Ruminations on the Bonnie Blue Flag

I consider myself generally aware of history. Like everyone I’m more knowledgeable about some parts of our history than others. But in the course of my life I have read small libraries full of history books and it’s a topic that I have a deep and abiding interest in. So it was with no small bit of surprise that I recently learned the history of the Bonnie Blue Flag.

Being a self-reliant sort who firmly believes in being responsible for one’s own self, I am hesitant to place the full blame for my own ignorance on anyone but me. However, since I was born and raised in Northeast Florida, I still can’t help but feel that my (public) school teachers were somehow remiss in not teaching us about a period in Florida’s history that in my opinion was, and is, highly relevant!

Going just a little further along in the flag’s history, I learned of its role in the War Between the States, and the song that it inspired. I’m to understand that The Bonnie Blue Flag was second in popularity only to Dixie among the men who fought for the CSA.

I know one thing, I find myself singing this little ditty more and more. And maybe it’s just the ghosts of my twenty Confederate ancestors tapping me on the shoulder, but when I sing it, I get way more of a sense of pride than any time I might have sung this thing!