News Release

Clark Lee and His “Service” to the Confederacy

Date: September 2, 2022
Contact: Kim Coons, 706-866-9241, ext. 139

Fort Oglethorpe, GA: On Saturday, September 3, at 2 pm, Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park will present a digital program about the Civil War “service” of Clark Lee, a locally enslaved man who was taken to war by his enslaver, and his subsequent struggle to receive a Tennessee State Pension in the early 1920s. Two weeks later, on Saturday, September 17, at 11:30 am, the park will host an 90-minute, in-person facilitated discussion about the information provided in the recorded program. The discussion will be held at the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center.

In 1921, the Tennessee State Legislature passed a bill to “Pension Negro Cooks and Servants.” Soon, news of the bill’s passage hit the papers, one of which estimated “that there will be thousands of dollars given to disabled members of the race who saw service with the Gray and who were loyal to their masters...” A few months later, Clark Lee applied for a pension created by this bill, yet he was denied. It took two years and the falsification of a Confederate veteran’s service record to finally secure Lee’s pension for his “service” to the Confederacy, though not as a combatant, but as an enslaved servant to a white officer. We hope you will join us for both the digital and the in-person programs presented about the intriguing story of Clark Lee.

The digital program can be found at the following address: www.nps.gov/chch/learn/photosmultimedia/chchafricanamericanexperiences.htm

For more information about programs Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park, contact the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center at 706-866-9241, the Lookout Mountain Battlefield Visitor Center at 423-821-7786, or visit the park website at www.nps.gov/chch