8th GA Co. C - Andrew McKenna

Top photo overlooks the final resting places of Andrew and Anastasia McKenna and their
five children who died young. The Stephen McKenna family site is in the foreground.
The scene is in Oak Ridge Cemetery, off Riverside Drive in Macon, Georgia.

"IN MEMORIAM OF ANDREW MCKENNA"

On the 8th day of December, 1885, after a life honorable to himself and useful to his fellowmen, Andrew McKenna was gathered to his Father. It was my pleasure to call him friend in those busy days which formed the crucible of character, and it is with melancholy satisfaction that I today bear tribute to the golden worth developed there.

He was born in Tipperary, Ireland, and immigrated to this country while yet a boy. In 1861, while the clarion voice of freedom summoned all her children to her aid, true to the instinct which he had caught from the waves which wash the emerald shores of Erin and echo still the music of O'Connell's voice, at the early age of 18 he enlisted in the Macon Guards, Co. C, and with them entered the Eighth Georgia Regt. Desperately wounded at the first battle of Manassas, he did not deem his blood a sufficient libation on the altar of his adopted country's liberty, but on his recovery again pledged his life to that sacred cause. Soon after this he was detailed as my orderly as colonel of the regiment, and it was while he thus occupied my I tent that I learned to know him and esteem him as my friend.

Kind and true as a woman, he was brave to eminence even I when among the gallant Irish race from which he sprung. From Manassas to Appomattox be fought, and never a stain soiled his soldier's shield.

When hostilities were ended and we returned to that poverty scarcely less terrible than the trials through which we passed, his brave soul and his unflagging industry were a competency for himself and family and left as a rich legacy to his children a name synonymous of honesty. In peace as in war he won the respect of his fellow men. He was noted for his enterprise and public spirit, and for many years was foreman of the Mechanics Fire Company No.4.

He leaves a most amiable wife, formerly Miss Anastasia Dillon, of Savannah. I trust that the grief of this most estimable lady and of his children will be tempered by the recollection that he who has left them has left behind a name and a record to which they can always point with pride. In grief and sadness do I peruse this tear-dimmed chaplet to the memory of Andrew McKenna, one of the bravest of all my gallant soldiers of the Eighth Georgia, and I only regret that mine is not the eloquence to make it as honorable to him as would have proved the laurel crown of victory in the glorious cause for which he shed his warm young blood while yet he wore the rose of youth upon his heart.

L. M. LAMAR

Confederate Military Service Summary:

McKenna, Andrew---Musician April 15, 1861. Absent, sick, October 31, 1864. Received citation from regimental commander for bravery in action. Captured at Macon, Ga. April 20, 1865. (Born in Limerick, Ireland in 1840. Died December 8, 1885.)