xt7v9s1khr4z https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7v9s1khr4z/data/mets.xml M., S. C. 1888 books b92-135-29325152 English Dennison & Brown, : New York : Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. Hopkinsville (Ky.) Monuments. Latham Confederate Monument (Hopkinsville, Ky.)Breathitt, James W. Deems, Charles Force, 1820-1893. Breckinridge, W. C. P. (William Campbell Preston), 1837-1904. Story of a monument : memorial of the unveiling of the monument to the unknown confederate dead, May 19, 1887, at Hopkinsville, Ky. / by S.C.M. and addresses of Hon. James Breathitt, Charles F. Deems, and Hon. W.C.P. Breckinridge. text Story of a monument : memorial of the unveiling of the monument to the unknown confederate dead, May 19, 1887, at Hopkinsville, Ky. / by S.C.M. and addresses of Hon. James Breathitt, Charles F. Deems, and Hon. W.C.P. Breckinridge. 1888 2002 true xt7v9s1khr4z section xt7v9s1khr4z T H E Story of a Monument. By S. C. M. MEMORIAL OF THE UNVEILING OF THE MONUMENT TO THE UNKNOWN CONFEDERATE DEAD, MAY 19, I887, AT HOPKINSVILLE, KY. AND ADDRESSES OF Hon. JAMES BREATHITT, Rev. CHARLES F. DEEMS, and Hon. W. C. P. BRECKINRIDGE. 1888. PRESS OF DENNISON BROWN, NEW YORK. This page in the original text is blank. The Story of a Monument. The Latham Confederate Monument, at Hopkinsville, Ky., is a flower which sprang from the soil of filial love. It was in May, i886, that Mr. John C. Latham, Jr., of New York, standing by the monument which he had recently erected in the City Cemetery of Hopkinsville, Kentucky, over the grave of his venerated father, who was for many years president of the Bank of Hopkinsville, determined to erect the monument to the Confederate dead which now adorns that cemetery. The younger Latham had left Hopkinsville, his birthplace, twenty-four years before, to enter the Confederate army as a private, in his seventeenth year; had continued in service until the final surrender at Greensburg, N. C., in May, i865, and, with the exception of three years, had been absent in Memphis in commercial pursuits, and afterwards, for over seventeen years, in New York, as the head of the banking-house of Latham, Alexander Co., of Wall street. The eminence on which he stood overlooked a green and densely shaded lawn, studded with many elegant and costly monuments; but there were evidences in some places of a lack of attention, which contrasted unpleasantly with the carefully tended spot where rested the ashes of his own dead. There are hours in every one's life when the spirit of the past rises from its tomb, and will not depart until it is appeased with sacrifice. The shade of the great civil strife, whose voice had been hushed for twenty- one years, passed before him as he gazed over the field where slept in eternal rest the dead warriors of both armies, many of 4 them his old towsnmen and schoolmates: Colonel Tom Wood- ward, the daring Confederate cavalry leader, killed in a raid in the streets of Hopkinsville; General J. S. Jackson, the fiery Hotspur, who used to express the wish to die in a cavalry charge, and whose wish had untimely fulfilment in a charge at Perryville. Side by side with the victims of war were the sacred ashes of valued friends who had gone to rest in peace, full of years. So mused the German poet on his departed friends as he crossed ''The Ferry: " "One through life in silence wrought, And his grave in silence sought, But the younger, brighter form, Passed in battle and in storm." Among the saddest sights of all were the unmarked graves of more than one hundred Confederates who died in the Hopkinsville hospitals in the Autumn and Winter of x86x-62, and were then lying in the "Potter's Field" of the lawn, where tangled weeds and vines sheltered reptiles and repelled approach. Some of the more fortunate had, years before, been taken home by their relatives, but the poor and friendless were left as drift and sea- weed cast aside by the receding tide of war. The pathos of the situation and tender thoughts of sweet home appealed irresistibly to Mr. Latham. He determined to perform friendship's last office for the unknown Confederate dead, who for quarter of a century had lain unhonored in the cemetery around him. And yet his original purpose, as the reader will soon perceive, had a wider scope than a monument to the martyred soldiers of one side only. The first step was to remove their remains to an eligible lot, and to effect this Mr. Latham, on his return to New York, addressed the following letter to Hon. R. T. Petree, a leading member of the Hopkinsville bar and Chairman of the Board of Council of that city: " NEW YoRK, June 2, i886. "Hon. R. T. Petree, " Hopkinsville, Ky. "MY DEAR SIR:-Herewith I have the pleasure to hand you my check on the National Bank of Commerce, New York, for 1,500, which I send as a gift to the City of Hopkinsville, Ky., for the benefit of the City Cemetery. 