Published: October 19, 2009 08:12 am      

War monument marks Kentucky’s anniversary effort

LOUISVILLE — On a cold December day in 1861, a few hundred German immigrants in blue Union uniforms squared off against 3,000 Confederates on foot and horseback near Munfordville.

When the withering artillery and musket fire cleared, the rebels fled, and Kentucky’s first Civil War battle ended in victory for the 32nd Indiana regiment known as the “First German.”

But before the regiment marched on, infantryman August Bloedner carved a limestone monument to the 13 Union dead, leaving behind the Civil War’s first monument to fallen soldiers.

Now, nearly 150 years later, that monument is set to be placed in a museum, likely in Louisville, after being rescued and restored following decades of neglect and environmental wear that nearly destroyed it at Cave Hill Cemetery, where it has rested since 1867.

The Battle of Rowlett’s Station, and its important monument, is just one of the stories Kentucky officials will highlight as they prepare to mark the 150th anniversary of the Civil War and the Commonwealth’s unique and deeply divided place in it.

According to the Kentucky Department of Archives and Libraries, more than 75,000 Kentuckians fought for the Union, while roughly 40,000 fought for the Confederacy. As many as one-third died from combat, disease and exposure, historians estimate.

“We were a border state; presidents of the North and South were both from Kentucky; and we had stars on both flags it divided many families here,” said Donna Neary, director of Kentucky’s 2011-2015 Sesquicentennial Initiative aimed at commemorating the political, economic and cultural impact of the war in a slave-owning border state.

Kentucky recently received $1 million in federal funds to pay for events that will include traveling exhibitions, scholarly presentations, renovations of historic buildings and new highway markers. The commemoration will be organized by a 25-member Kentucky Civil War Sesquicentennial Commission, recently created by Gov. Steve Beshear.

In addition, the state plans to spend $440,000 for improvements at the Battle of Richmond Park, near Richmond, where Union forces suffered a defeat as the Confederate Army advanced northward.

“There is no shortage of stories that have yet to be told about the Civil War in Kentucky,” Neary said.

The battle story behind the Bloedner monument, the war’s oldest-surviving memorial, began in an unlikely state, and from an unlikely unit, said historian Michael Peake.

The men who formed the First German Regiment were all recent immigrants between the ages of 17 and 49 and living in Louisville, New Albany, Ind., and Evansville, Ind. Some had fought in Germany and fled to America after a failed effort to unify their native country.

They volunteered to fight for their new country, driven in part to prove their loyalty amid anti-immigration political movements that targeted Germans, Irish and Catholics. Among them was Henry Eisenbeis, a carpenter from Aurora, Ind., said his great-granddaughter, Delores Eisenbeis, 73, of Louisville, whose family passed down accounts of the battle and who has made visits to the monument.

In December of 1861, the unit was sent to secure a bridge over the Green River that had been blown up by Confederate sappers near Munfordville.

During the roughly hour-long battle, which included cavalry charges and hand-to-hand combat, Eisenbeis was shot in the leg. He carried the bullet in his leg the rest of his life.

The battle was the first Civil War skirmish in Kentucky, “and these were the first men of the state to perish in the conflict,” according to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. While the skirmish was relatively brief, “it allowed the Union army to move forward and advance on Bowling Green,” Peake said.

It was after the battle that August Bloedner carved into an outcrop of limestone the names and birth dates of the 13 regiment soldiers killed, along with images of eagle and flags.

The memorial was erected in Munfordville in January 1862, and on June 6, 1867, the dead were removed from the field where they died and reburied at Cave Hill.

But acid rain and heat and cold extremes eventually ate away the porous limestone that commemorated the battle. Most of the inscription which hailed the unit in German for “fighting nobly in defense of the free Constitution of the United States of America” disappeared.

While most of the damage occurred in recent decades, it wasn’t until a Civil War memorial event was held in 2002 that historians and others began to realize the monument was disintegrating.

A wooden cover was erected to protect it from the elements, but, at the urging to Peake and others, the monument was removed from Cave Hill in 2008 for renovations.

“It was in sad, sad shape,” said University of Louisville archaeologist Phil DiBlasi, who works closely with local cemeteries.

With the help of the National Cemetery Administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs and Kentucky historical officials, contractors working at the University of Louisville recently finished cleaning the monument, including injecting microscopic glass beads into the pores to firm up the limestone.

“We normally don’t take a historic object from its location, but we decided we needed to go to extreme measures to save this,” said Sara Amy Leach, a senior historian with the National Cemetery Administration, who estimated the cost of the effort to be in excess of $300,000, which is being paid for by the federal government.

Now, the only question is where the original monument will rest.

In the next few weeks, National Cemetery Administration officials are likely to choose among potential locations including the Frazier International History Museum, the Hart County historical society and the Patton Museum near Fort Knox, all of which offer climate-controlled environments and the ability to showcase the monument.

Finding a proper home is important to scholars and descendants, who view it as a key piece of Kentucky’s rich tapestry of Civil War history.

“It’s important because it’s the oldest, and these were men from Germany who were willing to fight for their country,” Eisenbeis said. “It was a noble act, and it should be remembered.”