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Tullahoma’s Civil War Cemetery lies within the boundaries of Maplewood Cemetery on Maplewood Avenue on the city’s southwest side. It sits on land donated in 1889 by Col. Matthew Martin, 23^rd Tennessee Infantry, Confederate States of America (CSA).

Tullahoma had been home to Gen. Braxton Bragg’s Confederate Army of Tennessee in 1863, and as such hosted many CSA troops, including ones injured in battles nearby and ones who were sick due to various ailments. Tullahoma was therefore the site of three CSA hospitals. One was located at the current location of the Tullahoma Fine Arts Center, which was across the road from Bragg’s headquarters area. Another was located at about 209 S. Atlantic St. The purpose of Martin’s donating property for the cemetery was to provide an honorable resting place for the bodies of soldiers who had been killed in action in the area, or who had succumbed to their illnesses or injuries in the hospitals located here.

Martin deeded the property to a board of trustees and stipulated that each trustee must either be “a true Confederate soldier or a descendant of a sympathizer.” Also, no one was to be buried in the cemetery after 1889 unless they were “killed or died in actual service to the Confederate States of America” and “whose remains their friends wished buried in this grave-yard (sic).” It is believed that as many as 500 former soldiers are buried there, and originally their individual graves were marked with wooden headboards. Time and the elements long ago erased those markers.

In 1900, the United Daughters of the Confederacy erected an iron gate and a fence, which still stand. The Tullahoma Civil War Centennial Commission in 1964 erected the monument that stands in the center of the cemetery. Members of that commission were Paul Pyle, Bob Couch, Jr., Wirt M Armstead, Roy L. Mitchell, Paul Turner, John W. Harton, Sr., James Puckett, and Ben H. Wilkins, Jr.

The Benjamin F. Cheatham Camp No. 72 Sons of the Confederacy took on the task of identifying the soldiers buried at the cemetery, beginning in 1992. They examined muster rolls and other documents, and by 1994 had identified about 400 of the men buried there. Two large brass plaques now present those names.

At one corner of the monument installation is a cast iron Cross of Honor marker. The Cross of Honor was originally established as a medal given by the United Daughters of the Confederacy, and it was retired by the time the last CSA veterans died. Markers like the one here mimic those medals and are only allowed to be distributed by the Department of Veterans Affairs on graves of Confederate veterans.

Questions: There are stones around the base of the monument installation with names of CSA soldiers who do not appear on the brass plaques. Were they identified by family after the plaques were completed? One other curious thing is that just outside the Confederate Cemetery fence is another grave with a headstone for CSA Pvt. John W. Hill who died in 1912. Was he a local soldier who didn’t fit the criteria to be inside the fence but who desired to be buried near his comrades?

Sources: Information placard at the Confederate Cemetery; Historic Tullahoma by Paul Pyle; supporting information courtesy of Wikipedia.

If you have interesting Tullahoma area stories and photos from the past, please contact me: alanmayes@lighttube.net