“The Confederate soldier went to war because he loved his people, because his country was invaded, because his heart was throbbing for his hearthstone. Here was the land which gave him birth; here was his childhood's home; here were the graves of his dead; here was the church spire where he had learned it was not all of life to live nor all of death to die. No hostile foot should ever tread this consecrated ground except over his dead body…He could face the line of fire, but not the shame of standing back."
~ General Stephen Dill Lee on what motivated the Southerner to fight at a speech at the annual reunion of the UCV, in Louisville, 1905
