffrage be extended to a select group of black men struck lincolns antagonist as entirely too revolutionary. Thats where the young shakespearean actor who stood in a crowd that evening vowed to kill the president. Among his exact words now, by god, ill put him through. When booth fired a single shot in the back of lincolns head three nights later, in the president ial box, it was goodbye. That same evening, one of the conspirators attacked William Seward in his bed at home in washington. Seward lived, while the news of president lincolns death spread to the telegraph wires and across the nation and the world. Now, suddenly, new questions became pressing. What would become of the emancipation proclamation . All of president Andrew Johnson do. What would president Andrew Johnson do . What would happen the next day. Trepidation was particularly acute for africanamericans. Black leaders hesitated criticize the hesitation for emancipation but lincoln had been influenced the conviction of blackandwhite evolutionists evolutionists abolitionists. One boy echoing the fear of grownups around him asked if he would have to be a slave again. I knew when i began my research at the principal responses of mourners would be shocking grief. People were astonished astounded, stupefied. These are all the things they wrote in their diaries and letters. People wrote that word of lincolns death was like a dagger to the heart and a thunderclap from a clear blue sky. It was a dreadful dream, a play on the stage. Today we would say i felt like i was in a movie. It was a joke, a hoax, a lie and in particular for former slaves, it was a falsehood propagated by secessionist whites. One former slaves that even the trees were weeping for lincoln. By the rules of dominant American Culture expressions of grief had to be properly controlled, especially for men. But at this moment, all those rules of decor had lost their power. Clergyman struggled to make it through their servants, some of the their sermons, some unsuccessfully. One parishioner wrote the minister broke down in tears roll down his cheek. Union soldiers were weeping like children. But lincolns mourners were also angry. Very angry. If another battle came to pass, one soldier wrote, there confederate opponents would wish that they had never been born. The men of the famous troops stationed in South Carolina said to another now there is no more piece. Let us turn back, again the lower armistice and exterminate the race they could do such things. For these men, the confederates were not merely enemies, they were distinct race exterminate the race i could do such things. I did find evidence of reprisals in the immediate moment after the assassination. These kinds of expressions of wrath contradicted the proclamation of universal grief made by mourners that everyone everywhere across the whole nation, even the whole world was of one heart and mind. North and south are weeping together, lincoln knew no north, no south, only his country. I found sentiments like that across many personal writings. Of course that wasnt true, not at all. To begin with, if the assassination seen the greatest possible treasury for the union for the confederacy, surrender remained immediate and disastrous. Many confederates reveled in the assassination, blatantly contradiction contradicting visions of north and south united in grief. A young woman wrote about the attacks, thanking god for the first gleam of light in this midnight darkness. The darkness, of course, being surrender. Also in South Carolina, a 17yearold was in the middle of a german lesson when someone interrupted to break the news. Hurrah, she cheered, only lincoln has been assassinated the lesson forgotten, she flew home, her heart beating with excitement. She stop. First at her rantss house, where everyone shouted what do you think of the news . Isnt it splendid . The in a tremor of excitement. These kinds of divergent responses made for violent clashes between white southerners and black southerners. In portsmouth, virginia, for example, a was dangerous to venture out at night, when northerner explained, since the assassination of the president and since the return of sony rebel prisoners. The fact was confederates were angry too. One of my richest discoveries was the diary of an ardent secessionist and lawyer, preserved at the library of congress in washington. Living in the union occupied city of Jacksonville Florida he was thoroughly disgusted with lincolns mourners, and he didnt hold back his private writings. As he looked around and saw black men and soldiers uniforms, quite people begging in the streets and northerners teaching black people to read and write you could not contain his fury. Lincoln and white abolitionists were in his words, ignorant wretches, craven hearted knaves, contemptible pukes and cowards desecrated, prostituted, perverted. When he called them dogs, he apologized to dogs. There were also white northerners who despised lincoln. These were lincolns political opponents, the socalled copperheads. The archive preserves their words and actions also. A wealthy woman wrote it for irish immigrants, they hate lincoln for emancipating the negro fearing they will employ them and reduce their wages. Nor did all lincolns Union Soldiers love the president. To