One of the greatest lessons I have learned in life has to do when things do not go my way. Not only have I learned the importance of enduring the trial but maybe I am finally learning to appreciate it. God has always had a way of taking what we believe is bad and turning it into something good – even better than we ever imagined. I think we tend to get bogged down in the details while God is orchestrating our lives from a completely different vantage point and maybe even a different purpose.
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| Edward A. Goddard |
My great grandfather, Edward Aldrich Goddard, was in Macon that day among those Confederate troops. I’m quite certain that was a difficult day for my 23 year old future great grandfather. In fact, I would venture to say it was the worst day of his life. For almost four years, he had fought for the Confederacy. The fact that he had lived most of his life north of the Mason Dixon in Ohio with his grandparents and then later in Massachusetts had to weigh on his mind. Not sure if you have read about what it was like to fight in the Civil War but if not, you should do it sometimes. It had to be over the top crazy difficult. Here is a little snapshot:
The life of a soldier during the civil war wasn't easy. Not only did soldiers face the possibility of getting killed in battle, their daily lives were full of hardships. They had to deal with hunger, bad weather, poor clothing, and even boredom between battles. The soldiers of the civil war had to deal with terrible medical conditions. Doctors didn't know about infections. They didn't even bother to wash their hands! Many soldiers died from infections and disease. Even a small wound could end up infected and cause a soldier to die. The soldiers of the Civil War were often hungry. They mostly ate hard crackers made from flour, water, and salt called hardtack. Sometimes they would get salt pork or corn meal to eat. To supplement their meals, soldiers would forage from the land around them. They would hunt game and collect fruits, berries, and nuts whenever they could. By the end of the war, many soldiers in the Confederate army were on the verge of starvation. From American Civil War - Life as a Soldier in the Civil War.
Ed Goddard enlisted in the Confederate Army in Arkansas where he would join Company H of the Sixth Arkansas Infantry Regiment. After he finished school, Ed had moved from Massachusetts to Arkansas to work for his older brother. Incredibly he would spend the next almost four years of his life as an infantryman camping in all kinds of horrific conditions, hiking no telling how many miles, fighting many battles and losing many of his friends and comrades along the way. For you Civil War buffs - and to make a point, he fought in the Battle of Shiloh, Perryville, Murfreesboro, Chickamauga, Missionary Ridge, Ringgold Gap and was on the Sherman and Johnson Campaign from Dallas to Atlanta. He also participated in several days of fighting around Atlanta before the war ended. Somehow Ed found himself in Macon and was with the troops when they were forced to give up when the City of Macon surrendered to the Union forces in 1865.
I cannot even begin to imagine what he and all the others went through in that war – on both sides. The fact that Ed Goddard eventually ended up in Macon was not an accident though. It was part of the plan. Not the plan young Ed could see at the time, but the one God was orchestrating from that different vantage point. I am fairly confident when Ed signed on to join the confederacy, he had no idea he would end up in Macon Georgia. In fact I am very confident he had no way of knowing that.
To understand the bigger plan, there is more to the story.
Ed’s father, James, was one of the early settlers of Macon. James and his younger brother Bailey moved from Athol MA to Macon GA in the early 1820’s, well before any hint of a Civil War. James (Captain Goddard as was called) did really well in Macon and had many business interests including being a founder and president of an insurance company. He made his fortune, however, owning and operating a line of boats on the Ocmulgee River before the onset of the railroad. When you read about the Macon Train Depot being dedicated in the early 1840’s, James was there - even though he knew the railroad would eventually put him out of the boating business. The railroad disrupting the boating business would not be the only problem James faced. His eleven year old son drowned in the Ocmulgee River. James had a difficult time getting over that and his wife, Sophronia, never did get over it. James (Captain Goddard) died suddenly at 46 years old on a trip back to Massachusetts. The citizens of Macon erected a monument in James Goddard’s memory and it still stands today in the Goddard lot in Rose Hill Cemetery. Although we don’t know what caused James’ death, we do know that his young daughter had a premonition that he would die on that trip.
