February 2003 p4

"Ramblins from Forrests 'Riter"
By Ed Butler
continued from page 3

the river to rest in the shade of the trees" at the rate of
1,500 per day. We are fortunate to have a Veteran of World War II that is a charter member of our Camp. After serving his country in the Pacific theater during the War, he volunteered to serve his country in what was at that time the Army Air Corp. Soon after he volunteered to serve in the Army Air Corp. the name was changed to the United States Air Force.

During the past four years I have traveled many miles with Chief Warrant Officer James Heard. It has been a privilege to hear stories about WW II from someone that was there. It will be your loss if you do not attend the meeting on February 18, 2003 to hear Jim tell of his service in the United States Navy and the United States Air Force.

GEN. BRAXTON BRAGG
Speaking on the private soldier

To the private soldier a fair meed of praise is due; and though it is so seldom given and so rarely expected that it may be considered out of place, I cannot, in justice to myself, withhold the opinion ever entertained and so often expressed during our struggle for independence. In the absence of the instruction and discipline of old armies, and of the confidence which long association produces between veterans, we have had in a great measure to trust to the individuality and self-reliance of the private soldier.

Without the incentive or the motive which controls the officer, who hopes to live in history; without the hope of reward, and actuated only by a sense of duty and of patriotism, he has, in this great contest, justly judged that the cause was his own, and gone into it with a determination to conquer or die; to be free or not to be at all. No encomium is too high, no honor too great for such a soldiery, However much of credit and glory may be given, and probably justly given, the leaders in our struggle, history will yet award the main honor where it is due--to the private soldier, who, without hope of reward, and with no other incentive than a consciousness of rectitude, has encountered all the hardships and suffered all the privations. Well has it been said, "The first monument our Confederacy rears, when our independence shall have been won, should be a lofty shaft, pure and spotless, bearing this inscription, "To the unknown and unrecorded dead."

Jefferson Davis Statue
VANDALIZED!
Submitted by: Dave Holcombe
First Lt. Cmdr, Louisiana Division

It was discovered on New Years Day that the statue of Jefferson Davis on the corner of Canal Blvd and Jefferson Davis Parkway in the City of New Orleans was desecrated by vandals with black paint on three sides. This statue was erected in 1908 and rededicated and refurbished in 1989. The vandals used some type of black paint and painted a swastika on the front of the statue base in the raised lettering telling about President Davis. There was the verbiage "slavery today" painted on the back side also in the lettering and a gross obscenity painted in the left lower side of the base facing from the front.

Two attempts have been made to remove the damage. One by a civic entity and another by members of the General P.G.T. Beauregard Camp #130. Various cleaning agents and chemicals have been used to remove the damage and all we have been able to accomplish so able to accomplish so far is to fade the damage to a dull light black but it is still visible and readable.

A complaint is going to be filed with every city and law enforcement agency local state and federal we can, but in the City of New Orleans we honestly do not expect to receive anything but lip service. We will also be in continuous research with specialist in monument cleaning and restoration to remove this gross abomination to this monument to our President.