5 II I would suggest that i,ooo of the amount be used in beautify- ing the walks, drives and grounds, and to put in order and improve the lots, particularly those containing the remains of old and sterling citizens who have no relatives left to care for them. " The remaining 500 I beg that you will appropriate specially to put in order the plot of ground containing the remains of the Confederate and Federal soldiers. The graves of those brave men deserve every care and mark of respect, and I believe that the funds sent you will be used in the best possible way to further this end. "Yours truly, " JNO. C. LATHAM, JR." RESPONSE OF THE BOARD OF COUNCIL. The Council promptly supplemented this donation by appropri- ating 500 to the same object, in the passage of the following ordinance: "HoPKINSVILLE, KY., Tuesday, June 22, i886. "The Chairman of this Board reported to the Council that he has recently received a check from John C. Latham, Jr., of New York, for fifteen hundred dollars, as a donation to the city for the general purpose of improving its cemetery grounds, and with a request from the donor that five hundred dollars of said amount should be expended on the graves of the Confederate and Federal soldiers. It is therefore ordained that said amount, together with five hundred dollars which is now appropriated out of the general funds of the city and added to said donation, shall be used and expended in cleaning up the cemetery lots, improving the walks and carriage-ways, repairing neglected graves of old valued citizens who have no relatives left to care for the same, and for ornamenting and improving the graves of the soldiers of the late war. 6 "And H. C. Gant, James M. Howe and Charles M. Latham are appointed a committee to supervise said work and to pay for the same, said Gant to act as chairman of said committee. And the Chairman of this Board is requested to place said donation of 1,500 in the City Bank of Hopkinsville to the credit of H. C. Gant, chairman; and the Auditor and Treasurer of this Council is ordered to deposit to the same credit the sum of 500 out of the general fund of the city. "It is unanimously resolved by the Board of Councilmen, on behalf of the citizens of the City of Hopkinsville, that the gratitude of the city is hereby tendered to Mr. John C. Latham Jr., for his generous gift." Unquestionably Mr. Latham's purpose and intent, from the inception of his work, was unsectional, non-partisan and national. It was found on investigation that, with the exception of some who were interred in private lots, the remains of the Federal soldiers had been removed years before to the National Cemetery at Fort Donelson. This fact necessarily modified Mr. Latham's original purpose, and restricted it to the re-interment of the Con- federate dead. THE MONUMENT. A triangular plot, enclosed by drives on all sides, near the sum- mit of the slope in the northern end of the cemetery; was deeded by the Council to Mr. Latham, after some correspondence, as the place of re-interment, and upon this he determined to erect the monument which now forms the conspicuous feature of the ceme- tery. The monument was made at the Hallowell Granite Works, in Maine, after the following design: The base of the structure is eight feet three inches square, sup- porting a pedestal of two polished stones, with intaglio border, the upper stone projecting. Above this is the die, seven feet in height by four and a half feet square, with four polished panels. The cornice of the die is ornamented with cannons and laurel 7 wreaths done in bronze. The die is surmounted by a square obelisk, with Corinthian capital crowned with a pyramid of five polished granite cannon balls, eighteen inches in diameter. On the front of the shaft are two crossed swords in bronze, encircled by a laurel wreath. The whole structure is thirty-seven feet high, elegantly wrought, of the finest quality of granite, and is remark- able for its classic taste and simplicity. At the approach to the monument from the south side is an ornamental entrance of granite eight feet wide. On the posts of the entrance are engraved branches of laurel and oak, and underneath, an antique dagger, encircled by a wreath of laurel. 