Clint Ross (left) directs Nazar Loun and Zach Graber (right), with Michael Aubrecht (center), at the Innis House near the Sunken Road. MIKE MORONES/THE FREE LANCE-STAR View More Images from this story Visit the Photo Place

War 'Angel' to amaze again

Filmmakers shoot Fredericksburg scenes for documentary on South Carolinian who won his enemies' gratitude for risky act of charity

Date published: 8/1/2009

By CLINT SCHEMMER

Richard Rowland Kirkland is arguably the most famous enlisted man of the Civil War.

His compassionate deeds on the Fredericksburg battlefield earned him acclaim from friend and foe alike, and a nickname--"the Angel of Marye's Heights"--that has endured down through the decades.

Yet Kirkland's story hasn't been the stuff of film, our most compelling medium.

Now, a South Carolina filmmaker and a Fredericksburg historian aim to change that.

"Of all the facets of the Civil War, this is one that people can connect with," director Clint Ross said during shooting this week at Marye's Heights. "Everyone understands Kirkland's principles. His act of mercy itself, you can't dispute that."

Ross has spent this week in the area with a three-man crew--cinematographer Zach Graber, first assistant cameraman Naza Loun and set designer Clayton de Wet--shooting scenes for their documentary on Kirkland's life. All four are graduate students at the Savannah School of Art and Design.

Spotsylvania County resident Michael Aubrecht, author of several books on Civil War history, has arranged interviews, done research and guided Ross and his team to evocative sites for shooting.

What the South Carolina sergeant did--leaping the Confederate defenses, under fire, to carry water to wounded and dying Union soldiers--profoundly impresses both men.

Ross, who wrote a screenplay for a different, earlier treatment of Kirkland's story, said he wants to give the film's battle scenes a nitty-gritty, you-are-there feeling reminiscent of "Saving Private Ryan" or HBO's "Band of Brothers."

"That a man would risk his life to aid his enemy, the very men that he and his comrades had been busy killing only hours before, is just amazing," Aubrecht said. "But it's true."

Kirkland, 19, was a combat veteran of First Manassas, Savage Station, Maryland Heights and Antietam. At Fredericksburg on Dec. 13, 1862, he and his comrades in the 2nd South Carolina Regiment assembled behind the stone wall below Marye's Heights and helped slaughter the Union attackers.

But that freezing night and the next morning, the cries of Union wounded left on the killing field haunted many who heard them, including Kirkland.

Among those being interviewed for Clint Ross' film are Donald Pfanz, staff historian at Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park; award-winning Fredericksburg storyteller Megan Hicks; Spotsylvania historian John Cummings; Spotsylvania author Michael Aubrecht; artist Mort Künstler; retired National Park Service historian Mac Wyckoff; South Carolina historian Joe Matheson; and a Roanoke boy, 10-year-old Richard Warren, who will portray the young Kirkland back on his family's farm near Camden, S.C. Hicks provided her perspectives on both Kirkland and Martha Stevens, the woman whose frame house became a postwar landmark on the Fredericksburg battlefield.

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Date published: 8/1/2009