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IDENTIFIED AND BLOODSTAINED PERSONAL FIRST NATIONAL CONFEDERATE FLAG WORN AT FIRST MANASSAS BY WILLIAM BEARDEN, 8th GEORGIA, WIA

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This flag is typical of the small Confederate First National Flags that occasionally show up on the lapels or even prominently displayed on the caps of early war Confederate soldiers celebrating the formation of a new nation. They are rare and sought-after in photographs, and even more so in the flesh, so to speak. The one is in very good condition, with tight provenance, framed vertically, beneath a completely original, old family note at top: “This confederate flag was carried by grand father Bearden all thru the Civil War. The blood stains are his wounds received at First Battle - Manassas.”

This came from a small group of material relating to brothers William and Rufus Bearden, who were born in Knoxville, TN, but living in Macon, Georgia, when the war started. The note refers specifically to William (1840-1825,) who was wounded in action at First Manassas while serving as a private in the “Macon Guard,” Company C of the 8^th Georgia Infantry. William appears in the 1850 census living at home in Knoxville, but by 1860 is working as a clerk in Macon, where he was also a member of the “Macon Guard,” a militia company formed in 1859, likely in the wake of the John Brown raid.

The flag is mounted in a gilt ½” wide gilt wood frame measuring 5” by 8” overall. The back is heavy card stock secured by seven small nails, with one missing. The background of the flag is a very light blue. We have not taken it out of the frame. The flag itself appears to be silk and measures 2-3/4” across the top and roughly 4-3/4” long with the very tip concealed by the lower edge of the frame, and is handsewn with fine, delicate stitches. What would be the upper red stripe and the middle, white, stripe are 7/8” wide. The bottom red stripe, on left as mounted, is 1/16” wider: 15/16”. The dark blue canton is 1-3/4” square. What would be the hoist edge, the upper edge as mounted, has 1/8” folded, sewn edge. The blue of the canton is strong. No stars remain, so they may have been separately applied or thinly painted. The red stripes show slightly pink. The flag shows some soiling and light brown stains on the white stripe, with some darker brown on the red. These are certainly the blood stains referred to in the family note mounted at the top.

The Macon Guard had been accepted for a year of state service on April 15 and departed on April 16 for Tybee Island, near Savannah, where they did garrison duty until late May. Georgia Governor Brown did his best to control his state’s troops, but many companies, anxious for field service, then bypassed him by offering their service directly to the newly formed Confederate government and were accepted as part of a quota assigned to the state. The Macon Guards followed that path, were accepted on May 21, ordered to Richmond on May 24, headed by train back to Macon on May 27, and then went on to Richmond. They arrived in Richmond on May 31 and were mustered into Confederate service “for the war” on June 2, eventually becoming Company C of the 8^th Georgia Regiment under Colonel F.S. Bartow.

The regiment took part in Confederate operations at Harpers Ferry, Winchester, Bunker Hill and elsewhere in the Shenandoah before moving to Manassas on July 18, where they saw heavy action on July 21, receiving praise from Beauregard for their performance, but paying a stiff price in the fighting on Matthews and Henry House Hills with their Colonel, F.S. Bartow, killed in action while in brigade command, and the regiment losing 49 killed and 159 wounded. Bearden was among the latter, with the company losing 4 killed, 16 wounded, and 2 captured out of some 62 on the field. A Confederate “Compiled Military Service Record” card (misfiled in another soldier’s records) shows him as admitted to the “C.S.A. General Hospital, Charlottesville, Virginia” on July 23, suffering from, “Flesh wound of arm.”

How long he was out of action is unclear. The regiment took part in the subsequent advance of the army to Fairfax Court House in early September, where they did picket duty until mid-October when the army pulled back Centreville, but it is possible he had obtained a leave of absence to return to Macon or his family in Knoxville. In any case, he was discharged for promotion as of November 30, 1861, having been elected as a lieutenant in Co. D of Lt. Col. Coleman’s Battalion of North Carolina troops.

How Bearden connected with that unit is unclear. They had organized at Asheville, NC, with that particular company coming from Buncombe County and having mustered in October 28, 1861. We can only guess at a family or business connection, but there is no mistake that it is him. A pay document relating to his service in that unit and sworn to by him gives his post office as Macon. His appointment seems to have been as 3^rd Lieutenant in the company with a possible promotion to 2^nd Lieutenant on April 12, 1862. It was not, apparently, a satisfactory arrangement. When the battalion acquired additional companies and was reorganized as the 49^th NC Regiment of State Troops in May 1862, he failed to be re-elected and, in his own words, “retired” on June 19, 1862.

It is unclear if he served again, at least in the volunteer forces. There is some suggestion in the records that he may be the William Bearden or Beaden, whose only record is having enlisted as a private in the 1^st Virginia Cavalry in August 1864, but this is far from certain. After the war he married and for a time lived in Knoxville, where the 1870 census picks him up as a salesman in a shoe store. He then returned to Macon to pursue a similar venture, running the Brantley and Bearden Shoe Store. After the death of his wife in 1898 he moved to Davidson, TN, where the 1900 census picks him up living in the household of a cousin, but by 1920 was living with a daughter in Pennsylvania. She died there in September 1925 and he passed away there three months later in the house of his former son-in-law, survived by two other children, and was interred back in Macon.

This is a great early war example of Confederate patriotism. Bearden had been photographed in late 1860 or early 1861 wearing a secession cockade on his militia uniform (see our other listings.) The flag might date as early as February 1861 when Georgia joined the Confederacy, but it dates in any case prior to July when Bearden had it with him at Manassas, by which time the regiment as a whole seems to have put away its varied company flags, carrying one of the First National configuration as its regimental battleflag.  [sr][ph:L]

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