Dixie Diary 2: Checkered Allegiances

Block 2

Checkered Allegiances

8" version

Block 2 Checkered Allegiances

12" version with 1" frame

by Sandi Brothers

A checkered block represents the heart of the Southern and Northern loyalties in the Morgan family.

Photographer Andrew Lytle recorded

 Baton Rouge's occupation.

Here, Union tents camped near the Morgans' houses.

Baton Rouge (white star) is on the Mississippi River

northwest of New Orleans

In spring, 1862, Baton Rouge was at the center of a war zone with Union forces in charge and Confederate General Beauregard threatening to retake the town. The family had split their allegiances. Sarah's eldest brother Judge Philip Hicky Morgan was a Union supporter who left town. Two brothers, Gibbes and George, had joined the Confederate Army and the youngest boy Jimmy was in the Confederate Navy.

James Morris Morgan was about

 17 in 1862. He'd been a cadet at the 

United States Naval

Academy when the war began.

Brother-in-law Richard Coulter Drum

 was promoted  to General after the War.

Sister Lavinia Morgan Drum, ten years older than Sarah, was married to a Captain in the United States Army, one who remained loyal to the Union. Lavinia and Captain Drum spent the Civil War in California.

With father and brother Henry dead and the others in the armed forces on opposing sides, the Morgan women---mother, sisters and sisters-in-law---were left in their homes, adjacent houses on Church Street. Should they stay in town and brave the coming battles or flee to a family home in rural Greenwell Springs? Unpracticed in making important decisions, they felt unable to act.

From Sarah's diary:

June 4 1862, Baton Rouge

"Our condition is desperate. [Confederate General] Beauregard is about attacking these Federals. They say he is coming from Corinth, and the fight will be in town. If true we are lost again. Starvation at Greenwell, fever and bullets here, will put an end to us soon enough. There is no refuge for us, no one to consult. Brother [Philip], whose judgment we rely on as implicitly as we did on father's we hear has gone to New York; there is no man in Louisiana whose decision I would blindly abide by. Let us stay and die. We can only die once; we can suffer a thousand deaths with suspense and uncertainty."

Applique a heart or a star after piecing.

Cutting 12":

A – Cut 2 light and 2 medium light squares 4-3/4".

B -  Cut 1 dark and 1 medium dark square 7-1/4". Cut each into 4 triangles with 2 cuts.

Cutting 8":

A – Cut 2 light and 2 medium light squares 3-3/8" (3-5/16" if you use the 1/16" default in EQ).

B - Cut 1 dark and 1 medium dark square 5-1/4" (5-3/16"). Cut each into 4 triangles with 2 cuts. 

Notice how the dark/light shading changes in those triangles.

James in his seventies

Sarah wasn't the only writer in the Morgan family. Brother James wrote his own memoirs of the Confederate Navy.

http://docsouth.unc.edu/fpn/morganjames/summary.html 

And their Union-sympathizing brother Philip Hicky Morgan left his mark as grandfather to the three beautiful Morgan sisters of the 1920s: Consuelo Morgan Thaw and twins Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt and Thelma Morgan, Lady Furness. Read more about the more modern Morgans here:
http://bullrunnings.wordpress.com/2008/04/28/family-ties-kilpatrick-part-ii/