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Section 2: Building the Black Community: The Family Section 2: Building the Black Community: The Church Section 2: Building the Black Community: The School Section 2: Quest for Economic Autonomy and Equal Rights Section 2: Memory and Mourning Section 2: Violence


Letter from J.R. Montgomery to his father, 1864.

Letter from J.R. Montgomery to his father, 1864.
(Museum of the Confederacy, Richmond, Virginia. Photography by Katherine Wetzel)

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Facing death, a young Confederate soldier wrote words of consolation, love and hope from a battlefield in Virginia to his father at home in Mississippi.

The soldier, J.R. Montgomery, was mortally wounded while serving as a general's courier during the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, which raged between May 8-19, 1864 and resulted in 8,000 Confederate and 17,000 Union casualties.

The blood stains on the letter are assumed to be Montgomery's.
Copyright 2003
A New Birth of Freedom: Reconstruction During the Civil War The Meaning of Freedom: Black and White Responses to Slavery From Free Labor to Slave Labor Rights and Power: The Politics of Reconstruction Introduction The Ending of Reconstruction Epilogue Additional Resources Credits for this Exhibit