Camp 1962

Notice

Thu, 08 Apr 2010 20:28:31 -0700

The Illinois Convention is set for the end of this month- go to the web page for more information!!! Lt Commander in Chief Michael Givens is scheduled a the speaker. Lt Col. Knudsen will be our guest for the annual Lee-Jackson dinner.

Dixon camp on the expansion

Thu, 03 Sep 2009 13:18:09 -0700

It now appears that Dixon Camp is joining the expansion mode of the division. Currently, Compatriot and Elder of the camp, Gale Red needs men who are willing to step into leadership roles as Dixon camp begins to expand its rolls and breathe new life into nearby camps in Southern Illinois. By the division taking this dynamic move, we are insuring the survival of the Illinois Division by repopulating some camps that are near extinction. By insuring that we have men who are willing to and can lead in these camps, we expand our presence in those areas and seek to expand into other geographic areas. If you are one of those men, and are not afraid of responsibility- then contact Gale Red asap

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Wed, 02 Sep 2009 14:51:55 -0700

ILLINOIS DIVISION

SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS

Camp 1962 is the LARGEST camp in the Illinois Division and they are growing!!Camp 1962 is names after Lt. George E. Dixon, and is Located in Belleville, Illinois. Below is a list of their officers and how to get in touch with them should you happen to live in their area, and wish to join the S.C.V.

Dixon camp moves to its next mission

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 08:40:55 -0700

I have spoken to Gale Red, and he has told me of one of their next camp missions. Gale has expressd his agreement in expanding the Illinois Division and has is looking forward to seeing new SCV camps springing up all over Illinois. Gale and the camp command administartion of now and in the past have worked their camp into a camp model for expansion and cohesion. With their camp on solid footing, they are stepping out to help their division's vision take hold and grow more camps. Rockford is just a beginning, there a a few sites in Central and Southern Illinois that we might be able to plant the seeds of a new SCV camps. If you have an idea, send it to John Jeffers or Gale Red.

Camp 1962 adds new feature

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 07:48:29 -0700

Camp 1962 Lt George Dixon camp has added a new feature to its website. You can now make a donation directly to this camp through its camp website.

