On this episode of Our American Stories, formerly enslaved people in Charleston, SC, decided to honor the Union soldiers who had perished at a racecourse converted into a POW camp. Then, as Dan Welch of the Gettysburg Foundation puts it: "A procession at a gravesite, a procession with 9,000 spectators - was all but forgotten in just two years.". Here's the story of the real first Memorial Day. We'd like to thank the Gettysburg NPS for allowing us access to this wonderful audio.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
our special Memorial Day broadcast all show long. We're honoring
those who gave the last full measure of devotion to
this great country. There's some debate over how Memorial they
got its start, and he claimed that it started in
the South, the result of women decorating the graves of
(00:30):
both Union and Confederate dead. Others claim it started in
the North. Our story today deals with perhaps the true
origins of this day of remembrance, those origins finding their
roots in Charleston, South Carolina, just outside of a racecourse
turned prisoner of war camp. Let's get into the story.
Here's Dan Welch of the Gettysburg Foundation.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Land that would later become what was known as the
Racecourse was part of a plantation owned by John Gibb
and known as the Grove or as Orange Grove Plantation.
It was quite a large plantation. It was staffed by
hundreds upon hundreds of slaves, and within just twenty years,
in seventeen ninety one, part of Gibbs Plantation was acquired
(01:15):
by an organization known as the South Carolina Jockey Club.
The South Carolina Jockey Club is going to build this
track for horse racing with the vision of making it
the finest horse racing location in the South and in
the country itself. And by seventeen ninety two the course
was ready for what would become an annual horse race,
(01:37):
and it would attract thousands upon thousands of spectators for
one week in February. Charleston became the epicenter of the
Southern aristocracy. Racing was on a Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.
Social events every evening, social events kicking off before race
week and after race week is over. Race this week
(02:00):
became the apex of Charleston's social season. This was it.
If you wore anybody in the South, if you had money,
this is what you did every February. If you were
into horse racing and horses in general, you were in
northern er This is where you went in February every
year in Charleston. But beyond the beautiful Italian Ante grandstand,
(02:26):
the apex of the social season, the hobnobbing that would
take place among Charleston's elite. By the time of the
American Civil War, Charleston was the cradle of secession. Charleston
and South Carolina had been screaming for secession for decades. Richmond, Atlanta, Savannah,
(02:46):
all those other major southern metropolitan areas were not the
cradle of secession. It was Charleston was South Carolina. The
secession movement had been born in Charleston years earlier. It
had been brought into reality in December eighth, teen sixty
when they vote for secession, and it had been baptized
in blood in April of eighteen sixty one. Now four
(03:08):
years later, Charleston had suffered the effects of a long siege,
and with the arrival of thousands of prisoners of war
Union prisoners of war, a jewel of the South had
lost most of its luster. February was no longer the
social season, was no longer the racing of the horses
(03:30):
at this race course. February eighteen sixty five found hundreds
upon hundreds of Union prisoners of war suffering the effects
of exposure, malnutrition, illness, and disease at the Washington Racecourse.
And when they died, they would be buried behind this grandstand.
What was it like to be a prisoner? Many of
(03:51):
the accounts that we have of the race course, what
the prison was actually like, come to us from a
man by the name of James Redpath, and he's going
to be an important person to our story. A red
Path was a long time abolitionist and supporter of John Brown.
He had been born in Scotland, had been an immigrant
to America in eighteen forty nine, and upon getting off
(04:13):
the boat, as they say, his first job in this
country was to become a correspondent for Horace Greeley's New
York Tribune, traveling the South prior to the war and
reporting on the conditions of the Southern slave and eventually
published a small book from the newspaper articles he had written.
In regards to where prisoners slept at the Racecourse prison,
Redpath reported this. He said, they were not on mahogany bedsteads,
(04:37):
nor oaken bedsteads, nor even iron bedsteads. They were not
feather beds, and alast, they were not beds of down.
They were beds of stunted grass with little trenches or
gutters cut around them. Generally, these beds were about six
feet long and wide enough to let five or six
men lie side by side. Do you know why our
(04:57):
poor starved, abused soldiers cut these little gutters in the
hard earth? Instead? Of lying down anywhere here was to
keep themselves dry, Redpath said, for the ground was level,
and when the rain fell heavily, and as they say,
it comes down in buckets full. Here in the summer,
the earth would have been saturated if they would not
have dug these little gullies to drain off the water.
(05:19):
Red Path asked his readers, how would you like to
lie on the bare ground and all sorts of weather,
with a city full of houses in sight, but no
roof to cover you, with woods nearby, but not fuel
enough to cook your scanty and half rotten rations with,
and no shade, with shade trees everywhere in view. Our
soldiers had to suffer such fiendish cruelty. Regarding the food
(05:43):
served at the racecourse prison, Red Path reported that, and
to all this suffering were added the awful agonies of hunger.
They had half enough even of putrid food to eat.
