Furl That Banner: The Life of Abram J Ryan, Poet-priest of the South

In 1879, Abram J. Ryan's name was a household name in the South, especially after the publication of his book Father Ryan's Poems. His poems ?The Conquered Banner? and ?The Sword of Robert Lee?, were committed to memory by generations of children in the South. Margaret Mitchell, who knew them by heart, included Ryan as a character in GWTW because of her admiration for his work. Ryan was the editor of the Banner of the South, an anti-Reconstruction newspaper, in Augusta, Georgia, and popularized the term ?Lost Cause?. His outspoken views of government policies caused him to lose the support of the paper's owner. He moved to Mobile, Alabama, serving as a parish priest for ten years. He also spent three of these years as the editor of the Catholic weekly of New Orleans, the Morning Star and Catholic Messenger. This book is the first to place the Ryan story in its proper place.