Powderworks chimney is the first monument to the Confederacy

Editor:

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Re the May 28 letter from Bill Wells, "Confederate Powderworks Chimney not only structure from CSA":

Yes, Mr. Wells, Col. George W. Rains expanded the existing Augusta Arsenal and made many additions. The Confederate Powderworks did not exist prior to the war, so it was the only structures started and finished by order of Jefferson Davis and the Confederate government.

The Confederate Powderworks in Augusta was the second-largest gunpowder factory in the world during that era of the 19th century.

Col. Rains designed the obelisk chimney of the Powderworks to "...remain a monument to the Confederacy, should the Powderworks pass away."

This gives Augusta the "first" Confederate monument erected, designed by Confederate officers, built and paid for by the Confederate government.

The next-oldest Confederate monument in Augusta is at Fort Gordon, erected by the Lindwood Sunday School and bearing a date of June 1866.

T.W. Highsmith

Evans

T.W. Highsmith currently is residing at Camp Lindsey, Kandahar, Afghanistan.