Tan). 
 
 Duke University Libraries 
 
 Resolutions ado 
 Conf Pam #251 
 
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, Jan. 30, 1865.— Laid on 
 the table and ordered to be printed. 
 
 [By the Chair.] 
 
 RESOLUTIONS 
 
 Adopted by the Officers and Men of (he rylth Virginia Regiment. 
 
 Head Quarters, 57th Va. Infantry, 
 Januarij 26, 1865. 
 
 The following resolutions were read to, and adopted by the officers 
 and men of the fifty-seventh Virginia Regiment, tiiis day : 
 
 Whereas the long continuance of the bloody struggle in which we 
 have been engaged during the last four years, for liberty, indepen- 
 dence, and all the sacred rights dear to men ; the many sacrifices 
 which the army and people have been called upon to make in the 
 prosecution of the war ; the many trials and dangers which beset us 
 upon every side — and above all, the reverses which have recently 
 befallen us — disaster after disaster having followed each other in rapid 
 succession — have caused some of our people to hesitate, to falter in 
 the brave, proud course which has hitherto been marked oiit^or them, 
 and even to think of retracing their steps, of recanting their declara- 
 tion of independence from the accursed Yankee despotism which 
 once enthralled us; and actually to dream of submission to that 
 enemy who has been guilty of the most fiendish outrages and cruel- 
 ties ; has desolated and destroyed our country, and committed every 
 barbarity recorded in the past annals of rapacity, wrong and rapine. 
 Therefore, for the benefit of all such weak-minded and misguided men, 
 whether in the army or out of it, by the veterans of the 57th Regi- 
 ment of Virginia Infantry, who have, during the whole war, been 
 breasting every danger, and always ready to discharge their duty to 
 their country and her sacred cause: 
 
 1. Be it resolved, That now is no time to dream of submission and 
 reconstruction, when the enemy is at our very door; when the blood 
 of our brothers, our sons and our fathers call upon us for vengeance ; 
 when their bones lie bleaching on every hill-top and valley, from the 
 blood-stained heights of Gettysburg to the placid waters of the Rio 
 Grande; while the shrieks of our msulted women ring ever in our 
 ear; while the smoke of a whole country, consumed and desolated, 
 yet hangs over the lovely Valley of the Shenandoah, and when the 
 flames which destroyed the whole of Central Georgia have scarce 
 died out. 
 
2. Reeolved, That in such a condition of things as now reigns in 
 our beloved country, to abandon the struggle, and surrender the cause 
 which all have so long been engaged in defending, would be acts of 
 the basest cowardice, and would not only cause our ruin as a people, 
 together with the loss of our national self-respect, and all that we 
 hold dear, but also consign us and our children to a bondage and 
 slavery which would be insupportably base and degi-ading, and hand 
 us and our posterity down to the latest time, coupled with an infamy 
 to which any thing — even annihilation itself — were far preferable. 
 
 3. Resolved, That we take occasion to express our unbounded con- 
 fidence in that great and glorious patriot. General R. E. Lee, who 
 has so often led us to victory, and our belief that if sustained by the 
 people, the goverunicut and army, he will lead us again to victory 
 and success, and crown our efforts with an honorable independence 
 and lasting peace ; that we again dedicate ourselves to the cause, and 
 express our detennination to Hght to the lagt, to gain our freedom, or 
 perish in the attempt. 
 
 t. Resolved, That a copy of this preamble and I'esolutions be for- 
 warded to the Richmond papers for publication ; also to the Virginia 
 Legislature and Confederate Congress. 
 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 C. R. FONTAINE, Col. 
 Hon. Tnos. S. Bocock — Rkhmmd, Va. 
 
penmalipe* 
 
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