From the Confederate Veterans Magazine 1894 Mrs. Barney is President of the Fredericksburg Chapter, Daughters of the Confederacy, with one hundred members, but this special tribute is to honor her for an unparalleled achievement to our Confed- erate comrades buried in that historic old town — the home and burial place of the mother of Washington. J The Memorial Association was in session one day a dozen years or so ago, and deploring the general dilapidation of the Confederate lot, the headboards of which were fast falling into decay, when it was proposed that they all be removed and the ground made smooth so the grass could be mowed occa- sionally. To Mrs. Barney, an active member of the Association, the proposition was acutely painful and she begged that a committee go with her to the cemetery and consider the conditions. The members agreed with her that the headboards might, by careful attention, stand another year. Upon returning to the meeting she appealed in be- half of individual memories, proposing to undertake by herself, to raise the funds to preserve the names and locations of the 1,700 Confederate soldiers buried there. She began the work at home. Penny boxes were established and babes in their nurses arms were given the joy of depositing the yellow coins. She seems never to have thought of failure, and with her pen she wrote and wrote appeals to Southern people who caught the spirit of her zeal and co-operated. There was an amazing result; in a year or so that dilapidated burial spot of men who died for Dixie was the prettiest Confederate Ceme- tery in existence. Beautiful headstones of Georgia marble, with names engraved, were in place of the rotted boards, the entire area transformed, and in the center of the grounds there was erected a beautiful monument representing a private Confederate soldier. This patriotic and beautiful tribute to our dead was achieved with $5,160, secured by this noble woman, wife of a Confederate naval officer who resigned his position in the United States Army to serve his own Virginia and her sister States of the South.
Posted on: Tue, 01 Apr 2014 19:50:46 +0000
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