150 years later, state secedes once more

RALEIGH, N.C. -- With the dropping of a cotton handkerchief and the firing of muskets, North Carolina seceded from the United States again Saturday.

But while state officials in 1861 were worrying about how to prepare for the military conflict ahead, the challenge was far different 150 years later. State officials re-enacting the 150th anniversary of North Carolina's secession, and other Civil War sesquicentennial events over the next four year, are trying to recognize the events without appearing to glorify them.

The watchword Saturday was commemoration, not celebration, of the state's decision to join the Confederacy and engage in a war that would cost more than 30,000 North Carolinian lives.

"We don't feel from an agency standpoint that something that killed 625,000 men over a period of four years should be celebrated," said Keith Hardison, director of the division of state Historic Sites & Properties for the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources. "But it was a major turning point for the state and needs to be commemorated."

The issue of how to mark the 150th anniversary of the Civil War has been sensitive.

The national NAACP has said that Civil War observances shouldn't romanticize Confederate soldiers. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People also says the sesquicentennial shouldn't ignore that slavery was the primary cause of the war - a contention disputed by groups such as the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

Hardison said the state has tried to approach the 150th anniversary events with a "just the facts" approach, in contrast to the 1960s when, he said, Southern states celebrated the war's centennial.

Hardison said commemoration means explaining the context of the state's actions and how divided North Carolinians were about secession. The state was one of the last to secede, only doing so on May 20, 1861, after President Abraham Lincoln called on states to provide soldiers following the Confederate shelling of Fort Sumter in South Carolina.

"There were people who wanted war and people who wanted peace," Hardison said. "There were secessionists and Unionists. These are all the viewpoints we want to commemorate over the next four years."

On Saturday, the state House chambers in the State Capitol were filled with spectators to watch a re-enactment of the Secession Convention vote that removed North Carolina from the Union. The vote 150 years ago was unanimous, but some spectators in the gallery Saturday shouted "no." Rick Walton, playing the role of convention chairman, later quipped that he should have called the sergeant at arms to deal with the naysayers.

Walton, a retired engineer from Wendell and a Civil War re-enactor, said he's also mindful of the fine line he walks as he leads tours at the State Capitol.

"I'm not here to pitch a point of view," Walton said. "I'm not here to be pro-secession or anti-secession. But I want you to understand what led up to secession."

After the vote, the crowd gathered outside to watch the dropping of the handkerchief that signaled to spectators 150 years ago that North Carolina had seceded. The moment was marked by an infantry salute and cheers from the re-enactors, and some from the audience.

Arnold Huskins marked the dropping of the handkerchief by enthusiastically waving his Bonnie Blue flag, an unofficial Confederate flag used during the early months of the war. Huskins, who grew up in Lincolnton, northwest of Charlotte, was visiting Raleigh for the first time since the 1980s.

"My family suffered horribly during the war," said Huskins, 51, a retired Air Force major who now lives in Georgia. "I had to remember them."

Michael Ferrell, a Civil War re-enactor from Fremont in Wayne County, said he came to pay his respects to the State Capitol building and all the events that took place there 150 years ago.

"I just want it to be historically accurate and to portray history as it was," Ferrell said