Camp 1962 Newsletter

Mon, 03 Aug 2009 08:15:03 -0700

Dixon Camp Wins Big at National Convention The Dixon camp came off a big winner at the SCV National Convention in Hot Springs. The camp received the General Nathan Bedford Forest for the most number of new members. Compatriot Gale Red also won the award for most members recruited. Overall, members of the Illinois Division walked off with many well-deserved awards. Be sure to look for the summary when the next Confederate Veteran Magazine reports on the convention. Congratulations to everyone who worked so hard to make this all happen. The Illinois Division had made itself known on the national scene. In This Issue: Dixon Camp wins BIG��. pg 1 Next Meeting�� pg 1 It�s Dues Time Again.�� pg 1 Mark�s Musings��... pg 2 - 3 Calendar of Events��.�. pg 3 Other News from Camp.�. pg 3 August Birthdays�.��.. pg 4 Meeting Minutes�.�� pg 4 � 5 Mascoutah Homecoming... pg 5 � 6 Desertion��.�� pg 7 � 9 Samuel Mudd article��. pg 10 The Dixon Blue Light News Camp Motto- �Deo adjuvanti non timindin� Meaning: With God�s help we must not fear. The Voice of the Lt. George E. Dixon Camp #1962, SCV August 2nd, 2009 Edition Editor: Gale F. Red, 5 Hunters Pointe Court, O�Fallon, IL 62269 Telephone # 618-622-8949, E-mail: galered@yahoo.com Program for Aug. 6, 2009: Doug Lawrence will set the record straight on the �Real Mr. Lincoln � Part 1� using Abe�s own words and deeds. As a full-time law enforcement officer, Doug will set forth the evidence against Mr. Lincoln. Come find out for yourself, and you be the Judge in the case against this American icon and myth. Next meetiNg � Aug. 6, 2009 The next regularly scheduled monthly meeting of the Lt. George E. Dixon Camp #1962, SCV will be held at 7 pm on Thursday evening Aug. 6, 2009. The meeting will be held at the SWIC Senior Citizen Center on the corner of East B and North Church Streets, in Belleville. Parking is available immediately across the street from the building. The building is located at 201 North Church, just three blocks east of North Illinois on East B. To get to the auditorium where we will have the meeting, ask the gentleman at the desk what room we are in. If you have any questions, call Gale Red for directions at 618-622-8949. It�s Dues Time Again! Have You Paid? Ladies and Gentlemen of the Lt. George E. Dixon Camp. It is time once more to dig into your pocketbooks and ante up for our next year; national, division and camp dues are NOW due for our fiscal year 2009-2010. For life members, members of the Knights and Ladies of the Golden Circle, and associate members, dues are $20.00. For those members who signed up since January and paid their national dues through 2010, dues are just $20.00 for camp dues. For all other SCV members, your dues are $50.00 (that�s $30.00 for national and $20 for camp). We need EVERYONE to please help us by sending in your dues right away or bring them to the meeting on August 6. We must send in our dues by the end of the month to HQ and to the Illinois Division. Mark�s Musings - by Compatriot Mark Morgan Well, this month has provided a couple of �oh, here we go again� moments, concerning heritage defense and defense of the display of the Confederate battle flag. The first came in a 7 July news item from the Associated Press and Fox Sports. Officials of the Atlantic Coast Conference decided that due to the ongoing NAACP boycott of the State of South Carolina over the flying of the battle flag on state capitol grounds, it would move its annual league baseball championship elsewhere. Instead of taking place at Myrtle Beach, the ACC college baseball tourneys from 2011 to 2013 will now occur in Durham and Greensboro, NC. Four years ago the ACC agreed to consider holding championship series in South Carolina on a �case-bycase basis if the host groups� proposals included plans to work with the NAACP.� However, in announcing the move to North Carolina, conference Commissioner John Swofford said, �Our baseball committee and institutional administrators awarded the championships to Myrtle Beach with the understanding that the event had the blessings of all parties within the state of South Carolina. It has become clear this was not the case.� The commission chalked it up to an unspecified �miscommunication,� adding that ��given the conference�s commitment to diversity, equality and human rights, our institutions have determined that this change should be made.� Two words: oh brother� The NAACP boycott of South Carolina began in 2000 after the State of South Carolina removed the Confederate battle flag from top of the capitol (appropriately, I might add) and relocated it to the state�s Confederate memorial on the capitol grounds. I�ll note � as I have in the past � that economically the boycott has had negligible economic effect on the state. In addition, I�ll point out the state house grounds also hold memorials to Governor (and former Confederate cavalry general) Wade Hampton; and to the South Carolina Woman of the Confederacy, known as �Angels of the Confederacy.� Columbia also has the state�s Confederate Relic Room and Military Museum and the capitol lobby has the Orders of Secession engraved in marble. AND, South Carolina state legislator Sen. Robert Ford � a Democrat and an African-American - is pushing a bill that would require a paid state holiday in observance of Confederate Memorial Day, which in SC takes place on 10 May. Ford helped push through the state�s Rev Dr Martin Luther King holiday several years ago and stated, �Every municipality and every citizen of South Carolina should be, well, forced to respect these two days and learn what they can about those two particular parts of our history.� But wait, there�s more. At the end of May the Miami-Dade Branch of the NAACP went to NASCAR and asked it to ban the battle flag from stock car events at Homestead �Miami Speedway, a major south Florida racing venue. The chapter noted that if the officials at NASCAR and the track refused to ban private citizens from entering the track while either carrying or wearing the Confederate battle flag (italics added by yours truly), they would consider a) a boycott of the track; b) a protest march of the 22-29 �Ford Championship Weekend� Sprint Cup event; and c) will start contacting NASCAR�s sponsors. In addition, the NAACP has threatened to boycott businesses in the greater Homestead/Miami area if their demands are not met and will also campaign against city council members who are up for reelection. It�s also attempting to get future participation by the Sons of Confederate Veterans in the annual Veterans Day parade and has petitioned the Miami-Dade County School District to keep students and school bands out of events where the Confederate flag is displayed. NASCAR already has a ban in place on the display of Confederate emblems at its races, but that only extends to the cars, the drivers, the teams and sponsors. Lest you haven�t heard, NASCAR�s also run into serious financial difficulty lately, in a large part due to the economic crisis the nation which has not only curtailed the ability of stock car fans to attend events but also forced the major manufacturers (Ford, GM, Fiat�err, Chrysler) to cut back their financial support. According to the article about the possible Fracas at Homestead-Miami, �NASCAR can ill afford the negative publicity that would accompany an NAACP protest.� That�s probably a massive understatement but then again, NASCAR abandoned its roots and its Southern fan base years ago, which undoubtedly contributed to its decline in popularity. (continued on next page) Mark Your Calendars for Upcoming Events (As always, please plan to be with us; we need your support And miss you when you aren�t there to share the time with us.) Thursday, August 6, 2009, Camp Meeting, SWIC Senior Center, 7 � 9 PM Saturday, August 15, 2009, Freeburg Homecoming, Camp Dixon and parade Saturday & Sunday, August 29 & 30, 2009, Gun Show Recruiting Table, Belle Clair Fairgrounds Thursday, September 4, 2009, Camp Meeting, SWIC Senior Center, 7 � 9 PM Sunday, September 6, Victorian Days Civil War Reenactment, Jerseyville, 10 am � 4 pm Saturday, September 19, 2009, Hill Fort event in Greenville, 9 AM until .? (Sunday requested also) Other News from Around the Camp HAVE YOU PAID YOUR DUES? IF NOT, PLEASE GET THEM IMMEDIATELY. Brett Warner continues to make great progress and has been released from the captivity of his recliner, and is now allowed to roam occasionally. He even joined us in his new kilt for the Mascoutah Homecoming. Ron Doran is making good progress is his recovery and is able to be out and about on a limited basis. He was planning to be at the Mascoutah Homecoming. He would enjoy a call to say hello. Scott Baker is finally home from the war in Iraq and home on leave. He is currently stationed at Fort Hood, Texas, but will soon be transferred to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri and be able to attend some of our meetings once more. Welcome Home Scott. Butch Harris continues to have serious health issues and needs your prayers. * If you know of things going on with our members, please let Gale Red know so we can keep up with everyone. (continue from previous page) Can you imagine the impact on NASCAR if it attempts to step in the way of an individual race fan�s right to wear clothing bearing Confederate icons, or bar him from hoisting a flag from his RV? I�m pretty sure that comes under �Freedom of expression.� I don�t know if it would kill the racing organization, but it might just serve as the last straw when it comes to NASCAR�s dwindling fan base in the South. I also suspect lawsuits would follow, on both sides. I agree with one blogger who wrote the following: �While I understand the NAACP objecting to organizations or corporations displaying the flag, I find their need to dictate to individual citizens about what they can and cannot display a bit�alarming...� �Freedom from being offended is not a right, by the way. This boils down to one simple thing: freedom of expression and those who would demand you think and act their way. If the NAACP is allowed to bully NASCAR like this then we all lose.� Amen, and �nuff said. As a car racing fan going back some 40 years, I�ll continue to monitor this issue. in the meantime, as always my compatriots, hold high the flag. Confederately, Mark Morgan Camp Meeting Minutes from July 9th, 2009: Adjutant Gale Red called the meeting to order at 7 pm and turned the meeting over to Commander Merritt who welcomed all present. Compatriot Billy Altman was then sworn in by Commander Merritt as the Sergeant-at-Arms. Commander Merritt provided the invocation, and Billy led the pledge and salute. Bob Allen from the Gortee Camp in Texas was introduced as a visitor for the evening. The roll call was taken with the following members present: John Merritt, Gale Red, Richard Campen Jr., Richard Campen Sr., Bill Boyd, Harris & Lois Young, Billy & Helen Altman, Tom Sheeler, Doug & Betty Lawrence, Walter Hall, Johnny Kicklighter, John Barnhill, Bill & Janice Beasley, and Joe Starek. The minutes of the previous meeting were accepted as presented in the last newsletter. The financial report was provided by Gale Red. Under Communications, Gale Red reported on the health status of Brett Warner, Ron Doran, Al Wandling, and Judy Starek. Under Old Business, it was reported that no progress had been