But it was the Confederacy that died on that stone wall as the men in gray were repulsed by the Union forces. Their charge had failed. General Garnett, who was ill on the day of the charge, led his men into what was described as a mission to "hell or glory." As he plunged with his men through a hail storm of lead, Garnett was ripped apart by grape shot and was left unidentified on Gettysburg's field.

The honor these dead Confederates were denied in life, they found in death. On June 20, 1872, fifteen wagons were assembled at Rocketts Landing to carry the boxes containing the remains of the Confederate dead. Each wagon was draped in mourning and was escorted by two former Confederate soldiers with their muskets reversed. The funeral procession, which included both political as well as military leaders of the recently defeated Confederate nation, wound its way up Main Street as it moved toward Hollywood Cemetery.

There was nothing comparable to the Gettysburg Address for these soldiers. There were no memorable orations; only a prayer by The Rev. Dr. Moses Hoge of Richmond's Second Presbyterian Church was spoken. The prayer contained these lines: "We thank Thee that we have been permitted to bring back from their graves among strangers all that is mortal of our sons and brothers."

On Jan. 6, 1899, Rev. Dr. Hoge passed and now sleeps with his 18,000 beloved Confederate soldiers at Hollywood, Richmond.

Dr. Hoge prayed for those who had survived the war and then intoned, "Engrave upon the hearts of...all the young men of our Commonwealth the remembrance of the patriotic valor, the loyalty to truth, to duty, and to God, which characterized the heroes around whose remains we weep, and who surrendered only to the last enemy...death." Following the prayer, three musket volleys were fired in a final tribute to those whose bodies were laid to rest for all eternity on Hollywood's sacred hill. The sounds of the muskets echoed across the cemetery, across the River James, and they still echo today across the pages of history.