Close of Civil War to be Celebrated in Oxford

Tickets are now available for “The Observance of the 150th Anniversary of the Cessation of the Civil War” on Saturday, April 11, from 1-3 p.m. Sponsored by the Oxford Historical Society and funded by the Connecticut Community Foundation, the program will be held at the Oxford Congregational Church at 3 Academy Road.

Admission is free, but due to limited seating, tickets are required. They are available from the Oxford Town Clerk’s Office in the S. B. Church Memorial Town Hall, at the Twitchell-Rowland Homestead Museum on Sunday, March 15 from 2-4 p.m. or by calling 203 888-0230. Tickets are limited to two per person.

Planned as a tribute to the 107 men who enlisted in the Union Army from Oxford, the program features reenactors playing the roles of Abraham Lincoln and Major Philo Buckingham. An ecumenical choir will present a selection of patriotic songs, some of which would have been sung by local soldiers as they went off to battlefields in the South. A bell ringing ceremony will accompany the reading of the names of those who served, and descendants of those men will be honored. Following the program, refreshments made from Civil War period recipes will be served.

Students from Mrs. Sue Gibbons Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Grade Enrichment Classes are participating in an essay contest, modelling their writing on Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. Mr. Lewis Dube, Abraham Lincoln reenactor, will read the best essay and award its author with a $50 prize from the Oxford Historical Society.

Those seeking further information can call 203 888-0230.