made on the letter to the Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery Administration regarding the taking down of Confederate grave flags. John Barnhill said he would take charge of the issue and follow it through for us. Several people who had been present at the gun-show recruiting table on June 27th and 28th gave information about the gun-show. It was a much slower affair than usual, but all who attended had a good time visiting with each other and making the rounds. Commander Merritt then talked about the upcoming Homecomings at Mascoutah on August 1st and Freeburg on August 15th. We will be setting up Camp Dixon and marching in both parades. Everyone was encouraged to attend and participate. Compatriot Scott Leas then reported on the Eller Memorial for his Great-great grandfather Nelson Alexander Eller of the 4th NC Infantry. It was a tremendous success and was attended by over 110 people. He thanked everyone for making it such a wonderful and memorable event for his family and the community. Compatriot John Barnhill then reported on the SAR Flag Day event that he, Bill Wilson, Morgan Benjamin, and Gale Red participated in at Granite City. Under New Business Adjutant Gale Red told everyone that our annual dues are due NOW and asked that everyone be sure to pay as quickly as possible. Harris Young talked about the Labor Day CW reenactment at the Fulkerson Mansion in Jerseyville and asked for help to man the cannon crew on Sunday, September 7th. We then took a brief break for refreshments furnished by Billy and Helen Altman. Following the refreshments, we reconvened to listen to Johnny Kicklighter present an extremely interesting program on Confederate currency. He talked about its implementation and development, the various images used on the bills, some of the issues surrounding its use, the problem of counterfeiting by both the North and South, and the problem of sky-rocketing inflation as the people lost faith in the currency as the war losses mounted. He gave several examples of the various bills and showed his collection of Confederate currency. It was very well received and very interesting. Save those CSA bills as the South (at least the value of its currency) will surely rise again. Following the program, Gale Red gave the closing prayer and the meeting was dismissed. The next meeting will be held on August 6th. August Birthdays � �Rattlesnake� Joe Starek � 6 August Mark Morgan � 28 August Charles C. Sheeler � 30 August Happy Birthday, Ya�ll�. The flags were flying at Camp Dixon. Mascoutah Homecoming Event � August 1st, Mascoutah, IL The Mascoutah Homecoming was a challenge this year. It started out great, and the camp was set up with tent and flags. Several people showed early to help set up and then waited for others to show up toward lunch-time. In the meantime, passing rain showers wet things down well and increased as the early afternoon went along, eventually bringing soaking heavy rains, muddy grounds, and flowing streams of water. Jason Prichard and Brett Warner showed off their new kilts and Celtic trappings. Jason even claimed to have the best legs in camp. It must be a matter of perspective. Meanwhile, everyone huddled in the pavilion swapping lies and telling tales. Kevin Duffy even broke out his banjo and regaled us with versions of several songs not everyone recognized until he told us what we were listening to. Several people even dared to sing along as best they could, and everyone had a good laugh together as the rains continued. About three p.m. it appeared the rains might not let up to allow for the parade to go on, and several people departed for drier places. Commander Merritt and his darling Southern Belle bride, MS. Brunette Scarlet, decided they were going to march come �hell or high-water�. Eventually the clouds broke and we got on with the parade. We had seven intrepid souls who dared to march the parade route through town back to the city park. Commander Merritt strutted out front his gallant best waving and saluting his swords and saluting the ladies along the way. Catherine Merritt (Ms. Scarlett), dressed to the nines in her white Sunday-go-to-meeting dress and bonnet, and Janice Beasley dressed in her new Civil War nurses dress with apron carried the SCV banner right behind Jon, followed closely behind by Johnny Kicklighter, Bill Wilson, Bill Beasley and Gale Red carrying the colors. Meanwhile, three of our members (Bob Hardy, Charles Lee, and Ryan Warner) rode of other floats as part of other organizations. Brett Warner, all decked out in his Scottish kilt and Kevin Duffy manned the sidelines to take some photos for us. We all made it and were able to break camp and head for home. It was another successful, if not all together a wet day. As always, we missed those who didn�t come. Hopefully the weather will cooperate better for the August 15th Freeburg event. The broader perspective. Huddling together from the rains. Above- Who is that clown? Below - John heads out the intrepid marchers as the flags were waving proudly. Dixie � Ever so proudly we march. DESERTION (The following is an article from my archives of CW topics. Unfortunately I have lost the author and source. The article discusses the issue of desertion rates and causes in the Southern armies.) Lonn, Ella, Desertion During the Civil War. Gloucester, Mass.: American Historical Association, 1928. Reprint 1998 by Bison Books. The "lack-of-will" thesis, which blames Confederate defeat on rot from within, prevailed in the 1980s, and it was strongly rooted in the "social history" half of the Civil War bookshelf. In the quest for evidence of a want of commitment by Southerners, authors used military statistics to support