My future great grandfather was only five years old when his dad died. His mother was not well and would eventually be institutionalized or the vernacular of that day, put in an insane asylum. Ed’s maternal grandfather moved him to Perryville Ohio to live with him. He went to elementary school there before moving to Massachusetts to finish school – likely because family on the Goddard side lived there. As I have written, Ed later moved to Arkansas to work for his brother - and you have already read about his Civil War story.
The fact is Edward A. Goddard had a rough life for his first twenty three years. Any way you look at it, life was not easy for him. He lost both parents before he could ever have known them. He was sent off to Ohio to live with his grandfather in Ohio who either eventually passed away or could not look after him. He was then sent to Massachusetts to live with other relatives he could not have known. He finished school and moved all the way to Arkansas to work for his older brother, who I am sure felt sorry for him but he could not have known him well. Then after a short time there, he joined an army fighting for a cause he probably wasn’t sure about against his own friends and relatives in the north who talked more like him than the soldiers he fought beside.
When I wrote earlier that I would venture to say the day the Confederacy surrendered was the worst day of Ed’s life, I meant it. He had experienced many bad days but this had to be the icing on the cake for him. Defeated. Completely worn out. Sick enough that he had to be hospitalized.
Except there was a bigger story. There is always a bigger story. No matter what you are going through there is a bigger story being written that is seen from a different and better vantage point.
When the war ended for Ed, he would have only 50 cents to his name. But he was in Macon Georgia, the place of his birth. Although he could not have many memories, if any, of his young life there, people knew him because of the trail his dad blazed a couple of decades earlier.
Somehow and someway, Ed pulled himself together. He took his 50 cents in capital and began to trade. He bought a few cakes and make corn beer. Soon his business grew and demanded a larger store. He had been working out of a closet in the old Floyd House Building in Macon. Ed formed a partnership with the son of his dad’s good friend and their business (called Hines – Goddard) grew and they soon opened a branch store in Butler GA –some sixty miles away. After a short time, they moved the business from Butler to Reynolds. Ed bought out his business partner and married the partner’s sister. Ed Goddard’s business in Reynolds prospered and he became a successful businessman. Ed ended up owning not only the original business that included a funeral business but many residences in Reynolds and a modern (at the time) motion picture theater. He operated this business in Reynolds for almost 60 years until his death at 84 years of age in 1924. Three more generations of Goddard’s would follow his footsteps in that business in Reynolds.
I was the fourth generation owner and operator. I sold the business in 1997 after 131 consecutive years of business in Reynolds. In the last twenty years, it has been my good fortune to operate funeral homes and cemeteries all over the country. And more importantly, an opportunity to leverage the business principles and life principles that were passed down by my great grandfather to my grandfather, my father and my older brother and eventually to me
Interestingly, our youngest son and his family have moved back to Macon and are very involved in the community there. We now have come full circle. In fact, their third child was born in 2013 in Macon. His name is none other than... Hines Goddard.
From any human perspective, Edward A Goddard had a very tough life for the first 23 years of it. In light of his first 23 years, I can’t even begin to imagine what was going through his mind on April 20, 1865 when the troops surrendered to the Union Forces.
From my perspective 153 years later, Ed was in the right place at the right time. What had to seem overwhelming and incomprehensible to him then - only makes me smile today. Of all the places for him to be with the war ended but in Macon GA. The only place on earth where a path had been made years earlier.
One thing is for sure – if it wasn’t for the most difficult place of his life and the providence of God bringing him back to Macon, I would not be here today.
I will repeat what I stated in the first paragraph:
God has always had a way of taking what we believe is bad and turning it into something good – even better than we ever imagined. I think we tend to get bogged down in the details while God is orchestrating our lives from a completely different vantage point and maybe even a different purpose.
The lesson for all of us is a simple one. Although we may feel helpless and hopeless about whatever situation we face, the truth is we are not writing our story. God is not only our Creator but He is the great orchestrator of life. Only when we understand there is a bigger and better perspective will we be able to appreciate the current trial we face.
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