Some of them became raving mad with hunger. Food food,
food was there con thought and cry. The rebels drove
away the colored people who tried to bring our prisoners food,
(06:05):
and threatened the Irish and German women who threw bread
across the ditch to them. Redpath said that the sandy
soil at the racecourse is full of loathsome unclean creatures,
and the prisoners had no means of keeping themselves clean,
so they were tormented with these vermin and with swarms
of sandflies and mosquitoes. As some of them had no trousers,
(06:27):
their legs were blistered with the heat, and they then
became festered and full of sores. Conditions at the Washington
Racecourse prison only grew worse. In December of eighteen sixty four,
just three months into the prison's existence, things were so
bad at the racecourse that a flag of Truce boat
arrived to take home many of these Union prisoners suffering
(06:50):
numerous maladies. The only irony many of these men would
die waiting at the race course for that flag of
truce vote and those negotiations to be worked out, and
those men, along with the general population at the race
course would be buried behind that grandstand.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
And you're listening to Dan Welch of the Gettysburg Foundation
telling an untold and important story. When we come back,
more of the story behind the story of how Memorial
Day came to be here on our American Stories. Folks,
if you love the stories we tell about this great country,
and especially the stories of America's rich past. Know that
(07:36):
all of our stories about American history, from war to innovation,
culture and faith, are brought to us by the great
folks at Hillsdale College, a place where students study all
the things that are beautiful in life and all the
things that are good in life. And if you can't
get to Hillsdale, Hillsdale will come to you with their
free and terrific online courses. Go to Hillsdale dot edu
(07:56):
to learn more. And we continue with our American stories
Memorial Day Special. All so long we're honoring those who
(08:16):
died for this great country in the line of duty.
We also continue with our story diving into the forgotten
Decoration Day perhaps the first example of Memorial Day in
this country. When we last left off, Dan Welch of
the Gettysburg Foundation was telling us about the prisoner of
war camp inside the Washington Racecourse in Charleston, South Carolina.
(08:40):
Let's return to the story.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Two hundred Union soldiers died in camp. Behind that grandstand
would be a mass grave only yards across that deadline,
a little ditch in the ground telling these prisoners where
and where they could not step. Uncle James Redpath, as
he became known by many of the African American children
(09:02):
of Charlestown in the months after the war, wrote about
these men, wrote about the conditions of their burial, wrote
about their sacrifice when he said, two hundred and fifty
seven of them were found dead and were buried in
an enclosed piece of pasture nearby. If seven were found dead.
For example, they caused some of our soldiers to dig
a trench, a shallow pit seldom more than three feet deep,
(09:26):
and then they would throw the corpses of our brothers
in place them side by side, without coffins, and often
stripping them naked first. There were no religious rites performed,
no clergyman read the service for the dead, no sympathizing
eye looked on, and no heart beat. Sadly, for our martyrs,
the rebels covered them up, making little rows on the
(09:47):
tops of the long mound to show how many corpses
lay in the long grave, and at the head of
each of a piece aboard with a number on it,
number one, number two, and so on up to number
two hundred fifty seven. Nothing more on any of them. Now,
I don't want you to walk away from this program
(10:07):
today thinking wow, these Confederates, they were a really tough, hard,
mean lot. They mistreated all of our Union boys and
all of these prisons across the South in South Carolina, Georgia,
and many other locations Alabama and even the reaches of Texas.
Because the reality is prisoner of war camps in the
(10:30):
North for Confederate soldiers were just as bad, and casualties
mounted just as quickly, and mass graves and mass trenches
were established at those locations as well. The prison would
soon be empty, however, as the Union war machine prepared
to once and for all subjugate Charleston after four years
(10:54):
of war. Throughout the night of February seven teenth and
February eighteenth, eighteen sixty five, Confederate soldiers pulled out of Charleston.
Lieutenant Augustus G. Bennett, commander of the twenty first United
States Colored Troops, said this and his official report. He said,
(11:17):
at about one o'clock, the twenty first United States Colored Troops,
nine hundred strong, under the command of Major Richard H. Willoughby,
made their entry into the city, having crossed over from
the James Island of the arrival to Charleston by Union soldiers.
Charles Coffin, a reporter for the Boston Evening Journal, was
there to see the twenty first USCT march into the
(11:40):
town and many in its ranks. Coffin reminded his readers
were formerly slaves in the city of Charleston. Charles Coffin said,
with the old flag above them, its fadeless stars and
crimson folds, waving in the breeze, keeping step to Freedom's
drum beats up the grass grown streets, pasted the slave
marts where their wan and children, their brothers and fathers
(12:02):
were themselves had been sold in the public stables. Laying
aside their arms, they began to work the fire engines
to extinguish the flames, and in the spirit of the
Redeemer of men, saving that which was lost. The final
subjugation of Charleston was not something that could be very
quickly relished. As the Confederates began to evacuate the city,
(12:24):
they set on fire many numerous public buildings, stores, warehouses,
and with a gentle harbor breeze, those fires were fanned
and began to spread throughout most of Charleston. And in
this act of humanity, Bennett is going to release his
nine hundred man strong unit, the twenty first USUD. Many
(12:48):
of them had been slaves of Charleston. He's going to
release these men to now help some of the same
white citizens that had bought and sold them, to help
extinguish the flames of that city, of their house, of
their property. It was an astonishing act for the time.
