Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 23.djvu/386

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380
Southern Historical Society Papers

The handsome etchings of Generals Lee, Jackson, and Johnston, which adorned the walls of the main hallway, were presented to the Confederate Memorial Literary Society by Mr. Charles Barmore, of New York, who was at the Museum, and was thanked in person for the gift, by Mrs. Joseph Bryan, President of the Association.

Mrs. Bryan and other officers of the Society received in the main hallway at night, as they had done in the afternoon.

One of the most attractive of the relics in the South Carolina room was the company flag of the Macalla Rifles, which was found upon one of the battle-fields of Virginia, but has never been reclaimed.

The ladies in charge of the restaurant, and the officers and members of the Society generally, sent to Mrs. J. Johnston, who lives at the northeast corner of Clay and Twelfth sts., a bowl of punch and some beautiful flowers as a testimonial of their appreciation of a remarkable act of kindness on the part of that lady. Mrs. Johnston is a northern woman, and her father and two of her brothers were killed in the Union army. Nevertheless she turned over all of her dishes, her range, her dining-room furniture, and, in fact, her entire house, furnishing coal and light free of cost, to the ladies of the Society. "It was an act that was worthy of a noble and patriotic woman," said Mrs. Joseph Bryan.

Among the many interesting relics displayed at the Museum, a little volume—a memorial to Francis Dunbar Ruggles attracted considerable attention. The volume contains only the name and lineage of the young soldier, bound together, with a letter written in 1862 to his father, in Boston. Young Ruggles, though a Massachusetts boy, had adopted the South as his home, and had become a member of the Washington Artillery of New Orleans. He was killed in the battle of Fredericksburg, December 13, 1862, and lies in our beautiful Hollywood Cemetery.

ADVISORY BOARD.

The following prominent citizens of Richmond comprise the Advisory Board of the Confederate Memorial Literary Society:

Hon. George L. Christian, Colonel Wilfred E. Cutshaw, Colonel John B. Gary, Hon. J. Taylor Ellyson, E. D. Hotchkiss, Esq., Colonel John B. Purcell, Joseph Bryan, Esq., Robert S. Bosher, Esq., Hon. Beverley B. Munford, Hon. Edmund C. Minor.