"Bears a mark from the ... 'onpleasantness'"
"He still retains the his old soldier cap and canteen which he carried through the sanguinary battle of Missionary Ridge, at Chickamauga Gap."
One of the themes of my forthcoming book, Klandamentalism: Bob Jones at the Intersection of Revivalism, Politics, and White Supremacy, is that the founder of Bob Jones University is no different from his dad and his dad’s dad and every patriarch before him.
Bob Jones, Sr.’s father was William Alexander Jones (April 1835-October 13, 1900). And like most Alabamian working class farmers, Alex Jones was very active in the Farmer’s Alliance.
I can tell you all about the Farmer’s Alliance too. I had to cut big portions of Alliance history out of the book, so that will come at a later time.
But one Spring day in 1893, Alex popped into the Ozark Banner-Advertiser office to shoot the breeze. The Banner was the local Alliance paper. Alabama was the most mediated iteration of the Farmer’s Alliance. That is, more Alabama Alliances had weekly newspapers than in any other state. And these weeklies had to fill eight pages with something, and in May, they added this:
Bro. W. A. Jones of Brannan Stand, who was in Co. H, 37th Ala., and who bears a mark from the [great?] “onpleasantness” that he will carry to his grave, was in the BANNER office the other day, and informed us that he still retains his old soldier cap and canteen, which he carried through the sanguinary battle of Missionary Ridge, at Chickamauga Gap. Bro. Jones has turned his sword into pruning hook and his shield into a plow share, and is now doing well cultivating mother Earth.
Do you know how many people repeat that Alex Jones’s story that he was wounded at Chickamauga? It’s not just BJU’s official historians, Melton Wright, R. K. Johnson and Dan Turner.
Terry Rude, Sons of the Confederate Veterans Chaplain, states it in his 1991, “Southern Manhood” sermon.
Mark Dalhouse in his University of Georgia Press book in 1996.
Ronaldo Reynoso in his Pratt Institute Master’s thesis in 2006.
Law scholar Olatunde C. Johnson in his published paper in 2010.
Richard Jordan repeated it for the Irish press in 2011.
The encyclopedia Wiley Library repeats it too in 2011.
BJU grad Anderson Rouse says as much in his 2015 Clemson University Master’s thesis.
Even Molly Worthen repeats it in her 2014 Oxford University Press book.
Folks, it’s a lie.
Rouse bends over backwards to figure out a way to make it true, but it’s not true. Bob repeats it, and Bob’s hagiographers repeat it. But it’s not true at all in any way.
The Civil War was recent enough that we have really detailed data about where each of the regiments were at any particular time. Alex and his brother Solomon Drayton both joined the CSA on March 18, 1862, at Lawrenceville, Alabama after Jefferson Davis asked Alabama to do its part for the Cause. Both Alex and Sol were in the 37th Alabama. I have tracked every important date for that regiment. The highlighted rows were big events for the Joneses.
The 37th Alabama was not at the Battle of Chickamauga on September 18-20, 1863. Both Sol and Alex had been captured at Vicksburg. Both were paroled (and most soldiers returned home during their paroles). They weren’t back fighting until Halloween in 1863 at Lookout Mountain.
Two other pieces of information disprove the Chickamauga myth:
Georgia Creel Jones conceived her daughter, Dorothy Alabama (they called her “Dolly Bama” in some family records), in August 1893 — when Alex was paroled at home.
Alex says to the pension examiner in 1899 that he was wounded at Mill Creek on April 9, 1864. He knew when he had to tell the truth.
Mill Creek is not Chickamauga.
The source for the lie that Alex fought at Chickamauga was Alex himself, as the Banner-Advertiser clipping from 1893 proves. He was the one repeating that he fought in a great victory for Dixie, while he was actually enjoying hearth and home in Alabama, and he would be wounded at Dixie’s great defeat near the end of the war.
It’s no surprise that Bob repeats what he heard from his dad. That’s understandable. Maybe even R. K. Johnson, Melton Wright, and Dan Turner can be excused. Terry Rude should know better since he’s in charge of Greenville’s Confederate museum.
And my friends Mark Dalhouse, Ronaldo Reynoso, Olatunde C. Johnson, Richard Jordan, Wiley Library, Anderson Rouse, and especially Molly Worthen — you all need to fix your texts.
Dolly Bama!