the dismay of their comrades some laughed and clapped when they heard the news area these actions in the words that accompany them are preserved in the National Archives in Court Martial records. When word arrived among new regiment in origin in oregon, one that announced im glad the old site of a sort of a son of a bitch is dead. Meanwhile, lincolns mourners went to church on Easter Sunday april 16, and the crowds were unprecedented. From california to kansas to washington after new england black churches and white churches were jammed with worshipers eager to make sense of what felt incomprehensible. Listening as their ministers tried to explain the assassination as part of gods divine plan for the nations future. Confederates were also sure that the assassination was gods will. One wrote the whole thing to money his band of selfsatisfied northern villains and hypocrites should tremble and repent. And lincolns mourners did tremble. Many took comfort in their ministers explanations, but i was most interested in those who wrestled with their faith, who wrestled with god in the face of such unprecedented calamity. I cannot reconcile myself, one soldier admitted, stumped as to why the almighty would take away the great Abraham Lincoln just at the moment of Union Victory. I cannot believe it was for the best, he wrote. Lincolns death was such an incredible atrocity, wrote a great woman a quaker woman that she wondered that love and mercy still waiting reigned in heaven while unprovoked wickedness walks the earth. I was interested to figure out who lincolns mourners blamed. Reconciliation to the will of god did not leave them guilty from facing the will of justice. Nearly all wanted John Wilkes Booth prosecutor for his crimes. Most pointed to confederate leadership as the culprit, and many place the blame squarely on the institution of slavery. At 7 00 in the morning on april 16, a german immigrant from new york city wrote it is slavery slavery he capitalize the word. Lincoln had been sacrificed to slavery. Taken by an agent of that accursed system of slavery and states rights, killed by all the hate, wickedness, and guilt of slavery. At the same time, reading through so many diaries and letters, i realized that in order to understand personal and political responses to lincolns assassination, i had to grapple with the persistence of everyday life in the face of catastrophe. This is one of the places where personal responses differ the most from public sources. I think the first time this struck me was when i read the diary of a nineyearold away from new jersey. Who wrote that school had let out early on the day of the president s funeral, then added in the afternoon, i played ball. Mourners indulged in the idea that lincolns assassination had stopped the world. As a boston minister put it, all things stood still when the president was killed. But reading through diaries and letters, they realize that just the opposite was true. Instead of everyday life coming to a halt, everyday life intruded into this cataclysmic events. I was surprised at just how much ink people devoted to daily trivia alongside the reactions to the assassination. Take the diary of emily davis, an africanamerican servant and student, alongside recording her grief and her multiple attempts to the views of to view the president s body, davis also recorded visits with female friends, a sore throat, and whether or not her suitor had come by. That attention to daily life didnt diminish the meaning of emily daviss tribute to lincoln. We also know from the diary that her two brothers have fought in the war. She attended a jubilee celebration for the emancipation proclamation, and listened to a lecture by friendly Frederick Douglass months earlier. This diary and other personal writings made clear that mourners turned to matters of everyday life without apology or compunction for measure of consolation. A rare selfconscious immersion in everyday life as a form of consolation. From ohio, and man wrote to his friend in pennsylvania. Henry was getting married and frank would not be able to attend the wedding. Henry has his francais his fiancee had long set the date for april, which turned out to be the date of president against funeral. President lincolns funeral. I will shut my eyes to all tokens of mourning and close my years to all sorrowful tonings. And here only joy bells because it is your wedding day. Frank tried to stay on the happy topic, but pleaded that it had been ghastly to be replenished from the heights of joy following Union Victory to the depths of sorrow by the horrible murder. Now, frank confessed, he was glad for the distraction of henrys wedding. I have not felt like myself since the assassination and im thankful from time away from it. To that end, frank asked henry to tell him all about the wedding, whether you behaved yourself or not, and how many mistakes you made in the service. Frank also wanted to know the most details, asking about his new domestic life, including how your rooms look and what you can see from their window. Mourners like these immerse themselves in the everyday as diversion from grief, but also for another purpose. As a means to embrace the way forward after Union Victory. To face the future approved much more difficult for defeated