a social argument. But often they do so without proper assessment of the reliability of those statistics, or any attempt to refine them and make them more accurate. Fragments of Ella Lonn's "Desertion During the Civil War" are sometimes quoted badly out of context. Or her numbers are offered up as inerrant gospel. Yet the difficulty of basing an argument on the "Official Records" is touched on in William Blair's introduction to the reprint of "Desertion During the Civil War": "Lonn relied primarily on the 'Official Records.' Although adequate for the time, this would be considered merely a good beginning today." Lonn, 1928. Bessie Martin's study of Alabama troops, 1932. Now almost 80 years out of date, yet they remain the sources for desertion in the Civil War. Lonn and Martin relied primarily on the "Official Records," which are the most complete and impartial documentation of the Civil War, and the necessary foundation for any serious research. But they were never edited for accuracy, and many reports were condensed for space, and the information about the South is especially spotty. Modern historians are severely cautioned against relying on them without corroborating evidence. "The topic of Confederate desertion remains one of the least well understood in the field of Civil War scholarship," according to historian Gary W. Gallagher. Historians from Prof. McPherson on down have been saying for years that there needs to be a fresh study of this topic. But nobody wants to do it. It's not hard to see why. It would require a couple of people to spend the rest of their natural lives holed up in the National Archives, sifting through tens of thousands of provost marshals' reports and muster rolls of thousands of regiments. And even then, you would not have a total picture of desertion, only a clearer approximation. But a number of smaller-scale studies done in the last decade suggest what a more comprehensive overview might find. And, as it touches on the South, it's not the same picture that the "lack of will" theorists paint. Kevin Conley Ruffner, for instance, did a detailed examination of desertion in the 44th Virginia Infantry, published 1991, and found that it contradicted the image of Confederate desertion as a "linear problem of constantly increasing gravity." Most deserters left the 44th at the beginning of the war, "a product of the recruitment of men unsuited for military life." At the end of 1864, when many historians write of desertion sweeping unchecked through the rebel ranks, the 44th "had a desertion rate of less than 3 percent of its effective strength." A study of the 24th and 25th North Carolina regiments, meanwhile, also concluded that an "overwhelming majority" of their initial volunteers "performed steadfastly throughout the war." William Blair, author of the introduction to the Lonn reprint, concluded elsewhere that "Virginia's experience calls for modification of explanations of desertion as demonstrating a lack of will to fight or identify with the Confederate cause." Civil War legal codes defined desertion as leaving the military service without authorization and intending to remain absent. But skulkers, stragglers, men absent without leave, members of one unit fighting in another, and anyone who could not otherwise be accounted for were included as deserters in the "Official Records." Think about the scale of many Civil War battles, and the number of dead and wounded who never were found. Table 1 in the appendix of Lonn's book lists 1,028 as the figure for Confederate army officer deserters, and 103,400 as the figure for enlisted men. But Table 2 lists, by state, "Deserters from the Confederacy returned to the armies," and it totals 33,056 (the tally is incorrect in the source document, and Lonn notes this). Some would have been men captured and forced back into the ranks. But not all. Not every man marked as a deserter was truly one, and this was known during the war. A great many Southern men who lived near the front would leave the ranks to attend to some personal or family business like plowing, and then return. In other cases, men listed as deserters at first turned out to have been wounded or captured or both. Lonn's tables show 8,500 of 12,000 deserters from Virginia, and nearly 9,000 of 24,000 from North Carolina, rejoining the army. How should these men be categorized? The number of Confederate deserters is often given as "around 104,000;" a more accurate figure, accounting for those who voluntarily returned to duty, or who were incorrectly marked, would be lower. Gary Gallagher, in The Confederate War, calls attention to another point that ought to be obvious: "The presence of Union armies on southern soil generated a type of Confederate desertion unknown among Union soldiers -- and one that did not necessarily indicate weak will or unhappiness with the Confederacy." Devotion to homes and families, one of the most-often cited motives for the Confederate soldier's commitment, also drove the Confederate desertion rate up late in the war. William Dickey, company commander in the Georgia State Militia on the outskirts of Atlanta in 1864, wrote to his wife on July 13 about the many "Tennesseans and up Georgians" leaving the army to get back to their homes, which the Northern slash-and-burn advance had overrun. "They know their families are left behind at the mercy of the yankies and it is hard to bear." "I tell you it is enough to make any man desert. If the Yankees were to drive our army through our country & we were to pass on by you and the children, I could not say that I would not desert and try to get to you." This was how Sherman's march did double damage to the South: not just in wrecking