Marietta Confederate Cemetery - "Garden of Heroes" - Marietta, GA - Georgia Historical Markers on Waymarking.com

This cemetery was established on property once owned by the First Baptist Church of Marietta. Following the church's move, John H. Glover, Marietta's first mayor, bought this parcel. His wife, Jane Porter Glover, permitted this quiet corner of their 3,000-acre Bushy Park Plantation to accommodate the burial of approximately 20 Confederate soldiers of the 50th Tennessee Infantry Regiment who perished in a train wreck north of Marietta on September 13, 1863. New graves were added following the Battle of Chickamauga on September 19 and 20, 1863. Major expansions occurred after the war's fighting reached nearby Kennesaw Mountain on June 27, 1864.
The greatest expansion of the cemetery took place after the war. In 1866, the Georgia Legislature appropriated $3,500 to collect the remains of Confederate soldiers who fell elsewhere and bring them to Marietta for reburial. Catherine Winn of the Ladies' Aid Society and Mary Green of the Georgia Memorial Association spearheaded the recovery effort. They organized groups of women to search for soldiers killed on the battlefields at Chickamauga, Ringgold, Kennesaw Mountain, Kolb Farm and other points north of the Chattahoochee River.
As the original wooden grave markers weathered away, the names of soldiers buried here were lost. In 1902, caretakers replaced the wooden markers with plain marble markers. The Ladies' Memorial Association turned the property over to the State of Georgia in 1908. That same year the Kennesaw Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy dedicated the tall marble veterans' monument "To Our Confederate Dead." Former Confederate Brigadier General Clement A. Evans referred to the cemetery as "a rare garden of heroes" when he helped dedicate the monument.

In 1910, an act of Congress returned Marietta's “Little Cannon” to the cemetery from an arsenal in Watervilet, New York. Captured near Savannah in 1864, its 6-pounder barrel had originally been cast before the war for the Georgia Military Institute's use. The barrel's Latin inscription, “Victrix fortunae Sapientia," translates to “Wisdom, the Victor over Fortune."

Also in 1910, fifteen identical markers were placed among the cemetery's headstones, One marker was placed for each of the eleven Confederate states, plus one for Kentucky, a single one for Maryland and Missouri, one for the Confederate Soldiers Home section, and one for the Hospital section. More than 3,000 Confederate soldiers now lie in the cemetery.
The Confederate Soldiers Home section includes the grave of Bill Yopp, an African-American drummer for the 14th Georgia Infantry Regiment. Born into slavery near Dublin, Georgia, Bill was the personal servant of Thomas Yopp. When Thomas joined the Confederate army, he took Bill with him. Bill performed various tasks for the soldiers, always charging ten cents. He gained the nickname “Ten Cent Bill.”

In his later years, Bill, who took the last name of his former master, re-joined Thomas Yopp at the Confederate Soldiers Home. Bill Yopp was made a member of the United Confederate Veterans before dying in 1936.

Type of Marker: Other Marker #: 22 Sponsor: Georgia Civil War Heritage Trail, Inc. Date: Not listed

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