confederates. Most especially for former slaveholders. When a white mississippi woman wrote that all our morning and their hearts are crushed president lincoln is nowhere in her thoughts. She estimated she had lost 65,000 worth of human chattel. Or as a white man in tennessee wrote with aching hearts, we mourn for many days in the weeks, months, and years to come. In the ideal vision of lincolns mourners, the world come to a standstill, time suspended in order to allow proper grieving before turning to the unions glorious future. Lincolns enemies, on the other hand didnt so much wish to stop time as they wished to reverse time, taking them back to the antebellum south. All of these responses to the assassination all were tied deeply to the visions of the nations future and particularly to clashing and irreconcilable vision of the nations future. With Union Victory, African Americans and their white allies looks forward to equality education, land, citizenship Voting Rights for black men all with the guarantee of federal enforcement. Former confederates for their part looked forward to the reestablishment of their own Political Rights with no federal interference. Nor, i discovered, have the nations first president ial assassinations subdued the vanquished confederates. On the day of lincolns grand funeral in washington, a young southern woman contemplated a second war for independence precisely what the civil war had been for African Americans since the revolution had excluded them from its principles of freedom. A southern lawyer likewise wrote the south will rise again. Best of lincolns more radical mourners come to believe there are soon after his death that god had permitted lincolns demise for a specific political reason. That is in order to alert the victors of the intransigence of their defeated enemies. As one minister put it, without the assassination, the antislavery forces might not have insisted, might not have realized the need for radical policies like lack suffrage in the effort the aftermath of Union Victory. Very rapidly, president Andrew Johnson made apparent his complete dismissal of calls for black equality. Then i found africanamericans just as rapidly reached for lincoln. Black petitioners told president johnson that he was replacing a man who had proved himself indeed our friend. Reminding johnson of the liberty brought to us and our wives in our little ones by your noble predecessor. Africanamericans and their white allies now held lincolns visions as a model for radical future of freedom and equality. They look to the emancipation proclamation of course, and they looked to lincolns last speech, despite the president s quite modest proposal that only very intelligent black men and black soldiers should be granted the vote. But lincolns more radical mourners also looked to a speech that had already become famous. The second inaugural address the lincoln delivered six weeks before he was assassinated. They are, lincoln had declared that the war the battlefield would last until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword. The war he meant would not end until slavery ended. Lincoln close that address with the appeal, and richard fox had us speak these words this morning these words were already famous when he was assassinated. Malice towards none, charity for all. Lincoln exhorted his listeners to strive on, to finish the work we are in, and to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a lasting peace. Many of the time thought they knew what lincoln meant, and many today come above historians and not historians understand these words in the same way. As the union army approached triumph, it seemed lincoln wanted the congress to treat their vanquished confederate enemies with mercy. But after researching morning lincoln, mourning lincoln, African Americans interpreted malice towards none, Charity Towards all, to apply not to former confederates but just the opposite. To apply to themselves, to former slaves, to africanamericans in their quest for freedom and equality. Thats why lincolns black mourners inscribed those words on the banner they carried to the Nations Capital on the fourth of july, 1865. With lincolns imperative of a just and lasting peace in mind frederick doubtless Frederick Douglass told his supporters that Permanent Peace could not be accomplished without justice. Today we would say no justice no peace. Justice in 1850 five required going beyond legal freedom to encompass Voting Rights. Slavery, douglass believed, is not abolished until the black man has the balance. That is what lincoln meant too, parent in his calls a parent in his calls. Or at least that was the case made by africanamerican victors turned mourners, when they look to the spirit of the martyred president to realize their visions of freedom and equality. Thats why Frederick Douglas concluded that his words to the colored people lincolns death was an unspeakable calamity. The assassination had opened the eyes of these radicals, both black and white, to the necessity of revolutionary policies following confederate defeat on the battlefield. Because defeated confederates who held political power could still win the war off the battlefield. Two years later, when the radical republicans in congress overrode the policies