After the Union Army swept through South Carolina February of
(13:10):
eighteen sixty five, black refugees, African Americans, newly freed slaves
from across the state are going to flock to Charleston.
And as more African Americans, more former slaves, more freedmen
begin to arrive in Charleston, violence, tension, and racial confrontations
will proliferate, particularly amongst this community and the one hundred
(13:34):
and twenty seventh New York Volunteers. The men of the
one hundred and twenty seventh New York Volunteers reported that
tormented the freemen. They tormented, especially black merchants. One observer
of the time so that the one hundred and twenty
seventh New York Volunteer Infantry insulted the colored people everywhere.
They stoned them, knocked them down, and cut them. A
(13:57):
Boston Commonwealth reporter that the white provost guards forced unsuspecting
blacks to work as laborers and smashed stalls in the
Blacks marketplace, located in the northern sector of the city.
In addition to pillaging homes and businesses owned by black Charlestonians,
the white Yankees also reportedly beat and raped the former slaves.
(14:22):
Peaceable colored citizens have been kicked out of their homes,
knocked down in the streets, bled with brick bats and bayonets,
cut with knives, pounded and mauled in the places of
business by United States soldiers. It was against this black
drop that the African American community, the newly freed Low
(14:47):
Country slaves, rose above all of this to organize create
a procession and a ceremony for those that had given
what Lincoln called that last full measure of devotion, those
that had died at that racecourse prison in North Charlestown.
(15:07):
Charleston had devolved from a jewel of the South to
a casualty of war in its ideals. Most of the
town lay in ruins, Numerous other buildings stood vacant. Thousands
of former slaves had flocked to Charleston as refugees. With
a city ill equipped to handle the numbers and needs,
African Americans faced mounting tension between white citizens of Charlestown
(15:32):
as well as those who wore the uniform that had
liberated them. Even with this back drop, the African American
community began to lay the groundwork for what would become
the now forgotten Decoration Day by making sure those Union
soldiers that had died as prisoners of war in the
Charleston Racecourse prison received a proper burial and form of remembrance.
(15:58):
As Charleston was subjugated and liberated, a number of African Americans,
between twenty four to twenty eight workmen, all from local
African American churches and Charleston, came together. They marched out
to the racecourse itself, and they began to exhume the dead.
Took them about ten days to do their work. Each
(16:20):
Union soldier that had been buried hastily would receive a
coffin a headboard any information about that soldier that lay
in that trench as they could find. They began to
then construct a large ten foot high whitewashed fence around
the cemetery and last, but not leased. At the entrance,
they built an arch and the arch would read Martyrs
(16:44):
of the Racecourse. As they did this. In April eighteen
sixty five, and the war finally came to an end,
as some of the last remaining Confederate field units in
the far western trans Mississippi theater were us beginning to
receive the news of the ends of their movements. On
(17:05):
May first, eighteen sixty five, an estimated crowd of nine
thousand people visited the former Racecourse prison and had a
ceremony with the lane of flowers on the graves of
the prisoners.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
And you've been listening to Dan Welch of the Gettysburg
Foundation tell one heck of a story about the fall
of Charleston and what twenty plus African Americans did to
honor the fallen Union dead at a racecourse in Charleston.
When we come back more of this remarkable story here
(17:40):
on our American stories, and we continue with our American
(18:10):
stories and the final portion of the story of what
could be the origins of Memorial Day. Telling the story
is Dan Welch of the Gettysburg Foundation. When we last
left off, Dan was telling us about how emancipated slaves
had decided to honor the Union War dead who fell
at the Washington Race Course Prisoner of War camp in Charleston,
(18:32):
South Carolina. Let's return to the story.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
The crowd was mainly comprised that day of African Americans,
freed slaves, children, and Union soldiers. The Charleston Daily News
the following day, on May two, eighteen sixty five, wrote this,
So the ceremonies of the dedication of the ground where
are buried two hundred and fifty seven Union soldiers took
(18:57):
place in the presence of an immense gathering yesterday. Fully
ten thousand persons were present, mostly of the colored population.
The day's activities began when a large crowd made a
procession to the cemetery. The Charleston Daily News also reported
the following day that the procession was formed shortly after
nine o'clock and made a beautiful appearance. Nearly every one
(19:20):
present bearing a handsome bouquet of flowers. The colored children,
about twenty eight hundred in number, marched first over the
burial ground, strewing the graves with their flowers as they passed.
The Charleston Daily News continued that after the children came
the Patriotic Association of Colored Men, an association formed for
the purpose of assisting in the distribution of the freedmen's supplies.
(19:42):
These numbered about one hundred members. The Mutual Aid Society,
an association formed for the purpose of bearing poor colored people,
about two hundred strong, followed next. These were followed by
the citizens, generally nearly all with bouquets, which were also
laid upon the graves. A New York Mune correspondent that
witnessed it that day said that it was quote a
(20:03):
procession of friends and mourners as South Carolina and the
United States never saw before. As the procession arrived to
the cemetery, they were greeted by the famed fifty fourth Massachusetts,
thirty fourth, one hundred and fourth United States Colored Troops,
who had performed a special double columned march around the
(20:24):
grave site. James Redpath had organized this event, had gathered
together African American churches and community members to work at
the cemetery and rebuild that cemetery, and then put on
this procession and put on this ceremony to remember these men.
