Researching Confederate Monuments in North Carolina: Organizations
Chat with a librarian
United Daughters of the Confederacy - Published Material
Historical Roster, 1897-1997 by Call Number: C970.741 S46nISBN: 1880849119Publication Date: 1998-05-01
Dixie's Daughters by ISBN: 0813026253Publication Date: 2003-05-11Even without the right to vote, members of the United Daughters of the Confederacy proved to have enormous social and political influence throughout the South - all in the name of preserving Confederate culture. Karen L. Cox's history of the UDC, an organization founded in 1894 to vindicate the Confederate generation and honor the Lost Cause, shows why myths surrounding the Confederacy continue to endure. The Daughters, as UDC members were popularly known, were literally daughters of the Confederate generation. While southern women had long been leaders in efforts to memorialize the Confederacy, UDC members made the Lost Cause a movement about vindication as well as memorialization. They erected monuments, monitored history for truthfulness, and sought to educate coming generations of white southerners about an idyllic past and a just cause - states' rights. Soldiers' and widows' homes, perpetuation of the mythology of the antebellum south, and pro-southern textbooks in the region's white public schools were all integral to their mission of creating the New South in the image of the Old. Placing the organization's activities in the context of the postwar and Progressive-Era South- The history of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, 1894-1955 by Call Number: C369.17 P83h.1Publication Date: 1956This two-volume history of the United Daughters of the Confederacy was published and written by members of the organization in 1956. Although the work presents a highly favorable view of the organization, it can still be useful for researchers interested in the UDC's founding principles and goals as an organization.
- History of the North Carolina Division United Daughters of the Confederacy, 1949-1974 by Call Number: Cp369.17 U58hPublication Date: 1974
- United Daughters of the Confederacy : Tempe Betts Wilkins Chapter, Sanford, North Carolina. by Call Number: Cp369.17 U58tPublication Date: 1958
- The Confederate courier [serial]. by Call Number: FC369.17 C74n
United Daughters of the Confederacy - Archival Materials
Mrs. Seth L. Smith Papers, 1930s.
Mrs. Seth L. Smith was an officer in the United Daughters of the Confederacy in North Carolina. The collection includes materials accumulated by Mrs. Smith in the 1930s. Most items are essays on Confederate and southern topics, narratives of the war based on tradition, and biographical sketches and book reviews submitted in the 1930s as entries in contests sponsored by the United Daughters of the Confederacy. Also included are typescript memoirs of E. D. Dixon, William Edward Brantley, Susan Lennox, J. P. Mullinax, James Reese, and others, regarding their experiences in the Confederate Army and in other capacities in the South during the Civil War, as well as a history of the First North Carolina Cavalry by Minnie Bell, and three letters concerning the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
Eliza Hall Parsley Papers, 1802-1922 (bulk 1890-1918)
Eliza Hall Parsley was the president of the North Carolina Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy; and resident of Wilmington, N.C. The collection includes letters and papers of Eliza Hall (Mrs. W.M.) Parsley of Wilmington, N.C., chiefly those she received or collected, 1890s to 1918, in her capacity as member and president of the North Carolina Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. Also included are historical sketches and clippings; scrapbooks and club records; Civil War letters written by Lieutenant Colonel William Murdock Parsley (1840-1865) of the 3rd North Carolina Infantry Regiment, in Virginia and as a prisoner at Fort Delaware and at Hilton Head, S.C., and his memoranda concerning his capture at Spotsylvania, Va., and imprisonment; a portfolio of amateur plays and pageants presented in Wilmington in the 1890s; and other items.
Mrs. A. J. Ellis Confederate Scrapbook, 1860-1865; 1930s.
Mrs. A. J. Ellis (Kezia Katherine Clements Ellis) was a member of the Johnston Pettigrew chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy in Raleigh, N.C. The collection is a scrapbook compiled in the 1930s by Mrs. A. J. Ellis (Kezia Katherine Clements Ellis) of Raleigh, N.C., presumably as a function of her position in the Raleigh chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. The scrapbook contains clippings, 1930s, on Confederate subjects.