of president johnson to implement their program of radical reconstruction, lincolns mourners were not avenging lincolns death. Instead, as they made clear after the assassination, they wanted to avenge secession and war, and the cause of the war. Slavery. Which they also understood to be the root cause of lincolns assassination. Of course, that stunning moment of black equality and democracy known as radical reconstruction was accompanied by the birth of the good looks glam. By the end of reconstruct the ku klux klan. Him him as a read through confederate diaries, i found sentiments of white southerners from later decades. In 1905, confederate veteran John Johnston was leaving to his civil war diary when he came across an entry from april 1865 in which he had prayed to god that the rumors of lincolns assassination were true. 40 years later, johnston added a note on that same page this was a sincere prayer he wrote, that included lincolns death. By the turn of a new century, it seems clear that the shot John Wilkes Booth and fired here at fords theatre on april 14 1865 was the first shot in the war the came after appomattox, a war on black freedom and equality. And so my last point. We cannot know what happened had lincoln lived. We do know that the slain president s martyrdom permitted black americans and their white allies to invoke his name in the quest for equality. In 2015, the 150th anniversary of lincolns assassination, we know also that this quest is not yet resolved. The meaning of the civil war not yet resolved. Which is why we turned with such intense interest to the legacies of president Abraham Lincoln. Thank you. [applause] martha questions, thoughts reflections . You mentioned there was a fear, that the emancipation proclamation namely the 13th of and with the go away, even though it january of 1865. Martha what i found especially in the sentiments of africanamericans at the moment that moment of crisis of the assassination, often the documents i have for these are northern teachers who are teaching free people in the south, and wrote letters to the american missionary association, which had sent them, describing the scene in their classrooms. That is where children and grownups alike expressed that fear. But thats not the only place. Editors of African American newspapers in the north also expressed great termination trepidation that freedom was endangered, even if legal freedom seemed like it was about to happen. Freedom for africanamericans meant more than just the absence of slavery. Thats what people were talking about, more than literal reenslavement. It meant inequality, and met citizenship, it meant Voting Rights for the men, it meant education, immense land. Thats what people were afraid of. It meant land. Thats what people were afraid of. Thank you. Do have some thoughts about what draws us here to fords in the same context as to what draws the crowds to the world trade site in new york as a way to mourn that kind of incident . Martha i do have some idea. I think part of it comes from the sources i read while researching morning mourtning lincoln, people in 1865 made pilgrimages here to washington. Fords theater was close in the immediate aftermath of the assassination. The people would come to washington and right in their diaries i walked around the theater, i walked out and saw the alley where John Wilkes Booth escaped, and there is one wonderful diary of a boston woman who comes down for the great commemorative event of the army is in early may and she comes to fords theater and then goes across the street to Peterson House which is open for business and writes in her diary how she went to the room where lincoln had died, the back room, the bloody pillow was still they are, and she explains why she wanted to go there. She says i needed to see this because it was an historical fact, but also she said because it makes it so vivid. I think part of the visits to the world trade center, the popularity of fords theater making such a cataclysmic event seem real, even standing here today in this theater, sitting in the audience, looking up at that box, i felt something i hadnt felt before. Although i have been to fords theatre, i havent been part of an audience before. Theres a sense of this happened in this place. Right here, even though the theater has been reconstructed its very realistic area there is a sense of making something that seems so impossible to imagine, a way in which it makes it true, in which it makes it go from unbelievable too believable. Thank you. I directed national present reform organization, and i have been surprised at the lack of research that has gone into the exception clause in the 13th amendment, where we still have slavery within our prison system. We now have 2. 