He especially recounted the next generation's role in the procession
(20:46):
and ceremony that day. On May Day, I told all
the colored children of the free schools of Charlestown to
go out to the race course with bouquets of roses
and other sweet smelling flowers and throw them on the
graves of our martyrs. Redpath wrote nearly three thousand children
went out, and perhaps double that number of grown up people.
The children marched from the racecourse singing the John Brown song,
(21:08):
and then silently and reverently, and with heads uncovered, they
entered the burial ground and covered the graves with flowers. Afterwards,
they went to the fields nearby and sang the Star
Spangled Banner America and rally around the flag. It was
the first free May Day gathering they had ever enjoyed.
Large numbers of them had been slaves until the Yankees
(21:29):
came into Charleston and released them from their bondage, and
they love the Yankees. Charleston Daily News, in their article
of May second, the day after this event, wrote that
after the procession, the exercises on the ground commenced with
a reading of a psalm. A singing of a hymn
was followed by a prayer. Historian David Blight, who came
(21:51):
across to some remnants of this story in some research
about ten years ago, said that the official dedication ceremony
was conducted by the minister of all the Black churches
in Charleston. He continued by saying that after the dedication,
the crowds gathered at the race course grandstand to hear
some thirty speeches by union officers, local Black ministers, and
(22:12):
an abolitionist missionary. They would all be chaired by none
other than James Redpath. The crowd listened to these speakers
of both races and picnicked on the grass nearby. When
the day's procession and ceremony had ended, many recalled the
transformation the once open air prison grounds had undergone. On
May thirteenth, eighteen sixty five, the New York Tribune wrote
(22:33):
the following article. When all had left the Holy Mounds,
the tops, the sides, and the spaces between them were
one mass of flowers. Not a speck of earth could
be seen, And as the breeze wafted the sweet perfumes
from them outside and beyond, there were few eyes among
those who knew the meaning of the ceremony that were
not dim with tears of joy, but a procession at
(22:59):
a grave that had nine thousand spectators was all but
forgotten in two years. By eighteen seventy one, just four
years later, the cemetery was suffering from extreme neglect, and
the soldiers were later reinterred at Beaufort and Florence National Cemeteries.
(23:20):
With the removal of the dead from the racecourse to
Florence and Beaufort, and the number of years between the
First Decoration Day and the present growing, the memory of
the event and its significance faded drastically. The First Decoration
Day had become the forgotten Decoration Day in the sight
of the Union prison crafted cemetery. The founding of this
(23:42):
American day of remembrance had taken on a new life
without any form of reverence or remembrance. Today you can
visit what was once the Grand Charleston Racecourse, what was
a prisoner of war camp for Union soldiers, and the
grave site of those martyrs of the race course. Not
(24:03):
long after the war, the race course ended its time
as hosting all things horse racing. It was eventually turned
into a park space and would be named in honor
of Confederate General Wade Hampton, who had become the governor
South Carolina. Following the war, the city of Charleston would
eventually purchase the property in the early nineteen hundreds, and
(24:25):
just thirty years later, Charleston decided what a better way
to honor the past and history of this place than
by putting a zoo in the park. The zoo would
operate until recent years and closed until nineteen seventy five.
And following the closure of the zoo and the park,
blight set in and finally in the nineteen eighties, Charleston
(24:46):
decided to redevelop the park yet again and reopened it
in nineteen eighty four. And today you'll find many cadets
of the Citadel in local Charlestonians, running, jogging, biking on
the grounds that once housed the Union Prisoner of War
camp and the two hundred and fifty seven Martyrs of
the race Course. A new plaque, small in size not
(25:11):
prominent in location, was placed within the park just several
years ago. The plaque outlines a brief history of the
first Memorial Day in the United States May first, eighteen
sixty five. It recalls the accounts of James Redpath, the
conditions of the prisoner of War camp at the race course,
(25:31):
the African American community coming together to rebury these Union
soldiers that had died, creating a procession, a way to
decorate and remember these men. But what did it all mean?
I would say, perhaps it was a letter from Union
Admiral J. A. Dahlgren, who was unable to attend that
(25:53):
May first, eighteen sixty five ceremony and sent it to
be read during the ceremony itself. That defines the larger
meaning of the moment, the cause, and the remembrance. The
Charleston Daily News and their article of May second, eighteen
sixty five, published the extent of that letter. We should
never forget the gallant men who have laid down their
(26:16):
lives for a great cause, but always keep their memory green.
Speaker 1 (26:29):
And a terrific job on the editing, production and storytelling
by our own Monty Montgomery. A special thanks to Dan
Welch of the Gettysburg Foundation. And I've read countless too
many books to name on the Civil War, and these
stories keep coming out, These remarkable, beautiful and tragic stories.
