Semester of Graduation

Spring 2025

Degree

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

History

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

In June 1863, at the height of the American Civil War, Lieutenant Commander John Elliot Hart of the USS Albatross received a Masonic funeral with the assistance of Confederate Freemasons in the cemetery of Grace Episcopal Church. Every year since 1997, the town of St. Francisville, Louisiana, where the event occurred, has reenacted the burial truce. Now remembered in St. Francisville’s history as “The Day the War Stopped,” the unusual circumstances surrounding Hart’s burial gave rise to a romantic legend about the event, leading the Grand Lodge of Louisiana to commemorate the occasion with a memorial gravestone in 1955. Today, townspeople continue to observe Hart’s burial truce through their annual historical performance. The story of Hart’s burial serves as an ideal case to examine how historical events and figures are memorialized, commemorated, and mythologized in small communities.

Date

3-23-2025

Committee Chair

Prince, K. Stephen

Available for download on Tuesday, March 23, 2032

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