Images
Digitized photographs in the North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives depicting the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
Surry County, Mount Airy, N.C. United Daughters of the Confederacy parade on Main Street in Mount Airy, ca. 1910. Original print owned by Ruth Minick:
Digitized photographs from the North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives depicting Civil War veterans.
Black and White Sheet Film 079_442: Lenoir County, Kinston, N.C. "Veterans of battle of Kinston." The battle was fought on March 8, 1865. Photograph possibly made on May 10, 1920, at dedication ceremonies for a monument commemorating the battle. Photographic print by Mary Grace Canfield. Neg. 79-442. Mary Grace Canfield Collection (41), board 2.
Veterans Associations
Materials held at UNC Libraries about Civil War veterans.
Selection of published materials:
- The Carolina Confederate. Raleigh, N.C. : North Carolina Division, Sons of Confederate Veterans, 1986-. North Carolina Collection: FC970.7 C292n
- Guide to Confederate Issues in North Carolina. Sons of Confederate Veterans - North Carolina Division. North Carolina Collection: Cp970.7 S699g
- The Courier. Sons of Confederate Veterans (Organization). Pvt. Henry L. Wyatt Camp 1297 (Raleigh, N.C.), author. North Carolina Collection: C369.17 S69r
- Program, North Carolina veterans' reunion, August 19 and 20, 1908, Winston-Salem, N.C. North Carolina Collection: Cb369.17 P96u
Selection of archival materials:
- Longstreet Memorial Fund Records, 1991-1999
- The Longstreet Memorial Fund was established in June 1991 by the North Carolina Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans to erect a monument to the memory of Lieutenant General James Longstreet, Confederate States of America. The fund's committee worked with artist Gary Casteel and members of the National Park Service to establish such a monument in Pitzer Woods, Gettysburg National Military Park. Materials document the committee's fund-raising efforts, artist selection, and design collaboration; National Park Service specifications and approvals; and the monument's unveiling ceremony. Included is correspondence, speeches and writings, press releases, newspaper articles and clippings, brochures and broadsides, newsletters, committee minutes and schedules, topographical surveys of the site, and landscape and sculpture designs. Among the correspondents are Jesse Helms and Terry Sanford.
Memorial Associations
- History of the confederated memorial associations of the South by Call Number: C369.17 C74Publication Date: 1904
- A brief sketch of the Memorial Association of Wilmington, N.C. by Call Number: Cp369.17 J27bPublication Date: 1900
Ladies' Memorial Association: material in the UNC Libraries system
North Carolina Monumental Association: material in the UNC Libraries system
See also: Bishir, Catherine W. " 'A Strong Force of Ladies:' Women, Politics, and Confederate Memorial Associations in Nineteenth-Century Raleigh." North Carolina Historical Review 77, no. 4 (October 2000). CR970 N87hi v. 77
Soldiers' homes
Living Monuments by ISBN: 0807821098Publication Date: 1993-12-10While battlefield parks and memorials erected in town squares and cemeteries have served to commemorate southern valor in the Civil War, Confederate soldiers' homes were actually 'living monuments' to the Lost Cause, housing the very men who made that cause their own. R. B. Rosenburg provides the first account of the establishment and operation of these homes for disabled and indigent southern veterans, which had their heyday between the 1880s and the 1920s. These institutions were commonly perceived as dignified retreats, where veterans who had seen better days could find peace, quiet, comfort, and happiness. But as Rosenburg shows, the harsher reality often included strict disciplinary tactics to maintain order and the treatment of indigent residents as wards and inmates rather than honored veterans. Many men chafed under the rigidly paternalistic administrative control and resented being told by their 'betters' how to behave. Rosenburg makes clear the idealism and sense of social responsibility that motivated the homes' founders and administrators, while also showing that from the outset the homes were enmeshed in political self-interest and the exploitation of the Confederate heritage.
