Surprises

Friday, April 11

Hillary writes:  This has been a week of surprises.  The first one was Ms Carol.  You may recall her comments about "presiding" over the cash register in the Eastern National Books Store.  Someone called a "secret shopper" comes into each bookstore at random times to evaluate the performance of the personnel. Ms Carol was running the bookstore when the surprise secret shopper arrived.  On April 9, the bookstore manager received an e-mail evaluation from the secret shopper.  It seems that the 100% summary satisfaction was the first such rating for this year.  Her evaluation included the following, "I do not believe that my shopping experience could have been better.  Carol gave me her full attention and suggested several items within the store."  For this fine evaluation Carol was allowed to select a gift from the bookstore.  She picked out the bobblehead Smoky the Bear!

Surprise 2:  Only those who have served in the U.S military are buried in National Cemeteries which means that confederate soldiers are primarily buried in private sites, operated and maintained by non-profit organizations.  Imagine the surprise of Stones River visitors who walk through the National Cemetery to read stanzas from Theodore O'Hara's elegaic poem "Bivouac of the Dead" inscribed on iron tablets throughout the cemetery when they discover this soldier-poet was a Confederate soldier!  O'Hara was a colonel is command of the 12th Alabama regiment and saw action at Shiloh and Stones river battlefields.

Often these iron plaques provided to the national cemeteries do not credit the author in part because of his Confederate war experience, assuming, perhaps, that it would be unseemly to credit him in a cemetery dedicated to U.S. troops.  However, O'Hara was a captain, promoted to Brevet-Major in the Mexican War of 1846-48 including the battle of Sierra Vista.  He wrote "Bivouac" as a remembrance of the many casualties suffered by the second Kentucky Regiment of Foot Volunteers in that war.  This poem was written about the heroes of the Mexican American War and appropriated for the Civil War dead two decades later.  These same lines grace the entrance to Arlington National Cemetery.
                                 On fame's eternal camping-ground,
                                 Their silent tents are spread.
                                 And glory guards with solemm round
                                 The bivouac of the dead.
A photo of one of the iron plaques is included in an earlier post from our previous time at Stones River.

Surprise 3:  Stones River Cannons and Donuts, Oh, My
A couple from Illinois entered the Visitor Center this past week and in the chatting with them, we discovered they had traveled up the North Shore of Minnesota, as far as Grand Marais.  When we told them we live in GM, the both said, "That's the home of the 'World's Best Donut' and that they are."  Hillary also surprised them by telling them that not only does she know about cannons and Stones River Battle, she works at the donut shop!