8 On the eastern panel of the die is inscribed: AROUND THIS COLUMN Is BURIED ALL OF HEROISM THAT COULD DIE. CONFEDERATE DEAD. On the western panel is the inscription: BENEATH THIS SOD IS MINGLED THE SACRED DUST OF ONE HUNDRED AND ONE UNKNOWN SOLDIERS, WHO WERE ATTACHED TO THE FOLLOWING COMMANDS: FIRST MISSISSIPPI REGIMENT, THIRD MISSISSIPPI REGIMENT, SEVENTH TEXAS REGIMENT, EIGHTH KENTUCKY REGIMENT, FORREST'S CAVALRY, WOODWARD'S KENTUCKY CAVALRY, GREEN'S KENTUCKY ARTILLERY. WAR BETWEEN THE STATES. i86i-I865. On the northern panel: WHILE MARTYRS FOR CONSCIENCE SAKE ARE RESPECTED, THE VALOR AND DEVOTION OF THE CONFEDERATE SOLDIER WILL BE ADMIRED BY THE GOOD AND THE BRAVE. On the southern panel: THIS MONUMENT IS ERECTED AT THE PLACE OF HIS BIRTH, BY A SURVIVING COMRADE, To COMMEMORATE THE VIRTUES OF THE CONFEDERATE DEAD. A. D. i887. 9 THE UNVEILING. The i9th of May, i887, was appointed for the unveiling and formal presentation of the monument to the City of Hopkinsville. Hon. James Breathitt, a brilliant young lawyer of Hopkinsville and republican member of the Legislature from Christian County, was selected to make the introductory address, and Hon. W. C. P. Breckinridge, Representative in Congress from the Lexington (Ashland) District, and Rev. Charles F. Deems, pastor of the Church of the Strangers, New York, were appointed orators of the day. The general management of the celebration was placed in the hands of the following Executive Committee, composed of the Chairman of the various sub-committees: JAMES M. HOWE, Chairman of Committee of Arrangements. C. F. JARRETT, Chairman of Committee of Invitation. H. C. GANT, Chairman of Committee of Finance. A. D. RODGERS, Chairman of Committee on Music. JOHN W. BREATHITT, Chairman of Committee of Reception. WM. COWAN, Chairman of Committee on Transportation. The Marshal of the Day was M. H. Nelson, with the following deputies: Captain Ned. Campbell, H. H. Abernathy, John G. Ellis, C. A. Brashear, Polk Cansler, John Boyd, Wm. Jesup, R. A. Baker, H. C. Herndon, F. M. Quarles, H. H. Bryant, Wm. Cowan. Mr. Charles F. Jarrett, Chairman of the Committee on Invita- tions, sent out several thousand elegantly engraved cards of invitation to leading public men and citizens who had acted a conspicuous part in both armies, in all parts of the Union. To these invitations the most cordial replies were returned. Political associations were ignored in the constitution of the various com- mittees for the day, and Union veterans and Confederate veterans worked together. The citizens of Hopkinsville were incited to honor the day in 10 grateful recognition of the generous gift which had so largely improved and embellished their cemetery. The committee who managed the donation, Messrs. Gant, Howe and Latham, had worked with laborious fidelity and admirable taste, and had inaugurated a new era in the embellishment of cemetery land- scapes in Western Kentucky. The gloom and dampness of the grounds had been banished by the removal of trees which injured the monuments and obstructed the view, unsightly enclosures had been removed and the smooth turf intersected by graveled walks and drives. The cemetery had become a sunny lawn, swept by breezes playing pure and fresh among groups of trees, which gave pleasant relief to the lawn without encroaching upon the lots, around which was no other enclosure than a simple curbing. The request of the Committee on Decoration that private lots should be decorated on the occasion by their owners was generally observed, and floral tributes were distributed everywhere. The day of the unveiling was bright and auspicious. At an early hour crowds began to pour in constant streams into the streets from every direction. Trains from North and South brought invited guests, and visitors in large numbers from Louis- ville, Frankfort, Nashville, Evansville, Paducah, Memphis, St. Louis, Bowling Green, including societies, municipal officials and eminent civilians and soldiers. The street panorama was magnifi- cent. Thousands of guests, who had not walked the streets since the war, when Hopkinsville was a town of 2,500 inhabitants, wondered