A new memorial stone will be dedicated Saturday, 163 years to the week after one of the most intense Civil War battles fought in the Upper Cumberland.
The 1863 Battle of Snow Hill, fought near Smithville, will be remembered by the Savage Goodner Camp of Sons of Confederate Veterans. Past Commander Mike Corley said the original marker placed at the site over 30 years ago went missing. The current landowner brought the absence to the organization’s attention to ensure the casualties left behind during the retreat to McMinnville remain recognized.
“And if we don’t mark these grave sites, I mean it looks like the yard of a house cause that’s what it is and without this stone I’m afraid that time would forget the sacrifice that was made there by those three individuals,” Corley said.
Corley said Union forces traveling from Murfreesboro clashed with Confederate cavalry defending the elevated terrain. The engagement involved approximately 4,000 total troops as the Federal army searched for routes along the Sparta Pike to advance toward Chattanooga.
“Well we will simply talk a little bit as we have today about why they were there to begin with, we’ll go into a little more detail about that, and then we will just discuss the battle itself and thank the landowners for allowing us to replace the marker and just keep alive the memory of these three soldiers that on a spring day in 1863 gave all they had to protect their beloved Southland,” Corley said.
Corley said local residents had to bury the fallen soldiers where they died because their compatriots could not carry them back during the retreat. The unmarked graves sit on what used to be public ground near the Atwell School and the Snow Hill community center.
“You may have people buried in your front yard if you can’t learn to resolve your differences today because that’s what happened in the past and it was a devastating event that the country really never did recover from and it is something I don’t think we should ever forget because the cost of forgetting is too high,” Corley said.
Corley said the Upper Cumberland contains multiple unmarked graves and historical sites from the American Civil War, including a nearby DeKalb County cemetery and the Robinson home where wounded Union soldiers were nursed. Relic hunters still regularly find evidence of the battle, such as Minie balls, in the surrounding areas and creeks.
“It’s just meant to be a simple effort on our part to make sure that the burial site of these men is not forgotten because it’s not an established cemetery, it’s literally a front yard, not too far from a water meter, so it looks just like my front yard and maybe yours,” Corley said.
The commemoration event will begin Saturday at 2pm at 275 Man Hill Road, with parking available across the street.
