The Song of Wilder’s Brigade
“One day came the order; ‘Be ready my men; We’ll start back to Huntsville this morning at ten’; We came on to Mooresville the very same week, And Camped on a Stream which is called Piney Creek.” “A word about Mooresville I’ll have in my song, To speak of its people it won’t take me long; For people true-hearted, wherever they be, In the North or the South, are the people for me.” “The men are kind-hearted, the ladies are fair, And are kind to our soldiers, I truly declare, They welcome us warmly whenever we meet; We honor the men and the ladies so sweet.”
Guests experienced the same hospitality as those soldiers did over 150 years ago while visiting inside 2 homes and our 2 historic churches, enjoying the following presentations of early 1860′s Mooresville…
- A story narrated by Jerry R. Barksdale, portraying his great-great grandfather, James Daniel Barksdale, about events that happened in Mooresville during the Civil War. One episode involved the Union soldier from Wilder’s Brigade who was caught prowling around the Woodroof house and the subsequent order from Lt. Col. Biggs that this house is protected from search for arms. Guests were invited into the house to see this original hand-written document.
Click to read Jerry R. Barksdale’s talk, ”Civil War Comes to Mooresville”.
- A Reenactment in the Church of Christ of President Garfield’s time when he was a General encamped at Bibb’s Spring with the 20th Brigade of the Army of the Ohio as he wrote letters back to his wife and friends. The letters guided listeners from Garfield’s time in Alabama, back home to regain his physical health, and onto Washington, D.C. up to the time he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives
- Period music by Olde Towne Brass in the Brick Church
- A Southern afternoon Tea Party hosted in one of Historic Mooresville’s homes
- A very rare peak into one of Mooresville’s oldest kitchens built in the 1820s
- An encampment of the 19th Alabama Infantry Regiment, C.S.A., Inc. portraying Federal troops and open hearth cooking
- Letter and diary transcriptions recounting Union soldiers stories and experiences while encamped near and around Mooresville
Author and storyteller, Jerry R. Barksdale, is the author of Revolutionaries and Rebels, a historical novel set in Limestone County before and during the Civil War.
Actor, Chuck Puckett, who protrayed General James Garfield, is the creator of Puckett Publishing and has written plays, musicals, songs, and poetry but has always maintained a love for the theater.
Olde Towne Brass performs in the manner of Early American and Civil War bands, playing original Civil War Music on actual Civil War Over-the-Shoulder (OTS) Brass Horns.
19th Alabama Infantry Regiment, C.S.A, Inc is one of the largest and most active living history and Civil War reenactment groups in Alabama with headquarters in Huntsville - https://www.facebook.com/19thalabamainfantryregt
