KSLA News 12 Shreveport, Louisiana |Civil War site recovering after 2 hurricanes
Member Center:
Associated Press - May 30, 2009 4:05 AM ET
SABINE PASS, Texas (AP) - The bronze likeness of Confederate Lt. Dick Dowling has survived two hurricanes in the last five years.
That's as against the odds as the few dozen rebel Texas soldiers he led to victory against a huge Union flotilla almost 150 years ago.
But the double whammy of 2005's Hurricane Rita and last year's Ike left the Sabine Pass Battleground Park in shambles. Trees were toppled and ripped out. Historical markers were snapped off, and creature comforts for visitors were swept away in 1 of the few Civil War battlefield sites in Texas.
The 57-acre park on the coastal Texas-Louisiana border is considered 1 of the nation's most threatened Civil War battlefields by the Civil War Preservation Trust. It's where Dowling and his men stood fast against a Union attempt to invade Texas and wrest the state from the Confederacy in September 1863.
Now, there's been a healthy dose of tender loving care from the lone caretaker who oversees the park maintenance and a $600,000 rebuilding program directed by the Texas Historical Commission. The battlefield site is to reopen probably in September - just in time for the most dangerous part of the hurricane season that starts this weekend.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