at the changes which had taken place since that eventful period. Main street had been entirely rebuilt with elegant busi- ness houses, and public schools, factories, five large tobacco warehouses, mills and busy workshops, bore witness to the progress of the city, which had now three-fold its war population. So rapidly had the wounds of the great strife been healed over. The vast human tide flowed back and forth through the streets, which for sixteen squares were lined by a forest of brilliant-hued flags, banners, pennants, streamers, cartoons and mottoes of every conceivable description, attesting the prevalent good-will and hospitality. Business houses were all closed, the schools ad- journed, and all classes wore holiday dress. The interior and exterior decorations of the mercantile houses were brilliant, elaborate and tasteful in their combinations of flags, evergreens and bunting. National shields, with the legend "WELCOME," ii hung above door-ways; the Kentucky coat-of-arms, representing a Union and ex-Confederate soldier clasping hands, bore the motto " PEACE!;" crossed muskets from Fort Donelson were in- scribed "WAR IS OVER ;" the name "LATHAM," wrought of evergreens, was worked in arches at street corners; elegant chandeliers, suspended from the ceilings, fluttered with a kaleido- scopic mass of patriotic decoration, and hundreds of men and women wore on their breasts an elegant medal, struck by an eminent New York artist, to commemorate the event. At least 20,000 people were on the streets. The various orders, committees and individual citizens had made ample and excellent provision for the refreshment of strangers, and none went away hungry. The Knights of Pythias, Odd Fellows, Knights Templar, Masons, Board of Council and Grand Army Post set elegant tables in various halls, not only for their guests, but every stranger who appeared to be unprovided for was greeted without ceremony and invited into some lunch-room. Many citizens kept open houses all morning and proffered hos- pitality to strangers at abundant tables. The Latham Light Guards set lunch at the rink for their military and civic guests. The scene in the cemetery was one of unique and pathetic beauty. Even as the sun tenderly kissed both Federal and Con- federate graves alike, so did the hands of love and patriotism plant flags and strew flowers with impartial reverence over all. At noon Eichorn's Military Band, from Louisville, struck up the "Grenadier's March of Triumph," as the signal for the proces- sion to move in the following order from Main and Sixteenth street, over one mile in length, a grand American army of peace, industry and patriotism: Mounted police, ex-Confederate and Federal soldiers, visiting municipal officials, orators of the day, governors and distinguished guests, secret societies, Warren's Evansville Band, Latham Light Guards and South Kentucky Col- lege cadets, fire department, schools and colored orders, horsemen and carriages, citizens on foot. The procession marched through a forest of over two thousand national flags, until it passed under a richly draped arch at the northern entrance of the cemetery and reached the covered amphi- theatre and grand pavilion which had been erected a short distance east of the monument. The amphitheatre was crowded and thousands stood around the stand. Elegantly dressed women and 12 children occupied most of the seats. Never were the " Unknown Dead " honored with so splendid obsequies before. The shades of the pilgrims from the Gulf States, who, twenty-six years before, had hasty burial at the hands of comrades who " bitterly thought of the morrow," and on that morrow met the same fate, were appeased. The amphitheatre could not shelter a third of the vast throng under its double-peaked white canopy, and the remainder of the crowd strolled off to look at the decorations of the grounds. The grave of the Federal General James S. Jackson, who fell at the battle of Perryville, was decorated with a large flag and a wreath of laurel, sent by Mr. Latham from New York, decorated with white roses tied with purple ribbons, bearing the motto: " HONOR THE BRAVE." Klunder, the celebrated New York florist, sent a superb floral piece three feet long, exquisitely designed with the choicest roses, pansies, ferns and laurels, arranged in the form of crossed swords. The business men of Evansville sent a model of the monument in white flowers, forming a pillar two feet in diameter and eight feet high, with the inscriptions: " CON- FEDERATE DEAD;" PEACE AND GOOD WILL TO MEN;" EVANS- VILLE TO HOPKINSVILLE-GREETING." Another floral piece from Klunder's establishment, which attracted attention for its rich material and elegant design, formed a complete covering for the grave of the elder Latham. Mr. J. J. Crusman, of Clarksville, Tenn., contributed some elegant floral pieces. Flags and flowers were placed at the grave of a poor and friend- less Federal soldier, at the special request of Mr. Latham. No grave was overlooked. From the pavilion and crowded amphi- theatre, where the colors of the Union waved like rainbows in the sky, or fluttered like forest leaves, to the farthest corners of the lawn the eye met at every point the brightest and richest emblems which affection and patriotism could weave in flags, evergreens and flowers. Friends stood in groups and recounted the events of the past and the virtues of the dead; children, in the exuberance of health and youth, ran from place to place, too full of wonder to feel a thought of sadness; and scarred and armless veterans sighed as they mused on vanished scenes of camp life-the jests and tales of the tent, the picket-ground, the midnight alarm, the sudden call to arms, the sorrowful scenes of the hospital. 13 MEMORIES. "The scene," remarked an alderman, "I is very different from those which I saw here from November till February in the winter of i86i-62, twenty-six years ago." " What scenes do you refer to " asked a visitor. The old man replied: " The scenes which caused the erection of yonder monument and called the crowd here to-day. It was the death of some two hundred Confederates in hospitals, within two months, during their occupation of Hopkinsville at the beginning of the war, which suggested the monument, and, although hardly a sword was drawn or a musket fired in all that mortality, it is, to my mind, one of the most pathetic stories of the civil war. The deaths were so many that funeral marches soon ceased to be played, and salutes to be fired over the graves. The mortality was more than that of all the epidemics which have visited the town since its foundation. " General J. L. Alcorn, of Mississippi, with 3,000 troops of General S. B. Buckner's command, from Bowling Green, Ky., entered Hopkinsville September 30, i86i, and made his head- quarters at the Bank of Kentucky building, whose assets had been taken to Louisville some time before. He was succeeded by General Tilghman and General Clark, the latter of whom remained until the soldiers were withdrawn to take part in the defence of Fort Donelson, where hundreds of them lost their lives. The Seventh Texas suffered frightfully, and was one of the finest bodies of soldiers that I saw during the war." " What caused the mortality here, if there was no fighting " asked the visitor. " The plague of the camps, ' Black Measles,' as the boys called it," was the reply. " Hopkinsville was first selected as a recruiting station, and after a few weeks the soldiers were taken to more active fields of service, until there remained here only some 1,200 troops. The 14 soldiers from the Gulf States wore light clothes when they came here, and the supplies of the quartermaster's department were in- different in respect to winter outfits. " Winter arrived, and the soldiers, hundreds of them mere boys -look at that headstone, ' Aged i6 years,' and that one, ' Aged I8 years'-began to suffer from lack of warm clothing and blankets. Then proper medicines and food were wanting. Most of the doctors were young and unfamiliar with the climate and its diseases. While half the camp were down with measles, cold, drenching rain set in, and death began its work in good earnest. There were so few well soldiers left in a short time that men were sent, still weak and staggering from disease, to do picket duty. Pneumonia and erysipelas followed. It was a reign of terror." "Were no regular hospitals established " was asked. "I Yes; ten of the largest buildings in the place were taken for that purpose. You can imagine what the amount of sickness was when you learn that the Ninth Street Presbyterian, Cumberland Presbyterian, Christian, Methodist and Colored Baptist Churches, the old County Seminary, the Ritter Hotel, South Kentucky Col- lege and Baptist Bethel College, and Mr. B. E. Randolph's resi- dence, then General Forrest's headquarters, were all filled with sick soldiers. ",Numbers of officers were taken to private houses. An officer of the Ninth Street Presbyterian Church told me that every pew in that church was occupied by a sick soldier. Of course the women did all they could to relieve the sufferers. They organized a society, including nearly every woman in the place, and two of this number were detailed to visit each hospital daily. A lady visiting the Ritter House one day saw twenty corpses laid out for burial. Dr. R. W. Gaines, President of the Kentucky State Medical Association, who was employed in Forrest's command for some time as assistant, states that there were thirteen deaths in three days at Bethel College. "I' They died like sheep,' said one of the visiting committee. Two soldiers were sent one morning to purchase shrouds for two of their dead comrades who were lying at South Kentucky College. On their way back one of them dropped dead on the street, and the other died a few minutes after reaching the college. It was no wonder, when soldiers, too feeble to leave the hospital, were sent to stand guard in the chilly rains and snows of winter nights, coughing pitifully as they shivered in ragged clothes and almost unshod feet. Several pickets died on guard." This page in the original text is blank. REV. DR. C. H. STRICKLAND, Pastor First Baptist Church, Naskville, 7enn. I i11, I I' 15 "Were they all buried here " inquired the stranger. "About one-half," was the reply. " One hundred and one lie buried at the foot of the monument, and a comparison of the statements made by the undertakers, physicians and nurses of the place leads to the conclusion that more than twice that number perished in the mortality of that autumn and winter." As the narrative of Old Mortality ended, the exercises of the solemn pageant began at the monument. On front of the speakers' pavilion was the verse: "Not for the meed of praise Did he this deed of love, But on a bright, unfading page, Tis registered above." On the grand stand were the Hon. W. C. P. Breckinridge, Rev. Dr. C. F. Deems, Rev. Dr. Strickland, Rev. Dr. A. D. Sears, Hon. James Breathitt, Hon. E. D. Standiford, Governor Knott and staff, General S. B. Buckner, the Board of Council of Hopkinsville and their invited guests, including a number of ladies, the little girls who were to perform the ceremony of un- veiling the monument, and the correspondents of the Louisville Courier-Journal, Nashville American, New York Times, Atlanta Constitution, Evansville Journal and Tribune, St. Louis Globe- Democrat and a large corps of the local press of Kentucky. On the right of the stand was the legend: "IALL HONOR TO OUR DEAD HEROES;" on the left: " ONE COUNTRY, ONE FLAG, ONE DESTINY." A portrait of Mr. John C. Latham, Jr., was displayed on the speakers' stand. INVOCATION. Rev. Dr. C. H. Strickland, of the First Baptist Church of Nashville, offered the invocation, praying for the prosperity and peace of the Union. " We have met to honor those who died in 16 their country's service, obscure and unknown. Unknown, and yet "On fame's eternal camping ground, Their silent tents are spread, While honor guards with solemn round The bivouac of the dead. "Oh, God, we do not weep this day for our unknown brothers, for indeed "They need no tears who lived a noble life. We will not weep for these who die so well, But we will gather round the hearth and tell The story of their life. Such homage suits them well, Better than funeral pomp or passing bell. 4 We pray for the generous citizen, true comrade, sincere and liberal-minded patriot, who this day gives to his native place a token of esteem worthy of himself and those who receive it. "May none know him but to love him; May none name him but to praise. "Protect, we pray thee, this stone from the lightning, the storm cloud and the earthquake. May the fingers of time touch it lightly as it stands through the years, whispering of the loftiest virtues. "1 As it towers aloft, may it speak to all beholders, of devotion to country and heroism under trial. " May the stainless purity of this shaft be an inspiration to purity of thought and life. "d May its solidity and strength suggest to youth the desirable- ness of a strong and solid character, and, as with index finger, it points to that sky where the ' blue and grey ' are forever and happily blended, may it ever tell of peace on earth and good-will to men. " We beseech thee, Almighty Father, Lord of heaven and earth, as we this day worship thee underneath the flag of our common country and are secure, so may this, our beloved, our fatherland, be ever shadowed by thy wing, all of which we ask in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost-Amen." At the close of the invocation Hon. James Breathitt made the following address: This page in the original text is blank. H N. JAMB W. BREI11AITTH 17 Address of Hon. James Breathitt. LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:-Over a quarter of a century ago the foundations of American free government were shaken by the convulsions of civil war, and for a time it seemed that that grand structure would crumble into ruin. The war between the States was the natural result of the political conditions which had existed in the United States for a long period prior to the final outbreak. And, looking back at the events which were transpiring during the last quarter of a century just preceding the breaking out of hostilities, it is difficult to see how the important and exciting questions then dividing the sections could have been settled except by an appeal to arms. And if the brave men, living and dead, of this generation, had not fought that war, it would have descended as a bloody inheritance to their children. But instead of this it may be said that, as our reward for all that we suffered on either side in the settlement of these great questions, the " American nation had A NEW BIRTH OF FREEDOM and that the only true government of the people, by the people and for the people, shall not perish from the earth." It matters but little to-day what part we may have played in that memorable struggle, nor how conscientiously we may have entertained the principles for which we fought, nor does it matter that even to-day, as we look upon this scene, we feel as if we were surrounded by the same circumstances, National and State, that we would be willing to play the same part over again. There are but few men in this land who do not rejoice in the re-union and prosperity of the North and South, Who is it in this broad 18 land who does not feel in his heart, whether he stands on the shores of the lakes of the north or beneath the groves where the "gold orange grows," that " this is my own, my native land " The war had its bad results, but it cannot be doubted that much good has resulted from it. The only question which has ever seriously threatened the Union has been settled forever. And in its settlement deeds of patriotism, valor and skill in arms were performed by the American soldiers of either army which add to the nation's glory and renown in war, and command the respect and admiration of the civilized powers of the earth. WHEN AN IMPARTIAL HISTORY of that period shall have been written, and the student would search its pages for a true type and illustration of the American soldier, he will admire and praise, in equal degree, the skill and valor of Stonewall Jackson, in the valley of the Shenandoah, and Albert Sidney Johnston, yielding up his life for principle at the battle of Shiloh, with Grant, Sherman and others leading to victory the armies of the Union. Where, in the history of the world, can be found such an interesting picture as that presented to our view in the meeting of those two great Generals as they salute each other with chivalric courtesy at Appomattox Here is a distinctive illustration of the character of the American soldier-brave in battle, generous and forgiving in victory, and dignified and imposing in the hour of defeat. Such were Grant and Lee-the noblest Romans of them all-in this moment of victory and defeat. And whatever else there was noble, grand and heroic in that war and admirable in the peace that followed is ours now to enjoy, but soon to enrich the nation's history and become the proud in- heritance of a common posterity, and, like the deeds of our Revolutionary fathers, the glory of every American patriot. It is therefore THE DUTY OF EVERY MAN who loves his country to do all in his power to wipe away every tear, to soothe every heart-ache and to allay every embittered feeling yet remaining in the breasts of the people, in order that we may have a perfect union of hearts, as well as a perfect union of law. 19 There is a touching incident related of the war, that, during one of its many battles, a Northern soldier from New Hamp