Nine thousand mostly African American freed slaves honoring the Union dead,
(26:53):
transforming a prisoner of war camp into something beautiful only
to have it fall into disrepair. Now in that park,
just a small plaque. And that's why we tell these stories,
to keep them alive. The story behind the story of
the first Memorial Day. It happened in Charleston, South Carolina.
(27:14):
Here on our American Story.
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
our special Memorial Day broadcast all show long. We're honoring
those who gave the last full measure of devotion to
this great country. There's some debate over how Memorial they
got its start, and he claimed that it started in
the South, the result of women decorating the graves of
(00:30):
both Union and Confederate dead. Others claim it started in
the North. Our story today deals with perhaps the true
origins of this day of remembrance, those origins finding their
roots in Charleston, South Carolina, just outside of a racecourse
turned prisoner of war camp. Let's get into the story.
Here's Dan Welch of the Gettysburg Foundation.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Land that would later become what was known as the
Racecourse was part of a plantation owned by John Gibb
and known as the Grove or as Orange Grove Plantation.
It was quite a large plantation. It was staffed by
hundreds upon hundreds of slaves, and within just twenty years,
in seventeen ninety one, part of Gibbs Plantation was acquired
(01:15):
by an organization known as the South Carolina Jockey Club.
The South Carolina Jockey Club is going to build this
track for horse racing with the vision of making it
the finest horse racing location in the South and in
the country itself. And by seventeen ninety two the course
was ready for what would become an annual horse race,
(01:37):
and it would attract thousands upon thousands of spectators for
one week in February. Charleston became the epicenter of the
Southern aristocracy. Racing was on a Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.
Social events every evening, social events kicking off before race
week and after race week is over. Race this week
(02:00):
became the apex of Charleston's social season. This was it.
If you wore anybody in the South, if you had money,
this is what you did every February. If you were
into horse racing and horses in general, you were in
northern er This is where you went in February every
year in Charleston. But beyond the beautiful Italian Ante grandstand,
(02:26):
the apex of the social season, the hobnobbing that would
take place among Charleston's elite. By the time of the
American Civil War, Charleston was the cradle of secession. Charleston
and South Carolina had been screaming for secession for decades. Richmond, Atlanta, Savannah,
(02:46):
all those other major southern metropolitan areas were not the
cradle of secession. It was Charleston was South Carolina. The
secession movement had been born in Charleston years earlier. It
had been brought into reality in December eighth, teen sixty
when they vote for secession, and it had been baptized
in blood in April of eighteen sixty one. Now four
(03:08):
years later, Charleston had suffered the effects of a long siege,
and with the arrival of thousands of prisoners of war
Union prisoners of war, a jewel of the South had
lost most of its luster. February was no longer the
social season, was no longer the racing of the horses
(03:30):
at this race course. February eighteen sixty five found hundreds
upon hundreds of Union prisoners of war suffering the effects
of exposure, malnutrition, illness, and disease at the Washington Racecourse.
And when they died, they would be buried behind this grandstand.
What was it like to be a prisoner? Many of
(03:51):
the accounts that we have of the race course, what
the prison was actually like, come to us from a
man by the name of James Redpath, and he's going
to be an important person to our story. A red
Path was a long time abolitionist and supporter of John Brown.
He had been born in Scotland, had been an immigrant
to America in eighteen forty nine, and upon getting off
(04:13):
the boat, as they say, his first job in this
country was to become a correspondent for Horace Greeley's New
York Tribune, traveling the South prior to the war and
reporting on the conditions of the Southern slave and eventually
published a small book from the newspaper articles he had written.
In regards to where prisoners slept at the Racecourse prison,
Redpath reported this. He said, they were not on mahogany bedsteads,
(04:37):
nor oaken bedsteads, nor even iron bedsteads. They were not
feather beds, and alast, they were not beds of down.
They were beds of stunted grass with little trenches or
gutters cut around them. Generally, these beds were about six
feet long and wide enough to let five or six
men lie side by side. Do you know why our
(04:57):
poor starved, abused soldiers cut these little gutters in the
hard earth? Instead? Of lying down anywhere here was to
keep themselves dry, Redpath said, for the ground was level,
and when the rain fell heavily, and as they say,
it comes down in buckets full. Here in the summer,
the earth would have been saturated if they would not
have dug these little gullies to drain off the water.
(05:19):
Red Path asked his readers, how would you like to
lie on the bare ground and all sorts of weather,
with a city full of houses in sight, but no
roof to cover you, with woods nearby, but not fuel
enough to cook your scanty and half rotten rations with,
and no shade, with shade trees everywhere in view. Our
soldiers had to suffer such fiendish cruelty. Regarding the food
(05:43):
served at the racecourse prison, Red Path reported that, and
to all this suffering were added the awful agonies of hunger.
They had half enough even of putrid food to eat.
