Confederate uniform to be preserved

Posted 6:23PM on Monday 8th April 2002 ( 23 years ago )

ATLANTA - For more than 60 years, a Confederate uniform that belonged to an ancestor of former President Jimmy Carter has languished in a cardboard box because of an unusual will. Now the state is giving money to preserve the uniform and fulfill the wishes of the soldier's daughter. The uniform belonged to cavalryman Gilbert Perry Gordy, the great-great uncle of Carter. Gordy grew up in Chattahoochee County, just south of Columbus, and his mother spun the wool by hand and sewed the gray uniform before seeing him off to war in 1861. Gordy was wounded two years later at the Battle of Murfreesboro in Tennessee and died in 1864. The bullet hole and blood stains remain in the jacket. The uniform is collecting dust in a vault of the Chattahoochee County courthouse in Cusseta because of a quirk in the will of Gordy's only child, Carrie Parks. Parks willed the artifact to Chattahoochee County -- on the condition that the uniform remain in the county where it was sewn. Probate Judge Kenneth Van Horn started asking museums or preservationists to donate the help, and many agreed -- as long as they could have the uniform on permanent loan afterward. The uniform is worth at least $100,000 and considered extremely rare. Only a few surviving Confederate uniforms have known owners, especially one related to a U.S. president. The Georgia Capitol Museum also offered to take the uniform, but Van Horn resisted sending it away permanently because of Parks' will. That's when state Sen. Ed Harbison, D-Columbus, heard about the uniform. The senator is an admitted history buff and was alarmed to learn such a valuable artifact hadn't been maintained. Harbison and Senate Appropriations Chairman George Hooks, a longtime friend of Carter's, worked to put $25,000 in the budget to pay for preservation. That way, the county can afford the expensive work and will be able to bring it home afterward.

http://accesswdun.com/article/2002/4/196344