its economy and devastating important agricultural regions, but in drawing off the best soldiers, men who had stood by the Southern cause for three years, by threatening the one thing they seemed to hold more dear -- hearth and home. Ella Lonn understood this, too. Late in the war, it wasn't the shirkers and weak-hearted who were leaving the South's ranks; it was the veterans, as Grant and Sherman both noted. "Soldiers, faced with the choice of serving the State or their families, when famine was stalking the land, obeyed the stronger of the two obligations." The men in the rebel ranks had plenty of chance to get out of the war when they crossed into Pennsylvania in June 1863. They were spread out over three counties, and it's a wonder that Lee's army did not simply melt into the fat countryside. They could have bled away deserters the way the Hessians did when Cornwallis' redcoat army crossed the Delaware Valley in 1777, where Hessian names still dot the phone books. Towards the end of the Civil War, when the South had lost, a great many of their conscripted soldiers crossed the lines and surrendered. Tens of thousands lay down their arms and said, "Enough." But in between, they were an army. It does no credit to the North to have lost so many battles to an army of cowards and slaves, an army that the Northern troops outnumbered more often than not. The "lack-of-will" thesis tends to see each decision by a Southern soldier to desert as a sociopolitical one. As though the rebel private awoke in his tent each morning, rolled over, yawned and wondered, "Shall I perpetuate the planter aristocracy for another 24 hours in the face of my obvious class and demographic interests? Or shall I bugger off?" Reid Mitchell's book, "The Vacant Chair," is one of the better works on the experience and psychology of the average Civil War soldier, especially in his relationship to his home. As such, it connects the home front and the morale of troops. And, of course, late in the war this was a damaging influence on the Army of Northern Virginia. "Even though all the factors that created cohesion within the Union army operated as thoroughly on the Confederate army, the will to make war was crippled by the obligations men felt to their families," Mitchell writes. Lee blamed the fall of his army in April 1865 on "the communications received by the men from their homes, urging their return and the abandonment of the field." The inevitability of defeat offered rebel soldiers the choice of staying around and waiting to be killed, or going home to protect their loved ones from the imminent, or real, Yankee occupation and postslavery chaos in their communities. "Perhaps the most important reasons for Confederate desertion was the tug of home," Mitchell writes. There's an important study by Drew Gilpin Faust about Confederate women, that concludes the war was lost when they finally decided the men were needed at home more than independence was needed. Sickness, malnutrition, and invading Yankee armies closed in on the South, and the women called the men home. Mitchell points out what ought to be obvious: "Confederate soldiers left their wives -- and their mothers, sweethearts, daughters, fathers, sons, family, and friends -- at higher risk than most Union soldiers left theirs. And as the war went on, the dangers that the people back home faced grew more widespread. Confederate soldiers found themselves torn between two duties, one to the Confederacy, one to their families. After 1864, some Confederates saw the war as likely to end in defeat, others saw it as unlikely to end at all. Not surprisingly, more of them chose their duty to their families over their duty to the Confederacy, even over their duty to their fellow soldiers." He concludes, here and elsewhere, that Confederate soldiers fought for hearth, home, motherhood, womanhood, and family. But as Confederate armies became less able to protect these institutions, and as Southern slaves began acting out in the countryside, Confederate soldiers began to choose loyalty to home and family over loyalty to the Confederate cause. He doesn't call them cowards for this, and neither do I. Mark Weitz's "A Higher Duty," one of the few books to make a thorough investigation of Confederate desertion on a larger scale (Georgia troops) but with precise statistics, reaches conclusions that mirror Mitchell's in many ways: "Trouble back home, not fear of death on the battlefield, drove Georgia soldiers to desert. The Union, understanding the close connection between Southern soldiers and their homes, constructed a policy designed to exploit it. The Union desertion program did not attract cowards because the weak-hearted had left long before 1864. Seasoned Georgia soldiers accepted the Union desertion alternative that year because their responsibility to family gradually overcame their duty to the Confederacy. They returned only after the situation in Georgia became unbearable .... [T]here is no indication that widespread desertion among Georgia troops began in 1862. Most of Georgia's desertions came from units that did not form until March 1862, and few saw action until late that spring. ... James McPherson's belief that early 1865 witnessed wholesale desertion may be true, but not for Georgia's soldiers. The register reveals that Georgia's desertion to the enemy had all but stopped by 1865. ... Claims that as many as 278,000 out of 500,000 men listed on the rolls were absent and unaccounted for not only lack any kind of proof but are inconsistent with the limited work that has been done on Civil War desertion." Lonn also had concluded that the motives for desertion were similar on both sides of the Civil War.