Some of them became raving mad with hunger. Food food,
food was there con thought and cry. The rebels drove
away the colored people who tried to bring our prisoners food,
(06:05):
and threatened the Irish and German women who threw bread
across the ditch to them. Redpath said that the sandy
soil at the racecourse is full of loathsome unclean creatures,
and the prisoners had no means of keeping themselves clean,
so they were tormented with these vermin and with swarms
of sandflies and mosquitoes. As some of them had no trousers,
(06:27):
their legs were blistered with the heat, and they then
became festered and full of sores. Conditions at the Washington
Racecourse prison only grew worse. In December of eighteen sixty four,
just three months into the prison's existence, things were so
bad at the racecourse that a flag of Truce boat
arrived to take home many of these Union prisoners suffering
(06:50):
numerous maladies. The only irony many of these men would
die waiting at the race course for that flag of
truce vote and those negotiations to be worked out, and
those men, along with the general population at the race
course would be buried behind that grandstand.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
And you're listening to Dan Welch of the Gettysburg Foundation
telling an untold and important story. When we come back,
more of the story behind the story of how Memorial
Day came to be here on our American Stories. Folks,
if you love the stories we tell about this great country,
and especially the stories of America's rich past. Know that
(07:36):
all of our stories about American history, from war to innovation,
culture and faith, are brought to us by the great
folks at Hillsdale College, a place where students study all
the things that are beautiful in life and all the
things that are good in life. And if you can't
get to Hillsdale, Hillsdale will come to you with their
free and terrific online courses. Go to Hillsdale dot edu
(07:56):
to learn more. And we continue with our American stories
Memorial Day Special. All so long we're honoring those who
(08:16):
died for this great country in the line of duty.
We also continue with our story diving into the forgotten
Decoration Day perhaps the first example of Memorial Day in
this country. When we last left off, Dan Welch of
the Gettysburg Foundation was telling us about the prisoner of
war camp inside the Washington Racecourse in Charleston, South Carolina.
(08:40):
Let's return to the story.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Two hundred Union soldiers died in camp. Behind that grandstand
would be a mass grave only yards across that deadline,
a little ditch in the ground telling these prisoners where
and where they could not step. Uncle James Redpath, as
he became known by many of the African American children
(09:02):
of Charlestown in the months after the war, wrote about
these men, wrote about the conditions of their burial, wrote
about their sacrifice when he said, two hundred and fifty
seven of them were found dead and were buried in
an enclosed piece of pasture nearby. If seven were found dead.
For example, they caused some of our soldiers to dig
a trench, a shallow pit seldom more than three feet deep,
(09:26):
and then they would throw the corpses of our brothers
in place them side by side, without coffins, and often
stripping them naked first. There were no religious rites performed,
no clergyman read the service for the dead, no sympathizing
eye looked on, and no heart beat. Sadly, for our martyrs,
the rebels covered them up, making little rows on the
(09:47):
tops of the long mound to show how many corpses
lay in the long grave, and at the head of
each of a piece aboard with a number on it,
number one, number two, and so on up to number
two hundred fifty seven. Nothing more on any of them. Now,
I don't want you to walk away from this program
(10:07):
today thinking wow, these Confederates, they were a really tough, hard,
mean lot. They mistreated all of our Union boys and
all of these prisons across the South in South Carolina, Georgia,
and many other locations Alabama and even the reaches of Texas.
Because the reality is prisoner of war camps in the
(10:30):
North for Confederate soldiers were just as bad, and casualties
mounted just as quickly, and mass graves and mass trenches
were established at those locations as well. The prison would
soon be empty, however, as the Union war machine prepared
to once and for all subjugate Charleston after four years
(10:54):
of war. Throughout the night of February seven teenth and
February eighteenth, eighteen sixty five, Confederate soldiers pulled out of Charleston.
Lieutenant Augustus G. Bennett, commander of the twenty first United
States Colored Troops, said this and his official report. He said,
(11:17):
at about one o'clock, the twenty first United States Colored Troops,
nine hundred strong, under the command of Major Richard H. Willoughby,
made their entry into the city, having crossed over from
the James Island of the arrival to Charleston by Union soldiers.
Charles Coffin, a reporter for the Boston Evening Journal, was
there to see the twenty first USCT march into the
(11:40):
town and many in its ranks. Coffin reminded his readers
were formerly slaves in the city of Charleston. Charles Coffin said,
with the old flag above them, its fadeless stars and
crimson folds, waving in the breeze, keeping step to Freedom's
drum beats up the grass grown streets, pasted the slave
marts where their wan and children, their brothers and fathers
(12:02):
were themselves had been sold in the public stables. Laying
aside their arms, they began to work the fire engines
to extinguish the flames, and in the spirit of the
Redeemer of men, saving that which was lost. The final
subjugation of Charleston was not something that could be very
quickly relished. As the Confederates began to evacuate the city,
(12:24):
they set on fire many numerous public buildings, stores, warehouses,
and with a gentle harbor breeze, those fires were fanned
and began to spread throughout most of Charleston. And in
this act of humanity, Bennett is going to release his
nine hundred man strong unit, the twenty first USUD. Many
(12:48):
of them had been slaves of Charleston. He's going to
release these men to now help some of the same
white citizens that had bought and sold them, to help
extinguish the flames of that city, of their house, of
their property. It was an astonishing act for the time.
After the Union Army swept through South Carolina February of
(13:10):
eighteen sixty five, black refugees, African Americans, newly freed slaves
from across the state are going to flock to Charleston.
And as more African Americans, more former slaves, more freedmen
begin to arrive in Charleston, violence, tension, and racial confrontations
will proliferate, particularly amongst this community and the one hundred
(13:34):
and twenty seventh New York Volunteers. The men of the
one hundred and twenty seventh New York Volunteers reported that
tormented the freemen. They tormented, especially black merchants. One observer
of the time so that the one hundred and twenty
seventh New York Volunteer Infantry insulted the colored people everywhere.
They stoned them, knocked them down, and cut them. A
(13:57):
Boston Commonwealth reporter that the white provost guards forced unsuspecting
blacks to work as laborers and smashed stalls in the
Blacks marketplace, located in the northern sector of the city.
In addition to pillaging homes and businesses owned by black Charlestonians,
the white Yankees also reportedly beat and raped the former slaves.
(14:22):
Peaceable colored citizens have been kicked out of their homes,
knocked down in the streets, bled with brick bats and bayonets,
cut with knives, pounded and mauled in the places of
business by United States soldiers. It was against this black
drop that the African American community, the newly freed Low
(14:47):
Country slaves, rose above all of this to organize create
a procession and a ceremony for those that had given
what Lincoln called that last full measure of devotion, those
that had died at that racecourse prison in North Charlestown.
(15:07):
Charleston had devolved from a jewel of the South to
a casualty of war in its ideals. Most of the
town lay in ruins, Numerous other buildings stood vacant. Thousands
of former slaves had flocked to Charleston as refugees. With
a city ill equipped to handle the numbers and needs,
African Americans faced mounting tension between white citizens of Charlestown
(15:32):
as well as those who wore the uniform that had
liberated them. Even with this back drop, the African American
community began to lay the groundwork for what would become
the now forgotten Decoration Day by making sure those Union
soldiers that had died as prisoners of war in the
Charleston Racecourse prison received a proper burial and form of remembrance.
(15:58):
As Charleston was subjugated and liberated, a number of African Americans,
between twenty four to twenty eight workmen, all from local
African American churches and Charleston, came together. They marched out
to the racecourse itself, and they began to exhume the dead.
Took them about ten days to do their work. Each
(16:20):
Union soldier that had been buried hastily would receive a
coffin a headboard any information about that soldier that lay
in that trench as they could find. They began to
then construct a large ten foot high whitewashed fence around
the cemetery and last, but not leased. At the entrance,
they built an arch and the arch would read Martyrs
(16:44):
of the Racecourse. As they did this. In April eighteen
sixty five, and the war finally came to an end,
as some of the last remaining Confederate field units in
the far western trans Mississippi theater were us beginning to
receive the news of the ends of their movements. On
(17:05):
May first, eighteen sixty five, an estimated crowd of nine
thousand people visited the former Racecourse prison and had a
ceremony with the lane of flowers on the graves of
the prisoners.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
And you've been listening to Dan Welch of the Gettysburg
Foundation tell one heck of a story about the fall
of Charleston and what twenty plus African Americans did to
honor the fallen Union dead at a racecourse in Charleston.
When we come back more of this remarkable story here
(17:40):
on our American stories, and we continue with our American
(18:10):
stories and the final portion of the story of what
could be the origins of Memorial Day. Telling the story
is Dan Welch of the Gettysburg Foundation. When we last
left off, Dan was telling us about how emancipated slaves
had decided to honor the Union War dead who fell
at the Washington Race Course Prisoner of War camp in Charleston,
(18:32):
South Carolina. Let's return to the story.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
The crowd was mainly comprised that day of African Americans,
freed slaves, children, and Union soldiers. The Charleston Daily News
the following day, on May two, eighteen sixty five, wrote this,
So the ceremonies of the dedication of the ground where
are buried two hundred and fifty seven Union soldiers took
(18:57):
place in the presence of an immense gathering yesterday. Fully
ten thousand persons were present, mostly of the colored population.
The day's activities began when a large crowd made a
procession to the cemetery. The Charleston Daily News also reported
the following day that the procession was formed shortly after
nine o'clock and made a beautiful appearance. Nearly every one
(19:20):
present bearing a handsome bouquet of flowers. The colored children,
about twenty eight hundred in number, marched first over the
burial ground, strewing the graves with their flowers as they passed.
The Charleston Daily News continued that after the children came
the Patriotic Association of Colored Men, an association formed for
the purpose of assisting in the distribution of the freedmen's supplies.
(19:42):
These numbered about one hundred members. The Mutual Aid Society,
an association formed for the purpose of bearing poor colored people,
about two hundred strong, followed next. These were followed by
the citizens, generally nearly all with bouquets, which were also
laid upon the graves. A New York Mune correspondent that
witnessed it that day said that it was quote a
(20:03):
procession of friends and mourners as South Carolina and the
United States never saw before. As the procession arrived to
the cemetery, they were greeted by the famed fifty fourth Massachusetts,
thirty fourth, one hundred and fourth United States Colored Troops,
who had performed a special double columned march around the
(20:24):
grave site. James Redpath had organized this event, had gathered
together African American churches and community members to work at
the cemetery and rebuild that cemetery, and then put on
this procession and put on this ceremony to remember these men.
