A New Hampshire man recounts his childhood memories of historic Civil War flags at the state house and a 1900 ceremony in which those flags were returned to Alabama.
He describes spending Saturday mornings in Concord, exploring the State House and being fascinated by the tattered battle‑scarred flags that symbolized the Union and Confederacy.
According to the article, Union soldiers Corporal Peter Mitchell and Sergeant James Morrison captured two Confederate flags at Battery Five, Petersburg, Virginia, on June 5, 1864, and the flags remained in Concord until September 20, 1900.
During the battleship dedication ceremony for the Kearsarge and Alabama on that date, the New Hampshire governor returned the captured flags to the Alabama governor as a gesture of reconciliation, with dignitaries such as the Secretary of the Navy and governors present.
The article notes that many Civil War veterans, both Union and Confederate, harbored lingering grudges over the flag captures, and it does not specify how the captors were recognized or what followed the ceremony.
Source: www.concordmonitor.com
