The third week of April was one of the busiest weeks ever for our camp, and also one of the saddest. During that week we attended a funeral, had our monthly meeting, hosted a grave marker dedication service and conducted our Confederate Memorial Day Service.

As most of you probably know by now, longtime camp member Tony L. Carr Sr. passed away on Sunday, April 13th. For those of you that had the pleasure of knowing Tony, he was quite a unique individual. He loved people and was a good friend and confidante to many of us in the camp. And he truly loved the South and defended it to the very end. Tony was one of the leaders at the forefront of the battle to defend Southern heritage throughout the 1990s when the all-out assault on all things Southern started.

He recruited a fairly significant number of members into our camp, including myself. Tony was energetic and enthusiastic when it came to defending our heritage, and he would take the fight to our enemies. He enlisted a core group of members in the camp that shared his beliefs and were willing to go protest with him, to erect flagpoles with Confederate flags or raise money to help carry on the flag fight.

He was one of a small number of members that helped hold the camp together in the early years when there was very little interest in the SCV.

Tony was a Christian and Southern gentleman that lived a Christian life by example, and he was a very devoted family man, too. He was also a loyal and dedicated member of the SCV. Whatever he could do to carry out the SCV charge and advance our cause, Tony did it willingly. We appreciate his many contributions to the SCV and the positive influence he had on our lives. He’ll be greatly missed by all of us, but Tony Carr won’t ever be forgotten.

I appreciate the participation of camp members and also of the ladies in mourning dresses that helped make the grave marker dedication and memorial service on April 18th, at Bath Presbyterian Church in Blythe a success. There were well over a hundred people present, which included about 80 students from Hephzibah Elementary School.

Our annual Confederate Memorial Day Service at Magnolia Cemetery on April 19th went exceptionally well. I want to thank the dedicated camp members who worked so diligently to prepare the cemetery for the service. Everything came together as planned and the memorial service was a profoundly fitting tribute to the Confederate dead in Magnolia Cemetery, and our Confederate ancestors. To all of those who participated in the program, I sincerely appreciate all that you did by working together to make the memorial service go so smoothly. A special mention of appreciation goes to the soldiers of the 5th Georgia Infantry Regiment, the 32nd Georgia Artillery, and the six ladies in mourning dresses who placed the wreathes honoring the Confederate dead. Overall attendance was about the same as last year, and thirty-five Camp #158 members attended the service.

Our next camp meeting is at 7:00 p.m. this Thursday night, May 8th, at Sconyers Bar-B-Que Restaurant. Our program speaker will be camp member Carl Tommy Miller, Sr. He’ll speak on Flags of the Confederacy and give us an interesting history lesson on the various types of Confederate flags used during the War Between the States. This is the presentation he normally does when going to area schools to participate in living history demonstrations with other Confederate reenactors.

Plan to attend the meeting and bring a guest to enjoy a pleasant evening of good Southern fellowship. I look forward to seeing all of you this Thursday at Sconyers!

B/G E. Porter Alexander Camp #158: http://www.eporteralexander.homestead.com/Index.html

Georgia Division SCV Website: http://www.georgiascv.com/

SCV National Website: http://www.scv.org/

www.sonsofconfederateveterans.blogspot.com

■ Thursday, May 8th – Brigadier General E. Porter Alexander Camp #158 will meet at Sconyers Bar-B-Que Restaurant at 7:00 p.m. Our program speaker will be camp member Carl Tommy Miller, Sr. He’ll give a presentation on Flags of the Confederacy.

■ Saturday, May 10th – The 1st Annual Tony Carr Memorial Dinner will be held at Ryan's Family Steak House in North Augusta. The dinner will begin at noon. May 10th is also Confederate Memorial Day in South Carolina, which is an appropriate day to celebrate Tony's life.

■ Saturday, May 17th – 1st Annual Thunder Over Augusta Armed Forces Day Celebration, hosted by the City of Augusta, Fort Gordon and area businesses. The event will be from 2:00 to 9:00 p.m. at the Augusta Commons located on 836 Reynolds Street in Downtown Augusta. There will be activities honoring our men and women serving in all branches of the Armed forces, military displays, flyovers, vendors, car shows, Husqvarna's chainsaw competition, a free concert at 6:30 p.m. featuring national recording artist Lee Greenwood and the largest fireworks show in Georgia. Camp #158 has reserved two booths for this event - one booth for giving living history demonstrations & recruiting, and another for selling camp store merchandise.

■ Monday, May 26th – A Memorial Day Observance Ceremony will be held at 11:00 a.m. at the "All Wars Monument" located at 4th & Broad Streets in downtown Augusta.

■ Year of Davis Events: The SCV has declared 2008 the Year of Davis to commemorate the bicentennial of his birth. There are two events that every Southerner will want to try and attend: The reopening of Beauvoir in Biloxi, Mississippi on Tuesday, June 3rd, and the Bicentennial Celebration in Fairview, Kentucky on Saturday, June 7th.

■ Thursday, June 12th – Brigadier General E. Porter Alexander Camp #158 will meet at Sconyers Bar-B-Que Restaurant at 7:00 p.m. Our program speaker will be Army of Tennessee Commander Charles Kelly Barrow. He will speak on Confederate President Jefferson Davis.

■ Friday, June 13th - Sunday June 15th – The Georgia Division SCV 111th Reunion will be held in Villa Rica, Georgia. The business session will be on Saturday, June 14th.

■ Saturday, June 21st – A CSA Grave Marker Dedication and Memorial Service will be held at 10:00 a.m. for twelve Confederate soldiers interred in the Heath Family Cemetery in Girard, Georgia. This service is being hosted by Camp #158 member Philip Weaver.

And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. - Romans 5:5

Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. - 1st John 4:1

Blessed is the man that trusteth in the LORD, and whose hope the LORD is. - Jeremiah 17:7

This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief. - 1st Timothy 1:15

He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God? - Micah 6:8

If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. - James 1:5

What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee. In God I will praise his word, in God I have put my trust; I will not fear what flesh can do unto me. – Psalm 56:3-4

Nothing fills me with deeper sadness than to see a Southern man apologizing for the defense we made of our inheritance. Our cause was so just, so sacred, that had I known all that has come to pass, had I known what was to be inflicted upon me, all that my country was to suffer, all that our posterity was to endure, I would do it all over again. – Jefferson Davis

"Depend upon it, there is no difference between Consolidation and Empire; no difference between Centralism and Imperialism. The consummation of either must necessarily end in the overthrow of Liberty and the establishment of Despotism." – Alexander Stephens, Vice President of the Confederate States of America

"Our government is an agency of delegated and strictly limited powers. Its founders did not look to its preservation by force; but the chain they wove to bind these States together was one of love and mutual good offices …" – Jefferson Davis

"The contest is not over, the strife is not ended. It has only entered upon a new and enlarged arena." – Jefferson Davis, address to the Mississippi legislature 16 years after the war’s end

"Duty is ours, consequences are God's." - Stonewall Jackson

"It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ! For this very reason peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity and freedom of worship here." – Patrick Henry