He especially recounted the next generation's role in the procession
(20:46):
and ceremony that day. On May Day, I told all
the colored children of the free schools of Charlestown to
go out to the race course with bouquets of roses
and other sweet smelling flowers and throw them on the
graves of our martyrs. Redpath wrote nearly three thousand children
went out, and perhaps double that number of grown up people.
The children marched from the racecourse singing the John Brown song,
(21:08):
and then silently and reverently, and with heads uncovered, they
entered the burial ground and covered the graves with flowers. Afterwards,
they went to the fields nearby and sang the Star
Spangled Banner America and rally around the flag. It was
the first free May Day gathering they had ever enjoyed.
Large numbers of them had been slaves until the Yankees
(21:29):
came into Charleston and released them from their bondage, and
they love the Yankees. Charleston Daily News, in their article
of May second, the day after this event, wrote that
after the procession, the exercises on the ground commenced with
a reading of a psalm. A singing of a hymn
was followed by a prayer. Historian David Blight, who came
(21:51):
across to some remnants of this story in some research
about ten years ago, said that the official dedication ceremony
was conducted by the minister of all the Black churches
in Charleston. He continued by saying that after the dedication,
the crowds gathered at the race course grandstand to hear
some thirty speeches by union officers, local Black ministers, and
(22:12):
an abolitionist missionary. They would all be chaired by none
other than James Redpath. The crowd listened to these speakers
of both races and picnicked on the grass nearby. When
the day's procession and ceremony had ended, many recalled the
transformation the once open air prison grounds had undergone. On
May thirteenth, eighteen sixty five, the New York Tribune wrote
(22:33):
the following article. When all had left the Holy Mounds,
the tops, the sides, and the spaces between them were
one mass of flowers. Not a speck of earth could
be seen, And as the breeze wafted the sweet perfumes
from them outside and beyond, there were few eyes among
those who knew the meaning of the ceremony that were
not dim with tears of joy, but a procession at
(22:59):
a grave that had nine thousand spectators was all but
forgotten in two years. By eighteen seventy one, just four
years later, the cemetery was suffering from extreme neglect, and
the soldiers were later reinterred at Beaufort and Florence National Cemeteries.
(23:20):
With the removal of the dead from the racecourse to
Florence and Beaufort, and the number of years between the
First Decoration Day and the present growing, the memory of
the event and its significance faded drastically. The First Decoration
Day had become the forgotten Decoration Day in the sight
of the Union prison crafted cemetery. The founding of this
(23:42):
American day of remembrance had taken on a new life
without any form of reverence or remembrance. Today you can
visit what was once the Grand Charleston Racecourse, what was
a prisoner of war camp for Union soldiers, and the
grave site of those martyrs of the race course. Not
(24:03):
long after the war, the race course ended its time
as hosting all things horse racing. It was eventually turned
into a park space and would be named in honor
of Confederate General Wade Hampton, who had become the governor
South Carolina. Following the war, the city of Charleston would
eventually purchase the property in the early nineteen hundreds, and
(24:25):
just thirty years later, Charleston decided what a better way
to honor the past and history of this place than
by putting a zoo in the park. The zoo would
operate until recent years and closed until nineteen seventy five.
And following the closure of the zoo and the park,
blight set in and finally in the nineteen eighties, Charleston
(24:46):
decided to redevelop the park yet again and reopened it
in nineteen eighty four. And today you'll find many cadets
of the Citadel in local Charlestonians, running, jogging, biking on
the grounds that once housed the Union Prisoner of War
camp and the two hundred and fifty seven Martyrs of
the race Course. A new plaque, small in size not
(25:11):
prominent in location, was placed within the park just several
years ago. The plaque outlines a brief history of the
first Memorial Day in the United States May first, eighteen
sixty five. It recalls the accounts of James Redpath, the
conditions of the prisoner of War camp at the race course,
(25:31):
the African American community coming together to rebury these Union
soldiers that had died, creating a procession, a way to
decorate and remember these men. But what did it all mean?
I would say, perhaps it was a letter from Union
Admiral J. A. Dahlgren, who was unable to attend that
(25:53):
May first, eighteen sixty five ceremony and sent it to
be read during the ceremony itself. That defines the larger
meaning of the moment, the cause, and the remembrance. The
Charleston Daily News and their article of May second, eighteen
sixty five, published the extent of that letter. We should
never forget the gallant men who have laid down their
(26:16):
lives for a great cause, but always keep their memory green.
Speaker 1 (26:29):
And a terrific job on the editing, production and storytelling
by our own Monty Montgomery. A special thanks to Dan
Welch of the Gettysburg Foundation. And I've read countless too
many books to name on the Civil War, and these
stories keep coming out, These remarkable, beautiful and tragic stories.
Nine thousand mostly African American freed slaves honoring the Union dead,
(26:53):
transforming a prisoner of war camp into something beautiful only
to have it fall into disrepair. Now in that park,
just a small plaque. And that's why we tell these stories,
to keep them alive. The story behind the story of
the first Memorial Day. It happened in Charleston, South Carolina.
(27:14):
Here on our American Story.
Host
Lee Habeeb
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