Confederate Heroes

"All that the South has ever desired was the Union as established by our forefathers should be preserved and that the government as originally organized should be administered in purity and truth."
--- General Robert E. Lee, CSA

"Governor, if I had foreseen the use these people desired to make of their victory, there would have been no surrender at Appomattox, no, sir, not by me. Had I seen these results of subjugation, I would have preferred to die at Appomattox with my brave men, my sword in this right hand."
--- General Robert E. Lee, CSA - as told to Texas ex-governor F. W. Stockdale

To you, Sons of Confederate Veterans, we will commit the vindication of the cause for which we fought. To your strength will be given the defense of the Confederate soldier's good name, the guardianship of his history, the emulation of his virtues, the perpetuation of those principles which he loved and which you love also, and those ideals which made him glorious and which you also cherish. Remember, it is your duty to see that the true history of the South is presented to future generations."
--- Lt. General Stephen Dill Lee, Commander General, United Confederate Veterans, New Orleans, Louisiana, April 25, 1906. 

"We feel that our cause is just and holy; we protest solemnly in the face of mankind that we desire peace at any sacrifice save that of honor and independence; we ask no conquest, no aggrandizement, no concession of any kind from the States with which we were lately confederated; all we ask is to be let alone; that those who never held power over us shall not now attempt our subjugation by arms."
--- President Jefferson Davis - 29 April 1861 

"Captain, my religious belief teaches me to feel as safe in battle as in bed. God has fixed the time for my death. I do not concern myself about that, but to be always ready, no matter when it may overtake me. That is the way all men should live, and then all would be equally brave."
--- Thomas Jonathan "Stonewall" Jackson 

"I loved the old government in 1861. I loved the old Constitution yet. I think it is the bestgovernment in the world, if administered as it was before the war. I do not hate it; I am opposing now only the radical revolutionists who are trying to destroy it. I believe that party to be composed, as I know it is in Tennessee, of the worst men on Gods earth-men who would not hesitate at no crime, and who have only one object in view-to enrich themselves."
--- Nathan Bedford Forrest, in an interview shortly after the war. 

"General, unless he offers us honorable terms, come back and let us fight it out!"
--- James Longstreet, to Robert E. Lee as he rode off to discuss terms for surrender with General Grant at Appomattox.

“Our poor country has fallen a prey to the conqueror. The noblest cause ever defended by the sword is lost. The noble dead that sleep in their shallow though honored graves are far more fortunate than their survivors. I thought I had sounded the profoundest depth of human feeling, but this is the bitterest hour of my life.”
--- Col. John S. Mosby

"I desire my children to be educated south of the Mason Dixon line and always to retain right of domicile in the Confederate States."
--- General J.E.B. Stuart, CSA 

 "The field had been completely swept, and the foe driven back to the river under shelter of the fire from his gunboats. It needed only the inspiring presence and skillful hand of the master-spirit that had raised and guided the storm of battle to press the enemy to a surrender, and thus put the finishing stroke to one of the most brilliant victories of which the annals of war contain a record. But alas! that master-spirit was no more of earth. In the very moment of victory, the battle, and with it seemingly the Confederate cause, was lost."
--- Brigadier General Alexander P. Stewart, remarking upon the death of General Albert Sidney Johnston at the Battle of Shiloh. 

"Every man should endeavor to understand the meaning of subjugation before it is too late... It means the history of this heroic struggle will be written by the enemy; that our youth will be trained by Northern schoolteachers; will learn from Northern school books their version of the war; will be impressed by the influences of history and education to regard our gallant dead as traitors, and our maimed veterans as fit objects for derision... It is said slavery is all we are fighting for, and if we give it up we give up all. Even if this were true, which we deny, slavery is not all our enemies are fighting for. It is merely the pretense to establish sectional superiority and a more centralized form of government, and to deprive us of our rights and liberties."
--- Maj. General Patrick R. Cleburne, CSA, January 1864, writing on what would happen if the Confederacy were to be defeated.

"If this cause, that is dear to my heart, is doomed to fail, I pray heaven may let me fall with it, while my face is toward the enemy and my arm battling for that which I know is right."
--- Major General Patrick R. Cleburne before his fatal wound at the battle of Franklin, Tennessee.

 "Boys, stick to your colors!"
--- Brigadier General "Tige" Anderson, yelled back to his men at Malvern Hill as he headed up the hill toward the blazing Federal line. 

 "You have no right to ask, or expect that she will at once profess unbounded love to that Union from which for four years she tried to escape at the cost of her best blood and all her treasure. Nor can you believe her to be so unutterably hypocritical, so base, as to declare that the flag of the Union has already surpassed in her heart the place which has so long been sacred to the 'Southern Cross." --General Wade Hampton

 "I would die a thousand deaths before I would betray a friend."
--- Sam Davis, to his Union captors when asked to betray his compatriots, before being hanged. 

"I want my body taken up and laid in the dust around old Sweetwater and I want a tombstone put at my head with my name and my company and regiment, the day I enlisted and the name and date of the battles I have ever been in."
--- Sergeant Eli P. Landers, in a letter to home