Since we were in Vicksburg for Memorial Day Weekend, we found Old Douglas.
Well, he’s actually not there, but there’s a marker for him:
It reads:
“Old Douglas” was the “faithful, patient’ camel of the 43rd MS Infantry Vols, CSA…
From what I’ve read, he wasn’t crazy about being tied up so the soldiers would let him roam around, but he never left the area where they would camp. He was a useful pack animal and was loved.
Douglas was killed in Vicksburg…when the 43rd MS Infantry Vols came to Vicksburg with him, a Union Army sharpshooter killed the camel under orders. Not nice.
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For whatever reason when I was looking this up earlier, I found an AP article that came out this month about the largest population of wild camels on earth (go ahead & guess where you think it is! no it’s not there — I totally got it wrong too). There are 1.2 million (million!!) wild camels in Australia. Australia! I know. And this is what the AP says the government there wants to do about it.