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February 11, 2008
Feature Photo: Chalmette Cemetery
Sections 43 (left) and 44 of Chalmette National Cemetery, in St. Bernard Parish. The cemetery was originally part of the land blocked off by New Orleanians in the 1820s as a memorial for the Battle of New Orleans, which took place on 8-Jan-1815. During the Union occupation of New Orleans in the Civil War, several acres at the rear of the battlefield (behind the British starting lines) were isolated from the battlefield, and a cemetery for Civil War dead from both sides constructed.
Section 43 appears at first glance to be almost empty when compared with 44, but that's not the case. It's completely full, but most of those buried there are "unknowns." Most of those men were Union "Colored Troops." Freed slaves who enlisted in the Union Army didn't usually have the same paper trail following them that white soldiers did, so it was difficult to identify them when they were killed. Each grave is marked by a small square stone that has an identification number. The graves may not have names, but they are treated with all the honor and respect shown anyone else resting in this cemetery.
Originally, Confederate soldiers were buried alongside Union troops in this cemetery. In the 1890s, however, the Daughters of the Confederacy raised funds to construct a tumulus in Greenwood Cemetery at the head of Canal Street, and the CSA dead from Chalmette were re-interred there. The Confederate organization found it offensive that their dead were buried in the same cemetery as Colored Troops.
The view in the background is the perspective that the British had as they approached the American defenses at the Battle of New Orleans.
Posted by YatPundit at February 11, 2008 2:50 PM