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Nation's first soldiers honored
By MARK DAVIS
Posted by Patricia Freeman Hardin, pfhardin@carolina.rr.com
Article from: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution published at Atlanta, GA on 10/24/05
The 10 men formed a fine line, their tricornered hats just so. Their navy blue and tan militia coats looked splendid Sunday in the little bit of sun that shone through magnolias and oaks to illuminate aged tombstones.
"Carry arms!" Paul Prescott of Woodstock barked. The men spun on their heels and tramped past obelisks and rock walls at the Old Baptist Cemetery in Monroe. The color guard stopped at a shaded spot where a small stone remembered Henry Hardin — North Carolina boy, Georgia man, American patriot: a veteran of the Revolutionary War.
A few paces away rested the remains of John H. Walker, originally of Maryland. Like Hardin, he took up arms against one of the world's great powers. And, like Hardin, he lived a long life, dying in Georgia decades after 13 upstart colonies dared declare their independence from Great Britain.
Sunday was their day. On a perfect afternoon, with crows cawing in the distance, the Button Gwinnett chapter of the Georgia Society of Sons of the American Revolution placed plaques on both men's graves. The brass symbols remind passers-by that they were some of the first Americans to take up the defense of liberty.
About 50 people watched the commemoration, including Sydney Wynn McRee of Milledgeville. She's 14, Hardin's great-great-great- great-great-great- granddaughter.
"I've always known about him," said Sydney, who is in the 10th grade.
"She's been interested in her ancestors since age 3," said her grandmother, Sybil Bridges, great-great-great-great-granddaughter of Hardin.
Not much is known about either soldier. Hardin was born in North Carolina on May 8, 1750, and entered the service for that state in 1777. He came to Georgia sometime after the war ended, married, and outlived two wives. He died at 93 on Nov. 12, 1843.
Walker was born Christmas Day, 1763, in Maryland, and enlisted at an unknown date in Virginia. He moved to Georgia after the 1775-1783 war, where he became a Baptist minister, marrying and burying two wives. His third wife buried him on June 19, 1836. Walker was 72.
The ceremony marked graves Nos. 95 and 96 that the Georgia SAR has recognized in less than a decade, society officials said. They expect to honor more.
Because Georgia was the only state of the original 13 that held land lotteries, it attracted veterans from across the young nation.
Georgia's population stood at 40,000 in 1775, said Glenn T. Eskew,an associate professor of history at Georgia State University. By 1800, that number had increased fourfold, to 162,000.
"It was like a swarm of locusts," said Eskew, who specializes in Southern and Georgia history. Included were men who had taken up arms for a new country, he said.
Records from Gwinnett, which commenced land lotteries in 1820, show just how pervasive the new settlers were. At least 13 former Virginia militiamen, or their widows, are listed in J.C. Flanigan's "History of Gwinnett County, Vol. 1" as residents.
Other veterans settled in parts of what would become metro Atlanta, headed to the coast or moved into the leafy green reaches of the mountains, said Von Starkey of Norcross. An SAR member, Starkey traces his Revolutionary War lineage to Joseph Starkey, a 17-year-old Quaker from Virginia who signed up with Gen. Nathanael Greene to oppose a regime an ocean away.
The organization has marked graves all over the state, "but there are just as many we don't know about as we do know about," he said.
The graves show up in church cemeteries, family plots and, on occasion, in unadorned tracts in the woods, Starkey said. In metro Atlanta, genealogists and others are looking at several sites where veterans' graves may be located, including plots in Norcross and Duluth, he said.
Now, two have been recognized in a quiet old cemetery not three blocks from the Walton County Courthouse in Monroe.
"Carry arms!"
The men in the color guard stepped to the right and tramped away, their shadows moving across aged stones.
Walker's and Hardin's new plaques gleamed, even in the shade.