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Southern Historical Society
The Southern Historical Society was an American organization founded to preserve archival materials related to the government of the Confederate States of America and to document the history of the American Civil War. The society was organized on May 1, 1869, in New Orleans, Louisiana. The society published 52 volumes of its Southern Historical Society Papers which helped preserve valuable historical resources.
Dabney H. Maury founded the Southern Historical Society on April 15, 1869, in New Orleans. Maury and the eight other founding members donated family papers, books, and artifacts to the society to form its initial collection. Its first publication began in 1876 and continued until 1959. The society was officially organized on May 1, 1869; signatories included Braxton Bragg, J. E. Austin, Dabney H. Maury, B. M. Harrod, Simon Bolivar Buckner, S. H. Buck, A. L. Stuart, George Norton, and C. L. C. Dupuy.
As initially organized, the society had a president and secretary-treasurer, which were paid positions. Prominent individuals from each of the former Confederate states, plus the border states of Maryland, Kentucky, and the District of Columbia, were appointed as state vice–presidents to help expand the society throughout the Southern United States and to gather material relating to their areas. The first officers were Benjamin Morgan Palmer, president; Braxton Bragg, vice–president for Louisiana; Robert E. Lee, vice–president for Virginia; John C. Breckinridge, vice–president for Kentucky; and Alexander H. Stephens, vice–president for Georgia.
The society's objective was "to collect reliable data of the workings of the late Confederate Government, and the battles, sieges, and exploits of the war." Other targeted Confederate materials for the archive included newspapers, speeches, literary and medical journals, journals, maps, agricultural and manufacturing reports, geological reports, weather reports, sermons, poetry, songs and ballads, mining operation records, and foreign relations. The society also wanted to document the names and details of wounded soldiers, mortality records, and exchanges of prisoners of war. In addition, records of enslaved people and documentation of the impact of emancipation on the Slave states and free states. Once collected, the archival materials were to be classified and preserved, with an outlook for eventual publication. Preservation was to be achieved by securing a fireproof storage building.
The society's president, Benjamin Morgan Palmer, wrote in July 1873:
It is due to the noble men who fell martyrs to the "Lost Cause" that a faithful history of the events of the four years of bloody war be truthfully recorded, and an impartial view of the motives that actuated them be handed down to posterity with the seal of an impartial and unbiased history… The country has been flooded with partisan histories, in many of which the pretended historian has wandered as far from truth as if he had been writing a work of fiction, and in all of these every incident favorable to the Southern character has been suppressed, and the plainest facts so warped that the actors themselves would not recognize them. It is high time steps were taken to record the events of those years as they occurred….
With the assistance of these state vice–presidents, 6,000 copies of the circular were distributed throughout the southern United States. Newspapers and magazines reprinted the circular in both southern and northern states. However, membership was mostly limited to New Orleans, and there were only 44 dues-paying members at the start of the society's second year.
In 1870, its president was B. M. Palmer. When Palmer turned down reelection as president, he was replaced by Braxton Bragg. Dabney H. Maury was vice–president and J. William Jones became the secretary-treasurer. When Jones' health declined, James Strawbridge was elected secretary-treasurer. However, Strawbridge resigned at a meeting on December 12, 1870. The society did not meet again until July 10, 1871, with just ten members present. Palmer presided over the meeting and was reelected president and P. G. T. Beauregard as vice–president. John W. Caldwell was elected secretary-treasurer with an annual salary of $500.
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Southern Historical Society
The Southern Historical Society was an American organization founded to preserve archival materials related to the government of the Confederate States of America and to document the history of the American Civil War. The society was organized on May 1, 1869, in New Orleans, Louisiana. The society published 52 volumes of its Southern Historical Society Papers which helped preserve valuable historical resources.
Dabney H. Maury founded the Southern Historical Society on April 15, 1869, in New Orleans. Maury and the eight other founding members donated family papers, books, and artifacts to the society to form its initial collection. Its first publication began in 1876 and continued until 1959. The society was officially organized on May 1, 1869; signatories included Braxton Bragg, J. E. Austin, Dabney H. Maury, B. M. Harrod, Simon Bolivar Buckner, S. H. Buck, A. L. Stuart, George Norton, and C. L. C. Dupuy.
As initially organized, the society had a president and secretary-treasurer, which were paid positions. Prominent individuals from each of the former Confederate states, plus the border states of Maryland, Kentucky, and the District of Columbia, were appointed as state vice–presidents to help expand the society throughout the Southern United States and to gather material relating to their areas. The first officers were Benjamin Morgan Palmer, president; Braxton Bragg, vice–president for Louisiana; Robert E. Lee, vice–president for Virginia; John C. Breckinridge, vice–president for Kentucky; and Alexander H. Stephens, vice–president for Georgia.
The society's objective was "to collect reliable data of the workings of the late Confederate Government, and the battles, sieges, and exploits of the war." Other targeted Confederate materials for the archive included newspapers, speeches, literary and medical journals, journals, maps, agricultural and manufacturing reports, geological reports, weather reports, sermons, poetry, songs and ballads, mining operation records, and foreign relations. The society also wanted to document the names and details of wounded soldiers, mortality records, and exchanges of prisoners of war. In addition, records of enslaved people and documentation of the impact of emancipation on the Slave states and free states. Once collected, the archival materials were to be classified and preserved, with an outlook for eventual publication. Preservation was to be achieved by securing a fireproof storage building.
The society's president, Benjamin Morgan Palmer, wrote in July 1873:
It is due to the noble men who fell martyrs to the "Lost Cause" that a faithful history of the events of the four years of bloody war be truthfully recorded, and an impartial view of the motives that actuated them be handed down to posterity with the seal of an impartial and unbiased history… The country has been flooded with partisan histories, in many of which the pretended historian has wandered as far from truth as if he had been writing a work of fiction, and in all of these every incident favorable to the Southern character has been suppressed, and the plainest facts so warped that the actors themselves would not recognize them. It is high time steps were taken to record the events of those years as they occurred….
With the assistance of these state vice–presidents, 6,000 copies of the circular were distributed throughout the southern United States. Newspapers and magazines reprinted the circular in both southern and northern states. However, membership was mostly limited to New Orleans, and there were only 44 dues-paying members at the start of the society's second year.
In 1870, its president was B. M. Palmer. When Palmer turned down reelection as president, he was replaced by Braxton Bragg. Dabney H. Maury was vice–president and J. William Jones became the secretary-treasurer. When Jones' health declined, James Strawbridge was elected secretary-treasurer. However, Strawbridge resigned at a meeting on December 12, 1870. The society did not meet again until July 10, 1871, with just ten members present. Palmer presided over the meeting and was reelected president and P. G. T. Beauregard as vice–president. John W. Caldwell was elected secretary-treasurer with an annual salary of $500.