3 Million People in prison, we have 25 of the worlds prisoners and only 5 of the worlds population. I thought there would be some connection in regards we still have slavery within our constitution. We just have in regard to prisoners. I was looking maybe even today to find it some connection, the amendment actually became effective in 1965, december 18. We are looking at 150 years of its anniversary, maybe there should be a move to remove all slavery maybe that the unfinished work. Martha thank you for that comment. You are quite right that prisoners are not able to vote in this country. Your slaves. They are slaves. Martha i would say their activists on this issue, one of them is an historian, i cant remember her name. She is a temple university. Shes a scholar of prisons and a scholar of the history of prisons, and she is very active in this movement to allow prisoners to vote. Im talking about removing the exception clause, which is a constitutional amendment prisoners are considered slaves in our constitution. Presently. Martha lets have them next speaker. Thank you for the comments. I appreciate the confederate people who were celebrating they reminisce and dyers of reseller rating. But the assessment that i have always believed, and of course there was lincoln wanting to be very merciful and in reconstruction a significant part of his own party wanted to be vengeful after the assassination, they were more determined to be vengeful in reconstruction policy. What confederate diary writings, observations have you found about people who were horrified by what booth did that said hey, were looking towards the future, this is doomed us to a lot of northern retribution is going to make it very difficult the next few years as we try to get on with our lives and rebuild our economy and go on to another way of life. Martha i actually disagree with that very common reading that lincolns assassination further the retribution of northerners during reconstruction. If you read, as i have done, all of the sources, so many sources right at the moment of the assassination, people are very clear that its secession, war, and slavery that they are avenging. But let me speak to your very interesting last point. What is so fascinating about Abraham Lincoln, one of the reasons we are here today, is that once lincoln was assassinated, there were two groups of people who said that lincoln was their best friend. The first were the free africanamericans, free and former slaves. The second, despite the fact the confederates were gleeful in their personal writings, they were also very worried. I thought when i started my research that lincoln is the best friend of the confederates was a later development, maybe a lost cause Development Something you see in the film birth of a nation. That day, confederates were writing in their diaries, now is what now what is going to happen . Like it was her best friend. Lincoln was our best friend. They were glad from the moment of reprieve from the terrible moment of surrender, they were also very worried. Confederates were very clear that they wanted booth alone to be blamed for the assassination. In other words, Union Supporters were saying it was the spirit of the confederacy that did this, slavery with the did this. You see people saying two things , this is fascinating. Everything is a conservation. The first thing they say is booth is our hero, we welcome them to the south and protect him. The second thing they say is he was a lone madman, and he does not represent the sentiments of the confederacy. You are quite right that there were many confederates who were looking forward. There were also many confederates who, at the same time as they were intransigent also knew they needed to move forward. It was a very competent at time of the confederacy, as it would be in any defeated population. I have and live tweeting this talk and we have a couple of questions that have come in via twitter. One of them is how did your research for your book Impact Review on the assassination your view on the assassination . Martha ive been teaching the civil war for 25 years. I had a soft description of the assassination that i gave. I did imagine a nation in mourning in the way that i recalled 9 11 is the world in grief and shock. When i started to do all this research and i saw these manifold responses, not just between union and confederate, but within the north as well, it became a much more complicated complex event. When i look back at my 9 11 photographs, i saw the same thing. The best answer is my view became more nuanced, complex, and hard to understand. Thats the job of historians, to try to make things harder to understand because life is compensated and confusing. That will make for a perfect wheat. Tweet. The other question is where their top Conspiracy Theory is that you read . Martha interesting. There were conspiracy theories at the time of the assassination. The judge, joseph hold, and was prosecuting conspirators tried with all his might alter the trial to convicts members of the confederacy and the confederate leadership but was unsuccessful. As soon as the assassination that happened, lincolns mourners did right in their diaries that they were quite sure that the confederate leadership was involved. And often mourners would write out long list of names and their positions, the obvious ones were Jefferson Davis and robert e lee, but they would write out long list of cabinet members and confederate diplomats, quite sure that it had been more than booth, and that was part of their belief that whether or not these men were responsible, the spirit of booth, that was i believe douglass phrase, had assassinated the president. Thank you. We have had four president ial assassinations. We hear a lot about this one almost as much about kennedys. And very little about the other two. This may be offtopic, it may not be your area of expertise but you have any idea, with a were they considered cataclysmic in their time . When we hear so little about those . Martha with garfield and mckinley, the first reason that scholars tend to give is that lincoln and kennedy died immediately or almost immediately, where is and mckinley did not. But what i found so interesting i will speak for my own Research Experience some of the diaries i worked with i followed through up to later moments. You will see fewer the book that there is an abolitionist couple along with the rabid diehard rebels, i follow this couple up through reconstruction through the end of their lives. The woman keeps a diary and when garfields assassinated in 1981, im not sure i can explain this, she is devastated, utterly devastated. She writes about it in the same way she wrote about lincoln although minus the politics of slavery and civil war. But she does not even mention Abraham Lincoln. Someone you will see, if you read the book, i followed her through the whole story because she wrote so much about lincoln. There is a sense of at the immediate moment, i think garfield and mckinley were devastating events, but they didnt have the legacies that lincoln and kennedy had, partly because they were not although garfield was a very good president , they were not understood to be the kind of great statesman that lincoln and kennedy were understood to be. Thank you. Talking about peoples feelings, i just wonder if you can tell 150 years ago about lincolns assassination, we said 100 years later, we had the kennedy assassination and how people feel and also how they address the issues because the cause of the assassination may be freedom and justice and peace, could you give us a little bit related issues in the way how people feel . Why to the sfa this person did they assassinate this person . Why jfk is still . Martha i think kennedys assassination is still a trend is event. The peoples lives and in terms of commemorations and centennials. I do think whats so fascinating about thinking about kennedy and lincoln and the two assassinations was the difference in the world when the two took place. The first difference is civil war versus no civil war. Thats enormous. The other is more immediate and personal. When people got word of lincolns assassination, the first thing they did was left their houses, because they needed to look into peoples faces, they needed to see confirmation of this event by seeing other people crying weeping, sad. They went outside. Kennedys assassination, i was very young, but i do river this and ive spoken to other people about it. Maybe people in the audience member. What people did when they were out on the street was they gathered around Appliance Stores with Television Sets in the window. In those days, not every household in a television. Even if you did, you wanted to go outside to confirm this is happened that this had happened. You sit around watching television together so you can all confirm this event. 9 11 was prefacebook and tweeting, but 9 11 was about cell phones. You could get your cell phone and called someone to see what was happening. I also think that the persistence of everyday life is something that was true for both events during for example, asked my father what were you doing when you heard the news of kennedys assassination. He was in new york city in an Auto Parts Store buying parts for his ford. The guy behind the counter heard the news on the radio and brought the radio out front so the customers could hear. Everyone was devastated, but everyone finish their purchases and then went on to respond. Maybe thats not exactly what you asked, but i think perhaps scholars of kennedys assassination can speak more directly to your points. I do think the kennedy and that assassination are enormous historical events that have gotten a great deal and continue to get a great deal of attention. Thank you. [applause] im thrilled to say were running ahead of schedule. We are going to take a 15 minute break and we will come back at five of 3 00 to hear terry alford speak. 2 55 will be back. The symposium looking a president Abraham Lincolns life and legacy taking another break here, 15 minute break. We will be back with more live coverage of fords theatre in washington, d. C. When the symposium resumes. Until then, a look at the history of columbus, georgia, the city we are featuring all this weekend as part of our cspan cities to her. Tour. We are here the Columbus Museum in columbus, georgia. We are standing in the chattahoochee legacy gallery. This is the permanent gallery that focuses on the history of columbus and its many highlights. From the prehistoric periods 10,000 years ago up to the 1970s, even moving forward into the columbus that we know today. We are currently standing in the portion of the legacy gallery that deals with the civil war. Columbus was a significant city during the war for many reasons not least of which was that it was the secondlargest Manufacturing Center for the confederacy. Second only to the confederate capital richmond. However, many residents of columbus also left to fight the war. This jacket we are standing by was worn by one of those residents. This is an