#10 Visit a New Museum: Museum of the Confederacy

A huge theme amongst the 30-for-30 challenge suggestions was fully appreciating things we generally take for granted.  One challenger readily recognized that most Richmonders fail to take advantage of the plethora of museums we house.  I am chief among sinners in this respect.  For this challenge, I chose the Museum of the Confederacy for several reasons: 1. With Richmond being the capital of the Confederacy, our MOC is well-known and highly regarded. 2. I am currently reading “Gone with the Wind” for a book club, so I have been learning about the Civil War. And 3. It comes with a sterling recommendation from my sister Gayle Lynn – If she patronized it on a visit here all the way from Washington state, I have no excuse to explain my absence.

When going to a museum, I highly recommend you experience it with the help of a skillful tour guide. Thankfully, my friend Marko, who is an amateur historian and aficionado of the Civil War, was available to take me on a narrative tour through the museum.  He recounted the Southern campaign year-by-year; the battle advances and the losses, the hardships and injuries the soldiers endured, the major mistakes that contributed to the South’s downfall, and the hand that fate played in both the wins and losses for each side.  Walking through the timeline display of the main floor brought to life the war that I have learned about in history classes throughout my childhood.  The tour also highlighted the fact that if a few factors had gone differently at some key times, the war could very easily have had a different outcome and our nation’s history would have been dramatically different.

My favorite part of the museum was the exhibit on the lower level which displayed the effect the war had at home.  The exhibit showcased the make-shift fashions which were worn when cotton was scarce; the jewelry women wore that held the locks of hair of their deceased husbands and sons; food fare which consisted of their only available food rations; and items made out of worthless Confederate promissory notes when the war was over.

Before visiting the MOC and reading “Gone with the Wind,” I had little appreciation for how difficult life was during Reconstruction.  Infrastructure was gone.  The new order distrusted the old order and vice versa.  Most Southern cities were in shambles from the ravaging of effects of the war, Sherman’s destructive path, or the South’s self-destruction of its own cities (including Richmond) to prevent their resources from the hands of the Union soldiers.  For most Southerners, their old ways of life and the security they brought were gone.  Despite these uncertain times, unity was maintained and our nation grew to what it is today.

The Museum of the Confederacy serves as a relic of the tenacity of the human spirit in the face of uncertainty and change.  I highly recommend exploring your local museums.