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Wed, 01 Jul 2009 16:54:18 -0700

ILLINOIS DIVISION

SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS

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Wed, 17 Jun 2009 05:35:22 -0700

ILLINOIS DIVISION

SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS

Dixon camp event

Fri, 15 May 2009 14:33:32 -0700

Gentlemen of Dixon camp--do not forget you have a weekend event in Alton. Go to the division web calendar for further-jj

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Fri, 15 May 2009 13:45:03 -0700

ILLINOIS DIVISION

SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS

News from Camp 1962-Thanks Gale Red

Thu, 15 Jan 2009 18:32:17 -0800

Thanks for checking again. I still have not gotten to the RSS process. I have been pretty sick with flu or virus and not been doing much of anything. For our camp, we will be having our annual Lee/Jackson Dinner & Dance Sat. 31 Jan in Belleville. We are expecting about 70 people. We will be doing our annual Alton Confederate Cemetery Memorial on May 16th at 11 am. On 23rd we will be supporting the Blankenship Camp at Mound City for that memorial. On Memorial Day, we will be at Jefferson Barracks for the JB Memorial Day Commemoration. On June 13th we will have a Memorial at the Liberty Cemtery near Ramsey, IL in Fayette Co. for Nelson Alexander Eller, Pvt., Co. K, 4th NC Infantry, CSA. He is the great-great grandfather of one of our camp members. We now have 43 members and rising.

Compatriot Gale Red reports for Camp 1962

Mon, 12 Jan 2009 19:40:38 -0800

Jim & Ed, Thanks for the update. Camp 1962 is continuing to add to the total. I will be sending Ed another member we just approved. We expect four more within the month. Camp Douglas, look out.

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Mon, 08 Dec 2008 17:33:52 -0800

Camp 1962 is names after Lt. George E. Dixon, and is Located in Belleville, Illinois. Below is a list of their officers and how to get in touch with them should you happen to live in their area, and wish to join the S.C.V.

Camp George Dixon #1962 gets its own RSS feed

Mon, 08 Dec 2008 17:22:29 -0800

If you are seeing this message then you have set up your RSS reader correctly. You can now get ANY and ALL updated information for camp 1962!