iconic red jacket that was worn by the columbus guard. This is one of the cities private militia companies. These sorts of organizations were very common throughout the south in the 19th century. It was mainly a way for elite white southern men to socialize but also to come together and sort of a fraternal organization. Usually their activities were limited to military drills and social gatherings. But during the civil war, many of these companies and their members were actually called into action, and went to fight as representatives of their hometowns. The columbus guards was started during the second creek war in the 1830s and continue to be active until world war i. And up until immediately after the civil war, they chose to wear a bright red jacket. As you can see, the red jacket actually has a read and ivory color scheme. The ivory portion on the front is a bid, which is attached by the many buttons you see moving around the side. These buttons are actually oneofakind, there is no record of them being used by any other militia or military organization in the u. S. During the 19th century. If you look closely at them, they depict an eagle with a c g stamped in the middle. Obviously they were unique creation for the colonus guards to use. This is the only known surviving example of a red jacket from the coast guard. It was worn by walkens bank, a member of columbus. She grew up a couple of miles from the museum where we are standing today. He left to serve in 1861, and we know that this jacket belonged to him and that he acquired it just before he left because he wrote his name is close. Here we have a picture of the inscription inside the jacket. Wac. Short for walkens banks. This is what banks and other members of the columbus guard would have marched out of columbus wearing before they changed into regular confederate gray uniforms. Its also worth noting that before the war officially began at fort sumter in april, 1861, the columbus guards were invited to be the bodyguard of Jefferson Davis when he was inaugurated as the confederacys first and it turns out only president. The guards marched to Montgomery Alabama wearing these red jackets. Where they were photographed and talked about in many newspapers across the south. We are standing in the portion of the legacy gallery the details columbus as long middle history. Columbus was founded to the city in 1828, and its first mill was founded the very same year. The object we are looking at currently is a terry towel loom that was used at the field crest cannon mills here in columbus. This loom would have been used throughout the 1980s and actually still has ever on it, see can see the various stages just from the basic cloth all the way to the finished terry towel products. In addition to mass production, the canon mill actually had a company store, where residents of columbus and the surrounding area could actually come in and directly purchase towels and other scraps of fabric from the mill floor. Columbus is location on the fall line makes it an ideal place for many, many mills and many different types of mill products. When union forces came through the end of the war, they destroyed many of the citys Manufacturing Centers to help shut down confederate production at the end of the war. However, after the war, columbus rebuilt quickly with more mills than ever before. The majority of mills and columbus work on mills, so they were producing clothing, towels, genes. Jeans. There there were also grist mills and hosiery mills. These names of their buildings can still be seen all over the columbus landscape today. They are lofts offices, event centers, and places to look at and remember this history where so many residents of columbus worked, or have family members or friends who worked. Here we have several artifacts related to the life of tom wiggins, otherwise known as blind to tell me. Blind tom. Soon after his birth and was discovered he was both blind and mute. Though the terminology of the time referred to him as dumb today we would probably recognize him as autistic read specifically an autistic savant. Tom could not communicate in traditional ways, he had a remarkable talent for mimicry. He was able to reproduce any sound or voice that he heard in nature or manmade. He also displayed a remarkable talent at an early age for music. Being able to reproduce songs he heard just wants on the piano. Despite having very little formal training. His owners quickly realized the remarkable child they had on their hands and had begin giving concerts in columbus. Eventually they started touring him around the south in the country. He also wrote music. This piece here is one of his earliest pieces of sheet music you can see here at the top it says tom the blind negro boy pianist, only 10 years old. We have an image of him here, depicting him. He was most often photographed and drawn with his aunts close. Tom continued to tour not only through the nation but internationally. Even after the civil war when he was officially no longer a slave. However, through a series of convoluted legal dealings, members of his initial owning family continue to act as his manager and legal guardian. That one point, his mother even signed over legal guardianship with the promise of receiving some of toms earnings