Remembering Private Stone

Today is Confederate Memorial Day, a holiday in several southern states which honors the Confederate dead. A memorial service was part of the Battle of Selma events this past weekend.

Along with speeches, a march to Old Live Oak Cemetery and gun salutes, Civil War re-enactors paused to remember Private Henry P. Stone, a Selma native who enlisted in Co. A of the 4th Alabama Infantry when he was only 17. He later died in a bayonet charge during the Battle of Cold Harbor near Richmond, Va.

April 26 is also the anniversary of Confederate Gen. Joseph E. Johnston's surrender to Union Gen. William Sherman. Johnston lived in Selma for a while after the war.

Thanks for Christine Weerts for the photograph.

Historic Building for Sale

The former Riverfront Market Place on Water Avenue is up for sale. I happened by the place next to Lafayette Park just as the For Sale banner was hung.

This building once housed a unique antique mall, and long ago (late 19th Century), its second floor housed the New York Life Insurance office of General Joseph E. Johnston. Johnston was one of five Confederate generals who lived in Selma after the War Between the States, and he also served as president of the Alabama and Tennessee Railroad. When a reporter from the Cincinnati (Ohio) Commercial newspaper came to town to write a post-war report, he noted that Johnston was "a quiet, easygoing old merchant."