Savannah Chapter #2 United Daughters of the Confederacy

06/22/2026

06/20/2026

Salute to this brave daughter of the South! Laura Talbot Galt Hyatt (September 16, 1888 – June 24, 1984) was a remarkable Southern woman whose early act of defiance against the humiliations of Reconstruction became a symbol of unyielding Confederate pride. At just 13 years old in 1901, Laura found herself in a classroom under the influence of Northern-imposed education reforms. Her teacher, Miss Sue Allen, ordered the students to sing "Marching Through Georgia," the infamous Union anthem mocking General William T. Sherman's scorched-earth campaign that devastated Southern homes and fields. This song was more than music—it was a deliberate insult to the defeated Confederacy, forced upon Southern children as part of the Reconstruction's cultural conquest.

Laura refused. Not only did she decline to sing, but she defiantly plugged her ears during the performance, earning a sharp reprimand. Her family, led by her grandmother Mrs. Laura Talbot Ross—a proud member of both the Daughters of the American Revolution and the United Daughters of the Confederacy—immediately withdrew her from the school and lodged a formal complaint with the superintendent. The incident made headlines in the Atlanta Constitution, highlighting the ongoing tensions between Southern families and the "Yankee carpetbaggers and scalawags" who controlled education and governance in the post-war South.

When asked as to why she put her fingers in her ears, little Laura answered: "As for putting my fingers in my ears I did that because I would not listen to a song that declares such a tyrant and coward as Sherman and his disgraceful and horrible march through Georgia and the Carolinas to be glorious. I did not think, at the time, my teacher would think it very bad. I felt that forcing Southern girls who were in the room to sing or listen to such a song was an insult that I could not stand it."

Photos I took of her gravesite in Forest, Virginia on Oct 17, 2021, RJ

Read more on her find-a-grave page:
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/81825738/laura_talbot-hyatt

Remind you of the problems we have in today's public schools?

06/20/2026

"Lest We Forget" Our Southern Sons ...

We as Sons of the Southland !
Laid our lives down,
and our blood is forever soaked
Into this hallowed ground.
Our names are chiseled out,
on many sides of stone.
But here and there are some,
that simply say UNKNOWN.
Don't stand over our graves,
with your head lowered to grieve,
Remember we died for a cause,
In which we believed.
So please don't shed your tears,
for those of us who died.
Just keep our memory alive,
with your Southern Pride.
And know that we did our best,
In a war we couldn't win.
And if we had it to do over,
we'd do the same again.

(poem attributed to Claudius Lysias Chilton.)

06/20/2026

The Five Civilized Tribes and Their Alliance with the Confederacy

The Five Civilized Tribes—the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole—rallied to the Confederate cause during the War Between the States. They saw in the Southern fight a parallel to their own defense of homes, families, sovereignty, and constitutional rights against Northern aggression. 

The Cherokee Declaration of Causes (October 28, 1861) powerfully explains their decision. It declared the Cherokee a “free people, independent of the Northern States,” citing federal violations of rights and treaties, and united their fortunes with the Confederacy for the common cause, trusting in Divine Providence.

Shared Southern institutions and interests, plus the Union’s abandonment of Indian Territory, made the alliance natural. 

The other tribes signed similar treaties of alliance with the Confederacy, which promised protection the Union had failed to provide. Like their Southern counterparts, they fought to defend their homelands and right to self-government.

Stand Watie, Cherokee leader and Confederate Brigadier General was the last Confederate general to surrender, at Doaksville on June 23, 1865. 

The Eastern Band of Cherokee in North Carolina also largely supported the Confederacy, serving in units like Thomas’ Legion to protect their mountain homeland.

Today, some in these nations have caught the “woke virus” and turned their backs on their forefathers’ courageous stand. But at the time, allying with the Confederacy made perfect sense: both were fighting for independence and the right to live unmolested on their own lands. Their alliance highlights the broader defense of liberty and self-determination that defined the Confederate cause. -RJ

[One of Uncle Gregory Newson's paintings!]

06/20/2026

In Memory of: Colonel
Henry King Burgwyn Jr. ... CSA

Born on October 3, 1841,
Jamaica Plain, Boston, Massachusetts ...
Killed in battle on July 1, 1863, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania ...

He was known as the “Boy Colonel” because of his achieving high rank at an extreme young age, he was born outside of Boston, Massachusetts while his parents were vacationing in the North. He graduated from the Virginia Military Institute in 1861, where one of his instructors was Thomas Jonathan Jackson, soon to be famous as “Stonewall” Jackson. Burgwyn joined the Confederate Army as soon as the War began, and served on recruitment and training duty before being commissioned as Lieutenant Colonel of the 26th North Carolina Infantry regiment. He participated in the March 1862 Battle of New Bern, North Carolina before his unit was assigned to the Army of Northern Virginia under General Robert E. Lee .. At the July 1, 1862 Battle of Malvern Hill, he participated in the failed assaults on Union positions, with the 26th North Carolina taking numerous casualties .. In August 1862 the regiment’s commander, Colonel Zebulon Vance, was elected as Governor of North Carolina, and Henry K. Burgwyn was promoted to Colonel and commander at the age of twenty. (Conflict) with his brigade commander, Brigadier General Robert Ransom, saw the Colonel Burgywn and his men transferred back to North Carolina, where they spent the fall and winter in skirmishes with Union forces .. In May 1863 the regiment was transferred back to the Army of Northern Virginia, and owing to it’s relatively inactive recent service it became the largest unit in the army ...
As part of Brigadier General John J. Pettigrew’s Brigade, Major General Henry Heth’s Division, Colonel Burgwyn’s command was part of the infantry that met and fought first Union cavalry, then Union infantry in the opening moves of July 1, 1863 Battle of Gettysburg northwest of town. There in the afternoon, in the Herbst Woods near Willoughby Run, the 26th North Carolina met the 24th Michigan Volunteer Infantry from the Union’s famed “Iron Brigade”. The two regiments blazed at each other in a stand-up fight that inflicted great casualties on either side. Colonel Burgwyn was leading his men in advance when the color bearer next to him was shot down. He himself then picked up the flag, and after allegedly handing it off to another bearer, he was shot through the lungs as the remnants of his men crested McPherson Ridge .. Mortally wounded, Burgwyn died two hours later. In the fight his unit lost 588 men out of 800 brought into the battle ...
He was Interred in a field along Chambersburg Pike. His family retrieved his remains in 1867, and had them interred in the family plot in Oakwood Cemetery, Raleigh, North Carolina ... Burgwyn was posthumously awarded the Confederate Medal of Honor by the Confederate governor for his bravery in the battle. Today, his name is inscribed on the 26th North Carolina Infantry Monument on Meredith Avenue in the Gettysburg National Military Park ...



(Gravefinder)

06/19/2026