Old Fiddlers Contest

Local communities often contributed to the expense of building or operating Confederate soldiers’ homes. In 1902 residents of Morganfield, Kentucky, staged a two-day Old Fiddlers Contest and raised more than $200 for the Kentucky Confederate Home.

The event had some political overtones, however: two of the competing fiddlers were opponents in an upcoming election.

John B. Brasher and E. P. Taylor were both candidates for Congress in the Morganfield district. After a day and night of fiddling, the contest came down to a head-to-head competition between the two politicians. Contest organizers declared the men co-winners (though Taylor beat Brasher in the primary election several months later).

(See Hopkinsville Kentuckian, April 11, 1902.)

An Invitation

After several years of research on the history of the Kentucky Confederate Home (as well as on the people who organized it, built it, supported it, managed it and lived in it), I’m left with scraps of stories that didn’t quite fit into the resulting book. This blog is a way to share those stories.

If you have stories of your own about the Kentucky Confederate Home (or any of the other Confederate soldiers’ homes), I invite you to share them. Write me at ky.confedhome@yahoo.com.

Along the way, I might post news or events relating to the Confederate soldiers’ homes and information about the publication of “My Old Confederate Home: A Respectable Place for Civil War Veterans”.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated.