"T , 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 Class 
 
 - 
 
 
HARVARD 
 
 ;0)lem<mal 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE: 
 SEVERAND FRANCIS. 
 
 1866. 
 
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 PLATO'S MENEXKNUS, 9. 
 
 " Hence it is that the fathers of these men, and ours also, and themselves too, being thus 
 nurtured in all freedom and well-born, have shown before all men deeds many and glorious, 
 in public and private, deeming it their duty to fight for freedom and the Greeks, even 
 against Greeks." 
 
 UNIVERSITY PRESS : WELCH, BIGELOW, & Co., 
 CAMBRIDGE. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 fTlHOSE of us whose fortunate lot it was to enlist in the 
 -* army, during that magic epoch of adventure which has 
 just passed by, will never again find in life a day of such 
 strange excitement as that when they first put on uniform 
 and went into camp. It was a day absolutely broken off 
 from all that had gone before it. To say that it brought 
 a sense of utter novelty, is nothing ; the transformation 
 seemed as perfect as if, by some suddenly revealed process, 
 one had learned to swim in air, and were striking out for 
 some new planet. The past was annihilated, the future 
 was all. Now that dimly-visioned future has itself become 
 a portion of the past ; that new cycle of existence is ended ; 
 already its memories grow dim ; and, after all that seeming 
 metamorphosis, the survivors still find themselves with 
 their feet upon the familiar earth, and pursue once more 
 the quiet paths they left. The aureole is vanished from 
 their lives, but it still lingers round the heads of the fallen. 
 No time, no change, can restore them to the old ways, or 
 take them from the enchanted sphere in which they hence 
 forth dwell. 
 
 This is a series of memoirs of those graduates and former 
 undergraduates of Harvard University who fell in battle 
 
 224382 
 
iv Preface. 
 
 during the recent war, or who died in consequence of ser 
 vices rendered in the contest. Former members of the Pro 
 fessional Schools of the University are not included. There 
 are ninety-five of these memoirs, more than three quarters of 
 which were prepared by Harvard graduates, and more than 
 one quarter by graduates who have themselves served in 
 the army. The work is, therefore, in a very thorough sense, 
 a Harvard Memorial. Every memoir is here first published 
 in its present form ; and every memoir, with one excep 
 tion, is the most elaborate yet printed upon the subject 
 which it treats. Each was written, so far as practicable, 
 by the person who seemed best adapted to that particular 
 task, through personal intimacy or kinship ; and if the 
 results sometimes seem inadequate, they are like those 
 unavoidable failures of a military campaign, which have 
 often cost more labor than its successes. 
 
 The work not being a history, but a collection of biogra 
 phies, historic interest has been kept subordinate to the 
 exhibition of personal character. " The best thing we 
 have from history," said Goethe, " is the enthusiasm which 
 it excites " ; and any light here thrown on military move 
 ments is only an indirect result, the main object being 
 simply the delineation of the men. It was felt that if they 
 could be truly pictured, and if vague superlatives could be 
 rigidly excluded, then there would be no monotony in the 
 book, since no two of these lives were in reality alike ; and 
 it would contain nothing superfluous, because the humblest 
 of these lives was still given for our country at last. 
 
 If there is any one inference to be fairly drawn from 
 these memoirs, as a whole, it is this : that there is no class 
 of men in this republic from whom the response of patriot- 
 
Preface. v 
 
 ism comes more promptly and surely than from its most 
 highly educated class. All those delusions which pass cur 
 rent in Europe, dating back to De Tocqueville, in regard 
 to some supposed torpor or alienation prevailing among 
 cultivated Americans, should be swept away forever by this 
 one book. The lives here narrated undoubtedly represent 
 on the whole those classes, favored in worldly fortune, 
 which would elsewhere form an aristocracy, with only 
 an admixture, such as all aristocracies now show, of what 
 are called self-made men. It is surprising to notice how 
 large is the proportion of Puritan and Revolutionary de 
 scent. Yet these young men threw themselves promptly 
 and heartily into the war ; and that not in recklessness or 
 bravado, not merely won by the dazzle of a uniform, or 
 allured by the charm of personal power, or controlled 
 even by " that last infirmity," ambition, but evidently 
 governed, above all things else, by solid conviction and the 
 absolute law of conscience. To have established incontest- 
 ably this one point, is worth the costly sacrifice which com 
 pleted the demonstration. 
 
 And if there is another inference that may justly be de 
 duced from these pages, it is this : that our system of col 
 legiate education must be on the whole healthy and sound, 
 when it sends forth a race of young men who are prepared, 
 at the most sudden summons, to transfer their energies to 
 a new and alien sphere, and to prove the worth of their 
 training in wholly unexpected applications. So readily 
 have the Harvard graduates done this, and with such noble 
 and unquestioned success, that I do not see how any one 
 can read these memoirs without being left with fresh con 
 fidence in our institutions, in the American people, and 
 
 VOL. i. & 
 
vi Preface. 
 
 indeed in human nature itself. Either there was a most 
 rare and exceptional combination in the lives which Har 
 vard University gave to the nation, or else if they fairly 
 represent their race and their time then the work and 
 the traditions of our fathers are safe in the hands of their 
 descendants. The best monument that we can build to 
 these our heroes, is to show that they have renewed our 
 faith, and made nobler the years that are to come. 
 
 THOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSON. 
 
CONTENTS OF VOL. I. 
 
 ODE, RECITED AT THE HARVARD 
 
 PAGB 
 
 MEMORATION James Russell Lowdl H.u.l 838 ix 
 
 1828 JAMES SAMUEL WADSWORTH . Wm. J. Hoppin .... 1 
 
 1833 FLETCHER WEBSTER .... George S. Hillard H. u. 1828 21 
 
 1834 CHARLES H. WHEELWRIGHT . Charles A. Welch H.u.l 833 31 
 1837 JAMES RICHARDSON .... T. W. Higginson H.u.l 841 41 
 
 1841 CHARLES FRANCIS SIMMONS . T. W. Higginson H.U. 1841 54 
 
 1842 WILLIAM LOGAN RODMAN . . T. W. Higginson H.U. 1841 64 
 
 1843 ARTHUR B. FULLER . . . . T. W. Higginson H. u. 1841 79 
 
 1845 PETER AUGUSTUS PORTER . . George Cabot Ward .... 95 
 
 1846 EZRA RIPLET .... ,^\ . . James B. Thayer H.U. 1852 107 
 " MONTGOMERY RITCHIE . . . Samuel Eliot H.U. 1859 116 
 
 1847 EDWARD H. R. REVERE . . . H. G. Parker .... 124 
 
 1848 JOHN FRANKLIN GOODRICH . T. W. Higginson H.U. 1841 136 
 " Lucius MANLIUS SARGENT . . T. W. Higginson H.U. 1841 142 
 " WILLIAM OLIVER STEVENS . . C. G. Loring, Jr. H. u. 1848 147 
 
 1849 EVERETT PEABODY .... Francis H. Peabody . . . . 161 
 
 1851 WILLIAM DWIGHT SEDGWICK . Mrs. L. T. Sedgwick . . . . 179 
 
 1852 HENRY HILL DOWNES . . . Samuel H. Hurd H.U. 1852 190 
 " SAMUEL FOSTER HAYEN, JR. . William S. Davis H.U. 1853 192 
 " WILLIAM STURGIS HOOPER S. L. Thorndike H. u. 1852 203 
 
viii Contents. 
 
 1852 PAUL JOSEPH RETERE . . . 
 
 " ROBERT WARE 
 
 " SIDNEY WILLARD 
 
 1853 WILDER DWIGHT 
 
 1854 RICHARD CHAPMAN GOODWIN . 
 " CHARLES RUSSELL LOWELL 
 
 " JAMES SAVAGE 
 
 1855 GEORGE FOSTER HODGES . . 
 
 1856 CHARLES BROOKS BROWN . . 
 
 " DANIEL HACK 
 
 " STEPHEN GEORGE PERKINS 
 
 1857 HOWARD DWIGHT 
 
 " JAMES AMORY PERKINS . . . 
 " GEORGE WHITTEMORE ... 
 
 1858 SAMUEL HENRY EELLS . . . 
 " JAMES JACKSON LOWELL . . 
 " EDWARD BROMFIELD MASON . 
 " HENRY LYMAN PATTEN . . . 
 " HENRY AUGUSTUS RICHARDSON 
 " THOMAS JEFFERSON SPURR . 
 
 William R. Lee 
 C. E. Stedman 
 Joseph Willard 
 Mrs. E. A. Dwight 
 Mrs. L. M. Goodwin 
 James M. Peirce 
 Mrs. Emma Rogers 
 Edwin Hale Abbot 
 Wm. W. Burrage 
 T. W. Higginson 
 T. W. Higginson 
 Mrs. E. A. Dwight 
 John C. Ropes 
 Thomas B. Fox 
 T. W. Higginson 
 F. J. Child 
 Wm. Powell Mason 
 George E. Pond 
 Gerard C. Tobey 
 Samuel S. Green 
 
 . ... 219 
 
 H. U. 1852 238 
 
 H. u. 1855 253 
 
 . ... 271 
 
 . ... 294 
 
 H.u. 1853 296 
 
 .... 328 
 
 H. u. 1855 351 
 
 H.u. 1856 357 
 
 H.u. 1841 371 
 
 H. u. 1841 373 
 
 .... 382 
 
 H. U. 1857 395 
 
 H.u. 1828 404 
 
 H.u. 1841 415 
 
 H. u. 1846 422 
 
 H.u. 1811 437 
 
 H. u. 1858 443 
 
 H.u. 1858 465 
 
 H. u. 1858 472 
 
ODE 
 
 RECITED AT THE HARVARD COMMEMORATION, 
 
 JULY 21, 1865. 
 BY JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 WEAK-WINGED is song, 
 Nor aims at that clear-ethered height 
 Whither the brave deed climbs for light : 
 
 We seem to do them wrong, 
 Bringing our robin's-leaf to deck their hearse 
 Who in warm life-blood wrote their nobler verse, 
 Our trivial song to honor those who come 
 With ears attuned to strenuous trump and drum, 
 And shaped in squadron-strophes their desire, 
 Live battle-odes whose lines were steel and fire : 
 
 Yet sometimes feathered words are strong, 
 A gracious memory to buoy up and save 
 From Lethe's dreamless ooze, the common grave 
 
 Of the unventurous throng. 
 
 ii. 
 
 To-day our Reverend Mother welcomes home 
 Her wisest Scholars, those who understood 
 The deeper teaching of her mystic tome, 
 
 And offered their fresh lives to make it good : 
 
 No lore of Greece or Rome, 
 No science peddling with the names of things, 
 Or reading stars to find inglorious fates, 
 Can lift our life with wings 
 
Commemoration Ode. 
 
 Far from Death's idle gulf that for the many waits, 
 
 And lengthen out our dates 
 "With that clear fame whose memory sings 
 In manly hearts to come, and nerves them and dilates 
 Nor such thy teaching, Mother of us all ! 
 Not such the trumpet-call 
 Of thy diviner mood, 
 That could thy sons entice 
 From happy homes and toils, the fruitful nest 
 Of those half-virtues which the world calls best, 
 Into War's tumult rude ; 
 But rather far that stern device 
 The sponsors chose that round thy cradle stood 
 In the dim, unventured wood, 
 The VERITAS that lurks beneath 
 The letter's unprolific sheath, 
 Life of whate'er makes life worth living, 
 Seed-grain of high emprise, immortal food, 
 
 One heavenly thing whereof earth hath the giving. 
 
 in. 
 
 Many loved Truth, and lavished life's best oil 
 
 Amid the dust of books to find her, 
 Content at last, for guerdon of their toil, 
 
 With the cast mantle she hath left behind her. 
 Many in sad faith sought for her, 
 Many with crossed hands sighed for her ; 
 But these, our brothers, fought for her, 
 AHife's dear peril wrought for her, 
 So loved her that they died for her, 
 Tasting the raptured fleetness 
 Of her divine completeness : 
 Their higher instinct knew 
 Those love her best who to themselves are true, 
 And what they dare to dream of dare to do ; 
 They followed her and found her 
 Where all may hope to find, 
 Not in the ashes of the burnt-out mind, 
 
Commemoration Ode. 
 
 But beautiful, with danger's sweetness round her ; 
 
 Where faith made whole with deed 
 
 Breathes its awakening breath 
 
 Into the lifeless creed, 
 
 They saw her plumed and mailed, 
 
 With sweet, stern face unveiled, 
 And all-repaying eyes, look proud on them in death. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Our slender life runs rippling by, and glides 
 Into the silent hollow of the past ; 
 
 What is there that abides 
 To make the next age better for the last ? 
 
 Is earth too poor to give us 
 Something to live for here that shall outlive us, 
 
 Some more substantial boon 
 
 Than such as flows and ebbs with Fortune's fickle moon ? 
 The little that we see 
 From doubt is never free ; 
 The little that we do 
 Is but half-nobly true ; 
 With our laborious hiving 
 What men call treasure, and the gods call dross, 
 Life seems a jest of Fate's contriving, 
 Only secure in every one's conniving, 
 A long account of nothings paid with loss, 
 Where we poor puppets, jerked by unseen wires, 
 
 After our little hour of strut and rave, 
 With all our pasteboard passions and desires, 
 Loves, hates, ambitions, and immortal fires, 
 Are tossed pell-mell together in the grave. 
 But stay ! No age was e'er degenerate 
 Unless men held it at too cheap a rate, 
 For in our image still is shaped our fate : 
 
 Ah, there is something here 
 Unfathomed by the cynic's sneer, 
 Something that gives our feeble light 
 A high immunity from Night, 
 
xii Commemoration Ode. 
 
 Something that leaps life's narrow bars 
 
 To claim its birthright with the hosts of heaven ; 
 
 A seed of sunshine that doth leaven 
 Our earthly dulness with the beams of stars, 
 
 And glorify our clay 
 
 With light from fountains elder than the Day ; 
 A conscience more divine than we, 
 A gladness fed with secret tears, 
 A vexing, forward-reaching sense 
 Of some more noble permanence ; 
 
 A light across the sea, 
 Which haunts the soul and will not let it be, 
 Still glimmering from the heights of undegenerate years. 
 
 v. 
 
 Whither leads the path 
 To ampler fates that leads ? 
 Not down through flowery meads, 
 To reap an aftermath 
 Of youth's vainglorious weeds, 
 But up the steep, amid the wrath 
 And shock of deadly-hostile creeds, 
 Where the world's best hope and stay 
 By battle's flashes gropes a desperate way, 
 And every turf the fierce foot clings to bleeds. 
 Peace hath her not ignoble wreath, 
 Ere yet the sharp, decisive word 
 Lights the black lips of cannon, and the sword 
 
 Dreams in its easeful sheath : 
 But some day the live coal behind the thought, 
 Whether from Baal's stone obscene, 
 Or from the shrine serene 
 Of God's pure altar brought, 
 Bursts up in flame ; the war of tongue and pen 
 Learns with what deadly purpose it was fraught, 
 And, helpless in the fiery passion caught, 
 Shakes all the pillared state with shock of men : 
 Some day the soft Ideal that we wooed 
 
Commemoration Ode. xiii 
 
 Confronts us fiercely, foe-beset, pursued, 
 And cries reproachful, " Was it, then, my praise, 
 And not myself was loved ? Prove now thy truth ; 
 I claim of thee the promise of thy youth ; 
 Give me thy life, or cower in empty phrase, 
 The victim of thy genius, not its mate ! " 
 Life may be given in many ways, 
 And loyalty to Truth be sealed 
 As bravely in the closet as the field, 
 
 So generous is Fate ; 
 
 But then to stand beside her, 
 
 "When craven churls deride her, 
 To front a lie in arms and not to yield, 
 
 This shows, methinks, God's plan 
 
 And measure of a stalwart man, 
 
 Limbed like the old heroic breeds, 
 
 Who stands self-poised on manhood's solid earth, 
 
 Not forced to frame excuses for his birth, 
 Fed from within with all the strength he needs. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Such was he, our Martyr-Chief, 
 
 Whom late the Nation he had led, 
 With ashes on her head, 
 Wept with the passion of an angry grief: 
 Forgive me, if from present things I turn 
 To speak what in my heart will beat and burn, 
 And hang my wreath on his world-honored urn. 
 
 Nature, they say, doth dote, 
 
 And cannot make a man 
 
 Save on some worn-out plan, 
 
 Repeating us by rote : 
 
 For him her Old- World mould aside she threw, 
 And, choosing sweet clay from the breast 
 
 Of the unexhausted West, 
 With stuff" untainted shaped a hero new, 
 Wise, steadfast in the strength of God, and true. 
 
 How beautiful to see 
 Once more a shepherd of mankind indeed, 
 
xiv Commemoration Ode. 
 
 Who loved his charge, but never loved to lead ; 
 One whose meek flock the people joyed to be, 
 Not lured by any cheat of birth, 
 But by his clear-grained human worth, 
 And brave old wisdom of sincerity ! 
 
 They knew that outward grace is dust ; 
 They could not choose but trust 
 In that sure-footed mind's unfaltering skill, 
 
 And supple-tempered will 
 That bent like perfect steel to spring again and thrust. 
 
 Nothing of Europe here, 
 Or, then, of Europe fronting mornward still, 
 
 Ere any names of Serf and Peer 
 Could Nature's equal scheme deface ; 
 Here was a type of the true elder race, 
 And one of Plutarch's men talked with us face to face. 
 His was no lonely mountain-peak of mind, 
 Thrusting to thin air o'er our cloudy bars, 
 A seamark now, now lost in vapors blind ; 
 Broad prairie rather, genial, level-lined, 
 Fruitful and friendly for his humankind, 
 Yet also known to Heaven and friend with all its stars. 
 
 I praise him not ; it were too late ; 
 And some innative weakness there must be 
 In him who condescends to victory 
 Such as the Present gives, and cannot wait, 
 Safe in himself as in a fate. 
 So always firmly he : 
 He knew to bide his time, 
 And can his fame abide, 
 Still patient in his simple faith sublime, 
 
 Till the wise years decide. 
 Great captains, with their guns and drums, 
 Disturb our judgment for the hour, 
 
 But at last silence comes : 
 These all are gone, and, standing like a tower, 
 Our children shall behold his fame, 
 
 The kindly-earnest, brave, foreseeing man, 
 Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame, 
 New birth of our new soil, the first American. 
 
Commemoration Ode. xv 
 
 VII. 
 
 Long as man's hope insatiate can discern 
 Or only guess some more inspiring goal 
 Outside of Self, enduring as the pole, 
 
 Along whose course the flying axles burn 
 
 Of spirits bravely pitched, earth's manlier brood ; 
 Long as below we cannot find 
 
 The meed that stills the inexorable mind ; 
 
 So long this faith to some ideal Good, 
 Under whatever mortal names it masks, 
 Freedom, Law, Country, this ethereal mood 
 
 That thanks the Fates for their severer tasks, 
 Feeling its challenged pulses leap, 
 While others skulk in subterfuges cheap, 
 
 And, set in Danger's van, has all the boon it asks, 
 Shall win man's praise and woman's love, 
 Shall be a wisdom that we set above 
 
 All other skills and gifts to culture dear, 
 
 A virtue round whose forehead we enwreathe 
 Laurels that with a living passion breathe 
 
 When other crowns are cold and soon grow sere. 
 What brings us thronging these high rites to pay, 
 
 And seal these hours the noblest of our year, 
 Save that our brothers found this better way ? 
 
 VIII. 
 
 We sit here in the Promised Land 
 
 That flows with Freedom's honey and milk ; 
 
 But 't was they won it, sword in hand, 
 
 Making the nettle danger soft for us as silk. 
 We welcome back our bravest and our best ; 
 Ah, me ! not all ! some come not with the rest, 
 
 Who went forth brave and bright as any here ! 
 
 I strive to mix some gladness with my strain, 
 But the sad strings complain, 
 And will not please the ear ; 
 
 I sweep them for a paean, but they wane 
 
xvi Commemoration Ode. 
 
 Again and yet again 
 Into a dirge, and die away in pain. 
 In these brave ranks I only see the gaps, 
 Thinking of dear ones whom the dumb turf wraps, 
 Dark to the triumph which they died to gain : 
 Fitlier may others greet the living, 
 For me the past is unforgiving ; 
 
 I with uncovered head 
 
 Salute the sacred dead, 
 
 Who went, and who return not. Say not so ! 
 'T is not the grapes of Canaan that repay, 
 But the high faith that failed not by the way ; 
 Virtue treads paths that end not in the grave ; 
 No ban of endless night exiles the brave ; 
 
 And to the saner mind 
 We rather seem the dead that stayed behind. 
 Blow, trumpets, all your exultations blow ! 
 For never shall their aureoled presence lack : 
 I see them muster in a gleaming row, 
 With ever-youthful brows that nobler show ; 
 We find in our dull road their shining track ; 
 
 In every nobler mood 
 We feel the orient of their spirit glow, 
 Part of our life's unalterable good, 
 Of all our saintlier aspiration ; 
 
 They come transfigured back, 
 Secure from change in their high-hearted ways, 
 Beautiful evermore, and with the rays 
 Of morn on their white Shields of Expectation ! 
 
 IX. 
 
 Who now shall sneer? 
 Who dare again to say we trace 
 Our lines to a plebeian race ? 
 
 Roundhead and Cavalier ! 
 
 Dreams are those names erewhile in battle loud ; 
 Forceless as is the shadow of a cloud, 
 They live but in the ear : 
 
Commemoration Ode. xvii 
 
 That is best blood that hath most iron in 't 
 To edge resolve with, pouring without stint 
 For what makes manhood dear. 
 
 Tell us not of Plantagenets, 
 Hapsburgs, and Guelfs, whose thin bloods crawl 
 Down from some victor in a border-brawl ! 
 
 How poor their outworn coronets, 
 Matched with one leaf of that plain civic wreath 
 Our brave for honor's blazon shall bequeath, 
 
 Through whose desert a rescued Nation sets 
 Her heel on treason, and the trumpet hears 
 Shout victory, tingling Europe's sullen ears 
 
 With vain resentments and more vain regrets ! 
 
 Not in anger, not in pride, 
 Pure from passion's mixture rude 
 Ever to base earth allied, 
 But with far-heard gratitude, 
 Still with heart and voice renewed, 
 To heroes living and dear martyrs dead, 
 The strain should close that consecrates our brave. 
 Lift the heart and lift the head ! 
 Lofty be its mood and grave, 
 Not without a martial ring, 
 Not without a prouder tread 
 And a peal of exultation : 
 Little right has he to sing 
 Through whose heart in such an hour 
 Beats no march of conscious power, 
 Sweeps no tumult of elation ! 
 'T is no Man we celebrate, 
 By his country's victories great, 
 A hero half, and half the whim of Fate, 
 But the pith and marrow of a Nation 
 Drawing force from all her men, 
 Highest, humblest, weakest, all, 
 For her day of need, and then 
 
xviii Commemoration Ode. 
 
 Pulsing it again through them, 
 Till the basest can no longer cower, 
 Feeling his soul spring up divinely tall, 
 Touched but in passing by her mantle-hem. 
 Come back, then, noble pride, for 't is her dower ! 
 How could poet ever tower, 
 If his passions, hopes, and fears, 
 If his triumphs and his tears, 
 Kept not measure with his people ? 
 Boom, cannon, boom to all the winds and waves ! 
 Clash out, glad bells, from every rocking steeple ! 
 Banners, adance with triumph, bend your staves ! 
 And from every mountain-peak 
 Let beacon-fire to answering beacon speak, 
 Katahdin tell Monadnock, Whiteface he, 
 And so leap on in light from sea to sea, 
 Till the glad news be sent 
 Across a kindling continent, 
 
 Making earth feel more firm and air breathe braver : 
 " Be proud ! for she is saved, and all have helped to save her ! 
 She that lifts up the manhood of the poor, 
 She of the open soul and open door, 
 With room about her hearth for all mankind ! 
 The helm from her bold front she may unbind, 
 Send all her handmaid armies back to spin, 
 And bid her navies hold their thunders in : 
 No challenge sends she to the elder world, 
 That looked askance and hated ; a light scorn 
 Plays on her mouth, as round her mighty knees 
 She calls her children back, and waits the morn 
 Of nobler day, enthroned between her subject seas." 
 
 XI. 
 
 Bow down, dear Land, for thou hast found release ! 
 Thy God, in these distempered days, 
 Hath taught thee the sure wisdom of His ways, 
 
 And through thine enemies hath wrought thy peace ! 
 Bow down in prayer and praise ! 
 
Commemoration Ode. xix 
 
 Beautiful ! my Country ! ours once more ! 
 Smoothing thy gold of war-dishevelled hair 
 O'er such sweet brows as never other wore, 
 And letting thy set lips, 
 Freed from wrath's pale eclipse, 
 The rosy edges of their smile lay bare, 
 What words divine of lover or of poet 
 Could tell our love and make thee know it, 
 Among the Nations bright beyond compare ? 
 What were our lives without thee ? 
 What all our lives to save thee ? 
 We reck not what we gave thee ; 
 We will not dare to doubt thee, 
 But ask whatever else, and we will dare ! 
 
HARVARD MEMORIAL BIOGRAPHIES. 
 
 1828. 
 JAMES SAMUEL WADSWORTH. 
 
 Vol. A. D. C., rank of Major, Gen. McDowell's staff, June, 1861 ; 
 Brig.-Gen. Vols., Aug. 9, 1861 ; died May 8, 1864, of a wound received 
 at the battle of the Wilderness, May 6. 
 
 IT has been well said that the people of the North were 
 themselves the true heroes of the War for the Union. 
 They were brave, generous, hopeful, and constant; while 
 some, to whom they had a right to look for counsel and 
 example, were cowardly, despondent, unstable, and selfish. 
 An intelligent foreigner declared with great truth that 
 General Wadsworth was " a noble incarnation of the 
 American people." He certainly displayed throughout the 
 same earnest, self-sacrificing, undismayed spirit which they 
 collectively manifested. 
 
 James Samuel Wadsworth was born at Geneseo, New 
 York, October 30, 1807. He was the eldest son of James 
 Wadsworth, who had emigrated from Durham, in Connect 
 icut, and whose family was among the most ancient and 
 respectable in that State. It is said that one of his an 
 cestors was that sturdy Puritan, Joseph Wadsworth, the 
 captain of train-bands who concealed in the famous oak at 
 Hartford, in defiance of the authority of the tyrant Andros, 
 the precious charter which Charles II. had given to the 
 Colony ; and who afterwards, when another intruding gov 
 ernor, Colonel Fletcher of New York, attempted to exercise 
 
 VOL. I. 1 
 
l ! /: !: ^\*larmfd Memorial Biographies. 
 
 illegal rule over the Connecticut militia, caused his drums 
 to beat and drown the reading of the royal commission, 
 saying to Fletcher, " If I am interrupted, I will make the 
 daylight shine through your body." 
 
 James Wadsworth of Durham, and his brother William, 
 made their way to the banks of the Genesee in the year 
 1790, when that whole region was a rude wilderness, from 
 which the Indians had scarcely been expelled. They opened 
 their path, in some places, by their own axes, and estab 
 lished themselves at a point called " Big Tree," which is 
 now the village of Geneseo. They were, the agents of 
 many of the proprietors, whose lands they cleared and 
 brought into market ; and they themselves, in process of 
 time, became the most extensive and wealthy landhold 
 ers of that neighborhood. Mr. Lewis F. Allen, to whose 
 excellent Memorial of General Wadsworth I am indebted 
 for some of the information contained in this paper, in 
 timates that they owed this success to the happy union of 
 their own personal qualities. William, who had a more 
 hardy nature than his brother, carried on all the out-of-door 
 operations, while James, who had received an excellent 
 education at the East, and acquired habits of system and 
 order, managed the finances, entertained the guests, and, 
 by his sound judgment and fine taste, contributed not only 
 to the material prosperity, but to the picturesque beauty of 
 that famous valley. He had graduated at Yale College, 
 and he took into the wild country to which he emigrated a 
 love for letters and refined social intercourse, which made it 
 blossom early with the sweet flowers of mental and moral 
 culture. After the population had sufficiently increased, 
 he caused tracts upon the subject of popular education to 
 be printed and circulated at his own expense ; he offered 
 premiums to the towns which should first establish school 
 libraries ; he procured the passage of the school-library law 
 in 1808 ; he suggested the establishment of Normal Schools 
 in 1811 ; he founded and endowed a library and system of 
 
James Samuel Wadsworih. 3 
 
 lectures at Geneseo ; and he provided that in all his sales a 
 tract of one hundred and twenty-five acres in every town 
 ship should be reserved for a church, and as much more for 
 a school. When he died, in 1844, his gifts to the cause of 
 education alone had exceeded the sum of ninety thousand 
 dollars. 
 
 His wife, the mother of General Wadsworth, who is said 
 to have been a most intelligent and amiable woman, was 
 one of the Walcotts, of Windsor, in Connecticut, a family 
 of importance in the history of that State. 
 
 This was the stock from which he sprung, and he proved 
 his descent by the intrepidity and vigor of his character, as 
 well as by that frank courtesy of manners and princely 
 generosity which always distinguished him. 
 
 He received the first rudiments of his education at the 
 common schools of Geneseo, although much of his youth 
 must have been given to those rough employments in the 
 open air which the border-life of those days required, even 
 of the sons of rich fathers. Some of his friends in New 
 York remember him well when he was a boy of twelve or 
 thirteen, and made a visit to the city in company with his 
 uncle William. They had come all the way on horseback, 
 driving a herd of cattle ; and Wadsworth was then a hardy, 
 vigorous stripling, intelligent, manly, and self-possessed. 
 
 He entered Hamilton College, near Utica ; but after a 
 short residence there went to Harvard, where he remained 
 a longer time, but never graduated. About the year 1829 
 he became a student of law at Yale College, where he stayed 
 a few months, and then continued his course with Mr. 
 Webster at Boston, and finished it in the office of McKeon 
 and Deniston at Albany. He was in due time called to 
 the bar, but he never practised law as a profession. He 
 preferred to assist his father in the care of the family estate, 
 which had been increased by the property devised by his 
 uncle William, who died a bachelor in 1833. 
 
 Wadsworth was married about this time to Miss Wharton 
 
4 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 of Philadelphia. They went abroad soon after their mar 
 riage, and upon his return Wads worth applied himself with 
 great spirit and success to agricultural affairs. In 1842 
 he was elected President of the State Society, and he al 
 ways manifested a lively interest in its prosperity. He re 
 peatedly took prizes from this and the County Society for 
 the excellence of his farm stock. 
 
 In 1844 he had the misfortune to lose his worthy father, 
 and was thus left in sole charge of the greater part of the 
 property, embracing, in addition to his own share, the es 
 tates of his two sisters. He continued to make Geneseo 
 his chief residence, and was induced, both by self-interest 
 and affection, to promote its prosperity by every means in 
 his power. Among other generous acts, he caused the 
 works which supply the village with water to be constructed. 
 He was intending to erect a building there for the purposes 
 of the literary institution which his father had founded, 
 when the breaking out of the war prevented the execution 
 of the project, for which, however, he provided in his will. 
 
 He made another visit to Europe, with his family, in 1854 ; 
 and shortly after his return purchased a house in Sixteenth 
 Street, in the city of New York, which he made his perma 
 nent town residence. 
 
 I now approach the time when Wadsworth's name became 
 interwoven with the history of the nation. He had been 
 chiefly known as a wealthy landholder, a hospitable coun 
 try gentleman, a leading agriculturist. But the day had 
 come which was to develop nobler aims and larger capacity 
 than he had ever manifested before. The metal of every 
 man's character was to be tested. None came out of the 
 furnace purer and brighter than his. 
 
 Let me attempt to describe him as those who knew him 
 best remember him to have been at that time. And let me 
 first speak of his home in Geneseo ; for this is necessary 
 that we may understand the purity of his motives, the 
 greatness of his sacrifices, and the value of his example. 
 
James Samuel Wadsworth. 5 
 
 His country house, as it has been represented to me by 
 one of our most honored landscape artists, was large, but 
 not ostentatious, - embosomed in trees, and commanding, 
 on its western side, a prospect of the beautiful valley of 
 the Genesee, which, with its glimpses of sparkling water, its 
 cultivated fields shut in by rich masses of foliage, and its 
 scattered groups of oaks and elms, partook of the character 
 of an English landscape, and reminded my artist friend of 
 the famous view of the valley of the Thames from Rich 
 mond Hill. All these trees were relics of the primeval 
 forest, had been preserved by the pioneer who first opened 
 these solitudes, and had been since protected with pride and 
 reverence by his descendants. Near the mansion was the 
 home-farm of two thousand acres, which received the special 
 attention of Wadsworth, and was well stocked with flocks 
 and herds. Beyond and around, in Livingston and the 
 neighboring counties, lay the leased lands of the estate, a 
 domain of fifteen thousand acres altogether, and, if re 
 garded as one tract, as large as some German principal 
 ities. 
 
 I may not intrude upon the interior of the homestead, 
 made charming by all that wealth and taste and affection 
 could collect, books, pictures, music, the conversation 
 of intelligent guests, and the exercise of graceful and re 
 fined hospitality. Here Wadsworth lived, in the midst of 
 numerous, contented, and thriving tenants, two thirds of 
 whom, or their fathers, had also been the tenants of the 
 first James Wadsworth, and thus proved, by their continu 
 ing the relation, the justice and liberality of their land 
 lords. 
 
 I will not attempt to give a minute analysis of the char 
 acter of our friend, but only to describe some of its more 
 striking qualities. One of these seems to me to have been 
 his direct, straightforward manliness. He never knew fear 
 himself, and he despised all cowards. He was also eminently 
 true and just. He hated all shams, and loved whatever was 
 
6 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 open, frank, and genuine. Perhaps he might have seemed 
 to some a little unsympathetic, a little wanting in tender 
 ness. But this arose from absent-mindedness or the pre 
 occupation of engrossing business. There was an inner 
 source of gentleness and sympathy in his nature which they 
 discovered who knew him best, and saw him at times when 
 the secret doors of the heart were unlocked. That he was 
 thoroughly benevolent and generous is proved, not only by 
 the alacrity and profusion with which he contributed to the 
 Irish famine fund and other public and splendid charities, 
 but also by the readiness with which, when the crops failed, 
 he constantly forgave the rent to those small farmers who 
 paid in kind, and thus quietly abridged his own income to 
 the extent, sometimes, of tens of thousands of dollars. 
 
 Wadsworth had excellent natural powers of mind, but 
 little academic cultivation. His intellectual ability was 
 developed rapidly in the latter years of his life. He was 
 an original thinker. His judgment was always clear and 
 sound ; but he disliked the details of business and the petty 
 cares of an office. He seized with great quickness the point 
 of a law question, or any other matter which was the sub 
 ject of his reading or conversation. He also was a capital 
 judge of character, and had the art, which distinguishes 
 many leading minds, of sifting the knowledge of those who 
 engaged in discussions with him, by putting a few pointed 
 questions. No one had more tact than he in talking with 
 the farmers of his neighborhood. He rode about among 
 them on his small pony in the most simple and unpretend 
 ing manner, and his advice had always an important influ 
 ence in forming and directing their opinions. 
 
 He was entirely free from all false pride. He never, 
 directly or indirectly, boasted of his wealth or his connec 
 tions. In his manners he was simple, cordial, and unaf 
 fected. Mr. Lothrop Motley says of him, in a letter which 
 I have read : " I have often thought and spoken of him as 
 the true, original type of the American gentleman, not 
 
James Samuel Wadsworth. 7 
 
 the pale, washed-out copy of the European aristocrat." In 
 his dress and equipage he observed a simplicity which was 
 almost Spartan. He had no trinkets or curiosities of the 
 toilet. He was extremely temperate in eating and drink 
 ing, and despised all the epicureanism of the table. 
 
 He was now in the flower of his age. His figure was tall, 
 well-proportioned, and firmly knit. The glance of his gray 
 eye was keen and determined. His Roman features were 
 well rounded, and his hair, which had become prematurely 
 white, added to the nobility of his expression. 
 
 Such is an imperfect outline sketch of the man and of 
 his home in Geneseo, as they appeared in the autumn of 
 1860, when the great conspiracy, which had for many years 
 been plotting at the South to destroy the national govern 
 ment, proceeded from seditious language to treasonable 
 acts, and finally dared to inaugurate civil war. James 
 Wadsworth took at once the most open, manly, and decided 
 stand on the side of the Union. From that moment till 
 the day of his death he postponed all private affairs to pub 
 lic duties, and devoted his time, his thoughts, his wealth, 
 and all the power which his position gave him, to the service 
 of his country. 
 
 To this he was impelled by his political principles, no less 
 than his personal character. He had come of old Federal 
 ist stock, and learned from his father to respect the Consti 
 tution and the national government which the people had 
 created under it. So long ago as 1848 he had supported 
 the Free-Soil party, which had proposed his name as a Dis 
 trict Elector. He was consistent and persevering afterwards 
 in his efforts on the same side. In 1856 he had received 
 the nomination of State Elector from the Republicans ; and 
 now, in November, 1860, he was chosen a District Elector 
 for Lincoln and Hamlin. 
 
 He owned immense tracts of land and had numerous 
 tenants ; and this, to a superficial observer, might seem 
 likely to have diverted his sympathies toward the Southern 
 
8 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 slaveholders. He was also connected, by the marriage of 
 one of his sisters, with a noble English family, and his asso 
 ciates and intimate friends had been chiefly formed among 
 the wealthy classes, and in circles where the fires of patri 
 otism were burning very low, if they had not gone out 
 altogether. Some of his closest friends were indeed repre 
 sentatives of the best Southern society, men possessing 
 that refined and winning manner, the faint tradition of 
 Huguenot politeness, which seems, in a few instances, to 
 have survived the adverse influences that surrounded it, 
 and which has been nowhere more unduly praised than 
 at the North. But notwithstanding all these hindrances, 
 Wadsworth remained a true, brave, Northern democrat. 
 Mr. Lothrop Motley, in the letter from which I have already 
 quoted, says of him : " He believed, honestly, frankly, and 
 unhesitatingly, in democracy, as the only possible govern 
 ment for our hemisphere, and as the inevitable tendency of 
 the whole world, so far as it is able to shake off the fetters 
 of former and present tyrannies. He honored and believed 
 in the people with his whole heart, and it is for this reason 
 
 the people honored and believed in him It has 
 
 always seemed to me that he was the truest and most 
 thoroughly loyal American I ever knew ; and this, to my 
 mind, is his highest eulogy, feeling as I do how immeas 
 urably higher the political and intellectual level of Amer 
 ica is than that of any other country in the world ! " 
 
 No man valued his fellow-beings more than Wadsworth 
 for the high qualities of mind and heart, and, I may add, 
 the strong right-arms which God had given them, and no 
 man less for their clothes, their trivial accomplishments, or 
 the company they kept. No man more thoroughly despised 
 that counterfeit chivalry which was neither truthful nor 
 merciful, but repudiated its promises to pay, and, instead 
 of defending the oppressed, hunted its trembling fugitives 
 with bloodhounds. 
 
 He had opposed the extension of slavery into the Territo- 
 
James Samuel Wadsworth. 9 
 
 ries, and he befriended the negro as he did any other un 
 happy human being who needed his assistance. For this he 
 was called by that name which then seemed to some persons 
 the most opprobrious which party ingenuity could invent, 
 the name of " Abolitionist." Perhaps the application of 
 this name to him may add another to those examples in 
 history, where that which was devised as the instrument of 
 shame became afterwards the badge of immortal honor. 
 Wadsworth saw with his clear eye that a deadly struggle 
 had now begun between systems of society entirely repug 
 nant to each other, between the civilized democracy of 
 the nineteenth century and that ferocious spirit of bastard 
 feudalism which, strangely enough, found a more congenial 
 home on the banks of the Mississippi than it had ever 
 enjoyed on the Neva or the Danube. No charms of social 
 intercourse, no claims of private friendship, obscured the 
 clearness of his vision on this point. He attributed at once 
 to the Southern conspirators a spirit of determined aggres 
 sion, a calculating, comprehensive treason, which North 
 ern optimists were at first reluctant to admit. He saw that 
 the laws of population and the irresistible opinion of the 
 world forbade them from delaying an enterprise which 
 their mad ambition had long before planned, and that all 
 temporizing measures on our part would be idiotic and 
 pusillanimous. 
 
 Accordingly, in that comedie larmoyante, created by crafty 
 Virginia politicians, and misnamed the Peace Conference, 
 upon whose doors should have been written Claudian's 
 words, 
 
 Mars gravior sub pace latet, 
 " Under the show of peace a sterner war lies hidden," 
 
 in that assembly, in which he took his seat on the 8th of 
 February, 1861, he wasted no time in speeches, but con 
 stantly voted against all measures that seemed to jeopard 
 the honor and independence of the loyal States. On the 17th 
 of February, upon his motion, the delegation of New York 
 
10 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 virtually resolved to vote " No " upon the chief sections of 
 the report of the committee which summed up the action 
 of the Conference ; and the State of New York was spared 
 the mortification of assenting to overtures which weakened 
 the position of the North, while they failed to propitiate the 
 Southern conspirators. 
 
 For the time was now at hand when the action of delib 
 erative bodies was to be of no account, and the safety of 
 the nation to depend upon military measures alone. Fort 
 Sumter was attacked and captured. The soldiers of Mas 
 sachusetts were assaulted in the streets of Baltimore. The 
 railroad communication with the capital was interrupted, 
 and the supplies for the troops there were nearly cut off. 
 In respect to this latter danger, the clear, practical mind of 
 Wadsworth seized at once the difficulties of the situation, 
 and devised the remedy. With great promptness and en 
 ergy, he caused two vessels to be loaded at New York, on 
 his own account, with provisions for the army, and accom 
 panied them to Annapolis, attending personally to their 
 delivery. During that interval of great anxiety between 
 the first demonstration of the enemy against Washington 
 and the commencement of General McDowell's campaign, 
 Wadsworth was in constant communication with Lieuten- 
 ant-General Scott, and was employed by him in executing 
 delicate and important commissions. But he was not con 
 tent with the performance of duties which, however difficult 
 and responsible, made his example less valuable than in the 
 more dangerous service of the field. He soon determined 
 to enter upon this, notwithstanding the sacrifices it involved. 
 Let us remember that he was now considerably past the 
 military age ; that his private affairs were numerous and 
 engrossing ; that he was able to give wise counsel and large 
 pecuniary aid to government, and fulfil, in this way, every 
 duty which the most exacting patriotism might be supposed 
 to require. He had, as we have seen, a home made at 
 tractive by everything which wealth and taste and the love 
 
James Samuel Wadsworth. 11 
 
 of friends could supply. He had six children, three sons 
 and three daughters, some of whom were just coming into 
 the active duties of life ; and, while they needed his careful 
 supervision, their affection and high promise made the part 
 ing from them all the more difficult and trying. Wadsworth 
 resisted all these temptations, and rejected all these excuses. 
 In June, 1861, he became a volunteer aid on the staif of 
 General McDowell, and fought his first battle in the disas 
 trous affair of Bull Run. His intimate friends declared, 
 when they heard of his resolution to take military service, 
 that this was equivalent to the sacrifice of his life. They 
 knew his bravery was so impetuous that he would court 
 every peril and exposure, and that he would never survive 
 the war. These predictions, alas ! were too surely to be ac 
 complished, but not until a later day. They were, indeed, 
 very nearly fulfilled at Bull Run. Nobody was more con 
 spicuous than Wadsworth in every post of danger. He had 
 a horse shot under him in his efforts to rally the panic- 
 stricken troops. He seized the colors of the New York 
 Fourteenth, and adjured that brave regiment to stand up 
 for the old flag. As cool and collected as a veteran, he was 
 one of the last to leave the field, and was most active in re 
 storing order on the retreat, and in assisting, at Fairfax 
 Court-House, to preserve the government property and to 
 relieve the wounded. 
 
 In the organization of the national army, Governor 
 Morgan, supposing he had a right to propose the names of 
 two major-generals from his State, sent Wadsworth's and 
 Dix's to the President. Wadsworth, however, upon learn 
 ing that but one was allowed, immediately declined the 
 intended honor, considering General Dix to be better quali 
 fied for the service. Afterwards, in the summer of 1861, 
 Wadsworth was made a brigadier. 
 
 Whatever may be the judgment of intelligent critics 
 upon the expediency of taking generals from civil life, and 
 however unsatisfactory they may consider the reasons which 
 
12 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 influence the government in making such appointments, it 
 is admitted by all that Wadsworth received his commission 
 with diffidence, and that his genius, which was essentially 
 military, coupled with his attention to his duties, soon made 
 him an efficient officer. His brigade was attached to the 
 Army of the Potomac, and stationed in the advance, near 
 Upton's Hill. He lay there during the autumn of 1861 
 and the succeeding winter, impatient at the delay of the 
 Commander-in-Chief in moving upon Manassas, and always 
 insisting upon what has since been proved to be true, that 
 the enemy's force there was for a long time too weak to 
 resist any serious attack upon it, if we had made one. He 
 asked, indeed, permission to follow the retreating enemy, 
 but was refused. 
 
 In March, 1862, General Wadsworth was appointed Mili 
 tary Governor of Washington, and for nine months dis 
 charged the very delicate and responsible duties of that 
 office with great satisfaction to the government. A com 
 petent writer, who served under him, says : 
 
 " While he gave the citizens all the liberties consistent with pub 
 lic safety, he took vigorous measures against traitors, spies, block 
 ade-runners, and kidnappers. He seized the slave-pen, discharged 
 the captives, and permanently established the rule that no negro 
 should be taken out of the District of Columbia, under color of the 
 Fugitive Slave Law, without an examination on the part of the 
 
 military authorities respecting the loyalty of the master 
 
 Great pains were taken by General Wadsworth to facilitate the 
 change of these people from bondage to freedom. He organized a 
 contraband bureau, established permanent quarters, taught the poor 
 blacks how to work for themselves, and made the confiscated goods 
 of the blockade supply their wants. Amid political and military 
 embarrassments, he succeeded in pioneering the way to practical 
 emancipation while commanding the fortifications and twenty-four 
 thousand troops." 
 
 Gurowski says, in his Diary, that he was the good genius 
 of the fugitive negroes. But for him, great numbers of 
 them would have been remanded to the slave-whip. 
 
James Samuel Wadsworth. 13 
 
 In the autumn of 1862, and while he was still in com 
 mand of Washington, he received the Union nomination 
 for Governor of New York. This had been offered to him, 
 in 1848, by the Free-Soil Democrats, and again, in 1856, 
 by the Republicans, but he had declined it on both occa 
 sions. He now thought it to be his duty to accept the 
 position, and, in his letter to the President of the Conven 
 tion, stated in a clear and forcible manner his opinions of 
 the questions involved in the canvass. He assumed that 
 the election would turn upon the necessity of sustaining 
 the national government in its effort to maintain its terri 
 torial integrity, and upon the Proclamation of Emancipa 
 tion ; and he showed that to carry out the latter measure 
 would be the most effectual, as well as humane, method of 
 putting down the Rebellion. 
 
 He afterwards came to New York and made a speech, 
 which had a homely earnestness and force about it that was 
 better than all the polished elegance of the schools. It was 
 full of quaint, outspoken honesty, which reminds us of 
 Abraham Lincoln. " I stand before you," he said, " a can 
 didate for your suffrages, but, if I know my own heart, I 
 come with no personal aspirations. I have seen with pain 
 the undue and exaggerated commendations with which my 
 
 friends have referred to me The man who pauses 
 
 to think of himself, of his affairs, of his family even, when 
 he has public duties to perform, and his country lies pros 
 trate, almost in the agonies of dissolution, is not the man 
 to save it." It seems strange now, when we can view this 
 election in the light of subsequent events, that Mr. Sey 
 mour should have defeated General Wadsworth by a ma 
 jority of more than ten thousand. 
 
 General Wadsworth' s term of service in Washington 
 lasted for nine months. A friend who saw him constantly 
 at that time says that he felt more deeply and more pain 
 fully the disasters of the country than almost any one he 
 met. He suggested certain movements to the President 
 
14 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 which were disapproved by more experienced military 
 minds ; but they showed, at any rate, his personal courage 
 and his restless patriotism. He constantly applied for more 
 active duty, and in December, 1862, the government or 
 dered him to report to Major-General Reynolds, then in 
 command of the First Corps. General Reynolds gave him 
 his First Division, and this he led, with great gallantry, at 
 Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville. 
 
 The experience of the last four years has proved the truth 
 of the assertion of military men, that war is a science which 
 must be studied like any other, and that civilians cannot be 
 extemporized into generals. It must be confessed, how 
 ever, that the genius of some civilians eminently fits them 
 for command ; and a campaign or two may supply the want 
 of early professional study. As I have already stated, 
 Wadsworth seems to have been one of these natural sol 
 diers. He manifested decided ability in conducting the 
 retreat of his troops at Chancellorsville. After effecting a 
 difficult crossing of the river, he was ordered to recross. 
 It was intended that this should have been done in the 
 night, but the order did not reach him until after daylight. 
 He got three or four regiments over without being observed, 
 owing to the cover of earthworks ; but the enemy soon after 
 saw the movement, and opened upon him with shot and 
 shell. One bridge had been taken up the day before. The 
 remaining one was lost three times during the recrossing. 
 General Reynolds ordered the movement to be suspended 
 as impracticable, but Wadsworth convinced him it was not, 
 and completed it with a loss of only about twenty killed 
 and wounded, and the same number of artillery horses. 
 He remained until the last regiment crossed, preceding 
 only the skirmishers and pickets. 
 
 General Wadsworth was very successful in gaining the 
 love of his men. His high sense of justice and true repub 
 lican respect for manliness, wherever he found it, soon con 
 vinced them that, if they did their duty, they should be 
 
James Samuel Wadsworth. 15 
 
 rewarded. They knew, too, that he made their comfort his 
 constant study. These qualities endeared him greatly to 
 his troops, and when, before the battle of Fredericksburg, 
 he rode with his staff unexpectedly into the encampment 
 of his old brigade, the soldiers of all the four regiments 
 rushed tumultuously towards him and made the skies ring 
 with their shouts of welcome. But there was another and a 
 better reason why his soldiers loved him, and also why he 
 was always a reliable officer : he was so cool and collected 
 under fire. " He had a habit," says an intelligent writer, 
 who saw him at the front just before his death, " of riding 
 about the foremost line, and even among his skirmishers, 
 which somewhat unnecessarily exposed his life. He knew 
 very well how to handle his division, and he knew how to 
 hold a line of battle, how to order and lead a charge, 
 how to do the plain work which he liked best; and at 
 Gettysburg he showed how much a plucky, tenacious leader 
 can do with a handful of troops in keeping back and making 
 cautious an overwhelming force of the enemy. He was 
 pertinacious ; did not like to give up or back out ; and was 
 not a man safely to be pressed, even by a force much 
 superior to his own." 
 
 General Meade writes of him : " The moral effect of his ex 
 ample, his years, and high social position, his distinguished 
 personal gallantry and daring bravery, all tended to place 
 him in a most conspicuous position, and to give him an 
 influence over the soldiers which few other men possess." 
 
 And General Humphreys, General Meade 's chief of staff, 
 in speaking of the qualities he showed on the field on which 
 he lost his life, writes : "In the two days of desperate fight 
 ing that followed our crossing the Rapidan, he was con 
 spicuous beyond all others for his gallantry, prompter than 
 all others in leading his troops again and again into action. 
 In all these combats he literally led his men, who, inspired 
 by his heroic bearing, continually renewed the contest, 
 which, but for him, they would have yielded." 
 
16 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 This is high praise, and from the most competent sources, 
 to be given to a man who had never been under fire until 
 he had passed his fifty-third year, and whose life had been 
 occupied in quiet agricultural pursuits. It was the blood 
 of the old Puritan captain which tingled in his veins in 
 those days of trial : better than that, it was the inextinguish 
 able love of country, the reverence for right and truth, 
 the inborn hatred of everything false, and mean, and treach 
 erous, which made him content to exchange the delights of 
 such a home as I have attempted to describe, for the un 
 speakable horrors of the battle-field. 
 
 It may well be supposed that, with qualities like these, he 
 was not allowed to remain inactive in the campaign which 
 succeeded the battles of Fredericksburg and Chancellors- 
 ville. At Gettysburg he commanded the First Division of 
 the First Corps until the fall of General Reynolds, when he 
 assumed charge of the corps. Before that, however, his di 
 vision had received the brunt of the enemy's attack. It went 
 into action at nine in the morning, and continued under fire 
 until four in the afternoon, suffering heavier loss than any 
 other in the army. He had several horses shot under him, 
 and he animated the fight everywhere by his noble presence. 
 At the council of war held after the victory, Wadsworth, 
 who, as the temporary commander of a corps, had a seat at 
 the board, was one of three who, with decided earnestness, 
 favored the pursuit of the enemy ; but his advice was over 
 ruled and Lee escaped. A competent military authority 
 says : " No doubt now exists in the mind of any unpreju 
 diced observer, that, had this course been adopted, the army 
 of Lee would have been entirely captured or put to rout." 
 The war has seen no better instance of good judgment in 
 civilian officers than Wads worth's on this occasion. 
 
 After General Grant was ordered to the Eastern Division, 
 Wadsworth was constantly employed in assisting in the 
 arrangements for the campaign. Before it was undertaken, 
 however, and about the beginning of the year 1864, he 
 
James Samuel Wadsworth. 17 
 
 was sent upon special service to the Mississippi Valley, 
 and made an extensive tour through the Western and 
 Southwestern States. It was on the eve of his departure 
 that he made to the paymaster from whom he had always 
 drawn his pay the remarkable declaration, that he desired 
 to have his accounts with government kept by one and the 
 same officer, because it was his purpose, at the close of the 
 war, to call for an accurate statement of all the money he 
 should have received, and then to give it, whatever might 
 be the amount, to some permanent institution founded for 
 the relief of invalid soldiers. " This is the least invidious 
 way," said he, " in which I can refuse pay for fighting for 
 my country in her hour of danger." 
 
 When General Grant finally began his campaign, Wads- 
 worth was placed in command of the Fourth Division of 
 the Fifth Corps, which was composed of his old division 
 of the First Corps, with the addition of the Third Brigade. 
 He crossed the Rapidan on Wednesday, the 4th of May. 
 On the 5th and 6th the battle of the Wilderness was fought. 
 It was here that the event occurred which his friends, know 
 ing his impetuous valor, had feared from the first. Wads- 
 worth was mortally wounded. This heroic termination of a 
 noble career, and its attendant circumstances, are described 
 in simple and touching language by his son, Captain Craig 
 Wadsworth, in a letter which is published in Mr. Allen's 
 Memorial. Captain Wadsworth was attached to the cavalry 
 division, which was guarding the wagon train ; but, by per 
 mission of his commanding officer, he went to the front, 
 and remained with his father for two or three hours on the 
 morning of the memorable 6th, and while the fight was 
 going on. There is also an interesting description of it by 
 a Confederate officer, which has been communicated to the 
 family, but never yet published. 
 
 It seems from these accounts that General Wadsworth's 
 command had been engaged for several hours on the even 
 ing of the 5th, and had lost heavily. Early the next 
 
 VOL. I. 2 
 
18 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 morning General Hancock ordered it again into action on 
 the right of the Second Corps. The enemy's division op 
 posed to it was at first Heth's and afterwards Anderson's, 
 which were strongly posted in thick woods, and supported 
 by artillery placed in a small open field about two hundred 
 yards in the rear. The ground declined gently from this 
 field to Heth's position. 
 
 Wadsworth charged repeatedly with his division, and 
 drove the enemy back in disorder, but he was unable to 
 retain his advantage. He was afterwards reinforced, and 
 with six brigades made several other assaults. He fought 
 with the most conspicuous bravery, and had two horses 
 killed under him. At eleven o'clock General Hancock 
 ordered him to withdraw, and there was a lull in the battle 
 until about noon, when Longstreet, who had in the mean 
 time come up, precipitated his force upon Wads worth's left, 
 and drove back Ward's brigade at that point in some con 
 fusion. Wadsworth immediately threw forward his second 
 line, and formed it on the Orange and Fredericksburg Plank- 
 Road, at right angles with his original position. It was 
 while he was trying to hold this line with his own division, 
 then reduced to about sixteen hundred men, that his third 
 horse was shot under him, and he was himself struck in 
 the head by a bullet. The enemy were charging at the 
 time, and took the ground before General Wadsworth could 
 be removed. 
 
 The Confederate officer, to whose account allusion has 
 been made, states that he found him in the woods about 
 fifteen paces to the left of the Plank-Road. None of the 
 Federal dead or wounded were more than twenty or thirty 
 yards nearer than he was to the open field toward which 
 the attack had been directed. He was lying upon his back 
 under a shelter-tent, which was extended over him at about 
 three feet from the ground, the two upper corners being 
 attached to boughs of trees, and the lower ones and the 
 sides supported by muskets. The officer recognized him 
 
James Samuel Wadsworth. 19 
 
 by a paper with his name on it, which had been pinned to 
 his coat. His appearance was perfectly natural, and his 
 left hand grasped the stock of one of the supporting mus 
 kets near the guard. His fingers played with the trigger, 
 and he occasionally pushed the piece from him as far as he 
 could reach, still grasping it in his hand. Supposing he 
 might wish to send some message to his family, the officer 
 addressed him. The General, however, paid no attention 
 to the words, and it was soon evident that he was uncon 
 scious of what was passing around him, although the ex 
 pression of his face was calm and natural, and his eyes in 
 dicated intelligence. It was in this state that he was taken 
 to one of the Confederate hospitals. No medical skill could 
 save his life. He lingered from Friday until Sunday morn 
 ing, the 8th of May, and then yielded his brave spirit into 
 the hands of its Maker. 
 
 There is something touching in the manner in which his 
 remains were recovered. One Patrick McCracken, who had 
 been a prisoner for nine weeks in the Old Capitol, while the 
 General was Military Governor of Washington, and had 
 known how just and true a man he was to foes as well as 
 to friends, saw him as he lay in the hospital on the day of 
 his death, and, by permission of the surgeon in charge, 
 carefully interred the body in a family burial-ground. A 
 few weeks afterwards, through his information and assist 
 ance, it was restored to his friends, and removed with every 
 demonstration of love and respect to his native town, where 
 it was finally buried. 
 
 Thus died James Samuel Wadsworth, in the fifty-seventh 
 year of his age, and in the full strength of his manhood. 
 Many a true, and brave, and noble soldier fell on that 
 bloody field, but none truer, or braver, or nobler than he. 
 Many a patriot consummated there the long record of his 
 sacrifices, but none left a brighter and purer record of 
 sacrifices than his. In this war, which has been illustrated 
 by so many instances of heroism, it seems almost unjust to 
 
20 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 compare one man's services with another's ; and Wads- 
 worth, with his unaffected modesty, and his reverence for 
 worth wherever it existed, if his spirit could sit in judg 
 ment on our words, would rebuke us for attributing to 
 him a more genuine loyalty than that which animated 
 many a poor private who fell by his side. But when we 
 remember how entirely impossible it was in his case that 
 his worldly advantages should have been increased by mil 
 itary service, and how often it is that a mixture of motives 
 impels men to undertake such duty, we feel that we can 
 give our praise to him with fuller hearts, in unstinted 
 measure, and with no reservations or perplexing doubts. 
 
 As he lay upon the field, in the midst of the dead and the 
 dying, in that awful interval between the retreat of his own 
 men and the advance of the enemy, if any gleam of con 
 sciousness was vouchsafed to him, may we not feel confident 
 that the recollection of his noble fidelity to his country as 
 suaged the bitterness of that solemn hour ? 
 
 " Who is the happy warrior ? " asks a famous English 
 poet ; and the poet answers, He is the happy warrior 
 
 " Whom neither shape of danger can dismay, 
 Nor thought of tender happiness betray ; . . . . 
 Who, whether praise of him must walk the earth 
 Forever, and to noble deeds give birth, 
 Or he must fall and sleep without his fame, 
 And leave a dead, unprofitable name, 
 Finds comfort in himself and in his cause ; 
 And, while the mortal mist is gathering, draws 
 His breath in confidence of Heaven's applause : 
 This is the happy warrior, this is he . 
 Whom eA r ery man in arms should wish to be ! " 
 
Fletcher Webster. 21 
 
 1833. 
 FLETCHER WEBSTER. 
 
 Colonel 12th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), June 26, 1861; killed at the 
 battle of Bull Run, Va., August 30, 1862. 
 
 T71LETCHER WEBSTER, son of Daniel and Grace 
 JC (Fletcher) Webster, was bom in Portsmouth, New 
 Hampshire, July 23, 1813. He was fitted for college at 
 the Public Latin School in Boston, his father having re 
 moved to that city in 1816. He entered Harvard College 
 in 1829, and graduated in 1833. Though not of studious 
 habits, he held a respectable rank as a scholar. His gen 
 erous character and cordial manners made him a general 
 favorite with his classmates, and he was selected by them 
 to deliver the class oration at the close of their collegiate 
 life, a distinction more gratifying to a social and sym 
 pathetic nature like his than the highest honors of schol 
 arship would have been. 
 
 After leaving college he studied law, partly with Mr. 
 Samuel B. Walcott, at Hopkinton, Mass., and partly with 
 his father, in Boston, and was in due time admitted to the 
 Suffolk bar, and began the practice of his profession in 
 Boston. In the autumn of 1836 he was married to Miss 
 Caroline Story White, daughter of Stephen White, Esq., of 
 Salem, and immediately after his marriage put in execu 
 tion a plan he had previously formed of trying his profes 
 sional fortunes at the West, a change which at that time 
 required more enterprise and involved greater sacrifices 
 than now. He went first to Detroit, where he remained 
 till the close of 1837, in the practice of his profession, and 
 then removed to La Salle, in Illinois, where he remained 
 till 1840. During his. residence in Illinois, he made the 
 acquaintance of Mr. Abraham Lincoln, who immediately 
 
22 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 recognized Colonel Webster when they met in "Washington 
 in 1861, and recalled their former intercourse to his mem 
 ory. 
 
 Colonel Webster met with fair success in the practice of 
 the law, but the profession was not congenial to his tastes 
 or in harmony with his temperament. He had the quick 
 perceptions, the ready tact, and the easy elocution which 
 are so important in the trial of causes, but he disliked the 
 drudgery of preparation and was not patient in the inves 
 tigation of legal questions. This repugnance might have 
 been overcome, had he continued a few years longer in the 
 practice of his profession, but such was not destined to be 
 his fate. His whole course of life received a new direction 
 in consequence of the election of General Harrison to the 
 office of President of the United States in the autumn of 
 1840. Mr. Daniel Webster became Secretary of State, and 
 Colonel Webster removed to Washington, where he acted 
 as private secretary to his father, and occasionally as assist 
 ant Secretary of State. This was a sphere of duty con 
 genial to his tastes. He was a clear and ready writer, and 
 was fond of the discussion of political questions. His 
 father has said that no one could prepare a paper, in con 
 formity with verbal instructions received from him, more 
 to his satisfaction than his son Fletcher; and this was a 
 point on which Mr. Daniel Webster's parental affection 
 would not have blinded him. He was very fond of his son, 
 and was not only happy in having him near him, but his 
 happiness ,was always imperfect if his son were absent from 
 him. So far as the son's advancement in life was con 
 cerned, it might have been better that he should have 
 been left to make his way alone, and that his father should 
 have consented to the sacrifice of affection which such a sep 
 aration would have required ; but, now that both are gone 
 from earth, who will not pardon a mistake if mistake it 
 was which had its source in the best affections of the 
 human heart ? 
 
Fletcher Webster. 23 
 
 In 1843 Mr. Caleb Gushing was appointed Commissioner 
 to China, and Colonel Webster accompanied him as Secre 
 tary of Legation. He remained in China till the objects of 
 the mission were accomplished, and reached home on his 
 return in January, 1845. In the course of the year after 
 his return, he frequently lectured in public on the subject 
 of China, and gave interesting reminiscences of his own 
 residence there. 
 
 In 1850 he was appointed, by President Taylor, Surveyor 
 of the Port of Boston, an office which he held by successive 
 appointments till March, 1861, when a successor was nom 
 inated by President Lincoln. 
 
 Immediately after the firing upon Fort Sumter, and the 
 attack by a lawless mob in Baltimore upon the Sixth Mas 
 sachusetts Regiment, he responded to an appeal made to 
 the patriotic citizens of Massachusetts by the following 
 notice, which appeared in the Boston papers of Saturday, 
 April 20, 1861. 
 
 "FELLOW-CITIZENS, I have been assured by the Executive 
 Department that the State will accept at once an additional regiment 
 of infantry. I therefore propose to meet to-morrow at ten o'clock, in 
 front of the Merchants' Exchange, State Street, such of my fellow- 
 citizens as will join in raising this new regiment. The muster-roll 
 will be ready to be signed then and there. 
 "Respectfully, 
 
 "FLETCHER WEBSTER." 
 
 The above call was seconded by the following notice, sub 
 scribed by the names of twenty-eight well-known gentle 
 men. 
 
 " There will be a public meeting to-morrow, Sunday, in front of 
 the Exchange, State Street, at ten o'clock, A. M., to aid in the en 
 rolment of the new regiment of volunteer militia called for by 
 Fletcher Webster. Come all." 
 
 At the appointed hour on Sunday, April 21st, an immense 
 crowd appeared in State Street in front of the Exchange. 
 
24 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Colonel Webster attempted to address them, but the place 
 where he stood made it impossible for him to be heard ex 
 cept by those who were near him. Some one proposed to 
 go to the Old State-House, at the head of the street, a few 
 rods distant, and the suggestion was received with acclama 
 tion and immediately carried into effect. Colonel Webster 
 then spoke from the balcony of the Old State-House, and, 
 among other things, said he could see no better use to 
 which the day could be put than for us to take the oppor 
 tunity to show our gratitude to Divine Providence for be 
 stowing upon us the best government in the world, and to 
 pledge ourselves to stand by and maintain it. He whose 
 name he bore had the good fortune to defend the Union 
 and the Constitution in the forum. This he could not do, 
 but he was ready to defend them in the field. He closed 
 his remarks with an allusion to his father's devotion to the 
 country, and expressed a hope that we should yet see the 
 nation united, and our flag remain without a star dimmed 
 or a stripe obliterated. He then announced that all who 
 desired to enlist would find papers ready for signatures at 
 the surveyor's office, at the Custom-House. 
 
 The meeting was then addressed by other gentlemen in a 
 similar strain. Nothing could surpass the enthusiasm with 
 which the remarks of all the speakers, and especially those 
 of Colonel Webster, were received by the audience. And 
 this was in no small degree owing to the impression made 
 by the fact that it was the son of Daniel Webster who was 
 ready to risk his life for the defence of the Union and the 
 Constitution. The illustrious statesman had been but nine 
 years in his grave ; and, of the audience which listened to 
 the son, probably nine tenths at least had seen the father 
 and heard him speak. The scene before them recalled him. 
 To the mind's eye, that majestic form and grand countenance 
 seemed standing by the side of his son, and in the mind's 
 ear they heard again the deep music of that voice which 
 had so often charmed and instructed them. And there was 
 
Fletcher Webster. 25 
 
 yet another reason for the strong feeling that was awakened. 
 Colonel Webster had been for some years identified with the 
 great party which had been defeated in the election of 1860, 
 and he had been removed from a lucrative office by the 
 administration of President Lincoln. But none the less 
 zealously did he come forward in aid of his country in her 
 hour of peril and distress, and the value of his example was 
 appreciated and felt. 
 
 The enthusiasm of the meeting was not a transient flame, 
 but a steady fire. The next day a committee of one hun 
 dred persons was organized to co-operate with Colonel 
 "Webster in forming and providing for his regiment, and 
 among them were some of his own warmest personal 
 friends, and some of the most zealous and devoted of the 
 political disciples of his father. Money was contributed 
 with lavish hand. So rapidly were the ranks of the regi 
 ment filled, that in three days the enlistment was com 
 pleted and the lists closed. Five companies were enlisted 
 in Boston, one in North Bridgewater, one in Abington, 
 one in Weymouth, one in Stoughton, and one in Glouces 
 ter. Colonel Fessenden, a graduate of West Point, offered 
 his services as military instructor, which were gratefully 
 accepted. The classmates of Colonel Webster presented 
 him with a valuable horse and equipments. The young 
 ladies of Mr. Emerson's school in Boston made liberal 
 donations to the company commanded by Captain Salt- 
 marsh, which, in their honor, was called the Emerson 
 Guard. The pupils of the Latin School made most gen 
 erous provision for the equipment of the company com 
 manded by Captain Shurtleff, a graduate of the school, 
 and, in acknowledgment, the company was named the 
 Latin-School Guard. 
 
 The three months after the organization of the regiment 
 were spent in Fort Warren, in the harbor of Boston, in the 
 discipline and drill requisite to convert fresh recruits into 
 steady soldiers. This was dull work for ardent young 
 
26 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 men, burning for actual service in the field ; but the event 
 showed that it was time well spent. On the 26th of June 
 the regiment was mustered into service. On the 18th of 
 July a splendid standard was presented to the regiment, on 
 behalf of the ladies of Boston, by Edward Everett, who ac 
 companied the gift with a patriotic and soul-stirring address, 
 to which Colonel Webster made an appropriate reply. 
 
 On the afternoon of the 23d of July, the regiment left 
 Fort Warren for the seat of war. They were received with 
 enthusiastic welcome on their arrival at New York the next 
 day. The officers were entertained at the Astor House by 
 the sons of Massachusetts resident in New York. With a 
 few stoppages, the regiment arrived at Baltimore about 
 noon on Friday, July 26th, and were cordially received. 
 Colonel Webster and his command proceeded to Harper's 
 Ferry, where they arrived on Saturday, July 27th, and 
 pitched tents on the Maryland side of the Potomac, about a 
 mile from the ferry, calling their encampment Camp Banks. 
 The regiment was soon after removed to Darnestown, where 
 it remained until it was transferred to Cantonment Hicks, 
 about four miles east of Frederick City, in Maryland, arriv 
 ing there on Thursday, December 5, 1861. At that place 
 the regiment remained in camp until February 27, 1862, 
 when it marched into Virginia for more active service. 
 
 For the next four or five months the Webster regiment, 
 forming part of the division of the army under Major- 
 General Banks, was mainly employed in guarding the 
 Upper Potomac, and keeping vigilant watch upon the 
 enemy, so as to prevent him from crossing the river into 
 Maryland. It was an important, though not an exciting 
 service, and was of essential value in completing their mil 
 itary training, and giving them that efficiency which is the 
 result of mutual knowledge and mutual confidence. 
 
 During all this time Colonel Webster showed himself 
 possessed, in no common measure, of the qualities of a good 
 commander. His discipline was firm and uniform, but not 
 
Fletcher Webster. 27 
 
 alloyed by petulance or passion. His regiment acquired a 
 good name from the neat and soldier-like appearance of the 
 men, the quickness and accuracy of their drill, and the 
 orderly arrangements of their camp. His men were warmly 
 attached to their Colonel. They appreciated his manly 
 frankness, his simplicity of character, his kindness of heart, 
 and the cheerfulness with which he bore the hardships and 
 privations of the service, though he had no longer the un 
 worn energies of youth to sustain him. 
 
 In the early part of August, 1862, Colonel Webster 
 obtained leave of absence for a few days, and came home. 
 This was in consequence of the death of his youngest 
 daughter, Julia, to whom he was tenderly attached, and 
 whose death overwhelmed him with grief, and awakened 
 in him an irresistible longing to mingle his tears with those 
 of his wife and surviving children. It was during this 
 brief absence that his regiment was for the first time set 
 upon the perilous edge of battle in the disastrous affair of 
 Cedar Mountain, August 9th, where that gallant and prom 
 ising young officer, Captain Shurtleff, was killed, and where 
 so many of our "beautiful and brave" of the Second Massa 
 chusetts Regiment poured out their precious blood. It was 
 a source of regret to Colonel Webster that his regiment 
 should have been led into their first battle by any one but 
 himself; but, on the other hand, he had a right to be proud 
 of their excellent conduct and steadiness under a hot fire 
 of two or three hours. 
 
 Colonel Webster, on the 16th of August, rejoined his reg 
 iment, which was then encamped upon the Rapidan, near 
 Mitchell's Station. It was a part of Hartsuff s brigade, 
 Ricketts's division, and McDowell's corps, forming a por 
 tion of the Army of Virginia, under the command of Gen 
 eral Pope. On the 18th of August, the army began a 
 movement towards the North Fork of the Rappahannock, 
 and by the 20th the main body was behind the river and 
 prepared to hold its passes. 
 
28 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 On the 24th of August, General McDowell's corps was at 
 or near Warrenton. On the morning of the 27th of Au 
 gust, he was directed to move forward rapidly on Gaines 
 ville, by the Warrenton Turnpike. And the required po 
 sition was reached before the next day. On the next 
 evening a brisk engagement took place at Thoroughfare 
 Gap between the advance of the Rebel force under Gen 
 eral Longstreet and the division under General Ricketts, 
 in which the Twelfth Massachusetts Regiment took part, 
 and behaved well, having six men wounded. " The Colonel 
 did splendidly," said one of his officers, writing home im 
 mediately after. 
 
 The regiment was not on the field on the 29th of August, 
 the first day of the second battle of Bull Run, but in the 
 perils and disasters of the next day it bore a conspicuous 
 part. It was stationed on the left, against which the main 
 attack of the Rebel force was directed, where the fight was 
 most severe and the slaughter most terrible. Colonel Web 
 ster led his men into battle with the utmost gallantry ; and, 
 encouraged by his voice and presence, they behaved admira 
 bly well. Many of them fell, but the survivors did not 
 flinch. Late in the afternoon, some of the regiments on 
 their left, overborne by superior numbers, began to give 
 way, and the Twelfth fell back some twenty paces, to avoid 
 being placed between the fire of advancing foes and re 
 treating friends, but in good order and without breaking 
 their ranks. Not long after this Colonel Webster was shot 
 through the body. Lieutenant Haviland was near him 
 when he fell, and with two men went with him to the rear. 
 They had gone but a few paces when one of the men was 
 shot, and the other, seeing the enemy close upon him, sought 
 safety in flight. Colonel Webster was perfectly helpless, 
 and Lieutenant Haviland, still suffering from an injury re 
 ceived from his horse having fallen upon him at Cedar 
 Mountain, could do no more than find a place of shelter 
 for the dying man under a bush in a little hollow. No one 
 
Fletcher Webster. 29 
 
 could be found to carry him away, and messages sent for 
 a surgeon proved ineffectual. Colonel Webster desired his 
 friend to leave him, but Lieutenant Haviland was deter 
 mined to save him if possible ; at any rate,, not to desert 
 him. Within a short time, a body of Rebel troops came 
 upon them and took them prisoners. They would not 
 carry away Colonel Webster from the spot where he lay, 
 nor yet allow Lieutenant Haviland to remain with him. 
 The officer in command promised to send an ambulance 
 for him, but his pledge was not redeemed. He died on 
 the spot where he was left, and we can only hope that his 
 suffering was not long or severe. His body was recovered 
 and sent home by the generous and courageous efforts of 
 Lieutenant Arthur Dehon, as is told in the memoir of that 
 promising officer and most amiable young man. His fu 
 neral services were held at the church on Church Green, 
 Boston, on Tuesday, September 9, 1862. The building was 
 filled with a large body of mourning and sympathizing 
 friends, who listened with deep feeling to the well-chosen 
 words of the officiating clergyman, the Rev. Chandler Rob- 
 bins, and the solemn and appropriate music of the choir. 
 At the close of the services his body was taken to Marsh- 
 field and committed to the dust, in the family cemetery, by 
 the side of his illustrious father. 
 
 Colonel Webster was long mourned and affectionately 
 remembered by the officers and men who had served under 
 him. And there were others, too, who grieved for his loss ; 
 for though not widely known, he had many faithful friends 
 who had known and loved him from boyhood, and had 
 stood by him in all the changes and chances of life. His own 
 heart was warm, his nature was generous and open, and his 
 temperament cordial and frank. His tastes were strongly 
 social, and his powers of social entertainment were such as 
 few men possess. He had an unerring sense of the ludi 
 crous, his wit was ready and responsive, and no man could 
 relate an amusing incident or tell a humorous story with 
 
30 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 more dramatic power. Nor was he without faculties of a 
 higher order. His perceptions were quick and accurate, 
 he was an able and forcible speaker, and he wrote with the 
 clearness and strength which belonged to him by right of 
 inheritance. The value which his friends had for him was 
 higher than the mark which he made upon his times. The 
 course of his life had not in all respects been favorable to 
 his growth and influence, and he had not the iron resolu 
 tion and robust purpose which make will triumph over cir 
 cumstance. But when the golden opportunity came, he 
 grasped it with heroic hand. He rose to the height of the 
 demand made upon him, and dormant powers and reserved 
 energies started into vigorous life as the occasion required 
 them. Had he lived, he might have had a higher place, 
 but it is enough for his friends to know that in the provi 
 dence of God he was permitted to die a glorious death, at 
 the head of his regiment, with his face to the foe, calmly 
 confronting the shock of adverse battle, in defence of 
 the Union, the Constitution, and the laws, for which his 
 father had lived. Who could ask more for the friend of 
 one's heart or the child of one's love ? 
 
 Colonel Webster left a widow and three children, two 
 sons and a daughter. His eldest son has since died. 
 
Charles Henry Wheelwright. 31 
 
 1834. 
 CHARLES HENRY WHEELWRIGHT. 
 
 Assistant Surgeon, U. S. Navy, October 17, 1839; Surgeon, April 5, 
 1854 ; died July 30, 1862, at Pilotstown, S. W. Pass, La., of disease con 
 tracted in the service. 
 
 CHARLES HENRY WHEELWRIGHT, late surgeon in 
 the Navy of the United States, was born in Purchase 
 Street, in the city of Boston, May 29th, 1813, in a house 
 which was built by his father on the spot where the Sailors' 
 Home now stands. His father, Lot Wheelwright, a native 
 of Cohasset, Massachusetts, was originally a ship-builder, 
 and afterwards a ship-owner and merchant in Boston, and 
 was in 1813, and for many years afterwards, a man of wealth. 
 His mother was Susannah (Wilson) Wheelwright, of West 
 Cambridge. They were married in 1793, and Charles was 
 the youngest of their six children. 
 
 When about ten years old Charles was sent to the Round 
 Hill Academy, at Northampton, then a celebrated school, 
 kept by Dr. Cogswell, late of the Astor Library, and by 
 Mr. George Bancroft, the historian ; but in consequence of 
 failing health (for his constitution was naturally delicate), 
 he remained there only about a year. He went next to the 
 well-known school at Jamaica Plain, near Boston, kept by 
 Mr. Green, where he remained for some time ; but his final 
 preparation for college was made under the private tuition 
 of the late Jonathan Chapman, afterwards Mayor of Boston, 
 who, at the request of an older brother, undertook to direct 
 his studies. Before he entered college, however, his health 
 being still delicate, he was sent abroad in a vessel com 
 manded by a brother-in-law, and travelled through various 
 parts of England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. This was 
 the beginning of those wanderings which occupied the 
 
32 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 greater part of his life ; and though in after days he often 
 complained of his long absences from home, and of separa 
 tion from friends and relatives to whom he was strongly 
 attached, yet there was in his nature a certain restlessness 
 and fondness for new scenes and places, which had some 
 thing to do with his final choice of a profession. 
 
 He entered college in 1831, becoming a member of the 
 class which graduated in 1834. After a little more than a 
 year of college life, his health again became impaired, and 
 his lungs appeared so much affected that he obtained leave 
 of absence, and passed the winter in Mobile and New 
 Orleans. At Cambridge he was a general favorite, and 
 formed many intimate friendships which lasted through 
 life. His popularity with his friends and acquaintances 
 arose not only from the sterling qualities of his character, 
 his warm-heartedness, and the general kindness of his dis 
 position, but from his cheerfulness when in society, and the 
 high spirits which seemed natural to him, although he was 
 subject at intervals to very great depression. He was always 
 animated in conversation, speaking in a rather loud tone. 
 He sang a song acceptably, for he had a musical taste, 
 though his voice was not melodious ; and in convivial mo 
 ments his spirits would rise as easily without artificial stim 
 ulants, as if the glasses, which he would quietly fill with 
 water and then toss oif, really contained the champagne 
 he was supposed to be drinking. It seemed as if the mere 
 presence of his friends was a sufficient stimulus to enable 
 him to drive off that depression which many find it difficult 
 to overcome without some excitement more potent than 
 water. 
 
 In the latter part of the Senior year, in consequence of 
 some disturbances which occurred in College, several mem 
 bers of his class were punished by expulsion or otherwise. 
 This treatment was felt by their classmates to be unjust. 
 A pamphlet of considerable ability, written under the 
 authority of the class by one of their number, in which 
 
Charles Henry Wheelwright. 33 
 
 the character and conduct of the Faculty were rather se 
 verely handled, only added to the excitement, as it placed 
 the government in the unpleasant dilemma of either suffer 
 ing under its imputations in silence, or so far forgetting its 
 dignity as to answer an attack made by boys. Finally a 
 number of the class, considering themselves equally guilty 
 with those who were punished, determined not to receive 
 their degrees; and accordingly, when their names were 
 called, agreeably to ancient custom, on Commencement 
 day, they were not to be found. 
 
 At a later period, when the pamphlet and the causes 
 which led to this youthful act of quixotism were forgotten, 
 most of these recusants received their degrees, and were 
 welcomed back to the bosom of their Alma Mater ; but Dr. 
 Wheelwright's absence on his professional duties, and some 
 unavoidable delays, prevented him from being included in 
 their number, as he had expected. Since his death his 
 friends and classmates have regretted that the list of the 
 Class of 1834, in the Triennial Catalogue, does not contain 
 the name of one who was, to say the least, as much loved 
 and appreciated in College and in after life as any whose 
 name it bears. 
 
 There is a Catalogue, however, of at least one society in 
 College, where his name is enrolled. This society is an 
 ancient one, of a social character, composed at that time 
 mostly of intimate friends, and his name appears as its pre 
 siding officer from 1833 to 1834. He was also Adjutant of 
 the Harvard Washington Corps, a military company com 
 posed of the students of Harvard University, but now long 
 extinct. 
 
 Shortly after leaving college, his taste for chemistry and 
 other kindred studies induced him to select medicine as his 
 profession ; and he entered the office of the late Dr. George 
 C. Shattuck, and became a member of his household. In 
 1837 he received the degree of M. D. from the Medical 
 Department of Harvard University ; and his father's prop- 
 
 VOL. I. 3 
 
34 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 erty having become much reduced, if not entirely lost, he 
 now stood ready to begin life with that advantage which 
 his excellent preceptor, Dr. Shattuck, thought so impor 
 tant, and which in his peculiar style he was wont to term 
 " the healthy stimulus of prospective want.' 1 
 
 He decided to enter the Navy ; and having first attended a 
 course of medical lectures in Philadelphia, he was exam 
 ined and commissioned as Assistant Surgeon, October 17th, 
 1839. He must have passed an excellent examination, as 
 his name stood third on the list. He was soon after ordered 
 to the sloop-of-war Marion, and remained in her on the 
 Brazil station about three years. Much of the time was 
 spent in the ports of Rio Janeiro, Buenos Ayres, and Monte 
 Video, especially in the two latter. At Buenos Ayres the 
 American officers were treated with much attention by 
 Rosas, who was then at the height of his power ; and Dr. 
 Wheelwright saw a great deal of him and his family. In a 
 letter written during this cruise he says : " I passed seven 
 as happy months as I ever knew in Buenos Ayres, and per 
 haps, had the country been quiet, I had been there still. 
 But Rosas is losing ground These South Ameri 
 can republics, like the Kilkenny cats, fight till nothing but 
 their tails are left." He little thought, as he wrote this 
 letter, that he should, in a comparatively few years, see his 
 own country engaged in a civil war in which more valuable 
 lives would be lost on each side than Rosas and his antag 
 onist had enrolled in their respective armies, and that his 
 own would be among the number. 
 
 On his return, in 1843, he was for some time in the re 
 ceiving-ship Ohio, at Boston, and the frigate Indepen 
 dence, one of the Home Squadron. In this year he passed 
 the usual examination, and took the rank of Passed Assist 
 ant Surgeon. 
 
 In 1844 he left the Home Squadron ; and after a short 
 leave of absence, he was ordered, in 1845, to the Naval Hos 
 pital at Pensacola. The government was at this time con- 
 
Charles Henry Wheelwright. 35 
 
 structing a new hospital at that station, and orders came 
 from Washington, for some reason, to cut down the trees 
 which grew on a marsh in the vicinity. The medical offi 
 cers at Pensacola remonstrated against this measure, as 
 being likely to cause malaria by exposing so much wet 
 ground to the rays of the sun, but without effect. The 
 summer of 1845 was dry, but the winter and spring suc 
 ceeding were very wet and rainy ; and after the heat of 
 summer came on, a most violent form of bilious or yellow 
 fever showed itself, and soon began to rage with great 
 severity. The gentleman who held the position of surgeon 
 during the first part of the sickly season was in very deli 
 cate health. There were no hospital nurses except ignorant 
 negroes, and almost the whole responsibility and labor fell 
 upon Dr. Wheelwright, as assistant surgeon. The mortal 
 ity was very great, for all the invalids of the Gulf Squad 
 ron were sent to the hospital. It soon became almost 
 impossible to procure and retain servants ; and he was 
 obliged, in many cases, to perform the duties of surgeon and 
 nurse for the dying, and then to render the last offices to 
 the dead. The surgeon who succeeded the one first in 
 charge took the fever himself, and the poor assistant was 
 worse off than ever ; but he continued to perform his duties 
 with his usual energy and spirit, even after the time had 
 passed when, by the usages of the navy, he had a right to 
 ask to be relieved from the post. At last he was taken ill 
 himself. The fever ran high, and for some days his life 
 was despaired of; and though he finally rallied, he never 
 afterwards enjoyed the same degree of health as before. 
 
 After his recovery from the fever, he had leave of absence 
 for some months, which he employed in travelling in Eu 
 rope and in visiting the hospitals of Paris and other Conti 
 nental cities ; and he then joined the Mediterranean Squad 
 ron in January, 1848. In February, 1849, he returned to 
 this country ; and in the. spring of 1850 he was ordered to 
 California, by way of the Isthmus. The agitation caused 
 
36 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 by the gold discoveries had extended to our naval vessels 
 on that station, and they were for some time unable to 
 move for want of crews : the men deserted, and not a few 
 of the officers resigned. Dr. Wheelwright was attached to 
 one of these vessels for many tedious months. As the pay 
 of a naval officer then hardly equalled that of a waiter in a 
 hotel, a visit to San Francisco was too expensive to be often 
 undertaken ; and Congress, too, evidently disapproved of 
 such visits, and refused to increase the pay of the offi 
 cers -on that station. This monotonous course of life was 
 at last ended by his being ordered to the Falmouth, in 
 which vessel he visited Oregon and Yancouver's Island, and 
 finally returned to the Atlantic States in February, 1852. 
 
 In the following August he joined at Norfolk the steamer 
 Powhatan, which made a part of Commodore Perry's 
 famous Japan expedition. Doctor Wheelwright was not 
 present at the signing of the treaty between the United 
 States and Japan, for he was ordered to the Plymouth, 
 which left for China before that ceremony took place. 
 During this cruise he was promoted to a surgeoncy, his 
 commission being dated April 5th, 1854. On his arrival 
 at home, after being a few months in the receiving-ship 
 at Boston, he was ordered to the Home Squadron in the 
 Cyane, and visited Newfoundland and other places on the 
 northeast coast of America. In 1859 he was again in the 
 Gulf of Mexico, exposed to the bad influence which the 
 climate now had upon his constitution. 
 
 In 1860, at Philadelphia, and again in 1861, at the 
 Brooklyn Navy- Yard, he was a member of the Board to 
 examine Surgeons for admittance to the Navy. In 1861 
 this service was very fatiguing, owing to the great increase 
 of the medical corps required by the civil war. The Board 
 sat for many hours daily during several months ; and when 
 he returned to the receiving-ship at Boston, where he was 
 then stationed, he was much exhausted. Anxious, how 
 ever, to perform his duty, and probably not aware of his 
 
Charles Henry Wheelwright. 37 
 
 own state of health, he applied for active service, and was 
 in consequence ordered to the steamer San Jacinto, 
 which sailed March 5th, 1862, in search of the ship-of-the- 
 line Vermont, reported to be drifting about dismasted 
 off the South Shoal. After a vain search (for the report 
 afterwards proved incorrect) the San Jacinto returned 
 to Boston, and had hardly arrived when orders were re 
 ceived (on March 9th) to sail at once for Hampton Roads, 
 to assist in the expected sea-fight with the famous Merri- 
 mack. Dr. Wheelwright came on shore for an hour on 
 the afternoon of that day, to take leave of his friends. 
 They never saw him again. 
 
 The San Jacinto remained in Hampton Roads until 
 Norfolk was taken, and in May joined the Gulf Squadron. 
 This squadron consisted of about twenty-three vessels, and 
 for several weeks Dr. Wheelwright performed the duties of 
 fleet surgeon. He was at this time much reduced in con 
 sequence of having had a severe attack of dengue, or break- 
 bone fever, on his passage from Norfolk to Key West. It 
 was evident from his letters that he looked forward with 
 dread to another summer in the Gulf, and had a sick man's 
 longing for home ; but he did not ask to be relieved. Just 
 at this time he received orders to go North in the Colo 
 rado, but most unfortunately the orders reached him forty- 
 eight hours after she had sailed. This was a terrible disap 
 pointment. Surgeons could not be spared in those days, 
 and new orders came for him to take charge of the Naval 
 Hospital recently established at Pilotstown, a little village 
 on the southwest pass of the Mississippi. This hospital re 
 ceived the sick and wounded from the squadron in the 
 river ; and as it had been established but a short time, and 
 in a hurried manner, was poorly provided with the neces 
 sary articles for the suffering patients. The responsibility 
 and labor of the post weighed heavily upon the surgeon. 
 He had been there about a week when he thus wrote to a 
 relative : 
 
38 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 "My duties here are like those at Pensacola, only infinitely 
 greater. I was young and strong then, and came away, as you re 
 member, much shattered. There are about sixty patients, many 
 terribly wounded, or sick with fever, and most limited means to 
 treat them. Except beds, no furniture that we have not taken by 
 force from the dozen or more houses here. Conflicting orders 
 come to the captains of the transport steamers relative to receiv 
 ing men from the hospital without their accounts, and these are 
 not sent with them to the hospital. So here I have to keep them, 
 and many die in consequence. It is distressing to have those in 
 charge who ought to be sent home ; and yet my hands are tied, and 
 I cannot send them. I have been here a week, have only one 
 assistant, am weak from want of sleep and a diarrhoea. There is 
 no way to get relief from my situation. I shall do my duty to the 
 last." 
 
 He was not only weakened by a constantly increasing 
 diarrhoea, and worn down by his incessant labor and want 
 of sleep, but the feeling that he could not properly provide 
 for those under his charge, and that many lives were lost 
 on this account, depressed his spirits, and left him the less 
 energy to resist his disorder. Till the 30th of July, how 
 ever, he continued to perform his duties, but on the morn 
 ing of that day he was unable to get up. He grew rapidly 
 worse ; and though all means were used which the place af 
 forded, it was too late to save him. Before the day closed 
 he was quietly relieved of his post. His death, though far 
 removed from his home and relatives, was in some respects 
 such as he himself would have preferred ; for up to the last 
 possible moment that his strength permitted, and till within 
 twenty-four hours of his death, he was engaged in the dis 
 charge of the most satisfactory duty which any man can 
 perform, the relief of the sick, the wounded, and the 
 dying ; and he fell a sacrifice to his own exertions and anxi 
 ety in behalf of those whom his country had committed to 
 his charge. 
 
 In his last letter he alludes to his being no longer young 
 
Charles Henry Wheelwright. 39 
 
 and strong, but years had made no change in the qualities 
 of his heart or in the general characteristics of the man. 
 He had still the same slender, erect figure, the same hearty, 
 ringing tones in his voice, the same animated and confident 
 manner, and the same kindness and good-will expressed in 
 his whole bearing. Any one who saw much of him, even 
 if not an intimate friend, must have perceived his strong, 
 plain common-sense, his contempt for everything mean and 
 underhand, his resolution, firmness, and courage in the per 
 formance of his duty, the great purity of his character, and, 
 above all, a manly straightforwardness in his every action, 
 word, and look ; for there never seemed to be the slightest 
 disguise about him. His friends, of course, understood 
 the generosity of his character and the strength of his at 
 tachments ; but few could know how devoted he was to 
 the interests of some whom he looked upon as especially 
 committed to his protection, what acts of generous kind 
 ness he was constantly performing for them, and how 
 much they and their home mingled in all his thoughts and 
 plans. 
 
 The following extract from a letter written by the distin 
 guished commander, whose vessel, the Cayuga, led the 
 fleet in the famous passage of the forts below New Orleans, 
 and who had known him since his first entrance into the 
 Navy, indicates in what estimation he was held in that ser 
 vice where the best years of his life were spent. 
 
 "The character of Dr. Wheelwright was singularly free from 
 reproach of any kind. He had the love and respect of all who 
 ever sailed with him. He ranked high in his own corps as a 
 skilful and thorough physician, and was distinguished always for 
 his sympathy with, and careful attention to, the sick. He adorned 
 our profession by many noble qualities. With winning and affable 
 manners, he combined firmness, a high conscientiousness, a firm ad 
 herence to whatever was right, and an uncompromising resistance 
 to injustice and wrong. 
 
 " He lived for others more than for himself; and this is proved 
 
40 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 by the manner of his death, which was caused by his devotion to 
 
 our sick and wounded sailors after the battle of New Orleans 
 
 " No one who knew Dr. Wheelwright speaks of his loss with 
 out emotion ; but to those who were intimately associated with 
 him, his loss is beyond repair. His life was as gallant and costly 
 a sacrifice as any which the Rebellion entailed on our country." 
 
 Dr. Wheelwright was never married. His remains were 
 buried at Mount Auburn, August 14th, 1862. 
 
James Richardson. 41 
 
 1837. 
 JAMES RICHARDSON. 
 
 Private, Twentieth Connecticut Vols. (Infantry), August, 1862; died 
 at Washington, D. C., November 10, 1863, of disease contracted in the 
 
 service. 
 
 IN portraying most of the younger men whose memoirs 
 are contained in this volume, one is naturally led to 
 compare them with what they would, perhaps, have been 
 in times of peace. But in writing of the men of middle 
 age, one compares them with what they previously were. 
 To some the war only supplied a new direction for powers 
 already developed and mature. To some, on the other 
 hand, it brought a complete transformation ; or if not quite 
 that, yet a consummation so rapid and perfect as to seem 
 like transformation, giving roundness and completeness to 
 lives previously erratic or fragmentary. Of this there was 
 no more striking instance than in the case of James Rich 
 ardson. 
 
 " A prophet is never called of God until the age of forty," 
 says the Arab proverb. James Richardson had all his life 
 been loved and blamed, criticised and idolized, without ever 
 finding his precise or proper working place on earth. When 
 at forty-five he left his preaching and his farm, to enlist as 
 a private soldier, then his true and triumphant Christian 
 ministry began, and he continued in it till his death. 
 
 I remember watching his college eccentricities when I 
 was a boy in Cambridge, and was largely occupied, like 
 most Cambridge boys, in studying human nature as exhib 
 ited among the undergraduates. Long after, I was associ 
 ated with him in post-graduate studies at the same univer 
 sity, where he lingered long ; and I have known him ever 
 since. And any acquaintance with him came near to inti- 
 
42 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 macy, because of his open and eager nature and his 
 warmth of heart. 
 
 James Richardson was born in Dedham, Massachusetts, 
 May 25th, 1817. His mother's maiden name was Sarah Eliz 
 abeth Richards. His father was Honorable James Richard 
 son of Dedham (H. U. 1797), a man who had been a good 
 deal in public life, and was in his old age quite an enter 
 taining relic of the stern Federalist days. I remember his 
 fighting his battles over by the fireside, and telling me an 
 ecdotes of my grandfather, a warm Federalist like himself. 
 The old man and his son seemed as intimate with each 
 other as two school-boys, and it was easy to see whence the 
 latter had inherited some of his marked qualities. 
 
 In his autobiography in the Class Book, he says : 
 
 " The earliest event of importance, in my mental and spiritual 
 education, was the death of a mother, when I was but three years 
 old. An epidemic had swept through the little village of Dedham, 
 and three of our family, including myself, became its subjects. My 
 mother and baby brother fell its victims ; and though I survived, my 
 constitution has not yet wholly regained its former healthy tone. 
 The death of a mother at this tender age, when I most required 
 her guarding love, was a circumstance of almost incalculable injury 
 to me. Her form and features are indelibly impressed upon my 
 mind; and the remembrance of her teachings in the holy quiet of 
 the Sabbath mornings, when my heart was fresh in innocence and 
 warm in happiness, even now oft fills my eyes with blissful tears. 
 From her I inherited the love of harmonious sounds ; and before I 
 could utter articulate words, do I remember catching from her lips 
 the notes of some simple melodies. 
 
 "After my mother's death, on account of my father's frequent 
 absences on business connected with different public offices, I was 
 left almost wholly to the care of a nurse and other family domes 
 tics, who governed me only by fear, and who rewarded me only 
 with tales of murder, bloody-bones, ghosts, and hobgoblins. The 
 best influence of such treatment was to excite the love of the mar 
 vellous to an undue degree of action. 
 
 " To my father .... I owe the cultivation of my imagination 
 
James Richardson. 43 
 
 and my love of the beautiful. Added to his fine poetical taste was 
 a deep love of nature ; and after my fifth year my frequent rambles 
 with him, especially on Sabbath evenings, imbued me, in some 
 small degree, with his own spirit. The sports and games which 
 boyhood so generally pursues had no interest for me. I loved to 
 roam the fields, to commune with Nature in her sublimity and in 
 her beauty, in her strength and in her cunning. I would sit for 
 hours gazing upon the mountain rock, the giant oak, the leaping, 
 dancing streamlet, admiring their simple grandeur or reclining un 
 der the shade of some ancient tree. I would listen to the sighing 
 zephyr, as it made sad music among the fresh foliage, or to the 
 low murmuring of the rippling stream, till my soul was lost in the 
 misty maze of its own meditations. Or, again, I would watch the 
 yellow-bird, as she lined her downy nest with the soft fur of the 
 mullein-leaf, and the honey-bee as she rolled herself in the farina of 
 the rose's cup. Nature was my study, nature was my delight. By 
 my father I was first introduced to the conversation of the English 
 poets, and many of their sweetest verses I learned to repeat on his 
 knee. It was in my sixth summer that I first fell to rhyming, and 
 a happy boy was I ! happy in that state of purity and innocence 
 which had not yet fallen a prey to the passions and temptations of 
 the world, happy in an undisturbed peace, not in the triumph of 
 spiritual victory. One evening, ere the light of the moon had dis 
 placed the last blush of fading day, as I pressed my early pillow, 
 the thoughts of my great Father's bounty came rushing in a full 
 tide of grateful feeling over my soul, and I gave that joy expres 
 sion in poetic measure. At the returning day I repeated it to my 
 sister, and as she had advanced a step beyond me, in learning to 
 write, she kindly volunteered to put it on paper for me and hand it 
 up to the schoolmistress among the compositions of her class. Of 
 course the schoolmistress, the scholars, and other foolish friends 
 gave me exaggerated and undue praise, which fostered still more 
 my rhyming propensity, imbued me with a desire of praise, and 
 puffed me up with a nonsensical vanity, which, without the balance 
 of firmness and pride, has marked my character, and injured me 
 no little, even up to the present day. The devotional character of 
 my rhymes, my peculiar course of reading, and the character of my 
 conversation and feelings, induced my friends to suppose that I had 
 inherited the deep religious cast of mind that distinguished my 
 
44 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 mother, and I therefore received the name of the ' little minister.' 
 It was my custom to assemble, in all sobriety and simplicity, my 
 little playmates, and, imitating the parson's robe, to be their choris 
 ter and priest. In my sixth year I was attacked with lung-fever, 
 which again brought me to death's door." 
 
 He was fitted for college chiefly by Rev. Daniel Kimball 
 of Needham (H. U. 1800), and entered with his class in 
 1833. Rev. John Weiss was his first room-mate, and has 
 told me that Richardson showed, within the very first week 
 of his college career, that peculiar nervous excitability 
 which never entirely left him, and which at that early 
 period sometimes caused serious anxiety among his friends. 
 " Mental labor would just a little unsettle his delicate tem 
 perament " ; and this was combined with internal disorders, 
 of which nobody could ever tell either then or years 
 afterwards how much was real or how much imaginary. 
 These traits of constitution also made his college life less 
 happy than his childhood ; and his distaste to all regular 
 study made him no favorite with the Faculty, though his 
 aims were always high and his morals unstained. He had 
 also much facility as a writer and speaker, was a contrib 
 utor to " Harvardiana," and always claimed to have written 
 in that magazine the first American review of Carlyle. 
 
 His long and rambling autobiography in the Class Book 
 closes with this expression of his purposes at graduation : 
 " I shall most probably occupy myself in some literary 
 pursuit in the West for six or seven years to come, and 
 then, unless Heaven shall have given me some other pur 
 suit, I shall return to Cambridge and study for the sacred 
 office." He graduated with his Class in 1837 ; and a letter 
 which he wrote to the Class Secretary, dated Haverhill, 
 Massachusetts, November 4th, 1847, bridges over the in 
 tervening years of his life : 
 
 " Prior to the prosecution of my present profession I was from 
 October, 1837, to December, 1838, Principal of the Academy at 
 Milford, New Hampshire. The first young man whom I fitted for 
 
James Richardson. 45 
 
 college is the Rev. L. Jarvis Livermore, now settled in East Boston. 
 The famous Hutchinson singers were there my pupils. From De 
 cember, 1838, to June, 1842, I was located in Rhode Island, being 
 Principal of Kent Academy for the first year, and afterward of 
 the Rhode Island Central School in East Greenwich, Rhode Island, 
 where I had youth from all parts of the country under my care, re 
 ceiving some fifteen into my family. 
 
 " To the question, ' What is your profession ? ' I reply, a public 
 teacher, or preacher of theology and religion or righteousness, and 
 also, in connection with it, that of minister, or servant in the great 
 cause of human salvation from ignorance, malice, sin, disease, and 
 suffering. To study this profession I stayed three years at Divinity 
 College, Cambridge. I also was much with Dr. Lamson, editor 
 of the Christian Examiner. But I really studied it as little at the 
 college as anywhere. Nature and man were my books, the inward 
 spirit my teacher. I left Divinity College in the summer of 1845 ; 
 was soon settled in Central Connecticut, in the town of Southing- 
 ton, against my wishes, but from motives of benevolence and mis 
 sionary duty. I was ordained in June, 1846. Herewith I transmit 
 you an order of exercises. This ordination was the first occasion 
 on which several hundred Unitarians ever sat down at dinner to 
 gether in Connecticut. Dr. Parkman, of Boston, was president 
 of the day. Dr. Dewey exchanged with me the Sunday before, 
 and spent a week with me. At the collation, after the ordination 
 services, delightful speeches were made by Messrs. Parkman, 
 Dewey, Gray, Harrington, Hodges, Nightingale, Farley, Hale, 
 Snow, &c., &c. 
 
 " On the 1st of September, 1847, for the sake of being near 
 my father, and having some exchanges, which for two years I had 
 been without, I settled in Haverhill, Massachusetts, though I did not 
 get my dismission from Southington until September 19th, on ac 
 count of the unwillingness of my people to let me go. When I 
 left Southington my society had increased so as to more than fill 
 their church, it having doubled in a year. I also left bodies of 
 Liberal Christians in the neighboring towns of Berlin, Cheshire, 
 Meriden, &c., the Unitarian congregation of Berlin being as 
 large as that of Southington. 
 
 "On the 26th of September, 1847, I preached my farewell 
 sermon in Southington, comprising my views of the nature and ser- 
 
46 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 vices of theology, and rny views of Christian religion, salvation by 
 Christ. They are just being published by Crosby and Nichols, 111 
 Washington Street ; and as the philosophy they contain is perhaps 
 peculiar, and I think peculiarly important and worthy of attention 
 and consideration at the present theological and religious crisis, I 
 have a great desire that those of the class who take an interest 
 in such discussions, and especially who favor the spiritual-rational 
 istic school, should peruse them. 
 
 " I am now residing at Haverhill, where, again, I was settled 
 contrary to my inclination and sense of worldly interest, but from 
 motives of Christian philanthropy and duty." 
 
 At this period James Richardson was a very noticeable 
 person, and in fact seemed almost unique in style and tem 
 perament. Conspicuous rather than commanding in his 
 aspect, he had a peculiarly formed head, with a forehead 
 rather narrow and very prominent, thin, soft brown hair, 
 pale blue eyes, and very mobile features. Incongruities 
 seemed to meet in him, and he himself seemed to enjoy 
 them, and liked to hear them mentioned. He was tall, 
 erect, and well built, yet his health was delicate, he had 
 little physical strength, and seemed to move by his nerves 
 rather than by his muscles. His face had always a youth 
 ful look, despite his increasing baldness. His voice, in 
 speaking, was rather jarring and metallic, I always fan 
 cied it might resemble Shelley's, yet in singing it was 
 melodious and beautiful. His verbal utterance was hurried 
 and somewhat confused, yet his style of composition was 
 rather elaborate, and his handwriting unusually clear and 
 regular. In his manners an uneasy self-consciousness was 
 singularly mingled with real power. And every peculiarity 
 seemed to open the way to some other peculiarity, so that 
 the very groundwork of his nature seemed bizarre and fan 
 tastic, while all its main tendencies were essentially noble. 
 
 He wrote verses easily and smoothly, had a good deal 
 of musical taste, and a faculty for floriculture that seemed 
 akin to genius. He was too vivacious and sociable to be a 
 
James Richardson. 47 
 
 student ; but his memory was well stored and ready for 
 action, though rather loose and inaccurate. He hated 
 argument, and always rather preferred the deferential soci 
 ety of men younger than himself, or his inferiors in culture. 
 To such he was often very dazzling ; for with great apparent 
 mental activity and unbounded fluency he combined a 
 real kindness of heart and desire to do everything for every 
 body, limited only by a decided love of change. He was 
 easy of address, perhaps too easy, and had a horror of 
 being thought dignified, of which, however, there was small 
 danger. Of course, he was essentially a reformer. Moral 
 courage cost him no effort, for he liked to be conspicuous 
 and startling ; and his free exercise of this virtue, together 
 with his own taste for variety, kept him constantly in mo 
 tion among the parishes, so that some one christened him 
 " the flying prophet." As a preacher he was eloquent, 
 rather than satisfactory, and was often the object of great 
 enthusiasm among his congregations, especially during the 
 first weeks of his stay. He was settled for periods varying 
 in length, at Haverhill, Kingston, and Groveland, Massa 
 chusetts, at Southington and East Brooklyn, Connecti 
 cut, and at Rochester, New York. 
 
 Most of the peculiarities which have been described were 
 so very obvious that, however wide might be the discrepan 
 cies of judgment among comparative strangers, there could 
 not be much variation in the estimates made of James 
 Richardson by those who knew him well. I cannot refrain 
 from matching my own sketch of him by some extracts from 
 an admirable analysis of his character from the skilful pen 
 of Octavius Frothingham, who was also a friend of many 
 years' standing. The first sentence, especially, conveys so 
 felicitous a statement, that it might almost take the place 
 of all which I have said. 
 
 "I have just an impression of him as a wreath of fire-mist 
 which seemed every moment to be on the point of becoming a star, 
 but which never did, though it showed signs of solidity here and 
 
48 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 there, in spots of special effulgence. I remember him as all diffu 
 siveness, loving everybody he knew, and wishing it believed that 
 he loved everybody he did not know, and knew everybody that his 
 friends loved. Was there any end to his cousins and intimates ? 
 Was there any end to his affectionateness, his obligingness, his de 
 sire to be of service to his fellow-men ? His mental apprehension 
 was so rapid, that reflection with him had no chance. He was hos 
 pitable to ideas, and entertained so many strangers that he had no 
 bed to sleep on and no stool that he could call his own. Each 
 guest monopolized him in turn. But through all his mutations of 
 mind his spirit remained the same, always bright and buoyant and 
 hopeful, always believing, always anticipating better things, always 
 charitable and kind. If Richardson could have contained himself, 
 he would, I think, have been a man of mark. He was a powerful 
 stimulator, but his stimulus soon spent itself; and when those he 
 had stirred looked for results, they not only did not find any, but 
 they did not find him." 
 
 Such was James Richardson at the age of forty-five. He 
 had gradually retired, however, from the active duties of 
 his profession, and had devoted himself more and more to 
 his favorite pursuit of horticulture, on a farm, which he 
 had long owned, in Southington, Connecticut. He had also 
 been married for a few years (since September 18th, 1856) 
 to Henrietta Harris of Brooklyn, New York, but they had 
 no children. The second year of the war had arrived, 
 when, quite to the surprise of his friends, during August, 
 1862, he enlisted as a private in the Twentieth Connecticut 
 Infantry, Colonel Ross. 
 
 The regiment was encamped for about three weeks at 
 New Haven, where he was detailed as clerk to his captain, 
 sharing his tent. To this duty, after the regiment had 
 reached Virginia, was added that of attendance in regi 
 mental hospital. He wrote after some months' absence : 
 
 " I never go on drill or review or parade with the rest. It is 
 understood that I have different and separate duties, the captain's 
 and company's business generally, and the care of the wounded 
 
James Richardson. 49 
 
 and sick, so I have to submit and give up ' sojering.' I should like 
 to have learned military tactics, drill, discipline, and the use of 
 arms ; but I resign myself to what seems a higher duty." 
 
 His remarkable combination of faculties, large and small, 
 came rapidly into play. Among his domestic aptitudes, for 
 instance, was a decided culinary talent, and so he superin 
 tended the cook-tent. He had picked up a good deal of 
 medical knowledge, and so could be, in case of need, hos 
 pital steward or assistant surgeon. Rev. William Henry 
 Channing, who saw him amidst these duties, thus defines 
 his other functions, so far as they were definable : 
 
 " In the absence of a chaplain, he became the sympathizing friend, 
 the comforter and teacher ; writing letters, receiving last messages 
 of affection, transmitting moneys, and gradually fulfilling the varied 
 functions of confidant, guardian, father, confessor, peacemaker, com 
 mon friend. Then his fine social gifts of genial sympathy, cheerful 
 good spirits, entertaining gossip, exhaustless anecdote, and love of 
 music came in play to make his tent the centre and focus of broth 
 erly kindness and good fellowship. And finally, when, at the time 
 of a grand movement of the army, it became necessary to transfer 
 the sick from the camps to hospitals in Washington, he was put in 
 charge of these scores or hundreds of helpless men, and with 
 unflagging energy discharged this duty till all were comfortably 
 distributed and cared for or sent home." 
 
 It is an indirect illustration of the laborious life which 
 Richardson must have led, that he, who had always before 
 been a rather voluminous writer, now scarcely wrote letters 
 or diary. " I have so much to do that I have no time," 
 was all he could usually say. Again he wrote : 
 
 " I shall try to get time soon to copy my journal ; but it is hard 
 to keep it up, as I literally have not a moment, between the wants 
 of officers and men, to call my own. If I could know what my 
 work for the day was to be, I could get some time for myself; 
 but every day there are some new reports or records to make. 
 Then all our sick boys come to me for help and comfort. As I am 
 
 VOL. i. 4 
 
50 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 writing, two boys, one with a sprained foot and one with an ulcer 
 ated sore throat, are waiting for me." 
 
 Again he wrote, more despondingly : 
 
 "Nothing, however, troubles me much that concerns myself. 
 But for my country, at times, I almost despair. How terrible this 
 nightmare of a war, that never seems to advance or accomplish 
 anything ! I sometimes feel that the day of grace has passed, that 
 our repentance of our sin is too late, and that our nation is doomed. 
 This defeat of Burnside, and butchery of the boys, the sufferings 
 of the unpaid soldiers, without tents, poor rations, a single blanket 
 each, with no bed but the hard, damp ground, it is these things 
 that kill me." 
 
 In February, 1863, he was detailed by Colonel Ross, his 
 regimental commander, to report for duty to the " Sanitary 
 Commission" at Washington. He was to serve in the 
 " Special Relief" Department, planned and directed by his 
 old friend, Rev. Frederick N. Knapp, whose name should 
 be forever remembered in history as one of the " more than 
 conquerors" in that great work of peace. This was a post 
 entirely to his mind, and in this he labored until he died. 
 " I have a great satisfaction," he says, " in having a place 
 of usefulness, where I am conscious of doing great service 
 to the soldiers, and where continually a large field is open 
 ing before me." 
 
 But the strain upon him proved very great. He wrote, 
 for instance, after the battle of Chancellor sville : 
 
 "I am worn down with the general grief and horror that has 
 fallen upon* us like a pall, this slaughter of my regiment, of the 
 boys in my own company, some of whom w r ere just here ; and 
 then to go in the hospitals and see my own boys lying mutilated, 
 maimed, and dying ! O my God, all this is too horrible ! " 
 
 Later in the summer he wrote : 
 
 " The mental and physical labor of my work here is so great 
 that I cannot bear an ounce more burden of anxiety and care, nor 
 spare another minute from the continually narrowing time allotted 
 to sleep." 
 
James Richardson. 51 
 
 He died of fever at Washington, November 10, 1863. 
 But the rest can best be told in the eloquent words of Wil 
 liam Henry Channing, who knew Richardson intimately at 
 this period, and whose substitute the latter was, for a time, 
 as chaplain of the Stanton Hospital at Washington. The 
 narrative, from which the following is an extract, was writ 
 ten to be read at a meeting of the Class of 1837. 
 
 " ' Only give me work enough to fill up eighteen hours of every 
 day,' said he, as he entered on his new office, ' and I shall be satis 
 fied.' And all but literally did he fulfil the ideal. Of all persons 
 I have met with, during the trials of this civil war, I calmly think 
 that James Richardson was the most indefatigable. Up at dawn, 
 and off through storms on long walks to camps or hospitals, he 
 was all day engaged in patient explorations of difficult and en 
 tangled cases ; following up every clew through the mazes of differ 
 ent departments, and sitting up till after midnight in completing 
 his records and registers, and finishing his correspondence. He 
 never seemed to feel fatigue, or the want of food or sleep. And 
 instead of being burdened by these accumulated toils, he grew light- 
 hearted, buoyant, bright, and happy, according to the measure of 
 his disinterested services. And in addition to these official duties 
 in the Special Relief Department, Richardson found other spheres 
 for activity, in erecting, arranging, and superintending ' Soldiers' 
 Rests ' and * Temporary Homes,' for the sick and wounded, on their 
 first arrival from the front, or in their transient residence in Wash 
 ington on their way to their homes, when discharged or furloughed. 
 In these 'homes' he was father, brother, friend to hundreds and 
 thousands, distributing food, refreshing drinks, clothing, money, or 
 whatever might be needed, with a good sense, overflowing kindness, 
 and hearty cheerfulness, which were beautiful to witness. Finally, 
 to all these works he voluntarily superadded the function of hospi 
 tal chaplain, during the absence from his post of a friend. And 
 thus engaged, through the heats of last summer, month in, month 
 out, without one day's rest or intermission, did our humane and 
 heroic brother labor on, with resistless energy, till he fell, fainting 
 and fever-struck, in the midst of the wide harvest-field of charity, 
 waiting for the husbandman to garner. 
 
 " A few days before he was called * to come up higher,' he said 
 
52 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 to a fellow-laborer : ' I almost wish I was up yonder, to help our 
 poor boys who are putting off mortality and seeking a soldier's rest 
 in heaven. I should so rejoice to welcome them there.' The wish 
 was very characteristic, expressive at once of his glowing faith 
 in the nearness of the spirit-world to earth, and the closeness of 
 angelic ministries to man, and also of his generous disinterested 
 ness. The prayer was heard, and he was promoted to higher ser 
 vices. He had fought a good fight, and won a crown, as a hero of 
 humanity. 
 
 " Personally I never knew our friend till I met him in Washing 
 ton ; but I had often heard of him as extravagant in enthusiasm, 
 and erratic through divergent tendencies. Like many richly en 
 dowed men, James Richardson had probably never found his true 
 sphere till the scenes of suffering and sacrifice called his varied 
 powers into action, and concentrated their influence into one glow 
 ing focus of good-will for the soldiers of freedom. Here was a 
 bond of unity that gave harmony to otherwise discordant tastes. 
 He could here be spiritualist and physiologist, architect arid musi 
 cian, good neighbor and preacher, reformer and man of business, 
 all at once. The result was charming, in a rare blending of almost 
 feminine sweetness with courageous energy, of poetic ardor with 
 practical skill, of patient fidelity in minutest detail with a loving- 
 kindness wide as the horizon, and hope high as the heavens. Mov 
 ing swiftly and noiselessly to and fro, with his soft yet luminous 
 blue eyes seeing all, penetrating all around him at a glance, 
 courteous and graceful in manner, while dauntless in sincerity, in 
 speech and deed, he suggested the thought of one ready to be 
 translated from the struggles of earth to the blessed fellowship of 
 guardian angels." 
 
 The manner of his departure seemed in harmony, not 
 alone with the self-devotion of his life, but with the peculiar 
 nervous quality which had always marked it. His wife, 
 who was with him in Washington for some months before 
 his death, says that, on November 3d, he was seized with a 
 chill in dressing, but went out and attended to his duties 
 as usual. In the evening he had another chill, followed by 
 violent pains in the chest, which proved to be pneumonia. 
 
James Richardson. 53 
 
 For several days he suffered extremely, but was afterwards 
 more free from pain, though very weak. His mind was en 
 tirely occupied with his duties ; and, in defiance of the advice 
 of physicians and friends, he gave daily directions, and had 
 reports brought to him. His nights were very restless ; 
 he was constantly talking in his sleep, and always on the 
 one subject of his work, reiterating directions for the kind 
 treatment of the soldiers. He had at that time the super 
 vision of one of the Sanitary Commission " lodges " at Alex 
 andria, Virginia, and of another at the Alexandria Railway 
 Station in Washington, and had been quite annoyed by 
 the difficulty of inducing the employes to treat the soldiers 
 with proper consideration. This trouble seemed ever pres 
 ent with him ; and while giving, in his dreams, directions for 
 feeding the men, he would break out with the exclamation, 
 " You must speak kindly to them." 
 
 On the morning of November 7th he thought himself 
 better, and planned new work ; in the afternoon he found 
 himself weaker again, and said, that night, that he should 
 never get well. A consultation of physicians was held, who 
 thought that there was no cause for serious apprehension, 
 if he would only give up all thoughts of labor, which he 
 promised to do. He adhered to his original conviction, 
 however, and made all his final arrangements. On the 
 morning of November 10th he was seized with a violent 
 chill, and after it had passed sank into a stupor, and passed 
 away in such quietness that it could scarcely be known 
 when his breathing ceased. It seemed as if his delicate 
 organization, taxed to the utmost, had at last stopped its 
 vital motion without struggle, in such a death as he 
 would have always predicted for himself, and such a death 
 as he would have wished to die. 
 
54 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1841. 
 CHARLES FRANCIS SIMMONS. 
 
 First Lieutenant and Adjutant 14th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), July 15, 
 1861 ; discharged, on resignation, January 24, 1862; lost at sea, Febru 
 ary, 1862, on a voyage to Cuba, undertaken on account of a fatal disease 
 of the lungs contracted in the service. 
 
 AT the Freshman examination of Harvard University, 
 in 1837, 1 well remember to have observed, among my 
 future classmates, a tall, erect young man, of demure aspect 
 and rather sedate motions, with blue eyes and closely curling 
 fair hair, who was pointed out by some one as Charles Sim 
 mons, with the prediction that he would be our first scholar. 
 He came with an intellectual prestige, based less upon his 
 own abilities than upon those of his two elder brothers, 
 both of whom had been accounted remarkable for gifts and 
 culture. Such a reputation is often rather discouraging to 
 a younger brother, if it demands from him a career in any 
 degree alien to his temperament. Perhaps it was so with 
 Charles Simmons. He certainly seemed rather to shrink 
 from the path of college ambition than to pursue it ; and 
 his academical career, though respectable, was never bril 
 liant. 
 
 He was the youngest son of William and Lucia (Ham- 
 matt) Simmons, and was born January 27th, 1821. His 
 mother was a native of Plymouth, Massachusetts ; his father 
 was also born in Plymouth County, and was for many years 
 one of the Justices of the Police Court in Boston. Charles 
 was fitted for college partly at the Boston Latin School, 
 and partly by his brother, Rev. George Frederick Sim 
 mons. 
 
 In college I had never much personal acquaintance with 
 him, but vividly remember the implied contrast of his grave 
 
Charles Francis Simmons. 55 
 
 manners and fastidious air with the witty sayings and mirth 
 ful feats attributed to him by his few intimates. This 
 partial antagonism had indeed a peculiar zest for the whole 
 class, when exhibited in his public declamations, which were 
 rather noted among us ; since he usually selected some 
 serio-comic passage, which was recited with the gravest 
 face and the most irresistible humor. 
 
 He was shy, sensitive, proud, and reticent. But he was 
 exceedingly faithful to his friends and to his avowed prin 
 ciples, manifesting in this way a sort of chivalrous spirit, 
 which indeed brought upon him his only serious college 
 censure. In some undergraduate disaffection, in our Senior 
 year, he stepped forward to take a conspicuous position, 
 from which the other leaders shrank, and he was deprived 
 of his degree in consequence. It was bestowed upon him 
 fourteen years after, by the earnest petition of his class 
 mates. 
 
 He afterwards studied law with David A. Simmons, Esq., 
 a relative, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar. For the 
 rest of his life he had an office in Boston, with a moderate 
 chamber practice. But apparently the same qualities which 
 had impaired his collegiate success followed him into pro 
 fessional life also. Over-sensitiveness, ill health, and per 
 haps some want of resolute purpose, always kept him back, 
 while other men more fortunately constituted won an easy 
 success. 
 
 He remained unmarried, and rather shunned general 
 society as well as public affairs. Yet he had excellent judg 
 ment in practical matters, and held decided views on the 
 questions of the day ; having become, for instance, strongly 
 anti-slavery in his convictions. But he seemed by temper 
 ament a scholar and a critic rather than a man of affairs. 
 He was especially a student of the natural sciences ; had 
 much knowledge of music, and a rare taste in all matters 
 of art. His love of nature grew with his years ; and his 
 chief pleasures, beyond books and music, were found in 
 
56 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 country life, among " God's fresh creations," as he himself 
 said. Never demonstrative in manner, he became less so 
 as he grew older, and to strangers seemed cold and unin 
 terested. He was reserved even with his intimates ; and 
 it was, as I am assured, a matter of surprise to his nearest 
 friends when they heard of his enlistment, through his 
 own letters from Fort Warren. 
 
 The attack on our troops in Baltimore had, indeed, seemed 
 to excite him very much. He had described hearing the 
 departure of the regiments from Boston, in the middle of 
 the night, two days after; was very much impressed by 
 it, and he said then that, if he had not from boyhood 
 " despised soldiering," and so did not know the use of a 
 gun, he should have gone off with some of the three- 
 months men. So he joined two different classes in Bos 
 ton, for the purpose of drilling, and said that when he 
 knew enough he should go. But he went at last very 
 suddenly, in July, without having time to arrange his 
 business affairs ; for Colonel William B. Greene, who had 
 been his friend for several years, came home from Paris to 
 take part in the war, and finding this recruit ready, made 
 him his Adjutant at once in the Fourteenth Massachu 
 setts. 
 
 His letters describe his interview with Colonel Greene, 
 and his enlistment. 
 
 FORT WARREN, July 26, 1861. 
 
 " Then the first day I saw him, the day he landed, I told 
 him I would go into the service myself, under him. Two days 
 after he sent to me to know if I * was serious ' in what I had said. 
 And the result was that he took me, green as I was ; and says, 
 after four weeks' trial, that he does not repent of his choice, and 
 that he thought he could make a soldier of me then, and is sure of 
 it now. So I am entirely satisfied. And if I should come to grief, 
 be assured it will be with a light conscience ; for I have no one de 
 pendent upon me, and have not been troubled with any conflict of 
 duties." 
 
Charles Francis Simmons. , 57 
 
 In this same letter he thus speaks of the soldiers : 
 
 " ' Our regiment,' the Fourteenth Massachusetts, or * Essex,' has 
 as good material as ever marched out of the old Commonwealth. 
 All from Essex County. Stalwart, sober men, all of them. 
 Whether we succeed in drilling them to form squares, direct and 
 oblique, or not, during the short ten days we have left, I will war 
 rant every company of them to make face against cavalry, even in 
 line, before turning their backs and taking to the woods. If they 
 allow themselves to be ' cut up,' without killing man for man, call me 
 no prophet." 
 
 The change in his mode of life seemed to transform his 
 whole nature. This shy, contemplative, lonely, middle- 
 aged man, for whose fastidious nature the daily intercourse 
 of Court Street had been far too rough and harassing, en 
 tered with a sort of enthusiastic delight upon the duties of 
 a regimental adjutant, perhaps the most wearing and 
 vexatious functions which the army has to offer, and such 
 as seem to demand all the energy of youth and all the 
 equanimity of health. 
 
 His first letters from camp were very ardent. The de 
 tails of camp life, the noise and routine of military affairs, 
 which before had appeared either absurd or tedious, now 
 excited and interested him very much. The desire, as he 
 expressed it, " to strike a blow for the old flag we were all 
 born under," seemed to make him forget all annoyances ; 
 and he worked there, and through his whole military life, 
 as he perhaps had never worked before. And though it 
 ended in disappointment, both for the regiment and for 
 himself, yet his duty was done with his accustomed thor 
 oughness, as his letters show. 
 
 "FORT ALBANY, VA., August 19, 1861. 
 
 " Here we are at last, within four miles of the Rebels. We re 
 ceived sudden orders yesterday morning, at our camp at Meridian 
 Hill, to strike our camp, and march with our whole baggage and 
 equipage across the famous Long Bridge to this height by three 
 o'clock, which was morally impossible; but we got here by five 
 
58 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 o'clock, with a mile of regimental wagons and ambulances bringing 
 up the rear of our long line of men. 
 
 "The regiment really made a fine appearance going through 
 Washington, and did honor to old Essex. 
 
 " "We have be^n half drowned with rain ever since leaving home ; 
 and this last experience of last night makes the climax of everything 
 disgusting you can conceive of, to those brought up as white men 
 and Christians. The mud is so loathsome and universal, that the 
 men are ' down ' at last, and look sober to-day. These Essex men 
 are splendid fellows for soldiers, tough, cheerful, and persever 
 ing. They have seen nothing but the roughest side of soldiers' life 
 ever since coming South, and yet the regiment is in a state of per 
 fect subordination and good feeling. In striking our camp yester 
 day, all our tents but one fell at the tap of the drum, pretty 
 well for raw troops. I have to detail a strong guard every day to 
 protect the mansion (in our immediate neighborhood) of a ma 
 lignant Secessionist, which would be burnt in five minutes after 
 removal of the guard, not a specially agreeable interposition 
 to a man of my ultraism." 
 
 "FoRT ALBANY, September 14. 
 
 " This stationary life in camp, without any security that we shall 
 be here to-morrow, and without any movement or incident, is the 
 pure prose of war. We have all the solid discomforts which can 
 be combined in camp life. The most sanguinary fighting would be 
 a welcome change, I had almost said another Bull Run, which 
 was rather more disgraceful than bloody, but still exciting. The 
 Colonel tries to reconcile me with our present inaction, or rather 
 want of action, for we have work enough, by assuring me that 
 our previous hardships are < nothing' to those we shall have to 
 face in the field. But I have no faith in it. I believe that no pos 
 sibility of camp life in the field can take us by surprise. In fact, 
 I suspect it is a general aspiration in the regiment, not confined to 
 * field and staff/ to take our chance of some hard knocks from the 
 Rebels, rather than die of mildew in these wretched fens near the 
 Potomac." 
 
 " FORT ALBANY, October 3. 
 
 " Your pleasant picture of placid, rural Concord takes me miles 
 away from this war-blasted scene, and brings to my mind the mur 
 muring pines and elms of the Avenue and North Branch, and the 
 
Charles Francis Simmons. 59 
 
 lowing of cattle and song of birds which usher in a Concord night 
 fall. Here no bird is heard, but a few desolate cat-owls in the 
 night ; all the rest of the feathered tribe have been frightened off 
 by the laying bare to the glare of the sun their ancient shady re 
 treats, where the woods were all felled, or by the firing of artillery 
 and the rattle of drums. No ox or cow can live anywhere this 
 side the Potomac, in presence of the interminable camps of the 
 4 grand army.' On the Maryland side of the river there are many 
 vistas of thick, green foliage in the dim distance ; but all on this 
 side is devoted to Mars or Pluto, and is appropriated to the one 
 purpose of furnishing a great battle-field on which two hundred 
 thousand men can decide with the sword the issues of this war. 
 All smooth and level places have been scarred and dug in every 
 direction with earthworks and defences, or have been trampled 
 bare of every vestige of vegetation by the marching and manoeu 
 vring of regiments and batteries. Every hill-top has been stripped 
 and cleared, and crowned with the inevitable fort ; and every road 
 has been bared of its sheltering trees, and even stripped of its 
 fences and hedges, to remove every cover for the enemy. The 
 whole country has a grim, ravaged look, as far as you can see." 
 
 The regiment had very hard service at first, and then 
 was converted into heavy artillery, and kept at Fort Al 
 bany, with always a hope of being ordered into active ser 
 vice. The climate was formidable, in respect to fever and 
 ague, and at one time they had a hundred and twenty men 
 on the sick-list from this one cause. Simmons was also ill 
 for a time with this disease, early in September, and per 
 haps never fully recovered from its effects. The charge of 
 armament and service necessarily threw very hard work 
 upon the Adjutant, because of the great amount of writing 
 required ; and then, before having any opportunity to take 
 part in active service, he was taken ill again, and felt that 
 he could never do anything more. It was a bitter disap 
 pointment. Apparently he had never dreaded the thought 
 of death, certainly not of being killed in battle, but to 
 be a permanent invalid was an appalling prospect. After 
 his return he said, indeed, that, had his position been one 
 
60 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 where an invalid could have been of any service, he would 
 gladly have remained and have died in his place. 
 
 After a severe exposure, one October night, he was at 
 tacked with violent congestion of the lungs, followed by 
 bleeding ; but he tried for some time to convince himself 
 that he was gaining, and would not apply for leave of 
 absence, being at last decisively ordered away by the 
 surgeons. The following letters tell the story : 
 
 " FORT ALBANY, October 22, 1861. ' 
 
 "I am sick to-day. Have had to detail a lieutenant to perform 
 my out-door duties. Had to ride to the other end of Long Bridge 
 the other day, in a pouring rain, without cape or leggins. Have 
 been out for a week together, since I was in camp, without damage, 
 but this time am quite knocked up by it. Rode the same morning 
 out to the Rebel lines near Fairfax Court-House; and perhaps 
 that was the reason I took cold, being tired. You say, perhaps 
 we shall not be here. I hope we shall not. It will be heart-break 
 ing if we are. There is a great stir in our camp to-night. I feel 
 just sick enough to care nothing about it ; but if a kind Providence 
 should inspire General McClellan to order us forward, with or 
 without our guns, I shall be very glad to go, sick or well." 
 
 "FORT ALBANY, (toujours,) October 31, 1861. 
 
 " I have checked my hemorrhage, in spite of constant horseback 
 exercise. We are having fine, clear, wholesome weather, (almost 
 for the first time,) and I keep out of doors and on my horse all the 
 time. I have no doubt of receiving to-day General Mc'Clellan's 
 permission to go off for thirty or sixty days to recruit, and expect 
 to come back well, at least hope to. I am sorry to have to say that 
 the Fourteenth Massachusetts is probably destined to hold these 
 fortifications during the winter. So we must abandon all claim to 
 occupy a prominent place in the attention or interest of the public, 
 and even of friends at home, who are mainly interested in the 
 progress of the great drama, and the actors in it. It was a great 
 disappointment to most of the officers in the regiment when we 
 found that this was the meaning of our being set to drilling at siege 
 guns. But the disappointment would have been much more cruel 
 to me, individually, if I had continued well. Now, I care very 
 
Charles Francis Simmons. 61 
 
 little about it. The annoyance of it is very trifling compared with 
 that of falling sick." 
 
 He obtained leave for sixty days' absence at first ; and 
 after a short journey to one or two places, he decided to 
 accept the invitation of a classmate and friend, and visit 
 him in Minnesota. For a little while he seemed better, but 
 it did not last long, as these letters show : 
 
 " , MINNESOTA, December 12, 1861. 
 
 " My visit to these distant regions is not for pleasure, but for 
 life, as the air of this high plain was suggested to me by the 
 doctors as affording the best chance a rather slender one of 
 making me well again. I have had no further hemorrhage since I 
 came here, but am harassed with a cough, which at the East I 
 would expect to finish me in a very few months. I shall be driven to 
 resign my commission in the army, I suppose, during this month. 
 It is, of course, a great disappointment to me ; and if I die this way 
 I shall be greatly chagrined that I had not been favored with a 
 more soldierly death in Virginia, like poor William Putnam, and 
 so many others in the Fifteenth and Twentieth, at Ball's Bluff." 
 
 " , MINNESOTA, January 11, 1862. 
 
 " I find the air dry and bracing, but the cold and high winds 
 make all out-of-doors exercise next to impossible, and I don't find 
 myself bettered at all, in respect of this ' cough ' ; consequently I 
 leave here, on Tuesday next, for the East. Mean to stop a few 
 days in Detroit, and so come to Boston in about ten days, where I 
 expect to embark in the first clean merchantman, with cheap rates 
 of passage, either for Cuba or the Mediterranean. I should prefer 
 the Mediterranean voyage, on general grounds, to one to Cuba or 
 the Azores, for the reason that I do not go out with the idea of be 
 ing cured at all, but feeling utterly indisposed for any kind of work, 
 and not expecting a very long life. I feel an insuperable longing 
 to enjoy myself for a few months. Emerson says, 'Give me 
 health and a day, and I will make the pomp and luxury of emper 
 ors and kings ridiculous.' For ' health,' alas ! I have not much to 
 hope, and so trust it is not an indispensable ingredient. And I 
 cling to the faith that I can enjoy a great many pleasant days yet, 
 in rambling over the hills which look out on the blue Mediter- 
 
62 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ranean, or walking the beaches by Nice, or Leghorn, or Genoa, 
 and hearing the familiar murmur of the great waters so many 
 leagues from Saco." 
 
 He at last offered his resignation, which was accepted, to 
 date from January 24th, 1862. It was the heaviest disap 
 pointment he had ever met, and at first it seemed more 
 than he could bear with equanimity ; but when it became 
 certain that he was fatally diseased, he grew more cheerful 
 and more like himself, as if feeling that it would have 
 been useless for him to remain in the service. He never 
 had seemed more thoughtful for others, more patient him 
 self, than during these last days. 
 
 He finally sailed, on February 25th, for St. Jago de Cuba. 
 All who saw him felt that they were never to see him again, 
 although they anticipated no such sudden calamity as that 
 which occurred. The vessel sailed with a fine breeze, but 
 was never heard of again. The next day there were very 
 high winds, and it was supposed that she had been struck 
 by some gale, and had sunk at once, for no trace of her 
 was ever found. A vessel which sailed a few days later 
 was nearly wrecked near the Gulf Stream, and it was 
 thought that this disaster might have proceeded from one 
 end of the gale which had sunk the other vessel. 
 
 It is the impression of some of his most intimate friends, 
 that, if he could have chosen, he would not have regretted 
 his sudden departure in such a way ; for he could feel 
 that he was dying with the well and strong, and not in 
 his character of " invalid," which, as he himself said, he 
 " particularly detested." 
 
 For the last month that he had remained in Massachu 
 setts, while growing weaker all the time, he had retained 
 all his interest in his regiment. He expressed peculiar 
 pleasure in recalling his intercourse with the men ; saying 
 that he felt sure he had been useful to many of them, and 
 that only the pleasantest relation had existed between them 
 and him. Great as was his disappointment, he certainly 
 
Charles Francis Simmons. 63 
 
 never regretted his participation in the war. He said once 
 that it was a great satisfaction to him to think that if he 
 had stayed at home he should have been better off in money 
 affairs, for his business had increased since he went ; so 
 that it was proved to himself that he went from patriotic 
 motives. He also liked the thought that, had he stayed at 
 home, he probably should not have been thus mortally dis 
 eased ; for his lungs had been pronounced perfectly sound 
 by the physicians of a Life Insurance Company before he 
 entered the service. He could feel that it was a vigorous 
 life and a prosperous fortune of which he had made the sac 
 rifice. There was something noble, not selfish, in the feel 
 ing that led him thus to dwell, in what he knew to be the 
 closing period of his life, on the offering thus given to his 
 country, to rejoice that he had been permitted to give it, 
 and that he had possessed so much to give. 
 
64 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1842. 
 WILLIAM LOGAN RODMAN. 
 
 Major 38th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), August 19, 1862 ; Lieutenant- 
 Colonel, December 4, 1862; killed at Port Hudson, La., May 27, 1863. 
 
 rflHE many Boston and Cambridge boys who met thirty 
 JL years ago at the boarding-school of that fine old-fash 
 ioned Englishman, William Wells, in the near neighbor 
 hood of Harvard University, can hardly have forgotten one 
 schoolmate who came among us from New Bedford, in the 
 year 1836. He was a large, heavy, rather unwieldy boy, 
 of great personal strength and rather indolent habit, who 
 possessed, by reason of physical proportions, a. kind of bre 
 vet seniority among his compeers. Neither genius nor the 
 reverse, neither eminent saint nor prominent sinner, he 
 earned a permanent sobriquet from his size, and left behind 
 him chiefly an impression of inertia, of good nature, and of 
 good sense. 
 
 But those whose acquaintance with him continued 
 through college life will also remember how that cumbrous 
 frame gradually developed into a very powerful and com 
 manding manhood ; that rather heavy face into a hand 
 some and noble aspect; and that rather indolent mind 
 into clearness and vigor, though perhaps never into bril 
 liancy. He became, in due time, and in his own way, a 
 man of society, of culture, and of taste. But he studied 
 no profession, developed no marked ambition. He was sat 
 isfied, perhaps too easily, with the competence and the 
 pleasant surroundings to which he was born ; and, retiring 
 after graduation to his native city, he passed twenty years 
 so quietly that his name was hardly mentioned beyond it, 
 save among a small inner circle of his early companions, 
 until the war called him forth, for duty and for death. 
 
William Logan Rodman. 65 
 
 William Logan Rodman was the only son of Benjamin 
 and Susan (Morgan) Rodman, and was born March 7th, 
 1822. He was descended, on the mother's side, from a 
 prominent family in Philadelphia, and on the father's side 
 from a line of worthy ancestors, all members of the Society 
 of Friends, and numbering in their ranks the most influ 
 ential merchants and ship-owners of Nantucket and New 
 Bedford. Joseph Rotch, his great-great-grandfather, Wil 
 liam Rotch, his great-grandfather, Samuel Rodman, his 
 grandfather, were all men of uncommon character and 
 ability, who left a permanent impression on the community 
 where they lived. The latter, especially, was a man of re 
 markable capacity, uprightness, and benevolence, and of 
 physical appearance so striking as to attract attention every 
 where. " All Boston," said his friend Josiah Bradlee, of 
 that city, " would turn out to see Samuel Rodman walk 
 down State Street." Something of this personal prestige 
 belonged to his grandson, in middle life, as a mounted 
 officer. 
 
 William Rodman spent five years at Friends' Academy 
 in New Bedford, and two years under the care of Mr. Wil 
 liam Wells. He entered college with his class in 1838, and 
 graduated in 1842. He soon began mercantile life, being 
 at first chiefly engaged in the oil trade. In 1849, during 
 the California excitement, he sailed for San Francisco in 
 the ship Florida, part of which he owned ; but he went 
 " before the mast," and did his full share of the ship's duty. 
 Leaving the vessel at that port, he returned home by way 
 of Calcutta and Europe, having been absent about two 
 years in all. This was his only prolonged absence from 
 home until he entered the army. 
 
 During the intermediate period his life was quiet and 
 uneventful. He participated moderately in business life, and 
 in social and political activities ; was never married, lived 
 at home, and enjoyed his books and his gardening, with 
 some admixture of genealogical researches and antiquarian 
 
 VOL. i. 5 
 
66 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 pursuits. As a son and brother lie was not merely irre 
 proachable, but carried into those relations a rare tender 
 ness and a loyal, almost romantic reverence. As a citizen 
 he was public-spirited, honorable, and morally stainless. 
 He was president of the local Horticultural Society, a trus 
 tee of Friends' Academy, and of the Five Cent Savings 
 Bank ; was a member of the Common Council in 1852, and 
 one of the city representatives in the State Legislature in 
 1862, having been elected as a Conservative Republican. 
 During all this period he kept a diary ; and a few extracts 
 from this will show, better than anything else, the manner 
 in which his whole nature was roused and stimulated by 
 the gathering alarm of war. The extracts begin with the 
 day of President Lincoln's first election. 
 
 " November 7, 1860. Was up until three o'clock, and came 
 home with the assurance of a Republican victory. I have no fear 
 of secession or revolution. The South will bluster and resolve, but 
 cotton is seventeen and a half cents per pound, and all will be quiet. 
 It is a great revolution, however, in one sense. Political power 
 changes hands, and the most corrupt and degraded administration 
 topples over, not, I hope, to be revived in my day 
 
 " November 10. The last three days talking over returns. To 
 day we have accounts of terrible import from Charleston and Savan 
 nah. They will have to submit to the will of the majority in the 
 Union, or go to everlasting smash out of it. My own idea is, that, 
 however the South may fume, fret, and bluster, just now, they will 
 be very calm before next March 
 
 "November 13. Papers still full of Southern secession non 
 sense m 
 
 " December 5. I cannot feel that this great confederacy is to 
 be destroyed just yet, and I don't like to contemplate the fearful 
 ruin that must overtake the South if they pursue their mad 
 scheme 
 
 " December 10. Put on my skates this afternoon. Am aching 
 all over. Two hundred and fifteen pounds is a heavy weight to be 
 supported on two one-eighth-inch irons, but I love to mingle in 
 these gay crowds 
 
William Logan Hodman. 67 
 
 "December 17. Wonder what South Carolina is doing. Skat 
 ing 
 
 "December 28. Great stir yesterday, owing to the despatch 
 that Major Anderson had evacuated and destroyed Fort Moultrie. 
 Some of the people talk blood and warfare, but this is easy talking 
 far away from the probable scenes of danger 
 
 "January 25, 1861. What a short-sighted babydom prevails 
 in Boston. The Mayor fears W. Phillips and the Abolitionists will 
 make a riot, and so closes the Anti-slavery Convention. Boston 
 gentlemen, or rather, Boston snobbery, must stop the mouths of the 
 radicals and fanatics, because, forsooth, the traitors of South Caro 
 lina won't like it. Bah ! the fools make one sick ! . . . . 
 
 " March 7. Anniversary of D. Webster's fatal speech, and of 
 my birth 
 
 "April 15. 'Tis true Sumter has fallen, and war has com 
 menced. We accept the fact with mortification and anger. A se 
 vere accounting must follow. I don't fear the result. Stirring 
 times. Governor Andrew issues orders for an assembling to-mor 
 row of the Massachusetts volunteers, and the Guards are prepar 
 ing to start in the morning. Two thousand must start for Wash 
 ington to-morrow 
 
 "April 16. The Guards went off this morning in good style. 
 Thirty-five muskets, some dozen more to follow this evening. 
 They were addressed by Clifford, from the City Hall steps, in a 
 beautiful little speech. The crowd was very large, and the scene 
 was solemn. Tears rolled down many a rough face. We escorted 
 them to the boat. We may all have to follow 
 
 " May 24. I have been occupied in soldiering, having become 
 a high private in Company C, Home and Coast Guard. Drilling 
 takes up my evenings, and all last week I did garrison duty at Fort 
 Phenix. We had, upon the whole, a good time. Ours was the 
 first squad from Company C detailed for service, and we acquired 
 quite a reputation for soldierly bearing. The sneer at ' kid gloves ' 
 is wearing out, for we have done more real hard work, drilled more, 
 and behaved better than any other company. Of course the gen 
 tleman will tell now as it always has in the service." 
 
 It appears from this diary that he was sent for soon after 
 wards by Governor Andrew, who offered him the post of 
 
68 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 quartermaster in any regiment which he might choose. 
 The offer did not satisfy him, as he wished for a position 
 in the line; and so he waited awhile longer. Bull Run 
 did not discourage him. He came home indignant from 
 Boston, on the day the news arrived, and wrote, " I never 
 
 did see such a set of croakers For my own part, 
 
 much as I regret the result, I see in it good to come." 
 
 In September he went to Washington to see about an 
 appointment, but nothing came of it, though he enjoyed 
 the visit very much. He says (October 8th, 1861) : " I 
 failed in the object of my visit to Washington, but saw, 
 what every one ought to see, the capital in war time. I 
 have new love for my country and new confidence in our 
 rulers." 
 
 In November he was elected to the State Legislature, as 
 a Conservative Republican. There he was an active mem 
 ber of the Committee on Finance, no easy post in Massa 
 chusetts in war time. The session lasted until April 30th, 
 1862 ; and his services were thus mentioned, in a letter 
 written after his death, by Honorable A. H. Bullock, then 
 Speaker of the House, and now Governor : " In the session 
 of 1862 I became warmly attached to Colonel Rodman, and 
 our friendship ripened into intimacy. His frank and gallant 
 bearing, as an associate among gentlemen, attracted the ap 
 preciation of all. His marked intelligence and honorable 
 purposes commanded the respect of the House." 
 
 During the summer following, at a time when recruiting 
 moved heavily in New Bedford, Rodman decided to raise a 
 company for the war, and showed such zeal that he was 
 ultimately commissioned Major of the Thirty-eighth Mas 
 sachusetts, dating from August 19th, 1862. The regiment 
 left the State on September 24th, and was encamped near 
 Baltimore until November 10th, when it sailed for New 
 Orleans, with General Banks's expedition. During the 
 period of delay, Rodman wrote with his accustomed frank 
 ness : " I am green as a leek, but pick up constantly, and 
 
William Logan Hodman. 69 
 
 manage pretty well." This admission makes it the more 
 interesting to read in his letters the record of steady pro 
 gress and of final mastery. 
 
 " CAMP BELGER, BALTIMORE, MD., 
 September 5, 1862. 
 
 " So you see we are not likely to have a mere picnic party out 
 of our military life, but shall probably have our share of hard 
 knocks before I see New Bedford again. I believe I am all ready 
 to take my chance, come when it may. We are very unconcerned. 
 You may have heard me remark upon the strange mental change 
 enlistment makes. Being bound to go where sent, and resolved to do 
 one's best, seems to calm one's excitement ; and it is rather an effort 
 than otherwise to read the newspaper, or look at maps. You have 
 had a vast deal more of excitement of the recent battles than we 
 have 
 
 " November 4, 1862. [After orders to move.] There is a thou 
 sand times more chance of making a reputation in one of these ex 
 peditionary corps, than if we were swamped in the large mass of 
 regiments in the Army of the Potomac. These outside movements 
 will be like pictures in the one-day-to-be-written history of the 
 war 
 
 " December 4. How does the old Academy flourish ? I hope, 
 for the Aliens' sake, excellently well. I must resign my secre 
 taryship of the Board. Tell Ned he must be my successor, and he 
 must enter my military rank in the records somehow. It will be 
 the first instance of such a record among the Quakers. I won't 
 resign my trusteeship, however 
 
 "January 16, 1863. Every day this week I have been attend 
 ing a court-martial, .... and it is a great nuisance ; for it takes me 
 from my regiment, and I am losing the invaluable opportunity of 
 making myself a good commander. You can't imagine how it 
 galls me. There is no escape, and it may last a month 
 
 " February 4. None did so well as the Thirty-eighth ; we did 
 not make a single mistake. Were twice complimented by General 
 Emory. First, when we passed in review, he said, 'The Thirty- 
 eighth is doing finely.' This to his staff; and subsequently in the 
 drill, when we were the only regiment which went through an im 
 portant movement all right, in a tone to be heard all over the field, 
 4 Very well done, that Massachusetts regiment on the left.' 
 
70 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " These are little things, to be sure, but they are gratifying to offi 
 cers and men. One great thing we have gained, and that is in the 
 gratification experienced by the men, who have their regimental 
 pride stimulated immensely 
 
 " February 9. We had made up our minds to a lively enter 
 prise with danger in it, but one likely to be successful, and give us 
 a little reputation ; and now, after a week tied up to the levee, we 
 are on our way down to Carrolton 
 
 " February 23. I find plenty to do in camp, and am never so 
 contented as when attending to my duties here. 
 
 " As to the absurd twaddle about l the Union as it was,' I am 
 astonished that men of sense can indulge in such ridiculous non 
 sense. It is infernal humbug, all of it. 
 
 " People may argue and speechify as much as they please, they 
 can't help it. This is a revolution, and must result in a complete 
 reorganization of social systems, and all the old fogies in Christen 
 dom can't prevent it Lord, how I wish I could put a few 
 
 hundreds of the stay-at-homes into a regiment, and put them on 
 knapsack drills whenever they opened their mouths to say a word 
 on public affairs 
 
 " February 24. By the way, I see that Bob Shaw and Nor 
 wood Hallowell are to be field officers of the Massachusetts blacks. 
 I suppose they are much laughed at. I can't say I want to have 
 anything to do with black troops, but I respect these young men 
 for the part they have taken. They do it from principle, and are 
 worthy of admiration. The organization of a black army is a 
 grand experiment, which may be productive of splendid results, 
 not only to the negro race, but the country. I saw last night an 
 extract from Higginson's report of his Florida expedition, which 
 is certainly encouraging, and should disarm the sneering sceptic for 
 a while at least 
 
 " The balls, theatricals, and operas revive pleasant memories, but 
 I don't want yet to join in them ; but if the war is ever over, and I 
 live to see the end, I have no doubt I shall enjoy again just such 
 
 things, for I feel as young as ever I never was better in my 
 
 life. Life in the open air and sleeping in a tent are just suited to 
 my case. I have hardly had an ache or a pain or a symptom of 
 any kind whatever since I entered the service 
 
 " March 9. We have doubtless a hard fight before us, but the 
 
William Logan Rodman. 71 
 
 troops are in good order, and high spirits. The stir and movement 
 of the day of final preparation have been exhilarating in the ex 
 treme, after the monotony of camp life The Thirty-eighth is 
 
 all ready. I mean to do my duty. I don't feel as if I were to 
 suffer ; but, come what may, be assured of my unalterable love for 
 you 
 
 " March 29. It will be a disappointment to have to give up all 
 idea of taking part in any of the great scenes which we hope will 
 go far towards ending the war, but something may turn up for us, 
 and it is consoling to know that not always those most conspicuous 
 are most useful. I shall be content to play an insignificant part, if 
 the war can be brought to a close 
 
 "April 18. On road to Opelousas. It was pitch-dark ; we rolled 
 
 ourselves in our blankets and slept in line of battle [April 
 
 13, date included in the foregoing.] Their artillery sent a shower 
 of shell over our heads, and the zip-zip of the bullets was ever in 
 one's ears ; but although some came near, none were hit. I had, 
 like most men, expected to be a little scared; but somehow I 
 was not in the least so, and our boys all made fun of every shot 
 that came very near us. Meanwhile I had hard work to keep the 
 men flat, as they wanted of course to see what was going on ; and, 
 moreover, we were in the midst of an abundance of very fine 
 
 blackberries, to pick which required some wandering At two 
 
 o'clock I was ordered to prepare to advance, come what might, to 
 a point within good musket-shot of the works. 
 
 "This time I found that uneasy might be the shoulder that 
 wears a strap, for I should think I had a mighty good chance of 
 being shot ; for my passage across the field was greeted with partic 
 ular attention, that I was willing to excuse for the future. I must 
 have been in full sight, and was the only person mounted on the 
 field. Then the former order was so far modified as to rescind the 
 lying down part of it. Now the order stood, * Go on, and if you 
 reach the works go into them.' Charging more than three fourths 
 of a mile of earthworks, with four thousand men at least, and eight 
 pieces of artillery, with a line of skirmishers, let me tell you, is 
 not a thing very often done ; indeed, I do not think it was ever 
 attempted. It looked like a forlorn hope at the start. My officers 
 appreciated the nature of the attempt, and so did many of my men, 
 but no one thought of hesitating. I was, at twenty minutes 
 
72 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 past two, ordered to advance, and at the word ' Forward ! ' my 
 men went off as if on skirmish drill. It was elegant ! First my 
 skirmishers, then my reserves. So handsome was the advance, that 
 Colonel Currie, of the One Hundred and Thirty-third New York, 
 who was in the thickest of the fight, on the other side of the bayou, 
 and his men, gave three cheers. I heard the cheers, and thought 
 it was some success over there. I had found, in my movement dur 
 ing the last quarter of an hour, that I was a spotted man I was 
 the only person mounted, and every now and then the bullets 
 whistled round me thick, and I thought more of my gallant horse 
 than I did of myself. I don't quite understand it now, but I did 
 not feel afraid of being hit at all. I every now and then stopped 
 to think about it, generally eating a few blackberries in a ditch, 
 while cogitating upon the matter. The fact is, I don't think any 
 body was afraid, or if any, not more than one officer and a few 
 men 
 
 "Tuesday, April 14. At the dawn of day the Fifty-third 
 moved into the works and planted 'old glory' on the parapet, just 
 about the time that Weitzel crowned the works on the other side. 
 At seven o'clock we were ordered to go and do likewise, and our 
 
 now baptized flag was placed on the lunette At Franklin all 
 
 went into a field to bivouac, very tired, but in high spirits. We 
 learned that we have taken twelve hundred prisoners, and that the 
 Diana was blown up by the Rebs themselves, while the Queen of 
 the West was destroyed by the Arizona. We began to think our 
 selves becoming famous ; and the boys forgot their sore feet, and 
 ceased to grumble because they had not eaten meat twice since 
 Saturday 
 
 "Friday, April 17. General Emory came up with me on the 
 inarch the other day, and said, ' Colonel, I am glad to see you. 
 How is my old Thirty-eighth to-day? You did elegantly, ele 
 gantly.' I thanked him and said, ' General, I am glad you are sat 
 isfied. We did what we could ; but my regiment, deployed as skir 
 mishers along a line of three fourths of a mile, could not take an 
 equal length of earthworks.' The old fellow shrugged his shoul 
 ders, and with his pleasant smile said, in his prettiest way, * You 
 did all that was expected of you, and more.' .... I think we did 
 as well as any regiment in the corps would have done. Not to do 
 
William Logan Rodman. 73 
 
 so would have been disgraceful to us all, and I would not have my 
 darling mother and loving little sister blush for me 
 
 "May 3. Dr. Ward and I are the only really tough ones. 
 My knock-about out-door life tells now, and I don't wilt down like 
 these shade-grown men. Perhaps my time will come, but certes 
 I was never better than now 
 
 " May 7. It is very hard to blow up the weary wretches, and 
 make them believe you are very savage, when you are overflowing 
 with sympathy 
 
 " May 8. With the breaking up of slavery, which I hope will 
 follow this war, possibly these great places may be shorn of their 
 magnificence. I don't wonder the owners deprecate such a fate. 
 I can't, however, sympathize with them. May all these results of 
 
 the vile system vanish, say I I am told that strong signs of 
 
 Union feeling are found in this vicinity. I doubt all such yarns. 
 The chivalry are not to be trusted 
 
 u Tuesday, May 26, 9 o'clock, A. M. I have just had a stir 
 ring hour, occasioned by the arrival of Colonel Nelson with his 
 native Louisianian (black) infantry, one thousand strong, who 
 halted in our midst awhile, and attracted much attention. I was 
 interested to see how my men would regard such neighbors, and 
 was glad to see there was not much merriment and no contempt, 
 even among the Irishmen. The general impression was that they 
 were a fine lot of men, and will fight. Colonel Nelson and all his 
 officers are convinced they are to distinguish themselves ; and Nel 
 son tells me he and his niggers, according to the programme, are to 
 make the assault, and he has no doubt of his colors being taken 
 into the town first. If they fight well, and Port Hudson falls, the 
 great problem of ' Will the blacks fight?' will be solved forever. It 
 is a question of vast interest. General Paine has just been down 
 to see me, and has given me a fair idea of my position. I am on 
 the extreme right of all." 
 
 This was his last letter. The last evening of his life was 
 spent in entertaining these officers ; and it is to be remem 
 bered that in a letter written by him to a kinsman, about 
 this time, he said, " My highest ambition is to command 
 a negro regiment." 
 
 The rest must be told in the words of others. 
 
74 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 The two letters which follow are from his cousin, Captain 
 Robeson of the Thirty-eighth Massachusetts, and from Ad 
 jutant Loring of the same regiment. 
 
 "BEFORE PORT HUDSON, June 7, 1863. 
 
 " MY DEAR UNCLE, I wrote you and Aunt S. a few lines on 
 the 28th ultimo, giving you the particulars of William's death on the 
 27th. I think it best now to give such a connected account of 
 matters that you may know the whole. 
 
 " On the 22d of May we landed at Bayou Sara and marched to 
 wards Port Hudson. On the 23d we encamped in an old corn-field 
 about three miles from the fortifications. On the 25th we en 
 camped at a bayou, where we met the Rebel pickets, and had two 
 men killed and one wounded, none of them my men. On the 
 morning of the 27th we marched to the left, through the woods, 
 into the open space about the works, where the enemy had felled 
 trees to give the batteries range. Then we supported Duryea's 
 regular battery, lying down in the ravine behind the ridge where 
 they were posted, the enemy's works being about six hundred yards 
 distant. Up to about eleven o'clock we had met with but one 
 casualty. 
 
 " About eleven, Generals Grover and Paine ordered us to charge 
 the works. The Twelfth Maine was in front of us. "We marched 
 forward on what may be called a natural causeway, which ran 
 winding to the fort, having dark ravines on each side of it. We 
 had passed half the distance between our first position and the 
 work, when we heard a cheer and saw the skirmishers, who had 
 deployed in the ravine, struggling up the slope of the works and 
 fighting hand to hand with the Rebels. So we went forward at 
 the double-quick, to meet the next instant a perfect storm of bul 
 lets. The o'rder to i Lie down ' was given, and we lay down on the 
 causeway, while our artillery played upon the enemy's works. 
 About twelve o'clock General Paine gave the order for the five 
 right companies to skirmish, the five left to storm the works. A 
 few moments before, I saw William sitting behind a stump a dozen 
 yards in my rear, when a bullet whizzed over me. I heard some 
 one say ' Wounded,' and inquired ' Who ? ' and was told, Colonel 
 Rodman. By the time I got to him he was already dead, sup 
 ported in Lieutenant Rodman's arms. He was in the act of rising 
 
William Logan Rodman. 75 
 
 to transmit to the regiment General Paine's order, when the fatal 
 bullet struck him in the left shoulder, and thence, passing obliquely 
 down through his heart, made its exit at the right side. He only 
 said, ( My God, I am hit,' and then I have no doubt life was extin 
 guished instantaneously. 
 
 " We remained in the causeway until six o'clock, in close proxim 
 ity to his dead body, when, the order to fall back having been given, 
 the men of his old company put their muskets under him and car 
 ried him to the hospital, where Dr. N. Ward had all the necessary 
 arrangements made. He was laid in a box, wearing, except the 
 coat, the clothes he wore when slain, wrapped in a blanket, and 
 the coffin filled and covered with green leaves. Our good Quarter 
 master Mason endeavored to have him carried to New Orleans, to 
 be sent North from that city, but found this was forbidden at this 
 season by general orders. So he was laid in a beautiful little space 
 near our camping-ground of a few nights previous, and by his side 
 Captain Bailey, of the Fifty-third Massachusetts, and Lieutenant 
 of the . 
 
 "Our Quartermaster and Dr. Thompson were the only offi 
 cers who attended the funeral ; all the others being compelled, by 
 their duty, to be at the front. Lieutenant Mason tells me that his 
 face had its most natural expression, one of perfect tranquillity 
 and repose. 
 
 " At the grave a few remarks were made by the chaplain of the 
 
 Fifty-third Massachusetts, Mr. Whittemore 
 
 " Your affectionate nephew, 
 
 "THOMAS R. RODMAN." 
 
 " HEAD-QUARTERS, DEFENCES OF NEW ORLEANS, 
 NEW ORLEANS, June 5, 1863. 
 
 " DEAR SIR, I had hoped to obtain some of the details of 
 your son's death in time to send by the last mail, knowing that it 
 would be a comfort, though a sad one, for you to know how and 
 where he fell. 
 
 " It is, however, only since the steamer sailed that I have heard 
 anything which I could venture to write as reliable. 
 
 " The regiment was lying down in a line of rifle-pits, to protect 
 itself from the fire of sharpshooters. 
 
 " A messenger rode up with orders ; and as Colonel Rodman im- 
 
76 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 pulsively rose to receive them, he was shot through the heart, dying 
 instantly and without pain. 
 
 " The Thirty-eighth is on the north side of Port Hudson, so far 
 (twenty miles) from the landing below, that, during the exciting 
 and difficult honr which followed, it was impossible to remove the 
 body till it was too late to give it anything but the burial which, 
 after all, a soldier should most desire, on or near the battle-field. 
 
 " A letter from the Adjutant-General of the division, received this 
 morning, says of Colonel Rodman, ' His own men, and all those who 
 ever knew or saw him, lament him.' 
 
 "No one of those who have fallen during the siege thus far stood 
 higher in the estimation of the commanding generals, and over no 
 one have I heard so general and unfeigned regret. 
 
 " To the regiment his loss will be irreparable. Its excellent rep 
 utation for discipline and morals was due chiefly to him and his 
 just and determined efforts to reward and bring forward merit, no 
 matter where it was to be found. Every man under him knew 
 him to be really just and kind ; and every man held him in re 
 spect unusual amidst ' democratic volunteers,' and in esteem and 
 affection of which any man might be proud. 
 
 " It was my own good fortune to be more immediately associated 
 with him than any other officer in the regiment ; and his noble bear 
 ing, his scorn of all that was mean or low, his high-minded sense 
 of honor, his genial talent, and his kind heart attached me to him 
 more than I had known till the news came that he was killed ; and 
 then I learned how sad a thing it is to say, ' I 've lost a friend.' 
 His noble reputation and the kindly memory he will leave to all 
 those who knew him will be some sad consolation to you in your 
 grief. He fell nobly and in a noble cause. May all these sacri 
 fices be rewarded. May God temper your sorrow to you. 
 " With deep respect, 
 
 " Your obedient servant, 
 
 "FRANK W. LORING. 
 "MR. RODMAN." 
 
 Most of those whom this book commemorates were very 
 young men, who had no life-long habits to surmount, no 
 settled pursuits to abandon, arid to whom the new duty of 
 military service came as the first grand interest and joy of 
 
William Logan Hodman. 77 
 
 their existence. Of the maturer men there were many 
 whose lives were already full of active employment, more 
 or less public in its usefulness, so that even their army ser 
 vice hardly implied a wholly new direction to their activi 
 ties. Here, however, was one whose life had enjoyed almost 
 too much repose, and whose mind almost too much leisure ; 
 and whose bonds were the set habits of unmarried life and 
 the warm endearments of parental and sisterly love. From 
 these he must break away ; but beyond this effort, all was 
 new life and joy and strength ; the career at last open for 
 strong manhood never yet adequately developed ; the final 
 outpouring of faculties reserved for this. Whatever might 
 be the sacrifice to others involved in his departure from 
 home and in his death on the battle-field, it is certain 
 that to no one chronicled in these biographies did the war 
 bring a nobler opening of a new career and a fuller play 
 of all the powers. His previous habits had given him 
 self-control, uprightness, generous feelings, cultivated tastes, 
 and the fondest domestic affections. War called for all 
 these and more : he gave all it asked for, and died in the 
 giving. 
 
 The following testimony may well close the tale. 
 
 " HEAD-QUARTERS, DEFENCES OP NEW ORLEANS, 
 NEW ORLEANS, June 3, 1863. 
 
 " SIR, It is with unfeigned grief that I approach the sanctu 
 ary of your household to condole with you upon the occasion of 
 the death of your brave and noble son. 
 
 " But I have thought it my duty, not only as commander of the 
 division to which he belonged, but as his personal friend, to say to 
 you, that his blood relations cannot regret his loss more than do his 
 comrades in arms. 
 
 " At the time of his death his regiment had passed temporarily 
 from under my command, and I therefore leave the particulars of 
 it to those who were present on the field at the time. 
 
 " From the time he took the field in Maryland up to within a 
 day or two of the assault on Port Hudson, where I was not pres 
 ent, through our dreary camp in the marshes near New Orleans, 
 
78 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 and through our brilliant campaign on the Teche, he commanded 
 his regiment with signal success, and endeared himself to every 
 one, not only by his high military qualities, but by his strict moral 
 ity and his high nobility and honor. His regiment Thirty-eighth 
 Massachusetts was one of the best in the service, and, with him 
 at the head of it, marched with the steadiness of regulars to the 
 attack and capture of Fort Bisland. I wish I could express to 
 you the deep sorrow I feel at his loss. 
 
 " I am, with great respect, your obedient servant, 
 
 "W. H. EMORY, Major- General:' 
 
Arthur BucTcminster Fuller. 79 
 
 1843. 
 ARTHUR BUCKMINSTER FULLER. 
 
 Chaplain 16th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), August 1, 1861 ; discharged, on 
 resignation, December 10, 1862 ; killed as volunteer, at Fredericksburg, 
 Va., December 11, 1862. 
 
 IN that wonderful fragment of early autobiography which 
 Margaret Fuller Ossoli left behind her, and just be 
 fore that brilliant passage in which she portrays the respec 
 tive influence upon her childhood of the Greek and Roman 
 traditions, she speaks lovingly of the household around 
 her in those juvenile years, and of the " younger children" 
 in whom her mother was so much absorbed. One of those 
 younger children was Arthur, at whose funeral, long years 
 after, James Freeman Clarke thus recalled the images of 
 that happy group : 
 
 " I first knew Arthur Buckminster Fuller as a little boy. Being 
 a distant relative, I was in the habit of visiting his father's family 
 while a student at Cambridge. They lived at that time in the old 
 Dana House, on the bend of the road from Boston. In the large, 
 old-fashioned parlor the family sat together in the evening; Mr. 
 Timothy Fuller sitting by one corner of the open fire, with his 
 stand, holding his papers and a lamp, at work preparing for his law 
 duties of the next day, t ut occasionally taking part in the conver 
 sation ; usually, as I remember, in moderating what he thought some 
 too enthusiastic statement of his daughter Margaret. She sat talk 
 ing with her friends as only she could talk, and the younger chil 
 dren studied their lessons or played together ; and among them I 
 well remember the bright eyes, and clear, open features of Arthur. 
 Near by sat the mother at her work, serene, gentle, kind, a comfort 
 and joy to all." 
 
 Arthur Buckminster Fuller was born in Cambridge, Mas 
 sachusetts, August 10th, 1822; the son of Timothy and 
 
80 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Margaret (Crane) Fuller. His maternal grandfather, Major 
 Peter Crane of Canton, served in the Revolution, and was 
 at one time the chaplain of his regiment. His paternal 
 grandfather, Reverend Timothy Fuller, represented Prince 
 ton in the Massachusetts Convention for the adoption of 
 the Federal Constitution, and voted against that instrument 
 because of the clause providing for the rendition of fugi 
 tives from service. He was descended from Thomas Fuller, 
 who emigrated to America in 1638. 
 
 Timothy Fuller the younger was one of five brothers, all 
 lawyers. His daughter Margaret has sketched his charac 
 ter with frankness and with vigor. He was often in public 
 life, and was a Representative in Congress from 1817 to 
 1825, where he was Chairman of the Committee on Naval 
 Affairs, and prominent as a defender of the Seminole In 
 dians and as an opponent of the Missouri Compromise. He 
 resided in Cambridge until 1834, when he removed, with 
 his family, to a farm in Groton, where he died the follow 
 ing year. 
 
 The family being thus left fatherless, much of the respon 
 sibility of the care and training of the children devolved 
 on the eldest sister. How much they must have owed 
 to this extraordinary woman is indirectly made manifest in 
 many passages of her "Memoirs" and "Writings," the 
 latter having been edited, after her death, by the grateful 
 hands of her brother Arthur. He was fitted for college, 
 amid great obstacles, by his sister, by the teachers of Lei 
 cester Academy, and by Mrs. Ripley of Concord, Massachu 
 setts, whose classical school had then a high reputation. 
 
 During his college course he aided in his own support by 
 teaching school, was faithful to his duties, and graduated 
 with creditable rank in 1843. On leaving college he in 
 stantly entered on the career of activity which he loved ; in 
 vesting what was left of his small patrimony, a few hundred 
 dollars, in the purchase of an academy at Belvidere, Illi 
 nois. There he not only taught secular studies, but soon 
 
Arthur Buckminster Fuller. 81 
 
 began the work of religious exhortation with a zeal which 
 brooked no delay. A Unitarian of the more evangelical 
 type, he yet obtained the fellowship of Methodists, Bap 
 tists, and Presbyterians. With the Methodists especially he 
 sympathized by temperament and habits, and associated 
 much with them during his whole life. 
 He wrote home about this time : 
 
 " I go every Sabbath about eleven miles, take charge of a Sab 
 bath school at ten, preach at eleven, have an intermission of half 
 an hour at half past twelve, preach again a long sermon, take tea 
 at once, and ride over the chill, bleak prairie, directly home, which 
 I do not reach till late in the evening. On week days, besides the 
 hours of teaching, I lecture and aid in debating-societies, and so 
 forth, so that I can scarcely find time to write even these poor 
 letters." 
 
 Two years he spent in labors such as these, and then re 
 turned to spend two years of study at the Divinity School 
 of Harvard University. To revert to the pursuits of the 
 student was, however, rather hard for one who had already 
 lived the stirring life of a pioneer preacher ; and his zeal 
 was constantly bursting over the cautious regulations of 
 the Faculty, he naturally demeaning himself as a full- 
 fledged minister instead of a pupil. Much of his time was 
 given, therefore, to extraneous occupation, though he grad 
 uated with his class in 1847. 
 
 This partial separation of pursuits, added to some pecu 
 liarities of temperament, and a rather marked use of evan 
 gelical phrases and methods, formed undoubtedly some 
 slight barrier between Arthur Fuller and many of his com 
 panions, both at this time and afterwards. Having been 
 accustomed to express his opinions with the greatest 
 freedom and unction to Western audiences by no means 
 his equals in education, he had not always the necessary 
 tact in dealing with his equals, and hence was apt to elicit 
 as much antagonism as sympathy. If he erred, however, 
 
 VOL. i. 6 
 
82 Harvard Memorial Biographies . 
 
 everybody admitted that it was from excess of zeal ; but it 
 is difficult to make such zeal attractive, especially among 
 cultivated intellectualists, and certainly he did not always 
 succeed. His intense earnestness had, or seemed to have, a 
 flavor of self-assertion, and this often led his critics to do 
 him less than justice. The recollection of this peculiarity 
 in him, whatever may have been its source, added interest 
 to his later career in the army ; for it is evident that the 
 grander experiences of life smoothed away some of these 
 roughnesses, and developed in him more comprehensiveness, 
 more tact, and more power of adaptation. 
 
 After leaving the Divinity School he preached a few 
 times at Albany, New York, and wrote thence : " I have 
 been attending a course of anti-slavery lectures by Freder 
 ick Douglass, the fugitive slave, and have become greatly 
 interested." Then he supplied the pulpit, for three months, 
 of " Father Taylor," the celebrated Methodist sailor-preacher 
 in Boston. He was afterwards settled as minister over the 
 Unitarian Society in Manchester, Massachusetts, then over 
 the New North Church in Boston, and then in Watertown, 
 Massachusetts. In all these positions he worked for years 
 with the zeal of a revivalist ; and he also took active part 
 in the usual collateral duties of a New England minister, 
 rendering important services on school committees, and in 
 temperance and anti-slavery reforms. He was also twice 
 chaplain of different branches of the Legislature of Massa 
 chusetts. 
 
 He was twice married, to Miss Elizabeth G. Davenport 
 of Mendon ; and, after her death, to Miss Emma L. Reeves of 
 Wayland. The latter, with several children, survives him. 
 
 He devoted much time at this period to revising and 
 editing, in their final form, the writings of his sister Mar 
 garet ; interweaving in the work a great deal of new mat 
 ter from her manuscripts. This work was admirably done, 
 especially when we take into consideration the wide differ 
 ence in temperament, habits, and aims between the sister 
 
Arthur BucTcminster Fuller. 83 
 
 and the brother. He thus speaks of this affectionate 
 labor : 
 
 "I have done my best and hardest work on this book. The 
 labor of compiling and superintending such a publication and cor 
 recting the proof is greater than I could have conceived possible. 
 It is done ; and I thank God for giving me strength to do it. I 
 pray that it may contribute to do justice to her merits. That is all 
 the reward I can expect ; and that reward would be so noble, so 
 holy!" 
 
 And again : 
 
 " This has been a labor of love, which I have joyed in, and have 
 esteemed a privilege, and not a burden. If I only live to send 
 forth Margaret's works from the press, as they should appear, I 
 shall not have lived wholly in vain." 
 
 All the profits of these volumes were sacredly devoted to 
 repaying certain debts, contracted long before by his sister, 
 at the time when she was the support and protector of the 
 household. These debts were all due to very friendly cred 
 itors, yet he wrote joyfully when all was done : " Marga 
 ret's debts are all paid, every dollar. That sacred trust to 
 us is now fulfilled." 
 
 In the midst of these pursuits came the call to arms, 
 after the attack on Fort Sumter. Watertown, like other 
 villages, had its war-meeting, which was addressed by the 
 Unitarian minister among others. A newspaper narrative 
 describes his speech as follows : 
 
 " Rev. Arthur B. Fuller protested against * any further compro 
 mise with slavery. Thus far, and no farther.' He was in favor 
 of the Constitution of these United States. He was in favor of a 
 settlement ; but, in the language of Honorable Charles Sumner, 
 ' Nothing is ever settled that is not settled right.' Let us stand right 
 ourselves, and then we can demand right from others. He urged 
 the Republicans to stand by the election of Lincoln and Hamlin. 
 .... He was opposed to compromise, even to the admission of 
 New Mexico, because it would be in violation of our platform, 
 and at variance with the opinions of such honored statesmen as 
 
84 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Webster and Clay, and because it interdicted the spirit of the 
 Gospel." 
 
 He at once began to visit the camps for religious exhor 
 tation ; was soon elected chaplain of the Sixteenth Massa 
 chusetts Infantry, and was commissioned as such, August 
 1st, 1861. In his letter of resignation, he thus stated to his 
 parish his motives : 
 
 " The moral and religious welfare of our patriotic soldiery can 
 not be neglected, save to the demoralization and permanent spirit 
 ual injury of those who are perilling their all in our country's 
 cause. The regiment represents Middlesex County on the tented 
 field, the county in which I was born, and which my honored father 
 represented in our national Congress ; and one company is from 
 Watertown, where for nearly two years I have been a settled min 
 ister, circumstances which give this call of duty a peculiar claim 
 upon my mind and heart. I am willing to peril life for the welfare 
 of our brave soldiery and in our country's cause. If God requires 
 that sacrifice of me, it shall be offered on the altar of freedom, and 
 in defence of all that is good in American institutions." 
 
 A parting festival was held at the pastor's house, and 
 many presents were brought in, every religious denomina 
 tion in town being represented in the gifts. A prayer-meet 
 ing took place in the Methodist church, the services being 
 conducted by Mr. Fuller in connection with Rev. Mr. 
 Hempstead, minister of that church. An army officer, who 
 was present, spoke of the dangers to which he was about 
 to return ; and the two clergymen offered prayers for him. 
 It was noted afterwards as remarkable, that this officer 
 finally came back to his home uninjured, while both the 
 ministers became chaplains, and gave up their lives, within 
 a few days of each other, at Fredericksburg. 
 
 Chaplain Fuller left Boston, with his regiment, August 
 17th, 1861. Scarcely were they settled in camp, near Balti 
 more, when he entered with his wonted zeal upon his new 
 labors. He writes as follows : 
 
 "Our encampment is hardly settled enough yet for definite 
 
Arthur Buckminster Fuller. 85 
 
 arrangements to have been fully carried out. After this week, 
 however, the arrangements are as follows : Sunday school at nine, 
 A. M. ; attendance to be wholly voluntary. Preaching every Sab 
 bath at five o'clock, p. M., the old hour at Camp Cameron, and 
 the best hour of the day for the purpose. Prayer and conference 
 meeting (when practicable) every day at about six and seven, p. M. ; 
 attendance of course voluntary. These services will be fully 
 attended. Even now, every night there are quiet circles for prayer 
 and praise. 
 
 " Besides these services, there are Bibles and religious volumes 
 to be distributed to the men, and books for singing God's praise. 
 We find the ' Army Melodies ' useful among us, and were not the 
 writer one of the editors of the volume, he would say much of the 
 necessity and usefulness of supplying religious and patriotic music 
 and words to every regiment and every naval vessel, in place of 
 the ribald songs so sadly common in the army and on shipboard. 
 No more refining or religious instrumentality than music can be 
 used." 
 
 The position of an army chaplain is no easy one : the 
 majority of clergymen fail in it. In a little world of the most 
 accurate order, where every man's duties and position are 
 absolutely prescribed, the chaplain alone has no definite 
 position and no prescribed duties. In a sphere where 
 everything is concentrated on one sole end, he alone finds 
 himself of no direct use towards that end, and apparently 
 superfluous. In this difficult position, nine men out of ten 
 are almost useless, while the tenth achieves a wide-spread 
 usefulness. Arthur Fuller seemed to be one of the minor 
 ity. The prime qualities required by his new position were 
 moral energy and tact ; he had always a superabundance 
 of the one, and he must have developed the other, or he 
 could not have been so successful as he evidently was. 
 
 For instance, it is the custom in some regiments for the 
 chaplain to be the caterer for the officers' mess. The first 
 proposition to this effect, in the Sixteenth Massachusetts, 
 was promptly met by a Scripture text, "It is not reason 
 that we should leave the word of God and serve tables." 
 
86 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 The Colonel was not quite pleased, it is said, with this piece 
 of frankness ; yet afterwards, at a complimentary dinner 
 of the officers, when they had vainly implored the Chaplain 
 to take wine with them, the Colonel finally proposed three 
 cheers for the Chaplain, as " a man whom we all honor the 
 more, because in public and private he is uniformly con 
 sistent with his principles." 
 
 In accordance with these views, the Chaplain was soon at 
 work in resisting the most perilous of army vices. He 
 writes : 
 
 "We celebrated the close of the year 1861 by forming in the 
 Sixteenth Massachusetts Regiment a Division of the Sons of Tem 
 perance. At an early hour the new chapel-tent of the regiment 
 was filled to overflowing with soldiers eager to listen to an expo 
 sition of the principles of the organization, and to unite in the 
 movement, if it commended itself to their judgment. Over one 
 hundred officers and soldiers were proposed for initiation. Author 
 ity had been received by the chaplain from the Grand Division of 
 Massachusetts to organize this Division, which is to embrace not 
 only soldiers of this regiment, but Massachusetts men connected 
 with other regiments at or near Camp Hamilton, or with the naval 
 vessels lying off the fortress." 
 
 He formed also an " Army Christian Association," and a 
 " Soldiers' Teachers' Association," thus transplanting the 
 church and school-house of New England to the soil of Vir 
 ginia. Then, by freely setting forth at home the demands 
 of the regiment, he provided a " chapel-tent," the first 
 seen, probably, in our army. He thus describes its dedi 
 cation : 
 
 " Yesterday was a noteworthy day with the Sixteenth Massa 
 chusetts Regiment, for on it we dedicated our beautiful tabernacle 
 tent. This tent was presented to us by various patriotic and be 
 nevolent citizens of Boston, who desire that religious services may 
 not necessarily be suspended during the sultry heat of summer, or 
 during the fall of the rain, so copious in Virginia, and that our 
 evening prayer and temperance meetings may not necessarily be 
 
Arthur Buckminster Fuller. 87 
 
 held in the open air. The subscriptions were secured by a most 
 excellent lady, and she receives the grateful acknowledgments of 
 our entire regiment. The day of dedication was also Forefathers' 
 Day (December 22), which was very appropriate for a Massachu 
 setts regiment, having their tabernacle in the wilderness, as did 
 their fathers. 
 
 " Both army and navy chaplains participated in the exercises. 
 The chaplains were representatives of nearly every sect, including 
 Roman Catholic ; but there was entire harmony, and a sweet blend 
 ing of devout sentiment and Christian, patriotic utterance. Chap 
 lains from North and South, East and West, were there, and from 
 sea and shore, yet no discordant note was uttered. The tabernacle 
 tent was trimmed with holly and live-oak wreaths and crosses, 
 made by the soldiers with a taste which would have surprised our 
 female friends. The ladies of the Hygeia Hospital, who were 
 present, contributed a beautiful cross of mingled evergreen and 
 flowers. Our regimental band played the Star-spangled Banner 
 admirably, and the regimental choir sang the hymns written for the 
 occasion, in a manner which elicited, as it deserved, much praise. 
 Rev. Mr. Fuller's dedication discourse was founded on the text in 
 Isaiah iv. 6, ' And there shall be a tabernacle, for a shadow in the 
 daytime from the heat, and for a place of refuge, and for a covert 
 from storm and rain.' " 
 
 Besides these varied labors in the regiment, Chaplain 
 Fuller was an active newspaper correspondent, writing 
 letters to the Boston Journal, the Boston Traveller, the 
 New York Tribune, the Christian Inquirer, and other jour 
 nals. Among these letters was a narrative perhaps the 
 most graphic ever given of the famous contest between 
 the Merrimack and the Monitor, and all the exciting events 
 which preceded and followed. These important letters are 
 fully given in the Memoir of Chaplain Fuller, by his brother ; 
 but only the most exciting passage of the narrative can be 
 here inserted. The date is March 15th, 1862 : 
 
 " The morrow came, and with it came the inevitable battle be 
 tween those strange combatants, the Merrimack and the Monitor. 
 "What a lovely Sabbath it was ! how peaceful and balmy that 
 
88 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Southern spring morning ! Smiling Nature whispered only ' peace/ 
 but fierce treason breathed out threatenings and slaughter, and 
 
 would have war At nine o'clock, A. M., the Merrimack, 
 
 attended by her consorts, the war-steamers Jamestown and York- 
 town, and a fleet of little tug-boats, crowded with ladies and gentle 
 men from Norfolk, who were desirous of seeing the Minnesota 
 captured, and perhaps even Fortress Monroe taken, certainly all 
 its outlying vessels and the houses in its environs burnt. 
 
 " The little Monitor lay concealed in the shadow of the Minne 
 sota. The Merrimack opens the conflict, and her guns shake the 
 sea and air as they breathe out shot and flame. SewalPs Point 
 sends from its mortars shell which burst in the air above the doomed 
 Minnesota. The Minnesota, still aground, replies with a bold but 
 ineffectual broadside. All promises an easy victory to the Merri 
 mack, when lo ! the little Monitor steams gently out and offers the 
 monster Merrimack battle. How puny, how contemptible she 
 seemed! nothing but that little round tub appearing above the 
 water, and yet flinging down the gage of defiance to the gigantic 
 Merrimack. It was little David challenging the giant Goliath once 
 again, the little one, the hope of Israel ; the giant, the pride of 
 the heathen Philistines. Truly our hopes were dim, and our hearts 
 almost faint for the moment. The few men on the Monitor are 
 sea and storm worn, and weary enough, and their little craft is an 
 experiment, with only two guns with which to answer the Merri- 
 mack's many. Who can doubt the issue ? who believe the Monitor 
 can fail to be defeated ? And if she is, what is to hinder the vic 
 torious and unopposed and unopposable Merrimack from opening 
 the blockade of the coast, or shelling Washington, New York, and 
 Boston, after first devastating our camp and destroying its soldiery? 
 That was the issue ; such might have been the result, smile now 
 who will. Believe me, there were prayers offered many and 
 fervent that Sabbath, along the shore and from the Fortress 
 walls, as our regiment watched the battle ; and sailors must have 
 prayed, too, as never before. 
 
 "The Merrimack, after a few minutes of astounded silence, 
 opened the contest. She tried to sink her puny foe at once by a 
 broadside, and be no longer delayed from the Minnesota, whose 
 capture she had determined upon. After the smoke of the cannon 
 ade had cleared away, we looked fearing, and the crew of the 
 
Arthur Buckminster Fuller. 89 
 
 Merrimack looked hoping, that the Monitor had sunk to rise no 
 more. But she still lived. There she was, with the white wreaths 
 of smoke crowning her tower, as if a coronet of glory. And val 
 iantly she returned the fire, too ; and for five hours such a lively 
 cannonading as was heard, shaking earth and sea, was never heard 
 before. Literally, I believe that never have ships carrying such 
 heavy guns met, till that Sabbath morning. Every manoeuvre was 
 exhausted by the enemy. The Yorktown approached to mingle in 
 the fray. One shot was enough to send her quickly back, a lame 
 duck upon the waters, though she, too, is iron-clad. The Merri 
 mack tried to run the Monitor down, and thus sink her ; she only 
 got fiercer shots by the opportunity she thus gave her little antag 
 onist. And so it went on till the proud Merrimack, disabled, was 
 glad to retire, and, making signals of distress, was towed away by 
 her sorrowing consorts. David had conquered Goliath with his 
 smooth stones, or wrought-iron balls, from his little sling, or shot- 
 tower. Israel rejoiced in her deliverance, through the power of 
 God, who had sent that little champion of his cause, in our direst 
 extremity, to the battle. Since then the Merrimack has not shown 
 herself; and the enemy confess her disabled, and her commander, 
 Buchanan, ominous name, severely wounded, four of her crew 
 killed, and seventeen wounded." 
 
 The regiment occupied Norfolk and Portsmouth and Suf 
 folk for a time ; then joined the Peninsular army, and had 
 war and suffering in earnest, being attached to Hooker's 
 division. Chaplain Fuller had just obtained a furlough, 
 but refused to avail himself of it. Their first serious skir 
 mish was on June 19th, near the scene of the battle of Fair 
 Oaks. When the regiment was ordered out, the Chaplain 
 was lying in his tent, suffering with a severe sick-headache. 
 Hearing one of the soldiers say, in passing near the tent, 
 that he wished he had a sick-headache, the Chaplain at once 
 rose, went to the field, and happening to get under a dan 
 gerous cross-fire, behaved with such coolness as to increase 
 very greatly his influence among the men. Indeed, all 
 through that campaign he seems to have shared his lot with 
 the soldiers until his health began to fail. He wrote home 
 from the field : 
 
90 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " I am enduring much privation in the way of food, clothing, and 
 exposure. But I do not think it manly to write particulars, as you 
 desire; indeed, I endeavor not to think about it. Almost every 
 day, and sometimes twice a day, I go out with the regiment in line 
 of battle. I deem this my duty. For nine days I had no change 
 of raiment, not even a clean shirt or handkerchief, and lived on hard 
 crackers and sour coffee. But God blesses my labors, particularly 
 among the sick and wounded, and I am far enough from repining. 
 Of all places in the world, I am glad I am here now. I find no 
 physical fear to be mine. This is a mere matter of organization, 
 not merit. Meet me on earth, if it may be ; in heaven, surely. 
 And know that nothing will make me swerve from my fealty to 
 God, to Christ his Son, to my family, my State, and my Country." 
 
 All the following summer he remained at home, very ill ; 
 but rejoined his regiment at Alexandria, November 4th, 
 1862. Forbidden by the surgeon from accompanying it 
 to the front, he devoted himself to labors in the hospitals 
 and convalescent camps of that vicinity. He wrote : 
 
 " I work very hard among the sick and dying soldiers. We have 
 five large buildings and several tents crowded with more than five 
 hundred sick men, and only two surgeons in attendance, and my 
 services are greatly needed." 
 
 He again tried to rejoin his regiment at Manassas, and 
 failing, was obliged to abandon all hope of field service. 
 He wrote to his family : 
 
 " The President of the United States promises me, through Sen 
 ator Clark, a commission with full powers as chaplain in a hospital 
 or stationary camp. The Surgeon-General gives the same assur 
 ance. But it is necessary that I should resign my present position 
 before assuming the new. I go to the camp at Falmouth to-mor 
 row morning, in order to resign. I do this with much regret." 
 
 He was discharged from service, on resignation, Decem 
 ber 10th, 1862. On the very next day his death occurred, 
 under those extraordinary circumstances which made it 
 unique in the history of the war. At least I know of no 
 
Arthur JBuckminster Fuller. 91 
 
 other case in this war, or in any, in which a chaplain, the 
 day after his discharge, still wearing his uniform, and 
 therefore the more exposed, bearing his discharge on his 
 person, and therefore not liable to exchange in case of cap 
 ture, knowing that his family, should he be killed, could 
 legally receive no pension, and therefore having the more 
 to risk, has volunteered, without a soldier's training, for 
 the most perilous duty of a common soldier, and been killed 
 in doing it. 
 
 The Army of the Potomac, under Burnside, was to cross 
 the river at Fredericksburg. It was six o'clock, and though 
 the pontoons were partly laid, yet the fire of the enemy's 
 sharpshooters was so furious that the work could not be 
 finished. The boats could carry but a hundred at a time. 
 A call was made for volunteers. Chaplain Fuller, who was 
 present, took a rifle and stepped forward as one. He crossed 
 the river safely, but fell at the entrance of the city, pierced 
 by two bullets, and grazed by a third. He was instantly 
 killed. 
 
 The best narrative of the incident is that given by Cap 
 tain Moncena Dunn, Nineteenth Massachusetts Infantry, 
 under whose orders the Chaplain had placed himself : 
 
 " In answer to your inquiries, I would say, that, although I had 
 previously intended, at the suggestion of a mutual friend, to make 
 the acquaintance of Chaplain Fuller, I saw him for the first time 
 in the streets of Fredericksburg, on the llth December ultimo, at 
 about half past three, p. M., where I was in command of twenty- 
 five men deployed as skirmishers. We came over in the boats, 
 and were in advance of the others who had crossed. Pursuant to 
 orders, we marched up the street leading from the river, till we came 
 to the third street traversing it, parallel with the river, and called 
 Carolina Street, I think. We had been here but a few minutes 
 when Chaplain Fuller accosted me with the usual military salute. 
 He had a musket in his hand ; and he said, ' Captain, I must do 
 something for my country. What shall I do ? ' I replied, that 
 there never was a better time than the present ; and he could take 
 his place on my left. I thought he could render valuable aid, be- 
 
92 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 cause he was perfectly cool and collected. Had he appeared at all 
 excited, I should have rejected his services ; for coolness is of the 
 first importance with skirmishers, and one excited man has an un 
 favorable influence upon the others. I have seldom seen a person 
 on the field so calm and mild in his demeanor, evidently not acting 
 from impulse or martial rage. 
 
 " His position was directly in front of a grocery store. He fell 
 in five minutes after he took it, having fired once or twice. He 
 was killed instantly, and did not move after he fell. I saw the flash 
 of the rifle which did the deed. 
 
 " I think the Chaplain fell from the ball which entered the hip. 
 He might not have been aware of the wound from the ball enter 
 ing his arm, as sometimes soldiers are not conscious of wounds in 
 battle, or he may have been simultaneously hit by another rifle. 
 We were in a very exposed position. Shortly before the Chaplain 
 came up, one of General Burnside's aids accosted me, expressing 
 surprise, and saying, ' What are you doing here, Captain ? ' I re 
 plied that I had orders. He said that I must retire, if the Rebels 
 pressed us too hard. In about half an hour I had definite orders 
 to retire, and accordingly fell back, leaving the Chaplain and an 
 other man dead, and also a wounded man, who was unwilling to be 
 moved. It is not usual, under such pressing circumstances, to at 
 tempt to remove the dead. In about an hour afterward, my regi 
 ment advanced in line with the Twentieth Massachusetts. They 
 occupied the place where Chaplain Fuller fell ; and they suffered 
 very severely, it being much exposed. The Chaplain's body we 
 found had been robbed, and the wounded man bayoneted by the 
 Rebel Vandals, while the ground was left to them. 
 
 " I think, in addition to Chaplain Fuller's desire to aid at a criti 
 cal juncture in the affairs of his country, by the influence of his ex 
 ample and his personal assistance, he may have been willing also 
 to show that he had not resigned in the face of the enemy from any 
 desire to shrink from danger." 
 
 An unusual recognition of the services and the gallant 
 death of Chaplain Fuller took place in Congress, some time 
 afterwards. His death had led to just that result of which 
 he had been warned by an army officer before his death ; 
 his family was left without a pension, as he was not tech- 
 
Arthur Buckminster Fuller. 93 
 
 nically in the service. On his widow's petition to Congress, 
 a special law providing her a pension very promptly passed 
 both Houses without opposition. Honorable Charles Sum- 
 ner presented the petition in the Senate, remarking, that 
 
 " From the 1st day of August, 1861, Arthur B. Fuller had been 
 a duly commissioned chaplain in the Sixteenth Massachusetts Regi 
 ment of Volunteers, and had followed its flag faithfully, patrioti 
 cally, religiously, through all the perils of the Peninsula and wher 
 ever else it had been borne." 
 
 The petition having been referred to the Committee on 
 Pensions, they reported, 
 
 " That it appears that Arthur B. Fuller was the chaplain of the 
 Sixteenth Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers ; that his health 
 was much impaired by the hardships and exposures of the Peninsu 
 lar campaign ; that after repeated efforts to renew his labors in the 
 camp of his regiment, which were foiled by his sickness returning 
 upon every such attempt, it was finally determined, by the advice 
 of army surgeons, that his malady was such that he could not bear 
 exposure in the field. He was accordingly honorably discharged, 
 on surgeon's certificate of disability, on the 10th day of December, 
 1862. On the llth day of December, on the call for volunteers 
 to cross the Rappahannock at the battle of Fredericksburg, he 
 volunteered, and was killed in the service soon after entering 
 Fredericksburg. 
 
 " The committee think that, though Chaplain Fuller was techni 
 cally out of the service of the United States, still he was really fti 
 the service of his country and in the line of duty while bravely 
 leading on the soldiers, and dying on the field of battle. They 
 therefore think the petitioner entitled to the relief for which she 
 prays, and accordingly report a bill." 
 
 The body of the slain soldier was sent home to Massachu 
 setts, as soon as the incidents of war permitted. A private 
 funeral took place at the house of his brother, and a public 
 one at the First Church on Chauncey Street, in Boston, on 
 December 24th, 1862. 
 
 " The church was crowded with the friends of the de- 
 
94 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ceased, who wished some opportunity to express their sense 
 of loss, their respect for his memory, and their estimation 
 of his character and services. Governor Andrew and staff, 
 General Andrews and staff, Chief Justice Bigelow, and oth 
 er prominent public men, were present. The escort was 
 performed by the Cadets. 
 
 " The coffin was placed in front of the pulpit, and was 
 profusely covered with the most exquisite flowers. One by 
 one the wreaths were placed upon the lid by loving hands, 
 as the best expression of the cherished memories of the past. 
 The following inscription was upon the plate : 
 
 REV. ARTHUR BUCKMINSTER FULLER, 
 Chaplain of the 16th Regiment of 
 
 Massachusetts Volunteers ; 
 
 Killed at the Battle of Fredericksburg, Va., 
 
 llth December, 1862, 
 
 Aged 40 years. 
 ' I must do something for my country? " 
 
 These words were his fitting epitaph ; and few there are 
 who have so well succeeded in matching a single electric 
 word and deed together. Margaret Fuller Ossoli was an 
 artist in words ; she left behind her many a sentence of the 
 rarest depth and beauty, " lyric glimpses," Emerson called 
 them, and her glorious life in Italy joins with her tragic 
 death to throw back upon those brilliant phrases the lustre 
 of a corresponding self-devotion. Less gifted in intellect, 
 less devoted to artistic culture, her brother and pupil left 
 behind him this one utterance of self-devotion, putting to 
 it, within that same hour, the seal of death. It may yet 
 make his memory as lasting as her own. 
 
Peter Augustus Porter. 95 
 
 1845. 
 PETER AUGUSTUS PORTER. 
 
 Colonel 129th New York Vols. (afterwards 8th New York Heavy Ar 
 tillery), August 17, 1862; killed at Cold Harbor, Va., June 3, 1864. 
 
 IN how many of the students of Harvard does every 
 favoring element seem to have combined culture, pu 
 rity, self-reliance, and courage to give promise of high 
 and noble achievement. One only boon of Fortune they 
 lacked, her last and most reluctant gift, opportunity. 
 At length that opportunity came : it was their death. A 
 good Providence granted them to die, and in their death 
 accorded them the achievement of every possibility life could 
 have bestowed. Of such was Peter Augustus Porter, a 
 graduate of Harvard of the Class of 1845. He died in the 
 service of his country on the 3d of June, 1864, at the bat 
 tle of Cold Harbor. 
 
 There was something impressive and noble in the circum 
 stances of his death. Young, gifted, happily married, and 
 with children growing up about him, using all his powers 
 and opportunities with a high and noble aim, Colonel Por 
 ter had endeared himself to a large circle of friends by ties 
 of more than ordinary strength and permanence. Favored 
 in birth, and early master of his own career, he resolved 
 that no external advantage of position should help him to 
 any station he had not first merited by his own labor. We 
 all know the results he achieved ; but few have followed 
 and appreciated the conscientious labor and study, the 
 severely simple and unostentatious life, which preceded 
 them. His more distinguished merit, however, and higher 
 grace consisted in his benevolence and kindness of heart, in 
 his large and constant, though secret charities, and in his 
 consideration and tenderness towards the poor, the suffer- 
 
96 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ing, and the bereaved. However attractive lie may have 
 appeared in social life, and however valued for his eminent 
 powers, his best intellectual gifts were ever reserved for the 
 quiet hours spent with those whose relations with him were 
 purely personal and domestic. 
 
 My first acquaintance with Colonel Porter was at the 
 University of Heidelberg, where he appeared in my room, 
 a fair-haired, sunshiny youth, shadowed only by the loss of 
 his aged and beloved father. An orphan, on the threshold 
 of life, his career at Cambridge just terminated, with all 
 that fortune could add to the most noble and generous nat 
 ural endowments, he had left all behind him to enter on 
 the labors of a student ; and at an age when most men deem 
 their culture achieved, he earnestly and humbly commenced 
 anew the great task of self-education. " I want culture," 
 he would say ; "I want the equal development of all my 
 faculties, the realization of the true, the good, and the 
 beautiful ; and for this I am willing to give my whole life if 
 necessary, but I desire no results which are not based on 
 solid and real knowledge." At a much later period, when 
 time had chastened and tempered his qualities, he was still 
 faithful to this ideal. When urged to choose a career 
 among the many opportunities which presented themselves, 
 he said : " My call has not come ; I must bide my time ; I 
 can wait, but I cannot give myself, for the sake of occupa 
 tion or success, to that which my heart does not tell me I 
 am fitted for. I am conscious of the possession of all my 
 faculties in their prime. Whatever I could have been I 
 still could "be; but I cannot choose, I must be chosen." 
 The last time I saw him, it was in command of his regi 
 ment at Fort McHenry, I reminded him of this conver 
 sation. He smiled sweetly but sadly as he said : " I have 
 done my duty as I have known it. For the two years I have 
 been in command of my regiment, I have hardly been away 
 from it a single day. We are thoroughly drilled for artil 
 lery and for infantry service. We are ready for duty : we 
 are waiting for our turn." 
 
Peter Augustus Porter. 97 
 
 His mind seemed singularly old-fashioned, and even in 
 his early youth he had all the graces and courtesies of age. 
 " I am a generation before you all," he would say : " I am 
 the son of an old man. I reach back to the war of 1812. 
 I was born almost in the wilderness. My father rode on 
 horseback through the length of Ohio, to visit my mother 
 in Kentucky, before his marriage. There was nothing but 
 a bridle-path then." 
 
 To this adherence to the elder tradition we may trace 
 the source of those hospitalities, generous yet unostenta 
 tious, which characterized his home ; and his home for all 
 humane purposes was wherever he himself was. Rich and 
 poor were ever received by him with equal kindness, for his 
 nature was alike Christian and kingly. We saw in him 
 the scion of a stately old oak, grafted on a new and vigor 
 ous stock ; a gentleman of the old school gracefully adapt 
 ing himself to the duties of republican life. In accordance 
 with this element of his character was his position, partly 
 inherited and partly adopted, on the great question of hu 
 man liberty, to which he bore his testimony in humane and 
 generous actions, down to the last great sacrifice, when he 
 gave to it his life. 
 
 His reading was thorough and solid, and confined to the 
 best books. He was particularly drawn to the older English 
 classics, whose stately and sober style found a response in 
 his own character. His studies had always a direct refer 
 ence to a future American literature ; and I used to cherish 
 the idea that he was destined to take a high rank among its 
 pioneers. He had carefully and patiently examined, with 
 this view, all the elements of our poetry from its commence 
 ment, and, with a correctness of taste which amounted 
 almost to an instinct, had stored his memory with its 
 most striking passages. His own verses were carefully 
 written, and elevated in their thought and diction ; but he 
 was coy of expression, and has left but few poems. It was 
 in conversation, perhaps, that his rare combination of native 
 
 VOL. I. 7 
 
98 Harvard Memorial Biographies . 
 
 and acquired powers showed to the greatest advantage. 
 Gentle and wise, with a beautiful fulness of expression and 
 illustration, and a wit that was at once considerate and un 
 restrained, no one was more valued and cherished than he, 
 wherever the best elements of culture were appreciated. 
 
 He being the third of his family, in direct descent, who 
 had borne arms in the service of our country, each of the 
 wars which tell its history had added to the lustre of his 
 name. His grandfather, Dr. Joshua Porter, a physician in 
 Salisbury, Connecticut, and a graduate of Yale College, was 
 colonel of a regiment in the Revolutionary war, and took 
 part in the battle of Saratoga. His father, Major-General 
 Peter B. Porter, also born in Connecticut, an officer of great 
 distinction in the war of 1812, bore a most important part 
 in the military events on the Northern frontier, and at the 
 battles of Lundy's Lane and the sortie from Fort Erie 
 gained a name for courage and conduct which the histo 
 rian of that period called upon his son, while yet an infant, 
 to emulate. Later in life General Porter occupied the 
 office of Secretary of War under John Quincy Adams. 
 
 Colonel Porter was born at Black Rock, near Buffalo, New 
 York, on July 14th, 1827. His mother was Letitia Gray- 
 son, daughter of John Breckenridge of Kentucky, Attorney- 
 General under Jefferson, and was widely known as a person 
 of the highest principles and benevolence. He had the mis 
 fortune to lose her when he was only four years old, her 
 place being thenceforth supplied by the tender affection of 
 an only sister. At the age of seventeen he lost his father, 
 and was thus early initiated into the responsibilities of life. 
 He entered Harvard University, in the Sophomore class, in 
 1842, graduating in 1845. After this, he spent several 
 years in Europe, as a student at the Universities of Heidel 
 berg, Berlin, and Breslau. On his return, in 1852, he 
 married (March 30th) his cousin, Miss Mary C. Brecken 
 ridge, a lady greatly respected and beloved by all who 
 knew her, but who was taken from him by death in the 
 
Peter Augustus Porter. 99 
 
 short space of two years. In 1855 he returned to Europe, 
 spending the winter at Ems and Paris. In 1859 he mar 
 ried Miss Josephine M. Morris of New York, who as his 
 widow survives him, and had but just entered upon that 
 happy home-life which it was his greatest pleasure to culti 
 vate and embellish, when the call came which was to devote 
 him to his country.* 
 
 In 1861 he was elected a member of the Assembly of 
 the State of New York, where he performed his duties 
 with faithfulness and assiduity. In 1862 he tendered his 
 services to the government, applying for authority to recruit 
 a company of volunteers for the war. On receiving the 
 application, Governor Morgan at once offered him the com 
 mand of a regiment, if he would undertake the recruiting 
 of it in his own senatorial district. He began immediately, 
 and raised a fine regiment of infantry, the One Hundred 
 and Twenty-ninth New York Volunteers, in the unprece- 
 dentedly short time of about two weeks. It was originally 
 one thousand strong, but was subsequently changed to the 
 Eighth New York Heavy Artillery, and its numbers in 
 creased to more than two thousand. For nearly two years 
 he was stationed in the defences of Baltimore, the latter 
 part of the time in command of Fort McHenry. 
 
 In May, 1864, General Grant entered upon his great cam 
 paign in Virginia. Colonel Porter had been unceasing in 
 his applications for active service, but now seemed destined 
 to a new disappointment, as the army moved without him. 
 It was only in consequence of the losses of men sustained 
 in the battles of the Wilderness that his regiment was called 
 into the field. He had said to his officers, during the long 
 months of waiting : " Some of us will die in garrison, some 
 on the march, and others on the field of battle ; yet all alike 
 will be remembered as having died in defence of our coun- 
 
 * Colonel Porter left three children ; namely, Peter Augustus, born in 
 September, 1855 ; Letitia Elizabeth, born February, 1861, died October, 1864 ; 
 George Morris, born July, 1863. 
 
100 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 try." It was on a bright Saturday afternoon, after twenty 
 months of garrison duty, that the confidential order reached 
 him to proceed to the front. At nine o'clock on the follow 
 ing morning, Sunday, May 15th, they were en route for Wash 
 ington, and on Monday evening arrived by boat at Belle 
 Plain. On the march thence to Spottsylvania Court-House 
 Colonel Porter was temporarily in command of a brigade. 
 His regiment was then brigaded under General R. 0. Tyler, 
 and he resumed his own command. Daylight on the morn 
 ing of May 18th found them in line of battle near Spottsyl 
 vania Court-House, on an eminence overlooking the field 
 where the fighting was going on. At eight o'clock they 
 had changed their position so as to find themselves within 
 range of the enemy's guns, this being for many of them 
 their first experience under fire. 
 
 Upon the following day an attack was made by Early 's 
 corps upon their right and rear. The Eighth New York, 
 with several other regiments, were immediately under or 
 ders, and moved at double-quick to repel the charge. 
 After the whole force of the enemy had been pressed far 
 back into the woods, Colonel Porter sought out his officers, 
 anxiously inquiring if their men had behaved well ; and on 
 being assured that their conduct had been admirable, he 
 exclaimed with satisfaction, " Now I know that the Eighth 
 will stand fire, and will not disgrace itself on the battle 
 field." Every officer and private in the regiment knew that 
 his dearest wish was that the regiment, to the drill and dis 
 cipline of which he had given the best efforts of his mind, 
 and which he had always esteemed it an honor to command, 
 should acquit itself creditably in the first engagement with 
 the enemy ; and they had resolved he should not be disap 
 pointed. Their loss on that day was between thirty and 
 forty. Colonel Porter escaped unhurt, though his life was 
 repeatedly attempted by a sharpshooter in a neighboring 
 tree, who, when wounded and captured, boasted of the fact, 
 saying he had been his prisoner at Fort McHenry. With a 
 
Peter Augustus Porter:. > / ' i01 : 
 
 look of pity Colonel Porter directed him to be taken to the 
 rear and kindly cared for. 
 
 At midnight on the 20th of May, the movement towards 
 Eichmond commenced ; the brigade to which he belonged 
 being attached, as heretofore, to Gibbon's division of Han 
 cock's corps. The march was laborious, a part of each night 
 being employed in intrenching. On the evening of May 
 23d they reached the North Anna, near Hanover Station, 
 and on the next day crossed the stream under a sharp artil 
 lery fire. That night they lay upon their arms without 
 shelter, exposed to a drenching rain ; and during the long 
 and dreary hours Colonel Porter beguiled the tedium of his 
 officers by some of his most brilliant and humorous sallies. 
 The following evening they recrossed the North Anna, and 
 the whole night was spent in erecting more breastworks. 
 The night was dark, and the ground too broken to admit of 
 moving about except on foot, and a long line of works must 
 be erected before morning. The regiment was halted at 
 the point where the works were to be made, when the whole 
 line, men and officers, sank exhausted on the ground. Pres 
 ently Colonel Porter came along in the dark, calling out to 
 one of his officers, " I want you to take charge of this 
 work, and it is to be completed before daylight." The 
 officer, exhausted by the fatigue he had undergone, replied, 
 " Colonel, I am sorry, but it is physically impossible for me 
 to do it ; I am utterly prostrated." His commander came 
 close to him, saying, " I know you are ; I wonder you have 
 stood it so long. I am nearly exhausted myself ; but remain 
 where you are, get what rest you can, and I will see that 
 the work is done." Daylight found it finished. 
 
 On the 2d of June they reached Cold Harbor, and soon 
 after noon occupied the front line of works. Colonel Porter 
 had such information as led him to believe that a charge 
 would be ordered that afternoon upon the enemy's works, 
 situated within one hundred rods of the front. He gave his 
 officers full instructions how he wished the duty to be per- 
 
f^Hq+vard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 formed, passing frequently along the whole line, a prominent 
 mark for the enemy's sharpshooters. At length night came 
 on, and with it a heavy rain. Major Willett, the senior sur 
 viving officer of the regiment, writes : 
 
 " The Colonel was vigilant in guarding against surprise, and I 
 do not think he slept at all that night. My position was on the ex 
 treme right of our line, at a large frame-and-brick house. Near by 
 was a small evergreen, under which I took shelter from the rain. 
 The Colonel was with me there about midnight, but soon returned 
 to his own position near the centre of the line. He called upon 
 me again before daylight ; and we sat down on a log of wood to 
 drink our coffee, and talk over the charge we expected to make at 
 dawn. Suddenly the sharpshooters opposite, taking advantage of 
 the first ray of light, opened fire upon us. With a smile, and in a 
 cheerful tone, he spoke a few kind words, and was leaving me when 
 he turned about, reached out his hand, and with a shade of anxiety 
 and sorrow on his face, said, ' Good by, Major \ ' and was gone. 
 
 " In less than five minutes a staff officer came galloping up and 
 inquired for Colonel Porter. I directed him to the Colonel's quar 
 ters, and he rode on, saying we were to charge at a given signal, 
 the firing of a gun from a battery in our rear. The gun was fired 
 before he had reached the Colonel. I ordered my battalion over 
 the works, and we formed in line in front. Standing upon the para 
 pet I looked anxiously to the left for about a minute, when I saw 
 Colonel Porter suddenly appear upon the top of the breastwork, 
 near the extreme left of the regiment, and immediately after the 
 men climbing over the work. For an instant they halted and 
 closed ranks ; then as the Colonel, a few yards in advance, waved 
 his sword, the whole line went forward at double-quick into that 
 terrible fire, which cost the regiment, in killed and wounded, over 
 six hundred men and twenty-three officers, including its noble and 
 beloved commander." 
 
 Colonel Porter fell, at the head of his column, within a 
 few rods of the enemy's rifle-pits. He was wounded in the 
 neck. He rose once to his feet and again to his knees, ral 
 lying his men, till, pierced by six bullets, he sank to rise no 
 more. The last words he uttered were, " Dress upon the 
 
Peter Augustus Porter. 103 
 
 colors ! " For several days he had had a strong presenti 
 ment of his approaching death. In a letter received by his 
 family long after the battle, but written three days before, 
 he had said, " I try to think and act and feel as if each 
 day were to be my last, so as not to go unprepared to God. 
 We must hope and pray and believe He will preserve us. 
 But His will be done. It is selfish to wish to be saved at 
 the expense of others." 
 
 His body lay two days under the guns of the enemy, 
 whose works, by one of the sad chances of civil war, were 
 commanded by his own cousin, John C. Breckenridge, 
 doubly related to him by blood and marriage. It was re 
 covered on the night of the second day by the steadiness 
 and good conduct of five men of his regiment, Sergeant 
 Le Roy Williams, Privates Galen S. Hicks, John Duff, Wal 
 ter Harwood, and Samuel Travis. When Mr. Cozzens, in 
 reading his memorial of Colonel Porter to the Century Club 
 in New York City, narrated this fine act of affection, how 
 on a rainy night the men had crawled as near the enemy's 
 works as they dared go together, then how one had dragged 
 himself up to the body, attached a rope to the sword-belt 
 and drawn it out to where the survivors lay, and how they 
 together had borne it, partly on their hands and knees, a 
 distance of three miles to the hospital, the Club caused 
 medals to be struck in remembrance of the honorable deed. 
 They are of gold, and bear this inscription, " A tribute from 
 the Century for a rare act of heroic devotion in rescuing 
 the body of Colonel Peter A. Porter from under the guns 
 of the enemy." Two of them, by the chances of war, have 
 yet to be found, to claim their memorial of gratitude. Per 
 chance already with their beloved commander, they need 
 no record to testify to their affection. 
 
 The family and friends of Colonel Porter owed an equal 
 debt of gratitude to the devoted and faithful services of his 
 attached servant, John Huney, who had been taken many 
 years before as a child into his family, and had followed him 
 
104 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 with romantic affection into the field. It was owing to his 
 unremitting efforts that the privilege was accorded them of 
 uniting his remains with those of his ancestors. " If he 
 had been my brother," he said, " I would have buried him 
 at White House ; but I promised you to bring him back, if 
 he were wounded or dead." 
 
 The sentiment of personal attachment which these actions 
 indicate was earnest and sincere in his regiment, and had 
 grown out of the careful and just consideration he always 
 showed his men, and from his observance of the golden rule, 
 by which he consistently strove to direct his every action, 
 to do to others as he would, in like circumstances, have 
 had them do to him. This was beautifully shown in his 
 letter declining a nomination of Secretary of State for 
 New York. " I left home," he wrote, " in command of a 
 regiment composed mainly of the sons of friends and neigh 
 bors committed to my care. I can hardly ask for my dis 
 charge while theirs cannot be granted ; and I have a strong 
 desire, if alive, to carry back those whom the chances of 
 time and war shall permit to be present, and to account in 
 person for all." 
 
 In his will he left the following record of his upright and 
 modest adherence to duty : "I, Peter Augustus Porter, 
 being of sound mind, do declare this to be my last will and 
 testament ; feeling, to its full extent, the probability that I 
 may not return from the path of duty on which I have en 
 tered. If it please God that it be so, I can say, with truth, 
 that I have entered on the course of danger with no ambi 
 tious aspirations, nor with the idea that I am fitted, by na 
 ture or experience, to be of any important service to the 
 government ; but in obedience to the call of duty, demand 
 ing every citizen to contribute what he could, in means, la 
 bor, or life, to sustain the government of his country, a 
 sacrifice made the more willingly by me, when I consider 
 how singularly benefited I have been by the institutions of 
 the land, and that, up to this time, all the blessings of life 
 
Peter Augustus Porter. 105 
 
 have been showered upon me beyond what usually falls to 
 the lot of man." 
 
 His body, placed in a rude coffin and enveloped in his 
 country's flag, was buried in Oakwood Cemetery at Niagara, 
 near the Episcopal Church which his family had built, and 
 where, by faith and choice, he had long and lovingly wor 
 shipped. The solemn dirge of the great cataract, so dear 
 to him in life, sounds forever above his grave. And it 
 seems to those who knew and loved him, that he wrote his 
 own best elegy in the beautiful lines which he composed 
 in Europe, long years before, on hearing of the death of his 
 classmate and friend, George Emerson. 
 
 " I met our friends upon a foreign shore, 
 
 And asked of thee ; they told me thou wert dead ! 
 My lips repeat, ' He is no more, no more ' ; 
 'T was all I said. 
 
 " Yet sank my spirit in me, and there went 
 
 A strange confusion o'er my saddened brow, 
 I could not pierce God's infinite intent ; 
 I cannot now. 
 
 " I only know that He who in thy birth 
 
 Had shadowed forth Himself, though faint and dim, 
 Decreed how long thou shouldst remain on earth, 
 How long with Him. 
 
 " And now there comes that phantom of the past, 
 
 Rousing my soul with its elastic prime : 
 I see thee still as when I saw thee last, 
 In that glad time, 
 
 " Radiant in beauty of the form and mind, 
 And young renown of academic strife, 
 Joy lay around, a stainless life behind, 
 Before thee, life ; 
 
 " A high-priest standing in the temple's space 
 
 Ere yet the sacrificial rites begin, 
 
 A giant waiting for the glorious race 
 
 He is to win. 
 
106 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " We thought eternal tablets would record 
 
 Thy name with theirs who, since the world began, 
 With an immortal strength, and toil and word, 
 Have wrought for man. 
 
 " We thought alas ! what thought we not of good, 
 
 Of all that hope or promise e'er begat ; 
 Of all save early doom friend ! how could 
 We think of that ? 
 
 " We could not see the shadows close thee round ; 
 
 We could not know prophetic cypress shed 
 Funereal perfume for the wreath that bound 
 ' So dear a head.' 
 
 " We could not think the light that from afar 
 
 We deemed prelusive of the coming sun 
 Was but the parting radiance of his car, 
 When day is done. 
 
 " But now I know too well a light 's withdrawn 
 
 That made this gloomy earth for me more fair ; 
 A perfume 's fled and gentle influence gone 
 That soothed my care. 
 
 " And yet not wholly gone : through life's sad vale 
 
 Thy soul now prompting to resemble thee, 
 And now in sad monition when I fail 
 Shall walk with me. 
 
 " With me ? O yes ! but not with me alone ; 
 
 For in the fair companionship of youth, 
 Others than I have fondly felt and known 
 Thy love and truth ; 
 
 "Have .drunk at learning's font with thee, and seen 
 
 How Doubt's dark depths and Thought's wild surge above 
 Thy mild-eyed faith, so pure and so serene, 
 Soared like a dove. 
 
 " Enough : what might have been is not ; no more 
 Shall I return thy grasp, and seek thy glance : 
 Perchance we meet on heaven's eternal shore j 
 Alas! perchance!" 
 
Ezra Ripley. 107 
 
 1846. 
 EZRA RIPLEY. 
 
 First Lieutenant 29th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), July 24, 1861; died 
 July 28, 1863, near Helena, Ark., of disease contracted in the service. 
 
 LIEUTENANT Ezra Ripley was born August 10th, 
 1826, the son of the late Rev. Samuel Ripley of Wal- 
 tham, and the grandson of the venerable Dr. Ezra Ripley 
 of Concord, Massachusetts. His mother, Sarah (Bradford) 
 Ripley, still lives at Concord, a lady beloved and honored 
 as few persons are, in this or any community. Through 
 her he was descended directly from the Pilgrim Governor 
 Bradford. His grandfather, Gamaliel Bradford, was a lieu 
 tenant, and his great-grandfather, of the same name, was a 
 colonel, in the war of the Revolution. His paternal grand 
 mother was also the grandmother of Mr. Ralph Waldo Em 
 erson of Concord. He graduated at Harvard College in 
 1846, and was married in May, 1853, to Miss Harriet M. 
 Hayden of East Cambridge. In 1861 he had been for ten 
 years a lawyer at East Cambridge, had been there twice 
 appointed to honorable public offices, and was engaged in a 
 large and increasing practice. But when the war broke out 
 he gave up his business, and took part at once in the for 
 mation of a military company ; the blood that was in him 
 would not suffer him to doubt or linger. 
 
 And yet he was a slender, delicate, sensitive, and pecu 
 liarly unwarlike person, often the subject of his own 
 laughter for a timidity which he humorously exaggerated 
 into something more than feminine. His health, too, was 
 anything but robust. For these reasons most of his friends 
 opposed his going to the war ; but he would heed no oppo 
 sition, and with steadfast enthusiasm set his face stead 
 fastly to do what seemed to him to be his duty. It ought 
 
108 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 to be said, however, that, from beginning to end, his patri 
 otism had the support constant, gentle, self-sacrificing, 
 and inexpressibly comforting to him of the person who 
 was dearest to him. 
 
 After serving for a time as " Third Lieutenant " in the 
 East Cambridge company in camp at home, he was nomi 
 nated by General Butler, in the summer of 1861, to be First 
 Lieutenant in what was afterwards Company B of the 
 Twenty-ninth Massachusetts Regiment, then a company 
 of the old " Massachusetts Battalion," at Fortress Monroe. 
 This company and Company I, of the same regiment, were 
 the oldest volunteer troops in the three years' service, 
 having been mustered in on May 14th, 1861. In the same 
 modest but honorable place Lieutenant Ripley remained 
 a First Lieutenant until the time of his death. Some 
 reasons interfered with his promotion, which were in a 
 high degree honorable to him, but they cannot properly 
 be mentioned here. 
 
 Yet he was not without marked honor from his superior 
 officers. While stationed at Fortress Monroe and at New 
 port News he was quite constantly employed as Judge- 
 Advocate. Early in the year 1862 General Mansfield 
 placed him upon his staff. This position he resigned in 
 June of that year, when his regiment was ordered up the 
 Peninsula, and it was made certain that his general was 
 still to remain behind at Newport News. In Kentucky, he 
 served on the staff of Colonel Pierce, Acting Brigadier- 
 General ; ,and at the time of his death he was Acting 
 Assistant Adjutant-General to Colonel Christ, then acting 
 as Brigadier-General near Vicksburg. 
 
 The abilities and character of Lieutenant Ripley justified 
 the confidence of these officers, and might well have assured 
 him a higher nominal rank. But there never was a person 
 more modest, more eager to prefer others before himself, or 
 more indifferent to his own prospects of advancement, when 
 there was occasion to assert some neglected piece of justice. 
 
Ezra Ripley. 109 
 
 Had lie lived a little longer, there is reason to believe that 
 he would presently have received the nomination of colonel 
 to one of the new colored regiments. He was not aware of 
 this ; but it is known that he would have rejoiced to belong 
 to those troops in any capacity. For such a position he 
 had distinguished qualifications, skill, humanity, and a 
 great and inherited interest in the welfare of the African 
 race. He had a remarkably alert and penetrating intellect, 
 a tenacious memory, strong native good sense, and a keen 
 and cheerful wit. With a heart, also, which was full to 
 overflowing with sympathy for everything that breathes, he 
 knew well that secret which no school can teach, of com 
 pelling the obedience of men through sentiments of love, 
 gratitude, and personal regard. 
 
 Lieutenant Ripley was in the hottest of the terrible seven 
 days' fighting before Richmond. At Harrison's Landing 
 his strength gave out, and he came home on sick-leave. In 
 September he joined his regiment again, just before the 
 battle of Antietam, leaving home at a time when his 
 physician did not think him well enough to be out in the 
 damp of the evening, resisting the assurances of friends at 
 Washington that he was not well enough to go on, and, 
 when he could no longer for any money hire a conveyance 
 in Maryland, taking his bag in his hand, sleeping at night 
 under a haystack, and hurrying forward on foot to find his 
 regiment, just drawn up in line at the beginning of the 
 Antietam fight. Bluff General Richardson told him on the 
 spot that he was not well enough to be there ; but he per 
 sisted that he was, and went bravely through the whole of 
 the fighting. Just after the battles were over, he wrote from 
 Sharpsburg and again from Harper's Ferry as follows. 
 His ardent and generous lament for Colonel Barlow will be 
 read with interest ; although that brave officer, as all his 
 countrymen now know, recovered from the severe wounds 
 received in battle at Antietam, to fight with the same dis 
 tinguished gallantry down to the end of the war. 
 
110 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " SHARPSBURG, Sunday Morning, September 21, 1862. 
 
 " At last I think I have time to write a letter, at least I will 
 run the risk of being ordered to march before ten minutes. Friday, 
 September 12th, I left Washington in search of our regiment, and, 
 after travelling about eighty miles and paying almost fifty dollars, 
 reached them Monday morning, drawn up in line of battle on South 
 Mountain, near the town of Bolivar. At this place there was a se 
 vere fight the day previous. Our regiment was not in it, but that 
 night had marched to relieve our troops who had done the fighting. 
 Sunday I hired a hack at Frederick City and followed the regiment 
 to within three miles of the mountain, but finding the carriage could 
 go no farther, sent it back at twelve o'clock at night, sent my trunk 
 and boxes to the Provost Marshal of Frederick City, slept under a 
 haycock, and Monday morning set out, valise in hand, for the regi 
 ment. I have not seen my trunk, etc., since, but hope to get it 
 soon. As I went up the mountain the sun rose, lifting the fog from 
 all the surrounding hills, and presenting a scene I cannot describe ; 
 no one but those who have seen sunrise from mountain-tops can 
 imagine it. I found the brigade drawn up in line in the wood, ex 
 pecting an attack. The men of our company were very glad to see 
 me, and I gladly took command of them. In about half an hour 
 word came that the enemy were in full retreat towards the river, so 
 our division, under General Richardson, started down the moun 
 tain at double-quick, and passed through the towns of Boonsborough 
 and Keatysville, amid the cheers and patriotic greetings of the loyal 
 citizens, who freely gave us bread, water, and what other eatables 
 were at hand. A burning bridge delayed our passage a little, but 
 we overtook the enemy about eleven o'clock at Sharpsburg 
 
 " Here we lay two days and two nights ; the opposing batteries 
 meantime keeping up a terrific fire, which killed and wounded some 
 of our men'. At night we slept on the ground, covered only by 
 rubber blankets. Tuesday night it rained, and it seemed very 
 strange to be sleeping out in the rain. It woke me up ; but, draw 
 ing my rubber blanket over my head, I slept soundly till morning. 
 Tuesday night General Hooker forded Beaver Brook (a stream 
 about as wide as Concord River, near mother's) with his forces, and 
 opened the fight on Wednesday, A. M. On Wednesday, at nine 
 o'clock in the morning, we formed in line, and were marched across 
 the brook, which was about up to our knees ; and after resting on 
 
Ezra Ripley. Ill 
 
 the other side long enough to wring out our socks, and empty the 
 water out of our shoes, we were marched to the field of battle. 
 On the way we passed through a shower of bullets and shells. 
 When within about sixty yards of the Rebels, we halted. They 
 were right behind a hill in a cornfield, which was uneven, sloping 
 ground. We could see the colors of many regiments before us ; 
 and we have since learned that the whole of Longstreet's division 
 was opposed to our brigade. They kept up a terrible fire while 
 we were forming our lines ; some of our men dropped as we ap 
 proached, and before we took position ; but I saw no man in our 
 regiment flinch, though at one time we were exposed to a front and 
 flank fire. ..... 
 
 " I shall never forget the sight of the Sixty-ninth New York, on 
 our right. It was a small regiment when it went into the fight ; 
 and as it stood there on the hill, every shot from the enemy seemed 
 to visibly reduce it, till at last it was a mere handful of men, clus 
 tered around their flag, with no reference to company or regimental 
 lines, fighting to the last. The color-bearer fell, but before the flag 
 reached the ground some one else seized and put it up again. No 
 sooner was that done than the flag fell again, and was as soon 
 planted again ; and so this little cluster of Irishmen fought on till 
 Caldwell's brigade came up to relieve us. They came up with a 
 cheer and a shout, Colonel Barlow leading the way with his regi 
 ment, and took their stand some way ahead of our brigade. We 
 then fell back a short distance, but soon came up again. We were 
 at it in the infantry fight about an hour and a half. 
 
 " Right here I must speak of Colonel Barlow. Noble fellow ! 
 he is dead now, and his name is in everybody's mouth. When our 
 brigade passed Caldwell's brigade, to which Barlow belonged, just 
 at the ford, he was sitting on his horse at the head of his regiment, 
 waiting to go into the fight. He had on an old linen coat and an 
 old hat. We exchanged pleasant greetings with each other (my 
 last with him) ; and when he came up leading the way to our relief, 
 it seemed as if a fairy had transformed him. He was on foot. 
 Instead of the linen coat, he had a splendid uniform on, which 
 seemed to shine with newness, pants inside high-topped boots, 
 an army hat, and yellow regulation gloves. It seemed as if a new 
 suit must have dropped on him from the skies. And then he rushed 
 up the hill at the head of his little regiment, looking so handsome, 
 
112 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 facing his men to cheer them, moving with such grace and elas 
 ticity, that it seemed as if he were dancing with delight. I have 
 seen brave men and brave officers ; I saw that day colonels 
 coolly and bravely lead on their regiments ; but I never saw such a 
 sight as Barlow's advance, and never expect to again. It was a 
 picture, it was poetry. The whole regiment gazed with admi 
 ration on him. I wish I could do justice to the brave fellow. His 
 praise is now in every man's mouth. He chased the enemy from 
 the ground, and drove them almost a mile, he and two other 
 regiments following him, and then died as a soldier should. His 
 loss affected me more than anything else that has happened here. 
 I admired him, and enjoyed his society. 
 
 " We soon returned to the battle-field, and the rest of Wednes 
 day and until late Friday, p. M., lay there supporting batteries, 
 sometimes being covered with grape and shell, so that escape 
 seemed almost miraculous ; at other times we lay in quiet, and un 
 disturbed. So you see for five days we were constantly at work, 
 either supporting batteries or fighting infantry. 
 
 " The horrors of the battle-field I must describe to you in another 
 letter, as the mail-boy calls for this. I have seen sights and gone 
 through what I hope will never be my lot again. We are now 
 
 resting a little." 
 
 "HARPER'S FERRY, September 23, 1862. 
 
 " Yesterday (Monday), A. M., we left Sharpsburg, the scene of 
 our victories, and marched to this place, about twelve miles. We 
 were nearly ten hours, marching quite slowly, and being some time 
 fording the Potomac, the Rebels having burned the bridge. The 
 
 spot is the most beautiful and romantic I ever was in As 
 
 we stand in our camp and look down the river, the mountains, 
 separated by its bed, seem gradually to meet in the distance. I 
 wish I could* describe the picture. I stood and gazed with awe this 
 morning, as the golden-tinted fog at sunrise rolled off the mountain 
 and filled the gap. Just so beautiful too was the scenery in the 
 region of the battle-field, fertile fields, thickly-wooded mountains, 
 and rolling valleys met the eye everywhere, and it seemed wicked 
 that war should lay all this waste. I hope the North is satisfied 
 with what the army has done, and to think too that the old Army 
 of the Potomac should have done the chief part of the fighting ! 
 But, as usual, one thing was left undone, the enemy were not 
 
Ezra Ripley. 113 
 
 bagged. I was on guard the night they left, and it was evident to 
 us that they were leaving That night on guard in the corn 
 field was horrid. As I went round to visit my men, I stumbled 
 everywhere over dead men ; everywhere I was met with the cry of 
 Rebels, wounded two days before, calling for water. I could hear 
 one who died about morning, and who proved to be a major, saying, 
 in the pleasantest possible voice, ' Henry, Henry ; bring me some 
 water, Henry'; and another crying, <O my God! won't some 
 body bring me some water ? ' As I passed along in the night, I 
 was startled by a whisper which seemed to come from a heap of 
 dead bodies. ' Sam, where 's the regiment ? ' I found he was a 
 wounded sergeant from the Thirtieth North Carolina Regiment. 
 I gave him some water, and afterwards he was taken into camp. 
 He was very gentle and quiet, and bore his suffering bravely. I 
 will not distress you with these details. The scenes were terrible 
 
 enough to us, and will long haunt my memory I am well, 
 
 though I have slept on the ground eight nights, my only covering a 
 rubber blanket, in rain and wind and dew, and have lived a good 
 part of the time on raw salt pork, hard bread, and tea. I am well 
 and strong, and in good spirits." 
 
 Afterwards, while the Army of the Potomac was at Fal- 
 mouth, Ripley was called home on recruiting service for 
 the Second Massachusetts Cavalry. In February, 1863, he 
 returned to his regiment, which was then, or soon after 
 wards, placed in the Ninth Army Corps under General 
 Burnside. In March this corps went into Kentucky. As 
 they were moving westward he wrote home a letter which 
 was full of the pure inspirations that stirred him. He had 
 been speaking of the beautiful mountain scenery along the 
 Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, which had filled him with 
 enthusiasm, and then he added : 
 
 " I could not help thinking we had indeed a country worth fight 
 ing for. To think that we were in danger of losing the great and 
 good government whose paternal care is extended so widely, and 
 whose benign influence is felt in the remotest corner of these wild 
 regions, which offers freedom and equal rights to all, whose very 
 greatness is shown in this her struggle for existence, made me 
 
 VOL. i. 8 
 
114 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 almost frantic. If anything were needed to make me feel the ne 
 cessity of working in the good cause to the last, to give the last 
 drop to my country, this journey has convinced me. God forgive 
 me if I hesitate or falter now May you, too, feel this fresh 
 ness of heart and soul, this renewed vigor, with which this moun 
 tain air and scenery have inspired me." 
 
 And so he went over into Kentucky, and, in June, to 
 Vicksburg. 
 
 The manner of his death was characteristic. When the 
 troops in July went on to the capital of Mississippi, Lieu 
 tenant Ripley, on account of an injury to his leg, was left 
 behind, " in the wilderness," as he said, with one man 
 to take care of him. After a few days he had nearly recov 
 ered, when word came back that Colonel Christ was sick. 
 No orders came for Lieutenant Ripley, who was then his 
 staff officer, but he said that he felt sure he must be 
 needed, and, over-estimating his own strength, on the 16th 
 of July he hastened forward, riding about seventy miles in 
 an open wagon, under the blazing sun, and reaching Jack 
 son just as the troops were turning about and coming 
 again to their camp on the Yazoo Biver near Yicksburg. 
 He came back with them, but now travelled in an ambu 
 lance. When they arrived at the camp he was quite ill ; 
 and it was now thought best, in accordance with his own 
 wishes, that he should try to reach home. 
 
 On the 28th of July, at four o'clock in the afternoon, 
 this poor, exhausted, faithful soldier left the sultry heats 
 of Vicksburg for the North and his native New England. 
 As the boat was passing the city he sadly asked that he 
 might be lifted up to look again upon that spot where so 
 many of his comrades had fallen. The boat moved on up 
 the swift river, but his life was flowing fast away, and at 
 eleven o'clock that same evening he died. A cool night 
 breeze had succeeded the intense heat of the day, and was 
 blowing through the open doors of his room ; he was at 
 tended, moreover, by a faithful man from his regiment, 
 
Ezra Ripley. 115 
 
 whom he himself had chosen. An hour before his death, 
 he found strength to send a message of mingled love and 
 exultation to his wife ; nor did he forget to caution the 
 messenger not to tell her of his death directly, but to see 
 one of his brothers-in-law first. 
 
 His body was left at Helena in Arkansas. It was pres 
 ently removed and buried among his kindred, in the beau 
 tiful cemetery at Concord, where a simple and graceful 
 stone, erected through the care of several of his townsmen 
 and friends, fitly marks his resting-place. Upon his tomb 
 was placed the following inscription, written by one whose 
 regard for him was in itself an honor. 
 
 " In memory of Ezra Ripley, Lieutenant of the Twenty-ninth 
 Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers, born at Waltham, Au 
 gust 10, 1826, died on the Mississippi River, near Vicksburg, 
 July 28, 1863. 
 
 " Of the best Pilgrim stock, descended from officers in the Revo 
 lutionary army, and from a long line of the ministers of Concord, 
 he was worthy of his lineage. 
 
 " An able and successful lawyer, he gave himself with persistent 
 zeal to the cause of the friendless and the oppressed. 
 
 " Of slender physical strength, and of a nature refined, sensitive, 
 and delicate, he was led by patriotism and the love of freedom to 
 leave home and friends for the toilsome labors of war, and shrank 
 from no fatigue or danger, until, worn out in her service, he gave 
 up his life for his country. 
 
 " Animseque magnae 
 Prodigum." 
 
 Ezra Ripley was the friend of all poor and helpless per 
 sons, and risked everything to protect them. His lavish 
 expenditure of his own time and means for others would 
 never have suffered him to grow rich ; but he has laid up 
 treasure, which neither moth nor rust can corrupt, in the 
 heart of many a prisoner in the jail at East Cambridge, and 
 of many another poor man and woman to whom words of 
 sympathy were unfamiliar ; and his name is held dear by 
 the soldiers who were under him. 
 
116 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1846. 
 MONTGOMERY RITCHIE. 
 
 Vol. A. D. C. (rank of Captain), June, 1861 ; (rank of Major), July, 
 1861 ; Captain and Commissary of Subsistence U. S. Vols., December, 
 1861; Captain 1st Mass. Cavalry, November 25, 1862; discharged, on 
 resignation, May 6, 1864 ; died, of disease contracted in the service, No 
 vember 7, 1864. 
 
 MONTGOMERY RITCHIE was a man of marked char 
 acter. He was modest, even to the degree of self- 
 distrust ; his manners were reserved, his impressions slowly 
 received, but, when once received, ineffaceable. His nature, 
 like that of many others, was liable to be mistaken, partly 
 because it was veiled, partly because it was made up of va 
 rious and even opposite qualities ; but to those who pene 
 trated it, it constantly tended towards transparency and 
 harmony. 
 
 His self-distrust was a prominent trait. His standard 
 was too high to be easily attained or easily approached, and 
 he was not wont to think himself as near it as he actually 
 was. He constantly scrutinized his own motives and ac 
 tions, and often held himself back, when others, less self- 
 questioning than he, would have pressed forward. His friends 
 valued him the more for his humility. It was to many of 
 them an example which he was quite unconscious of set 
 ting, and which is not the less persuasive now that it is set 
 only by his memory. 
 
 He was self-distrustful, but he was also self-relying. He 
 did not hesitate to decide when the hour for decision came, 
 or shrink from action when it was time to act. He had 
 some grave difficulties to meet, and he met them steadily ; 
 some serious trials to bear, and he bore them firmly. His 
 resolution was often tested, and seldom, if ever, failed to 
 stand the test. He was a man whose principle sustained 
 
Montgomery Ritchie. 117 
 
 him when those who were quicker than he to begin were 
 also quicker than he to end their efforts. His modesty 
 never paralyzed, never weakened him. 
 
 With all his reserve, he was full of ardor. His temper 
 was hot, and it was one of the great successes of his life to 
 bring it under control. He was warm-hearted, fervent in 
 his affections, enthusiastic in cherishing the friends and 
 pursuing the paths he preferred. He struggled, when he 
 had to struggle, with zeal and fire, until he came off con 
 queror, either by achieving triumph, or by accepting failure 
 in a spirit that turned failure itself into triumph. 
 
 His bravery was as perfect as any human quality can be. 
 It was partly physical, the result of unusual bodily powers, 
 developed in boxing, fencing, rowing, and gymnastic exer 
 cises. But it was chiefly moral, the growth of noble char 
 acteristics, determination, earnestness, and magnanimity. 
 The nearest companion of his boyhood says that he never 
 struck a hasty blow, but would treat with scorn the provo 
 cations he received from such as he knew to be unable to 
 stand up before him. The high courage of the boy ripened 
 into the yet higher courage of the man. No one was ever 
 readier to confess and to repair a wrong, if he had commit 
 ted any ; no one ever gave a fuller measure of honor to 
 those whom he thought honorable, or of sympathy to those 
 whom he considered as meriting it at his hands. Courage 
 and high-mindedness met and mingled in him. 
 
 He was also remarkable for his integrity. Not only un 
 willing, but one may say unable to do a dishonorable ac 
 tion, he turned from anything like corruption or knavery, 
 whether great or small, open or hidden, with sickness of 
 the soul. He could not bear even the conventional irregu 
 larities of every-day affairs. Better, he thought, be unsuc 
 cessful in business, with a sense of unstained honor, than 
 be successful at the slightest risk of dishonor. " There are 
 not," he once wrote, " many trials of character, good and 
 bad, which in my varied life I have not seen. It has been 
 
118 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 only from experience, gained, I fancy, very much later in 
 life than is usual, that I have appreciated the fact that men 
 are far less restrained by considerations of conscience than 
 
 I supposed I find, in all money transactions, that the 
 
 great mass do not even pretend to honesty, or what is real 
 honesty." Whether he was right or wrong in this opinion, 
 he was resolved to be honest, and really honest himself, and 
 his resolution was unbroken from first to last. 
 
 His integrity sprang from his truthfulness. He loved 
 the truth, and the more he understood it, the better he 
 loved it, the more unreservedly he gave himself to it. He 
 shrank from what was false, not only in circumstances or 
 persons of slight importance to him, but in such as were 
 almost a part of his being. He wanted to get at the truth 
 wherever it lay, in science, or commerce, or life, and it was 
 often touching to see with what strong desire he labored to 
 inform himself, wherever he was in doubt, rather than be 
 ignorant, consciously, of that which was alone true. 
 
 Such are the mere outlines of his character. If they 
 have been sketched with any distinctness, they show a man 
 who would be among the first to spring to the defence of 
 his country the moment it was assailed. No self-distrust 
 would deter him, while his decision, his fervor, his courage, 
 his integrity, and his truthfulness would all urge him on. 
 Whatever his previous career, whatever his actual position, 
 such a man as this was marked out for instant and for per 
 severing service to the Union. Fort Sumter fired on, he 
 went at once to Washington. 
 
 He was at that time thirty-five years old, having been 
 born March 20, 1826. His birthplace was Boston; his par 
 ents were Andrew and Sophia Harrison Ritchie, his mother 
 being the daughter of Harrison Gray Otis. His education 
 was conducted by various teachers until 1839, when he went 
 abroad with his brother under the charge of Mr. T. G. 
 Bradford, with whom he spent between two and three years 
 in France and Germany, acquiring the languages of those 
 
Montgomery Ritchie. 119 
 
 countries and carrying on his preparation for Harvard Col 
 lege, winch he entered in 1842. After taking his degree in 
 1846, he began his commercial career in the counting-house 
 of the late Samuel Austin, Jr., and there remained till 
 1849, when he sailed for Calcutta. His business there 
 being transacted, he crossed to Bombay, and thence took 
 the overland route, returning home through Europe in 1850. 
 He continued in the East India trade at Boston till 1857, 
 and afterwards engaged in the grain commission business 
 at New York, from which he retired some time before the 
 outbreak of the war. 
 
 He married, in 1857, Cornelia, the eldest daughter of the 
 late General Wadsworth of Geneseo, and was residing with 
 his father-in-law when the cannon at Charleston called them 
 both to the field. Ritchie left a wife and two young sons 
 behind him when he entered the service. 
 
 It was some weeks before he obtained a position as Vol 
 unteer Aid on General Blenker's staff, and was engaged in 
 active duty. Just before the battle of Bull Run, he was 
 transferred to the staff of General Miles, whose warm com 
 mendation he received for the part he bore in the trying 
 scenes that followed. He did not yield to the panic which 
 overcame many of his comrades, but remained at his post 
 with the rear-guard, and on the sad morning after the rout 
 joined with General Wadsworth in caring for the wounded 
 and directing the stragglers at Fairfax Court-House, which 
 he and his father-in-law were among the last, if not them 
 selves the last, to leave before the entrance of the enemy. 
 Circumstances for which he was entirely irresponsible de 
 prived him of the military appointment he had held, and he 
 returned to Geneseo. 
 
 But it was only to labor " night and day," as he is 
 described to have done, in recruiting for the Wadsworth 
 Guards, the Geneseo or Hundred and Fourth New York Vol 
 unteers, of whom he was to have been Lieutenant-Colonel. 
 Before the regiment was organized, however, in December, 
 
120 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1861, he received a summons to join the expedition then 
 on the eve of departure, under the command of General 
 Burnside ; and, always eager for active service, he hastened 
 to Fortress Monroe. A grievous disappointment befell him 
 there, for instead of the position to which he had looked 
 forward, the post of Commissary of Subsistence proved to 
 be awaiting him. Strong as the impulse must have been 
 to decline the appointment and return to the Geneseo reg 
 iment, he decided, as generously as became him, that his 
 duty was to go on with the expedition, and he began his 
 work as Commissary, with the rank of Captain, on General 
 Reno's staff. He was soon in battle, commanding a gunboat 
 at Roanoke Island, and braving, at Reno's side, the hot 
 test of the fire at Newbern. A little later, he was in action 
 at Camden, and wrote with deep feeling of the dead and 
 wounded that were left upon the field at night when our 
 troops were ordered to retire. But his duties were chiefly 
 at Newbern and Beaufort, N. C., where he was stationed as 
 Commissary for several months, occupied, as he jestingly 
 said, in the grocery business of those posts. It was a hard, 
 a very hard service for him, and one that fretted his spirit 
 so much as to demand all the determination of which he 
 was capable, to hold him fast. He persevered until ill health 
 compelled him to go home in the summer of 1862. 
 
 As soon as he regained his strength, he obtained a com 
 mission as Captain in the First Massachusetts Cavalry, to 
 qualify himself for duty on the staff of General Augur in 
 the expedition under General Banks to the Mississippi. 
 Fatigue and exposure, with the added effects of the climate, 
 brought on during that winter another illness, far more 
 serious than the attack of the preceding summer. His 
 physicians attempted to dissuade him from continuing in 
 the service, but his self-devotion was stronger than their 
 counsels, and he resumed his staff duties at New Orleans, 
 then at Baton Rouge. A letter from this place, one of the 
 very few of his letters which are now within reach, speaks 
 
Montgomery Ritchie. 121 
 
 of the experiment about to be tried in the opening cam 
 paign. " For my part," he writes, " I consider the success 
 or failure of the negro troops the great problem of the day. 
 We have now some thousands of blacks officered by whites. 
 They resist the climate, keep their regiments one thousand 
 strong, while white regiments get reduced to three or four 
 hundred. They do all the drill, etc. Query, Will they 
 fight ? If they will, then Master South is beaten with his 
 own weapons. It cannot be long before some ten thousand 
 of these men will be led under fire. What momentous 
 results centre in that event ! If, as some predict, they fly 
 like sheep, we are far from conquest, and from holding our 
 conquests. If they stand, then, unless want of military 
 genius is an incurable trait of our government, the South, 
 
 from that day, is whipped It will be poetic justice, 
 
 should the cause of all our evils, Slavery, be turned to 
 avenge our wrongs." 
 
 Port Hudson was the last scene of his service in the 
 field. He took as prominent a part as one in his position 
 could take, in the siege of that stronghold. Always untir 
 ing, always undaunted, always ready to expose and to ex 
 haust himself, he here won largely upon the esteem of his 
 commander and his comrades. One exploit illustrates the 
 judgment as well as the gallantry which rendered him an 
 efficient officer. He had been sent to station a regiment in 
 support of a battery, and returned to report that the Colonel 
 had lost his presence of mind, while the men were falling 
 so fast that the regiment might break at any moment. The 
 general told him to take any troops he could find, and 
 carry them to the threatened position ; and off he rode, 
 bringing up two fresh regiments just as the one he had 
 distrusted broke and fled. 
 
 One day, after carrying a despatch over a peculiarly diffi 
 cult part of the field, he was in the act of reporting to his 
 commanding officer, when he fell by a sun-stroke, and lay 
 insensible for nearly twenty -four hours. This time the 
 
122 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 surgeons carried the day against him, and he was sent to 
 Baton Rouge, then to New Orleans, and then by sea to New 
 York, where he arrived in the summer of 1863, " almost 
 a skeleton," as he was described, in the body, but in the 
 spirit rounded and matured, as those who saw him that 
 summer, and observed the development which he had 
 reached through duty and suffering, can now take sad 
 comfort in remembering. 
 
 Slowly rising from weakness and disease, but not restored 
 to the health he had lost forever, he rejoined General Augur 
 in the autumn, at "Washington. There he remained through 
 the following winter, at one time much harassed by the 
 settlement of his accounts as Commissary, some items of 
 which, for want of the necessary formalities, were ques 
 tioned by the " executioners," as he playfully called them, 
 " who sit upon our official papers." The needed vouchers 
 were soon obtained, chiefly through the ready assistance 
 of Dr. J. B. Upham, of Boston, who had been in charge of 
 the Beaufort Hospital, for which, and for the hospital at 
 Newbern, the Commissary had incurred the expenses con 
 sidered unaccounted for at Washington. But it was a keen 
 trial to one of such integrity, when even the shadow of 
 a doubt fell upon his accounts, and, however swiftly the 
 shadow was lifted, the sense of unmerited questioning must 
 have remained. 
 
 A month or two later he felt that he ought to leave the 
 army. " It seems to me," he wrote, " one year more, and 
 unless victory forsakes our flag, the South, as a great force 
 
 in the field, will be no more I begin to think it time 
 
 to put my worldly affairs in order, and to let younger and 
 single men take their turn." He resigned his commission 
 in the spring of 1864. His last sight of battle-fields was 
 in the terrible Wilderness, where he went to recover the 
 body of his father-in-law, after the death of that lamented 
 general. It was a tragical close to the three years' service 
 of the father and the son. 
 
Montgomery Ritchie. 123 
 
 " I never had any adventures in the army," Ritchie was 
 wont to say, when asked about his campaigns. If he had 
 not, there were few who had a soldier's story to tell, and 
 to tell with honorable satisfaction. But his modesty was 
 strong to the last ; and he ended his military career, as he 
 began and pursued it, in self-retiring nobleness. 
 
 A few months passed, and the disease contracted in the 
 service, and never expelled, returned with fresh violence. 
 Week after week he lay suffering and emaciated, and no 
 care of physician or kindred, no change of air or treat 
 ment, no remedy, no devotion, availed to prolong the life 
 which was ripened for its close on earth. As death drew 
 nigh, he was again in the field, his fellow-soldiers around 
 him, the shell piercing the air, the horse pawing the ground. 
 And so his battles ceased ; his sufferings were over, and he 
 entered into rest at Geneseo, November 7th, 1864, in the 
 thirty-ninth year of his age. 
 
 " I can lay my hand on my heart," he said when he left 
 the army, in a confidence which it is no wrong to violate 
 now, " and say that I have not done a thing you would be 
 sorry to know." One who knew him all his life, and knew 
 him heart to heart, says he was " as true a Christian gentle 
 man as ever breathed." Be this assurance the wreath we 
 hang most gladly and most tenderly above his grave. 
 
124 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1847. 
 EDWARD HUTCHINSON BOBBINS REVERE. 
 
 Assistant Surgeon 20th Regiment Mass. Vols. (Infantry), September 
 10, 1861; killed at Antietam, September 17, 1862. 
 
 A PRINTED memorial of Dr. Revere seems proper only 
 as part of a design which has a wider and more pub 
 lic purpose than the memory of an individual. He is re 
 membered without a printed or written sentence, by truth 
 ful words, kind deeds, steadfast friendships, faithful servi 
 ces, and manly honor, as widely as he would wish, and 
 in the only way he would desire. Even had his life found 
 less completion, and had he not been permitted in its closing 
 years to show how nobly and usefully he could plan, and 
 how much and how well he could accomplish, he would yet 
 have desired to be remembered only by what he had done. 
 
 Edward Hutchinson Robbins Revere, son of Joseph W. 
 and Mary (Robbins) Revere, and grandson of Paul Revere 
 of Revolutionary memory, was born at Boston, Massachu 
 setts, July 23d, 1827. He was a boy of active tempera 
 ment and cheerful temper. He had a robust constitution, 
 was ardently fond of the sports of the field and river, and 
 his love of country life was almost a passion. He loved the 
 country, and the country loved and strengthened him, and 
 gave him -vigor of frame and fulness of stature. This, 
 however, prevented his receiving the strict course of city 
 schooling, and he attended different rural schools, receiv 
 ing his final preparation for college from Mrs. Ripley of 
 Waltham. 
 
 He entered the undergraduate department of Harvard 
 University in 1843, but left it to begin his professional 
 studies in Boston, in January, 1846, and finally took his 
 medical degree in 1849, at the Harvard Medical School. 
 
Edward H. R. Revere. 125 
 
 In August of the same year he went to Paris, where he 
 remained a year, devoting himself with his fullest energies 
 and the most constant application to the prosecution of his 
 medical studies. Before he returned home he visited the 
 South of France, travelled through England, went to Dub 
 lin, and finally visited Scotland, the country which, from 
 early boyhood, he-had most wished to see. From his early 
 years he had felt great enthusiasm for Scott's novels and 
 verses, which in after days extended more widely over 
 Scotch poetry. This poetry he loved to quote, and he 
 spoke oftener of what he had seen in Scotland than in 
 any other place. 
 
 Dr. Revere returned from abroad fully determined upon 
 a country life, and immediately began to look for a place 
 where he could engage in his profession. He fixed upon 
 Greenfield, Massachusetts, where he opened an office in 
 August, 1850. In the fall of 1851 he married Miss Laura 
 P. Jordan of Canton, Massachusetts, who, with their only 
 daughter, now survives him. 
 
 In Greenfield his remarkable facility in forming acquaint 
 ances soon made him a home, in which he seemed like an 
 old resident, and was surrounded with warm friends. His 
 skill, kindness, and tender care and nursing, gave him the 
 confidence and attachment of his patients, and the friend 
 ship of the neighborhood. The eager solicitude with which 
 the people of Greenfield, after his death, sought to know the 
 least fact in regard to his last days, was just the tribute to 
 his memory he would have desired from them. 
 
 Dr. Revere afterwards returned to the eastern part of the 
 State to reside, and spent the two years preceding the war 
 with and near his father's family, filling up his time with 
 the kindest efforts and services for those about him, always 
 engaging in whatever came to him in his profession with 
 such zeal and sympathy as to win the affection of all 
 who received his attentions ; and even now, expressions 
 of gratitude from one and another person whom he in 
 
126 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 those years relieved come often to gratify his family and 
 friends. 
 
 The war for the union, government, and institutions of 
 our country now broke out, and Dr. Revere, true to his 
 descent, his education, and his principles, looked to know 
 where he was most needed. Perhaps he felt that the time 
 had come when he could usefully employ all his physical 
 and mental powers upon a field such as he had long de 
 sired, but had not found. He well knew that in his profes 
 sion in the army he could not look for fame, and that at 
 best all he could reap would be the reflection that he had 
 been useful, and the happiness always brought by duty per 
 formed. 
 
 Dr. Revere at once brought his practical mind to bear 
 upon plans for securing to our sick, and wounded soldiers 
 the necessary medical skill and care. He saw that phy 
 sicians from the smaller towns, must, to a large extent, be 
 relied on to fill the positions of regimental surgeons. He 
 felt that they, like himself, needed some special preparation 
 for such duty. A large experience of surgical accidents 
 they could not often have had, while their toilsome daily 
 labor had usually left them but little time for systematic 
 study. 
 
 It was owing to his personal efforts, in view of these facts, 
 that the special lectures in Boston on Military Surgery, 
 which proved at that moment so valuable, were given. 
 Coming to the city, he spared no exertion to urge upon the 
 medical authorities the pressing need of such teaching, and 
 readily obtained their consent. He had been anxious to 
 express before the Society for Medical Improvement his 
 sense of the importance of early professional action, to in 
 sure a supply of capable regimental surgeons ; but being 
 himself unable to remain in town long enough for this pur 
 pose, he persuaded one of his friends to bring forward the 
 subject, the result being, that several leading surgeons were 
 appointed to approach the State government in the matter. 
 
Edward H. E. Revere. 127 
 
 It is well known that the members of this committee 
 were immediately, through the wise action of the Exec 
 utive, constituted the State Medical Commission, and that 
 no medical appointment was conferred till they, after full 
 examination, had approved the candidate. To Dr. Revere 
 belongs exclusively the credit of originating this plan. 
 I Dr. Revere had at first proposed entering the service 
 as an Assistant Surgeon in the Navy, and had received a 
 permission (waiving the objection of his age) for examina 
 tion for that position, but he was offered a position as Assist 
 ant Surgeon of the Twentieth Regiment of Massachusetts 
 Volunteers, of which regiment his brother, Paul J. Revere, 
 was then Major, and he promptly accepted it. He was 
 sworn into service on the 14th of September, 1861, and 
 joined his regiment on the 17th of the same month near 
 Poolsville in Maryland. He immediately entered upon the 
 duties of his post, and with Dr. Nathan Hayward, the Sur 
 geon of the regiment, and Dr. Henry Bryant, Brigade Sur 
 geon, established a brigade hospital, where he treated with 
 great skill and fidelity a large number of sick, the measles 
 having become an epidemic in the brigade. 
 
 On the 20th of October, 1861, he joined a battalion or 
 dered to Harrison's Island in the Potomac, preliminary 
 to the battle of Ball's Bluff. When, about noon of the 
 next day, the reconnoitring party which had crossed into 
 Virginia on the night of the 20th, was by order of Colonel 
 Baker reinforced, Dr. Revere accompanied a battalion of 
 the Twentieth, under command of his brother, Major Re 
 vere, and reported for service on the Bluff, which was to be 
 the scene of the contest. 
 
 During the first three or four hours of the final action 
 of that day, Dr. Revere had his post a few feet in rear of 
 the line of battle, being at all times under the fire of the 
 enemy. The only assistance which he had was from his 
 hospital steward, with such remedies and appliances as the 
 hospital knapsack afforded. No other medical officer was 
 on the field during the day. 
 
128 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 This was Dr. Revere's first experience upon the battle 
 field. His cool, self-possessed deportment, his well-directed 
 energy, and his self-forgetfulness were remarked by all who 
 observed him. He had his post beside a narrow path which 
 led from the Bluff to the river-side, where he gave such 
 care to the wounded as their immediate necessities re 
 quired, so that their lives could be saved ; and they were 
 then sent across the river for better attention and care. 
 The wounded were very numerous, and Dr. Revere's du 
 ties were, of course, very arduous, immediate and rapid 
 treatment being required to get the wounded across the 
 river alive. They showed, however, when they came under 
 more deliberate care, that Dr. Revere's duties had been well 
 and tenderly done. 
 
 When, after the disastrous battle was over, Dr. Revere 
 arrived at the river, two boats only were left for the survi 
 vors, both well and hurt. These boats soon becoming use 
 less, he, with a few others, passed up the river to seek 
 other means of escape. He was active in the endeavor to 
 prepare for the transportation of the party in a small boat 
 found near a flour-mill, about half a mile from the battle 
 field, but they were driven from it by a demonstration 
 of the enemy's cavalry. This was the same boat which, 
 after dark on the same day, was found by Captains Trem- 
 lett and Bartlett, and in which they escaped to the oppo 
 site bank of the river. He also aided in the preparation 
 of a raft for the same purpose, which, from the water- 
 soaked condition of the rails of which it was constructed, 
 sank under the weight of one man. 
 
 In the course of the evening Dr. Revere and his compan 
 ions were captured by the enemy's cavalry, and taken to 
 Leesburg ; from which place, at two o'clock the next morn 
 ing, they began to march toward Richmond. The rain fell 
 in torrents during the whole day. Neither Revere nor his 
 companions had eaten anything for thirty-six hours ; and 
 they now marched twenty-seven miles, through mud and 
 
Edward H. R. Revere. 129 
 
 rain, without subsistence of any kind, save one ration of 
 half-cooked bread and bacon, to Manassas Junction. On 
 Thursday morning, at about eleven o'clock, the detachment 
 of prisoners reached Richmond, having been three days and 
 three nights without any substantial food. 
 
 In Richmond the officers were placed in a tobacco ware 
 house, there being from seventy-five to eighty officers con 
 fined in a room some sixty feet wide by seventy or eighty 
 feet long. Dr. Revere's solicitude and care for the inva 
 lids, his uninterrupted cheerfulness and kindness, won for 
 him the respect and love of all. Said one who was confined 
 with him : " He was the only man who never spoke an irri 
 table word. The Confederate officers even treated him 
 with great respect, and gave him their confidence, on ac 
 count of his gentlemanly deportment and manly bearing." 
 
 With Dr. Fletcher of Indiana, he was permitted to leave 
 the prison on parole, to look after our sick and wounded 
 in the various hospitals. Their services to our wounded, 
 sick, and suffering men were most timely and valuable, 
 procuring for them, as they often did, from their private 
 means, many delicate and nourishing articles not found in 
 the prison rations. Our men were sick, wounded, neg 
 lected, dejected, almost without hope. His courageous, 
 cheerful kindness roused and cheered their spirits ; and 
 the promise of preparing them to be removed gave them 
 new life. At the end of three weeks, two hundred ofj 
 them were, under his superintendence, embarked from 
 Richmond for home. These services were especially ap 
 preciated by our men, and are still well remembered. 
 
 He wrote from Richmond to his wife : " No one could 
 believe that there could be such a change in the appear 
 ance of patients, as there was in the sick here, from merely 
 knowing that we were Yankee doctors. The patients sick 
 with typhoid fever showed it more than any others. Al 
 though there was no material change in the treatment, it 
 seemed to brighten them up, and a few words of encourage- 
 
 VOL. I. 9 
 
130 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ment did them more good than any medicine, and I think 
 the whole disease took a favorable turn from our first visit ; 
 for there has been only one death out of one hundred and 
 ninety-six patients, in the last ten days, and that was a man 
 who was wounded at Manassas." 
 
 While devoting himself to these men, Dr. Revere was 
 enabled to be of service to other prisoners, loyal private 
 citizens from West Virginia. These men were, if possible, 
 in a more miserable condition, and suffered more from neg 
 lect, than the prisoners from the North. When Dr. Revere 
 proposed to minister to them, the Confederate officers said, 
 " Don't mind them, they are of no consequence : they are 
 some of our traitors." But the Doctor kept on, and did 
 for them what he could. They, with our own men, remem 
 bered these services with gratitude ; and often afterwards, 
 while he was at home as a paroled prisoner, some poor fellow 
 came to thank him. He sincerely reciprocated this attach 
 ment of all the prisoners. November 23d he wrote : " Yester 
 day a large party of prisoners left for the South, Alabama, 
 I believe, and twenty of the officers confined here went 
 with them. One would hardly believe how hard it was to 
 part with them: it seemed really like breaking up a family." 
 
 Dr. Revere, while in Richmond, became thoroughly con 
 vinced of what the country now knows, that there was a 
 systematic determination among the Confederates to let our 
 prisoners perish from neglect, and that this determination 
 was stronger and more relentless against the loyal found 
 among themselves than against Union prisoners. 
 
 Ten days after Dr. Revere arrived at Richmond, his 
 brother, Major Paul J. Revere, was taken as one of the 
 hostages for the privateersmen who were to be tried as 
 pirates by our government. The fate of the privateersmen 
 was to be the fate of the hostages. The order of the Con 
 federate government in regard to them was, that they should 
 be confined and treated in all respects like persons convict 
 ed of infamous crimes. It is difficult now to recall what 
 
Edward H. R. Revere. 131 
 
 was the feeling of the country then. Intelligent people 
 could look upon these privateersmen in no other light than 
 as pirates, and felt that, be the consequences what they 
 might, it was beneath the dignity of our government to 
 treat them otherwise. At this time Dr. Revere wrote home : 
 " Paul and the other officers left us last Thursday for the 
 jail, to await the trial of the privateersmen. There were 
 seven in all from here, the rest of the fourteen being either 
 in South Carolina or New Orleans. They are confined in 
 one small cell, with two small windows. I hear from them 
 every day, but am not allowed to see them. You can im 
 agine our anxiety to hear what action the government will 
 take when they hear of their imprisonment, for there is not 
 the slightest doubt in my mind tliat whatever is done to 
 the privateersmen will be meted out to our unfortunate 
 comrades." 
 
 Yet he preserved his calm equanimity, and exhibited 
 only the same cheerful and encouraging deportment to all 
 about him. Said one of them, " He met it better than any 
 of us." Yet, after his return home, he admitted that the 
 agony of solicitude which he then endured had brought 
 upon him a more serious tone of mind, which could never 
 be removed. 
 
 Dr. Revere remained a prisoner in Richmond about four 
 months, being released February 22d, 1862, as a paroled 
 prisoner of war. He returned home for a brief period, 
 awaiting his exchange, which took place the last of the 
 following April. He immediately set out for his regiment, 
 and on the 2d of May reported for duty in the lines be 
 fore Yorktown. He accompanied the Army of the Poto 
 mac in its advance upon Richmond, and was with his regi 
 ment at the battle of West Point, as also at the battle of 
 Fair Oaks, May 31st and June 1st. 
 
 The casualties in this last battle were immense, five 
 thousand seven hundred and thirty men having been killed 
 and wounded during the two days' fight. When the battle 
 
132 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 terminated, the Twentieth Massachusetts found itself con 
 siderably in advance, surrounded by the killed and wound 
 ed of the enemy. Of the wounded were officers of high 
 rank, among whom were General Pettigru, and Colonel 
 Bull of Georgia. The medical labors were of course very 
 arduous ; and it was not until the middle of the night that 
 a medical officer could be spared to take care of the wound 
 ed in and around the front line. 
 
 As soon as the wounded of his regiment, who had been 
 left in the rear, had been attended to, Dr. Revere hastened 
 to the front, to take care of the wounded of the enemy. 
 Here again, as at Ball's Bluff, he was the only medical offi 
 cer present ; and he gave his patient labors and skill to the 
 care of the suffering, binding up wounds, and administer 
 ing opiates to those mortally injured, with unremitting 
 attention, never leaving such a patient until everything 
 the arrangement of the blanket, the rough couch, the posi 
 tion in every particular had been carefully attended to, 
 so that the last moments of the dying might be as comfort 
 able as possible. There was a cheerfulness and kindness 
 in the performance of his duty which brought many an 
 expression of gratitude from those in the greatest agony. 
 
 The month of June was passed in and about Fair Oaks, 
 in weather very unfavorable to health. Diarrhoea, scurvy, 
 and malarial diseases, induced by the weather and expos 
 ure, prostrated the whole army. During this period the 
 sick report of the Twentieth Massachusetts one morning 
 contained the names of two hundred and twenty-one men, 
 more than one half of the regiment, who were affect 
 ed by the above diseases. How arduous must have been the 
 duties of the Assistant Surgeon during this time can well 
 be conceived. 
 
 Toward the last of June the Army of the Potomac began 
 its perilous march in retreat to the James River. The 
 Second Corps, of which the Massachusetts Twentieth was 
 a part, constituted the rear guard, and upon it devolved 
 
Edward H. R. Revere. 133 
 
 the task of fighting all day and marching all night. The 
 regiment lost heavily in killed and wounded. The wound 
 ed were of course left upon the field ; but Dr. Revere be 
 stowed upon them every possible care and attention, to 
 make them comfortable until they should be picked up by 
 the enemy. His great physical strength here enabled him 
 to aid many a poor fellow, not severely wounded, to get 
 away from the enemy. More than once he was seen with 
 one such unfortunate man at each shoulder, assisting them 
 to a place of security. His labors and services during this 
 march were wonderful. It is the testimony of one who 
 was with him : " His labors and his usefulness to us, in 
 assisting and encouraging the men, no one will ever know. 
 About every other surgeon broke down under the duties. " 
 Said another : " After the seven days' bloody work upon 
 the Peninsula, at the battle of Malvern Hill, he worked 
 down nearly the whole medical force of the army, and 
 performed more amputations and other operations than 
 any other, as my surgeon told me, who worked at the 
 hospital with him." 
 
 The services of Dr. Revere upon the Peninsula were 
 appreciated by the medical officers of the army. His 
 " zeal, ability, courage, and discretion " were stated, and 
 he was recommended to promotion to a Surgeoncy by Dr. 
 Dougherty, formerly Brigade Surgeon, Dana's Brigade, 
 and Senior Reserve Surgeon, Sedgwick's Division ; Dr. D. 
 W. Hand, Brigade Surgeon, Gorman's Brigade ; and Dr. 
 John A. Lidell, Surgeon and Medical Director, Second 
 Corps. 
 
 After the army reached the James River, the malarial 
 poisons began again to develop their effects upon the sys 
 tems of the men. Dr. Revere, though himself a sufferer 
 from disease, would not yield to its debilitating effects, but 
 continued with the army in the zealous and faithful dis 
 charge of his duties. He accompanied the Army of the 
 Potomac when it moved north to join the forces in front of 
 
134 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Washington, where the Twentieth Massachusetts, toward 
 the last of August, was present at Chantilly, the closing 
 combat of General Pope's disastrous campaign. 
 
 After the disasters under General Pope, the regiment fell 
 back with the army across the Potomac to Tenallytown, in 
 order to move upon the enemy, who had crossed the Upper 
 Potomac into Maryland. 
 
 On the 17th of September, 1862, Dr. Revere accom 
 panied his regiment in its advance under General Sum- 
 ner, to follow up the charge of General Hooker upon the 
 enemy's troops under General Lee. The latter general had 
 taken position for battle on the heights in front of Sharps- 
 burg, between that place and the Antietam River. The Twen 
 tieth Massachusetts was in the hottest of the fight, and lost 
 very heavily. Dr. Revere, as usual, followed close to the 
 line, being of opinion that his duty to his men required him 
 to be as near as possible, in case of any casualty, so that they 
 should receive immediate attention. He had said that morn 
 ing, as he was marching to the field, " I mean that to-day 
 no man in our regiment shall fall behind, and that every 
 man shall do his duty." He attended to his surgical work, 
 aided the wounded, and urged and encouraged the men. 
 He was last seen alive about noon, calmly and industri 
 ously occupied in the strict line of his duty, in a spot 
 where, part of our soldiers being faced to the rear, the bul 
 lets of both armies were flying over his head. As he raised 
 himself from performing an operation upon a wounded man, 
 he was pierced by a bullet, and sank and died upon the field 
 of battle, just one year from the day he joined his regiment. 
 His body was left on the field, but was afterwards recov 
 ered, and buried at Mount Auburn. 
 
 Dr. Revere, in all his army practice, aimed to save both 
 life and limb. He never permitted an amputation where 
 he thought that there was a hope that skill, care, and pa 
 tience could avert that necessity. More than once since his 
 death have his friends been touched and comforted by a 
 
Edward H. R. Revere. 135 
 
 soldier's holding up an arm or foot, and saying, "Dr. 
 Revere saved that for me. I should have lost it if I had 
 not fallen into his care." He was led to perform his du 
 ties thus faithfully from the sense of a higher responsibil 
 ity than his great reserve upon the subject permitted him to 
 reveal. 
 
 Such is the memorial of one of the many sons whom Har 
 vard University sent out to die upon the battle-field. Not 
 one of them held his life more lightly in such a cause. 
 Brave and courageous Nature made him. Gentle, honor 
 able, and faithful he aimed to make himself, and he suc 
 ceeded. Fame he did not ask for, and he knew it could 
 hardly follow, however well he might discharge the arduous 
 and perilous duties which he assumed. If this testimonial 
 shall give to any one a juster appreciation of the debt the 
 country owes to the medical staff of the army, it will be a 
 service which he would have rejoiced to be the means of 
 procuring. 
 
136 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1848. 
 JOHN FRANKLIN GOODRICH. 
 
 Private 21st Iowa Vols. (Infantry), August 28, 1862; died at Vicks- 
 burg, Miss., June 4, 1863, of disease contracted in the service. 
 
 JOHN FRANKLIN GOODRICH was the son of Allen 
 and Mary (Emerson) Goodrich, and was born in 
 Mount Vernon, New Hampshire, August 13th, 1826. He 
 was fitted for college by Mrs. Ripley of Waltham, Massachu 
 setts. In college he was not prominent as a scholar, nor 
 very well known among his classmates ; but the respect in 
 which he was held was manifested at a class dinner, a few 
 years after graduating, when he had gone to California, by 
 the wish, pithily expressed in a toast, " that he might be 
 come as rich as he was good." 
 
 After graduation he was employed for one year as clerk 
 in one of the manufacturing companies at Waltham. At 
 the beginning of the California gold excitement he visited 
 that region, remaining there five years, and obtaining a 
 respectable competence by labor in the mines. Returning, 
 he purchased a farm in Epworth, Dubuque County, Iowa. 
 He was there married, September 12th, 1857, to Miss 
 Marion Pratt, whose family had emigrated to Iowa from 
 Connecticut. They had three children, two sons and a 
 daughter, ^and were living in prosperity on their farm 
 when the war began. 
 
 In August, 1862, at the age of thirty-six, he enlisted as a 
 private in the Twenty-first Iowa Volunteers (Infantry), 
 Colonel Samuel Merrill. In a subsequent letter, referring 
 to this enlistment (October 17th, 1862), he says: 
 
 "If there had been an abundance of young men in our State 
 ready to enlist, I should undoubtedly have remained at home. But 
 it was not so. The alternative remained for me to enlist and be 
 
John Franklin G-oodrich. 137 
 
 removed far away from all the sweet amenities of home, incur all 
 the risks of war in all its varied forms, and those on the battle 
 field are not the greatest, or remain at home in peace, and have 
 my cheek mantle with eternal shame. It was a severe trial for my 
 dear wife, but she endured it with Christian fortitude. It is the 
 hardest trial I have to endure, to think that she may be constantly 
 worrying about me." 
 
 In the same letter, in allusion to the death of a sister's 
 child, he adds : 
 
 " O how hard it would be for me to part with my dear little ones. 
 I did not know before how closely about my heart had been woven 
 the silken threads of their bright and happy lives." 
 
 And his letters to his sisters at the same time speak of 
 his wife and children as " the source of his greatest earthly 
 happiness." 
 
 The regiment was at first sent to Missouri, where, al 
 though not engaged in any great battle, it had its full share 
 of watching, marching, and skirmishing. It was once 
 highly complimented for performing a night march of 
 twenty-eight miles, and fording eight streams on the way, 
 some of these being waist-deep, and at November tempera 
 ture. At Hartsville, Missouri, on January 1st, 1863, a bat 
 talion of the regiment, including less than three hundred, 
 after being overwhelmingly outnumbered and flanked, held 
 its position, under Lieutenant-Colonel Dunlap, although 
 all other regiments had retired, until the enemy, number 
 ing four thousand, had retreated under cover of the night. 
 In all these duties, Goodrich is stated to have borne an hon 
 orable part, and seems to have been sustained through all by 
 a strong, unaffected religious feeling. He expresses pleas 
 ure, in his letters, that even amid the vice and profanity of 
 the camp he can enjoy the privilege of social worship ; and 
 after being brought face to face with danger, he learns that 
 " the more we are called on to do and suffer, the better off 
 we are." 
 
 For more than two months after this battle, he remained 
 
138 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 at Hartsville with two others, on detail, to take charge of 
 the wounded men, rejoining his regiment on March 20th, 
 1863. During this period he wrote as follows : 
 
 " I seem to realize more and more, as the danger increases, how 
 sweet a thing it is to live for my family. I sometimes tremble at 
 the thought that I may in the lapse of time be brought to welcome 
 a settlement of this great difficulty by some means other than 
 those strictly honorable to our government, for the sake of peace. 
 I have just finished reading the life of Washington by Weems, a 
 contemporary of Washington. It was found on the field after the 
 battle. Some Rebel had thrown it away, and I do not wonder ; 
 for he must be to the Rebels like a great avenging Nemesis, haunt 
 ing their e,very footstep. I could wish for no greater punishment 
 than for every Rebel to be obliged to read it ; for if one spark 
 of honor remained, his cheek would mantle with shame at his 
 degeneracy and violation of all the principles so inexpressibly dear 
 to the heart of Washington. 
 
 " We hear no news here, and know nothing thai is going on in 
 the world. How we long to hear of glorious and decisive victo 
 ries ! for a Washington to lead our armies, and march them 
 on, in the name of the ' Lord of Hosts/ to a decisive issue ! Have 
 we not been sufficiently humbled as a nation before God ? and will 
 he not speedily avenge us of our adversary ? Surely his anger 
 endureth but for a moment. 
 
 "There are no social gatherings for religious purposes in this 
 whole vicinity. It seems almost as though war and rebellion had 
 obliterated the thought of God, the Bible, and an eternal state of 
 existence from the heart of the community ; but Christianity has 
 to do with the individual rather than the community. It is as im 
 peratively necessary for us to ' keep our hearts with all diligence ' 
 in the midst of a godless multitude as in the society of Christians. 
 I pray God to keep me ever humble at the foot of the cross, that 
 he will ever feed my soul with the bread of life, that it perish not 
 in the wilderness of Sin. Although I have been separated during 
 my stay here from the religious influences that ever attended our 
 little Christian Association in camp, I have likewise escaped all 
 contact with the wickedness and vice that prevail to such a fearful 
 extent in an army. I tremble to think of the awful consequences 
 
John J?ranklin G-oodrich. 139 
 
 that must necessarily result to thousands of the young men that 
 are in the army ' drinking in iniquity as a flood.' I sometimes 
 think that it is because iniquity doth so abound in our army, that 
 God has no more prospered us in this war. I never allow myself 
 for a moment to doubt the entire justice of our cause, nor that it 
 must finally succeed, if we are true to the great work before us. 
 4 God and the right ' should be our motto. May we not constant 
 ly trust the Excellency of Heaven and Earth in this great afflic 
 tion ? * If God be for us, who can be against us ? ' Then let us 
 not be discouraged, but put up our earnest petitions to the Throne 
 of Grace for a speedy deliverance from this great trouble." 
 
 During the siege of Vicksburg, the Twenty-first Iowa 
 formed a part of the Thirteenth Army Corps. Foreseeing 
 the fierce, decisive contest for the supremacy of the Missis 
 sippi that was to ensue, Goodrich wrote, just as he was 
 embarking at St. Louis: 
 
 " If my life is necessary in dealing the death-blow to this horrid 
 Rebellion, I shall freely, willingly give it up. If I die, it will be 
 with a conviction, as firm as eternal truth itself, that our country 
 will be finally saved. As the blood of the martyrs is the seed of 
 the Church, so the blood of patriots shed in this war is a guaranty 
 of our country's salvation, future welfare, and prosperity." 
 
 " April 29, 1863. 
 
 " I feel that the prayers of my wife and sisters will be answered 
 to the full satisfaction of your souls. Sister Mercy has great faith 
 that I shall be returned to my family in safety. But I feel that it 
 would be wrong to make this a requisite in our prayers. If it sub 
 serves God's purposes better that I should die away from the bosom 
 of my family, let us school our hearts to say ' Thy will be done.' 
 I know that all will be well, and that the Almighty will prove him 
 self a God hearing and answering prayer. Then may we not leave 
 all to his wisdom, knowing that in his hands all is safe ? I know, 
 from bitter personal experience, that it will be one of the bitterest 
 trials to school yourself to submission to the will of God in these 
 hours of danger. Yet we know that his will must be done, even if 
 he sees fit to take my life. Let us pray that this cup may pass 
 away ; yet ' not as I will, but as Thou wilt.' I will not anticipate 
 
140 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 evil, but wait for God to develop his plans more fully, and in the 
 mean time exercise implicit faith in his wisdom and goodness. I 
 cannot but believe that all will be well, and that our government 
 will yet be firmly established over all the rebellious territory." 
 
 Just before the battle at Port Gibson, he writes : 
 " The enemy, without doubt, occupy a strong position. If they 
 make a stand, (as we think they will,) we shall no doubt have a 
 bloody contest. God only knows the issue. I pray him to cover 
 my head in the day of battle, if it be his will ; but if he has other 
 wise ordained, ' his will, not mine, be done.' It would be very sweet 
 to meet my wife and children once again on earth. It is almost 
 agonizing to the mind to think of the bare possibility that we may 
 meet no more ; but God is all-wise and good. He doeth all things 
 well When in action I trust I shall act prudently ; but I pray God 
 I may never shrink from duty, even if it leads me to the cannon's 
 
 mouth 
 
 " NEAR VICKSBUKG, May 20, 1863. 
 
 " The battle has commenced. The enemy are very strongly in 
 trenched, and hold a very strong position. We expect to storm 
 their works to-day ; and if it is in the power of man to take them, 
 they will be taken. May God aid us, I earnestly hope and pray. 
 The battle is not to the strong alone. May the God of battles be 
 on our side, and inspire our men with true and unflinching courage, 
 and give us a speedy victory, and thus bring an end to this awful 
 carnage and desolation. On Sunday, the 17th instant, our regi 
 ment, in conjunction with the Twenty- third Iowa Infantry, made a 
 charge upon the rifle-pits at Black River Bridge. Our company 
 lost one man killed, H. W. Britton, my former messmate (poor fel 
 low), and nine wounded, one or two mortally. God mercifully 
 spared my life through this fiery trial, thanks to his name. We 
 buried seven the day of the battle, and four or five have died at 
 the hospital since. The issue of the coming contest lies in the hands 
 of the Almighty. I am as clay in the hands of the potter. He 
 has thus far shielded me from danger. Many must fall ; I may be 
 among the number. Go to the Throne of Grace for strength to en 
 dure, and a spirit to submit to his holy will and pleasure. I pray 
 for submission to his will, whatever it may be, trusting that if we 
 meet no more on earth, we shall form an unbroken family in that 
 
John Franklin Goodrich. 141 
 
 home that Christ has gone to prepare for those that love him. God 
 grant me that unflinching courage that shall enable me to march 
 through the stormy missiles of death without fear." 
 
 This was almost the last thing he wrote. 
 
 In the charge on the enemy at Black River, May 17th, 
 Goodrich was one of the first to enter their works, and so 
 at the assault on the outer works at Yicksburg, May 22d. 
 Here he contracted the brain fever, of which, on the 4th 
 of June, 1863, he died. He was taken into the tent of his 
 Lieutenant, for more tender nursing; and recovering his 
 consciousness for a little while before his death, his last 
 messages were for the welfare of his children, that they 
 might be brought up in the path of Christian duty. 
 
 Lieutenant Hill, of his company, writing after his death, 
 says : 
 
 " Mr. Goodrich was as brave a soldier as ever entered the field. 
 Every fight that we have had he was in ; and when the charge 
 was made on the Black River works of the Rebels, he rushed 
 forward, and was nearly the first man to mount the embankment, 
 and nobly did he lead back a number of Rebels from their rifle- 
 pits to our camp. The same is true at the charge on the outer 
 works of Vicksburg. It may be said of him, that a good man has 
 fallen. Mr. Goodrich has lived the life of a Christian from the 
 time he enlisted until the day of his death. The evening before 
 his death he assured me all was well, and his trust was in Christ 
 alone. He repeated several times over, to tell his dear wife to 
 train up his two sons for Christ ; and very calmly passed away 
 about four o'clock on the morning of the 4th of June." 
 
142 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1848. 
 LUCIUS MANLIUS SARGENT. 
 
 Surgeon 2d Mass. Vols. (Infantry), May 28, 1861 ; Captain 1st Mass. 
 Cavalry, October 31, 1861 ; Major, January 2, 1864 ; Lieutenant-Colonel, 
 September 30, 1864 ; killed near Bellfield, Va., December 9, 1864. 
 
 LUCIUS MANLIUS SARGENT, JR., was born in Bos 
 ton, September 15th, 1826, the son of Lucius Man- 
 lius and Sarah (Dana) Sargent. He gave early evidence of 
 much talent, and of a daring and impetuous nature. It 
 is recorded of him as a child, that, when a friendly clergy 
 man had taken him on his knee, and asked him what he 
 meant to do in life, he answered, " I don't know, sir, 
 whether to be a minister or a highwayman ; but I should n't 
 like to be anything half-way." " On another occasion, 
 having by accident fired in an upper chamber a pistol 
 which he was forbidden to touch, and hearing the rush of 
 the alarmed family on the stairs, he cautiously lowered 
 himself a few feet, and then dropped from a third-story 
 window, as the only method of gaining an instant audience 
 of his kind old nurse in the basement, to whom he poured 
 out his griefs, and then manfully walked up stairs to ex 
 plain the offence, and receive punishment." 
 
 He had from childhood a great love of reading, a reten 
 tive memory, and a very ready imagination. He delighted 
 in poetry, and wrote verses with great facility. His instruc 
 tors in preparation for college were Rev. W. A. Stearns, 
 with Messrs. Charles K. Dillaway and Stephen M. Weld ; 
 and in 1844 he entered the Freshman Class of Harvard 
 University. 
 
 In college he entered at once upon the rather perilous 
 career which attends the class wit and satirist. In rhymes, 
 bon-mots, and caricatures he had no rival ; while his varied 
 
Lucius Manlius Sargent. 143 
 
 intellectual tastes, with his love of athletic exercises, and of 
 gay society, furnished temptations to draw him away from 
 the regular college studies. The paths of the class wit and 
 the class first scholar rarely coincide. Yet one of the first 
 scholars in Sargent's class volunteers the testimony, that, 
 " under an outside of apparent frivolity, he cherished a 
 sincere respect for whatever was manly and true, and had 
 many generous impulses." 
 
 He did not complete his undergraduate course with the 
 Class of 1848, but received his degree eleven years later, 
 after establishing an honorable reputation as a physician. 
 During the intermediate period he had interested himself 
 in a variety of pursuits, into each of which he threw him 
 self for a time with his accustomed energy. Music, paint 
 ing, astronomy, and practical seamanship occupied him in 
 turn, he having in the last-named vocation made a voyage 
 to Liverpool before the mast. 
 
 He was married, when barely twenty-one, to Miss Letitia 
 Sullivan, daughter of Jonathan Amory, Esq., of Jamaica 
 Plain. After his marriage he fitted up a studio at his 
 house, and passed much of his time in the study and prac 
 tice of art. This led him into the medical profession, in a 
 manner best stated by Dr. B. E. Cotting, afterwards his 
 professional instructor. 
 
 " Art anatomy naturally led him to practical anatomy, and thence 
 to medical science in general. Having decided to enter the profes 
 sion, he made the business of preparation no, half-way matter. 
 His zeal was unbounded and his application unremitted. Nothing 
 was too trivial to escape his rapid observation, nor too difficult to 
 discourage his ardent enthusiasm. His progress was remarkable, 
 and the position he attained unprecedented, so that when he 
 graduated he was already a man of mark, to whom the profession 
 looked in full expectation of greater things in after days. The 
 hospital created the office of Artist, to secure his services ; and the 
 Boston Society for Medical Improvement, at the earliest moment 
 allowed by their constitution, elected him a member. He soon be 
 came one of the most prominent physicians of the section of the 
 
144 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 city where he was located ; and a brilliant future seemed opening 
 
 before him To great physical strength he added the most 
 
 delicate touch with the pencil, and the tenderest manipulation of 
 
 the sick But the chief obstacle to his medical career came 
 
 from a source the last to be suspected by any one not intimately ac 
 quainted with his character, extreme tender-heartedness. Fear 
 less of gods and men, the plaintive weakness of a sick child appalled, 
 and its death while under his care completely unnerved him." 
 
 His other professional teachers were Dr. Jeffries Wy- 
 man and Dr. Henry J. Bigelow. He took his degree at 
 the Harvard Medical School in 1857, and was for a time 
 House Surgeon at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and 
 also Dispensary Physician. But the spirit of adventure 
 was still strong in him, and at the outbreak of the war he 
 was one of the first to volunteer for the post of regimental 
 Surgeon, and was the first man commissioned in that ca 
 pacity in Massachusetts. His regiment was the Second 
 (Infantry) , Colonel Gordon ; he was commissioned May 
 28th, 1861, and remained with the regiment in Virginia, 
 in the faithful discharge of rather monotonous duty, until 
 October 9th, 1861, when he resigned, in order to accept the 
 more congenial position of Captain in the First Massachu 
 setts Cavalry (Colonel Robert Williams), to which he was 
 commissioned on the last day of the same month. His 
 elder brother, afterward Brevet Brigadier-General Horace 
 Binney Sargent, was then Lieutenant-Colonel of the same 
 regiment. 
 
 The regiment was stationed in the Department of the 
 South untrl August 19th, 1862, when eight companies, in 
 cluding that commanded by Captain Sargent, were or 
 dered to the Army of the Potomac. From that time they 
 took part in all the cavalry service in that region, and were 
 especially engaged at Kelly's Ford, Sulphur Springs, Ste- 
 phensburg, and Aldie. At the last action he was left for 
 dead on the field, but subsequently revived and recovered. 
 It proved that a rifle-ball had made a subcutaneous cir- 
 
Lucius Manlius Sargent. 145 
 
 cuit of nearly one third the chest, without further penetra 
 tion. 
 
 Of the varied duties of a cavalry officer, those which best 
 suited his temperament were of course the most stirring 
 and dangerous. He had in him a large element of excita 
 bility, a trait which, while often impairing steady discipline, 
 may yet impart peculiar power on special occasions. Reck 
 lessly daring, he was in some respects well suited to the 
 branch of service he had chosen. To the strict routine of 
 regimental business and order he was naturally less at 
 tracted. Yet he had the merit of adhering faithfully to his 
 command, sharing the severest service and the poorest fare 
 of his men ; seeking neither promotion outside, nor staff 
 position, nor leave of absence. And he showed in some 
 respects as, for instance, in the temporary discontinuance 
 of intoxicating drinks a self-control hardly to have been 
 expected from one of his general temperament, and one 
 whose brilliant social powers exposed him to peculiar trials. 
 
 He was promoted as Major of his regiment, January 2, 
 1864 ; and became its Lieutenant-Colonel, September 30, 
 1864, a little more than two months before his death. 
 
 The precise circumstances of his death have been va 
 riously stated ; and the following account, derived from 
 officers of the regiment, varies in some degree from that 
 given in the Report of the Adjutant-General of Massachu 
 setts. The hurried and broken character of cavalry en 
 gagements often renders it peculiarly difficult to secure 
 accuracy of detail in narrating them. It appears that soon 
 after the successful raid on Stony Creek Station, Virginia, 
 as the division to which the First Massachusetts Cavalry 
 was attached (part of the Fifth Corps) was moving south 
 ward, the forces of the enemy were found strongly in 
 trenched near Bellfield. The infantry had been left along 
 the Weldon Railway, to tear up the track, while the caval 
 ry was moving on, to distract the attention of the enemy. 
 Lieutenant-Colonel Sargent, with his regiment, was at the 
 
 VOL. I. 10 
 
146 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 head of the column, and was just approaching some abatis 
 through which the highway ran. Just then General Davies, 
 the brigade commander, rode up and detached the rear 
 squadron of the regiment in pursuit of some supposed scouts 
 or pickets of the enemy. Captain Teague, in command of 
 the squadron, rode within range of the enemy's earthworks ; 
 and when the enemy opened upon them with shot and shell, 
 he halted and formed line, seeing nothing more to pursue. 
 At this moment Lieutenant-Colonel Sargent rode hastily 
 up, and said, " Captain, General Davies orders that you " 
 and at this moment a piece of a shell struck him in the 
 shoulder, shattering it, and throwing him from his horse. 
 Captain Teague then drew back his men beyond reach of 
 the fire, and sent a sergeant and four privates to bring in 
 the wounded officer. During the transportation, he spoke 
 a few words, but died within two hours of his fall. The 
 event occurred on the 9th of December, 1864. 
 
 It was afterwards ascertained that General Davies, when 
 he heard the firing, had directed Lieutenant-Colonel Sargent 
 to recall the advancing squadron, and that the latter, 
 instead of sending an orderly, had gone himself. General 
 Davies afterwards described the movement as " a most 
 gallant charge, contributing greatly to the success of the 
 late movements." Certainly to fall thus, sword in hand 
 and in the face of the enemy, was the very death which 
 Sargent's impulsive and daring nature would have chosen. 
 " Had he lived," wrote his former commander, Colonel 
 Robert Williams, " I am sure that he would have added 
 many additional laurels to those he had already gained." 
 
William Oliver Stevens. 147 
 
 1848. 
 WILLIAM OLIVER STEVENS. 
 
 Captain New York 72d Vols. (Infantry), May 30, 1861 ; Major, June 
 25, 1861 ; Colonel, September 6, 1862 ; died May 4, 1863, of wounds re 
 ceived at Chancellorsville, Va., May 3. 
 
 WILLIAM OLIVER STEVENS was son of William 
 Stevens, formerly a lawyer of Andover, Massachu 
 setts, now Judge of the Police Court in Lawrence, and 
 of Eliza L. Stevens, daughter of George Watson. His pa 
 ternal grandfather fought in the battle of Bunker Hill. 
 The patriotism that kindled his blood burnt no less eagerly 
 in that of the descendants, three of whom have fallen in 
 the struggle that has just closed, William ; his brother 
 Gorham, a youth of rare promise ; and their cousin, the 
 brave and lamented General I. I. Stevens, who graduated 
 with especial honors at West Point. 
 
 William was born in Belfast, Maine, on the 3d of Febru 
 ary, 1828. In preparation for college he entered Phillips 
 Academy at Andover, in 1841, where to this day is left a 
 pleasant reminiscence of the short, thick-set, round-faced 
 boy, quick and active in duty or play, frank in his inter 
 course, pleasant and genial in his manners, the type of 
 the man. 
 
 More grateful yet is the recollection of him in the minds 
 of his classmates at Cambridge. With a cheery voice, a 
 merry eye, dark hair curling closely over his head, and a 
 countenance open as the day, the window of a warm heart 
 and generous disposition, erect in his carriage, frank, un 
 reserved, he at sight won the love of the shy, awkward squad 
 that the first months of college life brought together. 
 
 It was an affection that deepened with fellowship ; and 
 being of boyish size, he soon became in a peculiar manner 
 
148 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 the pet of his class. Perhaps this was to his cost, in 
 some ways. Such good company he made of himself, so 
 overflowing was he with life and cheerfulness and all genial 
 qualities, that his time was usurped by his friends : he was 
 allowed but little opportunity for study, and so never aimed 
 at collegiate honors. Indeed, his social qualities were so 
 attractive that few then cared to measure the mental. He 
 was quick of apprehension, too ; and the fine tact he dis 
 played implies the possession of good judgment of men and 
 motives, and good common-sense. 
 
 He was one of the earliest enthusiasts in regard to boat 
 ing in Cambridge, and was the cockswain of the Undine, 
 one of the first college club-boats. He was very diminutive 
 in stature at that time, although he afterwards attained to 
 a manly height. It would be hard to say whether it were 
 due more to this smallness of size, or were rather as a term 
 of endearment, that he was universally known as " The 
 Bud." It was a bud that needed only the development of 
 a healthy life and the sunshine of a loving home to blossom 
 and ripen into goodly fruit. 
 
 After graduation he studied law for eighteen months with 
 his father, and again for a year with the Honorable Thomas 
 Wright of Lawrence. The responsibilities of life opened to 
 him, and he devoted himself diligently to his studies. 
 " Resolute and determined," says Mr. Wright, " whatever 
 he undertook, he accomplished. He felt he had a duty to 
 perform. He entered upon the practice of his profession 
 determined to succeed, with a confidence in himself which 
 afterwards proved not to have been unfounded." 
 
 But it was a self-confidence without a taint of arrogance. 
 " Never distrustful of the future, he counted success as 
 certain." The same confidence and hopefulness were later 
 no mean accessions to his worth as an officer. In all the 
 vicissitudes of war, he wore a steady, hopeful front, a 
 support to the wavering, a strength and encouragement to 
 all. 
 
William Oliver Stevens. 149 
 
 He practised his profession for a few months at Newnans- 
 ville, Florida, but left on account of the debilitating influ 
 ence of the climate, going to Dunkirk, New York, where he 
 established himself in 1852. He married, in 1855, Virginia 
 T. Grosvenor, daughter of the Honorable Godfrey John 
 Grosvenor, then of Geneva, New York, but originally from 
 Maine, By this marriage he had two sons, George Wat 
 son, seven years of age at the time of his father's death, 
 and William Grosvenor, twenty months old, besides one 
 daughter, who died in infancy. 
 
 Here he won the respect and affection of all classes. 
 Among his associates at the bar, his courtesy in practice, 
 his legal ability, his integrity, high sense of honor, and 
 manly straightforwardness inspired marked confidence and 
 esteem. In the resolutions adopted by the bar, after his 
 death, special reference is made to " the scrupulous care 
 with which he ever sought to guard and promote the digni 
 ty of his profession, and to make it the means of purifying 
 the administration of justice." 
 
 In 1859 he was elected District Attorney of Chatauqua 
 County. The vote was a very flattering one, in Dunkirk 
 being nearly double that of his party ticket. Some sturdy 
 old farmers from the county, and others who, from his very 
 youthful appearance, had voted against him, came to him 
 after a few months' trial of him in office, to say, " Mr. 
 Stevens, we voted against you ; now we have to say, if you 
 wish our votes at any time, or any aid whatever, count on 
 us." 
 
 One of the first cases brought forward by him was an 
 indictment for a capital offence, an event that had not 
 occurred before in the county for many years. Several 
 other cases of importance followed, in all of which he 
 acquitted himself to the great acceptance of the bench, the 
 bar, and the public, receiving many expressions of en 
 couragement and praise. 
 
 His letters to his father at this time show him as very 
 
150 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 busy, prosecuting his profession with great zeal, and with 
 an earnest aim to master its principles and practice. He 
 claims in these letters that he has the friendship of the 
 whole bar. The respect of the presiding justices he cer 
 tainly had. Graceful in delivery, clear in statement, logi 
 cal in reasoning, with an ingenuousness that impressed his 
 listeners with the honesty of his convictions, combining 
 enthusiasm with great pertinacity of purpose, the future 
 seemed to him bright and promising. 
 
 But it was soon to be overcast. When civil war grew 
 imminent, anticipating that he might be called upon to 
 serve his country in the field, he writes that no whispering 
 of ambition could persuade him to leave his wife and child. 
 " But if summoned,'' he adds, " I shall obey without fal 
 tering, conscientiously believing such to be my duty as a 
 husband, a father, and a man." 
 
 The opportunity was at hand. For several years he had 
 been the commander of a militia company (Company D of 
 the Sixty-eighth Regiment New York State Militia). He 
 had put his wonted zeal into the work of drilling and dis 
 ciplining this little corps, till it had become the crack 
 company in that part of the State ; and at the inauguration 
 of Perry's statue, where a number of such associations had 
 been brought together, had received marked applause. 
 Perhaps it is not too much to say that to his labor, in this 
 respect, was due, in good measure, the promptness with 
 which the citizens of the town met the call for soldiers at 
 the outbreak of the Rebellion. In January, 1861, he of 
 fered the services of the company to the Governor in case 
 of emergency. It had just then fallen in numbers to 
 twenty-eight, but was immediately filled to the full stand 
 ard of eighty. 
 
 After the roll of Fort Sumter's guns, there was no hesi 
 tation in his mind. To the remonstrances of friends his 
 reply was, " If I don't go now, my boy must." He at 
 once prepared his company for active service, and on the 
 
William Oliver Stevens. 151 
 
 21st of April again offered it to the State, and received 
 orders to report with it at Elmira on the 1st of May. 
 Countermandatory orders and delays intervening, he went 
 to Washington to seek the acceptance of the Sixty-eighth 
 entire, or at least his company. In this he failed. He 
 was, however, offered a Captaincy in the Regular Army, 
 which he declined. 
 
 Learning from the Secretary of War that Daniel E. Sick 
 les, Esq., was empowered to raise a brigade of volunteers, 
 Stevens immediately applied to him ; his company was ac 
 cepted, and ordered to report at Staten Island. Returning 
 home, he found that many of his men, impatient of delay, 
 had joined other organizations, but his indomitable energy 
 and perseverance were not to be thwarted ; and on May 
 31st, within seven days of the date of his order, he re 
 ported at the designated rendezvous with a company com 
 pletely uniformed, and one hundred and five strong. It 
 was incorporated into a regiment commanded by Colonel 
 Nelson Taylor, and known as the Third Excelsior Regi 
 ment, and subsequently as the Seventy-second New York 
 Volunteer Infantry. 
 
 At the camp, he at once showed that he had in him the 
 elements of an excellent officer, and displayed such knowl 
 edge of his duties, that he was selected by his Colonel, and, 
 without a dissent from his brother officers, was commis 
 sioned as Major, June 25th. He proved an excellent disci 
 plinarian and drill-master, having a clear and happy method 
 of imparting instruction by explanation and illustration. 
 Heart and mind were devoted to his work, which he mas 
 tered to its minutia3. A true soldier, he became very 
 sensitive of the reputation of his regiment, to the efficiency 
 of which, says his Colonel, he added much. 
 
 His affable manner, his manliness and unaffected dignity, 
 attracted and attached all who came within his sphere. 
 Ready to adjust difficulties, though firm in discipline, 
 full of sympathy for all human interests, he especially 
 
152 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 won the love of his men, a love which in the rough proof 
 of war when once given is poured out with no stint. 
 
 Assiduous study made up in him the want of previous 
 military training. Active service in the face of the enemy 
 is a stern school, but the most thorough for a soldier. 
 So well did he improve it, that the brigade commander 
 under whom he served his last campaign, and whose fullest 
 confidence he won, General Revere, a veteran in ser 
 vice, describes him as " a truly splendid officer and mag 
 nificently brave." 
 
 Immediately after the battle of Bull Run the Excelsior 
 Brigade was ordered to Washington, and put in the defen 
 ces of the city. The large fort on the Eastern Branch, 
 known as Fort Stanton, was built under the immediate 
 supervision of Major Stevens. In October his command 
 was ordered to Lower Maryland, and stationed for some 
 time at Budd's Ferry, opposite Shipping Point, where Rebel 
 batteries blocked the passage of the Potomac. During the 
 winter of preparation and drill which followed, he gained 
 the warm friendship of his division commander, General 
 Hooker. With spring came the campaign of the Penin 
 sula. The division was assigned to the Third Corps, Gen 
 eral Heintzelman commanding. At the siege of Yorktown, 
 busied in the construction of approaches, Stevens won the 
 name of a meritorious and gallant officer. 
 
 The battle of Williamsburg was the first severe test of 
 the fighting qualities of the Third Excelsior. In following 
 up the retreating enemy, Stoneman's cavalry found itself, 
 on the afternoon of May 4th, checked at Fort Magruder, 
 a bastioned work, with several redoubts on either side effec 
 tually covering the road. Hooker's division, which followed 
 in support of the cavalry, bivouacked in the woods that 
 night, and came up before the fort early in the morning of 
 May 5th. It commenced the attack at half past seven 
 o'clock, and for a while cleared the ground in its front ; but 
 the enemy, concentrating his forces, advanced to the attack, 
 
William Oliver Stevens. 153 
 
 and again and again endeavored to turn Hooker's left. 
 The firing became very hot, the enemy having a partial 
 shelter in the woods, while the division was drawn out, 
 partly in the open, partly in the felled timber, protecting 
 itself as well as it could by the logs strewn on the ground. 
 The brigade on the left was driven in, and soon after a 
 heavy attack was made on the right also. Between these 
 cross-fires the Excelsior Brigade lay, taking the brunt of 
 the battle till after four o'clock, when the opportune arrival 
 and gallant advance of Kearney's division allowed General 
 Hooker to withdraw his troops, exhausted by the long day's 
 fight. It had been a gallant struggle against superior num 
 bers, protracted through rain and mud and hunger, until 
 ammunition was nearly exhausted. They had suffered 
 severely : the brigade had lost, perhaps, a third of its num 
 bers, two hundred and eighteen having been killed and 
 wounded from Major Stevens's regiment alone. The Major, 
 who that day commanded the regiment, as the Colonel was 
 in command of the brigade, was delighted with the behav 
 ior of his men. " Not one did I see waver," he said. " Of 
 course," he adds, " it was necessary for me to be moving 
 from point to point, and it was necessary to go over the logs 
 to do so. I was hit three times, first by a ball which 
 ricochetted and bruised the calf of my right leg ; next, by a 
 ball which grazed my face just under the right side of my 
 mouth ; and again by one that grazed a shoulder-blade." 
 
 The " of course " modestly apologizes for constant activ 
 ity, not only in directing his own men, but in going to and 
 fro to encourage the whole shattered line, services that 
 won the commendations of his brigade commander, and 
 of Colonel Dwight, commanding the First Excelsior, which 
 fought gallantly side by side with the Third. And the 
 ball which " grazed " his face proved to be a buckshot, that 
 inflicted a severe wound, and remained in his jaw till his 
 death. 
 
 While the Major was thus engaged, his brother, a Second 
 
154 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Lieutenant, a stripling fresh from Cambridge, escaped 
 from the hospital, was toiling with a wounded leg after his 
 regiment, also hotly engaged. Coming up to the scene of 
 action, this boy gathered a couple of hundred stragglers, 
 planted them by a battery, and defended it in the teeth of 
 the enemy till Kearney and succor arrived. 
 
 Again the regiment was engaged at Fair Oaks, and 
 through the seven days' battles, till the close of the cam 
 paign at Malvern Hill. The Major had long since won the 
 love and respect of his men ; and his conduct in the cam 
 paign led his commanding officers to describe him as pos 
 sessed of courage of a high order, of coolness and equa 
 nimity that never failed, and of a clearness of judgment 
 that under the most trying and confused circumstances 
 remained unshaken. 
 
 As it seemed as if the Army of the Potomac was about 
 to enjoy a rest from its labors, the Major, at the request of 
 his Colonel, was sent to Dunkirk to recruit the depleted 
 ranks of the regiment. When at home he was offered the 
 command of a new regiment then forming, but declined it, 
 preferring, at sacrifice of rank, to remain with those who, 
 through danger and hardship shared in common, had 
 learned mutual respect and trust. He was also unwilling 
 to give aid to the disastrous policy of constantly sending out 
 bodies of raw and inexperienced men to be instructed by 
 incompetent hands in numerous and varied duties, when 
 the same material, put into regiments already in the field, 
 would give them new strength and vigor, and the recruits 
 would themselves speedily become assimilated and learn 
 one additional lesson of incalculable value to a soldier, a 
 pride in the history and name of their organization. 
 
 He returned, September 1st, with one hundred and twen 
 ty-eight recruits ; and as Colonel Taylor had been commis 
 sioned as Brigadier-General, was promoted to the colonelcy, 
 the commission dating from September 8th. 
 
 In November, marching across the country, he rejoined 
 
William Oliver Stevens. 155 
 
 the Army of the Potomac at Warrenton Junction. At 
 Fredericksburg his command was in the left grand division 
 under Franklin, and was not engaged. The winter was 
 given to the drill and discipline of his regiment, now largely 
 increased by the addition of new men, and with such suc 
 cess that General Revere (now the brigade commander) 
 describes it as a magnificent regiment of stalwart men in 
 splendid condition. 
 
 The end of April found the Army of the Potomac again 
 in motion. The Third Corps crossed the Rappahannock at 
 the United States ford on Friday, May 1st, and, moving up 
 towards Chancellorsville, bivouacked in the rear of the 
 troops then briskly engaged with the enemy. During that 
 night and the following day the enemy was busy in cutting 
 a road through the woods in front of our line, and marching 
 by it large masses of his force from the left to our extreme 
 right, where late in the afternoon they burst like a tor 
 nado upon the astounded Eleventh Corps, breaking it and 
 driving it before them. 
 
 The Third Corps was hurried up to check the rout and 
 hold the enemy, who by their own impetus had then been 
 thrown somewhat into confusion. The Excelsior Brigade 
 was thrown out on the right of the plank-road, down which 
 the enemy was advancing, and upon which Jackson, who 
 had conceived and executed this brilliant move, intending 
 to cut off and annihilate the army of the United States, 
 was that evening so mysteriously killed. During the night 
 the brigade threw up a line of log breastworks, strength 
 ened by abatis, in preparation for the attack expected in 
 the morning. The men were weary and hungry, but rest 
 they had none : the constant alarms and driving in of the 
 pickets kept them on the alert all night. 
 
 At daylight of the 3d, the enemy opened with artillery and 
 musketry. For some hours the line was gallantly defended, 
 until its left flank, resting on the road, was turned, and the 
 breastworks enfiladed. Regiment by regiment the brigade 
 
156 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 broke off from the left before the column that bore down 
 upon it. To meet its advance, Colonel Stevens immediately 
 ordered a change of front ; and while the movement was being 
 executed, he was struck by a minie-ball, which pierced his 
 chest. As the regiment was driven past him, he called to 
 one of his old company, unclasped his sword, and gave it 
 with the words, " Carry it to my wife, remember me to 
 my boy." 
 
 Captain Bliss and two men attempted to raise him. The 
 officer was shot, and the yelling masses of the enemy imme 
 diately closed around him. " Several of his men," writes 
 his brigade commander, who regarded him with " particu 
 lar affection," "several of his men and officers came to 
 me actually crying with grief to announce his fall." 
 
 The most graphic sketch of the demeanor of Colonel Ste 
 vens on that day is to be found in a manuscript narrative 
 by Chaplain J. H. Twichell of the First Excelsior Regi 
 ment, from which the following is an extract : 
 
 " To me there is no scene of individual soldiership to which I so 
 frequently recur as to Colonel Stevens at the head of his regiment, 
 leading it into fire at the battle of Chancellorsville 
 
 " Those who were present at that time and place will never for 
 get how suddenly, within half an hour, on the afternoon of May 2d, 
 the whole aspect of our affairs was changed from bright to dark by 
 a swift, unlooked-for disaster. When the attack, like a thunderbolt 
 out of the clear sky for unexpectedness, struck the right wing use 
 less at a blow, our corps was lying in reserve. We were instantly 
 ordered into the breach, and being under arms, in ten minutes had 
 turned the corner at the Chancellor House, and were hurrying out 
 on the plank-road toward the quarter where the storm had burst. 
 A third of a mile farther on we met the rout. It is always a try 
 ing thing for troops to stem a tide of confusion and retreat, while 
 going into action, and that was the worst situation of the kind I 
 ever witnessed. Thicker and faster poured back the panic-stricken 
 rabble, nearer and nearer swept down the successful onslaught of 
 the enemy. Plainly, no time was to be lost. Though we were still 
 marching in column, the order to load without halting was given, 
 
William Oliver Stevens. 157 
 
 and the men marched, and loaded, and cursed the fugitives, all at 
 the same time. Then came the order to form in line of battle, and 
 go into position. Being a non-combatant, I drew up beside the 
 road, upon a little knoll, where several batteries of the Seventeenth 
 Corps artillery were planted, to watch the process. It was while 
 sitting there upon my horse, that I saw Colonel Stevens pass by, 
 leading his command ; and, as I have said, his appearance then 
 comes first to my memory, when I call up the examples of individ 
 ual soldiership that have fallen under my observation. I can nei 
 ther forget nor describe it. His natural, habitual bearing was mil 
 itary. That I had noticed the first time I saw him, in the spring 
 of 1861, when he was fresh from the court-room and his law, it 
 was in such marked contrast with that of the generality of volun 
 teers ; but on this occasion all the soldier in him roused to its high 
 est pitch : it was splendid. If a face ever reflected the gaudium 
 certaminis, his did then. It was a noble, handsome face, always 
 alive with expression, and now it shone with a light of eagerness 
 and daring that made one forget the surroundings for a minute, to 
 look at it. Truly it was a goodly sight to see that calm, undaunted 
 front, amid the terror that was manifest on every hand. It relieved 
 the depression of calamity, and seemed to afford reason for believ 
 ing that the waning fortunes of the day would yet be restored. 
 Every little while he turned in his saddle, and cast his eye over the 
 regiment pressing close behind, as if in that way to impart his own 
 high spirit to his men ; and that he did so was soon after fully 
 proven." 
 
 He was carried to a hospital at the house of a Mr. Chan 
 cellor, near the Wilderness Church, on the plank-road. 
 He was tenderly cared for by our own surgeons and by the 
 enemy, bearing his suffering with patient composure, and 
 at times unconscious. When a wounded sergeant of his 
 regiment came to his side and asked what he could do for 
 him, the answer was, " Nothing, unless you close column by 
 division." That day his thoughts seemed to dwell upon his 
 men, his regiment, though he was too feeble to say much. 
 
 The next day he was removed into a small bed-chamber, 
 and the ball, which had passed from left to right through 
 
158 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 his breast and shoulder, was extracted from its lodgement 
 in the right arm. He seemed relieved, talked freely for a 
 while of home, of his wife and boys, his father, and his coun 
 try, and with his wonted cheerful smile expressed the hope 
 that he might recover. When at noon an officer came to 
 parole such as were fit to take the oath, he took the pen and 
 blank form in his hand, looked first at the one, then at the 
 other, then gave them back, saying he could not write. 
 
 During the afternoon he became delirious ; again his 
 thoughts went back to the battle-field, and he called, as 
 if to his men, " Forward, men, steady ! " Then he sank 
 quietly, and in the early evening passed away. 
 
 ' The chaplain of the Third North Carolina Volunteers, 
 Kev. George Patterson, who had been struck with the ap 
 pearance of the wounded officer, had procured him a bed 
 and privacy, had washed his body, had bathed his temples, 
 and had tenderly watched over him. " I thank God fer 
 vently," he afterwards wrote to Colonel Stevens's father, 
 " that it was my privilege to nurse him He was gen 
 tle and tender ; the heart of a woman in the body of a war 
 rior." And a surgeon of the opposing army told the father 
 that so gallant and soldierly was the young man's aspect, 
 he had called in several brother officers to look at him. 
 
 A further extract from the graphic narrative of Mr. 
 Twichell will show the impression left among the officers of 
 our own army. 
 
 " So far as I ever knew or heard, his military life was without 
 reproach ; and every commander he had, from old Joe Hooker down, 
 had marked him as one of the most promising young officers in the 
 Potomac Army. Indeed, his corps commander once told me that 
 he had been only waiting till he should have fought one battle as 
 Colonel (he had lately been promoted to that rank) before recom 
 mending him for further advancement. He lacked no quality re 
 quisite to the utmost success in the profession of arms. He was 
 rarely skilled in the science of it, had a strong natural liking for 
 it, and possessed to a wonderful degree the power of controlling 
 
William Oliver Stevens. 159 
 
 his men and inspiring them with enthusiastic confidence in him. 
 Poor fellow ! I saw them crying in the ranks as they stood present 
 ing arms to his body when it was brought back from over the 
 river. 
 
 " As a man, too, he was singularly free from faults. To his sol 
 dierly traits and accomplishments he added the rarer virtues of 
 Christian morality. He was a steadfast example of modesty, pu 
 rity, and temperance ; yet at the same time his tent was one of the 
 cheeriest places to spend an evening in that the army afforded ; for 
 he was the most genial entertainer, and knew the art of good-fel 
 lowship to perfection. His generosity and charity were of the kind 
 that < never faileth.' I recall an instance illustrative of this, which 
 I was told by those who witnessed it. 
 
 " At one time a captain of his regiment, mistakenly conceiving 
 himself injured by the Colonel in some official transaction, for sev 
 eral weeks cherished and expressed a bitter spirit toward him, and 
 avoided meeting him as much as he could. Meanwhile the Colonel 
 took no notice of the matter, but invariably spoke of and to the 
 captain, without manifesting displeasure with his conduct, though 
 its injustice must have deeply offended him. 
 
 " Finally, however, it was made known to the captain in some 
 way that he had been entirely wrong in the case, and going to the 
 Colonel in person, he acknowledged his fault and made a full apol 
 ogy. It was a scene not easily to be forgotten, when that same 
 evening, at the customary meeting of the regimental officers for 
 training in tactics, the Colonel made the reconciliation public, by 
 taking the captain's hand before them all, and openly declaring his 
 satisfaction in the fact that they were friends again. This same 
 officer was also fatally wounded at Chancellorsville, and it was 
 commonly reported after the battle that he was struck while stoop 
 ing over the Colonel, having been the first to reach his side after 
 he fell." 
 
 Chaplain Patterson took from Colonel Stevens's neck a 
 locket of his wife's hair, and sent it to her, with his papers. 
 The body, dressed in uniform, was wrapped in a blanket, and 
 laid in the ground near the old Wilderness Church. It was 
 soon after exhumed by one of our surgeons, placed in a rude 
 coffin made from a door of the church, and delivered to the 
 
160 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 father at the ford. After resting awhile in the Governor's 
 room in New York City, it was transported to Dunkirk, 
 where it lay in state, under guard, till the day of the fu 
 neral. 
 
 All classes and ages assembled to do honor to him whose 
 sympathetic nature, kindly to all, was in turn beloved by 
 all. Kesolutions of honor had been previously adopted by 
 the officers of the Excelsior Brigade, by the Supreme Court, 
 by the members of the bar in that county, and by the citi 
 zens of Dunkirk. And just before the burial, the grim 
 Arsenal was the scene of a most touching ceremony. The 
 infant son of Colonel Stevens, held over his lifeless body, 
 was baptized with the customary forms of the Church, as 
 signed the name of his father, and sanctified to the cause 
 in defence of which that father had sacrificed this world's 
 ease and successes, friends, wife, child, and the immeasur 
 able opportunities of life. 
 
Everett Pedbody. 161 
 
 1849. 
 EVERETT PEABODY. 
 
 Colonel 13th (afterwards 25th) Missouri Vols. (Infantry), Septem 
 ber 1, 1861 ; killed at Pittsburg Landing, Tenn., April 6, 1862. 
 
 FT1HE Rev. William B. 0. Peabody, D.D., of Springfield, 
 JL Massachusetts, was the son of Judge Oliver Peabody 
 of Exeter, New Hampshire, and was born July 7, 1799. 
 He married Eliza Amelia White, daughter of Major Moses 
 White, who served in the army through the Revolution. 
 Rev. Dr. Peabody was settled in Springfield, Massachusetts, 
 in October, 1820, and remained with the same parish until 
 his death, which took place in 1847. He was well known 
 as a preacher, essayist, naturalist, and poet, and was uni 
 versally respected for the pure and elevated character of 
 his daily life. Those who remember the Springfield of forty 
 years ago speak of Mrs. Peabody as lovely in person and 
 manners, full of energy and public spirit, and taking a 
 leading part in all the schemes for doing good which were 
 in vogue at that day. 
 
 Their eldest son, Howard, died in infancy. The rest of 
 the family consisted of one daughter and four sons, of whom 
 Everett was the oldest. He was born in Springfield, June 
 13, 1830. There is little to be told about his childhood. 
 He was a tall, athletic boy, fond of outdoor sports, and 
 excelling in them. He was particularly skilful as a swim 
 mer. Once, while swimming across the Connecticut, at 
 Springfield, he was taken with the cramp when half-way 
 across. One of his schoolmates swam out to .him with a 
 plank, by the aid of which Everett reached the shore. It 
 is a curious circumstance that this schoolmate (since dead) 
 was in the Rebel army at Shiloh, and afterwards said that 
 
 VOL. I. 11 
 
162 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 as he was marching into the Federal camp he saw Everett's 
 body on the field, and recognized it at once. 
 
 Everett was remarkably quick to learn, and was regarded 
 as the most gifted boy of the family. He was fond of 
 poetry, and would repeat page after page of Scott's poems, 
 which were great favorites with the household. His father 
 had a strong desire to send him to college, but had not the 
 means to do so. Assistance was at last volunteered in such 
 a manner that he could not refuse ; and in 1845 Everett 
 entered as Freshman in Burlington College, Vermont. He 
 remained there but a year, and in 1846 entered Harvard 
 as Sophomore. 
 
 At first his standing was very high, so that one of his 
 letters expresses the hope that he shall prove to be among 
 the first eight scholars ; and although he afterward seemed 
 to care less about his rank, he had a part at Commence 
 ment when he graduated. He was fond of fun and frolic, 
 and was rusticated, in 1847, for helping to make a bonfire 
 on University steps. He was sent home to study with his 
 father, and was at home when his father died, his mother 
 and only sister having died three years before. He finished 
 the term of his suspension in the family of Rev. Rufus 
 Ellis, then of Northampton. 
 
 While in college he never was a plodding student, but 
 learned with singular ease and facility. I remember his 
 asking me once to hear him recite a lesson of several pages, 
 which he had been studying for half an hour ; and I was 
 surprised to hear him give the substance of page after page, 
 having evidently fixed in his mind every point of impor 
 tance in the lesson clearly and distinctly, while he troubled 
 himself little about the precise phraseology. He had at 
 this time acquired a good deal of facility in French and 
 German, and had a great deal of miscellaneous informa 
 tion. His wit and love of fun made him a favorite com 
 panion at social entertainments ; and he enjoyed such things 
 himself, although not to excess. 
 
Everett Peabody. 163 
 
 During his last winter vacation, he made a visit to Phila 
 delphia and Washington, and in the latter place gained an 
 acquaintance who seemed to fascinate him a good deal, 
 Colonel Baker, then in Congress, and subsequently killed 
 at Ball's Bluff. Colonel Baker confided to the young man 
 a project of taking a party of fifty or a hundred men to 
 California, for two years' service in the mines. Everett 
 was delighted with the prospect of adventure involved in 
 such an enterprise, and wrote home to his friends for aid 
 and advice ; but the project ultimately failed. 
 
 He graduated in 1849, and at once found employment 
 at engineering on the Boston Water-Works, under Mr. 
 Chesborough. Soon afterwards, he obtained a leveller's 
 place on the Cleveland, Columbus, and Ashtabula Railroad. 
 He thus describes his first experience of outdoor life : 
 
 "Februarys, 1850. 
 
 " Thank Heaven, I can support myself now ; and if it is a pit 
 tance I live on, it is at least earned by my own right arm, which 
 does not snarl and tell me I am extravagant, whenever I ask it 
 therefor. And so au diable with money matters. Well, it 's glori 
 ous, after all, going about in these old woods, with trees which seem 
 to have borne the brunt of the tempests for a thousand years. 
 Huge shafts, with buttress-like roots, and a flowering of Nature's 
 own mosaic. Though our feet are wet and our hands cold, though 
 we anticipate the sun and work like hodmen, there 's a luxury in it 
 which I can feel, but not analyze. You might not think it poetry, 
 but it is, this wading through the swamps watching the clouds. 
 We have nothing at the East to compare with these glorious clouds. 
 We left off work last night about a mile and a half from the tav 
 ern where we now are. I started, along with about six of the 
 party, and trudged through the swamp for a mile and a half or two 
 miles, and then found ourselves four miles from the tavern, in a 
 driving snow-storm, dark, and the walking not fit to be called walk 
 ing. We came home very much fatigued." 
 
 This was the beginning of a Western residence of more 
 than ten years, with but a few short visits to the home of 
 
104 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 his youth. He was successively employed on the Pacific 
 Eailroad (St. Louis), the Maysville and Lexington, Ken 
 tucky, the Maysville and Big Sandy, the Louisville and 
 Frankfort, always as assistant or resident engineer, but 
 with always increasing salary and responsibilities. 
 
 At this time he was in splendid physical condition. His 
 frame was large and powerful, his health was always good, 
 and he was almost always very light-hearted and care 
 less about the future. Except that he had a very strong 
 ambition to rise in his profession, I never saw a man who 
 troubled himself less about what the morrow might bring 
 forth. At this time, the Hon. James Guthrie told the Hon. 
 Edward Everett, if I remember his words correctly, that he 
 thought Everett Peabody was " the best field engineer in 
 the West." He was soon after appointed Chief Engineer 
 of the Memphis and Ohio Railroad, with a salary of three 
 thousand dollars. At a later period, for everything con 
 nected with Western railroads was then fluctuating and un 
 certain, he was employed as engineer of the Nashville 
 and Chattanooga Railroad, and then of the Hannibal and 
 St. Joseph's (Missouri) Railroad. Here he remained for 
 three years. 
 
 Up to this time his letters to his brothers, which were 
 numerous, showed simply the professional enthusiasm which 
 might have been expected from his energetic and buoyant 
 nature. As he grew older, however, the wearying effects 
 of rough border life began to tell upon him, and the desire 
 for home -and for cultivated society became stronger and 
 stronger. One of his brothers was married about this time ; 
 and his many letters to his new sister-in-law showed a ten 
 derer side of his nature, and exhibited a plaintive longing 
 that was almost pathetic. For a man of education and cul 
 tivated tastes to find himself at twenty-seven the permanent 
 resident of a "boarding car" at the unfinished extremity 
 of a new railway track, in the midst of an unbroken wilder 
 ness, in the dead of winter, was rather a dismal experience. 
 The following letters speak for themselves. 
 
Everett Peabody. 165 
 
 "BOARDING CARS, February 20, 1858. 
 
 " This Sunday evening, wearied out by a day of the most listless 
 laziness, I can think of nothing to do, unless it be to write to you, 
 
 my dear The heading of this letter may puzzle you. As 
 
 it is well to have the snow off the track before we pull the engine 
 wide open, I will explain. 
 
 " A train of cars is kept at the end of the track, and pushed for 
 ward as the track progresses. These migratory dwellings contain 
 cars for the accommodation of the men who work, a car for cook 
 ing and one for eating, and at the end of the train, a blue car, with 
 a peaked roof, contains my office, one end of which is decorated 
 with bunks and shelves, which serve as sleeping apartments. An I 
 were skilful, I would delineate, in a few rapid strokes of the pen, 
 the inside hereof; but the gift of sketching is denied me, and the 
 mere statement that it contains a drawing-table, a stove, a desk, and 
 the aforesaid shelves, would seem to go as far as words can do in 
 describing. 
 
 " The aforesaid cars are now on an embankment about forty feet 
 high, and the snow stretches away to the north and south. The 
 trees are black and dreary-looking, and the wind goes howling by. 
 Bitter cold it is, too, outside. But I have finished my frugal repast 
 of bread and butter, and do not purpose exposing my cherished 
 nose to the night air again. Mr. Kirby, one of my assistants, is 
 reading the ' Autocrat ' by my side 
 
 " What a great thing a locomotive is, a sort of Daniel Webster 
 reproduced in iron. I always feel like taking off my hat, when I 
 see one come elbowing up. During the past week I have been 
 renewing my acquaintance with the levers, and getting able to ride 
 the beast again. It gives one a singular consciousness of power to 
 feel the machinery, and to know that the whole thing is under your 
 control ; that you can say to it, Thus far, or, Do this, or, Do that, 
 and it is done. 
 
 " But after all, vague reminiscences come back to me of ancient 
 sleigh-rides, of pretty faces snuggling close to your side, of muffs 
 held up before faces to keep off the wind, and gentle words. A 
 good dash across the Neck would be glorious now. It seems to me 
 the only case where our stiff Puritanic rigidity is overcome, pos 
 sibly by the still stiffer rigidity of the weather, and where people 
 
166 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 seem ' to let themselves out ' for fun and frolic generally, in our old 
 home-land. 
 
 " Naught of that in this "Western land. The fun and frolic is al 
 most entirely men's fun ; and, heavens ! how much we would give 
 for one good romp in the old land ! There is fun enough, and wit 
 and nonsense enough, out here ; but, after all, it is hard and angular, 
 and lacks entirely the refining influence which womankind infuses 
 into man's life. But the weird sisters weave, and Atropos sits ready. 
 Let her sit. I mean to get back before she takes the final suit, and 
 see if I can't find youth and life again in the ' auld countree.' ' 
 
 "April 18, 1858. 
 
 " Why do you attack me so ferociously about a mild remark, that 
 you Eastern people don't know how to love ? You don't. 
 
 " I have no doubt you think you do. I have no doubt you think 
 that this love which, as you yourself say, becomes such a part 
 of your nature that you don't show it, and, you might add (if it 
 were not doggerel), know it is strong passion and devotion ; but 
 it is n't. So far as it has any character, it is more habit than any 
 thing else. You lead not you particularly, but all the Eastern 
 people two lives : one, the outside life of society (which is hy 
 pocrisy) ; the other, the life of love, family, or otherwise, which is 
 real : and you have plenty of support for both, and very little care 
 for either. But wait until you only have support for one, the 
 outer, and none at all for the other, the inner. Wait till you 
 have to treasure up memories of each little act of affection, in place 
 of having the realities about you daily, and you knowing all the 
 time that these very realities exist, and you can't get at them. Did 
 you ever read of Tantalus, of Ixion, and the other reprobates ? 
 Wait till distance blinds you to the faults, and exalts the virtues, of 
 your friends, and you love them with a love the more absorbing 
 and complete because it finds no response in daily life, and because 
 it is all your inner and real life. Then, my dear, you won't call 
 me a truculent border ruffian. 
 
 " Pshaw ! what nonsense for me to write this stuff for you to 
 laugh at ! I love my friends, and that, you know full well, that 
 gave me leave or (if I might correct Shakespeare) provoked me 
 to speak of it." 
 
Everett Peabody. 167 
 
 " BLOOMINGTON, Mo., December 16, 1858. 
 
 " I have returned from a scouting expedition after game, cold, 
 angry, and generally ill-humored. A ' Merry Christmas ' to you 
 all at home there. 
 
 " I send you a song which we shall sing to the tune of * Benny 
 Haven's, Oh ! ' at our Christmas supper. 
 
 ' Our fires are blazing cheerily, 
 
 Our loaded tables groan, 
 The wine is circling merrily 
 
 Among us here alone. 
 But our thoughts are wandering sadly 
 
 To the days of long ago, 
 To the days when we so gladly 
 
 Saw Christmas wassail flow. 
 
 ' And the long years, whose passing 
 
 Hath left its many stings ; 
 And the young hopes, whose glassing 
 
 Mirrored such noble things ; 
 And the struggles we have fought through, 
 
 The sorrows we have borne, 
 And the objects we have sought, too, 
 
 All to our minds return. 
 
 ' Our weary exile bearing 
 
 Far from those loved before, 
 Our hearts shall still be sharing 
 
 Their pleasures as of yore. 
 Then fill up bumpers, brothers ; 
 
 As Christmas takes its flight, 
 We drink this toast together 
 
 To those at home to-night.' 
 
 " (A poor song, but mine own.)" 
 
 Early in 1859 Everett became partner in a firm organized 
 for the purpose of building the Platte County Railroad, in 
 Missouri, and he was appointed Chief Engineer, with com 
 plete control of the work and a salary of $ 3,000 per annum. 
 He expected to make an independent fortune out of the 
 contract, and would undoubtedly have done so, had he lived. 
 His residence now became St. Joseph, Missouri. His em 
 ployment involved a good deal of travelling, through a 
 
168 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 beautiful country, arid an occasional attendance on the 
 Legislature, as lobby-member, which he found less agree 
 able than instructive. His worldly prospects were bright. 
 " I should not be surprised," he wrote, "if in two or three 
 years each of us .(there are three) should have an annual 
 income of $20,000 or $ 25,000 from the road." His health 
 and strength were in admirable condition ; he described 
 himself as " strong as an ox, and with vitality enough for a 
 dozen of our young men of Boston." When, in the follow 
 ing summer (1860), he made his long-desired two months' 
 visit at home, I noticed that, wherever we went, his com 
 manding physique always attracted attention. He was six 
 feet and one inch in height, and weighed two hundred 
 and forty pounds. His motions were slow and steady, and 
 his manners quiet and grave. 
 
 Such were his condition and prospects at the outbreak of 
 the Rebellion. The following letter is the first record of his 
 views upon the subject. 
 
 " ST. JOSEPH, March 24, 1861. 
 
 "I received yours this morning. It will always be better to 
 direct letters here than to any place whence I may happen to write 
 you 
 
 " We have been fighting a gallant battle here for the Union, and 
 have whipped our opponents at every point. We had a conven 
 tion, called by the Legislature, for the purpose of carrying us out 
 of the Union, filled with men who declared ' that the present griev 
 ances did not justify secession ' ; and we carried the State on that 
 basis by a vote of sixty thousand majority. That convention has 
 decided in favor of a national convention ; and if one is held, we 
 shall send the right kind of men, men ready to compromise on 
 some basis of settlement which will, in time, bring back the seced 
 ing States, and restore the Union. See that you do the same thing. 
 If you drive the Border Slave States from you, and crush out us 
 Union men who are fighting the battles here, there will be separa 
 tion, and undoubtedly, sooner or later, war. We are satisfied here 
 with Lincoln's Inaugural and Cabinet ; but we have very little re 
 spect for a party which places him there to settle matters, and then 
 
Everett Peabody. 169 
 
 ties his hands by passing no bills to give him the necessary power ; 
 which passes a high-tariff bill (to which we have no objections), 
 and then provokes the violation of it by neither closing the South 
 ern ports nor giving power to collect revenue outside of them. 
 
 " I am growing terribly bored with having nothing to do, and 
 growing rusty. I shall have to pitch out somewhere before long. 
 I shall probably make a trip out as far as Laramie this summer, in 
 case nothing happens to prevent ; and if I could get a good opening 
 in any part of the world, I would wind up affairs here and start. 
 Love to all. 
 
 " Yours, truly, 
 
 "EVERETT." 
 
 This letter shows that his residence of twelve years in 
 the Border States had exerted the natural effect on his 
 views, and that he looked on national affairs with the eyes 
 of a Missouri Unionist, not of a New England man. The 
 next letter shows him carried already far on by the enthu 
 siasm of the war. 
 
 " ST. JOSEPH, May 16, 1861. 
 
 " DEAR , Yours received this morning. The reason of 
 
 my long silence is, that I made a trip starting about April 
 10th up to Fort Randal, a thousand miles up the Missouri 
 River, and only returned about ten days ago. 
 
 " Everything has been in a state of excitement here, and about 
 ten days ago was drifting toward thorough anarchy. I think the 
 operations in St. Louis did no particular harm, and Harney's proc 
 lamation does a wondrous deal of good. He is a citizen of Mis 
 souri, and has the power to do what he says he will ; and it is well 
 known here that when he undertakes to do a thing he is apt to do 
 it very roughly. Everybody knows him to be a pro-slavery man, 
 and this takes, to a certain extent, the sting away from any exer 
 cise of authority he may make. Altogether an excellent appoint 
 ment. 
 
 " Of course all business is dead. If I can get into the Regular 
 service, in a high position, I shall join the army. I cannot yet tell 
 whether I can muster influence enough to command a majority or 
 a captaincy, but shall probably try and see what can be done. 
 
 " We apprehend, at present, no difficulty ; and if we have one, it 
 will not, I think, be lasting. I trust not. 
 
170 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " There is little to write about, except politics. The real issue 
 in this State is between our damnable secession State government 
 and old Harney ; and as the Union men and Disunion men are 
 each afraid of the other, and our State government is powerless, 
 both from lack of money and of arms, I think that Missouri will 
 be apt to be quiet, Harney's sword being thrown into that scale. 
 
 " I shall look to you presently, perhaps, to help me in my mili 
 tary views." 
 
 The following letter shows his first summons to military 
 service. The volunteer corps here indicated was subse 
 quently organized, and he was appointed its Major. It be 
 came the nucleus of the Thirteenth Missouri, and he was 
 commissioned as its Colonel, to rank as such from Septem 
 ber 1, 1861. After the capture of the regiment at Lexing 
 ton, its number was given to another corps, and it was ulti 
 mately reorganized as the Twenty-fifth Missouri. 
 
 "HEAD-QUARTERS, DEPARTMENT WEST, 
 ST. Louis ARSENAL, May 31, 1861. 
 
 " SIR, I am directed by Brigadier- General Lyon, commanding, 
 to request you to repair at once to Fort Leavenworth, to confer 
 with the commanding officer there in regard to the organization 
 and equipment of a reserve corps in your city. 
 " I am, sir, very respectfully, 
 
 " Your obedient servant, 
 
 "CHESTER HARDING, JR., 
 
 "A. A. G., 1st Brig. Mo. Vols. 
 " To E. PEABODY, Esq., St. Joseph, Missouri." 
 
 Major Champion Yaughan wrote soon after to General 
 J. H. Lane : " There is no man in Northern Missouri so 
 well calculated to give you all useful information as Major 
 Everett Peabody, to whom I would urge upon you ' an 
 attentive ear ' in all matters he has to communicate. In 
 the great crisis now upon Missouri, I believe no man is 
 so likely to take hold of the helm with a manly resolution 
 as Major Peabody, who combines in a happy degree those 
 qualities which the occasion and the times demand." 
 
Everett Pealody. 171 
 
 Major Peabody's own letters now afford almost a contin 
 uous narrative : 
 
 "CAMP LANDER, August 27, 1861. 
 
 " DEAR , I am ordered to Kansas City, and expect 
 
 roughness. 
 
 " I shall send home, in the course of a day or two, my contract with 
 the Platte Railroad Company ; and in case I go up, which is very 
 likely, I want to have the rest of you take what I have made, and 
 use it to the best advantage for all three. 
 
 " Good by, old fellow. I have a sort of presentiment that I shall 
 go under. If I do, it shall be in a manner that the old family shall 
 feel proud of it. 
 
 Yours, 
 
 " EVERETT." 
 
 "LEXINGTON, September 24, 1861. 
 
 " DEAR , Finding nothing to do at Kansas City, I moved 
 
 down about eight hundred and fifty men to this place, on the 4th. 
 On the 7th I started southward with Colonel Marshall (First Illi 
 nois Cavalry) in command, towards Warrensburg. After progress 
 ing, in his fashion, eighteen miles in two days, he returned here, 
 leaving me in command of about nine hundred infantry and three 
 hundred and fifty cavalry, with two six-pounders, and directed me 
 to make a reconnoissance toward Warrensburg. I marched seven 
 teen miles, and reached there at five in the evening. 
 
 " The rumors I had been hearing were, before twelve o'clock at 
 night, reduced to certainty, that the main body of the Missouri 
 forces, under Price, Jackson, and Raines, were upon us, some twelve 
 thousand strong. They were within five miles when I commenced 
 my retreat, burning bridges, and delaying them as far as possible. 
 I was none too quick ; for, two hours after I arrived here, our pick 
 ets were driven in, and skirmishing began, and was continued dur 
 ing the night ; they (mostly mounted) having made a forced march 
 of thirty-five miles by a circuit, to cut us off. 
 
 "The next day (12th) we were attacked, first having severe 
 skirmishing with their van, and afterwards a three and a half hours' 
 cannonading, we behind some hasty intrenchments ; at evening 
 they retired. We lost four killed and twenty-five wounded ; they, 
 about fifteen killed and thirty-five or forty wounded. 
 
172 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " From this time we worked assiduously at the trenches, which, 
 however, were unfortunately situated, being below the top of the 
 hill, so that the inside could be only partially protected by traver 
 ses from the cannonading and sharpshooting, and having no water 
 inside the lines. Still we did the best we could. Colonel Mulli 
 gan, of Chicago, was in command (a good officer and a brave one), 
 with a total of two thousand seven hundred men and about one thou 
 sand head of mules and horses ; but seven hundred of our men 
 were armed only with horse-pistols and sabres. 
 
 " On Wednesday last (18th), after constant skirmishing in the 
 interval, the main attack commenced, and continued without inter 
 mission until five o'clock Friday evening, when Colonel Mulligan 
 surrendered. During all that time our men had not in all a full 
 meal of food or a pint of water to the man ; of course there was 
 no sleep. The enemy were receiving large reinforcements, and at 
 the time of attack claimed to be thirty thousand strong, and were, 
 I think, fully twenty thousand. Still we should have held out two 
 or three hours longer, had it not been for cowardice or treason on 
 the part of one of the Home Guards officers, (a butcher or stage- 
 driver, I believe,) who, after one charge had been repulsed, and just 
 as another was coming on, put out the white flag. Colonel Mulli 
 gan supposed it to be hoisted by the opposite side, and sent to Gen 
 eral Price to know the meaning ; and vice versa. Meanwhile they 
 had surrounded us in enormous quantities, and were even in our 
 ditches. The surrender was unconditional, and as the place had 
 been kept eight days (ample time for reinforcements), and as, owing 
 to the exhausted state of the men, we could not have held out over 
 night, I am not certain that we could have done better. The loss 
 is about equal, between forty and fifty killed. We have one 
 hundred and^five wounded. 
 
 " On the second day of the three days' fight, toward evening, I had 
 had some hot words, about a company of mine, with an officer of 
 the Irish Brigade, and we had drawn our sabres, but postponed it 
 at Colonel Mulligan's request ; and I went off to look after the 
 company, which had just charged a building outside the intrench- 
 ments, occupied by their sharpshooters, and had taken it. I went 
 through a very cross-fire from their sharpshooters, down to the 
 building, just in time to find the building recharged by the enemy 
 in overwhelming force. I brought up the retreat, and I tell you it 
 
Everett Pedbody. 173 
 
 was hot ; but I got into the intrenchments safe, and was passing 
 along, giving directions, when I was struck with a spent ball in the 
 breast, which knocked me down, and seemed to deprive me of any 
 power to move. I waited about half an hour, but did not recover, 
 and the boys then undertook to carry me to the hospital. We 
 had gone about ten yards when one was struck in the thigh, and 
 dropped. Another came, and about five yards farther along I was 
 struck by a slug, which went in behind the ankle, and passed round, 
 lodging in the middle of the foot, about three fourths of an inch 
 below the surface. It has been extracted, and I am doing well ; 
 although from the muscles and nerves concentrated in that place, 
 and the lack of attention, it has proved a most painful wound. 
 
 " My men have been released, and sent home ; some one hun 
 dred and thirty officers still here. If released on parole, I shall 
 probably visit you, as I can do nothing in any way for three or four 
 months to come. 
 
 " Fremont's proclamation has destroyed the chance of Missouri's 
 remaining in the Union. Men are flocking in here by thousands. 
 You will have to look to Virginia for success. 
 
 " Yours, 
 
 " EVERETT. 
 
 " The enemy had twelve or fifteen pieces of artillery ; we had 
 four. I have been highly complimented by both sides." 
 
 " ST. Louis, October 20, 1861. 
 
 " DEAR , I am at last able to sit up and move about a 
 
 little on crutches. The swelling is almost out of the foot, and the 
 wound nearly healed up. I shall be able, in five or six weeks, to 
 walk about freely, I think. Of course it is a great bore, but one 
 must bear it. 
 
 " I ought to have written to you before, but I have had my room 
 full of visitors, from the time I waked up in the morning till mid 
 night ; and as I knew others were writing, I neglected it. 
 
 " I have sent my officers up to St. Joseph, where I shall go when 
 I have recovered sufficiently to move about. Those not on parole, 
 and my friends in St. Joseph, are taking measures to reorganize 
 the regiment ; and there is, I believe, every prospect of my being 
 released (or rather exchanged), being well, and being in command 
 of fifteen hundred men in six weeks or two months, which will not 
 be unsatisfactory. So you see the prospect is not gloomy. 
 
174 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 "I have heard, comparatively, little of home affairs. Frank 
 Huntington, who is here, tells me that the last time he saw you he 
 thought you were looking quite unwell ; and I have been fearful 
 lest your infernal city life was gradually sapping your strength. I 
 trust you are better now, and only urge care. 
 
 " As to affairs here, I place little confidence in General Fre 
 mont's catching Price. I think the object of Price's movement is 
 to draw from St. Louis the whole strength of the Union forces, and 
 entice them as far away as possible, so as to prevent reinforcements 
 to the scattered squads of men at Ironton, Cape Girardeau, Bird's 
 Point, Cairo, and Paducah. 
 
 " It is impossible to look into the future ; but I augur little suc 
 cess here, unless Price gives Fremont battle, and that, as I have 
 said before, I do not believe he will do. But we have been grossly 
 and shamefully neglected. My men four months or more iii 
 the service have not received any clothing or pay, nothing but 
 arms and ammunition ; and my case is the rule rather than the 
 exception. 
 
 " We are looking to Virginia now, with great anxiety and hope 
 mingled. If a big blow is struck there shortly, it will simplify our 
 task amazingly. 
 
 " Kindest love to all at home. Write constantly, and believe 
 
 me, 
 
 " Yours, as ever." 
 
 " ST. Louis, November 26, 1861. 
 
 " DEAII , I returned yesterday from St. Joseph, where I 
 
 have been reorganizing my regiment, and received all your letters 
 in a bunch. I cannot tell you how thankful I feel for the evidence 
 of sympathy shown by you at home, for my poor boys, who have 
 done more arduous service, fought better and suffered more than 
 any other men in the service. 
 
 " Fortunately now everything is changed. We have received 
 the only complete outfit for a regiment and for four companies of 
 cavalry ever issued from the Western Department, and my boys 
 are rallying back with a cordiality and kindness that make me feel 
 proud of myself. 
 
 " The regiment was thoroughly disorganized and demoralized by 
 the delays of the department in regard to payment. The recruit- 
 
Everett Peabody. 175 
 
 ing officers flocked to St. Joseph like crows to the carrion, and in 
 duced about a hundred of my boys to join other regiments. 
 
 " About two weeks ago I went to St. Joseph, and all these boys 
 applied to come back. The present prospect is that I shall rendez 
 vous here. I have now about five hundred men, and we only com 
 menced recruiting ten days ago. 
 
 " I am a nondescript animal, which I call a triped, as yet, but I 
 trust in a short time to be on foot once more. 
 
 " Give my very best thanks for the presents you have sent me 
 to the kind ladies who wrought them. Tell them that these evi 
 dences of kindness are intensely felt by those who receive them in 
 the far West. You in Massachusetts, who see your men going off 
 thoroughly equipped and prepared for the service, can hardly con 
 ceive the destitution and ragged condition of the Missouri volun 
 teers in past time. If I had a whole pair of breeches in my regi 
 ment at Lexington, I don't know it ; but I learned there that 
 bravery did not depend on good clothes. 
 
 " I am sorry I have not written to you before, but I have been 
 so busy I have not thought of it. Best love to all, and believe me, 
 " Yours, as ever." 
 
 " ARMY OF WEST TENNESSEE, 
 
 12 miles southwest Savannah, and 18 from Corinth, Miss., 
 March 31, 1862. 
 
 " DEAR FRANK, In camp again, with a good regiment and 
 well equipped. We are in General Prentiss's Division (twelve 
 regiments), and I command the leading brigade. As we are the 
 left centre division, we expect rough work. I have a fine brigade ; 
 my own regiment at the right, the Twelfth Michigan, Sixteenth 
 Wisconsin, and Eighteenth Missouri forming the balance. We ar 
 rived here on the 28th, and have a very pleasant camp, the boys 
 as lively as crickets, and everything working smoothly. It is funny 
 to be called General ; but the boys are all delighted, and I think 
 will do good service at the proper time. The enemy is supposed 
 to be about eighteen miles from us. We have an immense army, 
 how large we have no means of knowing ; they say, however, one 
 hundred and twenty odd regiments, and they are arriving at the rate 
 of two or three a day. 
 
176 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " As I wrote you before leaving, I have left my contract with 
 Judge Krum of St. Louis. In case I go under, my old assistants, 
 Kilby and John Severance, can give you all the necessary informa 
 tion in regard to the property involved. Say to them all at home, 
 that if we have good luck I shall win my spurs. Love to all. 
 
 "Yours, 
 
 " Ev." 
 
 This was the last letter received from him. Shortly after 
 the battle of Pittsburg Landing, he was reported to be se 
 verely wounded, and one of his brothers set out to go for 
 him. He heard of Everett's death at Cairo, but went on 
 to the battle-field, to make arrangements for bringing the 
 body home. 
 
 The newspaper narratives of the battle are very contra 
 dictory ; but after careful study, the facts appear to be as 
 follows. Everett felt that the army was in great danger 
 of a surprise, and sent to General Prentiss on Saturday 
 afternoon for permission to send out a scouting party. Re 
 ceiving no answer, he sent it out without permission, on 
 Sunday morning, between three and four o'clock. This 
 party met the Rebel column advancing, and fell back, 
 skirmishing. 
 
 Everett had his brigade in line before the attack in force 
 came ; this was distinctly stated to his brother by officers 
 of the brigade. The Twenty-fifth Missouri mustered six 
 hundred on the day after the battle, which it certainly 
 could not have done, unless the retreat had been made in 
 good order. - 
 
 While the brigade was forming, General Prentiss rode 
 up to Everett, and reprimanded him as follows : " You 
 have brought on an attack for which I am unprepared, 
 and I shall hold you responsible." He replied, " General, 
 you will soon see that I was not mistaken." As a reply 
 to the reprimand, the remark seems not precisely appro 
 priate, and appears rather intended to remind General 
 Prentiss of some previous conversation, in which Everett 
 
Everett Peabody. 177 
 
 had in vain endeavored to induce the General to prepare for 
 an attack like this. Viewed in this light, the answer seems 
 decisive, and is another proof that, if he had been in higher 
 command, the attack would have been differently received. 
 
 The right of the division, under General Prentiss, was 
 captured en masse. Colonel Peabody 's brigade received 
 an attack which it could not support ; and when he found 
 it was giving ground, he rode to the front, and exposed 
 himself recklessly, to keep the men from retreating. His 
 Major, an old Texan ranger, did the same, and was also 
 killed, receiving eleven wounds ; while Everett received 
 five, namely, in the hand, thigh, neck, body, and head. 
 
 He was apparently killed about fifteen minutes after the 
 attack struck his line. The Colonel commanding the left 
 regiment of the brigade has since testified that an orderly 
 came from Everett to ask him if he thought he could hold 
 his position. He replied that he thought he could. The 
 orderly returned to his post, but presently came back once 
 more with the statement that Colonel Peabody was killed. 
 He was placed in a position where a chivalrous officer was 
 devoted to almost certain death, and he behaved just as his 
 friends would have predicted in such an emergency. 
 
 The following letter brought the announcement of his 
 death. 
 
 " CAMP PRENTISS, IN THE FIELD, 
 NEAR PITTSBURG, TENNESSEE, April 8, 1862. 
 
 "FRANK PEABODY, Boston. 
 
 " DEAR SIR, I have but a few minutes to write, and will de 
 vote them to performing one of the most painful duties that have 
 devolved on me during this war. 
 
 "Your brother, Everett Peabody, Acting Brigadier- General, and 
 commanding the First Brigade of General Prentiss's division, was 
 killed on the morning of the 6th of April, while gallantly urging 
 forward the men of his brigade. The ball that killed him entered 
 the upper lip, and passed out of the back of the head. A more 
 gallant officer or truer gentleman has not laid down his life for his 
 country. 
 
 VOL. i. 12 
 
178 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " General Prentiss's division was the first in the fight, and it sus 
 tained severe repeated shocks during the day. The men fought 
 with desperation, but were overpowered on the first day, and had 
 to yield some ground to vastly superior numbers. 
 
 " Yesterday, the 7th, the enemy gave way, and General Grant, 
 being reinforced by General Buell, has routed the enemy com 
 pletely. The enemy, however, in the retreat, took all the effects 
 of officers and soldiers. They have not left anything of the Gen 
 eral's (E. Peabody) that I can find that I could send to you as a 
 memento, his sword, pistols, saddle, everything, gone. We will 
 bury him this evening in his own camp, and will mark the place. 
 
 " I was his aid until after he fell. In haste, 
 
 " I have the honor to be, very respectfully, 
 
 " GEORGE K. DONNELLY, 
 Captain Co. I, 25^ Mo. Vols." 
 
 His officers buried him in a gun-box, placing at his head 
 a board with his name, and below it the couplet : 
 
 " A braver man ne'er died upon the field ; 
 A warmer heart never to death did yield." 
 
 His body was afterwards carried to Boston, where the 
 funeral arrangements were taken in charge by the Gov 
 ernor of Massachusetts, May 16, 1861. It was conveyed 
 thence to Springfield, where, on the following day, in pres 
 ence .of an immense concourse, it was laid beside the re 
 mains of his mother, in the beautiful cemetery which his 
 father had designed and planned. 
 
 His strong, simple, generous, manly nature reveals itself 
 perfectly in his letters. He died under circumstances 
 where continued life would have been certain to bring fur 
 ther distinction and usefulness ; and he singularly fulfilled 
 the prediction contained in a song which he had written, 
 years before, for an anniversary of the Boston Cadets : 
 
 " And if the army of a foe invade our native land, 
 Or rank disunion gather up its lawless, faithless band, 
 Then the arm upon our ancient shield shall wield his blade of might, 
 And we '11 show our worthy brethren that gentlemen can fight." 
 
William D wight SedgwicJc. 179 
 
 1851. 
 WILLIAM DWIGHT SEDGWICK. 
 
 First Lieutenant 2d Mass. Vols. (Infantry), May 25, 1861 ; Major and 
 A. A. G. U. S. Vols., September 16, 1861 ; died at Keedysville, Md., Sep 
 tember 29, 1862, of a wound received at Antietam, September 17. 
 
 WILLIAM DWIGHT SEDGWICK was the only son 
 of Charles and Elizabeth (Dwight) Sedgwick, and 
 was born in Lenox, Massachusetts, June 27, 1831. Till 
 the age of fourteen years he was brought up almost entirely 
 at home, when his father sent him to Illinois to spend a 
 summer with a farmer who was a relative, and who then 
 lived in a log-house. Here he learned and performed every 
 kind of farm-work of which a boy of that age is capable, 
 and con-firmed a constitution originally excellent. His fa 
 ther believed that, without some personal knowledge and 
 experience of labor, he could not have a proper sympathy 
 with laboring men. He spent one year at a French school, 
 and one in a boys' school taught by Rev. Samuel P. Par 
 ker, in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, and finished in Lenox 
 his studies preparatory to admission into college. After 
 leaving college, he spent one winter in a law-office ; then 
 went abroad and studied a portion of his profession at 
 Heidelberg, Gottingen, and Breslau. He was abroad about 
 seventeen months. After his return, he entered the Cam 
 bridge Law School, where he remained a year, and then 
 established himself as a lawyer in St. Louis, Missouri. 
 
 It was his good fortune to grow up, through all his boy 
 hood and the greater part of his youth, under the eye of two 
 excellent parents, both very remarkable and gifted. He 
 was allowed to develop with great freedom and under the 
 happiest influences and circumstances. The fear of dis 
 obeying and displeasing them was almost the only restraint 
 
180 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 he knew ; and he was so accustomed to give his parents his 
 full confidence, that, even as a young man and away from 
 them, he never tried or wished to hide his faults, and al 
 ways found in their forbearance and assistance the surest 
 help to overcome them. 
 
 His happy natural tendencies were carefully cultivated 
 and strengthened, and the truthfulness, humanity, and 
 kindness to every living being, which were the characteris 
 tics of both his parents, and which he saw daily and hourly 
 practised in his father's house, became also his second na 
 ture. From his mother he inherited the happiest temper, 
 great sweetness and cheerfulness, with great natural cour 
 age and firmness combined, and from his father the refine 
 ment of sentiment, the keen enjoyment of wit and fun, and 
 some portion of that pleasant humor for which his father's 
 conversation is still remembered with delight by those who 
 knew him. The free and extensive hospitality of his par 
 ents, and the attraction which the society of his aunt, Miss 
 C. M. Sedgwick, added to the family circle, brought among 
 the many guests a large number of distinguished and supe 
 rior people into the house ; and William Sedgwick enjoyed 
 the opportunity, rare for a boy and young man, of seeing, 
 in a perfectly unconstrained way, the best society, and of 
 acquiring early that ease and quiet self-possession, and the 
 winning manners, which marked him at once as the gen 
 tleman wherever he appeared. No wonder that his happy 
 home seemed perfect to him, and his birthplace the loveliest 
 spot on earth. His love for it became only strengthened by 
 separation ; and even with the grandeur of the Alps before 
 him, even in Rome, he could sigh for the beauties of his own 
 mountains, lakes, and valleys. He had great love for and 
 enjoyment in nature, and had gained much skill in all rural 
 and manly exercises and amusements, which were so pecu 
 liarly adapted to his taste and his strong, robust constitution, 
 that afterwards in town-life and amid sedentary occupa 
 tions he often painfully longed for them. While no amount 
 
William Dwiglit Sedywick. 181 
 
 of fatigue, of hardship, or privations, could subdue his spir 
 its or disturb his good humor, he was yet liable to become 
 depressed by the confinement of his life as a lawyer. With 
 these decided tastes for outdoor life and occupations, it 
 seems but natural that the temptation to neglect his books 
 and studies for the delight of following them proved some 
 times too strong for an active and spirited young man ; but 
 his natural capacities and talents were such, that, had he 
 really lost anything by these interruptions, he very easily 
 could repair the want by a few hours' earnest study, 
 where others had to give at least double the time. 
 
 Though originally he had no very strong and decided 
 preference for his profession, he had always regarded it as a 
 noble and interesting one. With all his advantages at home 
 and abroad, he had been carefully and excellently prepared 
 for it, and in some respects was peculiarly fitted to become 
 a distinguished member of the bar. He spoke as well and 
 as clearly as he wrote, had a sound and excellent judgment, 
 a lively imagination, great self-possession and readiness ; 
 and even a certain pertinacity of which he often accused 
 himself as a great fault, and which among his friends made 
 him almost always carry his point seemed only the better 
 to qualify him for a lawyer. The few years in St. Louis 
 were prosperous for him, and very promising for the future ; 
 and no doubt he would have continued in his profession, and 
 would have done honor to it, had not, from the moment of 
 the outbreak of the war, the destiny of his country occupied 
 his mind so powerfully that only with difficulty could he 
 turn his thoughts to other matters. He felt irresistibly 
 drawn to become active in the great national struggle ; and 
 this last year and a half of his life, with all its new and 
 most interesting, but often sad and terrible, experiences, did 
 much to ripen and elevate his character. 
 
 He married, in 1857, at Hanover, in Germany, Louisa 
 Frederica Tellkampf, daughter of Professor A. Tellkampf 
 of that place. From his letters to his father-in-law at the 
 
182 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 beginning of the war we can best learn the earnest and in 
 tense interest which he took in the destiny of his people, 
 and the motives that decided him to leave his profession 
 and family to offer his services to the country. In reply to 
 the warning of Professor Tellkampf, not to engage himself 
 in the war, and before the former knew that he had -joined 
 the army already, he says : 
 
 " Your views are perfectly natural ; but the same reasons which 
 should induce me to withdraw from the service of government 
 would, if adopted by all those to whom they apply as well as to me, 
 break up our armies and leave us at the mercy of Southern dicta 
 tors. In one prediction I have seen already that I was quite right, 
 in saying to my friends, when they tried to persuade me to the 
 contrary, that we should find there would be far from a superabun 
 dance of those ready for their country's call to arms, and that every 
 one would be needed ; even now we have barely enough to stand 
 on the defensive. After having once taken the step, and feeling as 
 / do, I know you could only despise me, should I forsake my coun 
 try's cause because you regard it as almost hopeless. Were these 
 views, which I believe are general, not only in Germany but in all 
 Europe, to prevail throughout the North, and were those engaged 
 now in their country's service to reason as foreigners do for us, we 
 should be lost indeed ; but we should deserve our fate, in such a 
 case, and for very shame could only wish to be buried in the ruins 
 our want of faith had involved us in. For my part, if my country 
 is to perish, my hope is to perish with her. I could not wish to 
 survive the downfall of what I regard as the world's hope. Should 
 America cease to be a first-class power, and be broken up in con 
 temptible little fragments, what would you think would become of 
 England ? How long would it be before she would lie before the 
 feet of France ? What would become of the surplus population of 
 Europe ? What chance would be left to Germany and Italy in the 
 struggle for eventual freedom after the failure of the grandest ex 
 periment of a free government that the world has known ? Utter 
 discouragement and dejection would fall upon the friends of freedom 
 everywhere, should the North now yield to the entreaties of those 
 who say, * Do not persist in this war, for you will be only shedding 
 blood to no purpose.' " 
 
William DwigJit Sedgwick. 183 
 
 In accordance with these principles, Mr. Sedgwick forsook 
 his profession, and was commissioned (May 25, 1861) as 
 First Lieutenant in the Second Massachusetts Volunteers 
 (Colonel Gordon). He went into service with the regi 
 ment, was detailed as ordnance officer of Major-General 
 Banks's corps, and was soon transferred to the staff of Ma 
 jor-General Sedgwick, his kinsman, with the rank of Major. 
 All through his period of service he wrote constantly to his 
 family ; and the following extracts will show his habits of 
 mind, and the spirit in which he served his country. 
 
 "Si. Louis, MISSOURI, April 18, 1861. 
 
 " . . . . The excitement increases here daily. I do not expect 
 any outbreak to occur here for the present, but at the same time 
 a breaking out of hostilities here at almost any moment would 
 
 scarcely surprise me. Men like Mr. G and Mr. C , who 
 
 still profess to be thorough Union men, say that Lincoln's procla 
 mation is sinful and outrageous ; that to try and whip in the Cot 
 ton States is madly hopeless ; and that when war breaks out, in con 
 sequence of the attempt, the Border States must infallibly defend 
 
 their ' Southern brethren.' Mr. G thinks, moreover, that one 
 
 Southerner is equal to two Northerners, and that the recognition of 
 the Southern Confederacy by the European powers is so palpably 
 certain as to leave no possible room for a contrary expectation. 
 These are the sentiments of many who have said and still say, 
 that if the government could put down the Rebellion and hang Jeff 
 Davis and the other Rebel leaders, they should like to see it done. 
 Thus you see how the matter strikes the Southern mind, among 
 those who deplore secession and declare it unjustifiable. I am led 
 to think this feeling will be pretty universal, ' Many men of many 
 minds.' 
 
 " We are drilling here, under a pledge to obey any call made 
 on us by the United States authorities, to resist attack or rebellion 
 here. I am longing, as I never should have thought to do, to join 
 the Massachusetts Volunteers. Perhaps I may not be able to 
 ' hold myself in,' if matters come to the point of actual war. I 'm 
 very sure that I would rather die in battle twenty times, than have 
 Washington captured, or than that the North should now yield her 
 
184 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 principles to accommodate those of the South. At the same time I 
 cannot avoid feeling grief and distress in the knowledge that so 
 many people I esteem, and could agree with on every question of 
 morality, except in these pro- and anti-slavery issues, are quite as 
 capable of being aroused to enthusiasm on the side of this mon 
 strous wrong as any of us at the North on the other side. God 
 send us a good issue ! " 
 
 " CAMP NEAR DARNESTOWN, September 12, 1861. 
 
 " . . . . How do people that you meet talk about the war ? Does 
 Northern spirit and determination seem to you unabated, and do 
 you see many signs of an increase of the desire to see slavery 
 abolished ? I pray God that it may come to that. Not that I would 
 have total and immediate abolition declared ; but I want a policy 
 adopted and persevered in which shall look to the speediest aboli 
 tion possible." 
 
 " CAMP SACKET, October 24, 1861, 
 
 " . . . . My faith does not begin to be shaken yet, though, so far 
 as I can see or learn, every i impartial observer ' abroad professes 
 the unqualified conviction that this government cannot succeed in 
 re-establishing its sway over the Southern States. I long for the 
 day to come when the government shall declare the war to be one 
 of emancipation, and be supported as now by the great mass of 
 Northern men 
 
 " The number of people about here, where they ought to be and 
 probably are as well educated and intelligent as in most parts of 
 the South, who can't read, is really astounding ; and I should need 
 to have great faith in a person's accuracy to believe what I have 
 seen, did he relate it to me, not having seen it myself. I asked a 
 man to-day, of about the mental calibre by nature of our sensible 
 Berkshire farmers, how it was possible that he and so many 
 others were so ignorant, and that their children were brought up in 
 the same way. He said they never had a chance to ' get learn 
 ing,' that there were no free schools, and they could not afford 
 to send their children to any others. I asked if he knew many 
 people about here who could read, and he answered, ' There a'n't 
 many sure.' But I did not need his assurance of the fact; for 
 though the country is not thickly settled, and I only see those who 
 come into town by the one small road we are on, I have certainly 
 
William Dwiglit Sedgwick. 185 
 
 given passes to fifty who could not read what I wrote for them ; 
 yet this is the * sacred soil/ sacred to the memory of Washington 
 and one or two other good men, but desecrated by the barbarous 
 influences of this damnable institution. If slavery were to be suc 
 cessful in this contest, I fear I should be driven into an utter aban 
 donment of all my faith in Providence. But if, for our own sins, 
 we have yet a long and hard struggle before us, I am willing to 
 accept it, so that we work our way through the darkness into light 
 at last ; and I think I could lay down my life cheerfully, if need 
 be, could I but die in the full faith that the inal result of the con 
 test would be to plant the system our fathers founded more firmly, 
 and purified from the canker that has corrupted it and endangered 
 its existence." 
 
 "HEAD-QUARTERS, December 26, 1861. 
 
 " War with England seems to me not unlikely, though I have 
 been very slow to believe in it. If it comes, we must bid good by 
 to the hope of a speedy peace, and every man who can will have 
 to turn soldier. Were it not for my wife and children, and for you 
 
 and , I should require only the assurance that the North 
 
 would continue in harmonious action to put forth its entire strength, 
 to enable me to accept cheerfully the prospect of a war which, if we 
 can keep under honest guidance, can but result in our coming out 
 of it the strongest of all the nations of the earth; but which, if poli 
 ticians and the traditional clinging to slavery-sympathies on the 
 part of so many of our Northern people tear us asunder, will grind 
 us to powder. If such is to be the result, we must accept it, believ 
 ing that, though we cannot interpret God's designs or appreciate 
 the tendency of the means he uses, his designs will yet be carried 
 out, and that we, his instruments, are doing his work, whether we 
 judge rightly or wrongly the immediate or proximate issue of our 
 deeds. Leave me the faith I have now that we are engaged in 
 a righteous war, and I shall never allow myself to despair; and 
 as yet I am very far from that point." 
 
 In another letter, written to his father-in-law in January, 
 1862, he says : 
 
 " There has been much reason for disappointment lately, but I 
 am not disheartened, and let not go one jot or tittle of my faith. 
 
186 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 This lukewarmness, this dreadful, silly fear of hurting people who 
 would never scruple at placing their feet upon our necks and grind 
 ing our heads into dust if they should get the opportunity, is a dis 
 ease of the national mind. But I believe it is a curable disease 
 and will be cured ; and I shall not mourn as one having no hope, 
 though I do chafe and fret that this obscuration of people's intellect 
 does not clear away all at once. I am afraid government does 
 not recognize as yet the truth that slavery must fall, and that by 
 attacking the enemy in every weak point, *and by stern measures 
 of confiscation whenever practicable, the success of our cause is 
 assured, which milder means will fail to bring about. I should be 
 glad to have the war last ten years, if it must, so that its end may 
 leave slavery in its death-throes. And I do not propose to abandon 
 the cause while life and strength are spared me ; for I believe it to 
 be a holy one, and devised of God, however much unholiness min 
 gles with it, as it mingles with everything involving the joint action 
 of masses of men in this world." 
 
 " CAMP NEAR YORKTOWN, VIRGINIA, April 13, 1862. 
 
 " . . . . For myself, I have no presentiment that I shall fall ; and 
 if I do, it will be Heaven's will. If I should lose a leg or an arm, I 
 should not consider that I had made any too great sacrifice to the 
 country's cause ; and I hardly feel as if I should regret it 
 
 "I am delighted, dear mother, that you do not allow 'yourself to 
 feel unnecessarily anxious about me. I shall do my duty, but I 
 shall not commit any folly of bravado, and shall survive this war 
 unless Heaven wills otherwise ; in which case we shall all be ready 
 cheerfully to submit ourselves." 
 
 "HEAD-QUARTERS, &c., FAIR OAKS, June 11, 1862. 
 " DEAREST MOTHER, I had your sweet letter, written after 
 you had seen Mr. Laflin, day before yesterday. It gave me a 
 lively impression of the far greater anxiety, and consequent suffer 
 ing, entailed by war upon those at home than upon those who go 
 out to fight. We, as soldiers are, or ought to be, proof against all 
 uneasiness, except in certain trying moments, which come compar 
 atively rarely, and when the occasion passes, the feeling of care 
 passes also ; but you at home, expecting constantly news of a battle 
 fought, and having to wait long for certain intelligence of the 
 result, after it has been fought, are worse off. I feel as if my 
 
William DwigU SedgwicJc. 187 
 
 sympathy were due to you more than yours to me. But I trust 
 you will not fail in adhering to your habitual serene faith. Think 
 of me, always, until you know to the contrary, as destined to be 
 restored to you, safe and sound. It will be quite time enough to 
 grieve when the occasion calls for it. War, with its deadly instru 
 ments and missiles, is far less dangerous than it seems. If one of 
 our Fourth-of-July cannon were accidentally loaded with shell, and 
 the shell should happen to burst near a group of persons, without 
 injuring any, the newspapers and the town-talk would call it mirac 
 ulous or providential. A hundred similar miracles at least have 
 happened to us within the last three days ; a hundred shell have 
 exploded, or have passed screeching by without exploding, over 
 ground covered with troops, wagons, and horses ; result, one or 
 two horses wounded, and a few darkies and camp-followers (per 
 haps a few soldiers) badly scared. 
 
 " . . . . General Howard, who lost his arm on Sunday, is a very 
 interesting man, scarcely older than I am, and the only army 
 officer I have met who could properly be designated by the appel 
 lation of a ' consistent Christian ' ; brave as the bravest, honestly 
 and unaffectedly believing that his life is in God's hands, and that 
 it is, to speak more expressively than elegantly, none of his 
 business whether he lives or dies, provided he is doing his duty. 
 Army officers who swear as habitually as Howard prays speak of 
 him with great affection and esteem." 
 
 These few extracts from his letters can only serve to 
 show what he was as a patriot, how clear and sound and 
 good his judgment, and how well, even in the beginning 
 of the war, and in some of the darkest times of it, he fore 
 saw with the eyes of his spirit the triumph of his country, 
 which he was not destined to share. His letters, of which 
 there remain a large number, seem to preserve to his 
 friends a living part of him, and have the great charm of 
 giving always a true and striking portrait of the mood and 
 moment in which they were written. Many are overflow 
 ing with pleasantry and humor, all with the tenderness 
 and kindness of his heart. Some show an uncommon talent 
 for the description of nature, as well as for the delineation of 
 
188 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 character ; and his way of expressing himself is always hap 
 py, clear, and natural. In these, written to his most inti 
 mate friends, he freely gives his religious sentiments, his 
 views of life and destiny ; and all he says is pervaded by 
 the generous and noble spirit from which it flows. 
 
 In his military career, he found a great advantage in hav 
 ing formerly hardened and disciplined his body by all manly 
 exercises, so that he was better prepared for the great ex 
 posure and fatigue that broke down many delicate con 
 stitutions. Great physical courage seemed born with him, 
 and was so natural that he never knew the nervousness 
 and timidity of more sensitive natures ; but it helped him, 
 no doubt, to acquire that higher moral courage which acts 
 independently of the judgment, the approval or blame of 
 others, and which has as its aim only that which the 
 mind has once recognized as right and duty. He thought 
 so little what others might think or say of him, that his 
 actions never seemed influenced by it ; and he not only 
 appeared always perfectly natural, self-possessed, and with 
 out restraint himself, but had also the happy gift to take 
 restraint and reserve from others, and to awaken confi 
 dence, kind feelings, and good humor. He soon became, 
 therefore, very popular among his fellow-officers and his 
 inferiors, as he had been always where he lived. 
 
 His personal appearance was prepossessing, his figure tall 
 and strongly built, and his face well expressed his charac 
 ter. It was at once a very manly and a very sweet face, 
 with dark, expressive eyes, and handsome, regular features ; 
 and the refinement, the inborn nobility of his soul, and the 
 high idea to which he devoted the end of his life, had set 
 their stamp upon it. In his military service, his duties 
 were always promptly and cheerfully fulfilled; and camp 
 life, which throws men and officers so intimately together, 
 gave him many opportunities to do kind offices to others. 
 His firmness and gentleness made him also a desirable as 
 sistant when amputations and difficult operations among 
 
William Dwight Sedgwick. 189 
 
 the wounded were to be performed. He had formerly, in 
 the universities, steeled his nerves by witnessing such pain 
 ful scenes, after he once found he was very weak in looking 
 at the sufferings of others, and needed some self-discipline 
 to acquire that perfect composure which he thought every 
 man ought to have. How quietly and manfully he bore 
 his pain, his own words show (written in his diary), when 
 he lay in the great agony of his mortal wound on the bat 
 tle-field of Antietam. 
 
 " While trying to rally our men, a musket-ball struck me in the 
 small of my back, and I fell from my horse. As I write this, I have 
 been lying here more than an hour, powerless to move my right leg. 
 I think the wound must be mortal. I have been praying God to 
 forgive my sins, to bless and comfort my darling wife and children, 
 my dearest mother and sisters. As I have been lying here in very 
 great pain, shells have been bursting close to me almost constantly. 
 I wish my friends to know that I have fallen while doing my duty 
 as well as was possible, which I can truly assert, and that I have 
 not uttered a groan as yet, lying alone on the hard ground, in the 
 sun, with no friend near." 
 
 Eight hours he remained in this same position, till found 
 by his friends. He was carried into a farm-house, where he 
 received the kindest treatment. His mother and sister had 
 the consolation of being with him during his last sickness, 
 and present at his death ; not so his wife, who learned her 
 misfortune only at the moment of her arrival from Europe. 
 He left behind him three little girls, the youngest of whom 
 he had never seen. He probably little thought, when he 
 wrote, two days before the battle of Antietam, in a letter 
 which alludes to the want of sleep he had undergone, " 0, 
 how I long for a few hours' assured rest ! " how soon his 
 eyes should close in the last deepest sleep, from which 
 there is no more awakening. Many were the hearts that 
 mourned his death, and many the tears that were shed at 
 his early grave. 
 
190 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1852. 
 HENRY HILL DOWNES. 
 
 Private 124th Illinois Vols. (Infantry), August 11, 1862 ; died at 
 Vicksburg, Miss., September 26, 1864, of disease contracted in the service. 
 
 HENRY HILL DOWNES was born at Boston, Novem 
 ber 24, 1830. He was the son of Commodore John 
 Downes, U. S. N., and Maria Gertrude (Hoffman) Downes. 
 Not long after his birth, his parents removed to Charles- 
 town, Massachusetts, where he resided till he graduated at 
 Harvard. He was fitted for college at the Chauncey Hall 
 School, in Boston, with the exception of a few months pre 
 vious to his admission, which were passed under the in 
 struction of George P. Sanger, Esq. He entered Harvard 
 in the year 1849, joining the Class of 1852 in the second 
 term of its Freshman year. Here those social qualities, 
 courteous manners, and that kindly disposition, which had 
 secured him so many friends while at school, still continued 
 to make him popular. 
 
 After leaving college he decided to fit himself for the 
 profession of the law, and for this purpose entered the 
 office of Charles B. Goodrich, Esq. He was admitted to 
 the bar of Suffolk County, and began to practise in 1855. 
 He did not, however, long remain in Boston, but finding 
 advancement rather slow, sought a more promising field 
 for the exercise of his talents at Detroit, Michigan. There 
 he remained but a year, and in 1857 removed to Grand 
 Rapids, in the same State, where he continued to practise 
 his profession till the winter of 1859-60, when he again 
 changed his residence to Davenport, Iowa. He was there 
 appointed Clerk of the Court of Common Pleas, and held 
 this office till his removal to Quincy, Illinois, where he was 
 living at the time of his enlistment in the Union army, 
 
Henry Hill Downes. 191 
 
 August 11, 1862. He joined the One Hundred and Twenty- 
 fourth Illinois Volunteers as a private, and continued to 
 perform his military duties in the army of Major-General 
 Grant till his last sickness. 
 
 He died September 26, 1864, in the United States Hos 
 pital at Vicksburg, Mississippi, of malarial fever. He had 
 labored faithfully and fought well ; and it is matter of sat 
 isfaction to his friends, as it was to himself, that he lived 
 to see the successful result of that long and glorious cam 
 paign which ended in the freedom of the Mississippi. His 
 patriotism was ardent and devoted, and he felt that his 
 country deserved every sacrifice that he could offer. 
 
192 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 SAMUEL FOSTER HAVEN, JR. 
 
 Assistant Surgeon 15th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), August 5, 1861 ; Sur 
 geon, July 21, 1862; killed at Fredericksburg, Va., December 13, 1862. 
 
 THE subject of this sketch was born in Dedham, Massa 
 chusetts, in the house of his grandfather, the Hon. 
 Samuel Haven, May 20, 1831. His father, S. F. Haven, 
 Esq., has been for many years librarian of the American 
 Antiquarian Society, at Worcester. His mother was the 
 daughter of the Rev. Freeman Sears of Natick, Massa 
 chusetts, who died early in life, after a brief settlement in 
 that place. She died when Foster was not quite five years 
 old. 
 
 Fortunately, at that tender age, the friend from whom 
 his mother, an orphan, had received her intellectual and 
 moral culture, in the most important period of her life, ex 
 tended to him the same kind care, and watched over his 
 early development with equal interest and affection. What 
 ever elevated and generous sentiments it is possible to culti 
 vate in the mind of a child, she labored to implant or nur 
 ture. She kept a journal of her experiences in the process 
 of guiding and enlightening his spontaneous mental opera 
 tions, which evinces her devoted affection, and has a strik 
 ing moral and metaphysical significance. The wide cir 
 cle of the friends and acquaintances of this lady (Miss 
 Elizabeth P. Peabody) will readily understand how every 
 intellectual germ which could be nourished into a principle 
 of devotion to duty or chivalrous self-sacrifice or heroic 
 aspiration would receive an impulse and a direction from 
 her hand which could never be wholly lost ; and in this 
 case the noble fruition of the life of her pupil bears ample 
 testimony to the success of her early cultivation. 
 
 The details of the life of a child are, perhaps, applicable 
 
Samuel Foster Haven, Jr. 193 
 
 to a notice of his maturity only in the general way of 
 showing the influence of early training on his more devel 
 oped character and actions. And in this connection it 
 may be appropriately remarked, that the record of Foster's 
 child-life, as kept by his devoted friend, displays many 
 touching incidents of tender, confiding affection, and 
 evinces a truthfulness of spirit, an unwearied and almost 
 systematic inquisitiveness, and a power of self-absorption 
 in an idea, very unusual in a child ; all of which traits 
 were eminently characteristic of his mature years. 
 
 The subsequent portion of his childhood, previous to his 
 residence in Worcester, he passed in the care of his grand 
 parents at Dedham, and at the family school of Rev. Mr. 
 Kimball, in an adjoining town. He went to Worcester in 
 1839, his father having removed thither two years before, 
 and received the remainder of his preparatory education 
 in the public schools of that city. 
 
 At the age of seventeen he entered Harvard College, and 
 graduated in the Class of 1852, the last of four successive 
 generations of his name and family in the Catalogue of the 
 Alumni of that University. Soon after graduation he en 
 tered upon his medical studies as the pupil of Dr. Henry 
 Sargent of Worcester, and subsequently became a member 
 of the Tremont Street Medical Class in Boston. During 
 the last year of his pupilage he held the position of house 
 physician in the Massachusetts General Hospital. In. the 
 autumn of 1855, having taken his degree of Doctor in 
 Medicine, he visited Europe, and spent nearly two years 
 in assiduous devotion to his studies, giving especial atten 
 tion to his favorite branch of Ophthalmology in London, 
 Paris, Vienna, and Berlin. 
 
 Previous to going abroad he published an essay on " In 
 testinal Obstruction," which is still esteemed a valuable con 
 tribution to medical literature. After his return from Eu 
 rope he established himself in practice in Boston, and while 
 there read before the Suffolk District Medical Society an 
 
 VOL. I. 13 
 
194 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 essay on " Cysticerci within the Eye," which was also found 
 worthy of publication. Although in Boston but a short 
 time, his stay was long enough to leave a grateful remem 
 brance of his kindness and charity among the poor of his 
 neighborhood, to which his medical successor bears cheerful 
 testimony. Yet so reticent was he about all things that 
 might seem to be creditable to himself, and so entirely 
 pure-minded in his generosities, that not even his own 
 father knew of his charitable habits, till after his death. 
 
 In the spring of 1858 he removed to Worcester, and there 
 established himself in practice, intending to give special at 
 tention to diseases of the eye. Here he remained until he 
 entered the army. 
 
 Although, owing to his peculiarly fastidious and retiring 
 nature, he was not widely known in his profession, he had 
 acquired an enviable reputation among his medical breth 
 ren, as well for his powers of investigation as for his scien 
 tific attainments ; while his moral worth secured for him the 
 respect of all who knew him, and his ingenuousness of 
 heart attracted the warm affection of the small circle of 
 his intimate friends. 
 
 Dr. Haven was essentially a student all his life. His 
 mental organization and moral qualities admirably fitted him 
 for scientific research. He was endowed with a subtlety 
 of discrimination, a love for, and facility in, minute obser 
 vation, a power of handling details, an honesty of purpose, 
 and a rare industry, fidelity, and perseverance, that could 
 not fail of success in this department. His thoroughness 
 was remarkable. He seemed unable to slight anything. 
 All his works were finished with the elaborate nicety of a 
 Dutch painting. 
 
 With these characteristics, combined with attainments 
 that were remarkable in his special department and very 
 excellent in all branches of medicine, he might well look 
 forward to distinction as a man of science, while his train 
 ing, his decided mechanical ingenuity, and his coolness 
 
Samuel Foster Haven, Jr. 195 
 
 gave promise of eminence in the more practical walks of a 
 surgical operator. 
 
 He entertained especially fastidious notions about the 
 dignity of his profession, and was exceedingly careful to 
 avoid even the appearance of those tricks and devices 
 which are not infrequently resorted to by practitioners to 
 draw public attention upon themselves. It was a part of 
 his thoroughness and conscientiousness to prefer the solid 
 success that professional ability is sure in the end to attain, 
 to the more dazzling and ephemeral kind sometimes brought 
 about by magnetic personal attractions or the loud praises 
 and skilful manoeuvres of active friends. 
 
 He was not merely a professional man. His culture was 
 wide for a person of his years and labors. Besides his col 
 lege acquaintance with the classics, which he kept up to 
 a considerable extent, he was in a measure familiar with 
 the literature of France and Germany, and was also, about 
 the time he entered the army, studying Italian, that he 
 might enjoy the poets of that language in their original 
 tongue. In matters of art his taste was pure and classic. 
 His power of versification was considerable ; and he was not 
 without some skill as a draughtsman, which, under cultiva 
 tion, might have ripened into an ability above mediocrity. 
 
 He had a strong taste for authorship ; and, after spending 
 many months in preparation, he had carried one manuscript 
 to an advanced stage, without the knowledge of any one 
 save those whom he was obliged to consult, and had made 
 a contract for its publication, just as the war broke out. 
 His desire to see this launched was the strongest obstacle 
 to his entering the service, though it caused no hesitation 
 in his conduct. It was an account of printers and printing 
 in this country prior to the Revolution, with a catalogue of 
 publications, revised and extended from Isaiah Thomas's 
 " History of Printing." His manuscript is now in the pos 
 session of the American Antiquarian Society, and it is 
 hoped may yet be published. 
 
196 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 How industriously he pursued his studies was never un 
 derstood until an examination of his papers after his death 
 revealed it. Among them were found copious and careful 
 notes upon a variety of subjects, evincing a wonderful de 
 gree of assiduity and thoroughness. That this was not 
 appreciated in his lifetime is due to his exceeding reticence 
 and to his peculiar methods of labor. It was one of his 
 frequent remarks, that he must work in his own way or he 
 could do nothing, and his own way was usually an original 
 method. 
 
 But overtopping his intellectual abilities and aesthetic 
 culture was a spirit of singular simplicity, gentleness, and 
 heroism, associated, however, with a shyness of disposition 
 and fastidiousness of taste that to some extent restrained its 
 free action. He was almost childlike in the guilelessness 
 of his life and the naturalness of his emotions. Quiet and 
 undemonstrative in temperament, his thorough amiability 
 and warm affection manifested themselves much more in 
 practical acts of kindness than in noisy profession or senti 
 mental talk. Truthful to an extreme, in word and deed, 
 he could not bend himself to suit the tastes of others, nor 
 easily adapt himself to varying circumstances. Sensitive 
 in his nature, judging always by the standard of perfection, 
 and influenced by a noticeable aversion to all shams and in 
 sincerity, he saw much in the world that shocked him, and 
 much in those around him with which he did not care to be 
 come intimate. Yet there was nothing of the cynic in his 
 disposition, nor did he take upon himself the duties of public 
 or private censor. Whatever offended his taste or his sense 
 of right seemed to pain rather than anger him, and caused 
 him to retire sorrowfully within himself, yet with a heart 
 ready and anxious to forgive as soon as his judgment should 
 assent. With this temperament and these tastes, it is not 
 strange that he shrank from rough contact with the world, 
 and that his circle of intimate friends was not large, nor 
 that in that circle he was the most warm-hearted, sympa 
 thetic, and trustworthy. 
 
Samuel Foster Haven, Jr. 197 
 
 But his conscientiousness was, perhaps, the most striking 
 of his moral characteristics. With him the appreciation of 
 a duty insured its performance, no matter what the cost or 
 self-sacrifice involved. United with it was a certain chiv- 
 alrousness of spirit, under the influence of which, shy and 
 gentle as he was, he was ready to do and suffer anything in 
 the defence and performance of what he deemed the right. 
 
 Though to a man thus constituted a military life could 
 present but few attractions, Dr. Haven did not hesitate 
 when the appeal came for troops. Duty seemed to call him, 
 and that was enough. Appointed Assistant Surgeon of the 
 Fifteenth Massachusetts Regiment, the first regiment of 
 three years' troops recruited in Worcester County, he 
 cheerfully departed for the seat of war in August, 1861, 
 never again to return to the city of his residence, until, 
 nearly eighteen months afterwards, he was borne through 
 its hushed streets, with solemn honors, to his lowly resting- 
 place. 
 
 Space will not permit to follow Surgeon Haven with any 
 thing like minuteness through his military career. Only a 
 few of the many facts and incidents at hand can be used, 
 illustrating the character of his devotion to duty. 
 
 Though in the service about a year and a half, he never 
 asked leave of absence to revisit his home, nor, it is be 
 lieved, was he ever absent from his post for a single day, 
 except on imperative business. Much of the time while 
 Assistant Surgeon, owing to the illness or absence of his 
 superior medical officer, he had the sole charge of the 
 sick and wounded of his regiment ; yet his letters do not 
 breathe one word of complaint, nor even a suggestion that 
 his path of duty was a hard one. 
 
 He early arrived at the conviction, eventually fatal to 
 himself, that it was the duty of a surgeon to follow his 
 regiment into actual battle, so that he might be near at 
 hand to succor the wounded. The counter-argument, that 
 on a battle-field the life of a surgeon was much more val- 
 
198 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 uable than that of any one whom he would be likely to save 
 by this undue exposure, and the representation that the 
 wounded might be readily brought to him in some place of 
 comparative safety, availed nothing. His opinion was in 
 flexible ; and he ever acted upon it with an utter disregard 
 of danger, that would have won distinguished promotion 
 to any line officer in the service. 
 
 At Ball's Bluff, indeed, he was not with his regiment in 
 the conflict itself; but, in his station on Harrison's Island 
 in the middle of the Potomac, he was by no means out of 
 danger ; for at one time, as he says in his short letter of 
 October 24th, " the bullets poured in upon us like hail 
 stones." Another brief extract from the same letter shows 
 how little he regarded himself. One of the boats in which 
 the wounded were removed had swamped. " It seemed an 
 impossibility to get the wounded off before morning, and 
 we were sure of being shelled out by daylight. Dr. H. 
 [Dr. Hayward of the Twentieth Massachusetts Volunteers] 
 and I decided to remain and be taken, and get off what 
 men we could." This calamity was fortunately averted. 
 
 At Yorktown, the next summer, he put his principle of 
 conduct into literal application, in coolly taking his seat on 
 a log a few feet in the rear of his regiment, one day when 
 it was supporting a battery, equally regardless of the shells 
 of the enemy and the solicitations of his brother surgeons, 
 who besought him to fall back with them but a few rods to 
 a place of security. 
 
 At Fair Oaks he bore himself with distinguished intre 
 pidity, attending to his surgical duties in the very midst of 
 the conflict, while wounded and unwounded men, with 
 whom he was conversing, were shot dead at his feet. His 
 personal experiences on that eventful day, did space permit 
 the detailing of them, would be highly interesting, though 
 in his letter to his father he says, with characteristic shy 
 ness, they " concern nobody but you and me." 
 
 From Harrison's Landing, under date of July 13, 1862, 
 he writes : 
 
Samuel Foster Haven, Jr. 199 
 
 " I am surprised to hear from you, that my name has been men 
 tioned in connection with the Thirty-fourth [a new regiment then 
 forming]. I am obliged to my friends that may have suggested it ; 
 but I really do not wish to leave the Fifteenth. There is already 
 evidence of too much desire on the part of officers to get leave of 
 absence for the sake of procuring higher appointments in new regi 
 ments." 
 
 He was soon after rewarded for his constancy by being 
 promoted to the surgeonship of his own regiment, on the 
 resignation of Dr. Bates. 
 
 His personal adventures at Antietam cannot be made 
 more interesting than in his own words, under date of Sep 
 tember 24, 1862 : 
 
 "As our brigade advanced in line of battle, under fire from 
 the Rebel batteries, General Gorman (why I know not) ordered 
 me to the left of the line, thus bringing me with the Thirty-fourth 
 New York Regiment. This regiment became first engaged with the 
 enemy, and partly from the deadly fire, and partly from the break 
 ing of the regiment on its left (of another brigade), the Thirty-fourth 
 gave way itself. "With other officers, I did my best to rally the 
 men, and only with partial success. General Sedgwick, who was 
 at this part of the line, had his horse shot, and was wounded in two 
 places. I looked at his wounds, and advised him to go to the rear ; 
 but he would not, and I then offered him my horse, but his wrist 
 was broken, and he could not well ride 
 
 " During this time the rest of the brigade had become separated, 
 and were far to the right. I rode hither and thither all over the 
 field, trying in vain to find the Fifteenth. At last I stumbled upon 
 all that was left, about one hundred and seventy-five men. [They 
 went into battle with five hundred and eighty-three men, and lost 
 three hundred and twenty-one killed and wounded, and twenty-four 
 missing.] 
 
 " . . . . The Colonel desired me to try and get the body of Cap 
 tain Simonds, which had been brought part way back. Taking an 
 ambulance, I found it, and while putting it in was called some way 
 
 to the front to see Colonel Wristar of the California Regiment 
 
 While hastily dressing their wounds, word was brought that the 
 
200 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Rebel skirmishers were close upon us. Colonel Wristar thought he 
 could walk, but while helping him out he Fainted, and I had just 
 brought him to, when his own surgeon appeared. 
 
 " . . . . The fight was expected to be renewed the next morning, 
 but both sides rested on their arms. A lot of our killed and 
 wounded lay beyond our lines, and within those of the Rebels. I 
 made several vain efforts to get at them, and particularly to find 
 Tom Spurr, riding even beyond our own pickets, and within half- 
 gunshot distance of the Rebel pickets, who were in plain sight. 
 Towards night I went, with Colonel Lee of the Twentieth, and a 
 flag of truce, over to the Rebels to get permission to bury our dead 
 and carry off the wounded. We parleyed some time with several 
 staff officers, and finally with General Fitz-Hugh Lee himself; but 
 permission would not be given, unless an arrangement had been 
 made between the commanders of the two forces themselves. 
 
 " During the night the enemy retreated, and early in the morn 
 ing we went over and found our dead and wounded, an awful 
 sight. The Rebels, however, had been kind to our wounded, and 
 got them in and around a barn with large haystacks." 
 
 Surgeon Haven's last hasty note (from Falmouth, oppo 
 site Fredericksburg) bears date December 9th. At the 
 close of it, he thus refers to the preparatory orders for the 
 disastrous battle of the 13th : 
 
 " We have this moment received orders to have to-morrow morn 
 ing, right after breakfast, three days' rations issued to officers and 
 men, and sixty rounds of ammunition to each man. This looks like 
 moving, and it remains to be seen what will be done." 
 
 What was done can be read, not only in his own epitaph, 
 but in the broken hearts and desolate homes of, alas ! how 
 many. A portion of the sad story can best be told in the 
 words of his superior officer, Surgeon Sherman. After 
 speaking of his " sacrifices to duty," and " utter disregard 
 of danger," he says : 
 
 " Witnessing his self-exposure at the battle of Antietam, I had, 
 as Medical Director of the Second Division, detailed your son, in a 
 written order, in the event of a battle, to repair to the Division 
 
Samuel Foster Haven, Jr. 201 
 
 Hospital, and give his services there instead of in the field with his 
 regiment. When I communicated this order to your son, he evi 
 dently felt disappointed. He expressed a strong choice to go wher 
 ever his regiment went ; and when the column to which the Fif 
 teenth Massachusetts was attached was about to pass over the 
 bridge in front of Fredericksburg, he was expostulated with, and 
 reminded of the previous order ; but he asked as a special favor to 
 be allowed to go with his regiment, and said that as soon as the 
 fight was done, he would return to the hospital and remain there." 
 
 Only a short time after, while marching through the 
 streets of the city by the side of his regiment, toward the 
 position assigned it in that day's battle, he was struck in 
 the leg by a casual shell from the enemy's batteries. Taken 
 back to the nearest hospital, it was for a time hoped that an 
 amputation might save his life ; but he never rallied from 
 the shock. And so, cheerful in his agony, upheld by the 
 consciousness of duty performed, in that shattered building, 
 even then rent by an occasional shell, adding fresh confu 
 sion and horror to the scene, surrounded by the dying 
 and dead, amid the groans of those to assuage whose early 
 pangs he had ventured and suffered all, the patriot passed 
 away ; and his gentle spirit, answering to the roll-call of the 
 mighty cannonade, took its place in the great army which 
 that night encamped in the heavenly fields. 
 
 The following verses, inscribed to the memory of Dr. 
 Haven, appeared in the Worcester Spy, of December 30, 
 1862, and were understood to have been written by Rev. D. 
 A. Wasson : 
 
 " With skilful touch he turned away 
 Death's wishful hand from wounded men ; 
 But when was done that doleful day, 
 The living laid him with the slain. 
 
 " Thy hurt to heal, O native land ! 
 What mortal might he did and dared ; 
 And when all service of his hand 
 Seemed not enough, his heart he bared, 
 
202 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 u And laid his life upon thy hurt, 
 By losing all, to make thee whole ; 
 But could not lose his high desert 
 And place on Memory's record-roll. 
 
 " And when that sacred roll she calls, 
 The word, perchance, will reach his ear, 
 And he shall from the eternal halls, 
 Among God's angels, answer, ' Here ! ' 
 
 " We will not deem his life was brief, 
 For noble death is length of days ; 
 The sun that ripens autumn's sheaf 
 Has poured a summer's wealth of rays." 
 
William Sturgis Hooper. 203 
 
 WILLIAM STURGIS HOOPER. 
 
 Vol. A. D. C. (rank of Captain), Major-General Banks's Staff, De 
 cember 4, 1862; died at Boston, September 24, 1863, of disease con 
 tracted in the service. 
 
 WILLIAM STURGIS HOOPER was born in Boston, 
 March 3, 1833. The name of his father, Samuel 
 Hooper, has been for many years as familiar in the com 
 mercial world as it is now in the affairs of the nation. His 
 mother was Anne, daughter of William Sturgis, whose early 
 career, as one of the pioneers of our commerce in the Pa 
 cific, and whose later prominence among Boston merchants, 
 are well known in the community. Both by his father's 
 and mother's line the subject of this sketch was allied to a 
 race of merchants ; and the taste and faculty for business 
 which his manhood developed had been born in him, and 
 had grown with his growth. 
 
 In his early school-days there was little of interest, and 
 of those days he afterwards had no cheerful recollection. 
 Not of robust constitution, possessing little rude childish 
 energy, never " a boy among boys," he shrank from all the 
 roughness of school life with the same sensitiveness which 
 later, as a man in contact with men, he strove faithfully 
 and successfully to conquer. Still he was never effemi 
 nate, and he very early manifested the fondness for field 
 sports and all sorts of out-of-door life which he always re 
 tained. His summers in the country, or on the sea-shore, 
 where he was his father's companion in walking and fish 
 ing, and his mother's pupil in books, and in many things 
 not taught from books, were the pleasantest portions of this 
 period of his life. As a child, he was ardent in whatever he 
 undertook, but with .an underlying sweetness and patience, 
 and had an older and more serious air than his years would 
 warrant. 
 
204 Harvard Memorial Biographies.- 
 
 Afterwards he attended the school of Mr. Francis Phelps, 
 a well-known teacher of Boston, who bears testimony to his 
 excellent character and mind, and to his fidelity as a stu 
 dent. He entered the Boston Latin School in September, 
 1844, at the age of eleven, and remained there until the 
 spring of 1848, and continued his preparatory studies for 
 the University for a few months with Mr. John B. Felton, 
 of the Class of 1847, and finished them with his cousin, Mr. 
 Nathaniel L. Hooper, of the Class of 1846. He entered 
 Harvard in the autumn of 1849, at the age of sixteen, join 
 ing the Class of 1852, then commencing its Sophomore 
 year. 
 
 His unboyish temperament had at this time developed 
 into a rather premature manhood. He already had the air 
 of a man of the world ; and it was a common remark among 
 his classmates that he entered college thirty years old, and 
 grew younger every year. He remained in Cambridge 
 until the end of the first Senior term. As a scholar he 
 took a less prominent position than many men of far duller 
 intellect and smaller attainments, and he perhaps felt less 
 interest in the regular classical and mathematical curricu 
 lum, by which rank is usually obtained, than he would 
 have taken in a more immediately practical course. Still 
 he was faithful in his attention to the college exercises, and 
 his standing, if not high, was respectable. Of the modern 
 languages, and especially of German, he was very fond, and 
 he laid up in his memory at this time a stock of German 
 ballads which he never lost. 
 
 One rarely sees a more quiet college career than Sturgis 
 Hooper's. Refined in his manners and tastes, singularly 
 exempt from youthful vices, having the utmost dislike for 
 the dissipations which Sophomores often consider manly 
 and the vulgarities which they often think gentlemanly, 
 joining no convivial clubs, but having his door always open 
 to those classmates whose tastes were congenial with his 
 own, and freely accepting their hospitalities, he went on 
 
William Sturgis Hooper. 205 
 
 his way, a little apart from the stir and hum around him, 
 but never repellent or exclusive. The resolutions which 
 the Class adopted upon his death speak of him thus : 
 
 " Less familiarly known to most of us than almost any other of 
 the Class, he yet commanded the esteem of all ; and though, partly 
 from the shortness of his connection with us and partly from his 
 natural reserve, he acquired few intimacies, he was remarkably 
 happy in never attracting a single enmity. Respected by all fcr 
 his purity of life, his aversion to whatever was ignoble or degrad 
 ing, his proud contempt of all evasion and indirection, his scorn of 
 hypocrisies and shams, he at the same time won the cordial affec 
 tion and friendship of those who were best enabled to know 
 and feel the warmth of his heart, the gentleness of his courtesy, 
 and his earnest enthusiasm for whatever was good or beautiful or 
 true." 
 
 In social life he had the cultivation and breeding of a 
 much older man, and his conversation was rarely trivial 
 or uninteresting. In the society of women he was espe 
 cially at ease. Faith in their purity and delicacy was one 
 of the cardinal points of his creed. He never thought or 
 spoke of them but with respect, and he was always impa 
 tient of any indecorous or derogatory allusion to them by 
 others. 
 
 His favorite indoor recreation, while in college and af 
 terwards, was chess, in which he became proficient. He 
 was especially skilful in exercises requiring accuracy of 
 eye and dexterity of hand, a capital draughtsman, an ex 
 pert driver, an excellent helmsman of a boat, and rarely 
 equalled in billiard-playing or in shooting with pistol or 
 rifle. His fondness for out-of-door pursuits driving, rid 
 ing, hunting, fishing, and boating had now supplied the 
 place of the athletic energy in which he was naturally de 
 ficient. 
 
 Hooper obtained from the Faculty leave of absence for 
 the last term of the Senior year, for the purpose of making 
 a voyage in a new ship which his father was about to de- 
 
206 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 spatch to California and China, and sailed from Boston in 
 January, 1852. He had invited one of his classmates to 
 accompany him. Seldom has the world been circumnavi 
 gated under pleasanter circumstances. It was as if college 
 rooms had been -carried on shipboard. College pursuits 
 were intermingled with the ordinary sea-life of a passenger, 
 half sailor play and half the dolce far niente. The 
 young men took their books with them, and perhaps did as 
 much hard study and reading under the fresh trade-winds 
 as they had ever done within the walls of Alma Mater. 
 History, navigation, mercantile law, and book-keeping took 
 their turns with modern languages, poetry, light literature, 
 and chess. Hooper kept up his rifle and pistol practice and 
 his drawing, and also spent a good deal of time in studying 
 and devising models for boats and ships. He applied him 
 self, moreover, to practical seamanship, and, as usual with 
 him, was not satisfied until he had proved to himself that 
 he could do with his own hands the work of which he un 
 derstood the theory. So, after spending a month very pleas 
 antly in California, partly at San Francisco and partly in 
 the mining regions, he shipped regularly as third mate of 
 the Courser for her voyage across the Pacific. The ex 
 periment was successful ; and after satisfying himself that 
 he could hold on to the yard-arm in a typhoon, he was 
 willing to return to his passenger-life for the homeward 
 trip from China. He reached home by the end of 1852, 
 spent the rest of the winter in Boston, took a trip in the 
 spring to the Southern States and Cuba (a journey which 
 he had taken once before, while in college), attended the 
 Law School in Cambridge during May and June, and went 
 to Europe with his family in July, 1853. He made the 
 tour of Great Britain and the Continent, saw everything and 
 admired what he saw, but found nothing to overturn his 
 love for America. " Those fellows," he writes, " who come 
 home full of Europe, and abusing America, are entirely 
 wrong. I am getting more certain of it every day." And 
 
William Sturgis Hooper. 207 
 
 again, to a friend who had rallied him on his ebullitions 
 of patriotism, " What do you suppose there is here to cool 
 one's patriotism ? I am ten times more proud of my coun 
 try than I ever was before." 
 
 His studies abroad were principally in the modern lan 
 guages and in drawing. The winter of 1853 - 54, spent in 
 Rome, was especially valuable in developing the artistic 
 taste which he had always shown. His skill in drawing 
 was something better than a mere mechanical accomplish 
 ment ; and his love and talent for art were in later years a 
 source of much pleasure and recreation amid the graver 
 cares of business. 
 
 In the autumn of 1854 his family returned home, while 
 he remained in Paris. Here he was attacked by a severe 
 disease of the intestines, which rendered a surgical opera 
 tion necessary. From the effects of this disease he never 
 recovered. It left him with a chronic weakness, and 
 implanted in his system the seeds of the consumption 
 which finally caused his death. But this severe experi 
 ence, which so enfeebled his body, left him in all else 
 ripened and strengthened. He had passed from boyhood 
 into manhood. 
 
 Hooper came home in the spring of 1855, and employed 
 the following eighteen months in a partially successful at 
 tempt to restore his health by hunting, yachting, and like 
 recreations. In the autumn of 1856 he found himself 
 well enough to go into business, and formed, with his cousin, 
 John H. Reed, the firm of Reed and Hooper, for the manage 
 ment and agency of the Bay State Iron Company, a con 
 nection which lasted until his death. For mercantile life 
 he was admirably adapted by character, by habit, and by 
 inherited taste and ability. He soon became most favor 
 ably known among business men, and was on the high road 
 to success. In October, 1857, he married Alice, the young 
 est daughter of Jonathan Mason, Esq. Their only child, 
 Isabella Weyman, was born in January, 1859. A happier 
 
208 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 domestic life would be hard to find. Had it not been for 
 the bodily disease which was constantly throwing its cloud 
 over him, it would seem as if fortune had now left him 
 nothing to desire. 
 
 From the very commencement of the Rebellion, he had 
 been anxious to bear his part in the war, but his feeble 
 health and urgent business were obstacles hard to sur 
 mount. The responsibilities of this business were rendered 
 more pressing than ever before, by the fact that the time 
 and thoughts of his senior partner were now much en 
 grossed by the duties of the office of Quartermaster-Gen 
 eral of Massachusetts, to which he had been appointed. 
 The possibility of deserting his counting-room being thus 
 for the time out of the question, Hooper accepted the situ 
 ation as patiently as he could. In April, 1861, he writes: 
 " Thus far I sit at my desk quietly, and have nothing more 
 to do with the war than reading the news in the papers. I 
 am very well contented that it is so, for the present ; but 
 if this is to be such a war as it now promises to be, I do not 
 mean to do office-work forever. I suppose every one has a 
 strong desire to hear how shot that are sent in earnest 
 whistle." 
 
 So, for the first eighteen months of the struggle, Hooper 
 still remained at home, occupied with labors which had 
 now become distasteful, and rather chafing at the restraint. 
 At last the opportunity to go arose from the very condition 
 of health, which his friends had considered so grave an 
 objection to his entering the service. In the autumn of 
 1862 his physicians said that he must avoid the New Eng 
 land winter, and seek a warmer climate and a more open- 
 air life than he could have at home. They advised him to 
 go abroad ; but he knew a better way of leaving New Eng 
 land than that. He at once offered himself, and was accept 
 ed, as a Volunteer Aid to General Banks, whose expedition 
 was under orders for the South. He obtained from Gov 
 ernor Andrew an appointment as Assistant Adjutant-Gen- 
 
William Sturgis Hooper. 209 
 
 eral of Massachusetts, for the purpose of getting the rank 
 necessary to qualify him for the position he sought, and 
 joined General Banks's staif, with the rank of Captain. 
 The expedition sailed from New York on the 4th, and 
 arrived at New Orleans on the 16th of December, 1862. 
 
 Captain Hooper's letters to his family are of great inter 
 est, and give a clearer and more vivid picture of the state 
 of society and of feeling in the newly reconquered State, 
 of the difficulties that lay in the way of reconstruction, 
 and of the means by which General Banks was attempting 
 to overcome them, than can easily be found elsewhere. In 
 their personal relation, these letters, full of love for home 
 and wife and child, are tinged with no regret that he had 
 left them. Conscious of the great work of the hour, he is 
 fully content at being at last engaged in it. Yet, with his 
 characteristic modesty and tendency to disparage his own 
 impulses, he is unwilling to claim the credit of patriotism. 
 The fact that it was the necessity of leaving New England 
 on account of his health which finally gave him the long- 
 sought opportunity of entering the service, seems always 
 present to his mind. Thus, just after sailing, he writes : 
 
 " I never claimed the praise of going to the war from a sense of 
 duty ; and yet when I see, as I do here, men who are really leaving 
 all that home has pleasant for them from a real sense of duty, it 
 makes me ashamed almost of the motives which prompted me to 
 come, and at the same time gives me some satisfaction in thinking 
 that, if I am not acting from the same high motives that some 
 others are, I am at least doing the same thing, just as much as if 
 my motives were less personal." 
 
 Hooper and another officer were at first left at Ship 
 Island, to inspect and forward the ships and troops of the 
 expedition as they arrived. Probably no one ever found 
 that dreary sand-bank a comfortable place of abode, and 
 at this time it afforded little to eat except bread and pota 
 toes. Still he writes : 
 
 " I am having a pleasant time, the climate seems very healthy, 
 
 VOL. I. 14 
 
210 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 and the weather is superb. Of course I want to get off as soon as 
 possible, but I am quite contented to take things as they come." 
 
 They however remained at Ship Island only about ten 
 days, and were then transferred to New Orleans, where 
 Captain Hooper was assigned to duties in more immediate 
 connection with head-quarters. On December 28th he 
 writes : 
 
 " On Christmas day I received an order appointing me to fill 
 the vacancy caused by the resignation of Major Bell, the President 
 of the Sequestration Commission, (who went home with General 
 Butler,) which separates me at once from the Adjutant-General's 
 office, and gives me an office of my own, and the partial control 
 
 of an interesting and to me wonderful institution It is far 
 
 from being an unimportant thing in this vicinity, and I find my 
 hands as full of business, and my thinking powers taxed quite as 
 much as I care to have them. In fact, my only anxiety now is 
 lest I should not prove equal to the task assigned me ; but the best 
 I can I shall do, and I trust the General will be satisfied. The 
 General tells me this shall certainly not prevent my accompanying 
 him if he takes the field, which I feared until to-night it might." 
 
 In a letter written at midnight of December 31st he 
 says : 
 
 " Before going to bed I just picked up Tennyson, which was 
 lying on my table, and opening it at random, the first lines which 
 caught my eye were in In Memoriam : 
 
 * Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, 
 The flying cloud, the frosty light, 
 The year is dying in the night, 
 . Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.' 
 
 " They brought to my mind, what I had before forgotten, that this 
 is the last night of 1862, and this the last chance to write to you in 
 the old year ; so, though I ought to go to bed, I will sit up a little 
 while to cross, in imagination, the hundreds of miles of water, or of 
 land worse than water, which separate me from all I love most, 
 who are now, most likely, under a wilder sky than the clear, soft 
 evening air shows here. A year does not go by without bringing 
 much change to all of us. Certainly 1862 has brought change 
 
William Sturgis Hooper. 211 
 
 enough for you and me, and for many another beside; and 1863, 
 which begins to-morrow, what has he in store for us ? I suppose 
 my little Bel, if she is not too sound asleep, is dreaming now of all 
 the presents which 1863 will bring her to-morrow; and though 
 I don't expect any presents, I know that 1863 will have much for 
 you and me, too, of joy or sorrow, which we shall think as impor 
 tant to us as Bel's presents are to her. Thank God, we do not know 
 what it will be. Perhaps in his eyes it is of no more consequence 
 than Bel's presents seem to us. One thing gives me a pleasure 
 which I hardly expected old 1862 to leave for me, and that is the 
 belief that I am likely to be of some use here. I have not been 
 in the Sequestration Commission long enough to feel sure ; but I 
 think now the chances are that I may do some good there, and it is 
 a place where a man of real ability could at this time do an im 
 mense good. I think I would give anything to be able to talk 
 with father for an hour, but perhaps it is as well that I should 
 be obliged to rely entirely on my own ideas. However, 1863 will 
 have other duties for me before he is very old than the Sequestra 
 tion Commission, and I trust that he will ' ring in the thousand 
 years of peace ' before next New- Year's day, and bring us all 
 together in happiness again. But we will take things cheerfully, 
 however they come, and thank God for what he leaves us, if he 
 does take the blessings of peace away." 
 
 His time during this winter was almost wholly spent in 
 his duties on the Sequestration Commission, of which, 
 though nominally and by rank the junior member, he per 
 formed most of the work, and the organization of which, 
 under its new system, was principally based upon a report 
 made by him soon after his arrival. To the ability, fidelity, 
 and success with which he performed these duties we have 
 the testimony of General Banks, who writes : 
 
 "Among many patriotic officers to whose labors I have been 
 indebted, I recall with gratitude the memory of Captain William 
 Sturgis Hooper of Massachusetts. He entered the service of the 
 government in 1862 as a volunteer, without compensation, bearing 
 himself all expenses attending his career The thorough mer 
 cantile education of Captain Hooper, and his extensive commercial 
 
212 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 experience, enabled him to render important services to the gov 
 ernment in affairs connected with the civil administration of the 
 department. The general direction of the business of the Commis 
 sion for the management of sequestrated property, of which he was 
 a member, was intrusted, among other interests, to his care. Im 
 portant questions of international as well as military law, and of 
 the commercial customs regulating trade in the staple products of 
 the country, were involved in these transactions. All his duties 
 were discharged with signal ability. His courteous deportment, 
 sound judgment, and unimpeachable integrity, disarmed the opposi 
 tion of interested parties, and secured for his decisions the respect 
 of all persons." 
 
 These duties, however, debarred him from the life in the 
 open air for which he longed, and to which he had looked 
 forward as the means of restoring his health. Shut up in 
 an office, surrounded by swarms of men and women, loyal 
 and disloyal, with complaints and demands and suggestions 
 of every description and degree of annoyance, writing and 
 talking and thinking from morning till night, he was con 
 stantly failing in health and strength. Still he was cheer 
 ful and hopeful, always nattering himself that his cough 
 was a little better and his other physical disorders certainly 
 no worse. 
 
 The modesty with which, in his letters, he always dispar 
 ages his own share in the work which was going on is very 
 remarkable, when compared with the real importance of his 
 labors and responsibilities, as shown not merely by the facts 
 themselves which he narrates, but by the evidence of his 
 superiors ancl associates. When inclined to be discontented, 
 he consoles himself thus : 
 
 " Sometimes when I go from our dirty, carpetless rooms up to the 
 handsome offices at head-quarters, and find the other aids finishing 
 up their business for the day at two o'clock, or before, I feel rather 
 like grumbling and calling myself a mere commissary's clerk ; but 
 when I think of the matter more seriously, I feel differently. The 
 Sequestration Commission has been, until General Banks's arrival, 
 
William Sturgis Hooper. 213 
 
 an institution of almost unlimited power. When I first came here, 
 every one looked upon it and all its officers with a species of awe, as 
 having the fate of nearly all the property within our lines at its dis 
 posal ; but now the Commission has cut its own claws and reduced 
 itself, or rather the General has reduced it, to a comparatively 
 harmless monster, with little power except to undo, so far as it may 
 see fit or be able, the work which it had done before ; so as fortune 
 and the General have put me there, I do not think it would be 
 right for me in any way to avoid the duties or the responsibilities 
 which it involves. So, on the whole, I am well enough satisfied to 
 be there, and do not seriously grumble, though I should like to get 
 time for a ride on horseback every day ; but this, I think, I shall be 
 able to do after a little while, when things are reduced more to a 
 system, and meanwhile I am contented, or reasonably so, and jolly." 
 
 When General Banks reached Louisiana, one of the first 
 things demanding attention was the condition of the blacks. 
 There were in the State probably over two hundred thou 
 sand slaves, three fourths of whom had flocked within the 
 lines of the army. Within these lines President Lincoln's 
 Emancipation Proclamation had, by its express terms, no 
 operation. The situation of the negroes who clustered 
 around the military posts was most distressing. Still slaves 
 in law, they were no longer slaves in fact, for our officers 
 and soldiers neither desired nor were permitted to aid in 
 retaining them in servitude ; and without the assistance of 
 our forces, the former masters, whatever claim they might 
 assert under the Proclamation, were powerless. The negroes 
 were without clothes, food, shelter, or protection. To meet 
 this state of things some vigorous action must be taken. 
 The commanding general therefore directed the Sequestra 
 tion Commission to prepare and report a proper system of 
 labor. 
 
 A system was proposed by the Commission, embodying 
 certain conditions demanded by a committee of the negroes 
 themselves. The system was intended to secure to the ne 
 gro liberty to go where he pleased, and to choose his ein- 
 
214 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ployment and his employer, compensation for his labor, 
 limitation of hours of work, exemption from corporal pun 
 ishment and from separation of families, access to proper 
 tribunals to enforce his rights, and an allotment of a small 
 tract to cultivate for himself, as an encouragement to strive 
 for the permanent acquisition of land. It also contained 
 provisions for the support of the aged and infirm, the edu 
 cation of the young, the attendance of the sick, and the bur 
 ial of the dead. The planters, after conference in public 
 meeting, decided to accede to the " Contract," and thus, 
 somewhat reluctantly, recognized the freedom of the very 
 men whom the President's proclamation had excepted from 
 that privilege. 
 
 Whatever difference of opinion there may be as to the 
 means by which General Banks and his assistants attempt 
 ed to solve the great problem of the day, there can be no 
 doubt as to the fidelity of Captain Hooper's efforts. He 
 believed in the General, he believed also in the march of 
 events ; and though his enthusiasm was often damped by 
 the many failures and the imperfect successes which fol 
 lowed the most zealous efforts, he still worked and hoped 
 and waited. General Banks writes : 
 
 " Early in the year 1863 many thousand negroes came within 
 the lines of our army. Captain Hooper manifested a deep interest 
 in all measures suggested for their protection and relief. The new 
 ly emancipated people had no truer or wiser friend. He gave great 
 attention during the latter part of his life to the consideration of 
 their interests. The free-labor system of Louisiana is his mon 
 ument. He lived long enough to justify the belief that it was 
 adapted to secure their liberty, but not long enough to witness the 
 full success which it is destined to accomplish, nor to receive the 
 thanks of those who were the subjects of his anxious care." 
 
 Towards the end of February Captain Hooper was sent 
 by General Banks to Donaldsonville to inspect the working 
 of the " Contract," and make a report upon it. He gives a 
 most unfavorable account of the real state of feeling among 
 
William Sturgis Hooper. 215 
 
 the planters ; and he evidently brought back very disheart 
 ening impressions with regard to the sincerity of the major 
 ity of those who pretended to have returned to or retained 
 their allegiance to the Union. 
 
 " for a land," he writes, " where one does not hear all the time 
 of this oath ! So far as I can judge, it is only considered binding 
 by those who would do no harm any way, and yet it is poked at 
 you all the time. I am getting a strong dislike to hearing of it." 
 
 "With the difficulties which attended the carrying out of 
 the labor system he was very disagreeably impressed. He 
 found the planters unable or unwilling to understand the 
 change of relation between themselves and their former 
 slaves, laboring under the hallucination that slavery still 
 continued, and attempting to coerce rather than persuade 
 the negroes to continue at work. 
 
 " The nearer one gets to this negro question," he writes, " the 
 more difficult and unpleasant it appears. I would not at all mind 
 issuing wise orders on the subject of the negro, but Heaven help me 
 from having to carry into execution even the wisest. The General 
 is confident of success in this matter ; and most of the reports which 
 come in are so favorable that I can but hope that the locality which 
 I visited was not a fair specimen." 
 
 So not discouraged, though a little disappointed, he went 
 back to the city. His description of his return down the 
 Mississippi that once crowded thoroughfare, but then 
 without sign of human life is very graphic. 
 
 " Without any stop we hurry on, passing plantations which before 
 the war brought to their owners yearly incomes of one hundred thou 
 sand dollars, now idle, the owners, perhaps, in the Rebel army, or, 
 if still on their plantations, unable or afraid to raise a crop in the 
 uncertainty of who will gather it. As we passed some noble places, 
 one I remember in particular, with a superb avenue of live-oaks 
 from the levee to the house, a really fine old mansion-house, and 
 not far off the huts of the slaves, almost a town by themselves, all 
 deserted by its Rebel owner, I thought of stories I had read of ex- 
 
216 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 plorers descending great rivers in savage lands, and finding on the 
 banks the relics of a civilization which had passed away into obliv 
 ion. Is this, perhaps, the very process which is going on here under 
 our eyes ? I do not think it is, and yet on the river I could well 
 imagine it." 
 
 On his return he plunged again into the details of his 
 office business, and toiled on at a task which, so far as the 
 planters were concerned, was at least a thankless one. 
 Through all difficulties and perplexities, he saw the great 
 end at hand. 
 
 " The men," he writes, " who carried Louisiana out of the Union 
 have much to answer for, I believe ; and yet I hope and trust that 
 they and others who brought on this war will prove in the end to 
 have been the unconscious instruments of Providence for doing 
 away with what I regard as the greatest social evil of the age. I 
 do not doubt that slavery is gone here. No power on earth can 
 make regular, permanent slaves of these people again, I think. The 
 planters do not know it, but they seem to me about as crazy still 
 as when they let Louisiana be drawn out of the Union." 
 
 And now the end of his service was approaching. He 
 had exhausted, in the confinement of his office, the small 
 stock of strength which he had brought from home. The 
 shattered health, which he had hoped .to restore by bodily 
 exercise, had sunk irretrievably beneath the constant wear 
 of mental labor and anxiety. When the opportunity to 
 take the field came, it was too late. He accompanied 
 our military and naval forces when they went, March 8, 
 1863, to make a demonstration against Port Hudson, and 
 was present at the first reconnoissance and bombardment 
 of the fortifications there. He performed his duties on the 
 General's staff until about the 20th of the month, and 
 then returned to New Orleans, convinced that he was too 
 feeble for campaigning. Speaking of the expedition, he 
 says : 
 
 "I have drawn some lessons from it which I think cheaply 
 bought at the expense of a pretty good attack of my old enemy. 
 
William Sturgis Hooper. 217 
 
 The most important is, that, in my present state of health, it is the 
 height of folly for me to attempt to go into the field ; in fact, an im 
 possibility. Even the great muscles of would not carry him 
 
 through the work, if he had to live without eating ; and in my case 
 I found that eating only pulled me down the more, by bringing on 
 my trouble. So I do not think that you are likely to hear of my 
 distinguishing myself at present." 
 
 Nor was this the worst. The labor which attended a 
 subject surrounded by so many difficulties as the business 
 of the Sequestration Commission was no less exhausting 
 than the fatigues of a campaign, and it had now become 
 evident to Captain Hooper that he was no longer strong 
 enough to attend to any active duty whatever. Soon after 
 coming back from Port Hudson, therefore, he left Louisi 
 ana for home upon sick-leave, still in the hope, never to be 
 fulfilled, that he might yet be brought back to strength and 
 usefulness. And thus Sturgis Hooper ended his military 
 career, and with it all the labors of life. A soldier who 
 never saw battle, a brave man who only lacked opportu 
 nity to show in the field how little terror death and wounds 
 had for him, he had a part of the great work less brilliant 
 than theirs who fell at Antietam and Gettysburg, but re 
 quiring no less manliness and moral courage, and he per 
 formed it faithfully and nobly. " His term of service," 
 says General Banks, " was not long nor free from suffering, 
 but there were few men of his age among the living or the 
 dead of this great struggle who will leave a better record 
 than his." His sacrifice of life to the cause at the desk of 
 the Sequestration Commission was as free and as perfect as 
 if it had been made upon the field of battle. 
 
 Of the last sad months there is little to be told. He lin 
 gered through the spring and summer, sometimes showing 
 signs of improvement, and then again sinking the more cer 
 tainly and rapidly, always hoping to live, but never fearing 
 to die, full of patience and fortitude. His interest in the 
 events of the day, and especially in the progress of eman- 
 
218 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 cipation, with which he had had so much to do, was unflag 
 ging to the last. 
 
 In the autumn the end became certain. He accepted his 
 fate with resignation and without gloom. His religious 
 faith was denned by no creeds, but he trusted, in death as 
 he had done in life, to the goodness of God, and committed 
 himself to his hands without apprehension. And so, on 
 September 24, 1863, he passed away, at the age of thirty, 
 " mourned by those who knew him only in the sterner 
 relations of business, as well as by his companions in arms, 
 and in a wide circle of those who respected him as a citizen 
 and loved him as a friend." 
 
 Harvard College has counted her sons among the fallen 
 on many a battle-field. Laurel-crowned they met their 
 fate. By the grave of each we stand with swelling hearts, 
 in pride and reverence. But almost more touching is the 
 self-sacrifice of one who marched bravely and quietly to his 
 doom, not to the sound of the trumpet, not amid the stir 
 and emulation of the conflict, with no prize of fame incit 
 ing him to one grand effort, but surrounded by the prosaic 
 details of monotonous labors, which were slowly but surely 
 leading him to his death. Thinking only of doing his duty, 
 of satisfying his General, of righting wrong, of helping to 
 make his country whole again and free from taint, he kept 
 his post through weariness, illness, and pain, so long as he 
 found strength for each day's work. If to redress grievan 
 ces and to raise up the oppressed be the office and the crown 
 of chivalry, J;hen no one who ever struck with sword has 
 met his end amid more knightly service than that of Wil 
 liam Sturgis Hooper. 
 
William Sturgis Hooper. 219 
 
 PAUL JOSEPH REVERB. 
 
 Major 20th Mass. Yols. (Infantry), July 1, 1861 ; Lieutenant-Colonel 
 and Assistant Inspector-General, U. S. Vols., September 4, 1862 ; Colonel 
 20th Mass. Vols., April 14, 1863 ; died at Westminster, Md., July 4, 
 1863, of a wound received at Gettysburg, July 2. 
 
 PAUL JOSEPH REVERE was born in Boston, Septem 
 ber 10, 1832, the son of Joseph W. and Mary (Rob- 
 bins) Revere. His paternal grandfather was Paul Revere, 
 of Revolutionary fame, and his maternal grandfather was 
 Judge Edward Hutchinson Robbins of Milton. He was 
 educated in the schools in Boston, with occasional periods of 
 country life at school, making friends in every place, and 
 forming warm attachments for life with many of his asso 
 ciates. An intimate friend writes : 
 
 " When a 6 boy, in that truest of all republics, the playground, 
 his companions instinctively recognized in him a leader. There 
 that keen sense of justice which seemed to be part and parcel of 
 him was so conspicuous, that he was the well-known umpire in 
 the boyish disputes of his companions, and we fondly recall the 
 often-used expression, ' I '11 leave it to Paul.' " 
 
 In the winter of 1849 he entered Harvard University in 
 the second term of the Freshman year, and he graduated 
 with that class in 1852. While a Sophomore, he passed 
 six months in the family of Rev. William Parsons Lunt, 
 D. D., and there secured the regard of that intelligent and 
 cultivated gentleman, with whose family Revere became 
 connected after Dr. Lunt's death. 
 
 He left college without any taste for professional life ; 
 and in view of the necessity of following a calling, he de 
 cided on mercantile pursuits. In the summer of 1853 he 
 went to Moosehead Lake on a hunting expedition, and 
 travelled with an Indian guide to the source of the Saco 
 
220 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 River. He went several times to the Adirondacks, for his 
 strong taste for active life was mingled with great love of 
 nature and the spirit of adventure. 
 
 In 1854, at the wish of his father, he went to Lake Su 
 perior to inform himself in regard to the copper region. 
 He had passed a month in pursuing this object, when all 
 his mental and physical powers were taxed by an accident 
 of no ordinary peril. He had crossed Lake Superior with 
 two gentlemen interested in mines ; and on their return, 
 upon arriving at the lake, they found that there was a high 
 wind, and the lake was like a disturbed sea. They were to 
 take two boatmen to manage the boat during several hours' 
 sail. Eevere said, " This is against my judgment ; let us 
 wait." They said, " You have no experience here ; we 
 will go, and you may do as you like." Deciding to go, 
 he took off his boots and his thick clothes, apprehending 
 danger. 
 
 After rounding a point, the boat capsized, and all were 
 thrown out. One of the gentlemen, Mr. Kershon, was 
 asleep in the bottom of the boat, and was lost, as was 
 one of the boatmen. The other, Dr. Pratt, was urged by 
 Revere to cling with him to the bottom of the boat ; but, 
 thinking that he could swim to the shore, made the attempt, 
 and sank almost immediately. Revere, diving after him, 
 brought him to the surface, but found him dead. The 
 others, after clinging several hours to the boat, reached the 
 shore. Rohiscault, the old boatman, repeatedly gave up 
 hope, and was, only compelled by authority to maintain his 
 hold ; he says he owes his life to the persuasions of Mr. 
 Revere, and relates that he held one end of the canoe, while 
 Mr. Revere grasped the other, and, throwing himself on 
 his back, guided the frail bark witli rapid and undeviat- 
 ing course to land, and finally dragged his companion, half 
 unconscious, on the beach. Revere, then discovering his 
 overcoat still attached to the boat, took from the pocket his 
 flask of brandy, and having administered it, rolled the 
 
Paul Joseph Revere. 221 
 
 boatman on the warm sand until he was recovered suffi 
 ciently to show the way to a logger's hut. 
 
 The following year he undertook the care of an extensive 
 wharf in Boston, and there exerted himself for the benefit of 
 laborers and exposed women and children, until the neigh 
 boring police continually came to him as a friend to aid and 
 protect the unfortunate about him. 
 
 In 1859 he married Lucretia Watson Lunt, daughter 
 of Rev. W. P. Lunt, D. D., who, with two children, sur 
 vives him. He had made a home near his aged father, 
 thinking his comfort the highest duty; but the country's call 
 was still higher, and that father's patriotic spirit aided him to 
 engage in the cause. To the representations of a near and 
 dear friend, who placed before him some family objections to 
 a separation from home, he replied, " I have weighed it all, 
 and there is something higher still. The institutions of this 
 country indeed free institutions throughout the world 
 hang on this moment." 
 
 To his mother he said, rt I shall feel humbled to stay 
 at home." The reply was, " Do as you think right." 
 
 With these convictions of personal and public duty, soon 
 after the insurgent attack on Fort Sumter he offered his 
 military services to the Chief Magistrate and Commander- 
 in-chief of Massachusetts ; and immediately entered as a 
 pupil in the Military Club of Mons. Salignac in Boston. 
 On the 1st of July, 1861, Revere was commissioned Major of 
 the Twentieth Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers (In 
 fantry), and soon after joined his regiment, then in camp 
 at Readville. His devotion to his new duties was consistent 
 with the high moral principle which had made him a 
 soldier of the Republic. The regiment to which he was 
 attached had in it elements which required strong and 
 judicious government ; the personal material which consti 
 tuted its nucleus having been principally drawn from a dis 
 banded and mutinous organization, and being thus demor 
 alized. To bring these men to military subordination re- 
 
222 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 quired the exercise of high moral power, and a strong will, 
 which fortunately was found in Major Revere and most of 
 his brother officers. Their efforts to establish and maintain 
 order and good discipline were rewarded with success, the 
 fruits of which -were exhibited in the annals of the regi 
 ment from Ball's Bluff to the surrender of the insurgent 
 army under General Lee. 
 
 Early in September the regiment was ordered to Wash 
 ington, and from thence, after a few days' halt, to Pooles- 
 ville, Maryland, where it reported to Brigadier-General C. 
 P. Stone, in command of the corps of observation. Until 
 October 20th the regiment was in the performance of picket 
 and outpost duty, along the Potomac River, Major Revere 
 taking his proper share of the service. On Sunday, October 
 20th, a battalion of the regiment was ordered to the river- 
 bank, from which, during the night of that day, it crossed to 
 Harrison's Island. This was preliminary to the battle of 
 Ball's Bluff. On the morning of the 21st, at an early hour, 
 two companies were sent into Virginia as the covering force 
 of a reconnoitring party which had preceded them. Major 
 Revere, who had accompanied the battalion from camp in 
 Maryland, was left on the island in command of the force 
 held there in reserve, and rendered a most important ser 
 vice in dragging round, from its east side to that opposite 
 the Virginia bank, a scow, which added materially to the 
 means of transportation, and was of great value in subse 
 quent operations. 
 
 Colonel Baker, having been ordered to the command of 
 the troops which had crossed into Virginia, and the support 
 ing force which lay on the island and the adjacent Maryland 
 shore, had, on assuming command, ordered the reserve of 
 the Twentieth Regiment, among other troops, to reinforce 
 the battalions in Virginia. Accordingly, about noon, Major 
 Revere crossed the river. The battle of Ball's Bluff fol 
 lowed. The aggregate Union force present during the bat 
 tle, not including the Nineteenth Massachusetts Infantry, 
 
Paul Joseph Revere. 223 
 
 which remained on the island and was not engaged, was, 
 exclusive of officers, sixteen hundred and three men. Ma 
 jor Revere bore an honorable part in this bloody and disas 
 trous conflict, earning a high character for cool and dis 
 ciplined courage. He was slightly wounded in the leg, 
 while endeavoring to run into the river two mountain-how 
 itzers which had become disabled, the cannoneers having 
 been all killed or wounded ; and he was among the last to 
 leave the field when it was irretrievably lost. The means 
 of transportation were very limited, and escape by the boats, 
 in the rush and confusion which prevailed, appeared very 
 uncertain. He therefore, with some brother officers and a 
 few men, among them his brother, Surgeon Revere, passed 
 up the river to seek other means of crossing to the Mary 
 land side. A boat was found and secured, but coming 
 under the observation of the enemy, the fugitives were com 
 pelled to abandon it, and pursue their way up the river. 
 After it became dark, an attempt was made to construct a 
 raft of fence-rails, but the rails were water-soaked, and the 
 raft would not float. Revere was a practised swimmer, 
 and could easily have reached the opposite bank ; he, how 
 ever, with that generous self-sacrifice which entered so 
 largely into his character, refused to leave his commander, 
 who was somewhat advanced in years and unskilled in 
 swimming. About half past eight at night, a scouting 
 party of the enemy's cavalry discovered the fugitives, who 
 had no alternative but to surrender. 
 
 The prisoners were taken to Leesburg, where the Rebel 
 commander received them and tendered them a parole, 
 which was declined, its terms being ambiguous. On the 
 following morning, at two o'clock, the column of prisoners, 
 five hundred and twenty-nine men, including fifteen offi 
 cers, commenced its long and weary march to Richmond. 
 It rained in torrents, the mud was ankle deep, and the 
 men had been long without food ; while one small wagon, 
 without cover or seats, was the only transportation provided 
 for the sick and wounded. 
 
224 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Major Revere had said nothing about his wound, and 
 now marched on uncomplainingly, refusing to take his turn 
 in the wagon. It was six, P. M., when the column reached 
 the stone house historically connected with the Bull 'Run bat 
 tle-field, its halting-place for the night. A ration of half- 
 cooked corn bread and bacon was here served at ten, P. M. 
 The next morning early the column was again in motion, 
 and at ten o'clock arrived at Manassas, where it rested till 
 six, P. M., when the prisoners were transferred to the cars 
 for Richmond. While at Manassas, the officers were con 
 fined in a barn, closely guarded ; they had many visitors of 
 both sexes, some of whom indulged in remarks and reflec 
 tions little in keeping with their claims of chivalrous breed 
 ing. A scanty ration was furnished in the afternoon to the 
 now almost famished prisoners, who were also drenched to 
 the skin by the heavy rain of the previous day, so that 
 their condition was miserable indeed. But the demeanor 
 of Major Revere, under these trials of temper and body, was 
 most dignified and patient ; he expressed to the officer of 
 the guard a hope that the men would be properly cared 
 for, but asked nothing for himself. 
 
 On the morning of the 24th the train arrived in Rich 
 mond ; and the prisoners, amid the jeers, taunts, and some 
 times threats of a dense crowd, were marched to the to 
 bacco warehouse assigned as their prison. The kind hos 
 pitality of fellow-prisoners, whom they found there, supplied 
 their immediate wants ; but days elapsed before they were 
 established -in any reasonable degree of comfort. Two la 
 dies, true to their womanly instincts, one of them, Miss 
 E. A. Van Lew, moved also by her loyal attachment to the 
 Union, sought out and relieved the new-comers. Mrs. 
 Randolph, wife of the Confederate General Randolph, and 
 Miss Yan Lew, were the ministering angels of this unlooked- 
 for and grateful kindness, which is here recorded as a trib 
 ute to their generous and timely beneficence. Prison life in 
 the Richmond warehouse was one of annoying discomforts ; 
 
Paul Joseph Revere. 225 
 
 the petty tyranny of officials, Wirz, of Andersonville no 
 toriety, being first-sergeant of the prison guard, the vul 
 gar obtrusiveness of civilian visitors, and a densely crowded 
 apartment, constituted a condition of existence which taxed 
 its subjects almost beyond endurance. Major Revere bore 
 these trials with manly fortitude. His deportment was dig 
 nified but affable in his intercourse with fellow-prisoners. 
 The kindly traits of his disposition seemed warmed into 
 a more lively exercise ; and while he did not join in the 
 amusements most common in a community of such varied 
 sympathies and habits, yet he had a cheerful word and look 
 for all. Mindful of his religious duties, he daily sought 
 counsel of THE FATHER, in prayer and in the Scriptures. 
 
 We now pass to a period in the prison life at Richmond 
 which was full of gloomy anxieties. 
 
 On the 10th of November, General I. H. Winder pub 
 lished an order of the insurgent Secretary of War, direct 
 ing him to select hostages, to be confined in the cells allot 
 ted to persons charged with infamous crimes, to answer 
 with their lives for the safety of the Rebel privateer smen, 
 held by the United States government, under a charge of 
 piracy on the high seas. In closing his order Secretary 
 Benjamin said: 
 
 " As these measures are intended to repress the infamous attempt 
 now made by the enemy to commit judicial murder on prisoners of 
 war, you will execute them strictly, as the mode best calculated to 
 prevent the commission of so heinous a crime." 
 
 Major Revere was one of the hostages selected under this 
 order, and he entered upon the ordeal with the equanimity 
 of a brave soldier, who stood for his country, with, its honor 
 in his keeping. On the following Thursday, the hostages, 
 seven in number, were transferred to Henrico County 
 Prison, and placed in charge of its warden. The cell in 
 which they were confined, and in which, for a considerable 
 period of time they were required to perform every func- 
 
 VOL. I. 15 
 
226 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 tion of life, was of most contracted dimensions, eleven 
 feet by seventeen in area, faintly lighted and filthy with 
 tormenting vermin. The situation was one almost too hor 
 rible and disgusting to contemplate. The hostages did not 
 utter one word of -complaint or remonstrance, although they 
 felt that life could not long sustain itself in an atmosphere 
 so foul. After a while General Winder modified this bar 
 barous treatment, allowing a half-hour each day to prison 
 ers, for a visit to the prison yard ; this half-hour being often 
 extended into an hour by the commiserating turnkey, 
 Thomas. 
 
 In this experience, dreadful as it was, Revere evinced the 
 same patient manliness which had always distinguished his 
 conduct. In a single instance only did he permit his indig 
 nation to master the habitual control which he exercised 
 over his feelings. The circumstances of this were as fol 
 lows. The prison in which the hostages were confined was 
 surrounded by a high wall, which hid from their sight every 
 outward object except the sky and distant house-tops. On 
 the second Saturday of their confinement, while engaged in 
 the simple pursuits of prison life, the hostages were sud 
 denly startled by the sharp sound of a lash and an accom 
 panying shriek of agony. It was " whipping-day," and the 
 negroes were receiving their allotted lashes for violations of 
 law and decorum. The cry of agony and the pitiful moans 
 which followed, as blow after blow in quick succession grad 
 ually reduced the sufferer to a condition of comparative in 
 sensibility, came from a woman. Revere absolutely started 
 to his feet, ~the hot blood coursing its quick way through 
 every vein. It seemed to him a personal affront, a con 
 trived indignity to Northern " prejudice" ; he learned after 
 ward, however, that Saturday was " whipping-day," and 
 the court-house yard the place of punishment. A brother 
 officer, who lay by his side, has said, that, during the night 
 which followed the incident just described, Revere trem 
 bled with rage when alluding to it. He never forgot that 
 
Paul Joseph Revere. 227 
 
 " whipping-day," with its cry of agony. That moaning 
 woman was to his heart the representative of an oppressed 
 race. He did not turn a deaf ear to the appeal for mercy 
 and protection. 
 
 Writing from Fortress Monroe the day of his arrival 
 there, a paroled prisoner from Eichmond, after speaking 
 of the ill treatment of the hostages by the Rebel govern 
 ment, he continues : 
 
 " However, it does not matter much now, and they never for a 
 moment, with all their outrages, made us forget our position as 
 gentlemen." 
 
 It is certain that he never did forget what was due to his 
 position as a gentleman, if manly fortitude and Christian 
 bearing be typical of that character. A prison companion, 
 writing to a member of his family after the fatal day of 
 Gettysburg, spoke of his deportment, while confined as a 
 hostage, in terms which will be understood and appreciated 
 by all who were familiar with his characteristics : 
 
 "'In the cell of Henrico County Prison, with its horrible expe 
 riences and painful suspense, there was a moral grandeur in his 
 conduct of which I can give no idea. All were strangers except 
 Revere and myself. How much depended, how much of ordinary 
 comfort even rested, upon decorum and self-respect in act and 
 speech ; how strongly yet delicately Revere restrained undue 
 license in each ! " 
 
 But Revere was reserved for future services to his coun 
 try, and for a more glorious death than that of a constructive 
 criminal. The government of the United States released 
 the privateersmen as pirates, changing their status to that 
 of prisoners of war ; and on February 22, 1862, after four 
 months' confinement, Major Revere returned on parole to 
 the home from which he had been separated under such 
 painful circumstances. 
 
 Observation and reflection, while a prisoner, had con 
 firmed his original conviction, that the war of the Rebel- 
 
228 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 lion was a war for the supremacy or extermination of hu 
 man slavery. He clearly saw that the institution of slavery 
 was the salient point of the Rebellion, and that the success 
 of the Union arms, even if it demanded " the last man 
 and the last dollar," was an imperative duty. To a friend 
 and brother officer who largely enjoyed his confidence, and 
 shared with him the hardships of Richmond and accom 
 modations of camp life, he often and earnestly spoke of this 
 obligation, as due both to God and country. It was a con 
 viction which had its birth in his soul. 
 
 With recruited health and strength came the desire for 
 active service, but he was still under the military restraints 
 of his parole, and the policy of the United States govern 
 ment did not seem, at that time, to encourage hope of 
 speedy exchange. It was determined, however, to make 
 an effort to obtain one, by personal application to Secretary 
 Stanton. Accordingly, having selected Major McAlexander 
 of Alabama, a prisoner of war confined at Fort Warren, 
 and having arranged with him a plan of proceeding, Major 
 Revere applied to the War Department at Washington* for 
 a leave of absence for Major McAlexander, permitting him 
 to visit Richmond, on condition that he should return to 
 Fort Warren within fifteen days, or should transmit to 
 General Wool, commanding at Fortress Monroe, an order 
 of the Confederate authorities, exchanging him for Revere. 
 Secretary Stanton granted the application, expressing, how 
 ever, strong doubts whether the Rebel officer or the ex 
 change would ever be heard of again. But Major Mc 
 Alexander was a gentleman of personal honor ; and he 
 successfully accomplished his mission. On May 1st Major 
 Revere was en route to rejoin his regiment, then in the lines 
 before Yorktown, Virginia. He reported for duty on May 
 2d, in season to move with the general advance of the 
 army which followed the Rebel evacuation of Yorktown. 
 
 On May 7th he was present with his regiment at West 
 Point, when the Rebel General W. H. C. Whiting made 
 
Paul Joseph Revere. 229 
 
 his unsuccessful attempt to force the position occupied by 
 Franklin's division and Dana's brigade. The army was 
 greatly hindered in its advance by the condition of the 
 roads ; and it was not till towards the last of May that 
 General McClellan found himself within striking distance 
 of Richmond, the objective point of the campaign. On the 
 march up the Peninsula, Major Revere had greatly dis 
 tinguished himself while in command of the skirmish line 
 of a brigade, and intrusted with the duty of scouring the 
 north bank of the Chickahominy, thereby winning honor 
 able mention from his corps commander, General Sumner. 
 The last days of May found the army massed on both 
 sides of the Chickahominy, the communications between its 
 wings being mostly maintained by temporary bridges, con 
 structed by the troops. A sudden and violent rain, during 
 the day and night of May 30th, had swollen the river to an 
 unprecedented height, and greatly endangered the bridges. 
 The Rebel general, acting upon the belief that the bridges 
 would be swept away and the Union army divided, resolved 
 to make a sudden and overwhelming attack upon Keyes's 
 division, which lay at Fair Oaks, on the south side of the 
 river, somewhat in advance of the supporting corps. In 
 execution of this design, General Johnston concentrated, 
 on the morning of May 31st, a heavy column under Hill, 
 Longstreet, Smith, and Huger, intending to fall upon Keyes 
 by early dawn. ; but the rain had proved unfriendly to his 
 movements, as well as to those of the Union army. Smith 
 and Huger were long behind the designated time in reaching 
 their respective positions. At noon they had not appeared, 
 and Hill and Longstreet moved to the attack of Keyes, with 
 out waiting for their expected diversion. The attack was 
 sudden, vigorous, and overwhelming. Keyes was forced to 
 retire, abandoning his camp, and losing many guns. The 
 enemy pressed forward, encountering and overcoming a 
 brigade of Couch's .division, which sought to arrest the 
 Rebel advance. Affairs looked very discouraging ; a fresh 
 
230 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 column of the enemy was now moving against the right ; 
 and along the railroad, a heavy force, which had been held 
 in reserve, was directing its march upon Fair Oaks. 
 
 In this critical condition of affairs, General Sumner was 
 ordered to march rapidly to the scene of conflict ; his corps 
 lay on the opposite or north side of the Chickahominy, there 
 being two hastily-constructed bridges for communication 
 between the two portions of the army. The swift and swol 
 len stream had swept away one of these bridges, that oppo 
 site the First Division ; and the other, opposite the Second 
 (Sedgwick's), was trembling and vibrating in its struggle 
 for life. The division succeeded, however, in crossing, and 
 pressed onward, for the unceasing cannonade in front still 
 told of sharply-contested battle. The deep and miry mo 
 rass, which formed the intervale of the river, had swamped 
 all the artillery of the division, except five guns, beyond 
 extrication; and two infantry regiments the Nineteenth 
 Massachusetts and Forty-second New York were detached 
 to protect them and guard the river. As the column ap 
 proached the field of battle, it was halted to load. " We 
 are in luck to-day," said Major Revere ; " we are not left 
 in the rear to guard the river." This was not said thought 
 lessly, or with levity, for no man felt more profoundly the 
 solemnity of battle. 
 
 The division, weakened by the causes above mentioned, 
 hastened forward, and late in the afternoon arrived upon 
 the field near Fair Oaks. The column of the enemy which 
 had advance^ along the railroad was deployed in front of 
 Sedgwick's division, when the latter came into line of bat 
 tle. The safety of the army depended in a measure upon 
 its ability to stem the tide of Rebel victory, to restore the 
 lost battle. That it did so, after a sanguinary conflict, 
 which terminated in the repulse and disorderly flight of the 
 Rebel troops, is historical. To Major Revere the victory 
 had an unusual charm ; he had suffered, as a consequence 
 of defeat on a previous occasion, cruel hardships, and while 
 
Paul Joseph Revere. 231 
 
 in Richmond as a prisoner had been often offended by the 
 Virginia boasts of superior courage. He had now seen the 
 backs of this vaunting chivalry, who, throwing away their 
 arms and leaving their wounded behind, sought safety in 
 flight. During the night, these wounded, who lay in great 
 numbers on the field, in the vicinity of the position occu 
 pied by the division, (for the charge which broke the Rebel 
 line and completed the victory had carried it forward some 
 distance,) were carefully collected, and made as comfortable 
 as circumstances permitted. Officers and men cheerfully 
 surrendered overcoats and blankets to protect the poor suf 
 ferers from the cold night-air, and water-carriers were de 
 tailed to supply the ever-craving cry of " Water ! water ! " 
 
 Major Revere was most active in this work of mercy. 
 The maimed and dying men, whose moans and cries so 
 painfully rose upon the ear, were no longer public enemies, 
 they were his suffering fellow-creatures. Many times dur 
 ing the night he visited that long line of recumbent wound 
 ed, to be sure that no faint cry for water should be uttered 
 unheard or unheeded ; and at earliest dawn he personally 
 went in search of a surgeon, for the medical officers of 
 the Twentieth had been left in the rear, to care for their 
 own wounded. 
 
 The enemy having drawn heavy reinforcements from 
 Richmond during the night, sought, on the morning of June 
 1st, to retrieve their fortunes in renewed attack ; but fail 
 ing to penetrate the Union line, after a fierce and long 
 struggle, they returned discomfited to their defensive 
 works. The month of June was passed in the usual man 
 ner of an investing army, watching and waiting for the mo 
 ment of assault. Major Revere shared with his regiment 
 during this period the arduous labors of an advanced line, 
 being half the time within range of the enemy's sharp 
 shooters, who inflicted some loss on the regiment. 
 
 On June 25th, the. Rebel general moved in force against 
 the Union right, which he succeeded in turning. A result 
 
232 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 of his success was to cut off McClellan's base of supplies 
 at the White House, forcing him to fall back on James 
 Kiver. On the 29th, at an early hour, the Second Corps, 
 which with the Third and a division of the Sixth, constitut 
 ed the rear-guard in this memorable movement, silently 
 marched out of their intrenched camp at or near Fair Oaks. 
 Major Revere had been detached during the night of the 
 27th, in command of a small battalion of the Twentieth, on 
 special duty connected with the Ordnance Department, and 
 was absent from his regiment when the retrograde move 
 ment of the Second Corps commenced. Sedgwick's divis 
 ion was halted, and fronted the enemy in line of battle at 
 Peach Orchard, a mile or more from Fair Oaks, where it 
 had a sharp skirmish, checking the Rebel advance. 
 
 Again in the afternoon at Savage Station, where Major 
 Revere rejoined his regiment, the division was sent into 
 action to arrest the enemy's advance, which had now be 
 come serious and threatening. It was late in the evening 
 before the regiments were withdrawn from the ground they 
 had held against the Rebel troops. About nine, P. M., the 
 Second Corps entered upon its march through White-Oak 
 Swamp. The night was dark and wet, and the narrow road, 
 lighted only by the glare of a few lanterns, was most dismal 
 and gloomy ; but the morale of the troops was wonderfully 
 good. Encouraged by the example and voice of their offi 
 cers, the men trudged along cheerfully and steadily, pre 
 serving excellent order and discipline. 
 
 Early in the morning of June 30th the column debouched 
 from the swamp on the high ground which borders its south 
 ern side, and halted to get a few hours of repose. Major 
 Revere, during this severe and trying night-march, exhibited 
 the true and solid qualities of a soldier. His admonitions 
 to " close up," and his cheerful words of encouragement, 
 were judiciously bestowed from time to time, avoiding the 
 unprofitable annoyance of what the men significantly call 
 worrying. 
 
Paul Joseph Revere. 233 
 
 The troops, after two or three hours of such rest as could 
 be obtained in wet clothes on the wet ground, without shel 
 ter, were summoned to continue their march. An hour or 
 two brought them to Nelson's farm, where they were halted 
 to cover the Quaker road, the main line of communica 
 tion with James River. Franklin's division had been left 
 at White-Oak Swamp to protect the rear, and about noon 
 had become engaged with the enemy. Two brigades, 
 Dana's and Gorman's of Sedgwick's division, were hastily 
 marched to Franklin's support, but upon a fierce and suc 
 cessful attack of the enemy made in the afternoon upon 
 McCall's division of Pennsylvania Reserves, which occupied 
 the position of Glendale, in front of the Quaker road, were 
 sent back at double-quick to aid in recovering the position. 
 It was an oppressively hot day, and the leading brigade, 
 Dana's, was immediately hurried into action on its arrival 
 from the swamp, for the exigency was most imminent. 
 The men were panting with exhaustion ; many of them had 
 fallen out of the ranks, some senseless from sun-stroke, and 
 the regiments coming up separately went forward into the 
 copse of wood known as Glendale, without much concert of 
 movement. Major Revere exerted himself actively as an 
 extemporized staff officer to remedy the last-named diffi 
 culty, and by his personal efforts partially succeeded in 
 bringing the regiments as a united brigade in front of the 
 enemy. Reinforcements were soon sent forward, and the 
 ground was held by the Union troops ; the loss in killed 
 and wounded, however, had been very heavy. Major Revere, 
 in the course of the operations in and around Glendale, had 
 his horse killed under him, and was thrown violently to the 
 ground, fortunately without injury. It will be undoubt 
 edly in accordance with the general opinion of his brother 
 officers to award to him, for his conduct on this occasion, 
 a high degree of honor. 
 
 With night came the order to march again; and the 
 morning of July 1st found the army occupying Malvern Hill, 
 
234 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 to make its last stand against the now desperate foe. The 
 conflict was long and obstinate, but in the end successful, 
 and the Army of the Potomac on the next day made its way 
 unmolested to the new base of operations on James River. 
 The new position of the army was not free from causes of 
 anxiety ; the enemy clustered around it on both sides of the 
 river, keeping up a constant and annoying fire of artillery, 
 and the poisonous malaria of the bottom-land began to de 
 velop its debilitating influence upon the health of the troops. 
 The robust constitution of Revere seemed for a time proof 
 against this insidious enemy, but about the middle of July 
 disease began to manifest itself in painful neuralgic affec 
 tions ; he did not, however, report himself sick until the 
 early part of August, when, being utterly prostrated and 
 unfit for duty, he was compelled to seek restored health in 
 the more salubrious air of his Northern home. 
 
 With the last days of August came the discouraging in 
 telligence of Pope's disastrous campaign in front of Wash 
 ington ; and Revere, scarcely recovered from sickness, has 
 tened to his post of duty. He had, during his absence from 
 the army, been appointed Inspector-General of the Second 
 Corps, with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, and now report 
 ed at the head-quarters of General Sumner in his new posi 
 tion. The Maryland campaign followed within the next two 
 weeks, terminating with the battle of Antietam and the con 
 sequent retreat of the insurgent army into Virginia. 
 
 Lieutenant-Colonel Revere was wounded at Antietam, 
 while endeavoring to rally and re-form some broken and 
 flying regiments ; but he nevertheless kept the field, aiding 
 materially in bringing up and guiding into action the rear 
 divisions of the corps. His wound forced him again to 
 seek the repose and care of home, leaving, without know 
 ing it, his brother dead on the field. There he remained 
 till the following spring, a confirmed and suffering invalid. 
 
 In the mean time General Sumner had died, and as a 
 consequence Lieutenant-Colonel Revere was mustered out 
 
Paul Joseph Revere. 235 
 
 of the service as Inspector-General of the Second Corps. 
 He was now appointed Colonel of his old regiment, the 
 Twentieth Massachusetts, and in May, 1863, reported at 
 Falmouth, Virginia, on the north bank of the Rappahan- 
 nock, as commander of the regiment. In June following, 
 Lee led his army down the Valley of the Shenandoah, to re 
 peat his exploit of the previous year, an invasion of Mary 
 land and Pennsylvania. The Army of the Potomac there 
 fore broke camp, and moved north also, keeping the Blue 
 Ridge between it and the enemy. Lee, by rapid marches, 
 had reached the Upper Potomac, and crossed that river 
 into Maryland, almost before General Hooker had penetrat 
 ed his design, or felt safe to uncover the gaps, through 
 which the Rebel troops could advance upon Washington. 
 As soon as all doubts on this point were removed by the 
 appearance of Lee's main army in Maryland, the Union 
 columns were pressed rapidly forward. The Twentieth 
 Massachusetts crossed the river near the old field of Ball's 
 Bluff, its first battle experience. By June 30th the whole 
 army was in Maryland, moving upon Lee, who had a week 
 before occupied Hagerstown in force, with his advanced par 
 ties in front of York in Pennsylvania, threatening both Bal 
 timore and Philadelphia. Major-General George G. Meade 
 had only within a day or two relieved General Hooker, in 
 the command of the army, and on July 1st had not arrived 
 at the front. At this time the advanced corps (First and 
 Eleventh) of the Union army were in the vicinity of Get 
 tysburg, Pennsylvania, and while on the march were at 
 tacked and driven back, through that town, to a strong 
 position on its south side, where they waited for the main 
 body of the army to come up. During the night General 
 Meade arrived at the front, and before morning, on July 
 2d, the whole army was once more in the presence of its 
 old foe, the Army of Northern Virginia. Preparations for 
 battle were at once made. Quietly and quickly the artil 
 lery and infantry took up their assigned positions ; the men 
 
236 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 lying down in that solemn silence which precedes expected 
 battle. Colonel Revere was here again, and for the last 
 time, to renew his covenant with Union and Freedom. 
 The offering of his life was to consummate the sacrifice. 
 
 The day of July 2d was passing away. The artillery on 
 both sides had unceasingly hurled a destructive fire of solid 
 shell and canister shot into opposing ranks, and the inter 
 mitting, rattling fire of musketry, which ever and anon 
 reached the ear from the right, told rather of watchful ob 
 servation than general battle. On the left, however, Sick 
 les, who held a somewhat advanced position, had been 
 fiercely attacked by Longstreet and forced to fall back more 
 within supporting distance of the main line, after sustain 
 ing a heavy loss. But the Union army made no aggressive 
 movement ; for it was the design of General Meade to act 
 defensively, to receive an attack from the Rebel com 
 mander in the strong position occupied by his troops. 
 
 About six, P. M., a canister shot burst a short distance 
 above Colonel Revere, a bullet from which struck him, 
 penetrating the vital parts, and inflicting a mortal injury, 
 of which he died on the 4th of July following. He lived 
 long enough to know that the Union arms were triumphant, 
 that the enemy, after obstinate and vain efforts to force 
 Meade's lines, had been repulsed. 
 
 In contemplating the character of Colonel Revere, we 
 are at once and strongly impressed with the beautiful har 
 mony of its moral proportions. The religious sentiment 
 was marked and prominent ; he habitually referred every 
 question of personal conduct to the tribunal of conscience, 
 able to abide the decision with unwavering trust. He be 
 lieved that conscience was the light of God. Deliberate in 
 his method of reasoning, and gifted with unusual powers of 
 discernment, his conclusions did not suffer in comparison 
 with the lessons of experience. A resolute will, too, en 
 forced his convictions of duty against all obstacles of self- 
 interest. What he thought to be right, he did. With all 
 
Paul Joseph Revere. 237 
 
 the sterner and rigid attributes of human nature, so neces 
 sary to overcome the rough places in the path of life, his 
 heart was a deep and ever-welling spring of warm affection. 
 Distress never called to him in vain for needed relief. 
 Amid the din of battle he would kneel by a dying comrade 
 to receive his whispered and choking accents of parting 
 love to dear ones at home. 
 
 The remains of Colonel Revere were removed to Massa 
 chusetts and interred at Mount Auburn, amidst the verdant 
 beauties of that Nature whose loveliness he never failed, 
 even amid the stern scenes of war, to notice and enjoy. 
 
238 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ROBERT WARE. 
 
 Surgeon 44th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), August 29, 1862; died at New- 
 bern, N. C., April 10, 1863, of disease contracted in the service. 
 
 ROBERT WARE was born on the 2d of September, 
 1833, in Boston, being the youngest son of the late 
 Dr. John Ware, Professor of the Theory and Practice of 
 Medicine in Harvard University, and of Helen (Lincoln) 
 Ware. He was prepared for college at the Boston Latin 
 School, and entered the Freshman class at Cambridge in 
 1848, being its youngest member. He graduated with hon 
 or in 1852, having made a host of friends by the sweetness of 
 his temper, his kindly wit, his manliness, and his excel 
 lent parts. He began the study of medicine in Boston, and 
 spent the year 1855 abroad, enjoying the advantages of the 
 hospitals of Paris, with the great benefit of his father's wis 
 dom and presence to direct his studies. His application, 
 w T ith this thorough preparation, had gained him unusual 
 qualifications for the practice of his profession, when he 
 took his degree of M. D. in 1856. 
 
 As a young physician, he found that his first patients 
 were the poor, and seldom have the poor the benefit of so 
 ripe a judgment and such conscientious care. No thought 
 of ease or pleasure could draw him from the bedside of his 
 most wretched patient. Those physicians who succeeded 
 him in his very large dispensary practice know how hearty 
 were the gratitude and affection of those who had experi 
 enced his skill and forethought. Though too hard a worker 
 to have much leisure for writing, he found time to prepare 
 a report on small-pox during an epidemic in 1860, which 
 gained him no little credit, and was published for distribu 
 tion by vote of the Legislature of Massachusetts. His cul 
 ture, however, was by no means limited to his profession. 
 
Robert Ware. 239 
 
 Foreign travel, and a high appreciation of art and litera 
 ture, lent polish and elegance in no ordinary degree to a 
 solid and discriminating mind. 
 
 Although so young, he had been for some years noticed 
 by his professional seniors as giving the highest promise of 
 success ; his quickness of intellect, his patient industry and 
 powers of observation, had marked him for a high position. 
 The outbreak of the war found him with a growing prac 
 tice, a sound reputation, and a mind deeply stirred by the 
 rush of events. His remarkable modesty, and a feeling 
 that his education had fitted him specially for a physician's 
 work, made him shy of undertaking the duties of a military 
 surgeon. When, however, he was called to a surgeon's 
 post, it was found that cleverness as an operator was added 
 to the list of his professional excellences. 
 
 He embraced his first opportunity of usefulness in the 
 war by entering the service of the Sanitary Commission, 
 in the latter part of 1861, as Inspector. Out of the few 
 extracts from his letters which our space permits, the 
 reader can gather somewhat of his spirit ; but his keen wit, 
 his prompt denunciation of abuses, and shrewd estimate of 
 character, must be lost to all but his correspondents. 
 
 "NEWPORT NEWS, December 10, 1861. 
 
 ". . . . Where do you suppose the name of Old Point Comfort 
 came from ? The place is certainly old, and there is no question as 
 to its being a point, but as to comfort, allons done / . . . . We used 
 to ride out on horseback, and visit about two regiments a day. The 
 word ' riding ' reminds me of the condition to which three or four 
 days of this business reduced me. You probably supposed, in the 
 innocence of your heart, that the old and abominable rack of the 
 Inquisition had been abolished, and no longer existed out of the 
 Tower or such places. Pray divest your mind of such an error ; 
 it still lives and is active, it has been placed on four legs, endowed 
 with a skin and hair together with a tail, and is called a quarter 
 master's horse. Upon this instrument of torture have I been jolted 
 about for some days. The result must be felt to be appreciated." 
 
240 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 "ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND, December 17. 
 
 " .... I have been sent up here to do General Stone's division. 
 Saturday I reached Washington from Fortress Monroe, devoted 
 Sunday to writing a report of my doings at that place of dulness and 
 darkies ; was sent yesterday to Relay House to visit a Maine regi 
 ment, and started this noon for Poolesville. Winkle never eyed 
 that noble quadruped, the horse, with half the murderous feeling 
 which fills my heart, after I have been for an hour or so on the 
 back of a quartermaster's horse. The animal furnished me to-day 
 is a small, stumpy, coarse-haired, thick-eared, yellowish-gray beast, 
 with the stupidity of a penguin and the hide of an alligator. I 
 tried in vain before I left to buy a pair of spurs, but could find none 
 that would go over my leather leggings. Tired with continuous and 
 unavailing castigation, I resorted to the use of a stout pin. The 
 pin doubled up, but did n't even rouse him. He was left to his own 
 devices and the prospect of supper ; one or the other finally brought 
 him here With me and the horse came a rubber bag contain 
 ing much Sanitary knowledge, and the means of asking thirty-six 
 hundred questions, that being the extent to which (as you will as 
 certain by a very simple process of arithmetic, if you assume the 
 command to contain twenty thousand men, and the number of ques 
 tions to each regiment to be one hundred and eighty) my inquisitive 
 powers are to be exerted." 
 
 "FORTRESS MONROE, January 26, 1862. 
 
 " . . . . Do you know that I am so far removed from anything 
 approaching civilized society, and am so much in the daily habit of 
 talking about dirt and bad air to all whom I meet, that when it 
 comes to sitting down and talking to a person who is n't dirty and 
 does n't breathe bad air, I hardly know what to say ?....! was 
 sorry not to get over to Hampton to see the ruins of what every 
 one speaks of as a most picturesque old town ; but the day on which 
 I intended to go was much occupied in waiting to find Captain L., 
 who had just come from Hatteras, that I might learn whether or 
 not I could go back with him, and I did not feel justified in taking 
 the day for a mere excursion. That, by the way, is a great evil in 
 selling yourself for a fixed salary ; you feel perpetually as if all the 
 time not given directly to the business in hand was so much money 
 obtained on false pretences, and that you were nothing if not Sani 
 tary at all times and places." 
 
Robert Ware. 241 
 
 "CHESAPEAKE HOSPITAL, FORTRESS MONROE, April 1. 
 
 " . . . . When I wrote the other day that I was rapidly forgetting 
 how to practise medicine, I did not think that I should so soon be 
 immersed in an extensive practice, and that too under the most 
 disagreeable circumstances. Though this hospital was not half 
 ready, and no proper means were provided for attending a single 
 very sick man, nearly one hundred patients have been sent in here, 
 and we have been compelled to do the best that we could. If the 
 matter were not so serious, and the results, in the way of discom 
 fort and perhaps death, to the soldiers, so melancholy, it would 
 make one laugh to see the absurd inadequacy of the supplies sent 
 
 here And then the apothecary's shop ! any druggist of even 
 
 moderate ideas and expectations would go stark mad, and drown 
 his woes in his own assafoetida, did he find he was expected to dis 
 pense drugs under such circumstances. 
 
 " My medical work here is so consuming of time that I have not 
 been outside the house for three or four days, and can do nothing 
 in the Sanitary line, and feel as if I were neglecting my own 
 proper business, though the demand is so absorbing that I must 
 keep on. The house is not well adapted for a hospital. This army 
 will need nearly a thousand beds here, and yet no measures have 
 been taken to put up temporary buildings as adjuncts to this one." 
 
 "April 10. 
 
 "My hospital labors have continued with no intermission, ex 
 cept for three days when I went up to Newport News, to see a 
 large number of sick who had been sent in and were in a sad 
 
 plight We have many very sick here in this house, 
 
 four or five died yesterday. It 's a most painful thing to see men 
 die so, away from home and friends, surrounded by people who care 
 nothing for them. One soon learns what a little thing is a man's 
 life. One poor fellow died yesterday of typhoid fever, and the 
 nurse brought me down his diary, which he had kept since joining 
 the regiment. In it often occurred, ' wrote to mother,' ' got a letter 
 from mother,' or * father.' The record ceased abruptly two days be 
 fore his entry into the hospital, and the blank seemed to tell so sad 
 a story of no kind friend near to tell his mother of her son, that I 
 filled up the record with a few words about his sickness and death. 
 
 " To this hospital have now been sent the munificent provision 
 
 VOL. i. 16 
 
242 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 of two hundred linen sheets, so new and stiff that one might as well 
 ensconce himself between two panes of glass ; fifty towels, fifty or 
 sixty hospital shirts, thirty-four hospital dressing-gowns, and other 
 articles in the same proportion. No, I am wrong ; the supply of 
 horse-radish graters is complete and ample, there is a dozen of 
 them, enough for a whole town ; but as an offset to such prodigal 
 ity, there are not more than a dozen teaspoons in the house. The 
 nurses have laid violent hands upon all these, and carry them in 
 their pockets to dispense medicine in. The supply of vials has 
 been so small that the nurses have come down to the office, had the 
 medicine put in a mug, gone up and turned the dose into the pa 
 tient, and returned for another mess for another man. When cas 
 tor-oil, salts, and quinine follow each other in rapid succession, you 
 can see that the impression made on the sense of taste in the last 
 victim must be more startling than pleasant. With the exception 
 of the blankets and bed-sacks, every article of bedding in use has 
 come from the people of the country, through the agency of the 
 Sanitary Commission. Without them, the bulk of those now in 
 bed must have lain on the slats of the bedstead, like St. Lawrence 
 on the gridiron. The only thing that has been sent without stint 
 by the authorities is the patients ; and these, which should be the 
 last thing to come to a hospital, were the first here." 
 
 The disastrous Peninsular campaign had now begun. 
 What part Dr. Ware performed in caring for the sick and 
 wounded that poured in ghastly streams from the front to 
 the transports would hardly be gathered from his own story 
 in his letters. Fortunately, we have ample means of know 
 ing from his associates how he toiled, and with what benefit 
 to those who experienced his care. 
 
 "HOSPITAL SHIP OCEAN QUEEN, 
 OFF YORKTOWN, Wednesday, May 7. 
 
 " . . . . This ship was put into the hands of the Commission on 
 Monday. To-day she sailed with over eight hundred sick men." 
 
 " May 26. 
 
 "We are having busy times here with the sick, and are ex 
 pecting still busier when the wounded come from the anticipated 
 battle. To-day we sent off the steamer Spauldiug with three 
 
Robert Ware. 243 
 
 hundred and twenty-five sick men. Perhaps I have not written 
 enough of our method of procedure here for you to know how we 
 manage. The Commission has had several steamers placed in its 
 charge by government, which it has agreed to fit up with beds, &c., 
 and to provide with surgeons for the transportation of the sick. 
 Want of hospital room either here or at Yorktown forces men to 
 be carried to the hospitals at Washington, and they being now full, 
 even farther North ; and in this work we are engaged. Mr. 
 Olmsted, with some others who have been long attached to the 
 Commission, including myself, constitute a sort of permanent staff, 
 and see to the selecting of patients, the fitting up of the steamers, 
 &c. With us are engaged several New York ladies, who are most 
 
 useful and efficient I should not have supposed that women 
 
 of their breeding and habits could go through with so much and 
 such fearfully disagreeable work, but they are untiring, always 
 cheerful, ready, and uncomplaining; and by their very presence, 
 apart from the actual assistance in nursing, soften the treatment 
 which, at the hands of the best-intentioned men, is somewhat rough 
 and harsh. They are charming company, and I am rapidly learn 
 ing to eat with my fork when I can get one. We take our qui 
 nine regularly in a jovial company, and laugh at each other's wry 
 faces over the bitterness." 
 
 " June 8. 
 " . . . . The battle has been fought, and we hare had fearfully hard 
 
 work with the wounded at this point The results of the fight in 
 
 the shape of wounded men began to appear on Monday, and since 
 then every train has brought in varying numbers. Nearly four thou 
 sand have been sent away from here I have the charge of a 
 
 sort of hospital, with kitchen, &c., which has been established at the 
 terminus of the railway, for the reception of the sick and wounded 
 as they come down. The general hospital to which patients are sent 
 from the front is about a third of a mile distant from the railway ; 
 and as most of the trains arrive here in the night, it would be diffi 
 cult to move them to the hospital as they arrive, and they would 
 be obliged to remain in the cars all night. At Mr. Olmsted's sug 
 gestion, therefore, about sixty tents were pitched at the side of the 
 railway, capable of containing about four hundred men ; and the 
 kitchen, and the care of these tents, and the men in them, has been 
 made over to me by Mr. Olmsted. Some nights we have cared for 
 
244 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 over two hundred sick or wounded men ; and I wish you could be 
 here some night to see the moving. There are many lanterns. A 
 bright fire behind our cook-tent brings out in full relief the moving 
 figures of the men carrying stretchers, and of the limping wounded. 
 As soon as we can get it ready, food is sent up to the tents, and you 
 would smile to see how grateful the men are for a piece of soft 
 bread. The only bread at the front is the hard ship-biscuit ; and 
 many of the men, whose gums are sore from scurvy, find difficulty in 
 eating it. Sometimes we get to bed at twelve, sometimes at three, 
 sometimes not at all ; and I am free to say that I regard sunrise as 
 a greater humbug than ever. "When the wounded first began to 
 come down, there was immense enthusiasm on the part of the va 
 rious hangers-on at the post, and men swarmed around with offers 
 of assistance. If the cars came in pretty early, there were plenty 
 of hands to carry them to the boats ; but if they came in late, or 
 the task of carrying them was extended over a long time, it was 
 amazing hard work to find people who would assist. Make what 
 representations we would, it was impossible to get men detailed for 
 the especial duty ; and we had to rely on such help as could be got." 
 
 No better comments on his own modest story can be 
 made than those of his fellow-workers. In the little book 
 entitled " Hospital Transports " we read : 
 
 " As soon as the whistle is heard, Dr. Ware is on hand (he has 
 
 all the hard work of this kind to do) Dr. Ware sees them all, 
 
 and knows that they have blankets, attendants, and stimulants for 
 the night. When the morning comes, ambulances are generally 
 sent for them from the shore hospital, but occasionally they are left 
 on the Commission's hands for three days at a time. They would 
 fare badly but for the sleepless devotion of Dr. Ware, who night 
 after night works among them, often not leaving them till two or 
 three o'clock in the morning." 
 
 Another writes : 
 
 " He had a passion for usefulness. How many days and nights 
 have I not seen him, staggering with fatigue, dropping asleep for 
 minutes here and there, where they could be snatched, but* working 
 on cheerful, quiet, observant and careful for others, never for one 
 instant thinking of himself. I have never known modesty like his. 
 I have often thought it was his one defect." 
 
Robert Ware. 245 
 
 In the last of July he reached home, and wrote as 
 follows : 
 
 "Various and sundry reasons urged me to leave the James 
 River. I was n't well ; I had been bothered with diarrhosa for the 
 last three weeks of our stay in the Pamunkey, and was rapidly get 
 ting no better at Harrison's Landing : I 'm not entirely over it yet. 
 Then the government has taken in hand the business of transporting 
 the sick ; and that part of the occupation of the Commission was, so 
 to speak, gone. And I concluded that I should be of more service 
 in some other capacity than inspector. My lack of surgical practice 
 stands in my way of becoming a regimental surgeon How 
 ever, I shall wait till I feel really well before I start away again. 
 .... The Class Supper was quite a successful affair, so far as num 
 bers and brilliancy went, but somehow it went against my grain. 
 I could n't help thinking of the misery and horrors I had left 
 down on the James, and it seemed as if we were a collection of 
 
 Neros, fiddling while Rome burned." 
 
 "September 11. 
 
 " I wrote thus far last month, when the demon of laziness made 
 a prey and a spoil of me; and then I was sent by Surgeon- General 
 Dale to the assistance of the Second Massachusetts Regiment, which 
 
 had come to great grief at Culpepper Everything there was 
 
 quiet and comfortable, till suddenly there came an order for the 
 regiment to strike its camp and move to the rear. I was summoned 
 into the town, where I was worked by the Medical Director for 
 twenty- four hours in getting off the sick and wounded on the cars 
 to Washington ; all in the town were thus sent, except about eighty, 
 who could not have borne the journey. We personally finally 
 evacuated about four, p. M., 19th August, and made our way in the 
 rear of the army, which had been advancing towards Washington 
 from the Rapidan in a steady stream for about twenty-four hours. 
 Instead of being sent to Washington on one of the trains, as I had 
 expected, I was told to rejoin the regiment, which I found on the 
 
 northern side of the Rappahannock Having thus rejoined the 
 
 regiment, when there was every prospect of immediate shindy, I 
 could not of course leave them, and have been with them through 
 all the marching of the two weeks' campaign, which has ended in 
 Pope's sudden and by no means dignified exit from Virginia. We 
 
246 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 did all sorts of things except fight; we marched and counter 
 marched, we guarded baggage, we went hungry and thirsty, we 
 spread our blankets on the ground with no other cover than the 
 canopy of heaven ; in short, the experience was more severe than 
 any the regiment have ever been through, and was harder than 
 that of the Army of the Potomac when it removed from before 
 
 Richmond to Harrison's Landing They want me to go as 
 
 Surgeon of the Forty-fourth Massachusetts, and I am undecided 
 whether I shall do right in accepting or not ; if I don't go with 
 them, I shall probably go back to the Sanitary, which also requested 
 my services." 
 
 We now come to his last and fatal service of government, 
 as Surgeon of the Forty-fourth. No man ever left his 
 home from a sterner and purer sense of duty than Dr. 
 Ware. Military life was repugnant to all his tastes ; and 
 something more than a foreboding seems to have filled his 
 heart on the eve of his sailing for the South. He was not 
 the man to talk about it, and perhaps not more than one 
 or two knew that it existed. But the belief that he never 
 should return did not hold him back one instant. The 
 duty nearest his hand he took up, and performed cheerfully 
 and steadily to the end. 
 
 " NEWBERN, NORTH CAROLINA, November 21, 1862. 
 
 " . . . . The men, except one company, are already in barracks, 
 and I have been at work since we returned to what we now call 
 home in trying to get them ventilated. The men begin to appre 
 ciate the savage discipline which cut all sorts of holes in their 
 houses at Readville, and was instrumental in causing them to lie 
 on bare boards ; for here no straw is to be obtained even for the 
 hospital, and it has proved an advantage that the men learned 
 to do without it while at home. The blankets of the regiment, 
 which were stored when we started from Washington, North Caro 
 lina, have not yet appeared. 
 
 " We left Washington, North Carolina, on Sunday, and had a 
 very hot and toilsome march, through a wholly uninteresting coun 
 try, till just before sunset, when there was a sort of prophetic halt, 
 and word came back from the Colonel that two of our companies 
 
Robert Ware. 247 
 
 had been detached, and he thought that some of the stretcher-men 
 
 had better be sent with them Pretty soon cannon opened on 
 
 one side, and continued for a time ; then there was a pause, and 
 we heard the rattle of musketry, and the hum of the balls as they 
 whizzed over us. Only two or three volleys were fired, at least so 
 far as I know ; for I was soon engaged in attending to the wounded, 
 two or three of whom were brought back on the stretchers. Our 
 donkey-cart (containing medicines, instruments, and stretchers) was 
 drawn up on one side of the road, the lanterns were lighted, for 
 it had become very dark, and we established our first hospitals 
 among some pines. By word from Dr. Green, this was changed 
 to a small cottage of two rooms, nearer the creek. Such bedding 
 as the mansion afforded was laid out in one of the rooms, and the 
 men we brought were laid upon it. The house was small, and the 
 only light outside came from an occasional lantern. One of our 
 men lay dead at one end of the porch. He had been instantly 
 
 killed by a shot through the head Pretty soon word came 
 
 that our column had passed the creek, but that the enemy had some 
 earthworks farther up the road. Then De Peyster was brought in, 
 very badly wounded in the arm. After a consultation, it was de 
 cided that the arm must be removed In the mean time the 
 
 movement of troops continued The chaplain came in, asking 
 
 for some assistance to get the body of one of our men up from the 
 creek, who was shot through the head, and that of a man belong 
 ing to the artillery. Some of Captain Lombard's men had dug a 
 grave for their comrade in among some pines, opposite the house 
 we occupied ; and these two other men were buried there. It was 
 a strange scene. The moon shone bright and peacefully ; but there 
 was a scent of powder in the air, and my hands were bloody from 
 assisting in amputating De Peyster's arm. While we heard the 
 rumble of wheels, and the voices of men from the troops passing 
 in the road, the three bodies were laid in one grave ; the chaplain 
 said a short prayer, and then we turned from the first grave of the 
 Forty-fourth Regiment. Just then came the rattle of musketry 
 from some little distance up the road." 
 
 " NEWBEKN, NORTH CAROLINA, December 22. 
 
 " . . . . We reached Kinston on the return march [from Golds- 
 borough bridge] Friday morning, and I left the column to go down to 
 
248 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 the boat with some of our men severely wounded, who I was anxious 
 should be spared the journey over the road to Newbern in those 
 infernal ambulances. I got down to the boat, which was a miser 
 able concern, with little or no cover, and was in season to put the 
 two worst cases in the cabin on a mattress which I took from a 
 house near the landing. I had them comfortably settled, and left 
 provisions, and a nurse to look after them, when the Medical Di 
 rector appeared, and told me to go on board, and report to the 
 surgeon in charge, and go down with the wounded. I sent my 
 horse back to the regiment, and went on board. Soon men began 
 to arrive in numbers, and the boat, which ought to have held fifty, 
 was laden with upwards of one hundred and fifty. They were 
 packed everywhere. We opened bundles of hay, which had been 
 brought as a protection from the rifles of the Secesh, and spread 
 it over the decks. A large scow, which had been laden with 
 provisions, was cleared as far as possible, and the men laid in that. 
 "While we were at work, one of my men died, as I had expected, 
 and I said nothing, because I thought we might get his body down 
 to Newbern, where it could be obtained by his friends ; but it be 
 came evident I was doing wrong in thus using space required for 
 the living, and I finally had a grave dug under a splendid pine at 
 the landing. The body was moved just in season to give room 
 for one of our drummer-boys, who had a severe shell-wound of the 
 thigh, and who, I feared, had gone down in the ambulance over 
 the road. I was glad to have a bed for him." 
 
 " NEWBERN, January 10, 1863. 
 
 " . . . . We are having our first experience of severe sickness here 
 in the shape of congestive fever, of which three men have died 
 within ten days, several others being very sick. One man died in 
 twelve hours from the time of attack. It is more savage than any 
 thing I ever saw, except some cases of scarlet fever in children." 
 
 " January 27. 
 
 " . . . . The W. H. Fry has arrived, and now the barracks will 
 be filled with all sorts of mouldy trash in the shape of pies and 
 decayed puddings, semi-putrescent sausages, and unwholesome litter 
 generally ; and on Sunday inspection I shall rouse the wrath of the 
 men by having a considerable amount of it emptied into the swill- 
 
Robert Ware. 249 
 
 barrels. Then there are various packages for the hospital, and 
 the donors will have to be written to and told separately that they 
 have selected just the article we needed." 
 
 " WASHINGTON, NORTH CAROLINA, March 16. 
 
 " On the 14th, at evening, orders come to start at once from 
 Newbern for this place. We were off in about two hours, and 
 are now nearly arrived. It was feared that Pettigru, who made 
 the attack on the fort on Saturday, being foiled in that, may join 
 with Pryor, who is up here'somewhere, and attack this place, which 
 has about twelve hundred men in it ; we being five hundred (only 
 
 eight companies)." 
 
 "April 2. 
 
 " The face of events has greatly changed since last I wrote, 
 and at present we are regularly besieged ; cut off from the world 
 outside, and surrounded more or less by batteries, which boom 
 away at intervals, to keep us constantly aware of their existence. 
 .... Everything remained quiet till Monday, though warnings 
 had come in various shapes that an attack was to be made. Gen 
 eral Foster arrived in the morning, much to our surprise and de 
 light. Two companies were sent across the river on a reconnois- 
 sance. We soon heard a few cannon-shots, then musketry, and 
 pretty soon a man ran to the river, and told the gunboat whose 
 guns are trained up the road to open fire. One party soon ap 
 peared, and came back over the bridge, bringing with them Cap 
 tain Richardson, wounded, who withdrew his men, as it was evident 
 
 that the force there was pretty large We had an anxious 
 
 and uncomfortable night ; for there was no knowing at what hour 
 an attack might be made. Just about daylight we heard musketry 
 down the river ; and I learned that a company had gone down on 
 
 a flat-boat, and fire was opened on them from the bank The 
 
 next day firing began again down below. I got up and went to 
 the point below the town, where, from the way in which the shot 
 whistled, it was evident that something lively was in progress. 
 The Commodore Hull was close down at Rodman's Point, fight 
 ing the battery there Several houses in town were struck ; 
 
 the enemy fired Whitworth shot, and banged away as if they had 
 
 plenty of ammunition We are obliged to pull down houses 
 
 for fuel ; but whether we shall get as far as short rations or not, I 
 don't know." 
 
250 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " April 3. 
 
 " The enemy opened two new batteries this morning ; one 
 nearly opposite the market, and the other somewhere up the road 
 from the bridge. Their shot were mainly thrown at the boats. The 
 gun opposite the market was soon dismounted ; and when the enemy 
 came up with horses to take it off, a well-directed shell from the 
 
 Louisiana pitched horses and men into the air The other 
 
 battery and the gunboat fired for some time ; but after about three 
 
 hours, the battery stopped About two, a fleet of six gunboats 
 
 made their welcome appearance below, and engaged the battery 
 
 for about three quarters of an hour Now the great question 
 
 is, whether or not the boats will attempt to pass up or not to-night ; 
 a boat was to go down to-day to buoy out the channel, so that 
 perhaps they will come up. Shot and shell are as plenty as black 
 berries ; and I pity the unfortunate townspeople, whose houses now 
 and then get holes knocked in them, and whose women are fright 
 ened. Many of them have taken refuge in their cellars. One 
 family had a Whitworth shot through their house yesterday ; and 
 this morning, just as they were getting up from the table, another 
 shot landed plump upon it. The streets are empty and still, the 
 shops all shut, and it seems like a perpetual Sunday." 
 
 These were the last lines he wrote before his illness. 
 He and Dr. Fisher, in whom he found a most congenial 
 coadjutor, appreciated very highly the extraordinary oppor 
 tunities for surgical and anatomical study that the condi 
 tion of things afforded, and spent night after night, till the 
 small hours, studying special topics, the great mortality 
 among the blacks affording large material. It was this, 
 and his practice in the black camps, quite as much as his 
 regimental "duties, that pulled him down. On the 5th he 
 was seized with typhoid pneumonia, the disease which, 
 as he had told a medical friend, he feared he should not 
 escape in the spring. " For several days he wandered in 
 his mind, talking about the experiments he and Dr. Fisher 
 had in hand, or imagining himself on the battle-field. The 
 day that he died was the critical one A violent can 
 nonade from the Rebel batteries, nearer and more continu- 
 
Robert Ware. 251 
 
 cms than any that had preceded, excited him to wildness. 
 It was with difficulty he could be kept to his pillow, and 
 the slender thread that bound him to us was rudely bro 
 ken." On the 10th he died " perfectly tranquil, with an 
 inspired, happy look in his eyes." They buried him pri 
 vately in the afternoon of the following day, at Washington, 
 North Carolina ; General Foster and his staff, and the offi 
 cers of the two regiments, attending. The body remained 
 at that place till the siege was raised. It was then disin 
 terred for removal to the North ; and as it passed through 
 Newbern, funeral services were held there at the request of 
 the regiment. The final interment took place at Mount 
 Auburn on the 1st of May following. 
 
 His assistant, Dr. Fisher, wrote : 
 
 " I cannot but think that the anxiety and fatigue of his assiduous 
 and unremitting labors for the regiment, which he had previously 
 borne so well, by a cumulative process predisposed him for the 
 fatal attack. For the first three weeks at Washington, he was the 
 senior medical officer at the post ; and after, the Rebel investment 
 added to this responsibility the fatigue of frequent alarms and much 
 professional labor. He performed several capital operations among 
 the wounded negroes, all of whom I found on my arrival doing 
 well, and bearing evidence of his kindness and foresight in their 
 after treatment His anxiety for the safety of the regiment oc 
 cupied his last thoughts. I cannot conceive a nobler death, nor one 
 I should more envy. It was entirely consonant with what I know 
 of his life, which seemed guided at every moment by honor and 
 duty. Courageous on the field of battle, he was equally so in the 
 insidious dangers of the camp and hospital." 
 
 From the mass of testimonials to Dr. Ware's memory, 
 the resolutions of his classmates, the votes of social and sci 
 entific organizations to which he belonged, and letters of 
 personal friends, I select the following from a letter of Rev. 
 Edward H. Hall, then Chaplain of the Forty-fourth : 
 
 " You could hardly tell whether to admire most his remarkable 
 skill or his wonderful fidelity. His professional skill was acknowl- 
 
252 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 edged on all sides in the department ; but we, who saw him every 
 day, were even more struck by the readiness and cheerfulness with 
 which he answered every call. A surgeon's office, at best, to a con 
 scientious man, is the most laborious in the regiment. Yet I never 
 saw the time, during the hardest marches or at the most untimely 
 hours, when Robert hesitated for a seeond to go to those who needed 
 him, and give them all the time that was required. If you knew 
 the prevailing standard of official duty in the army, you would un 
 derstand how striking such single-minded fidelity must be. 
 
 " But the feeling of the men towards Robert is still more touch 
 ing and even more honorable to him than that of the officers 
 
 He certainly never sought popularity ; he exacted stoutly the re 
 spect that was due to his office, and was most unsparing in unmask 
 ing the shams by which a surgeon is sure to be beset. Yet in spite 
 of all this, his real kindness, his tenderness and sympathy, impressed 
 them so deeply, and revealed his true nature so plainly, that they 
 could not help feeling more attracted to him than to any other offi 
 cer. They feel his loss deeply and speak of it sadly. So true a 
 man always finds himself appreciated by simply acting out the 
 promptings of his nature." 
 
 " We who remain," says another friend, " and have been 
 in the way of looking forward to his future, and imagining 
 what he would some day become, find with some surprise 
 that he was already all we had ever looked for. He had 
 not to wait for added years to fill a place, and to perform 
 work, which, being done, makes his life already one of the 
 finished lives." 
 
Sidney Willard. 253 
 
 SIDNEY WILLARD. 
 
 Captain 35th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), August 13, 1862 ; Major, August 
 27, 1862 ; died December 14, 1862, of a wound received at Fredericks- 
 burg, December 13. 
 
 SIDNEY WILLARD, the eldest son of Joseph and 
 Susanna Hicklin (Lewis) Willard, was born February 
 3, 1831, at Lancaster, Massachusetts, where, nearly two 
 hundred years before, Major Simon Willard, the earliest 
 New England ancestor of the family, leading a hardy band 
 of Puritans, had planted the little town upon the frontier. 
 Sidney Willard was but an infant when his parents removed 
 to Boston, and his boyhood and manhood were wholly passed 
 in the city. 
 
 At an early age he showed a love for outdoor activity, in 
 marked contrast with a certain quiet and reserve of nature, 
 and an aptitude (but imperfectly perceived by himself) for 
 the sober pursuits of a scholar. To him, as to every lad 
 whom the watchful care and gentle influences of home sur 
 round, a knowledge of himself and ready use of his own 
 powers came but slowly. Shy and yet self-possessed, re 
 spectful to age and authority by nature and education, yet 
 singularly fearless and independent, and with a frame of 
 whose boyish awkwardness he was conscious, knowing not 
 that it was the sign of great coming strength, he was slower 
 to develop the natural points of his character than most of 
 the companions of his early years. But through all this 
 somewhat tardy growth there worked a steady and ripen 
 ing purpose of self-development, which seemed almost to 
 have been born in him, and which gradually brought order 
 out of the chaos of his boyish nature. 
 
 He became a pupil of the Latin School of Boston at the 
 age of ten. The good influences upon his nature here 
 were twofold. The admirable drill which gives this school 
 
254 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 a fair rivalry in exact scholarship with Eton or Harrow, 
 taught him by degrees to know his own powers of study ; 
 and though he did not attain eminence in mere rank, yet 
 he learned those habits of thoroughness which it is the pride 
 of the school to convey. It was good seed in good ground. 
 But his ambition went beyond this ; and while he gradu 
 ally gained in scholarship, his conscientious and singularly 
 systematic habits made the wide general reading in which 
 he indulged an education in itself. His moral and physi 
 cal development, moreover, were steadily pursued. Natu 
 rally quick-tempered, he held this impulse under the curb, 
 until, even in extreme provocation, no sign of anger could 
 be detected, save a passing flush, which testified to the strug 
 gle and the victory ; and he conformed to the precept which 
 he wrote in a Greek book daily used by him in school, " He 
 that ruleth himself is better than he that taketh a city." 
 Outdoor sports attracted his companions, and gave them 
 health rather than strength ; but Willard, even at this early 
 age, trained his powers at the gymnasium with the method 
 and success of a Greek athlete. 
 
 While the school thus did its office in promoting the 
 growth of his character, and his admirable home influences 
 produced their due effect, he was, after all, to an unusual 
 extent, his own teacher. Inborn and growing as he grew, 
 his controlling moral sense made the duty of the moment 
 the law of his action, and his guiding motive of conduct to 
 find in what shape that duty lay. His judgment was too 
 sound ever.to allow his sense of duty to become morbid ; 
 and he held with admirable moderation and singularly clear 
 perception the balance even between the opposite require 
 ments of his nature. His purity of mind was remarkable. 
 He was incapable of vicious companionship, not more from 
 a conscious repugnance to depraved natures, than from the 
 unconscious rebuke which such natures felt in his presence. 
 He was not phlegmatic or hard. The sensitive, shy, proud 
 nature which underlay his calm exterior, but seldom sus- 
 
Sidney Willard. 255 
 
 pected to exist except by those who knew him well, became 
 very noticeable by its contrast with the outer man, and gave 
 an added charm from that contrast. He was indeed 
 
 " To the soul that loved him sweet as summer." 
 
 Yet he was very slow to form friendships or impart con 
 fidences, and with all his self-reliance came a certain self- 
 distrust, from his inability to give and receive that ready 
 show of outside friendliness which is the every-day coin of 
 social intercourse ; and this produced a certain coldness of 
 manner, as of one not open to every comer. He rarely 
 asked for sympathy or aid in the accomplishment of a 
 task, even though intruding doubts of his powers made the 
 effort of achievement almost heroic. Still less did he seek 
 applause for his performance. In all his self-culture, his 
 labor of preparation was quiet and unnoticed, and the effort 
 was never suspected until it became achievement. His 
 culture and accomplishments were as sure and reliable as 
 if hewn out of rock. He acquired considerable skill for 
 he had excellent taste as a musician ; and his nice touch 
 as a draughtsman still has enduring shape in many a grace 
 ful figure or vigorous sketch in the portfolios or on the 
 walls of his friends. 
 
 In 1848, at the age of seventeen, he entered Harvard Col 
 lege. He brought to the training of the college a vigorous 
 physical frame, exact and methodical habits of study, and a 
 keen sense of duty ; but with these a certain solitariness of 
 nature that held him much aloof from his Class, and tastes 
 that the college course did not satisfy. He was no negli 
 gent loiterer; he was neither unable to acquire, nor un 
 aware of the golden time for progress which he was enjoy 
 ing. Life meant duty to him, and duty and its performance 
 were the law of his existence ; but he must needs make his 
 progress mainly in his own way. Perhaps it is not too 
 much to say, that, at the tune of his graduation, he was the 
 equal in general culture of any one in his Class, and had 
 laid the foundations of his knowledge deep and broad. 
 
256 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 . Of that subtle discipline which the democracy of a college 
 enforces on its members, he felt much. A perfect Nazarite 
 in the law of the body, hardly knowing vice even in thought, 
 he was far removed in ordinary companionship from the 
 idle or the luxurious ; yet his character won the respect 
 and confidence even of those with whom he could not read 
 ily associate ; and those who did not appreciate his finer 
 qualities, could yet perceive his solid steadiness of purpose, 
 or admire the regularity of his physical life, and the per 
 fection of his athletic strength. The ordinary opportuni 
 ties in college life for vigorous exercise are many, and 
 Willard made the most of them. He became a tough and 
 expert rower ; he was the best walker, leaper, and vaulter 
 of his Class, or perhaps of the College during his day ; and 
 in fencing and boxing, his coolness and perfect self-control, 
 his untiring muscular strength, his supple frame, and great 
 length of limb, made him a most formidable antagonist. 
 
 These were qualities sure of appreciation in college ; but 
 this always a little annoyed him. He could not but feel the 
 unthinking injustice done to higher qualities by the exclu 
 sive applause bestowed upon humbler ones ; and it was not 
 his aim, in the education of his body, to be praised as a 
 gymnast. In his last year at Harvard the boating contests 
 between Harvard and Yale began, and in the first on 
 Lake Winnipiseogee he was selected to pull the heaviest 
 oar. The victory gave a great stimulus to boating at 
 Cambridge, and to that hardy culture which formed a 
 school for the war, and sent forth many of those who had 
 contended manfully together for the prize of endurance 
 and strength, to fight and die side by side on the battle 
 field. 
 
 He graduated in 1852, in the same class with Paul 
 Revere and Foster Haven, the former a companion at the 
 Latin School, the latter an old acquaintance before college 
 days, and a friend almost as it were by inheritance. En 
 deared by many ties, and often familiarly associated, Wil- 
 
Sidney Willard. 257 
 
 lard and Haven met their end on the same bloody field of 
 battle, and almost at the same moment. 
 
 After graduation, Willard entered the Law School at 
 Cambridge, coming to the study of the law in pursuance 
 of long-settled plans. He was eminently fitted for this 
 career. His judgment was cool, and he inspired all who 
 dealt with him with confidence. He was able to meet 
 every emergency that might arise, not by immediate 
 preparation, but from acquirements gained long before ; 
 for every study in which he had engaged had been under 
 taken, not from passing fancy, or to gratify a pride of 
 knowledge, but to develop fully each faculty in harmony 
 with, and aid of, every other. He had great patience in 
 acquiring information, always seeking, in conversation, 
 rather to receive than to impart, and to possess himself of 
 all that any source offered to him. Hence his complete 
 ness of information made his knowledge always equal to 
 the moment, and left him master of himself and of the 
 occasion. 
 
 He remained at the Law School for eight months, and 
 then entered the office of the Hon. Edmund Gushing, in 
 Charlestown, New Hampshire. His life here was uneventful 
 in enterprise or adventure ; but in the uudeviating pursuit 
 of self-culture, and the busy toil of an active mind pre 
 paring for its work, it was crowded with effort. His letters 
 to his family, in his absence from home, were graphic, with 
 characteristic sketches with pen and pencil, for he drew 
 as readily as he wrote, and a quiet sense of humor caught, 
 without fail, the grotesque side of country life. In his 
 stay of more than a year, he left upon the people whom he 
 met an enduring impression of his strength and purity of 
 character, which found warm and affectionate expression 
 when his death brought sharply to remembrance the qual 
 ities they had prized. 
 
 Willard left Charlestown in 1854, and, returning to Bos 
 ton, entered the law office of the Hon. Charles G. Lor- 
 
 VOL. I. 17 
 
258 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ing. He studied here until his admission to the bar in 
 1856, when, feeling the necessity of a wider experience of 
 men before committing himself to any locality for life, he 
 went to St. Paul, Minnesota, with a view to establish 
 himself in business there, if it seemed advisable. But the 
 West did not attract him. He had not the ready gift of 
 adaptation to new and uncongenial men and manners, and 
 was slow to forego his fixed habits of thought and work 
 for immediate success. He therefore wisely gave up all 
 thought of seeking his fortune elsewhere than in New Eng 
 land, and came back to practise in Boston. Success surely 
 awaited him here, and success in his own way, and in a 
 community peculiarly congenial to his temper and training ; 
 but it came slowly, and not without many doubts and mis 
 givings on his part. 
 
 At last came the reward of toil. One by one clients ap 
 peared and friends were made ; and professional labor, care 
 fully and successfully performed, gradually gave him a rec 
 ognized position at the bar. He was not a fluent speaker, 
 but his words were always well chosen and appropriate, and 
 his reasoning compact and cogent. The hearers uncon 
 sciously accompanied the speaker's clear statement ; and, 
 disarmed by its apparent simplicity, adopted it as their own, 
 mentally adding to it, and convinced by what they seemed 
 to have suggested to themselves. 
 
 But he did not allow professional duties or studies, how 
 ever attractive, to withdraw him from physical exercise. 
 He never permitted any acquirement to gather rust from 
 disuse, and steadily kept up his athletic skill. He had 
 carefully constructed under his personal supervision, and 
 according to a model of his own, a wherry, fitted per 
 fectly for secure voyaging on the open sea as well as for 
 speed on smoother water. In this he set out in August, 
 1860, to row from Boston to Mount Desert Island, there to 
 meet a party of friends. It was the first ocean voyage in 
 one of these slender skiffs which had then been attempted, 
 
Sidney Willard. 259 
 
 and required no little hardihood to undertake. His own 
 graphic account of it, written, by request, for the Atlantic 
 Monthly Magazine, is the best evidence at once of his skill 
 with the oar and with the pen. The voyage proceeded 
 very successfully until the rocky headlands of Cape Ann 
 were passed, when the steady easterly wmd drove in the 
 fog and storm shorewards, obscuring everything, and night 
 fell upon the adventurous voyager, who was at sea in his 
 frail boat, in a locality beyond exact conjecture. Carefully 
 calculating the possibility of drifting on the treacherous 
 shore before morning, and concluding against it, he very 
 coolly drew about him his oil-skin outer shelter, and slept 
 lulled by the impatient plash of the waves against his little 
 craft. Morning broke and showed him close under the 
 rocky islets of The Shoals, and but half-way to his intended 
 goal ; and as the easterly storm showed no signs of abating, 
 he abandoned further progress, and rowed home. Many 
 shorter trips in this beloved boat were from time to time 
 successfully carried out, and he had projected a long excur 
 sion for that summer which saw him depart from his home 
 forever for the sterner scenes of war. 
 
 In 1861, the alarum of war found Willard well established 
 in business, engaged to be married, and surrounded by 
 friends whose number was constantly increasing. He had 
 found his position in life, which it was not probable any 
 change would unfix. His home satisfied his tastes, but 
 imposed upon him active duties and a life of energetic 
 effort. 
 
 At an early period of his life he had been interested in 
 military affairs. In his boyhood the battles and sieges of 
 Froissart engrossed his attention with far more than the 
 ordinary boy's interest in scenes of enterprise and exciting 
 adventure. Later, he followed up this study, as he did all 
 his studies, to a thorough and exact acquaintance with vari 
 ous details of military .science. To his expertness in the use 
 of the sword he had added great skill as a shot. Overcoming 
 
260 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 an early strong dislike to mathematics, he had in maturer 
 years, with iron perseverance, made himself thoroughly 
 versed in the higher branches, and trained to exact calcula 
 tion of distances as a draughtsman. Study soon made him 
 well informed in the theory, as experiment gave him great 
 skill in the actual practice, of projectiles. He had joined 
 the organization of the Boston Cadets in 1858, believing in 
 the great value of some militia system, faulty as he felt the 
 existing one to be. He had projected long before this time 
 the scheme of a company where vigorous and rigid drill, and 
 a uniform sufficient to promote discipline, but admitting the 
 freest use of the limbs and the most active exercise, should 
 be combined with constant practice in the use of arms, and 
 the routine of the camp should be learned by actual trial ; 
 but he had not found time to put his plan in operation 
 before the critical hour came. 
 
 Immediately after the passage of the ordinance of seces 
 sion by South Carolina in December, 1860, and before the 
 first note of war had sounded, he began drilling a club 
 formed chiefly of younger members of the bar, and con 
 tinued with them for several months. With the first call 
 for volunteers arose in his mind a most painful conflict. 
 His military tastes and competency seemed to summon him 
 to put in practice, in a cause dearer to him than life, the 
 physical capabilities and theoretic skill in which he had 
 perfected himself so thoroughly. Far more than this, his 
 strong anti-slavery convictions prompted him to enlist in a 
 war begun by the South in defence of slavery, but which 
 put in our hands the power forever to destroy that baneful 
 seed of evil. But with Willard the conviction of duty was 
 always the result of cool deliberation, never of mere enthu 
 siastic sentiment. He was now past the age when want of 
 fixed position in life, mere youth and absence of responsibil 
 ities, make war a source of fascinating attraction, like hunt 
 ing or adventure, only far more potent than these from 
 its realities, its perils, and ifs glory. Nor did this first 
 
Sidney Willard. 261 
 
 call for volunteers awaken any general sense of the magni 
 tude of the impending contest, of whose favorable issue no 
 one then doubted ; and to one who appreciated as Willard 
 did the efficiency of thorough organization, it seemed an 
 easy task for the government to use its vast powers, and 
 create an army able to sweep unresisted from the Potomac 
 to the Gulf of Mexico. He knew his own fitness for the 
 administration of military affairs, perhaps no more ac 
 complished soldier ever entered the army from civil life, 
 and every man whom he trained for the war increased his 
 sensitiveness as to his self-suggested duty to take up arms 
 in person. But he felt equally well the reality of duties at 
 home, that he himself was even better fitted for peace than 
 for war, and that in enlisting he must abandon much which 
 he had long educated himself to be able to perform, an 
 ability which the growing recognition of the community had 
 fully indorsed. He could not, therefore, close his ears to 
 the voice of duty which bade him stay. But he gave his 
 time lavishly to complete the general preparation of the 
 community for whatever might come. Several hundred 
 men in different organizations received his instruction in 
 drilling, and he was unsurpassed as a drill-master ; and 
 many also who came to him singly were taught the mili 
 tary knowledge requisite for the positions they sought or 
 had obtained. 
 
 Thus passed the year 1861. The dawning spring of 
 1862 brought new triumphs to our cause, and it appeared 
 that the beginning of the end was nigh. All that spring, 
 the progress of our arms seemed certain ; but it did not 
 diminish Willard's activity in his labor of drilling, nor did 
 it lessen his regret in bearing no share in a task to which 
 he found himself so well suited. 
 
 Then came the long summer days, bringing first doubt, 
 darkening our long-cherished hopes, then despair, as all the 
 great enterprise on which we had built dwindled to shame 
 ful defeat. Sidney Willard's decision was made, and with 
 
262 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 the same quietness with which he had suppressed all sug 
 gestion of desire to take part in the war, when that desire 
 could not be followed by performance, he now announced his 
 purpose, and immediately set about its execution. In three 
 days after his application for a commission, he had raised 
 the requisite number of men, and was appointed Captain in 
 the Thirty-fifth Regiment, then in process of formation, on 
 the 13th of August. On the 21st, the day before his depart 
 ure for the war, he was married to Miss Sarah R. Fiske, 
 daughter of Augustus H. Fiske, Esq., an eminent lawyer, 
 at the latter's country residence in Weston. 
 
 On the 22d of August the regiment left for the war. 
 There was no more noticeable man in its ranks than Cap 
 tain Willard, marching with stately figure through the ea 
 ger, crowded streets, to enter upon a mode of life that had 
 little in it to attract him, his face sobered by the duty which 
 separated him from all he loved, but set with a resolution 
 that never looked back ; an untried commander, with men 
 even more untried, hastening to the field when the country's 
 peril was greatest. 
 
 He received his commission as Major of the regiment 
 September 2d, while encamped at Arlington Heights. From 
 this point his own letters tell the story. He thus writes : 
 
 "NEAR WASHINGTON, August 25, 1862. 
 
 " We camped in the open field all night It is just like 
 
 camping out in the middle of Brighton road when it is hottest and 
 dustiest. I am well and jolly, except when I think of you all ; and 
 then the thought that I am trying to do my duty is consolation 
 ample." 
 
 A few days later, under date of 
 
 " ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, August 28. 
 
 " Our men are just getting a notion of loading and firing. We 
 have had rumors of the defeat of Pope, Sigel, &c., but nothing 
 authentic. We can tell literally nothing here about the movements 
 of the armies. Regiments come and go: their tents whiten the 
 
Sidney Willard. 263 
 
 hillside one day, and are gone the next I hope that the Thir 
 ty-fifth will soon prove itself an excellent regiment." 
 
 In a letter to his sister, dated Arlington Heights, Sep 
 tember 2d, he writes : 
 
 " I shall ever love you as I have done, not in very demonstrative 
 mode, perchance, but yet better than you think ; and, while I live, 
 you know that you have somebody to depend on, to help and assist 
 you. I hope, God willing, after this accursed Rebellion is put down, 
 to return to old Massachusetts ; and, a better and more energetic 
 man, to make my way, so that I can aid in other ways than mere 
 
 words I have had the appointment of Major to the regiment. 
 
 Pray, who, if any one, made representations to the Governor ? 
 
 If you know, please let me know. The promotion is rapid enough 
 to satisfy the most exacting ; and I shall try to fill the post thor 
 oughly, and hope to." 
 
 Shortly afterwards, his regiment, with others, moved, in 
 support of McClellan, towards Harper's Ferry as far as 
 Brookville, when the Major was sent back to Washington on 
 detached service, while his regiment was hurried into action, 
 and took part in two severe battles when it had been raised 
 barely five weeks and could not execute a single battalion 
 manoeuvre. On the first report of the likelihood of an en 
 counter, he hastened to the front. 
 
 "WASHINGTON, September 18. 
 
 " I sent the detachment off Tuesday evening to rejoin the regi 
 ment, and must follow just as soon as I can My regiment is 
 
 perhaps seventy miles distant, a long way in this bebothered State. 
 The great thing which I regret in staying here in Washington on 
 regimental business is, that my regiment may have been engaged in 
 the fighting, and I not there, a source of great trouble and regret 
 to me. I shall go to them just as soon as I can." 
 
 He was met half-way by tidings of loss. 
 
 " BOONSBOROUGH, MARYLAND, Monday night, September 22. 
 
 " I have to-day, while on my way from Frederick hither 
 
 (sixteen miles), learned the fate of my regiment. We have lost, in 
 two battles, nearly every commissioned officer, killed or wounded. 
 
264 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 The Colonel's left arm is gone at the shoulder, and the Lieuten 
 ant-Colonel is shot through the neck. Captain Bartlett is killed, 
 and Captains Andrews and Lathrop are the only ones fit for duty 
 in the regiment. I believe my men (I shall, till the Lieutenant- 
 Colonel recovers, be in command of the regiment) are not more 
 than ten miles distant ; and I hope to reach them to-morrow. 
 
 " But you can tell how sad a thing this loss of officers and men 
 (fifty-two killed, two hundred and five wounded) is ; one quarter 
 part of the regiment gone, taking out the sick, and necessary at 
 tendants. The thousand that marched up State Street, little more 
 than four weeks since, now number hardly more than six hundred ; 
 and I almost dread seeing the diminished ranks." 
 
 He found himself just in time to assume the command. 
 
 " September 28. 
 
 " I am working with all my might on the regiment ; and hope, 
 in the course of the week, to get things agoing systematically. You 
 can hardly conceive what up-hill work it is. There are but three 
 captains in the regiment, and everything has to be organized. 
 Morning reports, accounts of the sick and wounded ; bothers innu 
 merable about forage, commissary stores, subsistence, &c. ; servants' 
 attendance, regiments' wash-sinks, guards, funds, sutlers, discipline, 
 drill, details for different duties, postage, losses in battle, and every 
 thing else conceivable I did not think, when I left Boston 
 
 and walked over to Lynnfield, that I should be in command of the 
 remainder of the regiment in less than five weeks." 
 
 He was a strict disciplinarian, and gave the regiment a 
 character it never lost. Naturally he enforced those partic 
 ulars wherein he never failed himself. He writes, Octo 
 ber 2d: . 
 
 " I have intense satisfaction in my position as commander for 
 two reasons, it enables me to enforce cleanliness, and prohibit 
 swearing ; which last I have checked to a considerable extent, to 
 a degree which I never thought I should be able to." 
 
 He had never been a horseman, and this requirement of 
 his new position was not at all agreeable. The horse he 
 had purchased at Washington, before rejoining his regi- 
 
Sidney Willard. 265 
 
 ment, was a fertile source for his half-serious, half-joking 
 abuse. 
 
 " I wish," he says, " Uncle Sam would allow his majors to walk. 
 The horse has passed the largest part of his valuable existence, 
 since I became his unwilling owner, tied to a stake back of my tent, 
 where I can distinctly hear every sneeze and cough, every motion 
 
 of the quadruped Nature never intended me for a horseman. 
 
 I hate the beasts." 
 
 On the 9th of October, the regiment was moved to Pleas 
 ant Valley. On October 24th he writes : 
 
 " For five weeks our men ' have fought, marched, dug, slept, ate, 
 and camped out in the same clothes,' having but one suit." He then 
 describes his great relief since the return of the Lieutenant- Colonel. 
 He is willing to bear his own share, and more ; " but it is hard to 
 do three men's work, and get blown up for six, and to tread with 
 the greatest caution, lest you come upon the military, gouty toes of 
 some precise old tactician, who roars in wrath at the slightest error 
 
 in your course of proceeding If I live to come back, it won't 
 
 be for want of all sorts of training that I am not evenly developed, 
 body and mind." 
 
 The army under General Burnside now moved southward 
 in a line parallel to that pursued by the retiring army of 
 Lee down the Shenandoah Valley. 
 
 On the 10th of November, near Jefferson, he writes : 
 
 " We have been marching incessantly since November 1st ; had 
 snow-storms ; slept tentless about the whole time ; had salt pork, 
 raw ; hard bread, and coffee sugarless, where we could get it, and 
 thankful for it. O, it 's jolly campaigning in the winter ; turning 
 
 into a potato-field, in a driving snow-storm, to sleep I think 
 
 that we shall see a fight soon. The Rebels are close to us ; and, 
 while I write, the cannonading is incessant. I shall try to do my 
 duty like a man, when the time comes." 
 
 On November 13th he was again (and the third time) 
 put in command of the regiment, much against his will ; 
 " the Lieutenant-Colonel, together with the Adjutant, hav- 
 
266 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ing been taken prisoner while eating dinner across the river 
 at White Sulphur Springs." After leaving camp on Au 
 gust 22d, he was in command about half the time ; and he 
 remained in command till he fell. 
 
 November 15th, Saturday, he was, for the first time, un 
 der fire ; and says, November 16th : 
 
 " I don't think I either showed or felt the least fear. The Reb 
 els shelled us ; and I had to march my regiment back under the 
 fire of our battery over our heads, and of the Rebels from a hill 
 opposite directly into us. A fragment of shell (so the men said, 
 I thought it was dirt) struck the road, and bounced right over my 
 cap, about two feet above my head ; and shot and shell struck and 
 whizzed about in all directions. The Lieutenant of the battery was 
 killed, and an artilleryman had his arm torn to pieces, besides 
 wounded men in other regiments than ours. We had one man 
 badly wounded in the leg. I was reading your letter during the 
 shelling, while my regiment was lying under cover, and when that 
 
 bit of dirt or iron, I don't know which, bounced over my head 
 
 Home-matters are what I care for in home-letters ; they are inde 
 scribably pleasant." 
 
 At length the army reached the front of Fredericksburg. 
 On November 24th he writes : 
 
 " We have marched south along the base of the Blue Ridge ; 
 then turned to the left, and marched here. We have been on the 
 move for three weeks and two days quite steadily. We left Pleas 
 ant Valley; marched along the Potomac to Berlin; crossed, 
 camped ; then south through Lovettsville, &c., to Amesville, Jeffer 
 son, White Sulphur Springs, Fayetteville, Warrenton Junction ; 
 then straight here, to wit, a mile from Falmouth, and riear Fred 
 ericksburg. We have zigzagged over the country (particularly in 
 our marches near the Blue Ridge) beyond all description ; but now 
 we are promised a two days' halt. 
 
 " .... I wish you, dear , the pleasantest Thanksgiving you 
 
 have ever had. I shall, God willing, remember you all most lov 
 ingly on that day ; and I know you will not forget me Burn- 
 side means to push for Richmond ; in what way, I am sure I can't 
 tell or conjecture : but we shall have some very hard fighting, I 
 expect, within the next four weeks." 
 
Sidney Willard. 267 
 
 " CAMP OFF FREDERICKSBURG, November 28. 
 
 " We had a quiet Thanksgiving, without any extra dinner except 
 an old goose and four very diminutively small chickens. I thought 
 of home as I sat at the head of the mess-table (made, by the way, 
 of cracker-boxes, and clothless), and wished that I could fill my 
 place, for a short time at least, at home. But I have the consola 
 tion of knowing that, as I came because I ought, that same i ought' 
 will keep me up fairly to the mark." 
 
 He writes to his father under date of December 2d, same 
 camp : 
 
 " I hardly think I can make you a fitting return for all your 
 affectionate and Christian care of me, or all your patient and lov 
 ing waiting during my slow struggle to work my way in life and 
 gain a place among men. I hope, if my life is spared to return, 
 and with increased knowledge of men, with an experience in rough, 
 practical life of the greatest value to me, and habit of prompt de 
 cision, with the attrition of a life as open and public as my former 
 one was secluded and fastidious, to make my fortunes more rapidly 
 than earlier years foreboded." 
 
 " OPPOSITE THE LOWER SUBURBS OF FREDERICKSBURG, 
 December 7. 
 
 " Night ; quiet till one, A. M. ; then I stump over the crusty snow 
 in company with the officer of the day, whose duties also cover the 
 
 night, unless the Rebels cross and stir up my camp It is 
 
 freezing in true New England style, and the weather is as genuine 
 
 an importation from Massachusetts as is our regiment My 
 
 tramp to-night is to visit my pickets and guards. I have guards 
 stationed at each of the guns, which peer watchfully through the 
 embrasures of the half-moon in which they are placed. A cold 
 time the sentinels have of it, and the greatest vigilance is needful ; 
 for a rat-tail file and a tap with a hammer would render useless in 
 a moment a superb piece of ordnance. I don't object to the trip a 
 bit, though it will take me nearly two hours ; but for my shoes, 
 which are in sympathy with the shoes of more than two thirds 
 of the regiment." 
 
 His last letter, a very hurried and brief one in pencil, 
 written on Friday, December 12th, was affectionate as usual. 
 Amongst other things, he says : 
 
268 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " We shelled and half burnt Fredericksburg yesterday. My 
 regiment and brigade was ordered to be in readiness, and was 
 marched and countermarched, as I will tell at some future time, 
 
 when I have pen, ink, and opportunity The whole of 
 
 Franklin's grand corps is passing in the rear of our camp, cross 
 ing the river on the left, artillery, infantry, and cavalry by the 
 thousands. My men are pretty much used up by want of shoes, 
 and consequent colds. I had, by actual count, yesterday, a force 
 of only three hundred and fifty-three men and seventeen officers 
 with which to go into battle. I hope to write in a few days more 
 fully." 
 
 This was either the last letter he wrote, or else the next 
 to the last. It bears the same date with the last letter to 
 his wife. On Saturday, before he fell, his thought must 
 have been upon the impending battle. 
 
 The sad duty remains of speaking of the last hours of 
 the Christian soldier ; of the man (as truly and tersely de 
 scribed by a friend) " who never raised his arm or his 
 voice in anger or pride ; the self-controlled, highly moral, 
 and exemplary man, whom even the follies of youth never 
 seemed to touch." 
 
 On Sunday evening, December 14th, a telegram was re 
 ceived from Falmouth, Virginia, without date, saying that 
 " Major Willard died this afternoon, at half past one " ; 
 and soon after, in the same evening, a second telegram was 
 received, also without date, that " Major Willard lies in 
 Fredericksburg, wounded, shot through the body," and 
 containing ^a request to his wife " to come immediately." 
 Nothing further was heard until Monday evening, Decem 
 ber 15th. Meanwhile the family had been in an agony of 
 suspense, buoyed up with hope against hope. In the con 
 fusion of the day, there might have been a mistake in the 
 first telegram received ; the son, husband, and brother 
 might be, and perhaps was, living. Several plausible theo 
 ries were suggested ; but Monday evening (when several 
 members of the family, who had left Boston in the morn- 
 
Sidney Willard. 269 
 
 ing, were on their way to Washington) brought with it a 
 confirmation of the intelligence. 
 
 The regiment left the city of Fredericksburg at half past 
 eleven o'clock on Saturday morning, and was advancing 
 against the Rebels ; the Major being in front of Color-com 
 pany B, when he led the regiment to the charge. Captain 
 Lathrop was in the rear, acting as major. Efforts were 
 made to persuade the Major to order the charge and take 
 his station in the rear, but without success. Waving his 
 sword, and leading on the charge, he was seen to fall ; and 
 the cry went forth, " The Major is down ! " A lad in 
 the regiment, by the name of Krill, seems to have been 
 the first to go to his assistance, having seen him at the 
 moment he was shot ; but he was not strong enough to lift 
 him. Private Estes then started to his support, and was 
 helping him through the lines to the rear, when Captain 
 Lathrop came up on the other side, and the two attempted 
 to take him from the field. They had proceeded but a rod 
 or two, when he said, " You must let me lie down : I can't 
 go any farther." 
 
 They laid him down, put him in a blanket, and endeav 
 ored to place him out of the range of the fire ; but the Reb 
 els enfilading the road, they removed him just below the 
 bank. Here there was a shelter from the front fire ; and, 
 by a little bend in the road, from the cross-fire also. Cap 
 tain Lathrop lay down by his side. Here, with the con 
 sciousness of death upon him, after sending the tenderest 
 message to the loved ones at home, and in submission say 
 ing, " But Grod's will be done" he added, " Tell them I tried 
 to do my duty to my country and to the regiment "; and also 
 expressed his desire to be buried at Mount Auburn. 
 
 Within a half-hour or an hour two soldiers appeared with 
 a stretcher, and bore him upon it to the hospital of a Con 
 necticut regiment. He was in pain, but never moaned nor 
 exclaimed. 
 
 Towards night the surgeon gave him whiskey and mor- 
 
270 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 phine ; but lie doubted whether to take it, saying that he 
 had never drunk whiskey. However, he was induced to 
 consent, and soon became easier. He was thirsty, and 
 wanted water, which was brought ; but from self-control, 
 says the Captain, he would not drink, but only rinsed his 
 mouth. 
 
 About nine o'clock on Sunday morning, Captain Lathrop 
 was obliged to be absent to attend to the regiment, now 
 reduced to less than one third of its original number. He 
 left the Major calm, quiet, and apparently comfortable, and 
 did not apprehend any early change in his condition. Estes 
 and another private remained in attendance, and the for 
 mer was absent some fifteen minutes, between one and two 
 o'clock, to take some food. Major Willard had been induced 
 to go to sleep ; and he was asleep, lying on his left side, 
 when Estes returned. A motion of the right shoulder was 
 noticed ; presently his lips were seen to move ; his eyes 
 were open, and cast upward. Estes felt his pulse, and found 
 none ; he felt his hands, they were cold. He called the sur 
 geon, who confirmed his fears that all was over. Sidney 
 Willard had entered into his rest. 
 
 As he lay in the repose of death in the home of his youth, 
 his expression was natural and life-like, as of one who had 
 returned wearied with conflict, and had sunk into a calm 
 but thoughtful and semi-conscious slumber. 
 
 On the 17th of December the mortal remains of Major 
 Willard were brought home, with loving care, to the city he 
 had left but four short months before, in the pride of manly 
 beauty and the fulness of his strength. On Saturday, De 
 cember 20th, in accordance with his almost last uttered 
 wish, he was laid to rest in Mount Auburn, where a simple 
 cross of granite marks the spot. 
 
Wilder Dwight. 271 
 
 1853. 
 WILDER DWIGHT. 
 
 Major 2d Mass. Vols. (Infantry), May 24, 1861 ; Lieutenant- Colonel, 
 June 13, 1862; died September 19, 1862, of wounds received at An- 
 tietam, September 17. 
 
 WILDER DWIGHT, second son of William and Eliz 
 abeth Amelia (White) Dwight, was born in Spring 
 field, Massachusetts, on the 23d of April, 1833. His pa 
 ternal ancestor was John Dwight of Oxfordshire, Eng 
 land, who settled in Dedham, Massachusetts, in 1636. 
 His mother was descended from William White of Norfolk 
 County, England, who settled in Ipswich, Massachusetts, 
 in 1635. His family has belonged to New England for 
 more than two centuries, and during that whole period 
 has been identified with its history, its industry, its enter 
 prises, and its institutions. 
 
 In childhood he gave promise of all that he afterwards 
 became, manly, courageous, self-possessed, acute, original, 
 frank, affectionate, generous, reliable. He was, in boy 
 hood, not less than in manhood, one in whom to " place an 
 absolute trust." Yet, in less vital points, he was no pat 
 tern boy. He had a quick and irritable temper, which was 
 a source of trouble to himself and to his friends in early 
 life, and which, early and late in life, it was his effort to 
 control. Full of fun, and ever ready with comical sugges 
 tions, his humor was irresistible. Many a reproof did he 
 ward off by it in childhood ; many a dark hour did he 
 brighten by it in after years. When not six years old, it 
 was said of him : " He has a sincere love of right, and 
 aversion to wrong, though he does not desire to hear 
 preaching on the subject." Before he was seven, he was 
 pronounced uncommonly clear-headed and strong in in- 
 
272 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 tellect. At the age of seven and a half he began to 
 study industriously ; and from that time he was a faithful 
 student. 
 
 At the age of thirteen he left home for the first time, to 
 fit for college at Phillips Exeter Academy. " There," says 
 the preceptor, " from the beginning to the end of his 
 course, he was a pattern pupil." 
 
 The following extract from his diary kept at this time 
 shows the character of the boy : 
 
 " December 31, 1846. To-day is the last day of the old year ; 
 and, in commencing the new, I wish to lay out some rules in relation 
 to myself, which I will try to observe. In the first place, I will ex 
 ercise every morning after breakfast, until school time ; and, after 
 school, at night, until supper time. Secondly, I will study after din 
 ner until school time ; and I will go to my room after supper and 
 busy myself in studying or in reading a useful book until bedtime. 
 Thirdly, while in school, I will try to busy myself about my les 
 sons ; and, at any rate, behave in an orderly manner. And I will 
 observe strictly these rules, except when it is right for me not to 
 do so, that is, at such times as I may think it right, though I may 
 err in that opinion. And may I also try to correct my defects of 
 temper. May I watch every word that comes from my mouth ; 
 and may I let my yea be yea, and my nay be nay ; and may I not 
 merely write these things down and think no more of them, but 
 may I always keep them in my mind, and remember them most 
 of all when I am angry, as that is the time to control myself." 
 
 At the end of two years, he was fitted for college ; but, 
 not wishing to enter so early, he passed six months at the 
 Private Military School of L. J. D. Kinsley at West Point, 
 in order to secure the advantage of the military drill ; 
 while, at the same time, he continued his classical studies, 
 and received instruction in French and mathematics. In 
 May, 1849, preparatory to entering college, he returned to 
 Exeter for a review of his studies. In the following July, 
 he writes in his diary: 
 
 "On Monday, July 16th, I was examined for entrance to the 
 
Wilder Dwight. 273 
 
 Freshman class, and, after due trepidation and effort, on Tuesday, 
 at about four, p. M., I received my ' admittatur,' overjoyed at finding 
 it an unconditional one." 
 
 He took high rank as a scholar, and maintained it 
 throughout his college course. The following extract 
 from his diary shows by what means he accomplished this 
 result. 
 
 "March, 1850. . ... I am somewhat of 'a dig,' I suppose; 
 and though the character is rather an ignominious one in college, 
 it is in so good repute elsewhere and among wiser persons than 
 Freshmen or even Sophomores, that I shall endeavor always to 
 deserve the title. Natural geniuses, that is, lazy good scholars, are 
 few and far between. I shall, therefore, estimate myself as a very 
 common sort of a person ; and as I desire to excel, I shall choose 
 the way which seems to promise success." 
 
 Among the privileges which he enjoyed in college, that 
 which he valued most highly was the instruction received, 
 in lectures and recitations, on the Evidences of Natural and 
 Revealed Religion, from the Rev. Dr. Walker. Not less 
 did he value the pulpit ministrations of this distinguished 
 preacher. His diary at this period, and while he was in the 
 Law School, is filled with abstracts of the sermons to which 
 it was his privilege to listen. The following extract from 
 his journal indicates the influence which these teachings 
 exerted upon his character : 
 
 " Sunday, January 4, 1852. Heard Dr. "Walker preach from 
 the text, Ecclesiastes viii. 11, 'Because sentence against an evil 
 work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of 
 men is fully set on them to do evil.' " 
 
 After a long abstract of the sermon, he writes : 
 
 " . . . . This is the sermon on which I may well found the first 
 resolutions and actions of the opening year. All my life has been 
 a series of violations of law, though I have ever had a theoretic 
 veneration of it. Memory runs back over a sad list, and time passes 
 on swift wings. To-morrow is to-day ere it is spoken, and yesterday 
 
 VOL. i. 18 
 
274 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 was lost m irresolution and weakness. Now, now, now ! God, 
 God, God ! Eternity, eternity, eternity ! Action in the one, mer 
 cy and justice in the sectfnd ! Pain or pleasure, joy or grief, in the 
 last ! Let me remember, then, that i though a sinner do evil an 
 hundred times, and his days be prolonged, yet surely I know that 
 it shall be well with them that fear God, which fear before him ' ; 
 that no man knoweth the ways of God, they are past finding out. 
 Then I will trust in the goodness which is inscrutable but inex 
 haustible. I will apply my heart to know, to search, and to seek 
 out wisdom, and to know the wickedness of folly. And may these 
 thoughts glow in my mind, may they rouse my energies till I seek 
 to embody them in my actions, and make their spirit felt in my life ; 
 and may not these aspirations be transient and shadowy." 
 
 On leaving college he entered the Law School at Cam 
 bridge, with ardent enthusiasm for the profession. There 
 too he took a prominent position, receiving the first prize 
 in 1855. On leaving the Law School, he passed fourteen 
 months in foreign travel. He sometimes spoke with re 
 gret of this interruption to his studies, because it placed him 
 further from the attainment of the main purpose of his life. 
 He resumed his studies immediately on his return, and com 
 pleted them in the offices of Hon. Caleb Gushing, the At 
 torney-General of the United States, Hon. E. R. Hoar, and 
 Horace Gray, Jr., Esq., of Boston. 
 
 He was admitted to the bar in 1856, and commenced 
 practice in 1857. Of what he was as a lawyer Judge Ab 
 bott says : 
 
 " I can say, in reference to my appreciation of him, what I know 
 will be appreciated as the highest evidence, in my judgment, of his 
 qualifications as a lawyer, that I have come up before the tribunal 
 which I respect above human tribunals, depending entirely upon 
 briefs furnished by my associate, this young man. I have trusted, 
 beginning with the first cause he ever had occasion to try after 
 being admitted to the bar, trusted, what I should rarely do, 
 the entire preparation of causes to him, and sat down to the trial 
 of them without any personal attention to them myself." 
 
Wilder DwigU. 275 
 
 He soon became the partner of Horace Gray, Jr., Esq., 
 in whose office he had formerly been a student. Judge 
 Gray says of him : 
 
 " I think I may say that I have never known any young man 
 who combined, in such just and equal proportions, the theory to 
 be learned from the books, with a readiness of practical application 
 to the facts of cases as they came up." 
 
 Of his position and prospects at the time of the breaking 
 out of the war, his friend, Francis E. Parker, Esq., speaks 
 as follows : 
 
 " He had everything which a man of high ambition most de 
 sires : he had youth and health, fortune and friends, a profession in 
 which he delighted, the practical talents which smooth the way in 
 it, and the confidence in himself which made labor light. But 
 when the trouble of our country came, he thought that all advan 
 tages and successes which did not aid her were to be trampled un 
 der foot. He gave up to his country, without a moment's hesita 
 tion, all that he had gained and all that he was." 
 
 The first gun fired on Sumter was his summons to arms. 
 When the awful tidings came, he closed his law books, 
 never again to return to his beloved profession. While a 
 school-boy at West Point, as the term drew near its close, 
 he had playfully written home : "I shall, ' to the right 
 about face,' and ' forward, quick march,' when the term is 
 over, and I shall never evince any desire hereafter to 
 shoulder a musket or wear a sword." Even now, his taste 
 was unchanged. Truly did Mr. Parker say of him : " He 
 looked the dangers of his new profession in the face, not 
 fascinated by its glitter nor drawn from weightier thoughts 
 by the sound of martial music, but deliberately, for the de 
 fence of the law and the support of a cause which he sol 
 emnly considered to be just." 
 
 The Hon. Richard H. Dana, Jr. said of him, after his 
 death : 
 
 " He had that combination of qualities which led to success in 
 
276 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 whatever he undertook His love was for that kind of intelli 
 gent labor which looks to specific results He had an intuitive 
 
 knowledge of himself, and instinctive knowledge of other men. 
 He adapted his means to his ends. He knew what he was suited 
 to do, and he had a power of will, a faculty of concentration, and 
 
 patience, perseverance, and confidence, which insure success 
 
 When the war broke out, he determined to become a soldier. His 
 friends knew he would make himself one. He determined to offer 
 the first regiment of three years' men to the army, and he did so. 
 He went to Washington to obtain advantages and opportunities 
 most difficult to secure ; but we felt that he would succeed, and he 
 did succeed." 
 
 Every step he took towards the prosecution of his work 
 illustrates the truth of Mr. Dana's words, " He had deter 
 mined to become a soldier." " Adapting his means to his 
 ends," he began by associating himself with two gentlemen 
 of West Point education and acknowledged military ability 
 and experience. He was no less faithful as a student under 
 them, in military tactics, than he had been, under other 
 teachers, in more congenial pursuits. He determined to 
 raise a regiment for the war ; consulting daily with Messrs. 
 Gordon and Andrews, formerly of the United States Army, 
 the future Colonel and Lieutenant-Colonel of the regiment, 
 he made it sure that no want of military experience on his 
 part should prove a hindrance to the perfect accomplishment 
 of his work. He suffered not a day to pass, after the news 
 from Sumter, before opening a subscription paper, to guaran 
 tee the expenses which would be incurred in the enterprise. 
 His cheerful presence met a warm welcome from all whom 
 he approached, and he had but to present his claim to meet 
 a cordial response. The money thus raised enabled him and 
 his associates to prosecute their enterprise without delay. 
 The practical difficulty in their way was, that there was no 
 law, at that time, either of the United States or the Common 
 wealth, under which it could be carried into operation. It 
 was necessary to obtain from the Secretary of War special 
 
Wilder Dwight. 277 
 
 authority for the enlistment and control of the proposed 
 regiment. For this purpose, on the 25th of April, 1861, 
 while the excitement which followed the Baltimore riot 
 was at its height, and the usual communication with the 
 seat of government was cut off, Mr. Dwight and Mr. An 
 drews left Boston, and went by the way of Annapolis to 
 Washington. They reached there on the evening of the 
 27th, at which time he wrote to his father a brief account 
 of this eventful journey through hostile country, saying 
 that he was to have an interview with the Secretary of War 
 that evening. 
 
 After submitting his plan to the Secretary in conversa 
 tion, he addressed to him a written statement of the same. 
 On the next day the following letter was received from the 
 War Department : 
 
 "WASHINGTON CITY, April 28, 1861. 
 " To Messrs. WILDER DWIGHT and GEORGE L. ANDREWS. 
 
 " The plan which you communicated for raising a regiment in 
 Massachusetts for service during the war meets my approval. 
 Such a regiment shall be immediately enlisted in the service of 
 the government, as one of those which are to be called for imme 
 diately. The regiment shall be ordered to Fort Independence or 
 some other station in Boston Harbor, for purposes of training, equip 
 ment, and drill, and shall be kept there two months, unless an 
 emergency compels their presence elsewhere. 
 
 " I am, gentlemen, very respectfully, 
 
 " SIMON CAMERON, 
 
 Secretary of War" 
 
 From this time Wilder Dwight seemed to have but one 
 interest in life. To see the Massachusetts Second become, 
 in organization and in discipline, a perfect regiment, and to 
 do, in connection with it, all that such a power could do, 
 towards suppressing the Rebellion, this was the aim which 
 bounded his horizon. He was appointed, by Colonel Gor 
 don's recommendation, Major of the regiment, which posi 
 tion he held until June 13, 1862, when he was promoted by 
 
278 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Governor Andrew as its Lieutenant-Colonel. During what 
 remained to him of life, the history of the regiment is his 
 history. " All I want," he once wrote, " is the success of 
 the regiment itself, nothing more or less ; and there is 
 room enough for distinction for any one who does his share 
 in any regiment to make it a good one." To no service 
 assigned him by his superior officers was he ever found un 
 equal. And as at the very entrance upon the practice of 
 the law he had the confidence of one who had spent his life 
 in courts, so now, a beginner in military duty, he was relied 
 upon by his superiors in command. The spirit which he 
 carried into his new profession is best illustrated by ex 
 tracts from his own letters. On the 15th of July, 1861, 
 just one week from the day the regiment left Boston, while 
 " in bivouac at Bunker Hill," he writes : 
 
 "We have just received our orders for an advance upon Win 
 chester ; a very good place is assigned us I hope for a big, 
 
 worthy battle, one that means something, and decides something ; 
 and I hope to have strength, courage, and wisdom to do my duty in 
 it. I never felt happier or more earnest than for the last few days, 
 and I never realized more fully the best significance of life. I 
 have always had a dream and theory about the virtues that were 
 called out by war. I have nothing to say of the supply which I 
 can furnish, but I am vividly impressed by the demand. The calling 
 needs a whole man, and it exacts very much of him. Self gets 
 thrown into the background. It straggles out of the column, and 
 is picked up, if at all, very late, by the rear-guard." 
 
 This letter closes with the words, " If anything happens 
 to me, remember I meant to do my duty." 
 
 A month later, after giving a schedule of a day in camp, 
 he says : 
 
 " One day treads closely on another, and variety is always at 
 hand. Here I give you the prose of it, the treadmill without the 
 song. But there is poetry in it, too. There is a sentiment which 
 gives the impulse to this duty and hallows the effort. I have been 
 to Washington, and I return with a sort of desperate, teeth-set de- 
 
Wilder DiviyU. 279 
 
 termination to do all I can in the sphere of my duty. It seems to 
 me that the country wants active, busy, self-forgetting endeavor." 
 
 After writing earnestly of the need of improvement in 
 discipline and organization, throughout the army, he 
 says : 
 
 " But out of this nettle I pluck one flower, namely, that I can 
 be of service ; and it cheers me to hope, that, by active and constant 
 endeavor, I may, perhaps, do my small mite towards organization 
 and efficiency. I wish I could do more. To will is present with 
 me." 
 
 Judge Gray, in the remarks from which we have already 
 quoted, says of him : 
 
 " To those, who really knew him, his warmth of feeling was not 
 less remarkable than his purity of principle and strength of char 
 acter. None but his intimate friends knew how much of his time 
 was taken up in acts of kindness and charity. From the time he 
 became a soldier, he was devoted to the care of his men, both as a 
 matter of military judgment and of right feeling ; in this, as in other 
 things, showing how his intellect and his heart worked together." 
 
 Did these limits permit, there could be furnished from 
 his letters many illustrations of the interest he took in every 
 thing which could promote the comfort of the men. A few 
 extracts must suffice. On August 3d, "in bivouac on 
 Maryland Heights," he writes : " I am giving personal at 
 tention to every detail of food and clothing, and expect to 
 get the system so organized that it must always work 
 right." Again, he says : 
 
 "The event of yesterday was the arrival of the coffee-mills. 
 Colonel Gordon reports that the men are in ecstasies with them. 
 I am only a witness by his report, for I was ordered off on this 
 duty just as the coffee-mills arrived. I know how badly they were 
 needed, and I hear how admirably they work. Night before last 
 accumulated the evidence from reports of Captains and Quarter 
 master about the want of tea, hard bread, salt pork, &c. I went 
 up to General Banks's head-quarters and had a long talk with him, 
 
280 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 urging the remedies which have occurred to my mind. The Gen 
 eral promises to change all this, and to accomplish the regular and 
 constant issue of the ration to the soldier, in the form and at the 
 moment required by law." 
 
 Again, lie writes : 
 
 "I wish you to buy and forward, by express, a large coffee- 
 roaster, which will roast thirty or forty pounds of coffee at a time. 
 It would be of immense advantage to us." 
 
 On its arrival lie writes : 
 
 " The coffee-roaster is lovely, and wins golden opinions. At last, 
 also, we have tea ; and, indeed, we have waked up our Commis 
 sary to something like activity." 
 
 At one time he writes : 
 
 " We had a visit from General Banks yesterday. The General 
 visited our kitchens, and tasted, with apparent approval, my dough 
 nuts. I say mine, because I regard as perhaps the most successful 
 endeavor of my military life the general introduction of dough 
 nuts into the regiment. If you could have seen the helplessness 
 in which the flour ration had left us, and the stupidity of the men 
 in its use, you would hail as the dawn the busy frying of dough 
 nuts which goes on here now. Two barrels are a small allowance 
 for a company. They are good to carry in the haversack, and 
 ' stick by a fellow on the march ' ; and when the men have not 
 time to build an oven, as often they have not, the idea is invaluable. 
 Pots of beans baked in holes in the ground, with a pan of brown 
 bread on top, is also a recent achievement, worthy of Sunday 
 morning at an old Exeter boarding-house. The band produced 
 that agreeable concord yesterday, and contributed from their suc 
 cess to my breakfast. Our triumphs just now are chiefly culinary ; 
 but an achievement of that kind is not to be despised. ' A sol 
 dier's courage lies in his stomach,' says Frederick the Great ; and 
 I mean that the Commissary of our division, and the Commissary 
 of our regiment, and the captains and the cooks, shall accept the 
 doctrine, and apply its lessons, if I can make them." 
 
 Much as he enjoys the success of these achievements, he 
 
Wilder Dwight. 281 
 
 soon complains that no opportunity is offered them for 
 " teaching the men to take care of themselves on the march 
 and in active duty." At one time he writes : " It is idle 
 to disguise the fact, that it is a heaviness to the natural 
 and unregenerate heart to see no prospect of achievement, 
 no opportunity of action." And again : " I must say, I 
 think the tonic of victory would be of most happy and in 
 vigorating influence. Give me a little of the ecstasy of 
 strife ; bother this constant rehearsal." After rejoicing 
 over the victories at Roanoke, in Tennessee, and in Mis 
 souri, he exclaims : 
 
 " Exploit, achievement, victory ! and I not there ! I may feel 
 and express foolishness, and I think I do ; but I had rather lose 
 my life to-morrow in a victory than save it for fifty years with 
 out one ! When I speak of myself as not there, I mean the Mas 
 sachusetts Second, in whose fortunes and hopes I merge my own. 
 I ought, perhaps, to burn this letter ; but I '11 send it, I believe. 
 In an hour or two I shall be cheerful as ever, and continue the 
 service of standing and waiting witli good heart, I hope." 
 
 He did so ; yet at times his eagerness for action would 
 express itself. Once he exclaims : 
 
 " I presume I love life, and home, and friends as much as any 
 one ; but I should sooner give them all up to-morrow, than to have 
 
 our regiment go home empty If you have any prayers to 
 
 give, give them all to the supplication that the Second Regiment of 
 Massachusetts Volunteers may find a field whereon to write a 
 record of itself. Do not spend your days in weakly fearing or 
 regretting this or that life, lives whose whole sweetness and 
 value depend upon their opportunities, not upon their length." 
 
 A day later we find him returning to the cheerful acquies 
 cence in events as they are, which was the principle and 
 habit of his life. He writes : " I buried hope yesterday, 
 had a glorious wake, and resolved to sink every other wish 
 in the absorbing one of the success of the war, without 
 or with the Massachusetts Second, as it may happen." 
 
282 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Thanksgiving day occurred during the month, when, owing 
 to the absence of his Colonel and the illness of his Lieuten 
 ant-Colonel, he was in command of the regiment. He en 
 joyed making the arrangements requisite to secure a happy 
 season for the men. After a graphic and spirited account 
 of the festivities of the day, he says : " I hope on our next 
 Thanksgiving we may be all together ; but if not, at least 
 we can hope to be as thankful as we are now." " Our next 
 Thanksgiving " found us standing by his grave ; but these 
 words of his were not forgotten. Many lessons of thank 
 fulness and hope had he given us in the darkest hours of 
 our country's trial. After the disaster of Ball's Bluff, he 
 was asked if his heart did not sink. " Sink ? " he replies, 
 " it swims like a duck when I think of the future that 
 some of our eyes shall see ; and will not they swim, too, 
 with intense delight, when the sight dawns upon them? 
 For myself, even now I cannot look upon the flag which we 
 brought away from Boston without a glow and heart-bump, 
 which I take to be only faint symptoms of the emotion that 
 is to come." 
 
 In December, 1861, when everything looked darkest, he 
 writes : 
 
 " I can confidently wish a merry Christmas to you, and look for 
 ward to a happy New Year. We are fighting a good fight ; if only 
 we can be true to ourselves and to our cause, we have a right to 
 indulge the brightest hopes and rely on the best promises. God 
 is with us. Hang up every sign of Christmas, the freshest green. 
 Commemorate the message and the Prince of Peace. Gather the 
 Christmas family circle, and remember the absent ; for family ties 
 are never so close as in the days of separation and trial." 
 
 As late as May 9th, the service of the regiment was still 
 to " stand and wait." Then he writes : " Of course, this is 
 a severe trial to me, the severest, I think, of my life, 
 but, equally, of course, I keep a cheerful spirit, and mean 
 to do my best to the end." 
 
Wilder Dwight. 283 
 
 Two weeks later, the regiment saw its first action in the 
 field, on the occasion of General Banks's retreat in May, 
 1862. From General Gordon's official report of his portion 
 of the retreating forces we quote the following : 
 
 "Major Dwight, of the Second Massachusetts, while gallantly 
 bringing up the rear of the regiment, was missed somewhere near 
 or in the outskirts of the town. It is hoped that this promising 
 and brave officer, so cool upon the field, so efficient everywhere, so 
 much beloved in his regiment, and whose gallant services on the 
 night of the 24th instant will never be forgotten by them, may have 
 met with no worse fate than to be held a prisoner of war." 
 
 Chaplain Quint of the Second wrote at this time : 
 
 " Our hopes that Massachusetts will be proud of the late history 
 of the Second Regiment are clouded by the anxiety felt by every 
 
 man as to the Major's fate You will know how nobly he 
 
 commanded the little band of skirmishers on Saturday night last ; 
 when his small force was formed against cavalry and infantry, with 
 entire success ; how his clear, cool, deliberate words of command 
 inspired the men, so that no man faltered, while, in ten minutes, one 
 company lost one fourth of its number." 
 
 Of this command of the skirmishers, Major Dwight's 
 journal contains the following : 
 
 "At General Jackson's head-quarters I saw the Lieutenant- 
 Colonel of the Fifth or Second Virginia Regiment. He asked who 
 it was at the Run near Bartonsville. I told him I had that honor. 
 He said that he had three companies of his regiment deployed 
 there ; and he added, that he did not care to fight us again in the 
 dark." 
 
 Many were the tributes to his bravery at this time. Of 
 these, none so deeply affected him as one which he received 
 from a wounded man of the regiment, whom he was endeav 
 oring to cheer by telling him how well he and his comrades 
 had done in the fight. The man looked at him, with tears 
 in his eyes, and said, " Ah, Major, I 'm afraid we should n't 
 have done so well if it had not been for you." 
 
284 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Chaplain Quint wrote : 
 
 " I hope you have heard that he fell behind the column, coming 
 out of Winchester, by helping and encouraging along a wounded 
 soldier." 
 
 In his journal he tells the story as follows : 
 
 " As we went down the hill, a few of our men would turn and 
 fire up the hill, reloading as they went on. I delayed a little to 
 applaud their spunk. We passed down into the edge of the town. 
 As I came along, a young soldier of Company C was wounded in 
 the leg. I gave him my arm, but finding that he was too much 
 wounded to go on, I took him into a house and went on. The 
 regiment was forming in line when I reached it. Before I had 
 time to go to the left, where Colonel Andrews was, the regiment 
 moved off again. I followed. Just as I was near the edge of the 
 town, one of our soldiers called out to me, ' Major, I 'm shot.' I 
 turned to him, took him along a few steps, and then took him into 
 a house and told the people they must take care of him. I laid 
 him down on a bed, and opened his shirt. I then turned to go out, 
 but the butternut soldiery was all around the house, and I quietly 
 sat down ; ' Under which king,' &c. A soldier came in and took 
 me prisoner. I made friendly acquaintance with him. He went 
 with me to get a surgeon for my wounded soldier, and to pick up 
 my overcoat, which I had thrown off in the heat In the after 
 noon I went upon the field with some of the prisoners from our 
 regiment, and buried our dead. I read a portion of Scripture over 
 their grave." 
 
 Later in the week he writes : 
 
 " I have furnished bread and some vegetables to our prisoners at 
 the Court-House every morning. On Wednesday I attended the 
 funeral of Sergeant Williams, Company F. General Jackson gave 
 permission to eight of the Second Massachusetts prisoners to go 
 out with me, as an escort for the burial of their companion." 
 
 Thus was he occupied during the week when he was re 
 ported " missing " and mourned as dead. 
 
 The Hon. Richard H. Dana, Jr., in illustrating his talent 
 for success, says : 
 
Wilder DwigU. 285 
 
 " When he was made a prisoner at Winchester, and the Rebels 
 were taking all their prisoners to Richmond, he determined not 
 to go to Richmond, and he did not go, but was paroled. Some of 
 us know the sagacity and perseverance by which he gained his 
 point." 
 
 On his arrival within the Union lines, he writes, " I 
 cannot describe our thankfulness and heart-swell " ; and 
 on reaching his regiment, " I cannot describe their wel 
 come ; God knows I should be proud to deserve it. I 
 have never known greater happiness or thankfulness than 
 to-night." Of his return to the regiment, another, an eye 
 witness, has given the following account : 
 
 "It was in the dusk of Monday evening, June 2d, just after 
 evening parade, while officers and men were in or about their tents, 
 many talking of the Major and his probable fate, that a stir was per 
 ceived among the officers. The lamented Captain Gary was heard 
 to exclaim, 4 Good heavens, the Major ! ' as he rushed forwards ; then 
 the Major was seen running on foot towards the regiment. The 
 officers ran to meet him. More than one lifted him in his arms. 
 The men ran from their tents towards the limits of the camp. 
 They could not be restrained : they broke camp and poured down 
 upon the Major with the wildest enthusiasm." 
 
 At this time our informant left the scene to telegraph to 
 his family the news of his safety. 
 
 " On my return to camp," he says, " the scene of noisy excite 
 ment was changed for one of profound calm. The regiment was 
 drawn up around the Major, who was reading to them from a 
 paper which he held in his hand. Not a face there but was wet 
 with tears. He gave them the names of those of their comrades 
 who were prisoners in Winchester. He told them who were 
 wounded and the nature of their wounds. He told them of their 
 dead, and of the burial upon which even the Rebels of Winchester 
 had looked with respect. Then he said : ' And now, do you want 
 to know what the Rebels think of the Massachusetts Second ? " Who 
 was it ambuscaded us near Bartonsville ? " asked a cavalry officer 
 of me. I replied, " That was the Massachusetts Second." An of- 
 
286 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ficer of Rebel infantry asked me, who it was that was at the Run 
 near Bartonsville. " That was the Massachusetts Second," said I. 
 " Whose," asked another officer, " was the battery so splendidly 
 served, and the line of sharpshooters behind the stone wall, who 
 picked off every officer of ours who showed himself? " " That was 
 the Massachusetts Second," said I. On the whole, the Rebels came 
 to the conclusion that they had been fighting the Massachusetts 
 Second, and that they did not care to do it again in the dark.' " 
 
 The next day he wrote from Washington : 
 
 " I am here to see about my exchange, &c. I am sorry you had 
 
 so much anxiety about me, but thankful to be able to relieve it. 
 
 My reception by the regiment is reward enough. I must get back 
 
 to them." 
 
 His return was long delayed ; and of all the trials of his 
 life, this was the greatest. " This is not the life for me," 
 he said repeatedly, during the week, when he was flattered 
 and caressed at home. A still severer trial awaited him. 
 On Monday, A. M., August llth, the day on which his ex 
 change was effected, he heard of the battle of Cedar Moun 
 tain, in which his regiment had lost so heavily. Every true 
 soldier can appreciate the bitterness of his feeling, at hear 
 ing that his regiment had been in action without him. The 
 loss of his friends who had fallen cut him to the heart. 
 He suffered as he had never suffered before. Some hours 
 were given to visiting the friends of the wounded and the 
 killed, and to making arrangements for serving them. 
 Then he left us, never again to return. He had repeatedly 
 said that he did not expect to come back. Those who met 
 him that "morning saw in his face what he felt. To more 
 than one he said in parting, "It is the last time." Yet 
 he was not depressed by the thought. " My life is God's 
 care, not mine," he often said ; " and I am perfectly willing 
 to leave it in his hands." Now his only desire was to 
 rejoin the regiment, and, as he said, " help those poor 
 fellows." 
 
 On reaching their camp, near Culpeper, he writes : 
 
Wilder DwigU. 287 
 
 " A sharp, sudden half-hour's work, under desperate circum 
 stances, has crippled us sadly, as you must have heard only too 
 
 well Our five brave, honorable, beloved dead are on their 
 
 way to Massachusetts. She has no spot on her soil too sacred for 
 them, no page in her history that their names will not brighten. 
 The regiment looks well, but oh, so gloomy ! .... As for my 
 self, I look forward" 
 
 Soon after this, a prohibition was put upon the mails, 
 and no letter reached us from him until September 3d, 
 when he wrote from Washington : 
 
 " After an experience of sixteen days, here I am, humiliated, ex 
 hausted, yet well and determined. Pope's retreat, without a line 
 and without a base, is a military novelty. We lived on the coun 
 try with a witness, green corn and green apples. Twice cut off 
 by the enemy, everything in discomfort and confusion, forced 
 marches, wakeful bivouacs, retreat, retreat ! O, it was pitiful ! " 
 
 Some days later, from " Camp near Rockville," he writes: 
 " We want soldiers, soldiers, and a general in command. 
 Please notice the words, all of them. For the history of 
 the past fifteen months is the sad record of that want." 
 On September 10th he wrote from Washington : " I am here 
 now, two days, getting arms for our recruits. All is re 
 ported quiet beyond Rockville, and I do not return till to 
 morrow." This is the last he wrote us until the morning 
 of the fatal day. From others, we have an account of the 
 intervening days. Chaplain Quint has recorded his return 
 to the regiment on the evening of Friday, September 12th, 
 when " his horse bore marks of his haste to find them," 
 the movement of the regiment during the three following 
 days, and his last march on the evening preceding the 
 battle of Antietam, when, " at half past ten they halted." 
 They were roused the next morning at five, A. M., by can 
 nonade, and their corps was speedily moved towards the 
 front. At this time he wrote, in pencil, to his mother as 
 follows : 
 
288 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " DEAR MOTHER, It is a misty, moisty morning. We are en 
 gaging the enemy, and are drawn up in support of Hooker, who is 
 banging away most briskly. I write in the saddle, to send you my 
 love, and to say that I am very well so far." 
 
 Chaplain Quint writes : 
 
 " Colonel Dwight was as active and efficient as ever. It was not 
 
 for several hours that our regiment went into action I am 
 
 told of his bravery and daring, that after our regiment had cap 
 tured a Rebel flag he galloped up and down the lines with it, amid 
 the cheers of the men, reckless of the fire of the enemy." 
 
 His last act before receiving the mortal wound was to 
 walk along the line of the regiment, which was drawn up 
 under the shelter of a fence, and direct the men to keep 
 their heads down out of reach of the enemy's fire. Colonel 
 Andrews writes : 
 
 " Lieutenant-Colonel Dwight was mortally wounded within three 
 feet of me. He had just come from the left of the regiment, and 
 was about to speak, when the ball struck him. He fell, saying, 
 1 They have done for me.' The regiment was soon ordered to fall 
 back, and men were ordered to carry him ; but the pain was so in 
 tense that he refused to be moved." 
 
 Here, while alone upon the field between the two armies, 
 he took from his pocket the note which he had written in 
 the morning, and added to it the following : 
 
 " DEAREST MOTHER, I am wounded so as to be helpless. 
 Good by, if so it must be ; I think I die in victory. God defend 
 our country. I trust in God, and love you all, to the last. Dear 
 est love to father and all my dear brothers. Our troops have left 
 the part of the field where I lie. 
 
 " Mother, yours, 
 
 " WILDER." 
 
 On the opposite page, in larger and firmer characters, he 
 added these words, " All is well with those that have faith." 
 The paper is stained with his blood, and the scarcely legible 
 lines show with what difficulty he accomplished this last 
 effort of a life filled with acts of fidelity and love. 
 
Wilder Dwight. 289 
 
 Private Rupert Saddler crept out to him at great risk. 
 He writes : 
 
 " I saw a man with his head lying on a rail. I felt that it was 
 the Colonel, and I hurried to him. I gave him a drink of water, 
 and asked him where he was wounded. He said his thigh-bone 
 was shattered. I saw his arm was bleeding. I asked, was it seri 
 ous ? He said, * It 's a pretty little wound.' I saw two of our men 
 coming, and I called them over. The Rebels saw them, and began 
 firing. Colonel Dwight wanted us to go back to the regiment. 
 Said he, ' Rupert, if you live, I want you to be a good boy.' I 
 wanted to bind up his wounds, but he said 't was no use. He 
 gave me a paper he had been trying to write on, and the pencil ; 
 the paper was covered with his blood. He then gave us directions 
 how to carry him, and we lifted him carefully and carried him into 
 a corn-field." 
 
 Magee, one of the men who helped carry him, says : 
 " When we first came to lift him up, he said, * Now, boys, 
 don't think that because I 'm wounded I 've any less spirit 
 than I had before. I feel just the same.' " 
 
 General Gordon writes : 
 
 " As Wilder was brought from the fatal spot, I rode to his side. 
 As I reined up my horse, his eye met mine, and he almost exult- 
 ingly saluted me. At this moment bullets whistled over our heads, 
 shot and shell crashed through the trees. I said, 'I must have 
 you removed from here.' He replied, ' Never mind me, whip 
 them.' I ordered six men to carry him to the rear." 
 
 Chaplain Quint writes : 
 
 " I found him in the garden of a hospital, somewhat in the rear. 
 He was lying on a stretcher, covered by a blanket, with his eyes 
 closed, and quite pale from loss of blood. As I kneeled down be 
 side him, he opened his eyes, and smiled as he took my hand. ' Is 
 that you, Chaplain ? ' said he. Doubtless he saw my sorrow in my 
 face, for he said, ' Don't feel bad,' and with a firm look, and natural 
 smile, he said, ' It 's all right, all right.' I replied, ' I thank God 
 you feel so cheerful' ; when he added, ' Now, Chaplain, I know I 'm 
 done for, but I want you to understand I don't flinch a hair. I 
 
 VOL. i. 19 
 
290 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 should like to live a few days, so as to see my father and my moth 
 er. They think a good deal of me, especially my mother, too 
 much,' (this was said smilingly,) ' but apart from that, if God 
 calls for me this minute, I 'm ready to go.' " 
 
 Colonel Andrews soon came, and bending over him, 
 yielded to the grief which overwhelmed him. Dwiglit 
 threw his arm around his friend's neck, and, drawing him 
 down, said, " Kiss me, dear. Don't take it so hard, dear 
 fellow ; don't take it so hard. Think how much better it 
 is that I should be lying here than you, who have wife and 
 children at home." He then talked more freely. He 
 said, " I want it distinctly understood that I have no per 
 sonal regrets in dying. My only regret is that I cannot 
 longer serve the cause." He gave him the history of the 
 boy Saddler, who had been in his charge before the war, 
 and for whom he wished Colonel Andrews' s sympathy and 
 care. He also told him that he wished a soldier's burial. 
 Turning to Chaplain Quint, he said, " I don't like display, 
 but I think this appropriate, do not you ? " The Chaplain 
 assented ; and he added, " I have lived a soldier, I die a sol 
 dier, I wish to be buried as a soldier." To another mem 
 ber of the regiment, a son of his clergyman, the Rev. John 
 S. Stone, he said that he wished Dr. Stone, as his minister, 
 to receive his last message in case he did not live to reach 
 home and talk with him. He said, " Tell him I am ready 
 to die. I look back upon the past with many regrets for 
 failings and for misused opportunities, but still with the 
 self-respect of a man who lias tried to do his best. As for 
 the future, there is but one hope, no putting forth of 
 one's own claims, but reliance on the merits of Another : 
 you know what I mean." 
 
 He was placed in an ambulance for the night. The men 
 lay around it. At daybreak his wounds were dressed. He 
 examined them in a cool, naive manner. Looking at the 
 hole through the forearm, he said : " Now that 's a very 
 neat little wound, a proper wound ; but the other, point- 
 
Wilder Dwiglit. 291 
 
 ing to the thigh, won't do so well." It was now deter 
 mined to carry him to Boonesborough, where a house had 
 been found for him. Twelve men from the new recruits 
 were detailed for the purpose. They were divided into six 
 parties, who relieved each other by turns. During the 
 journey of three miles and a half, he called out the reliefs 
 himself. On their way, they met the drum and fife corps 
 of the regiment. He stopped them and requested them, as 
 a last favor, to play him the Star-spangled Banner once 
 more. He thanked them, repeating the sentiment of the 
 song in the wish that " The star-spangled banner in tri 
 umph may wave o'er the land of the free and the home of 
 the brave." One of the men happened to ask where the 
 rest of the regiment was. Colonel Dwight called out : 
 " Who asked for the Second Regiment ? I '11 tell you 
 where the Second was yesterday. In the foremost front 
 of the battle, fighting like men ; and we drove them, boys, 
 drove them." Chaplain Quint writes of him on this jour 
 ney : " If water was given him, or any service rendered, his 
 old i Thank you ' was never omitted. Indeed, the night be 
 fore, in the garden, he repeatedly sent his servant and 
 others to relieve the wounded men around him, while in 
 pain himself." 
 
 About one, P. M. (Sept. 18), they reached Mr. Thomas's 
 house, where a bed was prepared for him. By following 
 his own suggestions, they were able to place him in bed 
 without his suffering in the process. As they lifted him, 
 he said, " Steady and true, steady and true." As they 
 turned to leave the room, he roused himself and said, 
 " Wait a minute, boys ; you 've taken good care of me : 
 I thank you very much. God bless you." They then 
 partook of a dinner he had provided for them. 
 
 " That afternoon," says Chaplain Quint, " he suffered very much. 
 The next morning I had no thought but that he would live several 
 days ; but he felt that he should not see any of his family. He 
 spoke of it and of the time required. It was not until nearly noon 
 
292 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 that a marked change took place. I was in the kitchen, giving 
 directions for the preparation of beef tea, when his servant came to 
 me, saying, " The Colonel is wanting you quick, sir." I went in, 
 instantly saw a change, and took his lifted hand. After looking 
 earnestly in my face, he said, ' Chaplain, I cannot distinguish your 
 features ; what more you have to say to me, say now.' (I had, of 
 course, remembered his dying condition, and conversed according 
 ly.) I said, ' Colonel, do you trust in God ? ' He answered, with 
 ready firmness, ' I do.' ' And in the Lord Jesus Christ, your Sav 
 iour ? ' 'I do.' ' Then,' said I, ' there is no need of saying more.' 
 I said a few words of prayer over him, with a blessing, after which 
 his own lips moved in prayer and he added audibly, 'Amen.' 
 Then I said, ' Now what shall I say to your mother ? ' He an 
 swered, with his whole face lighted up, < My mother ! Tell her, / 
 do love my mother ' (he emphasized every word) ; ' tell her I do trust 
 in God, I do trust in the Lord Jesus. Nothing else.' No more 
 did he say then. He was soon sinking. The last was a few min 
 utes later, and about fifteen minutes before he died, when he said, 
 ' O my dear mother ! ' About twenty-five minutes past twelve, he 
 died ; so peacefully, that we could hardly tell the time." 
 
 He died, as lie had lived, a brave, gallant, noble man, 
 a hero, and a Christian ; cheerful to the last, considerate, 
 happy. 
 
 When he breathed his last, every face, among soldiers as 
 well as officers, was wet with tears. Colonel Andrews had 
 sent him word of our success in the battle. " It is a glori 
 ous time to die ! " was his joyful exclamation. 
 
 " So died," writes Colonel Andrews, " one of the most faithful, 
 brave, unselfish, and devoted officers of our army. He was, I 
 think, the officer most beloved and respected throughout the regi 
 ment by officers and men. 
 
 " His conduct as an officer and as a man was noble. On the 
 battle-field he appeared to me to retain his self-possession most 
 completely, and to have his soul bent upon doing his best to up 
 hold the honor of his country's flag. He showed no consciousness 
 of danger, although there was nothing rash in his conduct. He 
 was uniformly kind to every one. How we all feel here in the 
 
Wilder DwigJit. 293 
 
 regiment, you can perhaps imagine. It is not the same regi 
 ment. 
 
 " His friends have every consolation possible : his memory is 
 their pride." 
 
 Mr. Justice Hoar, in his address to the Suffolk bar upon 
 the occasion of the death of Wilder Dwight, closes with the 
 following words : 
 
 " Tender and loving son, firm friend, true soldier, Christian hero, 
 we give thee up to thy fame ! For thee life has been enough. 
 ' Goodness and greatness are not means, but ends.' 
 
 For us there is left the precious legacy of his life. Brethren, it is 
 well that we should pause, as we are entering upon our stated and 
 accustomed duties, to draw inspiration from such an example. For 
 who can think of that fair and honorable life, and of the death 
 which that young soldier died, without a new sense of what is 
 worthiest in human pursuits, a stronger devotion to duty, a warmer 
 ardor of patriotism, a surer faith in immortality." 
 
294 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1854. 
 RICHARD CHAPMAN GOODWIN. 
 
 Captain 2d Mass. Vols. (Infantry), May 24, 1861; killed at Cedar 
 Mountain, Va., August 9, 1862. 
 
 RICHARD CHAPMAN, the eldest child of Ozias and 
 Lucy (Chapman) Goodwin, was born in Boston, Oc 
 tober 11, 1833. After the necessary preparation he en 
 tered the Latin School, whence, at the end of four years, he 
 entered Harvard College, graduating in the Class of 1854. 
 On leaving college, he was in a mercantile house in Bos 
 ton for more than a year, when he left this country for 
 India. Here he passed a few months, and afterwards 
 travelled through the Holy Land, made an extensive tour 
 through Europe, and returned to his home after an ab 
 sence of nearly two years. 
 
 On the breaking out of the Rebellion, prompted wholly 
 by the movings of his own mind, he decided to unite him 
 self with the Second Massachusetts Regiment, under Colo 
 nel George H. Gordon, with several of his personal friends. 
 The Second Regiment left Boston in July, 1861, and its 
 career is well known. The connection of Captain Good 
 win with it is described so truthfully by Dr. Bartol, his 
 friend as well as pastor, in a sermon preached in the 
 West Church the Sunday after the funeral, that an extract 
 from it is given, rather than the words of his friends. 
 
 " The Captain of Company K, in that Second Regiment of 
 Massachusetts Volunteers which will fill a shining page in 
 our history, at the motion of his own will, obedient to the 
 pleading within him of his country's call, gathered his men, 
 and from his situation of independence and comfort went 
 into all the labor and hazard of the war, with the simple 
 purpose of doing his part as he has with unspotted honor 
 
Richard Chapman Goodwin. 295 
 
 to solve our awful problem. The Colonel of the regi 
 ment testifies to what we learn on all hands, of the respect 
 he won from his brother officers , and the devoted regard of 
 those whom he led. His personal behavior rose uniformly 
 to the highest tide-mark of noble sentiment and actual fidel 
 ity. In the unavoidable and admirably planned retreat of 
 General Banks, before overwhelming numbers, near the 
 Shenandoah, though so exhausted that had he fallen by 
 the way he could not have risen again, he was faithfully in 
 his place. All the hardships and privations of a soldier's 
 life he bore with signal fortitude ; while absence weakened 
 no familiar tie, but only drew him more strongly in all affec 
 tionate bonds ; the tenderness of his heart overflowing on oc 
 casion of a Christmas visit he was able to make to his home. 
 " When unusual perils had been around him, and he came 
 out safe, he gratefully recognized the providence of God in 
 his preservation. In one of his letters, he speaks of the brief 
 and solemn communion he had with a comrade in the ter 
 rific perils and threats of the Rebel pursuit. Upon him, as 
 upon so many, from the sober air of our great struggle a 
 breath of sanctity seemed to pass. His health, not wholly 
 strong when he left, had, by the great heat of the weather, 
 become so much impaired that he asked for a furlough. 
 This was not granted, on the ground that his was a case 
 rather for resignation, an idea he would not for a mo 
 ment entertain, preferring, as he said, i rather to die there 
 than think of it, as he must be a great deal sicker even to 
 ask for it.' So, as the engagement came on, which, when 
 he intimated his need of repose, he had not anticipated, he 
 resolved, persisting against all remonstrance, weak as he 
 was, to take his share in it and his chance with the rest. 
 But so extreme was his bodily weakness, that it was neces 
 sary for his servant to assist him to the field which proved 
 fatal to them both. He toiled on and up the hill in the 
 neighborhood, fast as possible, to the point of hazard and 
 decision, where, so far as can be known, he was instantly 
 killed, and, without suffering, passed away." 
 
296 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 CHARLES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 Captain 6th U. S. Cavalry, May 14, 1861 ; Colonel 2d Mass. Cavalry, 
 April 15, 1863; Brigadier-General of Volunteers, October 19, 1864; 
 died at Middletown, Va., October 20, 1864, of wounds received at Cedar 
 Creek, October 19. 
 
 CHARLES RUSSELL LOWELL, JR., was born at 
 Boston, January 2, 1885. He was the eldest son of 
 Charles Russell and Anna Cabot (Jackson) Lowell, and 
 was the grandson of the Rev. Charles Lowell, D. D., and of 
 Patrick Tracy Jackson. From infancy he showed a rich 
 variety and freedom of nature. He entered with eager relish 
 into the games of boyhood, and surpassed all his companions 
 in invention and daring; in study he displayed an equal 
 alertness of faculty. " Those who knew him in his first ten 
 years can recall a sturdy little figure, active but not rest 
 less, a pair of bright, soft, dark eyes, and rosy cheeks curl 
 ing all over with enjoyment. He finds everything good ; 
 but the eyes are often withdrawn from the charms of life 
 and nature, and rest with a far-away upward look on some 
 thing unseen beyond.'' 
 
 When only thirteen, he had finished the studies of the 
 Boston Latin School ; and the next two years were spent 
 at the English High School. 
 
 In 1850 he entered college. He was one of the youngest 
 members of his Class ; but he immediately took the first 
 rank in scholarship, and maintained it to the end. During 
 the four years of college life, he gradually unfolded to the 
 vision of his friends the great and brilliant attributes the 
 deep, quick, and independent intellect, the vigor of will, the 
 self-reliance, the power over men, the originality and force 
 of moral faculty, the jubilance of spirit, itself in him amount 
 ing to a moral excellence, the earnest tenseness and life of 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 297 
 
 the whole nature which continued to distinguish him in 
 all the phases of his career. 
 
 " When he entered college," says a classmate and near 
 friend, " he was unusually boyish in appearance, with a rud 
 dy countenance overflowing with health and animal spirits, 
 and a manner somewhat brusque. He did not win popu 
 larity at once ; but as his powers and character developed, 
 and toned down the rather boisterous life and manner of 
 the body, he came to be proudly acknowledged, without a 
 dissenting voice, as the foremost man of the Class." 
 
 His scholarship, which was equally distinguished in all 
 branches of study, seemed in no sense a forced product, 
 but the natural resultant of the action of a remarkable 
 variety of powers. His thought was at once fluent, accu 
 rate, and transcendental. He learned with such rapidity that 
 it was commonly believed he did not study. His mem 
 ory, both lively and tenacious, needed to take only one im 
 pression of an object, and then it was daguerreotyped. But 
 deeper than his gift of memory lay an extraordinary power 
 of concentration, and a genius for detecting in principles 
 the key to facts. " He made as much mental effort in a 
 minute as many people in an hour; perhaps as much of 
 his life went to each effort." 
 
 His intellectual sympathies were without limit. He read 
 extensively and systematically ; and he talked, out of a 
 full understanding and a fresh, free spirit, on literature, 
 science, and philosophy. He threw himself with glad and 
 vigorous activity into the current of college life. He was a 
 constant participant in its sports and exercises, and a leader 
 in its public affairs ; and with all his overflowing energy of 
 motion, he had within a deep repose of nature, delighting in 
 nothing more than in contemplation, with him no aimless 
 and luxurious revery, but a powerful action of the reason 
 and the spirit, to which, in later as in earlier days, his mind 
 constantly returned, as to its congenial employment and 
 for the renewal and purifying of its strength. 
 
298 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 His chief interest was in philosophy. Yet he cared little 
 for ordinary disputation ; because he regarded the princi 
 ples of morality and truth as lying deeper than the ques 
 tions which such disputation is wont to touch. In his 
 higher speculation he moved with a straightforward au 
 dacity which scorned conventionality of feeling or opinion. 
 Sometimes, indeed, he would indulge himself in working 
 off his superfluous activity by the defence of extravagant 
 theses ; but his sincere views were as profound as they were 
 original. The full counsel of his mind he never opened 
 probably to any one ; but it can be said with certainty that 
 his philosophy united elements which to a dry reasoner seem 
 hardly capable of combination. Plato was his constant study 
 and his most valued authority ; he also often referred to 
 Lucretius, whose writings he read carefully in college ; and 
 he was familiar with the thought of the English and Amer 
 ican transcendentalists. He loved mysticism. His religious 
 conceptions were far removed from those of the received 
 theology ; but they were the conceptions of one who, with 
 personal insight, beholds the world of divine reality. The 
 root of his life was in his spiritual consciousness ; and in 
 that consciousness he waited for the coming of a higher 
 future with great-souled faith, which he was able to com 
 municate to others by the contact of his mind. 
 
 " Thrice in a life he flashed upon our sense. 
 Time disappeared ; its griefs and cares were dumb ; 
 Its joys mere bubbles on our sea of bliss." 
 
 His face, in its rapt moments, might have been taken for 
 the type of intensity combined with depth of thought, 
 nay, rather of an ideal power exercising itself intensely 
 and deeply. 
 
 Even at this period Lowell evinced his natural power of 
 command, by the influence he exercised throughout a large 
 circle of friends. He drew their wills to him, as a load 
 stone attracts iron. He was highly valued as an adviser ; 
 for he had great soundness of judgment and unusual 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 299 
 
 power of understanding matters from another's point of 
 view. He was reserved in the expression of feeling, so 
 that casual acquaintances sometimes supposed him wanting 
 in it ; and few of his friends fully knew (what his letters, 
 if they could be completely published, would reveal) that 
 it was an exquisite and manly tenderness that gave his 
 character its tone. 
 
 The spirit in which Lowell approached his entrance into 
 practical life was expressed in his Valedictory Oration on 
 " The Reverence due from Old Men to Young " ; a subject 
 peculiarly illustrative of his earnestness and originality, 
 and not likely to appear unmeaning to the reader of this 
 book. 
 
 " When a young man is burning to do the world great service, 
 it is a falsehood to tell him that faithful labor is the best gift 
 the world expects from him. If young men bring mankind noth 
 ing but their strength and their spirit, the world may well spare 
 them ; but they do bring it something better, they bring it a gift 
 which they alone can bestow ; they bring it their fresher and purer 
 
 ideals It is not true that good comes often of evil ; good comes 
 
 only of good, and of evil comes only evil Each generation 
 
 stands in a new position, it gets new views of past faults and fail 
 ures, with new glimpses of future possibilities This is not all, 
 
 however. While mankind is constantly rising to higher ideals, 
 there is always danger that the man may sink to lower ones. Labor 
 has been blessed as the Lethe of the past and the present ; it may 
 
 well be cursed as the Lethe of the highest future Therefore 
 
 the old men, the men of the last generation, can not teach us of the 
 present what should be, for that we know as well as they, or better; 
 they should not teach us what can be, for the world always ad 
 vances by impossibilities achieved; and if life has taught them 
 what can not be, such knowledge in the world's march is only im 
 pedimenta ; in short, though men are never too old to learn, they 
 are often too young to be taught. 
 
 " If beauty, then, which has been called the promise of function, 
 causes youth to be loved, the function, which already brings the 
 world its life and its growth, should cause it to be reverenced. A 
 
300 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 nation that feels this reverence has its golden age before it ; it can 
 not be wholly undone by unprincipled governments or evil institu 
 tions. Where this is not felt, though the course may seem rapid and 
 prosperous, a swift undercurrent is sweeping it surely to destruc 
 tion Mere action is no proof of progress ; we make it our 
 
 boast how much we do, and thus grow blind to what we do. Action 
 here is the Minotaur which claims and devours our youths. Athens 
 bewailed the seven who yearly left her shore ; with us scarce seven 
 remain, and we urge the victims to their fate. 
 
 " Apollonius of Tyana tells us in his Travels that he saw * a 
 youth, one of the blackest of the Indians, who had between his 
 eyebrows a shining moon. Another youth named Memnon, the 
 pupil of Herodes the Sophist, had this moon when he was young ; 
 but as he approached to man's estate, its light grew fainter and 
 fainter, and finally vanished.' The world should see with rever 
 ence on each youth's brow, as a shining moon, his fresh ideal. It 
 should remember that he is already in the hands of a sophist more 
 dangerous than Herodes, for that sophist is himself. It should 
 watch, lest from too early and exclusive action, the moon on his 
 brow, growing fainter and fainter, should finally vanish, and, sadder 
 than all, should leave in vanishing no sense of loss." 
 
 This oration is not to be read as a mere literary exercise ; 
 it is a sincere expression of the spirit in which Lowell made 
 his choice of a profession. " Nor was this spirit a youthful 
 enthusiasm ; it shaped his life up to its last fatal hour." 
 On taking his degree, he was strongly urged to devote him 
 self to letters or science. But in spite of his force of intel 
 lect and of his Platonism in philosophy, his energetic nature 
 demanded, as a necessity, continual contact with men and 
 things. Yet he was resolved to maintain in full vigor his 
 life of thought and feeling ; and, above all, both at this time 
 and always, he heartily abhorred the apathy of an educated 
 man who, after having gained a great power to benefit the 
 world, makes his own enjoyment the purpose of his life. 
 
 He had already meditated plans for raising the condition 
 and character of the working classes ; and he now chose his 
 course of life with reference to this object, being also deter- 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 301 
 
 mined in the same direction by the partial consciousness of 
 that capacity of ruling men, which was perhaps, on the 
 whole, the most remarkable of his gifts. He desired to se 
 lect a profession which would afford him, not only a field of 
 practical usefulness, but the opportunity of becoming a mas 
 ter in some department of science. His mind at last settled 
 on the working of metals as the occupation best suited to his 
 views ; and he entered the iron-mill of the Ames Company 
 at Chicopee, Massachusetts, in the spring of 1855. Here he 
 remained half a year as a common workman. He interested 
 himself in his fellow-workmen, and often met with them to 
 talk on branches of science connected with their work. 
 
 " CHICOPEE, April 1, 1855. 
 
 " If you could in any way get hold of a tenth part of the letters 
 which I enjoy myself in writing to you after I get to bed, you would, 
 though an ' infinite shoeblack,' be satisfied with our correspondence ; 
 but through the post-office, why, the very thought of sitting down 
 and patching together a letter is insufferable to me. ' Silence is 
 golden and speech is silver ' ; but pens, ink, and paper are mere 
 
 rags, galls, and goosequills Laughing and talking on paper 
 
 may do very well for , but by Plato ! for me it is too absurd." 
 
 " June 24. 
 
 " Your last letter was really delightful, by far the balmiest I 
 have got since I came here. I only wish you could find time 
 to write oftener. I am glad to hear that the pantaloons are 
 finished, not however because, as you hint, I think it 'neces 
 sary to exclude work' to make life 'gracious as roses.' There is, 
 of course, a poetry in pantaloons, as well as in woman and youth ; 
 but the point I insist on is that you are not yet able to enjoy it. 
 For our family, work is absolutely necessary ; but by Plato ! our 
 lives need not for that cease to be poems. Roses work ; there is 
 a good deal of force-pumping to be gone through before a rose can 
 get itself fairly opened; and force-pumping, your ears will tell 
 you this evening, is rather hard on the muscles. But you mistake, 
 I think, in not choosing more judiciously the sort of work. Roses 
 never think of forcing their red juice into their roots. If they 
 did, their poetry would soon vanish ; but beets don't find this work 
 
302 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 at all prosaic. On a fine day like this I can fully understand that 
 the joy of swelling and swelling should make it highly poetic. 
 You feel the necessity of a choice in great things, such as set 
 tling my profession, but in small things, I am afraid, you are in 
 clined to overlook it. Sweep rooms, that you can do poetically ; 
 but don't make any more pantaloons at present. Even George 
 Herbert's Elixir can make that but poor prose for you. The pleas 
 ure of sewing at an open window I fully enter into. The happiest 
 afternoon I ever knew (and I use the word happiest in its highest 
 sense) was passed at an open window, the first of the season, filing 
 away on cast iron. I am thinking that you did not understand my 
 meaning, when I endeavored to convince you that the need of work 
 is a disease; I mean that the 'divine men' have no such need. 
 However, I will not go into that discussion again. The ' Heroes ' of 
 the world have certainly needed work, and had it, and done it well ; 
 and it is Heroes that we must try to be." 
 
 Then, after a long passage about his plans : " Don't think that 
 I am growing uneasy, for I never was better situated, and don't be 
 afraid that I shall grow unsettled ; 
 
 ' To give room for wandering is it 
 That the world was made so wide/ 
 
 By the way, I have been reading ' Walt and Vult ' yet again, 
 and with renewed delight. Jean Paul enjoyed the poetry of com 
 mon life better than any one that has ever written. He made the 
 world he lived in. So did Sir T. Browne ; and it is for this, among 
 
 many other things, that I am so fond of him." 
 
 " August 19. 
 
 " Of this you may be sure, that, if ever I am worth knowing, 
 you will know me as well as if I had been close under your wing. 
 Homer say, * The gods know one another, even though they dwell 
 far apart.' It is equally true of men, i. e. men ' as are ' men." 
 
 Early in the autumn of 1855 Lowell accepted a situation 
 of great trust and great promise in the rolling-mill of the 
 Trenton Iron Company, New Jersey, and felt that he had 
 now really entered on his permanent work. But at this 
 very moment came upon him the great trial of his life. 
 From the beginning of his establishment at Trenton, we 
 cannot but mark in his letters, exceedingly infrequent dur 
 ing his whole stay there, the growing shadow of disease. 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 303 
 
 In November a friend went over from New York to see 
 him, and found him in his room, bleeding at the lungs and 
 seriously changed. Finding it necessary to withdraw him 
 self from the injurious atmosphere of the iron-mill, Lowell 
 returned to Cambridge. His disease continued through 
 the winter obstinate and alarming ; and his physician di 
 rected him to give up all work and try the effect of travel 
 and more favoring skies. 
 
 A great fabric of noble ambitions fell before this word. 
 In the year of discussion and change through which he had 
 passed, his views of life had gradually cleared, and, at the 
 same time, the beauty of his character had been revealing 
 itself with new distinctness to his nearer friends. The first 
 contact with affairs, so far from extinguishing his higher 
 aspirations, had strengthened his faith in the possibility of 
 his ideal life. He viewed the actual order of things with a 
 generous discontent, of which Mr. Emerson said, " I hope 
 he will never get rid of it "; a discontent commonly cen 
 sured by men of action, but in Lowell the mark of a great 
 spirit, because it was founded on high and thoroughly con 
 sidered principles, and also accompanied with a resolve to 
 labor with sober patience for the remedy of abuses. His 
 experiment at Chicopee had increased his confidence in his 
 plans for elevating the condition of the workmen. He 
 had given much thought to the leading questions connected 
 with his occupation ; and he looked forward both to the 
 introduction of improvements in the practical organization 
 of a mill, and to the development of higher scientific princi 
 ples in metallic work as affording him a field for important 
 original activity. In short, his profession had now fully 
 opened to his mind as a career. 
 
 But it was not in Lowell's nature to remain conquered 
 by disappointment, still less to give any outward indication 
 of depression of feeling. In his letters he speaks of him 
 self constantly as "the, fool of fortune," a favorite of " the 
 lady with the wheel." 
 
304 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " I do not entirely understand what you mean by ' preternatural 
 fears/ " he writes from Gibraltar in May, 1856. " I have been 
 fussy and fidgetty, and have perhaps been unnecessarily careful 
 about exposure ; but as to fear about myself, why, as Emerson 
 somewhere says, ' I sail with God the seas.' My only fear now is 
 that which drove the tyrant of Samos to throw his ring into the 
 sea. I am frightened and oppressed by the terrible good fortune 
 which has always attended me, by the kindnesses which I have 
 
 done nothing to earn and which I can never repay For 
 
 Heaven's sake, don't feel anxious about my enjoying myself. I 
 am in an agony of enjoyment all the time now." 
 
 In February, 1856, Lowell left home. First making a 
 short visit at Havana, he then passed through the cotton 
 States of the Union to New Orleans, and, on the 8th of 
 April, sailed from that city in a ship bound for the Med 
 iterranean, landing at Gibraltar near the end of May. He 
 spent a little more than two years abroad. He journeyed 
 much on horseback for the sake of his health, and acquired 
 an equestrian skill which in Algiers excited the admiration 
 of the Arabs. At Algiers, too, he took lessons in the use 
 of the sword, and watched the movements of the French 
 troops as he had already studied the Austrian military sys 
 tem in Italy. He was thus, in several ways, unconsciously 
 preparing himself for his army life. He also became thor 
 oughly proficient in the principal European languages, and 
 applied himself, with his usual intellectual activity, to the 
 study of the great monuments of art and history, drinking 
 in, with a thirsty mind, the culture of the Old World. 
 
 During" the whole two years, he was battling with his 
 cruel disease. Yet at no time of his life, it would seem, 
 was Lowell more captivating. Everywhere he made new 
 friends, who were apt to think, such was the modesty of his 
 demeanor, that they had achieved an original discovery in 
 becoming aware of his splendid qualities. 
 
 When Lowell returned from abroad, in June, 1858, he 
 was still too unwell to think of resuming his former trying 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 305 
 
 occupation, or of living in the climate of the Atlantic coast ; 
 and he took the office of local treasurer on the Burlington 
 (Iowa) and Missouri River Railroad. This place did not 
 offer the kind of work he most enjoyed, and he entered on 
 it with great self-distrust ; but his success was so decided 
 that, in the opinion of a competent authority, " he might, 
 before he left, have been at the head of any railroad in 
 the West that needed a manager." He remained at 
 Burlington two years, in which time his health became 
 gradually established, and he began to feel once more 
 a happy confidence that he had a share in the life of this 
 world. 
 
 In the autumn of 1860 Lowell was requested to take 
 charge of the Mt. Savage Iron Works, an important estab 
 lishment at Cumberland, Maryland. He had come to re 
 gard himself as settled at Burlington, and had grown really 
 attached to his mode of life. But he now felt himself a 
 well man and did not hesitate to accept this opportunity of 
 returning to his former plans. In November we find him 
 at Mt. Savage, in a position of great responsibility, at the 
 head of a small city of workmen ; and once again his chosen 
 work seemed to lie before him. But going now into a Bor 
 der State at the moment of the great election of 1860, and 
 remaining there during the following five months, Lowell 
 could not fail to find himself brought into more positive 
 relations than ever before to political affairs, and his long- 
 cherished plans of professional activity thrown into abey 
 ance by the urgent anxieties and excitements of that dis 
 turbed winter. He had, for years, been a decided enemy 
 to slavery and to the system by which it was supported. 
 He had, at times, been strongly excited by public events. 
 It is said that the argument of his Commencement Oration 
 " derives the passion of a personal feeling from his indig 
 nation at the then recent surrender of Anthony Burns." 
 But his opinions, though radical, were not generally vio 
 lent, and, even in some of his last letters, it is evident that 
 
 VOL. i. 20 
 
306 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 his mind dwelt habitually ahove the range of the ordinary 
 thought of any political party. 
 
 In December he visited New Orleans on business con 
 nected with the mill, and he wrote to his mother on his 
 return : 
 
 " MT. SAVAGE, December 28, 1860. 
 " I suppose you fancied me burned, or at least barrelled ; but 
 
 after all, I suppose I ran less risk than friend exposed himself 
 
 to in panic-stricken Boston. Perhaps I did not merit martyrdom 
 so richly, however, and certainly I should not have enjoyed it so 
 keenly. I must say I have no sympathy with those John-Brown- 
 ists, nor do I believe they will make much out of the * Free- Speech ' 
 cry. It was a piece of rowdyism to break up their meeting, but 
 was at the same time a proof the more how free speech is in Mas 
 sachusetts. Fancy a parcel of Union-savers breaking up a fanat 
 ical Southern-rights meeting in New Orleans, and you have an ex 
 act parallel. But in New Orleans a Union-lover dare not speak 
 under his breath. Beyond ' co-operation ' no man's courage hath 
 yet ventured. This to be sure means * time ' ; and ' time ' means 
 4 submission ' ; but even co-operation finds few and feeble advo 
 cates, though I believe the vote of New Orleans city will show a 
 large majority for Union. I was present at that great historical 
 act, the unfurling of the ' Pelican Flag,' when news was received 
 of South Carolina's secession. It was an instructive spectacle. I 
 wonder whether the signers of our Declaration of Independence 
 looked as silly as those fellows." 
 
 On the 20th of April, 1861, hearing of the attack made 
 the preceding day in Baltimore on the Sixth Massachusetts 
 Regiment, Lowell instantly abandoned his position and set 
 out for Washington. In what manner he made the journey 
 is not clearly known ; but he reached the capital on Mon 
 day, April 22d, one of the first-comers from the North 
 since public communication had been broken. He thus 
 announced his action to his mother (April 24th) : " I was 
 fortunate enough to be in Baltimore last Sunday, and to be 
 here at present. How Jim and Henry will envy me ! . . . . 
 I shall come to see you, if I find there is nothing to be done 
 here. So have the blue room ready." 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 307 
 
 He put himself at once at the disposal of the govern 
 ment, and applied for the commission of Second Lieutenant 
 of Artillery in the Regular Army. While awaiting the re 
 sult of his application, Lowell sought to be of service as a 
 civilian. As soon as the railway was opened, he went to 
 Annapolis, and exerted himself there for the Massachusetts 
 troops ; first, in a private capacity, as the representative of 
 several Boston gentlemen, and afterwards as a semi-official 
 agent of the State. It is believed that he was also at this 
 time employed by the government as a scout, and that in 
 this perilous service he found opportunities of indulging 
 his dashing spirit, and obtained valuable information con 
 cerning the condition and movements of the enemy. 
 
 " WASHINGTON, May 13. 
 
 " I feel confident I am all right for a commission in the first 
 batch of civilians ; since my application none have been given ex 
 cept to the graduating class of West Point. When I am fairly ap 
 pointed, I shall want you to send me a copy of ' Oakfield,' with your 
 love and fondest wishes ; in exchange perhaps I will send my 
 photograph. Although I did not consult you, dear, in coming 
 here, I was very glad indeed to have your letter and father's ap 
 proving. I think, too, you will agree that I am right in trying to 
 enter the Regular Army. ... I have thought from the first that . . it 
 will fall mainly on the regular organization to keep the armies in 
 the field and keep them moving. Military science I have abso 
 lutely none, military talent I am too ignorant yet to recognize ; but 
 my education and experience in business and in the working of 
 men may, if wanted, be made available at once in the regular 
 
 army Of course I am too old to be tickled with a uniform, 
 
 and too apathetic to get up such a feeling against the worst traitor 
 among them as to desire personally to slay him ; but like every 
 young soldier, I am anxious for one battle as an experience ; 
 after that, I shall be content to bide my time, working where I can 
 do most service, and learning all I can from observation and from 
 books. I believe no one is more anxious to see the government 
 1 go through ' than I am. I want to see the Baltimore traitors put 
 on trial at once and armed rebellion everywhere crushed out ; but 
 
308 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 I cannot help feeling that the task is a long one, and of uncertain 
 issue ; and whether we are to have a long war and subdue them, or 
 a short war and a separation, it is evident that the army is to as 
 sume a new position among us. It will again become a profession. 
 Hence my anxiety to get into the Artillery ; if the change is to 
 
 come, I want to be in position to take the best advantage of it 
 
 The government troops parade here, and crowds stare at them. 
 In Alexandria (six miles off, I was down there last week) the Vir 
 ginia troops parade, and crowds gape at them. As to fancying 
 
 any hostile relation between them, it is almost impossible My 
 
 room-mate, S , was at Richmond last Friday, drove all about the 
 
 town and visited the camps in the neighborhood ; he reports them 
 to be in quite large force and very anxious for a fight, thoroughly 
 convinced that they were fighting the battles of freedom ! " 
 
 " May 25. 
 
 " After the movement yesterday across the river, all pass 
 ing to and fro was forbidden ; but Mr. Dalton and myself, by 
 going up to Georgetown and making interest with the Irishmen of 
 the Sixty-ninth, who have a rather Milesian idea of sentry's duty, 
 succeeded in getting into Virginia. We visited the earthworks 
 and many of the camps and dined at Arlington House on corn-pone 
 and milk. There were no troops yesterday within two miles of 
 Arlington, and the place was just in the prime of its spring beauty. 
 I have seen no place like it in this country for position and for 
 well-improved natural advantages. I suppose to-day it is occupied ; 
 and in spite of its importance and of its owner's treason, I cannot 
 
 think of it with much pleasure If I have been of any use to 
 
 the Massachusetts troops, I am very glad of it. I wish our people 
 would not feel so very anxious about their comfort. Their health 
 and morale is" excellent, and they are as efficient as any troops here. 
 I am sure you do not worry so much about my comfort, and I do not 
 see why other mothers should. The greatest kindness to our troops 
 
 now is to teach them to use what they have." 
 
 "June 7. 
 
 [ To C. E. Perkins, Esq., BurlingtonJ] " I cannot say I take 
 any great pleasure in the contemplation of the future. I fancy 
 you feel much as I do about the profitableness of a soldier's life, 
 and would not think of trying it, were it not for a muddled and 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 309 
 
 twisted idea that somehow or other this fight was going to be one 
 in which decent men ought to engage for the sake of humanity, I 
 use the word in its ordinary sense. It seems to me that within a 
 year the slavery question will again take a prominent place, and 
 that many cases will arise in which we may get fearfully in the 
 wrong if we put our cause wholly in the hands of fighting men and 
 foreign legions." 
 
 About the middle of June, Lowell received his commis 
 sion (dated May 14, 1861), as Captain in the Third (after 
 wards numbered Sixth) Regiment of United States Cavalry ; 
 and he was engaged, during the summer, in recruiting in 
 different parts of the country. 
 
 " WARREN, OHIO, August 5, 1861. 
 
 " You seem to feel worse about the Bull Run defeat than I do. 
 To me the most discouraging part of the whole is the way in which 
 company officers have too many of them behaved since the affair, 
 skulking about Washington, at Willard's or elsewhere, letting their 
 names go home in the lists of killed or missing, eating and sleep 
 ing, and entirely ignoring the commands of their superiors and the 
 moral and physical needs of their men. I regard it as a proof of 
 something worse than loose discipline, as a proof that these offi 
 cers at least have no sense of the situation and no sentiment for 
 their cause. If there are to be many such, we are whipped from 
 the outset. Fancy Jim or Willy behaving so ! I know that my 
 Southern classmates in the Rebel ranks would never have treated 
 their companies of poor white trash so contemptuously. They 
 respect them too much as means for a great end." 
 
 During the following autumn and winter, Lowell's regi 
 ment was occupied in drilling and preparing for the field. 
 He gave himself wholly to his work, employing his time of 
 leisure in making himself a master of cavalry tactics and 
 in studying also the higher principles of military science. 
 His talent and assiduity attracted the admiration of every 
 officer of his regiment ; and, even before he had had the 
 opportunity of showing his sagacity and courage in action, 
 
310 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 his colonel had come to look on him as " the best officer 
 appointed from civil life he had ever known," and honored 
 him with the command of a squadron. 
 
 The regiment moved in March, 1862, with the Army of 
 the Potomac, and was engaged, as a part of General Stone- 
 man's command, in the Peninsular campaign of the ensu 
 ing season. During the whole of Lowell's career as a 
 soldier, with the self-contained dignity of character for 
 which he was conspicuous in all periods of his life, and 
 which was now re-enforced by a severe principle of military 
 propriety, he kept in his letters, and (unless pressed by ques 
 tions) in his speech, a perfect silence concerning his per 
 formances, drew no battle-pieces, seldom even mentioned 
 having been in battle, never so much as dropped a hint 
 of any act of wit or bravery of his own, and professed con 
 tinually that he could find nothing to " narrate." We are 
 therefore forced to rest for most of the facts which created 
 his brilliant reputation on the memory of his companions 
 in arms ; and we may, in some instances, have failed to 
 recover or even have misapprehended important details. 
 
 In the advance of the army towards Richmond, and es 
 pecially after the evacuation of Yorktown, Lowell was con 
 stantly in action, and his gallantry was everywhere conspic 
 uous. " For distinguished services at Williamsburg and 
 Slater sville," he was nominated for the brevet of Major. 
 
 " I heard yesterday of a narrow escape which Charley had," 
 writes Lieutenant James Lowell, on the 29th of May, referring to the 
 affair at Slatersville. " He was charging, and came upon a man who 
 
 aimed a double-barrelled carbine at him. C called out to him, 
 
 ' Drop that ! ' and he lowered it enough to blow to pieces C 's 
 
 coat, which was strapped on his horse behind him." 
 
 Captain Lowell further distinguished himself in a recon- 
 rioissance on the 15th of May, and in the battle of Hanover 
 Court-House on the 27th. On the memorable 27th of June 
 the whole of Stoneman's command was cut off from the 
 main army and obliged to retire down the Peninsula to 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 311 
 
 Fortress Monroe. In the severe battles of the following 
 week Lowell was therefore not engaged. But they cost 
 him the life of his tenderly loved brother, James, who was 
 wounded at Glendale on the 30th of June, and died in the 
 hands of the enemy at a neighboring farm-house on the 4th 
 of July. 
 
 On the 10th of July Captain Lowell was detailed for duty 
 as an aid to General McClellan. He remained in this posi 
 tion till November, winning the esteem of his chief by effi 
 cient conduct at the second battle of Malvern Hill (August 
 5), and rendering energetic service in the brilliant and ar 
 duous Maryland campaign. At South Mountain (Septem 
 ber 14), in bearing orders to General Reno, he showed a 
 bravery which excited universal admiration. But at An- 
 tietam (September 17) he revealed the high order of his 
 military capacity more fully than on any other occasion 
 during the first period of the war. He went, early in the 
 day, with orders to General Sedgwick's division, of General 
 Sumner's corps. He met it retreating in confusion, under 
 a hot fire. Lowell put forth all his vigor to meet the occa 
 sion. He rode rapidly from point to point of the line, driv 
 ing back and rallying the men ; and such was the magnet 
 ism of his presence and his voice that whole companies 
 which a moment before had seemed uncontrollable started 
 forward with alacrity at his word. Through the re-enforce 
 ment given to discipline by his energetic behavior, a rout 
 which threatened disaster to the whole right of our line 
 was checked. " I shall never forget the effect of his ap 
 pearance," says an officer who saw him for a single instant, 
 while he was engaged in this work. " He seemed a part of 
 his horse, and instinct with a perfect animal life. At the 
 same time his eyes glistened and his face literally shone 
 with the spirit and intelligence of which he was the em 
 bodiment. He was the ideal of the preux chevalier. Af 
 ter I was wounded, one of my first anxieties was to know 
 what had become of him ; for it seemed to me that no 
 
312 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 mounted man could have lived through the storm of bul 
 lets that swept the wood just after I saw him enter it." 
 He was with Sedgwick when that general was wounded ; 
 and at the same time his own horse was shot under him, 
 while a bullet passed through his coat, and another broke 
 the scabbard of his sabre. In recognition of his gallantry 
 in this battle, General McClellan bestowed on Lowell the 
 office of presenting to the President the trophies of the 
 campaign ; and he accordingly visited Washington, the 
 bearer of thirty-nine colors taken from the enemy. This 
 was a high honor, and by the customs of the service 
 equivalent to a recommendation for promotion. In the 
 midst of the excitement caused by this important victory, 
 Lowell writes to his mother, on the 19th of September, a few 
 pencilled lines on an official blank, in which he begins, 
 '" We had a severe fight day before yesterday " ; then men 
 tions some casualties among officers known in Massachu 
 setts ; and after a brief statement of the general results of 
 the battle, closes without one syllable of the brilliant part 
 he has himself played in it. 
 
 From time to time, in the course of this summer, the 
 project of a new volunteer regiment of horse, to be com 
 manded by Captain Lowell, had engaged the attention of 
 the authorities of Massachusetts. In August he writes : 
 " As to a regiment, I have given up all idea of it very will 
 ingly Your scheme of a regiment of gentlemen, even 
 
 if practicable, would not suit me at all. What do you mean 
 by ' gentlemen ' ? Drivers of gigs ? " 
 
 In November, however, he was ordered to report to Gov 
 ernor Andrew, for the purpose of organizing the Second 
 Massachusetts Cavalry, of which he was appointed Colonel. 
 This work kept him in the neighborhood of Boston through 
 the winter and spring of 1862-63. 
 
 In February, 1863, Congress passed the Negro Army 
 Bill. The appointment of Colonel Shaw to the command 
 of the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts, the first regiment raised 
 
Charles Eussell Lowell. 313 
 
 under the provisions of this bill, deprived Colonel Lowell of 
 one of his most valued officers ; but he heartily approved 
 the selection. " It is very important," he writes (February 
 9), " that the regiment should be started soberly, and not 
 spoilt by too much fanaticism. Shaw is not a fanatic." 
 He was strongly interested in the success of this enter 
 prise, and aided it with his counsel and his influence. 
 
 While Colonel Lowell was engaged in organizing the 
 Second Cavalry, a serious mutiny broke out, on the 9th of 
 April, at barracks under the recruiting-office in Boston, 
 where one company of the regiment was quartered. The 
 men rushed on their officers with drawn swords. Colonel 
 Lowell went to the barracks, and by his force of character 
 and resolute coolness succeeded in restoring discipline ; 
 but he was obliged to shoot the ringleader in the revolt, 
 whom he saw in the act of striking at a lieutenant with 
 his sabre. 
 
 This tragic incident affected Lowell deeply ; but he acted 
 from a well-considered principle, put into practice with the 
 quick decision of a fearless mind. His conduct was uni 
 versally applauded. In the street-crowd that gathered on 
 the first rumor of the occurrence, a young man was heard 
 to say, " I was with Lowell at the High School ; and if he 
 did it, I know it is right." 
 
 He is said to have reported what he had done to Gover 
 nor Andrew in the following manner. Entering his Excel 
 lency's room, he made a military salute and said, " I have 
 to report to you, sir, that in the discharge of my duty, I 
 have shot a man " ; then saluted again and immediately 
 withdrew. " I need nothing more," said the Governor to a 
 bystander ; " Colonel Lowell is as humane as he is brave." 
 His action was approved by the United States authorities 
 and by those of Massachusetts, and it exerted a wholesome 
 influence throughout the service. 
 
 In the spring of 1863 Colonel Lowell became engaged to 
 Josephine, daughter of Francis G. Shaw, Esq., of Staten 
 
314 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Island, and sister to Colonel Shaw. To her most of his 
 later letters are addressed. 
 
 In May he left Boston with his regiment, and was soon 
 placed in command of the cavalry of the Department of 
 "Washington, with head-quarters at Vienna, Virginia. For 
 many months he was occupied in resisting the incursions of 
 Mosby. This was a post of danger, and one in which he 
 rendered important service to the country. But he con 
 stantly desired an opportunity of acting on a larger and 
 more glorious field. " I have often said," writes General 
 Mosby, " that, of all the Federal commanders opposed to 
 me, I had the highest respect for Colonel Lowell, both as an 
 officer and a gentleman." 
 
 "June, 1863. 
 
 "Your Capri and Sorrento have brought back my Campagna 
 and my Jungfrau and my Psestum, and again the season is la gio- 
 ventu dell' anno, and I think of breezy Veii and sunny Pisa and 
 the storm-pines of the Villa Pamfili Doria. Of course it is right 
 to wish that some time we may go there. Of course the remem 
 brance of such places and the hope of revisiting them makes one 
 take ' the all in the day's work ' more bravely. It is a homesick 
 ness which is healthy for the soul ; but we do not own ourselves, 
 and have no right to even wish ourselves out of harness. I don't 
 believe you wish there was no harness, nor yet to be out of harness 
 by reason of a break-down. Collars are our proper ' wear,' I am 
 afraid, and we ought to enjoy going well up to them 
 
 " A man is meant to act and to undertake, to try to succeed in 
 his undertakings, to take all means which he thinks necessary to 
 success ; but he must not let his undertakings look too large and 
 make a slave of him. Still less must he let the means. He must 
 keep free and grow integrally 
 
 " You know I believe Heaven is here, everywhere, if we only 
 see God ; and that, as a future state, it is not to be much dwelt 
 upon, only enough to make one content with death as a change 
 not infinitely different from sleep ; that this world, and all that is 
 in it, being created for the glory of God, (and for what other end 
 can such a fearful and wonderful ' nature ' be designed,) we espe 
 cially ought to glorify him by being thankful and seeing his glory 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 315 
 
 everywhere. Just how we are to show our thankfulness is a more 
 searching question : I think not by depreciating this world to exalt 
 another ; perhaps by bene vivere, perhaps by * loving well both 
 man and bird and beast ' ; probably by one person in one way, by 
 
 another in another 
 
 "I wonder whether my theories about self-culture, &c., would 
 ever have been modified so much, whether I should ever have 
 seen what a necessary failure they lead to, had it not been for this 
 war. Now I feel every day, more and more, that a man has no 
 right to himself at all ; that, indeed, he can do nothing useful unless 
 he recognizes this clearly. We were counting over the ' satisfac 
 tory ' people of our acquaintance the other day, and very few they 
 were. It seems to me that this change in public affairs has entirely 
 changed my standard, and that men whom, ten years ago, I should 
 have almost accepted as satisfactory now show lamentably deficient. 
 Men do not yet seem to have risen with the occasion ; and the per 
 petual perception of this is uncomfortable. It is painful here to see 
 how sadly personal motives interfere with most of our officers' use 
 fulness. After the war how much there will be to do, and how 
 little opportunity a fellow in the field has to prepare himself for 
 the sort of doing that will be required. It makes me quite sad 
 sometimes ; but then I reflect that the great secret of doing, after 
 all, is in seeing what is to be done. I wish I could feel as sure of 
 doing my duty elsewhere as I am of doing it on the field of battle ; 
 that is so little part of an officer's and patriot's duty now." 
 
 " July 3. 
 
 " Wars are bad, but there are many things far worse Any 
 thing immediately comfortable in our affairs I don't see ; but com 
 fortable times are not the ones that make a nation great. See what 
 too much comfort has reduced the Philadelphians to. Honestly, I 
 dare scarcely wish that the war should end speedily." 
 
 " July 5. 
 
 " I am vexed at having to remain here, when there is so much 
 going on close by. I almost wish I was back a Captain in the 
 
 Sixth. However, I have done all I dare to get away You 
 
 must n't be disappointed. I suppose there will come a time when the 
 regiment will have a chance." 
 
316 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " July 9. 
 
 " What glorious news about Vicksburg ; and I am particularly 
 glad to have that and Gettysburg come so near the 4th of 
 July. A year ago on that day Jimmy died, in a farm-house on 
 the battle-field of Glendale ; the little fellow was very happy ; he 
 thought the war would soon be over, that everything was going 
 right, and that everybody was as high-minded and courageous as 
 himself. He was a good son and a pure and wise lover of his 
 country. With mother and father I shall never fill his place, nor in 
 the Commonwealth either I fear." 
 
 " July 24. 
 
 " Many nations fail, that one may become great ; ours will 
 fail, unless we gird up our loins and do honest and humble 
 days' wor^ without trying to do the thing by the job or to get a 
 great nation made by any patent process. It is not safe to say that 
 we shall not have victories till we are ready for them. We shall 
 have victories, and whether or no we are ready for them de 
 pends upon ourselves ; if we are not ready, we shall fail, 
 voila tout. If you ask what if we do fail, I have nothing to say ; 
 I should n't cry over a nation or two, more or less, gone under / . . . . 
 
 " I don't at all like the duty here, serving against bushwhackers ; 
 it brings me in contact with too many citizens, and sometimes with 
 mothers and children. The other night a fine-looking young fellow 
 stumbled against our pickets and was captured. It proved that he 
 had been out to visit his mother. She came to bid him good-by the 
 next morning, a Quaker-like looking old lady, very neat and quiet. 
 She did n't appeal to us at all. She shed a few tears over the son, 
 repacked his bundle carefully, slipped a roll of greenbacks into his 
 hand, and then kissed him farewell. I was very much touched by 
 her. Yesterday we took a little fellow only sixteen years old. He 
 had joined one of these gangs to avoid the conscription, which is 
 very sweeping. He told us all he knew about the company to 
 which he belonged ; but he was such a babe that it seemed to me 
 mean to question him." 
 
 " July 26. 
 
 " has just sent me the report about dear Rob, and it does 
 
 not seem to me possible it should be true. Was he not pre 
 eminently what every man-at-arms should wish to be ? The man 
 liness and patriotism and high courage of such a man never die 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 317 
 
 with him, they live in his comrades ; it should be the same with the 
 gentleness and thoughtfulness which made him so lovable a son and 
 brother and friend. We have been talking over the good fellows 
 who have gone before in this war, fellows whom Rob loved so 
 much, many of them. There is none who has been so widely and 
 so dearly loved as he. If ' life is but a sum of love,' Rob had had 
 his share and done his share. It is pleasant to feel sure, without 
 knowing any particulars, that his regiment has done well ; we all 
 feel perfectly sure of it. I hope he knew it too." 
 
 "July 26. 
 
 [To his mother. ~\ "He was to me one of the most attractive 
 men I ever knew, he had such a single and loyal and kindly 
 heart; I don't believe he ever did an unkind or thoughtless act 
 without trying to make up for it afterwards. In that he was like 
 Jimmy. It cannot be so hard for such a man to die : it is not 
 
 so hard for his friends to lose him Tell not to feel 
 
 anxious, and don't you feel anxious, dear, about anybody. It is not 
 
 our business." 
 
 " August 1. 
 
 " Everything that comes about Rob shows his death to have been 
 more and more completely that which every soldier and every man 
 would long to die ; but it is given to very few, for very few do their 
 duty as Rob did. I am thankful they buried him * with his nig 
 gers.' They were brave men, and they were his men." 
 
 "October 18. 
 
 " It has been a lovely day, the woods in all their softest and 
 warmest colors, and seen in the light of a balmy Italian spring sky. 
 I am afraid it has demoralized me, and made me feel as if the end 
 
 of the war were a great way off yet I don't see that this war 
 
 has done us as a nation any good, except on the slave question. In 
 one sense, that is enough ; but how is it that it has not taught us 
 many other things which we hoped it would ? " 
 
 Colonel Lowell married on the 31st of October, 1863 ; 
 and for several months his wife remained with him in 
 camp.* 
 
 In July, 1864, he took a conspicuous part in resisting 
 
 * One daughter, Carlotta Russell Lowell, was born after the father's death. 
 
318 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 General Early, who in that month made a demonstration 
 upon Washington. On the 14th of July, going on a recon- 
 noissance, with his own regiment and an additional battalion, 
 he sent a part of his command forward, and himself followed 
 with the remainder. A little beyond Rockville, the ad 
 vance column was suddenly overwhelmed by a greatly su 
 perior force of the enemy, and took up a rapid retreat. Just 
 as Colonel Lowell had reached the middle of the town, the 
 flying battalion came charging down upon him. He had 
 not even time to turn his men. There was a violent col 
 lision ; and then the whole brigade went whirling in mad 
 confusion towards Washington. The enemy were at their 
 heels. With brilliant audacity, Lowell shouted the order, 
 "Dismount! " Seizing their carbines, the men sprang from 
 their saddles at the word of their dauntless commander. 
 In another instant, they were in line. On came the assail 
 ants; but, as they drew near, such a deadly volley was 
 poured into their ranks that both horses and riders recoiled 
 before it. Lowell saw the enemy waver, advanced, and 
 turned the fortune of the day. With his little force, just 
 now routed and in full retreat, but unable, even in a mo 
 ment of panic, to forget its discipline, he held his ground 
 against two brigades of the enemy's best cavalry. Colonel 
 Lowell's control over his men on this occasion has been 
 compared by his officers, not inaptly, to Sheridan's famous 
 rally of his army at the battle of Cedar Creek. 
 
 On the 26th of July, Colonel Lowell was put in command 
 of a new '^Provisional Brigade," and was ordered to report to 
 General Hunter, then at the head of the Army of the She- 
 nandoah. This brigade, which numbered nineteen hundred 
 men, contained, besides the Second Massachusetts, repre 
 sentatives of every cavalry regiment in the service ; and 
 Lowell never gave a more signal proof of his wonderful 
 administrative power than when he brought this hetero 
 geneous collection of men in a few days into a state of or 
 ganic unity. 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 819 
 
 On the 6tli of August General Sheridan took command 
 of the Army of the Shenandoah, which, on the 10th, moved 
 up the valley from Harper's Ferry, the Provisional Bri 
 gade taking the outside position. The next day Lowell 
 overtook the rear-guard of the enemy, and, after a sharp 
 skirmish, drove it pell-mell through Winchester. On the 
 16th, Sheridan began to retire down the valley, the cav 
 alry protecting his rear ; and from this date till the 31st, 
 Lowell's brigade was fighting every day. On the 21st, the 
 army was again encamped near the Ferry. Colonel Lowell's 
 business was now to watch the movements of the enemy. 
 It was in the discharge of this duty that his soldiership 
 made its first deep impression on the commanding gen 
 eral ; and day by day from this moment, as he was tried 
 in new service, his reputation rose to a higher and higher 
 point at head-quarters and throughout the army. On the 
 26th of August, he led an attack on the advance of the en 
 emy. To succeed, it must be made with great rapidity. 
 " Charging up to a rail-fence behind which were the enemy, 
 and which he could not leap, he actually whacked their 
 muskets with his sabre. In tearing down the fence, men 
 were clubbed with muskets, and two killed in this way ; but 
 over they went, nothing could resist them. The Second 
 Massachusetts captured seventy-four men, a lieutenant- 
 colonel, three captains, and several lieutenants. This 
 was the first time that Colonel Lowell's men ever really 
 measured him. Such a noble scorn of death and danger 
 they never saw before, and it inspired them with a courage 
 that quailed at nothing." 
 
 On the 3d of September the army was again in motion ; 
 and on the 8th, Colonel Lowell was appointed to the com 
 mand of the " Reserve Brigade," which was made to consist 
 of three regiments of regular cavalry, one of artillery, and 
 his own volunteer regiment, and was considered the best 
 cavalry brigade in the service. This appointment was the 
 more honorable to Lowell, as he owed it in no degree 
 
320 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 to personal favor or influence. He had been utterly un 
 known to General Sheridan at the beginning of the cam 
 paign, and the high estimation he now enjoyed had flowed 
 from his own merits only. 
 
 In the superb charge at Winchester (19th September), 
 when our cavalry rode over a whole division of the ene 
 my and drove their army flying through the town and for 
 miles up the turnpike, till night ended the pursuit, Lowell 
 achieved new distinction. " At one moment," says an offi 
 cer of his regiment, " he found himself, with one captain 
 and four men, face to face with a Rebel gun. The piece 
 was discharged, killing both the horses and tearing off the 
 captain's arm. The Colonel quietly mounted the first 
 horse that came up ; and the gun was his." " A little 
 more spunk," said Lowell, never satisfied that enough had 
 been done, to a member of Sheridan's staff, " and we 
 should have had all their colors." " A little more go," was 
 the answer, " and you would have been in Richmond." 
 
 The 9th of October was the date of a hardly less brilliant 
 fight, called by our men, in allusion to the complete rout 
 of the Confederates, the " Woodstock Races." Here the 
 cavalry of Sheridan's army tried its strength against that of 
 the enemy, which was commanded by General Rosser, the 
 long-expected " savior of the valley." Colonel Lowell 
 held the Strasburg turnpike, and it fell to him to lead the 
 attack that day. " It almost rained lead ; and the men 
 crouched behind rocks, trees, fences. It seemed as if they 
 could not go on. The Colonel rode up among them and 
 along the line ; then they must advance. The enemy 
 opened two guns at short range, shotted with grape and 
 canister ; but on, still on. Our first line was half de 
 stroyed, and the reserve was ordered up ; but the Colonel 
 rode all the while in advance of every man in his command. 
 Remembering Winchester, the enemy grew tremulous ; and 
 our bugles sounded the charge. The recall was not heard 
 nor the pace abated till our men were seventeen miles 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 321 
 
 away, beyond Edinburgh." In this battle, in the words 
 of General Sheridan, "everything on wheels was cap 
 tured." 
 
 These are only shining points in a campaign which gave 
 every day new proofs of LowelPs quality. " He was per 
 fectly brave," says one who saw him constantly in the val 
 ley. Thirteen horses were shot under him in the course of 
 as many weeks ; and as he went ruddy and buoyant into the 
 storm of death, he seemed to know that he was protected 
 from its fury by some decree of fate. But he was not a 
 soldier of dashing courage only. He was distinguished 
 by self-devotion and sleepless vigilance, by coolness, sound 
 judgment, and military knowledge, by rapidity and sure- 
 ness of eye, and skill in turning peril into an opportunity 
 of victory, by persistency undiscouraged, by absolute prompt 
 ness, by self-reliance and self-possession, by a discipline, 
 temperate and just, but unflinching, and by an inborn 
 spirit of command. " In whatever position Lowell was 
 placed," remarks one who knew him well through life, 
 " it always seemed to those around him that he was made 
 for just that work." His men, some of them dissatisfied 
 at first to be led by a commander who appeared even more 
 youthful than he was, never shrank from following him 
 into any danger after they had seen him in one battle. 
 "His officers loved him, and wished for nothing so much as 
 to show him what they dared to do ; and he would watch 
 them with tears in his eyes." In the midst of this labori 
 ous campaign, he found time to read several books of seri 
 ous thought, a few such books he always carried in his 
 baggage, and he liked to engage his officers in discussions 
 suggested by his reading. In his views of public affairs 
 " he was always an enthusiast, never a fanatic," says one 
 who talked with him intimately at different periods of the 
 war. Honorably ambitious of advancement, he ever ear 
 nestly maintained the principle that promotions should be 
 neither made nor sought on any ground but that of mili- 
 
 VOL. I. 21 
 
322 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 tary merit. " He was free, eminently free, from the finesse 
 of the politician." 
 
 " Those who knew him at any period in life know how 
 wonderfully he united the aspirations of immortal youth 
 with an instinctive knowledge of the world, patience with 
 persistent energy, freedom from illusions with nobleness of 
 aim." 
 
 " I know none like him left, so sparkling, so rapid in his 
 eye, so true, so sound, so noble. I will not say he had no 
 faults ; but, in my long intercourse with him, I never saw 
 them as faults that jarred. The worst and only complaint 
 I have ever had was that he would not tell me of himself. 
 He had the impersonality of genius " 
 
 " From the time he entered the army he was happy. 
 He had found all he asked, an object worthy of his ef 
 forts. The vague desire to do something for his fellow-men 
 became a settled resolve to do all he could, whether much 
 or little, for his country. Though quick to perceive short 
 comings, and to feel their discouraging influence, he never 
 lost his faith. He was inflexible in duty ; for he believed 
 that through fidelity in trifles only could the great whole 
 be gained. Especially was every good and noble growth 
 quickened during the last two years." 
 
 "September 5, 1864. 
 
 " I like Sheridan immensely. Whether he succeeds or fails, he 
 is the first general I have seen who puts as much heart and time 
 and thought into his work as if he were doing it for his own ex 
 clusive profit. He works like a mill-owner or an iron-master ; not 
 like a soldier. Never sleeps, never worries, is never cross, but 
 is n't afraid to come down on a man who deserves it." 
 
 "September 10. 
 
 [ To a disabled officer."] " I hope that you are going to live like 
 a plain republican, mindful of the beauty and of the duty of simpli 
 city. Nothing fancy now, sir, if you please ; it 's disreputable to 
 spend money when the government is so hard up, and when there 
 are so many poor officers. I hope that you have outgrown all fool- 
 
Charles Russell LyuoelL 323 
 
 ish ambitions, and are now content to become a ' useful citizen.' .... 
 Don't grow rich ; if you once begin, you will find it much more diffi 
 cult to be a useful citizen. Don't seek office, but don't 'disremember ' 
 that the ' useful citizen' always holds his time, his trouble, his money, 
 and his life ready at the hint of his country. The useful citizen is a 
 mighty, unpretending hero ; but we are not going to have any coun 
 try very long, unless such heroism is developed. There ! what a 
 stale sermon I 'm preaching ! But being a soldier, it does seem 
 to me that I should like nothing so well as being a useful citizen. 
 Well, trying to be one, I mean. I shall stay in the service, of 
 course, till the war is over, or till I 'm disabled ; but then I look 
 
 forward to a pleasanter career 
 
 " I believe I have lost all my ambitions I don't think I would 
 
 turn my hand to be a distinguished chemist or a famous mathema 
 tician. All I now care about is to be a useful citizen, with money 
 enough to buy bread and firewood, and to teach my children to ride 
 on horseback, and look strangers in the face, especially Southern 
 
 strangers." 
 
 " October 5. 
 
 " The new moon looked very strangely calm and peaceful and 
 almost reproachful in the west last night, with the whole north 
 and east, far and near, lighted up by burning barns and 
 houses I would cheerfully assist in making this whole val 
 ley a desert, from Staunton northward ; for that would have, I am 
 sure, an important effect on the campaign of the spring ; but in 
 partial burnings I see less justice and less propriety. I was sorry 
 enough the other day that my brigade should have had a part in 
 the hanging and shooting of some of Mosby's men." 
 
 " October 10. 
 
 " I don't think I now care at all about being a Brigadier-Gen 
 eral. I am perfectly satisfied to be a Colonel, if I can always have 
 a brigade to command. That 's modest, is n't it ? " 
 
 " October 17. 
 
 [ To J. M. Forbes, Esq.~] " I am very glad that we have not a 
 ' handy ' writer among us. The reputation of regiments is made 
 and is known in the army ; the comparative merits are well known 
 
 there. Such a notice as I saw of the makes a regiment 
 
 ridiculous, besides giving the public false history." 
 
324 Harvard ^Memorial Biographies. 
 
 "October 17. 
 
 [ To his mother.'] " If I 'm ever taken prisoner, you '11 find one 
 fellow who won't think he 's badly treated, and won't come home 
 
 and make the friends of all prisoners sick with his twaddle 
 
 People must be patient : we are going quite fast enough." 
 
 On the 15th of October, General Sheridan left the army, 
 then strongly intrenched near Cedar Creek, for the pur 
 pose of visiting Front Royal and other points in the val 
 ley. The story of the 19th is well known. It will be re 
 membered how, in the dawn of that day, the enemy suc 
 ceeded in accomplishing a surprise ; how the whole left of 
 our line, suddenly exposed to a deadly fire poured into 
 them from the rear, were driven from their position and 
 rushed headlong down the valley, while the only hope that 
 seemed to remain was that of saving the army from total 
 destruction ; and how, at midday, into that routed and 
 huddled mass Sheridan came galloping from Winchester, 
 with a speed that left most of his escort far in the rear, and, 
 received by the troops with wild cheers and a spontaneous 
 resolution to renew the battle, how he turned ruin into 
 victory. 
 
 Late in the evening of the 18th Colonel Lowell had or 
 ders to make a reconnoissance, as soon as the fog broke the 
 next morning, in front of the position occupied by the cav 
 alry, on the right of the line. He caused reveille to be 
 sounded at four o'clock, and at half past four his brigade 
 was in motion. Crossing the creek, he encountered the 
 enemy in Jbrce. A sharp skirmish ensued, the beginning 
 of the battle. Lowell held his position till half past seven, 
 when he was relieved by infantry, and withdrew. His punc 
 tuality in making his advance had saved the right wing of 
 the army from a disaster, possibly as great as that which 
 befell the other end of the line. 
 
 Soon after eight o'clock the whole cavalry corps passed 
 from the right of the field to the left, a distance of three 
 miles, with the object of obtaining an advantageous position 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 325 
 
 for covering the retreat of the army. The Reserve Brigade 
 took the lead in this movement. Passing along the fast- 
 retiring line of battle, between the infantry front and the 
 skirmish line, they had an excellent view of the state of 
 affairs, and were exposed sometimes to a heavy fire. " We 
 met everywhere flying men and officers. We asked the 
 officers why they went to the rear. ' They had no com 
 mand.' We asked the men. ' They had no officers.' ' 
 " They moved past me, that splendid cavalry ! " wrote 
 shortly after a distinguished general. " If they reached the 
 pike, I felt secure. Lowell got by me before I could speak, 
 but I looked after him for a long distance. Exquisitely 
 mounted, the picture of a soldier, erect, confident, defi 
 ant, he moved at the head of the finest brigade of cavalry 
 that at this day scorns the earth it treads." 
 
 Striking the turnpike just north of Middletown, which was 
 already occupied by the enemy, Lowell at once established 
 his position at the extreme left of the line ; and he main 
 tained it almost unchanged, against great superiority of 
 numbers, till the final advance in which he received his 
 mortal wound. He attended in person to the disposition of 
 his men, riding backwards and forwards along the line of 
 skirmishers, a conspicuous mark for the sharpshooters on 
 the roofs of the village. His last horse was shot under him 
 early in the day. In a charge at one o'clock, he was him 
 self struck in the side of the right breast by a spent ball, 
 which, without breaking the skin, imbedded itself in the 
 muscle and deprived him of voice and strength. "It is 
 only my poor lung," he said faintly to the officers who 
 urged him to go to the rear. " You would not have me 
 leave the field without having shed blood ! " The force of 
 the blow was sufficient to collapse the lung and cause in 
 ternal hemorrhage, and it would probably have been fatal if 
 he had had no other hurt. 
 
 For an hour and a half he lay on the ground under a 
 temporary shelter. Presently an order came for a general 
 
326 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 advance along the line at three o'clock, the advance which 
 was destined to give us victory. " I feel well now" said 
 he, though too weak to mount to his saddle without assist 
 ance. He sat .his horse firm and erect as ever. The color 
 had come back to his cheeks. But he could not speak 
 above a whisper. He gave his orders through a member of 
 his staff; arid his brigade was, as usual, the first ready. Just 
 as they were in the thickest of the fire that was poured on 
 them from the town, a cry arose, " The Colonel is hit ! " 
 He fell from his horse into the arms of his aids, and was 
 carried forward, in the track of his rapidly advancing bri 
 gade, to a house within the village. 
 
 The ball had severed his spine at the neck ; and his body 
 was completely paralyzed below the wound. He gave no 
 signs of suffering ; his mind was perfectly clear ; and he 
 rested calm and cheerful, though he knew from the begin 
 ning that he had no chance of life. He dictated some 
 private messages of affection. Then, from time to time 
 through the night, as his waning strength would allow, he 
 gave complete directions about all the details of his com 
 mand. Not the smallest thing was forgotten ; no one was 
 left in doubt. In the intervals he remained silent, with his 
 eyes closed. Twice he directed his surgeon to leave him 
 and look to the injuries of other officers and of some 
 wounded prisoners whose voices he heard without. He 
 expressed pleasure at the triumphant issue of the fight, 
 and at Colonel Gansevoort's victory over Mosby, news of 
 which was brought in that day. As dawn approached, it 
 was evident that his spirit was gradually freeing itself from 
 its vesture of decay. He had finished his " day's work " ; 
 and he lay tranquil, his mind withdrawn, it seemed, into 
 that chamber of still thought, known so imperfectly to the 
 nearest of his friends, wherein was the seat of his deepest 
 life. Even in his last hour he was fully conscious, and 
 seemed to retain his strength. But he spoke less and less 
 often ; and as day rose into full morning, he ceased to 
 breathe the air of earth. 
 
Charles Russell Lowell. 327 
 
 A letter, from one whose official position under govern 
 ment gives his opinion authority, says, " I do not think 
 there was any officer in all the army so much beloved as 
 Lowell." " We all shed tears," said Ouster, " when we 
 knew we had lost him. It is the greatest loss the cavalry 
 corps has ever suffered." " I do not think there was a 
 quality," said Sheridan, " which I could have added to 
 Lowell. He was the perfection of a man and a soldier." 
 His commission as Brigadier-General of Volunteers, " de 
 termined on days before," was signed on the 19th of Octo 
 ber, too late for him to wear the honor he had earned so 
 well. 
 
 The funeral of General Lowell took place on Friday, the 
 28th of October, at the College Chapel at Cambridge. It 
 was fit that Harvard should pay the last honors to this son 
 of hers, than whom none nobler ever left her lap. In an 
 address, spoken in the presence of a dense assemblage, the 
 Rev. George Putnam drew a vivid picture of the departed 
 hero, and consecrated the occasion, with fine felicity, not to 
 Lowell only, but also to those many dear friends of his to 
 whom he had been as a leader, yet who before him had fall 
 en and nearly all still rested where they fell. Then the 
 relics of this high-minded, gallant, and gifted soldier were 
 restored to the earth at Mount Auburn, with the honors 
 befitting his military rank. 
 
 " Not on the vulgar mass 
 
 Called ' work ' must sentence pass, 
 Things done, that took the eye and had the price ; 
 
 O'er which, from level stand, 
 
 The low world laid its hand, 
 Found straightway to its mind, could value in a trice : 
 
 " Thoughts hardly to be packed 
 
 Into a narrow act, 
 Fancies that broke through language and escaped ; 
 
 All I could never be, 
 
 All men ignored in me, 
 This I was worth to God, whose wheel the pitcher shaped." 
 
328 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 JAMES SAVAGE. 
 
 Captain 2d Mass. Vols. (Infantry), May 24, 1861 ; Major, June 23, 
 1862; Lieutenant-Colonel, September 17, 1862; died at Charlottesville, 
 Va., October 22, 1862, of wounds received at Cedar Mountain, Au 
 gust 9. 
 
 JAMES SAVAGE, JR., the subject of this memoir, was 
 the only son of the Hon. James Savage of Boston, 
 well known for his historical researches connected with the 
 early settlers of New England, and of Elizabeth Otis (Still- 
 man) Savage. 
 
 Major Thomas Savage, the founder of the family in 
 America, came to this country in 1635, settled in Boston, 
 and rendered valuable service to the Colony as commander 
 of the Massachusetts forces in King Philip's war. His son 
 inherited the martial instincts of the father, and was the 
 " noble, heroic youth " spoken of by the old chronicler of 
 that war, who, holding the rank of Ensign in Captain Mose- 
 ley's company, was twice wounded. These words might be 
 aptly quoted to describe James Savage, Jr. 
 
 Born in Boston, April 21, 1832, he inherited a sen 
 sitive, earnest, and joyous nature, united with a physical 
 constitution not equal to the enterprises which his adven 
 turous spirit craved. His love of outdoor play was inex 
 haustible ; and the city streets among which his childhood 
 was spent, while depriving him of the freedom of the coun 
 try, gave him equal opportunity for adventure in a different 
 way. A favorite enjoyment was to lead a band of play 
 mates to some distant part of the city, by cross-routes 
 known only to boys and cats, scaling sheds and walls, 
 climbing the leads of houses, and dropping from eaves, at 
 imminent risk of their necks. One of his comrades says : 
 " We knew no barrier too high nor place too difficult to 
 enter. We were not mischievous or ill-disposed. Neither 
 
James Savage. 329 
 
 man nor animal suffered from our games ; but the delight 
 of starting at Brattle Square and going to Boylston Street 
 ' across lots/ never entering a public street except to cross 
 it, can never be known to those who have not, as I have, 
 chased Jim Savage in coram and hie-spy. The boy who 
 took to the street for security or success lost caste at once." 
 The same companion says : " I have not seen Savage for 
 years, but I remember him as yesterday, full of fun and 
 courage, with his ' hockey ' in hand, ready to plunge into 
 any melee to get a blow at the ball. He was thin, and light 
 in weight, and in a severe hustle would get pushed to the 
 outside by mere want of weight, but he was sure to go in 
 again and again. His side at football would win if he 
 could make it, for in rush or race it took a good player to 
 compete with him ; and yet withal he was such a gentle 
 and noble fellow that everybody loved him, and felt that he 
 would never do a mean thing. He was one that never com 
 plained or made a fuss if the game was not arranged to suit 
 him ; all he wanted was fair play." 
 
 In those days, twenty years ago, Boston boys were often 
 called into sterner encounters ; there were frequently severe 
 battles between the sons of more wealthy parents and the 
 Irish boys. Beside these contests there were long-standing 
 feuds between Northenders and Southenders, between Bos 
 ton and Roxbury boys. Temple Place, James's home, was 
 nearly middle ground, and those who lived in that neigh 
 borhood were ever in danger of a blow. James Savage 
 never engaged in a quarrel if he could avoid it, but when 
 one was forced upon him he never thought of dodging. 
 If a friend was in trouble, or an insult offered to those who 
 could not defend themselves, James was ready to strike ; 
 and when he did strike, it was with all his might. Many 
 of his companions have said, in later days, that he was un 
 conquerable as long as his strength lasted. Careless of 
 pain, his only thought was to reduce his opponent to sub 
 mission. 
 
330 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 But the boy's life was not all play ; for, though not dis 
 tinguished as a scholar, he was exceedingly fond of reading, 
 particularly those books of history which treat of the wars 
 of Greece and Rome and the Middle Ages. He never wea 
 ried of the feats of knight-errantry, and read and re-read 
 Irving's Conquest of Granada until he had it by heart. 
 In the winter evenings, when a very little boy, he would sit 
 at the table and fight the battles of the Moors and Spaniards, 
 using spools to represent the contending knights and squad 
 rons. Of the early display of this martial spirit and other 
 manifestations of character a picture is given in the follow 
 ing letter from his teacher, Mr. George Fowle, whose kindly 
 sympathy James ever remembered with gratitude. 
 
 " You could not have made me a more pleasing gift than that of 
 
 the likeness of our loved and loving James He was always 
 
 prompt and ready for all our school doings, whether of frolic or la 
 bor, picnic or exhibition. He showed his military turn at an early 
 age. At one time when English history had warmed up the boys 
 into a military ardor, they divided themselves into Saxons and 
 Normans, and James was chosen commander of the latter. Our 
 old Scotch carpenter, whom you may remember, Mr. Troup, was 
 called upon to furnish us with wooden swords and shields, and I 
 was laboriously engaged in making devices and mottoes to be 
 placed upon the shields. I had the shield of James in my pos 
 session till I lost it on my removal to my present rooms. The de 
 vice was a bull in wild career and the motto, 
 
 ' When I wave my sword on high, 
 See the Saxon porkers fly/ 
 
 We had been reading ' Ivanhoe ' at the time, as illustrative of the 
 reign of Richard Coeur-de-Lion, and James hit upon Front-de- 
 Bosuf as his pattern." 
 
 His relish for the heroic made him delight in the poetry 
 which recounts the deeds of valor in stirring verse ; and he 
 seemed never weary, even when he became a man, of read 
 ing Macaulay's Lays, Aytoun's Border Minstrelsy, and 
 Scott's Poems. On the eve of actual battle, James was 
 
James Savage. 331 
 
 heard quoting from " Henry of Navarre." Being so full of 
 romantic feeling, it was to be expected that he would have 
 a vivid perception of beauty, and so, indeed, he did ; it was 
 to him the manifestation of God in the world. He had a 
 fine ear, and his musical taste was apparent when so small 
 that he had to climb upon the music-stool before the piano, 
 and twine his legs around its stem to keep from falling off. 
 Thus perched, he would study out simple tunes, and then 
 practise them until they were perfectly familiar. As he 
 grew older, his pleasure in this art increased, and led him 
 to an excellence rarely attained by amateurs, especially in 
 the delicacy of touch and feeling with which he played. 
 Possessed of a good voice and ear, he sang with ease ; and 
 when he had no instrument at hand, he found in song an 
 expression for his feelings, whether sad or joyous, often 
 helping others to beguile a weary hour in city and camp by 
 singing. 
 
 Added to his love of music was a love of nature, which 
 he seemed to have inherited from his mother, who, through 
 her life, was keenly alive to all that reminded her of the 
 fields and flowers, the forests and mountains, of her native 
 State. 
 
 We have seen in him the adventurous boy, the eager play 
 mate ; yet there was a side to his character in singular con 
 trast to this, and not less conspicuous to the ordinary ob 
 server. He was extremely shy and diffident, although free 
 from the false pride which, centring in self-esteem, renders 
 so many unable to do their best from dread of failure and 
 ridicule. At school he was a fair scholar, doing his duty 
 and getting his lessons without needing either bridle or 
 spur, and yet, when suddenly called upon to show what he 
 knew, he would hesitate and forget, and be often unable to 
 say a word. In after years this diffidence did not altogether 
 leave him, but was a cause of disappointment to him on 
 many occasions. 
 
 It would seem that this boy, living so much in the open 
 
332 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 air, would have been rugged and sturdy, with a constitu 
 tion capable of defying all ordinary ills. But the kindly 
 influences of air and exercise were not sufficient to secure 
 his perfect health, and in his thirteenth year he was sent to 
 school in Lunenburg, Worcester County, that he might 
 have the benefit of pure country air and simple food. In 
 spite of this, however, he ultimately became a sufferer from 
 dyspepsia, which not only prostrated his body, but reacted 
 on his mind, causing frequent despondency, and making it 
 more difficult to conquer the diffidence so natural to him. 
 
 In the summer of 1849 he entered Harvard University, 
 having finished his preparation at the Boston Latin School ; 
 but he did not enter without " conditions," obliging him to 
 make up during the first term for his seemingly defective 
 preparation in certain studies. When he came up to be 
 examined, his constitutional diffidence so possessed him that 
 he was unable to give proof of attainment commensurate 
 with his actual knowledge, or with the requirements of a 
 free admission, and thus he started on his college career 
 oppressed by the weight of these added tasks as well as 
 dispirited by ill health. In the midst of these difficulties, 
 he found his spirits cheered and his mind sustained by his 
 piano, which at the same time drew many friends around 
 him. The musically inclined in his Class soon found him 
 out, but until his Senior year he did not become truly known 
 to his classmates. Though much inclined to be alone at 
 times, few men were more dependent on the love of friends 
 and the pleasures of social intercourse. 
 
 During the three previous years he had lost his mother 
 and two lovely sisters, whose deaths followed each other at 
 short intervals, the passing bell of one prolonging its sad 
 tone into that of the next. Yearning for sympathy, the 
 quiet, unchanging love which his home afforded had sus 
 tained him ; and when these blows fell upon him, he was 
 bowed by a sadness which only such deep and tender na 
 tures feel. He loved his friends with great earnestness, 
 
James Savage. 333 
 
 and yet was so little demonstrative that some whom he 
 loved the best were often unaware of the depth of his affec 
 tion, until sorrow or danger threatened, when the warmth 
 of his attachment showed itself in untiring devotion. 
 
 Although not a disciple of any special religious creed, 
 he was in the truest sense a religious man, penetrated by 
 a clear faith and loving trust in God, whose presence he 
 seemed to feel ever around him. Long after, and almost 
 at the end of his earthly career, he expressed to a friend 
 his firm conviction that God was ever near to comfort and 
 sustain his trusting creatures ; adding, that he felt " as if 
 God's hand was always under him." The friend asked him 
 how he had attained this earnest faith ? He replied, "By 
 contemplation" 
 
 This religious consciousness showed itself in the atmos 
 phere of moral purity which all admitted to encircle him. 
 He was so pure-minded and fervent, that impurity shrank 
 from contact with him, and the conversation in which he 
 participated, however careless and free, had no tinge of 
 coarseness. For vulgar men and things he had an instinc 
 tive repugnance. A classmate says : " No man, however 
 coarse, indulged in vulgar or sensual talk before him ; some 
 how it did not seem to agree with the atmosphere in which 
 he lived." 
 
 It could not be expected that a young man of his tem 
 perament should attain to college honors. Though eager 
 in the acquisition of knowledge, he was by nature devoid 
 of the ambition of distinction which is an incentive to 
 study ; and even had this motive been added, it could not 
 have overcome the diffidence which also stood in the way 
 of his success. A classmate who sat next him for four 
 years says : " It was impossible for him to recite. He 
 would go into the class as well prepared as any one, and on 
 being called upon, stand up, and sometimes be unable to 
 say a word. A mist seemed to rise before him, and he 
 could not recall anything that he was expected to answer." 
 
334 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 But his college life was by no means unprofitable in book 
 learning. He studied botany and the natural sciences 
 with eagerness, and read all books within his reach which 
 treated of theoretical and practical agriculture and land 
 scape gardening. Long before graduating he had deter 
 mined to pursue agriculture in some form as a profession. 
 
 The pleasure of his last college days and anticipated 
 travels was clouded by the loss of another dearly loved 
 sister in the summer of 1854 ; but James's tone of mind 
 and body had become more elastic during the last few 
 months of a happier life, and though he suffered, he 
 yielded less to sorrow than before. In all his trials he 
 turned for solace to nature and music. Seldom giving ex 
 pression to his feelings, his silence showed that those suffer 
 most whose wounds bleed inwardly. The open manifestation 
 of sorrow, however real, is the healing process by which 
 nature throws off anguish and opens the mind to healthy 
 action. Yet it would be wrong to convey the impression 
 that James was generally despondent. His fervor and en 
 thusiasm never abandoned him; but he could not resist 
 occasional attacks of melancholy. 
 
 In the autumn of 1854 he sailed for Europe, accompanied 
 by two classmates and intimate friends, Horace Furness 
 and Atherton Blight. It was James's especial plan to study 
 agricultural chemistry as a preparation for his chosen pro 
 fession ; and with this view he attended the lectures of 
 Professor Liebig at Munich and Professor Rose at Berlin. 
 On his way to the former city, he stopped to examine the 
 famous agricultural school of Hohenheim ; and he after 
 wards spent a winter of study in Munich. His friend Hor 
 ace Furness wrote to James's sister, after his death : 
 
 " What was always so peculiarly charming to me in Jim's char 
 acter was, that with his great physical strength and love of outdoor 
 life and athletic exercises, wherein he always showed to such manly 
 advantage, he united the most refined tastes and an almost feminine 
 delicacy. I remember so vividly how once in Munich, on a very 
 
James Savage. 335 
 
 warm, enervating spring day, he walked between five and six miles 
 to gather a handful of little blue gentians, and when he brought 
 them home to our rooms, he hung over them with the keenest de 
 light. He used to drink in the beauty of a summer landscape with 
 more rapture than any man I ever met. I shall never forget the 
 almost crazy joy with which he greeted the first sight in our lives 
 of that exquisite little pink-fringed bellflower that grows almost in 
 the very ice of the glaciers, I think it is Soldanella glacialis ; and 
 how appreciative he was in poetry and music. Indeed, his was a 
 most rare combination of the manly and tender ; and I do not think 
 that there ever lived a more pure-minded young man. His char 
 acter was as stainless as a saint's." 
 
 In the spring and summer the friends made a tour em 
 bracing the Tyrol, of which the following letter gives some 
 glimpses. 
 
 " WEIMAR, June 3, 1855. 
 
 " MY DEAR SISTER L , I am writing to you from classic 
 
 "Weimar, which, you know, belongs to Goethe and Schiller, Her 
 der and Wieland. I saw in my walk this morning the Stadtkirche 
 where Herder lies buried, and his house opposite the church. In 
 the burial-ground of St. James's Church I saw the graves of Lucas 
 Cranach (it seems as if half the pictures I had seen lately at Nu 
 remberg and other places were by him and Musasus) ; in the new 
 churchyard, the tombs of Goethe and Schiller. 
 
 " And now, you see, I have at length torn myself away from Mu 
 nich. Have n't you sometimes had misgivings that I intended to cut 
 you all at home, and had married and settled down in Munich for 
 life ? No, I have left, and, what 's more, I have seen Nuremberg ! 
 I don't think I can make an attempt at description. It has given 
 me more pleasure than all that I had seen before. 
 
 " It is all old ; it is all rich ; it is all history ; it is all carving, 
 carving in brown stone of every pattern and figure. No fish, 
 flesh, or fowl that is not carved there. And then those old fel 
 lows, who, so to speak, left their lives everywhere about their dear 
 old city, Albert Diirer, Adam Kraft, Veit Stoss, and Peter Vischer 
 too. And yet the Bavarian court resides at Munich, a city on a 
 perfect flat, no beauty in the houses, and the worst climate in the 
 world." 
 
336 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 It had been his intention to spend another studious win 
 ter in Berlin ; but the damp and chilly climate proved so 
 unfavorable to his health, that he was compelled to retreat 
 to Italy, where he enjoyed himself to the utmost. " In no 
 city have I enjoyed so much as in Rome," he writes April 
 1, 1856, " and the parting will be a sad one." After a 
 short stay in France and England, he returned home that 
 summer. 
 
 He passed the remaining season of fine weather in vain 
 search for a farm where he might carry out his plans and 
 use the knowledge of agriculture he had long been acquir 
 ing. The decided wish of his father, however, induced him 
 to devote himself to the study of the law during the follow 
 ing winter, attending the lectures at Cambridge and reading 
 at home. But his constitution was wholly unfit for a seden 
 tary life ; and his taste leading him otherwise, it was with 
 out regret on his own account that he relinquished his 
 studies, though it pained him to disappoint his friends. In 
 the following letter, after speaking of the uncertainty from 
 which he had suffered before deciding, he says : 
 
 " I gave up the study of the law last week, and have returned 
 the ponderous volumes to the library at Cambridge, and have 
 settled with the steward. I have been studying hard at Kent 
 and Greenleaf ever since I left you, and making myself generally 
 miserable thereby. I have not the health for such study, if I had 
 the taste, which is also wanting. As you may guess, I have taken 
 to farming. The last two weeks have been spent in looking for a 
 farm near Boston. I have not yet fully decided on the spot ; and to 
 morrow I have a farm to visit in Weston and one in Concord, but 
 the situation I like best of those I have seen is one on the Blue 
 Hill." 
 
 The spot at length selected was in Ashland, Massachu 
 setts. In his eagerness to become a farmer he attached no 
 importance to the absence of congenial companions. Per 
 haps his thoughts turned to the solitude of nature with the 
 anticipation of freedom and relief from the painful pressure 
 
James Savage. 337 
 
 of social forms. He selected the place he thought best 
 adapted to farming, and began his new enterprise with 
 earnestness. He liked work, and took no exception to its 
 quality. He was ready for whatever was to be done, and 
 found a continual and varied pleasure in preparing and 
 planting his land and harvesting his crops. He engaged 
 a worthy man and his wife to work the farm with him and 
 to keep his house. The following letter gives a picture of 
 his farming life. 
 
 " ASHLAND, August 20. 
 
 " MY DEAR SISTER, What with starting a new yoke of oxen, 
 ' shee-a-haack ! ' and ditching my pasture-ground, I have had no 
 time to write before. The oxen are doing finely, and are uni 
 versally admired ; they work very steadily and are up to any 
 thing. I have sold five bushels of potatoes, many of which show 
 some signs of the rot which I prophesy will be very prevalent this 
 fall ; there never was, I suppose, such a wet summer since the 
 flood. We have had this week new potatoes for the table, corn 
 and beans, and a few tomatoes are ripening. My flowers are doing 
 finely ; my heliotrope is magnificent, and portulacas begin to make 
 a show. I have a gentleman from Cork now living under my roof, 
 who is engaged in draining the pasture ; and the monotony was 
 enlivened the other night by an Italian with images to sell, who 
 spent the night in my barn and refreshed the Ashland air with 
 the classic accents of Tuscany. His home was Florence. 
 
 " Ade, from your affectionate brother." 
 
 During the first years he did not suffer from the isola 
 tion of his life, but by degrees it preyed upon his spirits 
 and his health. In the long evenings his fireside was lonely. 
 Although his walls were hung with pictures and mementos 
 of home and travel, and his shelves filled with his favorite 
 authors, their silent voices failed to give him the compan 
 ionship he craved. If he had been married, the daily labors 
 of the farm would have been cheered by hopes that reached 
 beyond the harvest of the fields, and his loneliness relieved by 
 objects of deeper interest. He finally wrote to a friend : 
 
 VOL. i. 22 
 
338 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " Of all disappointments, I have learned that no young man who 
 has not firm health and a wife can go into our farming country and 
 give himself up to the pursuits of agriculture. My farm is for sale. 
 Of the requisites mentioned above, I have neither the first nor sec 
 ond. I have only failed because my health was not improved as I 
 expected, and because I was not made to live deprived of all society. 
 In our country life I find that, if one has not the last-mentioned 
 article (a wife) in his own home, he must be content to live pretty 
 much in solitude. Of love and enjoyment of the occupation and 
 the delightful freedom of country life, no one can have more than I." 
 
 The autumn of 1859 at length arrived. The country 
 was generally depressed. A gloomy uncertainty prevailed 
 at the North, and the progress of events was watched with 
 painful anxiety. In his early manhood James had given 
 little thought to the political strifes, or even to the general 
 movement of public affairs. But later he had become 
 aroused by the teachings of Theodore Parker, and his at 
 tention was strongly drawn to the condition of the Southern 
 States. When he saw plainly the outrages of the system of 
 slavery, he hesitated no longer, but from that moment gave 
 his earnest heart to the work, feeling that all he could give 
 and all he could do towards the freedom of the slave he 
 was bound by his duty to God and humanity to offer. 
 
 Clear and strong as were these convictions, and sympathiz 
 ing as he did with the high motives and heroism of Captain 
 John Brown (though not approving of his course of action), 
 he attended the meeting in commemoration of his death, 
 held in Boston, in 1860, where he remained through the 
 day, despite the insults of an excited mob, and showed then 
 and on subsequent like occasions his determination at all 
 personal risks to protect freedom of discussion, and, as he 
 said, to " give truth fair play." 
 
 In the ensuing winter he joined the Salignac Drill-Club 
 in Boston, where he soon became a sergeant. One of his 
 brother officers writes of this club as follows : 
 
 "I found a new class then forming. The first day we were 
 
James Savage. 339 
 
 drilled by a sergeant who did not seem to have a power of impart 
 ing instruction. The second day by another sergeant, whose name 
 I did not know, but with whom all things went smoothly. I was 
 very much impressed with his simple and earnest manner. He 
 was dressed in the blue uniform of the school, with its red binding, 
 and seemed very much interested in his work. For several days 
 he attended as instructor with others, and we all hailed his appear 
 ance with satisfaction. About a week after joining the class, I 
 mentioned to one of the old members whom I knew that I wanted 
 very much to take some part in organizing a negro force. He said 
 to me, ' Why don't you talk to Savage about it ; he is one of your 
 kind.' I asked him to point Savage out. He did so, and to my 
 delight he proved to be the favorite sergeant. He seemed much 
 interested, but said he had promised to take hold of Gordon's regi 
 ment, and proposed to me to go into it. I took his advice." 
 
 In the spring of 1861 it had become clear that war was 
 the only alternative. A friend, who gave a dinner to a 
 number of classmates at that time, says : 
 
 " Savage was one of the company. Of course we were all ex 
 cited, and all talked more or less about the state of the country and 
 the war ; and, although all but myself have since then served in 
 the army, Savage was the only one that day who had decided to go 
 into the service ; and it was singular to see how simple a matter it 
 seemed to him. There was no excitement or enthusiasm ; it was to 
 him an obvious duty, to be done as a matter of course." 
 
 A lady who was with him very often at a bowling club, 
 during the winter of 1859 - 60, describes James as 
 
 " One of the men whom women instinctively trust; there was such 
 a reserved force and gentleness pervading all his simplest actions, 
 that one could not doubt for a moment that he might be relied upon 
 in any emergency. On the afternoon when the news of the fall of 
 Fort Sumter came, the young men got to the club late, and all 
 were talking over the news very excitedly ; but Mr. Savage was 
 calm and quiet, and seemed the least affected of any, yet he was 
 the first to apply for a commission." 
 
 In conjunction with his friends, Wilder Dwight (who 
 
340 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 afterwards fell at the battle of Antietam) and Greeley S. 
 Curtis (eventually Colonel of the First Massachusetts Cav 
 alry), a plan was formed to organize a regiment of infantry 
 to be offered to the United States. It was anxiously dis 
 cussed at his home in Temple Place. In order to give it 
 a high military character, two graduates of West Point, 
 Messrs. Gordon and Andrews, who had formerly resigned 
 their commissions in the army, were induced to take the 
 highest appointments. Mr. Dwight undertook to get per 
 mission to raise the regiment as well as to secure funds for 
 arming and equipping the men ; while Curtis and Savage 
 were to carry forward the organization and recruiting. 
 Their efforts resulted in the formation of the Second Regi 
 ment of Massachusetts Volunteers, in which Dwight was 
 commissioned as Major, and Curtis and Savage were Cap 
 tains. It will be admitted by all that this regiment has 
 been unsurpassed for discipline, for efficiency, and probably 
 for its fearful losses of officers and men on the battle-field. 
 
 From the beginning of the enterprise James manifested 
 a new impulse of life. The romantic feelings of his child 
 hood had been absorbed by the military histories of former 
 times, and the interest that bound his thoughts with never- 
 wearied attention to the old battle-fields of England and 
 Spain was now gathered in living power to the real strife, 
 the actual war of his own people in a cause worthy of all 
 sacrifice. His health improved, and, however much he suf 
 fered from indigestion, his old enemy, dyspepsia, never 
 prostrated him. Camp life agreed with him, and he learned 
 to laugh over the impunity with which he dined on hard 
 bread and salt pork, a dinner which formerly would have 
 been to him impossible of digestion. From the day he re 
 ceived his appointment as Captain he worked diligently to 
 recruit and drill his men. His company was one of the 
 first to complete its number. He went, in company with 
 his Lieutenant, Henry Lee Higginson (afterwards Major, 
 First Massachusetts Cavalry), to the neighborhood of Fitch- 
 
James Savage. 341 
 
 burg, where he obtained recruits of the first quality. The 
 whole company felt James's personal influence, and, al 
 though not better drilled than some others, it was always 
 distinguished for good behavior. 
 
 More than two months were passed in drilling and prep 
 aration at Camp Andrew, formerly Brook Farm, ten miles 
 from Boston. On the 8th of July the regiment entered the 
 city to take its departure for the seat of war. During the 
 rest of that summer it remained at Harper's Ferry and 
 Maryland Heights. There was little to do besides guard 
 duty and drilling ; but James was never at a loss for occu 
 pation and amusement in the woods and fields, and his 
 tent was the frequent resort of those officers especially 
 whose tendencies of thought were progressive rather than 
 conservative, while one of those who disagreed with his 
 opinions wrote home at this time that he never left Sav 
 age's tent without wishing to be a better man. In the au 
 tumn the regiment moved from place to place along the 
 Potomac, as described in the following letter. 
 
 "ON PICKET ON THE POTOMAC, October 30, 1861. 
 
 "Mr DEAREST , Your eagerly expected letter of the 27th 
 
 has just been sent me from camp. I am away on two days' picket 
 duty with my company, about a mile and a half from our camp. 
 We are stationed along the canal and river-bank, guarding about two 
 miles of the shore, a company of the Massachusetts Twelfth being 
 on like duty above, and one of the New York Twenty -eighth below 
 us. My company during the daytime occupies six or seven stations 
 along the river-bank, a sergeant or corporal and eight or ten men 
 remaining at each. At night the company is drawn in from the 
 stations, and, divided into three reliefs, patrols the tow-path of the 
 canal for two miles, the sentries meeting each other on their beats 
 and being within hailing distance. By stations are meant promi 
 nent positions on the river, where is thrown up a brush hut, and a 
 screen is formed of bushes, to prevent our fires from being observed 
 from the other side of the river. 
 
 ". . . . At nine in the evening [October 21st] we started, and 
 walking all night reached Conrad's Ferry at half past six the next 
 
342 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 morning, in a heavy rain, the roads full of mud. We crossed the 
 canal at that point on a canal-boat, connected with the shore by a 
 single plank, over which the regiment had to pass, a man at a time. 
 
 " All that dismal day (the 22d) we stood ankle-deep in the mud, 
 supporting nature by a few cold, hard beans obtained from a hospi 
 tal tent. We managed to keep some fires agoing, thanks to dry 
 rail-fences, and the men cooked their rations and stood it splen 
 didly. 
 
 " We saw on the Virginia bank a dozen poor fellows, the rem 
 nant of the massacre [at Ball's Bluff], and with a little skiff, which 
 would carry but one besides the man with the paddle, they were 
 brought away safely after five or six hours' labor. 
 
 " I should have said that all the way through Poolesville and 
 along the road we heard rumors of the catastrophe from stragglers 
 of the Fifteenth, who had swum the river and told sad tales of the 
 regiments cut off. At Conrad's Ferry we learned further particu 
 lars, and in the only house there I saw several wounded men 
 brought in for shelter from the storm, one poor fellow who had 
 been struck in the left eye by a rifle-ball, and whose face was swol 
 len beyond recognition. The attendant told me the ball was still 
 in his cheek. This was my first experience of war. There were 
 others wounded, and one lieutenant of the California regiment 
 brought in dead out of the river. 
 
 " . . . . The next day we marched back, but found that the camp 
 had been moved in our absence two miles farther up ; and so we 
 ' toted ' on and got in before dark, and again got into dry shoes and 
 stockings (this time borrowed). We had been in not above an 
 hour when orders came for the regiment to march for Edward's 
 Ferry. Again started on a muddy, rutted road, and, struggling 
 on for four or five hours, reached the general's head-quarters. Up 
 to this point we had been kept up by the hope that we were to 
 cross the river and meet the enemy, but we found we were not ex 
 pected ; some order had miscarried, or had not been sent, and we 
 were ordered to countermarch and return to camp. The distance 
 was about eight miles ; but this was the third night that three of our 
 companies had been on their feet, to say nothing of the days. Our 
 Colonel told us not to compel our men to keep the ranks, and if it 
 had been ordered, obedience could not have been enforced. We 
 were footsore, wet, and discouraged. Some halted where they were. 
 
James Savage. 343 
 
 Most of the officers turned in to different camps as they came to 
 them on the road or bivouacked by the fences. Henry reached 
 camp with difficulty, and I came in with one man along side and two 
 just in front. Perhaps there might have been a dozen of my com 
 pany who slept in their tents that night." 
 
 The first time his company and himself were under fire 
 was when deployed as skirmishers in the advance of the 
 army under Banks up the Shenandoah Valley. After de 
 scribing the position of his men, he says : 
 
 " Then the shelling would be splendid for a minute or two, till 
 the enemy retired. It was the first experience of our men under 
 fire ; and a grand display it was, like a terrible thunder-storm, only 
 
 more exciting Yesterday I picked the first flower I have seen, 
 
 a hepatica. I passed it running, for I had my company deployed 
 as skirmishers, and was chasing away six or eight Rebel cavalry, 
 who had the impertinence to approach our camp and fire on a 
 squad going for water. It was getting dark ; but as I ran through 
 the wood, the flower attracted my attention, all alone as it stood up 
 above the dry oak leaves, and I made a dash at it and captured it, 
 though I believe the Rebels got off in safety, unless a bullet or two 
 went with them." 
 
 He had steadily declined proffered promotion, which 
 would remove him from his loved Second Regiment, saying 
 that he would never leave it save for a colored regiment. 
 But his ardent desire to aid the slave in securing his free 
 dom was stronger than even his affection for his regiment. 
 Major Copeland describes an interview with James when 
 the question of raising such a colored regiment was dis 
 cussed. The matter had been talked over between Major 
 Copeland and Lieutenant Shaw, before mentioning it to 
 James. He says : 
 
 " Savage came to my tent, back of head-quarters at Strasburg. 
 The tent was pitched on a delicious bit of greensward, a rare sight 
 in these days ; and for a few moments we lay on the grass, enjoying 
 the sky, the air, and the fragrance. Presently I began to describe 
 our plan for a colored regiment, and our belief that through it we 
 
344 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 could insert a wedge which would not only sever the connection 
 between master and slave, but which would aid the race in its own 
 regeneration. At length I said, ' Now, Jim, we want you to go 
 with us, will you ? ' Jim was lying down, resting on his elbow ; he 
 sprang up instantly, seized my hand, and, giving it a hearty shake, 
 said, ' Yes, I '11 go with you, if it is only as sergeant.' No one was 
 more disappointed at the failure of the plan, and no one would have 
 been more proud than he to have seen his dearly loved ' Bob ' lead 
 ing his determined and well-drilled command into the field of ac 
 tion." 
 
 The following letter merits insertion as indicating his 
 feeling on the same general subject. 
 
 "ABOUT FOUR MILES SOUTH OF STRASBURG, VIRGINIA, 
 Sunday, March 30, 1862. 
 
 "Mr DEAREST , The march was quiet and through 
 
 the most lovely country, approaching the Shenandoah range and 
 river. The next day, Sunday, we were to have gone as far as 
 Goose Creek, wherever that may be ; but the hastily constructed 
 bridge over the river broke down early in the day, and two mules 
 out of a mule team became fractious and were drowned, which 
 must have been a relief to them. So we waited all day for the 
 bridge to be mended, and were entertained by the contrabands from 
 the neighboring country, who flocked to see the i sogers,' and told 
 us strange stories that they had learned from their masters about 
 us Yankees. How that they said that if the d d Yankees got hold 
 of them, they would cut their right hands and feet off, so that they 
 could no longer be of service to their masters ; and they thought 
 that their masters had gained all the battles in the war, and had 
 whipped us terribly, and nothing was ever said to them of the 
 Union victories, and how sorry they were that we were not vic 
 torious at Bull Run. And then they told us of the effect that the 
 attack of ' old Mr. Brown,' as he is here called by the blacks, had 
 on them and their masters ; how they thought he must have had 
 some hundreds of men with him ; and how all the blacks about there 
 knew he was their friend and the terror of their white rulers. One 
 
 man (almost as white as I, quite as light as Captain R ), the 
 
 son of his master, and the father of nine children, two of whom he 
 had with him, interested me very much. His boys were very 
 
James Savage. 345 
 
 handsome little fellows, about eight and ten years, and looked like 
 Neapolitans, perhaps a little fairer. His gratitude to God, when he 
 told us how his wife and children had all been left to him, while 
 so many of his neighbors had lost theirs by having them sold, was 
 very touching. He did n't know how he could ever have borne it ; 
 they might as well, he said, have taken his heart right out of his 
 body at once and trampled on it, and with the words came the ex 
 pressive gesture. 
 
 " We talked with him and his dear little boys for near two hours, 
 and that was my Sunday's sermon. If you had been with me you 
 could have learned no better lesson." 
 
 One of his intimate companions said : 
 
 " No one ever saw James so earnest and noble as when he heard 
 the tale of suffering and outrage, and saw before him the way to 
 right the wrongs of the suffering race, if not by his personal arm, 
 at least by the grand sword-arm of his country." 
 
 He was promoted to be Major of the regiment on June 
 13, 1862 (Lieut.-Colonel, Sept. 17) ; and it is the testimony 
 of all that the period immediately after this was almost the 
 happiest of his life. His health was good, his gayety over 
 flowing, all diffidence and despondency disappeared, the 
 country in which they were encamped was beautiful, and 
 his daily rides, in the society of his favorite companions 
 (Shaw, Russell, Copeland, and Dr. Stone), were a con 
 stant delight. The latter writes : 
 
 " I think James was never more happy since the time he joined 
 the army than in the short time he acted as Major after receiving 
 his commission. The fatigue of marching was not to be compared 
 with what he had to bear while in the line. It was only his strong 
 determination to keep up and do his duty that prevented him many 
 times while in the line from going in an ambulance, as I often tried 
 to persuade him to do. At Little Washington he enjoyed himself 
 exceedingly. The country was wonderfully beautiful, and the 
 weather lovely ; and he rode a great deal, all about the roads along 
 the foot of the Blue Ridge, often early in the morning, coming back 
 
346 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 to breakfast all fresh and radiant, his only exclamation, ' Doctor, 
 I had such a ride ! ' " 
 
 We are now near the end of his career. For many years 
 his sky had been often overcast, but gleams of joyous sun 
 light had illuminated the clouds ; and as the sun rose higher, 
 its fervors dispelled the mists and shadows, revealing a 
 beautiful and noble landscape. At last the clouds were 
 almost gone, and men saw clearly that which they had 
 always believed was present, but hidden. But he had done 
 his work, and shown how an earnest and pure heart could 
 overcome both constitutional weakness and the disappoint 
 ments which come to all enthusiastic men ; and now he was 
 to meet in battle the end he had long looked forward to 
 with earnest readiness. 
 
 In the following letter from Lieutenant Miller, formerly 
 one of James's sergeants, we may read the story of his 
 wounds and capture. 
 
 "The 9th of August, 1862, was a very hot, sultry day. Our 
 brigade marched from Culpeper to within about one mile of Ce 
 dar Mountain, where we halted in a piece of woods. Our artillery 
 was already slightly engaged with the Rebels. At about five 
 o'clock, P. M., a brigade of our corps d'armee advanced and at 
 tacked the Rebels. They were soon repulsed, and our brigade was 
 ordered forward. We advanced through a piece of woods, my 
 company (A) being thrown forward as skirmishers. My company 
 advanced to within one hundred yards of the Rebels, and we main 
 tained our position while the regiment formed in line of battle in 
 our rear. 
 
 " My Captain (Abbott) had just given the order to fall back on 
 the regiment, when I was struck and fell insensible. When I re 
 covered my senses, I attempted to walk back to the regiment, but 
 was taken prisoner, and led about two miles to the rear of the 
 enemy's lines, where they laid me on the ground with about one 
 hundred and fifty more wounded. About midnight the surgeon 
 dressed my wound, and told me that Major Savage, of my regiment, 
 was also wounded and a prisoner. In the morning I got one of the 
 nurses to lead me to the Major, when I laid down beside him, and 
 
James Savage. 347 
 
 we talked and chatted together to pass the time during the day. 
 The Major was very cheerful, though in considerable pain. About 
 nine o'clock that night the Major was put in an ambulance and 
 
 taken away. The next morning I, too, was sent to the rear 
 
 Major Savage received three wounds. First, a bullet broke his 
 right arm near the shoulder, the ball lodging in the flesh; sec 
 ond, another ball broke his right leg just above the ankle ; while 
 he was falling he received a severe contusion on the left hip from a 
 spent ball. About a week after our capture, the surgeons decided 
 to remove the ball in his arm by cutting it out. They accordingly 
 gave him ether. Large quantities were administered without any 
 effect, when the Major sat up in bed, and in a few minutes the ball 
 was removed. Three weeks from the day of our capture, Professor 
 Davis and several other surgeons decided, in consultation, that the 
 Major's leg would never heal, and should be amputated. Upon the 
 Major being informed of the decision, he merely remarked, ' The 
 sooner the better.' The same afternoon he was taken out of the 
 
 ward to the tent where all amputations were performed In 
 
 about an hour and a half the Major was brought back. The leg 
 
 was taken off about six inches below the knee The next 
 
 day the stump began to bleed, and it was only by great skill and 
 promptitude that the surgeons saved him from bleeding to death. 
 This was the first time I had any serious doubts about his ultimate 
 recovery. But on the second day it bled again. The bleeding was 
 stopped by applying iodine. It bled a third time, when they were 
 obliged to open the flaps and re-tie the artery. The Major was now 
 so low that the surgeons decided he could not possibly survive 
 twelve hours. They gave him large quantities of brandy. Think 
 ing he would not live till morning, and as he seemed sensible of his 
 condition, I asked him if he would like to see and converse with a 
 chaplain, or if he had any message to send to any of his friends. 
 But to all these questions he answered, ' No.' His mind seemed to 
 be at peace." 
 
 The terrible news of Cedar Mountain battle, which was 
 to cast a gloom over many households, came almost too 
 fast to the anxious and waiting hearts. In all cases where 
 the enemy remain in possession of the battle-field there 
 must be uncertainty as to the fate of many of the miss- 
 
348 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ing. For some days there were very confused accounts 
 of James's fate, though the general opinion seemed to be 
 that he was severely though not fatally wounded. The 
 only comfort to be had was the assurance that his loved 
 Harry (Captain Kussell) had stayed by to cheer and aid 
 him, though he must in consequence become a prisoner. 
 Captain Shaw, then serving as Aid to General Gordon, 
 used every effort to learn his fate. He wrote thus to 
 James's father: 
 
 " NEAR CULPEPER COURT-HOUSE, August 12, 1862. 
 " DEAR SIR, Major Savage was wounded and taken prisoner 
 in the late engagement, as was telegraphed you. Since that mes 
 sage was sent we have learned that his wounds were not considered 
 serious, and that he is in a house within the enemy's lines. Lieu 
 tenant Abbott sent him twenty dollars by a Rebel officer, and I have 
 no doubt it will reach him safely. Captain Russell, who was taken 
 with him, stayed, I think, to take care of him. I feel the deep 
 est sympathy with you all, and the greatest anxiety to get near 
 Jim. 
 
 " In great haste, very respectfully yours, 
 
 "ROBERT G. SHAW." 
 
 Again on the following day he wrote, but without having 
 obtained further information. Uncertainty was at last re 
 moved by the receipt of a letter from the Surgeon dated 
 August 18th, giving an account of his case and its chances, 
 with a note also from Mr. I. J. Randolph to his friend Pro 
 fessor Rogers, the brother-in-law of Major Savage, saying 
 that he would endeavor to communicate once a week with 
 his friends of his condition. The last words written by 
 dear James came at the bottom of the Surgeon's letter, 
 feebly traced by his left hand, to his brother, Professor 
 Rogers. 
 
 " MY DEAREST WILLIAM, Your friends here leave nothing 
 to be desired. I am pretty much broken up, but am sure of the 
 best treatment. Best love to all. 
 
 " From your Major." 
 
James Savage. 349 
 
 Then there came a short message from his beloved friend, 
 Captain H. S. Russell, from the Libby Prison in Rich 
 mond : 
 
 " I was taken while tying a handkerchief round Jim Savage's 
 leg. Write to his father that he was wounded in the arm and leg, 
 and taken. I have not seen him since I left Culpeper, as he was 
 not well enough to march." 
 
 After some weeks, during which occasional letters were 
 received from the surgeon and other friends, giving rise to 
 alternate hopes and fears, a letter came, bearing on its en 
 velope the words, " Announcing the death of a prisoner of 
 war." It was from Dr. J. S. Davis, stating that James 
 had died of exhaustion, on the 22d of October, without 
 acute suffering. His mind had been perfectly clear till 
 within a few hours of death, after which " the circumstances 
 which surrounded him faded from his view, and he thought 
 himself at home." 
 
 So passed away the noble and earnest soldier, who had 
 been the truest and most unselfish of sons, brothers, and 
 friends, and whose sole question in the hour of doubt was, 
 " What is it right for me to do ? " When conscience an 
 swered, he hesitated not, but braced his soul to the work. 
 The sweet steadfastness and patience with which he bore his 
 sorrows endeared him to his enemies, and when overborne 
 by the agonies of the surgical operations, he strangled the 
 utterances of his pain. 
 
 This memoir has purposely omitted a reference to the 
 loving relations of home, which are so beautifully suggested 
 in the letters which have furnished much of this short 
 sketch. To those who knew him well, he was inexpressibly 
 dear, and we have seen how his comrades felt in his death 
 the loss not merely of a friend, but something of that holier 
 and more delicate affection which marks the love and friend 
 ship between man and woman. This extended to the men 
 under his command, as the following letter well illustrates. 
 It was written by one of his men while in hospital. 
 
350 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " CAPTAIN JAMES SAVAGE : 
 
 " DEAR AND HONORED SIR, Permit me, with the first return 
 ing of my strength, to pay my grateful acknowledgments to you, 
 my duly appreciated and always beloved Captain. I think you 
 yourself feel that none of your company, though all loving you so 
 fully, understood the reason for that love as myself. O, never-to- 
 be-forgotten days, when Captain Savage deigned a smile of appro 
 bation on the proud color-company drilling under his most gentle, 
 yet most complete, command. How many of your men have I 
 heard say, 'How sweet it were to die defending Captain Savage!'" 
 
 One of the agents of the Sanitary Commission, the Rev. 
 Francis Tiffany of Springfield, while pursuing his duties in 
 this connection, accidentally fell into conversation with a 
 soldier. " Well," said the man, " of all the officers ever I 
 saw, Major Savage was the noblest Christian gentleman." 
 
 A brother officer thus sums up his character : 
 
 "To an almost feminine gentleness, refinement, and amiability 
 he joined the indomitable pluck, energy, and resolution which be 
 come the man. When, before the regiment had yet been in action, 
 officers around their camp or picket fires at night would discuss its 
 possible behavior, there was one universal sentiment, namely, that 
 ' Jim Savage ' at least would fight, as it was once expressed, ' like 
 Mr. Valiant-for-Truth, until his sword clove to his hand.' And this 
 prediction he^ well fulfilled at Newtown, Winchester, and Cedar 
 Mountain." 
 
 Robert Shaw wrote, after the death of his friend : 
 
 " There is no life like the one we have been leading to show 
 what a man is really made of; and Jim's true purity, conscientious 
 ness, and manliness were well known to us all. The mere fact of 
 
 having him among us did us all much good Neither shall I 
 
 ever forget the three weeks I lived in the same room with him at 
 
 Frederick, when I learned how truly good a man can be Out 
 
 of his own family, there can be no more sincere mourning for his 
 loss than in this regiment ; and the best wish we can have for a 
 friend is, that he may resemble James Savage." 
 
G-eorge Foster Hodges. 351 
 
 1855. 
 GEORGE FOSTER HODGES. 
 
 Private 5th Mass. Yols. (Infantry), April 20, 1861 ; First Lieutenant, 
 May 8, 1861 ; First Lieutenant and Adjutant 18th Mass. Vols. (Infan 
 try), August 20, 1861 ; died at Hall's Hill, Va., January 31, 1862, of 
 disease contracted in the service. 
 
 GEORGE FOSTER HODGES was born in Providence, 
 Rhode Island, January 12, 1837. He was the son of 
 Almon D. Hodges, Esq., now of Boston, President of the 
 Washington Bank, and of Martha (Comstock) Hodges. 
 He entered Harvard College in 1852, when only fifteen, as 
 a member of the Sophomore Class, and graduated with 
 honor and the regard of his classmates in 1855. In Janu 
 ary, 1856, he became an assistant teacher in the school of 
 Mr. Stephen M. Weld of Jamaica Plain. This position he 
 held for a short time only, as he sailed for Cuba during the 
 next October. He stayed awhile at Havana, and then went 
 into the interior as tutor in a private family. In June, 
 1857, he returned home, not being pleased with Cuban 
 habits and customs. On September 14, 1857, he entered 
 the office of Hon. Peleg W. Chandler and George 0. Shat- 
 tuck, Esq., in Boston, where he remained until he went to 
 the Harvard Law School, where he joined the Middle Class 
 in the first term of 1858-59. He finished the course, and 
 received the degree of LL. B., and then for a while re 
 turned to Mr. Chandler's office. For the greater part of 
 the time until 1861 he resided in Cambridge, where he 
 was Librarian of the Law School, and worked on the law 
 books of Professor Parsons. He made the Index to Par- 
 sons's Maritime Law, and had a very important share in 
 preparing Parsons' s Notes and Bills, rendering valuable ser 
 vice in the composition of that work. He was exhaustive 
 in his research, and, perhaps, unsurpassed in the school for 
 
352 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 thorough work. On April 20, 1861, he enlisted as a private 
 in the Charlestown City Guards, Captain Boyd, Fifth Regi 
 ment Massachusetts Militia, commanded by Colonel Samuel 
 C. Lawrence, and the next morning left Boston for Wash 
 ington. On May 8th he was commissioned Regimental 
 Paymaster, with the rank of First Lieutenant, which office 
 was abolished in the service after the return of the three 
 months' men. He entered Alexandria, Virginia, with the 
 Fifth, at the time when Colonel Ellsworth was killed. After 
 the battle of Bull Run, he carried Colonel Lawrence, who 
 had been wounded, from the field to Centreville. On July 
 30, 1861, he returned to Boston with his regiment ; but, 
 being determined " to see the thing through," as he ex 
 pressed it, he obtained a commission on August 20, 1861, 
 as Adjutant of the Eighteenth Regiment Massachusetts Vol 
 unteers. 
 
 On January 31, 1862, at one o'clock in the morning, he 
 died, at Hall's Hill, near Alexandria, Virginia, of typhoid 
 fever, contracted in the discharge of his duty. He was re 
 covering from a first attack, when a relapse came on and 
 terminated fatally. Of him his brother writes : 
 
 " He was so loath to speak of what he himself did at the war, that 
 we of the family know but little of his deeds, and that little was 
 mostly learned from his comrades. By them he was always spoken 
 of with love and respect." 
 
 Hodges was very young in college, and those of his class 
 mates who were with him afterwards understood best his 
 promise and sterling worth. One of them writes in the 
 Secretary's Report of his Class for 1865 : 
 
 " I was, myself, much in company with Hodges during his resi 
 dence at the Law School, at the time while I was officially con 
 nected with the college. Our old acquaintance ripened into warm 
 friendship. His extreme youth, when we were all together, pre 
 vented his being then well known as the vigorous, noble-hearted 
 man he in reality was, both in body and mind. He would have 
 
G-eorge Foster Hodges. 353 
 
 risen to eminence in the law ; for his industry, patience, and clear 
 perception of logical relations I have seldom known equalled. His 
 death was to me a personal loss deeply felt. He was the more 
 valued and appreciated, on some accounts, perhaps, because in my 
 own profession ; but his personal qualities won very much upon 
 all who, in his maturity, had the opportunity of knowing him. To 
 them he was loyal to the last degree. If ever man was entitled to 
 be called a faithful friend, Hodges was that man." 
 
 All who knew him well say the same of him, and the 
 eminent lawyers with whom he studied bear testimony to 
 his peculiar excellence in his profession also. 
 
 " When I first heard of the death of your son," Mr. Chandler 
 wrote to Hodges's father, " I thought I would write you a note at 
 
 once It may be some consolation to you to know how much 
 
 your boy was loved and respected by others, and to feel that you 
 have the sympathy of all who knew him. Nor is there any reason 
 why I should not repeat, now and here, what I have often said of 
 him while alive, that I never knew his superior in many respects. 
 In point of ability he stood in the very first class. His great suc 
 cess as a lawyer appeared to be absolutely certain. More than 
 this, he was faithful, sincere, truthful, and simple-hearted. In sim 
 plicity, manliness, and other similar qualities, I never knew his su 
 perior. He was a universal favorite in my family, and I never 
 heard one of his college mates speak of him except in terms of 
 praise." 
 
 And Mr. Shattuck says of him : 
 
 " Hodges was a very diligent student, and by constant applica 
 tion for more than three years, had become a thorough master of the 
 principles of the common law. Every day's acquaintance brought 
 out more distinctly his high character and his remarkable moral 
 and intellectual strength. 
 
 " He carefully weighed all questions of duty which were pre 
 sented ; and when his convictions were once formed, nothing seemed 
 to deter him from acting in accordance with them. I well recol 
 lect the seriousness with which for several days he considered the 
 question of entering the army. He carefully considered his duty 
 to his family, his friends, and his country ; but when the question 
 
 VOL. i. 23 
 
354 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 was once decided, he seemed to have forgotten himself, and seized 
 the first opportunity to serve his country by enlisting as a private. 
 
 " Hodges was unobtrusive, but very active in benevolent labors. 
 While studying law, he regularly taught in the Evening School of 
 the Warren Street Chapel. When he tried his first case, and was 
 successful, he carried part of the fee he earned to its Treasurer, 
 saying to him, ' This is one half of my first fee. Take it, that it 
 may do good to others.' " 
 
 His death was too early in the war to afford opportunity 
 for brilliant military service ; but his immediate superiors, 
 Colonel Barnes and his classmate Major Joseph Hayes, both 
 afterwards general officers, bear testimony to his fidelity 
 and conscientious discharge of his duty. 
 
 When Rev. William S. Mackenzie, another classmate, 
 heard of Hodges's death, he wrote to Hodges' s father as 
 follows : 
 
 " My acquaintance with him commenced early in the college 
 course, and was very intimate all the way through. I never knew 
 him to be guilty of a piece of meanness. Indeed, he always seemed 
 to me to look on any such thing in another with surprise mingled 
 with sadness. When others would become indignant and utter 
 remonstrances in violent language, he was thoughtful, sad, and 
 silent. He appeared to be incapable of understanding how any 
 body could descend to say or do mean things, and such as imposed 
 on conscience. * Foster,' I used to say, ' you are an unsophis 
 ticated fellow.' But that word did not do him justice. It was 
 a pure noble-mindedness (is that the word ?) that made him so 
 promptly and keenly sensitive, and so averse to anything that out 
 raged manliness. 
 
 " He was singularly affectionate, kind, and compassionate. Those 
 qualities shone in his face, spoke in the tones of his voice, and, as I 
 can bear witness, in many unobtrusive but significant acts. There 
 was no selfishness apparent in anything he did or said. It did not 
 seem to occur to him when doing a favor, however costly, that he 
 was making any sacrifice. He loved to help any one ; it cost him 
 no effort, it was spontaneous and cheerful. There was a gush of 
 good-will in his face, and a naturally affectionate tone in his words. 
 
G-eorge Foster Hodges. 355 
 
 I was a poor boy, with very little to help me along in college. My 
 struggles with want were severe. Putting both hands on my 
 shoulders, and looking into my face, Foster would frequently say, 
 * Mac, how are you getting along ? ' If reluctant to disclose the 
 truth, in sympathetic tones of voice he would coax me to tell him. 
 If I consented, it was sure to fill his eyes with tears. He had a 
 tender heart ; tears came quickly and easily. With a voice made 
 husky by emotion he would often say, * Never mind, Mac, you will 
 get along, and come out right side up in the end.' Many a timely 
 favor came into my hands from some unknown source in the Class. 
 It was very evident to my mind that he was often very intimately 
 concerned in those favors." 
 
 Colonel Lawrence, of the Fifth Massachusetts Militia, was 
 also a classmate of Hodges, and gives the following account 
 of the way in which Hodges enlisted, and afterwards saved 
 his Colonel's life at the first battle of Bull Run : 
 
 " When my regiment was called out, and we were about to start 
 for Washington, I met Hodges on Court Street. Said he, * Colonel, 
 I want to go with you. Have you a place for one man more in 
 your regiment ? ' I replied, ' Hodges, are you willing to go as a 
 private ? ' * Yes,' said he, ' I mean to go any how, for I can't stay 
 at home in this war.' So we went down to Faneuil Hall, and I 
 put him into the Charlestown City Guards as a private, and so he 
 went to Washington. I there detailed him to write for me at 
 head-quarters, and procured his appointment as paymaster of the 
 regiment. While he served in the ranks, and afterwards, I never 
 knew a more energetic, active, attentive, devoted soldier. He always 
 went to drill, though his duty did not require it of him ; but he was 
 eager to learn, and became very thorough in his knowledge of tac 
 tics, through his desire to fit himself to become an Adjutant. He 
 often rode with me, and was very fearless. When we went on the 
 Bull Run campaign, my regiment, the Fifth Massachusetts Volunteer 
 Militia, had the advance of Heintzelman's column ; and, as I went 
 at the head of the regiment through the thick woods, often in ad 
 vance of the line of skirmishers, Hodges was always with me. 
 When we came under fire, Hodges was left with the wagons, where 
 it was proper for him to stay. But at a time when the fire was 
 
356 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 very heavy, whom should I see but Hodges, quietly walking up 
 through it all. * Hodges,' I exclaimed, ' are you here ? ' ' Yes,' he 
 replied very quietly, ' I thought I could be of some help to you.' 
 He then stayed with me, acting as Aid, to carry orders through the 
 regiment, as the noise made it impossible for my voice to be heard. 
 " Just at the close of the battle I was wounded, while near the 
 right of the regiment. Hodges came up and ordered the men to 
 carry me to the rear. He had me put into an ambulance, which is 
 the last thing I remember then, for I became insensible. Four or 
 five men, I believe, accompanied the ambulance a short distance. In 
 the confusion of the general retreat, the others, supposing me almost 
 dead, and that it was impossible for me to survive, all left me ; but 
 not so Hodges. He took me out of the ambulance, which the 
 driver had left, and, bearing me over a fence into a wood, supported 
 me against a tree. He told me that all had gone, and I should 
 probably be soon taken a prisoner, but that he would stay with me 
 and be taken too. I told him to go, as it was bad enough for one 
 to be taken prisoner. ' No,' said he, i I shall stay, for it is not right 
 to leave you, our Colonel, helpless here alone ; and besides, I want 
 you to understand I will not desert a classmate.' And so he stayed 
 until assistance came. By Hodges's means I escaped captivity at 
 that time, and probably death. He was a noble fellow, and none 
 could wish a better friend." 
 
 Hodges died too soon for the fame which follows suc 
 cess, whether in arms or a professional career. He was the 
 only member of the Class of 1855 who died in the war, a 
 fact rather singular, since twenty-five out of its eighty-three 
 members served in the army, among whom was Major-Gen- 
 eral Francis C. Barlow, the ranking officer of the College. 
 But if fidelity, in its broadest sense, fidelity to country, 
 friends, and duty, is the noblest element of manly char 
 acter, it can be truly said that no nobler man gave up life 
 in his country's service than Foster Hodges. 
 
Charles Brooks Brown. 357 
 
 1856. 
 CHARLES BROOKS BROWN. 
 
 Private 3d Mass. Vols. (Infantry), April 17 -July 22, 1861; Private 
 19th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), August 23, 1861; Sergeant; re-enlisted 
 December 20, 1863; died at Spotsylvania Court-House, Va., May 13, 
 1864, of a wound received in action May 12. 
 
 CHARLES BROOKS BROWN was son of Major Wal- 
 V_y lace and Mary (Brooks) Brown, and was born in Cam 
 bridge, Massachusetts, September 29, 1835. He was the 
 sixth in a family of eleven children. He received his early 
 education in the public schools of Cambridge, and at the 
 age of eleven years entered the High School. He was a 
 pupil of that school at the time when it was put under the 
 charge of Mr. Elbridge Smith, who infused new life into 
 the institution, and soon caused it to rank among the fore 
 most schools of the country. Brown, like many others, 
 caught a new spirit under the new administration. He had 
 always exhibited quickness of mind and eagerness to do as 
 well as others whatever interested him. But he had cher 
 ished no thought of ever receiving more than a common- 
 school education, and had expected erelong to engage in 
 the business of his father, that of soap-making. The 
 size of his family and the humbleness of his father's means 
 seemed to forbid his receiving further advantages. As he 
 himself once remarked, it had been one of his earliest pleas 
 ures as a boy to go to the College buildings on Commence 
 ment days and take a look at the mysterious alcoves of the 
 Library, and watch the College processions, without suspect 
 ing that he himself would ever become a participant in sim 
 ilar scenes. But while at the High School the desire to 
 go to college suddenly took possession of him. 
 
 Up to this time his tastes had led him to take more inter- 
 
358 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 est in the natural sciences and in mathematics than in the 
 classics, and he had many deficiencies in the latter to sup 
 ply, within a short time, in order to enter college with 
 those of his class in school who had that destination. He 
 had been particularly interested in chemistry, a knowledge 
 of which he thought would be useful to him in what was 
 to be his future pursuit. As he appeared to his school 
 mates at this time, his chief characteristics were such as 
 are generally expressed by the term "rough and ready." 
 He was a favorite of the boys at their games, being strong 
 of muscle and of an active temperament, and putting his 
 whole spirit into anything in which he participated. He 
 was below the average in stature, and for some time bore 
 among his schoolmates the nickname of " Stubby," which 
 was often changed to " Stuffy," to express his tenacity. In 
 general, he was at this time recognized by his schoolmates 
 as a boy of great pluck, quick mind, and good capacities, 
 but with a relish for outdoor sports, and for the every-day 
 activities of life, rather than for persevering study. 
 
 But upon making up his mind to gain a college educa 
 tion, he directed all his vigor and persistency to fitting him 
 self for admission, and with such success as to enter the 
 Freshman class at Harvard in the year 1852, after pass 
 ing a good examination in all studies except Ancient Geog 
 raphy. 
 
 During his college course he was very studious, and de 
 voted himself to his prescribed duties with great assiduity. 
 His tastes - at college, as at school, were for the natural 
 sciences and metaphysics, though he was not a poor scholar 
 in the classics. He received a " Detur," and had parts at 
 the Junior and Senior Exhibitions ; his part at the May 
 Exhibition of 1855 being in a Greek Dialogue. He grad 
 uated in the Class of 1856, with the rank of twentieth in 
 a class of ninety-two members. His Commencement part 
 was a Disquisition on " Sir William Hamilton." The 
 mingling in him of blunt and hardy qualities with the 
 
Charles Brooks Brown. 359 
 
 finer traits of character so impressed his classmates, that 
 the part given to him in the mock programme for the 
 Junior Exhibition of October 17, 1854, was, " A Miner alog- 
 ical Essay, ' Rough Diamonds,' by C. B. Brown." 
 
 He was obliged to depend chiefly upon himself for the 
 means with which to meet the college expenses, and he 
 pursued his studies and maintained his rank in the Class, 
 subject to the interruptions caused by pecuniary necessities. 
 He met his expenses by keeping school during the winter, 
 and with the aid furnished by the college monitorships, 
 and, moreover, by the use of his pen. He was quite averse 
 to having his friends know of his habit of relying on his 
 pen, and was himself inclined to forget, so far as he could, 
 his efforts in that respect. For his writings comprised a 
 strange variety of subjects. Sometimes he wrote a sermon 
 or a theological discussion for a religious newspaper, 
 for he had quite a taste for theological subjects, and had 
 a familiar knowledge of the Bible ; again, it would be a 
 novelette for a weekly paper ; and then, again, it might be 
 a conundrum sent in competition for some prize offered. 
 His surprise one day at receiving such a prize for a conun 
 drum which he had devised while going to recitation, and 
 which he had sent to a New York paper, and his joy at the 
 unexpected windfall, led to his informing one of his friends 
 of his habit of writing for the press, which he had before 
 kept a profound secret. 
 
 A leading quality in Brown's character as he appeared to 
 his college classmates was persistency. When he set him 
 self to a work, he clung to it with almost dogged obstinacy. 
 There was also in his nature, perhaps, a natural love of 
 contest. This showed itself in social converse in his readi 
 ness to take sides upon any subject in question, and in his 
 enjoyment of a vigorous defence of his opinions. He was 
 always quick and frank to announce his views, and earnest 
 in supporting them. In work or study, a spirit of compe 
 tition was easily awakened in him. In sports, too, he en- 
 
360 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 joyed the excitement of contest, and particularly enjoyed 
 outdoor exercises requiring muscular strength, because 
 of his sturdiness of body. He had also a great liking 
 for all games requiring thought and patience. In the 
 game of checkers, the homely associations of which were 
 to him pleasing, he particularly excelled ; and there were 
 few amusements he enjoyed more than coming in as a 
 stranger upon a party of proficient players of that game 
 at a country inn, or elsewhere, and putting to shame the 
 champion of the village. 
 
 After graduation he selected the profession of the law, 
 and in April, 1857, entered the law office of Messrs. Griffin 
 and Boardman in Charlestown, Massachusetts. He was ad 
 mitted to the Suffolk Bar in Boston, January 28, 1858, and 
 soon afterwards went to the West to practise his profession. 
 While looking for an opening, he visited Springfield, Illi 
 nois, where he made the acquaintance of Abraham Lin 
 coln, and of his law-partner, Mr. Herndon ; and after visits 
 to St. Louis and elsewhere, he, at their suggestion, returned 
 to Springfield and commenced practice in an office adjacent 
 to theirs. 
 
 He took part in the political contest of 1858 between 
 Lincoln and Douglas, making various public speeches 
 during the campaign on the side of the former, whom he 
 ardently admired. Upon his return to the East, he was 
 surprised to find how little Mr. Lincoln was known in 
 New England; and it was his delight to talk with every 
 one on this , theme. He brought home with him two good 
 photographs of Mr. Lincoln, one of which he kept in his 
 own room, and the other of which he hung up in the room 
 of a friend whom he frequently visited, and where he never 
 tired of discoursing about his hero. His enthusiasm for a 
 man who was then little known at the East led some of 
 his friends to smile at what they thought his extravagance 
 of earnestness. Subsequently, upon the nomination of Mr. 
 Lincoln for the Presidency, he felt proud to have the op- 
 
Charles Brooks Brown. 361 
 
 portunity of lending one of his much-derided likenesses to 
 be copied, and to see copies of it circulated in public among 
 the first pictures of Mr. Lincoln that were seen in New 
 England. 
 
 While he was in Springfield, Mr. Lincoln was about to 
 send his oldest son to some Eastern college. Brown, on 
 finding that Harvard was not regarded with so much 
 favor at the West as some other colleges, advocated in 
 frequent conversations with Mr. Lincoln, and with his 
 usual ardor, the merits and advantages of his own col 
 lege. He claimed that the very conservatism charged 
 upon Cambridge was salutary to a Western boy ; and 
 that the practical tendencies and vigor of Western life 
 would react favorably upon Cambridge. The result was, 
 that Mr. Lincoln decided in favor of Harvard for his 
 son. 
 
 Brown remained at the West about a year and a half, 
 when he returned to New England and opened an office in 
 Charlestown, Massachusetts, removing, however, afterwards 
 to Boston. On November 14, 1860, he delivered an Ora 
 tion in the City Hall, Cambridge, before the Cambridge 
 High School Association, having been appointed orator for 
 the occasion of its annual reunion. 
 
 He rejoiced in the election of Mr. Lincoln to the Presi 
 dency, and in the ascendency of the political principles rep 
 resented by him. Thus it happened that at the outbreak 
 of the Rebellion, in the following spring, not only was his 
 general love of country ardent, but his special opinions 
 and sympathies were such as to be easily touched by 
 events. The attack on Fort Sumter aroused his inmost 
 nature. 
 
 On the 17th of April, 1861, he left his home in Cam 
 bridge, in the morning, to go to his office in Boston, but 
 learning that a Cambridge company of volunteers, which 
 had been forming, was. to be equipped and to leave for the 
 seat of war immediately, he went and joined them, and that 
 
362 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 night was on board a steamer bound for Fortress Monroe, 
 as a private in Company C, Third Regiment Massachusetts 
 Volunteer Militia. He served with his company at Fortress 
 Monroe and vicinity during the three months' campaign, and 
 received his discharge July 22, 1861. 
 
 But on his return home, and after the news of the battle 
 of Bull Run, he could not keep quiet, and without waiting to 
 consider how he could with most ease and honor to himself 
 serve his country, he looked around to see what regiment 
 would be likely to leave soon for the field ; and on the 23d 
 of August, 1861, enlisted as a private in Company G, Nine 
 teenth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers ; and five days 
 afterwards was marching with his regiment, in which he 
 soon became a sergeant. They were ordered to the vicin 
 ity of Poolesville, Maryland, where his company, with others, 
 did duty in picketing the river. Passages like the follow 
 ing, from his letters at this time, show the interest he took 
 from the very first in the reputation which the sons of Har 
 vard should sustain in the war. 
 
 He writes October 10, 1861 : 
 
 "There is a slight prospect of our being ordered to Missouri 
 or Kentucky. I want to go anywhere, providing I can see active 
 service ; and if ever C. B. gets into a battle, rest assured that he 
 will never disgrace the Class of '56 or the old Cambridge High 
 School." 
 
 After the battle of Ball's Bluff, October 21, 1861, his 
 company was engaged all night in removing the wounded 
 from Harrison's Island. He writes : 
 
 " About four o'clock in the morning, Caspar Crowninshield, of 
 boat-club renown, turned up in shirt and drawers, with a blanket 
 over his shoulders, after a cold swim across the river. All unite 
 in praising his gallant conduct on the field of battle, and old Har 
 vard has good reason to be proud of the courage and ability 
 shown by her representatives." 
 
 Some of his vacations at school and college he had spent 
 
Charles Brooks Brown. 363 
 
 among the farmers of New Hampshire, where, with his 
 readiness to learn anything that was practical, he had be 
 come familiar with many of the duties of hard-working 
 men. The following extract shows how he could turn 
 this practical knowledge to account. He writes, Decem 
 ber 19, 1861 : 
 
 " Here I am, on the banks of the Potomac, still on picket 
 duty. I have constructed a log-house, twelve feet by ten, with 
 ridge-pole, &c., and it is large enough for my guard and myself. 
 I have the best house on the tow-path of the canal. My prac 
 tice in New Hampshire comes in play, for I always do my share. 
 My house is bullet-proof, or very nearly so, with loopholes on 
 three sides, and stands in a good position as regards the river ; so 
 if the Rebels should attempt to cross, even with my small force 
 of four men I could give them a warm reception." 
 
 In March, 1862, the regiment was transferred to the 
 Peninsula, to participate in the campaign against Rich 
 mond. He shared in the labors before Yorktown and in 
 the seven days' fighting before Richmond ; and through 
 out the whole campaign his letters show, in the gloomiest 
 periods, no signs of despondency on his part. He writes, 
 June 6, 1862, from camp at Fair Oaks Station : 
 
 " I have not seen my knapsack since a week ago yesterday. 
 Since then we have been constantly on duty, and I have not had 
 my cartridge-box or roundabout off for eight days, except for a 
 
 few moments I enjoy first-rate health, notwithstanding the 
 
 hardships of the campaign, and cannot give up my belief in the 
 final capture of Richmond." 
 
 He writes, June 12th, of his experience in advancing 
 pickets ; and, in speaking of an order given him to send a 
 man forward and then have the rest follow, says : 
 
 " It looked dubious, but as I never would send a man in where 
 I was unwilling to go myself, when the order came, on I went 
 myself." 
 
364 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 At the battle of Fair Oaks in June, 1862, he was wound 
 ed by a minid-ball passing through the left leg a little 
 above the ankle. He persisted in firing his gun several 
 times after he was wounded, and then with its aid as a 
 crutch hobbled off the field. He was sent to the United 
 States General Hospital at David's Island, New York. 
 
 While in the hospital he had the opportunity of receiving 
 his discharge from the service, and some of his friends 
 urged his procuring it. His wound seemed to him to be 
 healing too slowly, and for a few days he was despondent, 
 and wrote : 
 
 " I am in doubt whether to take my discharge or not. Should I 
 tell the doctor how I am, the discharge would be given without a 
 shadow of doubt ; but again it would look like backing out, that 
 I don't like." 
 
 He resolved to remain in the service, and soon had the 
 satisfaction of finding his wound improving, so that by Oc 
 tober 15th he left the hospital, and in November, 1862, re 
 joined his regiment near Warrenton, Virginia. About a 
 month after his return the battle of Fredericksburg took 
 place. 
 
 The following extract from the correspondence of the 
 Boston Journal describes his conduct at the battle of 
 Fredericksburg, December 13, 1862 : 
 
 " This regiment (Nineteenth Massachusetts) was presented with a 
 new stand of colors, to replace those sent home stripped and torn by 
 Rebel bullets. In the action of the 13th, the new colors had four 
 teen holes in them ; and we are informed that they were carried 
 by eleven different men, nine of whom were killed or wounded 
 within one hour. Sergeant Charles Brown was the seventh man. 
 He received a wound in the head, which stunned and for a time 
 confused him. Lieutenant Hume, thinking his wound mortal, told 
 him to give up the colors ; but he refused, saying, ' I will not give 
 them to any man.' Finding he was fast becoming weak, he rushed 
 out in advance of the line, staggered and fell, driving the color- 
 lance into the earth; and there he lay, dizzy and bleeding, still 
 
Charles Brooks Brown. 365 
 
 grasping the lance with both hands, until Lieutenant Hume caught 
 them up." 
 
 Referring in his letters to the scenes of that day, he 
 writes : 
 
 " The color-sergeants had been shot, and no one seemed willing 
 to take the colors, when I made the offer, and to the front I went. 
 When I took the colors I bade farewell to life ; but God saved me. 
 .... The Boston Journal gave your humble servant a good 
 * puff'/ in consequence, as I suppose, of a nearly accurate account of 
 the affair as related by Lieutenant Hume to some correspondent of 
 that paper. Give yourself no uneasiness, however, in regard to 
 the wound I received. It would have felled a bullock ; but the ef 
 fect was temporary. I stayed with the regiment all the time, and 
 the next day was all right, though my head was a little sore. As 
 regards the remark of the correspondent, that ' such sergeants 
 should be commissioned,' that will come right, if I live, unless 
 something happens not now thought of." 
 
 After the battle of Fredericksburg followed the winter- 
 quarters at Falmouth. The following illustrates his esprit 
 de corps. Writing January 13, 1863, he says : 
 
 " I am looking forward with somewhat gloomy anticipations to 
 another battle. I do not fear it. Anybody who was ever with me 
 in battle knows that I am not a man to run ; but what I fear is this : 
 the three regiments of our brigade, who always do about all the 
 fighting of the brigade, are almost dismayed. We have six regi 
 ments, yet the Twentieth Massachusetts, the Seventh Michigan, 
 and our regiment know as well beforehand as afterwards, that if 
 there is any risky job to do, we shall have to do it ; and it makes 
 the boys a little down-hearted. I have command of my company 
 about half of the time ; the Lieutenant being sick. In my company 
 I have but twelve privates on duty ; so that the boys feel, in a fight, 
 as if their time had come. All I feel afraid of is, that the regiment 
 may some time get into a fight, and not behave well, and lose some 
 of their reputation. I would rather be shot half a dozen times than 
 see the old Nineteenth run." 
 
 In spite of his hardy constitution, and although he had a 
 
366 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 year before written that he was " as tough as a knot, and 
 could stand being wet all day, lie down in wet blankets, and 
 wake up in the morning and not feel the effects of it," the 
 exposures of the service began now to tell upon him ; and 
 April 24, 1868, he writes that he is " in full enjoyment of 
 the blessings of fever and ague, and rheumatism." 
 
 While he was suffering with these sicknesses the second 
 battle of Fredericksburg (Chancellorsville) took place. 
 When at midnight of May 2, 1863, his regiment was 
 marched to the river-bank preparatory to crossing, the 
 Surgeon of the regiment advised him to remain behind on 
 account of his sickness. But as he afterwards wrote, " Not 
 withstanding any unfavorable effect it might have upon me, 
 it was my duty to try and go." The enemy prevented the 
 laying of the pontoon bridges, and twenty-five volunteers 
 from each regiment were called for to cross in boats. Ser 
 geant Brown volunteered to go, but was not allowed to go 
 on account of being needed in his position of Acting First 
 Sergeant. After a crossing was effected, he participated 
 with his regiment in the fighting and labors of the 3d and 
 4th of May, and on the 5th recrossed. 
 
 " On reaching this side," he writes, " the excitement and nerve 
 that had sustained me through the entire affair left me, and I was 
 entirely exhausted, and was ordered to fall out and have my things 
 carried, and told to take my own time to reach the camp. I have 
 been unable to do anything since I returned." 
 
 When in June, 1863, the army moved, under Hooker, 
 towards Maryland, he was sent, against his own will and 
 protestations, to the hospital at Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia, 
 being almost entirely disabled with fever and ague, and 
 rheumatism. From here he writes : 
 
 " Sometimes I feel very hopeful, and feel that the time will be 
 short before I return once more to active service ; then perhaps 
 the very next day I feel discouraged, and fear that I shall never 
 again face the foe It is the first time I have been sick to 
 
Charles Brooks Brown. 367 
 
 amount to anything since I was in the army ; but now the old 
 wound in my leg bothers me considerably (the one I had in the head 
 never gave me any trouble), but I do not expect it will be long be 
 fore I have a chance to get back to the front again. I hate to be 
 away from the regiment." 
 
 He writes again, congratulating a brother upon not being 
 drafted, since he thought their family in sending three sons 
 to the war was doing its share, and says : 
 
 " Don't think I am tired of the war or a disbeliever in maintain 
 ing it. I am in for carrying it on until the South will get so badly 
 whipped that they will not dream of rebellion again for a century. 
 But one family should not be called upon to make all the sacrifices ; 
 and this is why I would not have you go." 
 
 He writes from hospital at Chestnut Hill, Philadel 
 phia : 
 
 " I am sorry you think I have done my share in putting down 
 the Rebellion. I do not. My experience up to this time has only 
 served to make me anxious to conclude the war and to be in at the 
 death. Do not imagine that I admire military service, or am at all 
 fond of martial pomp. Far from it. But my entire sympathies 
 are enlisted in putting down this Rebellion. It is the old conflict, 
 the Roundheads and the Cavaliers ; and one or the other must 
 succumb." 
 
 At length, much to his joy, he was able to leave hos 
 pital, and November 23, 1863, he rejoined his regiment. 
 On account of the absence of the commissioned officers from 
 sickness, or duty elsewhere, he took command of the com 
 pany upon his return, and three days afterwards was shar 
 ing in the fatigues and perils of the reconnoissance across 
 the Rapidan. 
 
 For the first two weeks of December, 1863, he had a very 
 serious question to reflect upon and decide, that of re-en 
 listing. With the exception of a month's interval between 
 his return from the three months* campaign and his second 
 enlistment, he had now been in constant service since the 
 
368 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 very opening of the war, had been twice wounded, had re 
 ceived a severe shock to his rugged constitution from the 
 exposures of the service, and was a soldier in a regiment 
 which was so reliable, and had done such gallant service, 
 that it was sure to find its place in the thickest of the fight 
 in any future campaign. All this he had done and en 
 dured with no higher rank than that of Sergeant, while of a 
 nature more than ordinarily ambitious, and while feeling as 
 deeply as any one could that his abilities and education en 
 titled him to be a commissioned officer. Ways were opened 
 to him of procuring an officer's position elsewhere ; friends 
 were suggesting to him that he had done his share of the 
 hard work of the war. But to his own mind there seemed 
 but one line of conduct for him to follow. He must at all 
 events continue in the war until the Rebellion was crushed ; 
 and remaining in the service, he must abide with his old 
 regiment, and receive his promotion there, or not at all. 
 So he writes to his parents entreating them to be contented 
 and to overcome their natural disappointment until his fur 
 lough, at least ; and on December 20, 1863, he deliberately 
 re-enlisted in the ranks. 
 
 To those who knew his peculiar temperament, there was 
 something more in this action than either patriotism on 
 the one side or personal indifference on the other. For 
 this resolute, hardy, self-trained young man there was a 
 kind of pride in the very humbleness of his station, and in 
 the thought that the rank which others sought through 
 private favor or influence would come to him through his 
 deserts, or not at all. Some personal opposition or dis 
 couragement which he encountered within his own regi 
 ment perhaps increased his unwillingness to leave it. He 
 had spent most of his life in conquering obstacles, and 
 could patiently bide his time while conquering a few more. 
 He was far from being an unambitious man ; but his was 
 a kind of ambition which enjoyed the thought of suddenly 
 emerging from obscurity and ascending several steps at 
 
Charles Brooks Brown. 369 
 
 once, or, should this fail, of going down to posterity as sim 
 ple Sergeant Brown. This last is the alternative which fate 
 chose for him, and this the laurel which after all suits his 
 strong nature best. 
 
 After the usual month's furlough allowed on re-enlist 
 ment, he returned with his regiment to the Army of the 
 Potomac in March, 1864 ; and May 3, 1864, entered upon 
 the campaign in the Wilderness, having charge of his com 
 pany. Just as the campaign commenced, he received from 
 Major-General Butler an appointment, which friends had 
 procured for him, as First Lieutenant in that general's 
 department, dated April 26, 1864. But without seeking 
 for leave or orders to report under that appointment, he 
 put the document in his pocket, and passed safely through 
 the hard fighting of the first few days, until the morning 
 of May 12, 1864, when, in command of his company, he 
 shared in the glories of the charge of Hancock's corps at 
 Spottsylvania Court-House. 
 
 The line of works had been carried, cannon and prison 
 ers captured, and half of the regiment killed or wounded, 
 when another advance was made. During this advance, 
 while leading on his company, Sergeant Brown was struck 
 by the fragments of a shell which burst close beside him. 
 His right leg was taken almost off by the explosion, and his 
 left leg was badly mangled. 
 
 Immediately after being wounded, he drew from his 
 pocket his unused commission as Lieutenant, now stained 
 with his blood, and a likeness of his betrothed, and told 
 the comrades who came to wait upon him to send those 
 home with the news of his death. He was obliged to lie 
 on the battle-field an hour before he could be conveyed 
 to an ambulance, was then carried three miles for that 
 purpose, and then driven to the field hospital of the 
 Second Corps. He was received into the hospital tent 
 about ten o'clock in the morning, and so great was the vi- 
 
 VOL. I. 24 
 
370 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 tality of his system, that he lived until half past six o'clock 
 of the following morning. 
 
 After he was taken into the tent, he told an attendant 
 that his fighting days were over, and he wished him not to 
 leave him until he died, and to inform his parents that he 
 died doing his duty. His mind would often wander, and 
 at times he spoke as if to his mather, and at other times 
 as if to his company on the field. 
 
 Two of his brothers, James and Henry, belonged to the 
 same corps. James was wounded in the same battle, and 
 died the same day with Charles ; and after the battle had 
 ended, Henry visited his wounded brothers. When he 
 came to the hospital where Charles was lying, and had been 
 recognized by him, Charles seemed anxious to know how 
 the battle was going ; and among his first questions he 
 asked, " Shall we win the day ? " Henry told him his 
 brother James was mortally wounded. u It will be hard," 
 replied Charles, " for mother to lose both of us " ; and the 
 news of his brother's condition, more than his own ap 
 proaching death, seemed to unnerve and prostrate him. 
 From that moment he sank rapidly until the morning of 
 the following day, when he died. 
 
 His betrothed, whom he had first known through a letter 
 of religious counsel which she had written to him as a sol 
 dier, and to whom he had become engaged during his last 
 furlough, was taken ill of rapid consumption upon receiv 
 ing the news of his death, and died six months later, with 
 his name .upon her lips. 
 
Daniel Hack. 371 
 
 DANIEL HACK. 
 
 Private 14th Mass. Battery, January 24, 1864 ; discharged for disabil 
 ity, March, 1864 ; enlisted as private in Connecticut (but unassigned), 
 March, 1864; died of disease at Hartford, Conn., April 17, 1864. 
 
 DANIEL HACK was the son of Christopher Amory and 
 Sarah (Sever) Hack, and was born in Taunton, Mas 
 sachusetts, December 31, 1834. He was the oldest of three 
 children. His early instructors were Samuel Kipley Town- 
 send and Henry B. Wheelwright. 
 
 He entered college with his class in 1852, taught school 
 in Taunton during the winter of his Junior year, and was 
 also absent from Cambridge during the greater part of the 
 second Junior term and first Senior term. He graduated 
 in 1856, having at the time the intention of studying law. 
 
 He did not, however, carry out this intention, but con 
 nected himself with the printing business of his father in 
 Taunton, and there remained till January 24, 1864, when 
 he enlisted in the Fourteenth Massachusetts Battery (Cap 
 tain Wright). He remained in camp at Readville about 
 four weeks, and was detailed as clerk at post head-quarters. 
 At a review of troops by Major-General Burnside, he stood 
 for several hours with wet feet, and, being physically deli 
 cate, contracted a severe cold, which brought on conges 
 tion of the lungs. He went home on a furlough of three 
 days, which was afterwards, on his continued illness, ex 
 tended to three weeks. At the end of that time (March 
 14th), he returned to camp, but was dropped during that 
 month for physical disability, without having been mustered 
 into the service. 
 
 Persevering in his efforts to join the army, he went to 
 Hartford, Connecticut, and enlisted as a private during the 
 same month ; but was again taken ill before being assigned 
 to any regiment, and died at Hartford, April IT, 1864, aged 
 
372 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 twenty-nine years. His friends were with him in his last 
 illness and bore his body home for burial. The funeral 
 services took place at his father's house in Taunton four 
 days later. 
 
 Thus died, after two enlistments within two months, both 
 times as a private soldier, and the second time with the 
 hand of death almost visibly upon him, a young man who 
 was scarcely known even to his classmates, and who was 
 yet endeared to those who knew him by many amiable 
 qualities. He died without seeing a battle-field. His name 
 hardly appears upon the military records of his country ; but 
 he gave her all he had to give, even his life. 
 
Stephen Qeorge Perkins. 373 
 
 STEPHEN GEORGE PERKINS. 
 
 Second Lieutenant 2d Mass. Vols. (Infantry), July 8, 1861 ; First 
 Lieutenant, July 11, 1862; killed at Cedar Mountain, Va., August 9, 
 1862. 
 
 I APPROACH with infinite reluctance one of the most 
 difficult themes for biography to be embraced in these 
 volumes. There hung around Stephen Perkins a peculiar 
 atmosphere, not merely suggestive of admiration, not merely 
 of affection, but of some indescribable commingling of the 
 two, more subtile than either, which renders his most intimate 
 friends unwilling to attempt his portraiture, and thus leaves 
 the task for me. And I, his cousin and his teacher, can hardly 
 overcome this same shrinking, or force myself to break that 
 silence which his proud and fastidious nature would doubt 
 less have preferred. For he made no claims, ran no race, 
 won no prize, achieved no eminence but in dying ; and per 
 haps, from peculiarity of temperament, would have achieved 
 none had he lived. Yet his friends were all among the most 
 gifted young men of his day, and it is now observable that 
 not one of these companions seems able to talk of him with 
 out a tinge of romance. So peculiar and subtile the impres 
 sion of superiority which he made, I observe that it can be 
 better measured by a certain lowering and trembling of the 
 voice in those who attempt to describe him, than by any 
 account they can give. One of them said, the other day : 
 " I could write nothing about Stephen Perkins, because the 
 simplest things I could say of him would seem like such 
 absurd exaggeration. Suppose I should say that my few 
 years' intercourse with him had done more for me than any 
 other influence of my life, who would believe it ? Yet it 
 would be the most commonplace truth." 
 
 He was born in Boston, Massachusetts, September 18, 
 1835. His father was Stephen Higginson Perkins, a well- 
 
374 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 known Boston merchant, and a man of varied culture, 
 whose life has been devoted in great measure to the study, 
 and latterly to the practice, of art. Stephen's mother was 
 Sarah (Sullivan) Perkins, daughter of the Hon. Richard 
 Sullivan of Boston, and one of a family of sisters well re 
 membered in that city for their charms of person and of 
 mind. When Stephen was seven years old, I took charge 
 of him and his two brothers, as their private tutor, residing 
 in the family in Brookline for nearly two years. He was 
 then a sweet, modest, lovable boy, with a healthy and ac 
 tive mind, but without indications of the philosophic, intro 
 spective mood which he afterwards developed. And though 
 his physical activity was great and constant, he was then 
 short of stature, and only his large bones and very powerful 
 muscles gave promise of that superb physique which he 
 finally attained. Beloved as he was by all who came in 
 contact with him, and becoming constantly a finer and finer 
 type of noble and intelligent boyhood, yet I do not think 
 that any one ever predicted of him the precise combination 
 of traits and tendencies which his manhood showed. 
 
 He passed from my instruction to that of Dr. Charles 
 Kraitsir, a learned Hungarian, whose theories of language 
 were then attracting some attention ; and he was afterwards 
 successively the pupil of Messrs. T. G. Bradford and Wil 
 liam P. Atkinson. He entered college with the Class of 
 1855, but was compelled to leave it by a weakness of the 
 eyes, and afterwards joined the Class of 1856. During most 
 of his college career he was obliged by the same infirmity 
 to study with the aid of a reader, his chief dependence in 
 this way being Francis Channing Barlow, since Major-Gen 
 eral of Volunteers. This drawback made the attainment 
 of college rank impossible, but his remarkable abilities were 
 fully recognized by his classmates and teachers. In his so 
 cial relations, however, he had developed that peculiar re 
 serve and imperturbability of manner which were his later 
 characteristics ; and everybody admitted it to be a good hit, 
 
Stephen Creorge Perkins. 375 
 
 when, in the distribution of mock parts for an imaginary 
 exhibition, that assigned to Perkins was " a Dissertation on 
 Icebergs." 
 
 After his graduation he travelled in Europe, returning 
 in 1857 ; spent a year in the Law School at Cambridge ; but 
 afterwards left that department of the University for the 
 Scientific School, where he obtained a degree in mathemat 
 ics in 1861. 
 
 At this period the first trait which impressed a stranger 
 on meeting him was his distinguished physical aspect. 
 Those present at the College Regatta at Springfield, in 1855, 
 will remember the admiration excited by the picked crew 
 of the Harvard four-oar, the " Y. Y.," composed of John 
 and Langdon Erving, Alexander Agassiz, and Stephen 
 Perkins. Three of these young men, including Stephen, 
 were over six feet in height, and all were in the finest con 
 dition, according to the standard of training in those early 
 days. Discouraged at the very first stroke pulled, by the 
 breaking of the " stretcher " of the stroke-oar, they yet 
 rowed a stern-race with perseverance so admirable, that 
 they lacked but three or four seconds of victory, being then 
 beaten only by the six-oar of their own University. To 
 this result, as I am since told by one of the crew, the pecu 
 liar imperturbability of Perkins's temperament greatly con 
 tributed. He had an aversion to " spurts," and believed 
 in a certain total of effort, to which it made no sort of dif 
 ference whether his opponents were in sight or out of sight. 
 This coolness of habit characterized his whole physical na 
 ture. He was not light, agile, or adroit ; but to whatever 
 undertaking he addressed his rather indolent strength, that 
 work was done. 
 
 And his beauty of face was as characteristic as that of his 
 figure. The highest point attained, twenty years since, by 
 American miniature-painting, in the judgment of many 
 connoisseurs both in this country and in Europe, was a 
 likeness of Stephen Perkins taken by Staigg about 1843. 
 
376 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 None who have ever seen it can forget the charm of those 
 dark-blue eyes, that fresh complexion, and that open smile, 
 
 traits of boyish beauty which he always retained. 
 
 But the peculiar charm of this stately mien lay, after all, 
 in something un definable, a certain type of temperament, a 
 sensation of tranquil strength, of indefinite resources, of 
 reserved power. What he accomplished seemed far less 
 than the victories he seemed to waive and scorn. There 
 seemed a sort of Greek languor about him ; not the best 
 temperament for usefulness perhaps, nor even for happiness, 
 but undoubtedly the most potent for personal fascination, 
 though he would not have deigned to use it consciously 
 for any such end. He seemed to attempt nothing ; in fact 
 it was the drawback in his life that he did not greatly care 
 to attempt anything ; and yet his mere preferences seemed 
 to carry more weight than the vigorous efforts of other 
 men. Each of his associates had some anecdote to tell, 
 showing how Stephen had at some time "'conquered with 
 out the crossing of bayonets," effecting by a single quiet 
 word or look what others had toiled and stormed in vain to 
 accomplish. Quite democratic in his theories and sympa 
 thies, though he never got credit for this with strangers, 
 
 and utterly despising every affectation of personal or 
 social advantage, yet he had at his command all the haugh 
 tiness of a Venetian nobleman, and could at a moment's 
 notice put barriers insurmountable and immeasurable be 
 tween himself and any offender. 
 
 The sort of temperament which Charles Reade endeavors 
 to describe in his Lord Ipsden in " Christie Johnstone " 
 but without freeing it from a certain air of affectation 
 was natural and almost controlling in Stephen Perkins. 
 Holding in his hands youth, beauty, culture, social advan 
 tages, he seemed yet to grasp them all lightly, as if for the 
 next breeze to bear away. He dallied with his great pow 
 ers, not in mere indolence, still less in conceit ; but as if 
 some hidden problem were first to be solved before these 
 
Stephen George Perkins. 377 
 
 trivial faculties could become worth exercising. Meantime 
 it was the very consciousness of this unstated problem which 
 seemed to give him his influence. This delaying quality 
 was the very thing that charmed. It suggested vast spaces 
 of time and hidden resources of ability. It was not alone 
 that thought in him lay behind action, but something else 
 seemed to lie behind thought ; as in a machine-shop the 
 flume is behind the wheel, and the silent reservoir beyond 
 the flume. His control of those about him was not a thing 
 won by effort, but a thing possessed in virtue of mere head- 
 of-water. 
 
 Thus it was noticeable that his intimates seldom praised 
 him for this or that special gift, except perhaps that of con 
 versation, but always labored to carry their explanations 
 back to this ultimate force, expressed or implied. And it 
 is equally remarkable that their enthusiasm bore no refer 
 ence to any expected success in any special direction. Usu 
 ally the admiration and the predictions of young people go 
 together ; where they see gifts, they expect miracles. In 
 this case they seemed to recognize a rarer quality than that 
 which wins success, and they were content to allow him a 
 whole eternity to grow in, demanding nothing meanwhile. 
 They did not pretend to understand or explain or justify 
 him ; they only knew that there was but one Stephen Per 
 kins. It was a dangerous form of admiration ; a weaker 
 person would have been spoiled by it. He only received it 
 all with that same imperturbable equanimity with which he 
 took everything. When his friends were pleased, they 
 called this stoical mood philosophy ; when they were a lit 
 tle provoked, they called it laziness ; when very much pro 
 voked, they called it conceit, and revoked the phrase in 
 self-contrition the next day. For they knew very well that 
 under all this motionless surface there was a nature abso 
 lutely noble, that would gladly give up all the superficial 
 joys of life, could it but live itself out clearly and find its 
 true career at last. And older men and women, whose so- 
 
378 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ciety he always rather sought, found him modest, gentle, 
 and truthful, though they might miss something of that 
 fresh enthusiasm which seems the proper birthright of 
 youth. 
 
 It is almost needless to say, after what has been said of 
 his temperament, that he had a choice taste in books, and 
 knew his Emerson from beginning to end. He liked, too, 
 to hear Theodore Parker preach, but would not acknowl 
 edge to any positive thrill of the blood from that powerful 
 electric battery ; and if moved thereby to any special act of 
 courage or self-sacrifice, would have been sure to keep it 
 out of sight. Habitually defending all who were attacked 
 or criticised, he also habitually understated all emotions ; 
 and, when the war came, treated it as he treated the rest of 
 life, with only a sort of guarded and critical interest. He 
 held it at arm's length for philosophic consideration. Of 
 course life was nothing ; but after all, might not the whole 
 game, about which the nation was excited, prove as valueless 
 as the particular pawn which was all he could contribute if 
 he took part ? Even when he had actually enlisted, he was 
 very willing to let it be supposed that it was only from en 
 nui, or because he was tired of being asked whether he were 
 not going. One of his intimates told me that he only once 
 ventured to put the question to Stephen point-blank, why 
 he went into the army, and then he only replied, with his ac 
 customed shrewd, meditative smile, that " it was an ancient 
 and honorable profession." But one of his female rela 
 tives has since said that at the outbreak of the war, on her 
 remarking to him, rather heedlessly, that the war was not 
 likely to come home to their two lives, for instance, in any 
 immediate way, he answered, with an unwonted serious 
 ness that was almost sternness, " I do not know that it will 
 make any difference in your life, but it is likely to make 
 a very great difference to mine." In a few days he had 
 enlisted. 
 Li passing to the sequel of the story, it would be easy for 
 
Stephen Creorge Perkins. 879 
 
 a stranger to conjecture that this proved one of the cases 
 where the war gave the needed fulness and completion to 
 a life otherwise incomplete. But I do not think it was so 
 with Stephen Perkins. With his rare powers, and his sen 
 sitive, haughty nature, the course of development was not 
 to be so easily rounded. On the 8th of July, 1861, he was 
 commissioned Second Lieutenant in the Second Massachu 
 setts (Infantry); was promoted First Lieutenant in the 
 same month of the following year, and was killed within a 
 month after his promotion. The intermediate period was 
 the most tedious epoch of the war, and he was engaged in 
 its most tedious service, in the Army of the Potomac. Dan 
 ger and exertion would have seemed to him worthy the 
 sacrifice they brought ; but he chafed under a forlorn and 
 monotonous routine, and amid a seemingly aimless waste 
 of resources. Life, which had appeared of little value at 
 home, seemed utterly valueless there, and the secret lan 
 guor of the blood increased rather than diminished. His 
 letters showed much of his accustomed philosophy, but no 
 enthusiasm and little enjoyment. None of them are now 
 accessible to quote from, and I speak of them from memory 
 alone. He complied with forms which he detested, fulfilled 
 a routine which he undervalued, and saw a seemingly use 
 less campaign draw its slow length along. It will always 
 remain uncertain what influence active service might have 
 had in concentrating his powers of action and developing 
 the latent enthusiasm of his nature. But it is certain that 
 inactive service, under generals in whom his shrewd sa 
 gacity put no faith, and with noble companions whose lives 
 he saw wasted, gave neither joy nor tonic to his nature. 
 
 The disastrous battle of Cedar Mountain, the first impor 
 tant engagement of the Second Massachusetts, took place 
 on the 9th of August, 1862. The regiment was under fire 
 but half an hour, yet of twenty-two officers who went in 
 only eight came out unhurt ; five were killed, five wounded, 
 three others wounded and captured, and one captured while 
 
380 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 attending a wounded comrade. Of the five killed, three 
 stand recorded in these volumes, Abbott, Goodwin, and 
 Perkins, besides Savage, who died of his wounds. Of 
 those five killed, moreover, three went into battle almost 
 too ill to stand, of whom Stephen Perkins was one. " All 
 our officers behaved nobly," wrote Robert Shaw after this 
 battle, in a letter which will be found elsewhere in full. 
 "Those who ought to have stayed away didn't. It was 
 splendid to see those sick fellows walk straight up into the 
 shower of bullets as if it were so much rain ; men who, 
 until this year, had lived lives of perfect ease and luxury. 
 0, it is hard to believe that we shall never see them again, 
 after having been constantly together for more than a 
 year." 
 
 . In a contest so hot, individual casualties pass unnoticed 
 at the time, and often the precise facts can never be estab 
 lished. Robert Shaw says : " The men were ordered to 
 lie down until the enemy came nearer. Almost all the 
 officers kept on their feet, though." This readily explains 
 the fearful loss among those thus prominent. It is stated 
 by Colonel H. S. Russell, then Captain in the Second, that 
 when the regiment had been in position about twenty min 
 utes, Stephen Perkins received a wound in his right hand, 
 but refused to go to the rear, saying that a handkerchief 
 was all he wanted, and this was given him. Ten minutes 
 afterwards, Russell noticed him again, and in a few minutes 
 more, when the regiment was withdrawn, he was not in his 
 place. The body was found a little way to the rear, pierced 
 with three bullets. 
 
 His remains were identified on the next day by General 
 Gordon and Captain Shaw, and were, after due prepara 
 tion, sent to Washington, and thence to Oakhill Cemetery, 
 Georgetown. There took place on the 25th of September 
 that simple and touching funeral ceremony, the narrative 
 of whose pathetic loneliness has touched many hearts ; while 
 it was yet more consonant with the nature of Stephen Per- 
 
Stephen G-eorge Perkins. 381 
 
 kins than would have been any priestly or military splen 
 dor. The services were performed by Rev. John C. Smith 
 of the Fourth Presbyterian Church in Washington, who thus 
 describes them : 
 
 " There were but four of us, the father, Dr. Francis 
 H. Brown, Surgeon of Judiciary Square Hospital, and a 
 young ministerial friend, Mr. D. R. Frazier, from the 
 Union Theological Seminary, New York. As we were about 
 to leave the Superintendent's house, I beckoned to three 
 wounded convalescents near by, and said to them, * Boys, I 
 have come here to bury a young officer ; we have no guard, 
 fall in and act for us.' They obeyed promptly, giving the 
 usual military sign. We went to the vault and received 
 the body ; then moved in the following order, namely, 
 Superintendent and convalescents in front, myself and the 
 young minister ; the body carried by hand ; the father lean 
 ing on the arm of Dr. Brown (also a Boston man) 
 
 " Reader, if you visit the metropolis and desire to see the 
 grave marked by the marble placed there by the father's 
 love, go to the monument of the Russian Ambassador, M. 
 de Bodisco, and a few yards eastwardly you will see the 
 spot where lie the remains of the gallant young Lieutenant 
 of the Second Massachusetts." 
 
 Thus closed the brief earthly life of one whose slow and 
 large development would alone seem enough to guarantee 
 immortality in a universe where nothing runs to waste. To 
 Stephen Perkins, with his haughty humility, the accidents 
 of place and fame were nothing, and the most unnoticed 
 funeral and briefest record would have appeared most fit 
 ting. And he who, with no steady hand, has woven this 
 slight tribute to the noble promise that he loved, may now 
 gladly let the garland drop, and leave the rest to silence. 
 
382 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 1857. 
 HOWARD DWIGHT. 
 
 First Lieutenant 24th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), September 1, 1861 ; 
 First Lieutenant 4th Missouri Cavalry, October 4, 1861 ; Captain, Sep 
 tember 4, 1862; Captain and A. A. G. (U. S. Vols.), November 10, 
 1862; killed by guerillas, Bayou Courtableau, La., May 4, 1863. 
 
 HOWAKD DWIGHT, fourth son of William and Eliza 
 beth A. D wight, and grandson, on the mother's side, 
 of Hon. D. A. White of Salem, was born in Springfield, 
 Massachusetts, October 29, 1837. His characteristics in 
 boyhood were great sweetness of disposition, accompanied 
 by a spirit which would suffer no encroachment upon his 
 rights ; great simplicity and ingenuousness, with straight 
 forward honesty of purpose, manly resolution to persevere 
 in whatever he undertook, and excellent mental powers. 
 His father said of him, while he was a school-boy, that it 
 was an intellectual treat to study a lesson with him, his 
 mind was so clear and so true in its operations. He was 
 affectionate, but undemonstrative. Refined and gentleman 
 ly in his bearing, he was reserved, even to those of his own 
 household, who were accustomed to say of him, that he 
 spoke only when he had something to say worth saying, and 
 when he did speak it was always to the point. In the year 
 1850 he entered Phillips Exeter Academy. Mr. Soule, the 
 respected Principal of the Academy, thus writes of him : 
 " I remember him as a lad of thirteen, full of health and joyous 
 activity, frank, impulsive, and attractive to his classmates and com 
 panions. In his intercourse, with his instructors he was always 
 trustworthy and manly in his bearing. During his last term here, 
 his habits of study improved so rapidly, and his progress was such 
 in exact scholarship, that I regretted his leaving. His character 
 and general deportment were unexceptionable." 
 
 He was prepared for college by Thomas G. Bradford, Esq., 
 
Howard Dwiglit. 383 
 
 of Boston, for whom lie always expressed great affection 
 and esteem. That the regard was reciprocated by this 
 teacher is apparent from the following tribute from his pen. 
 Mr. Bradford writes : 
 
 " I think I appreciate the character of Howard. I know his 
 noble and endearing qualities, his warm and kind impulses ; his 
 affectionate, true, frank, generous heart ; his clear, discriminating, 
 well-balanced intellect ; his energy of purpose, decision and straight 
 forwardness in will and action ; his lofty notions of right and honor, 
 and other traits of mind and heart which made him so true a man. 
 I can say of him, that I not only loved him, but, although he was a 
 mere boy when I was connected with him, that I truly respected 
 him." 
 
 He left Mr. Bradford's school to enter Harvard College 
 in the year 1853. He passed a brilliant examination, and 
 gave every promise of taking high rank in his Class. It 
 was said of him by the distinguished President of the Uni 
 versity, Dr. Walker, that, " as easily as he could put forth 
 his hand, he could take the highest honors of the Class, if 
 he applied himself to that object." Although he allowed 
 himself to be diverted from it, and failed to accomplish 
 what had been hoped for him as to college rank, he suc 
 ceeded in awakening a strong interest in his instructors ; 
 and among his Class he was an object of enthusiastic regard. 
 After his death, besides passing the customary resolutions 
 expressive of their sorrow at his loss, they addressed a let 
 ter to his family, of which the following is an extract : 
 
 " His position among us was so peculiar, both in the influence 
 which he exercised and the regard in which he was held, that it 
 was our general desire, when we came together upon the occasion 
 of his death, that, besides the resolutions adopted as a public trib 
 ute to his memory, a private communication should be made to 
 his family, in which a freer expression could be given to our sen 
 timents, and which, by its informality, should the more feelingly 
 assure them how important we estimate the loss we have sus 
 tained." 
 
384 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 This letter contains a just and discriminating analysis of 
 his character as a man and as a scholar, and perhaps indi 
 cates, clearly enough, the faults which stood in the way of 
 his taking the high rank in his Class to which his uncom 
 mon abilities soemed to entitle him. The following passage 
 occurs in it : 
 
 " He was a leader among us from our earliest college days, and 
 had continued the object of our increasing pride and hope. Intel 
 lectually, it is not invidious to say he had no superior in our ranks. 
 He combined in his mental constitution rare clearness of judgment 
 and quickness of perception, with a tenacious memory and singular 
 felicity of expression ; and to these gifts added a remarkable 
 eloquence of manner in public speaking. His prominent charac 
 teristics seem to us to have been energy, intrepidity, and public 
 spirit. His cast of mind was thoroughly practical, not given to 
 subtleties or abstruseness, but regarding what was broad, prac 
 ticable, and expedient. He was earnest as a partisan, and full of 
 the inspiration of leadership, but knew how to be courteous towards 
 his opponents, and just to their positions ; while in public and in 
 private he set forth his own opinions and maintained his own prin 
 ciples, with cogent force and fearless resolution. His energy was 
 something exhaustless, and he showed as much acuteness in the 
 construction of his plans as he did unwearied persistency in their 
 prosecution. If his restless vigor was sometimes difficult for him 
 self to govern, as it was for others to withstand, it was gener 
 ally subjected to prudence, while his ardent ambition was regulated 
 by generous feeling and guided by masterly executive skill. These 
 effective and manly qualities were the basis even of his faults ; but 
 if his forcible temperament, his unbounded vitality, and exuberant 
 animal spirits ever led him into errors, they did not vitiate the re 
 finement of his sensibilities nor impair the genial heartiness of his 
 disposition. His calmer nature was sensitive and elevated, and he 
 often betrayed in his looks or language a singular simplicity of 
 feeling, half unsuspected to those impressed by his more salient 
 characteristics. His ready kindness of feeling was indicated in a 
 smile of peculiar sweetness, and a manner which he could make 
 most winning, adapting himself with grateful skill to persons of 
 divers characters or positions. Affable and courteous in general, 
 
Howard Dwight. 385 
 
 among his nearer associates, he was genial and affectionate, and 
 possessed a brilliant combination of qualities which we shall never 
 
 cease to miss in our reunions While we lament him, it is still 
 
 with a just pride in the rich sacrifice we were able to make, when 
 
 so valuable a life was manfully surrendered to a sacred cause 
 
 It is a still greater consolation, as we reflect upon his death, to re 
 member that it was with a warm and intelligent personal interest 
 that he engaged in the cause to which he has given his life. We 
 do not forget that he was compelled, not merely by the ardor of 
 adventure appropriate to our years, but by a manly devotion to the 
 principles which the cause of our country represents, an earnestly 
 cherished conviction which he had manifested long before it became 
 necessary to support those principles by arms. That he felt their 
 importance, and would have deemed their triumph worth his life, 
 may assist our resolution to resign him without complaint, if not 
 without sorrow." 
 
 Howard Dwight never ceased to cherish the scholarly and 
 literary tastes which had been so marked in him during his 
 college life, but from which it might have been apprehended 
 that the activities of business and army life would have a 
 tendency to divorce him. When he and his brothers left 
 home for the army, it was remarked that, though they, un 
 willing to be drawn aside from the study of their new pro 
 fession, were content to take with them only books of a 
 purely military character, he could not be happy unless he 
 had with him Shakespeare, Tennyson, and Macaulay for his 
 daily companions ; and the hard- worn volumes give evi 
 dence of his constant use of them. After leaving college he 
 repeatedly expressed himself tempted to follow the bent of 
 his tastes, and continue his education in some foreign uni 
 versity ; but other considerations had weight with him, and 
 he soon turned his attention to manufacturing, " with the 
 purpose," to use his own language, " of making himself 
 master of its theory." 
 
 He was thus occupied until the summer of 1859, when 
 it was proposed to him to take charge of building and run 
 ning a cotton-press in Memphis, Tennessee. 
 
 VOL. I. 25 
 
386 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Hitherto lie had engaged in no pursuit that had properly 
 tasked his energies. His life had been an easy one, admit 
 ting of leisure and self-indulgence. He eagerly welcomed 
 the prospect of duties which, he well knew, while they of 
 fered a good field for the exercise of his abilities, would 
 demand of him constant labor and self-denial. 
 
 He went to Memphis in September, 1859. His duties 
 during that and the following winter were severe. He 
 writes of rising, in midwinter, at six o'clock, so as to be at 
 the press when the men went to work at seven ; and as he 
 was unable to leave his work at noon, to go to the hotel 
 for dinner, he found himself, to use his own language, 
 " obliged to be satisfied with the corn-bread and bacon 
 which the negroes live on." He adds : " I have been run 
 ning the press, too, at night, so I have only been able to let 
 up between the hours of six and seven in the evening. You 
 may fancy the relief brought to my somewhat overwrought 
 body and mind by the advent of Saturday night." 
 
 This life was a good preparation for that upon which he 
 was so soon to enter, in the army ; and in the performance 
 of his duties as a man of business in Memphis, he showed 
 the same energy, ability, and fidelity for which, as a soldier, 
 he was afterwards distinguished. 
 
 His life was made, as he expressed it, " one of turmoil 
 and trouble," during the winter of 1860-61, by the begin 
 nings of rebellion in Tennessee, the State of which, as he 
 said, he had " become by residence, voting, and everything 
 else that could make him so, a citizen." " I have had my 
 eyes," he writes, " suddenly opened to the fact that we are 
 not one people, and that I am almost certain to become a 
 foreigner, while supposing myself at home." 
 
 He writes, on one occasion, of going about among his 
 secession friends, crying " Liberty and Union, one and in 
 separable," and adds, " I don't know that I did any good ; 
 but it certainly raised agreeable emotions in my breast, if 
 not in theirs." 
 
Howard Dwiglit. 387 
 
 One thus frank and earnest in avowing bis Union senti 
 ments could not but find bimself in an uncomfortable posi 
 tion as a citizen of Tennessee in April, 1861. Howard 
 Dwiglit was not a man to be easily intimidated, but, from 
 tbe day that Sumter fell until he left Memphis, a month 
 later, his situation was not without peril, and, to his friends 
 at home, this was a season of great anxiety on his account. 
 For weeks before he left Memphis he must have appreciated 
 the danger. The " rag of Secession," as he called the Rebel 
 flag, was raised, and the voice of Secession was loud about 
 him. A man less faithful to duty might have sought his 
 own safety, and left his post at once. Not so with him. 
 He was careful for the safety of those in his employ ; 
 and, at an early period, he sent away a faithful Irish la 
 borer, whom he knew to be true to the Union. But, for 
 himself, he had charge of the property of another, and he 
 would not leave it without permission to do so. 
 
 Meantime, communication between Massachusetts and 
 Tennessee was interrupted. He could get no letters from 
 home : he knew nothing of what was occurring outside of 
 Memphis. At last, everything around him told him that 
 liberty and even life would be endangered by remaining 
 longer among rebels and traitors. He came away, hardly 
 knowing if he had a country. 
 
 The first evidence he had that the cause of the Union 
 was not so desperate as was indicated by his rebellious sur 
 roundings was in seeing the American flag waving at Cairo. 
 His eloquent account of the emotions awakened by the sight 
 of the stars and stripes will not be forgotten by those who 
 heard it. It was not his wont to talk about his own feel 
 ings ; but as he told us how the sight aifected the passengers 
 on the boat, that there was not a dry eye among them, 
 and that he saw two strong men throw themselves on 
 each other's neck and weep, we felt that he too had had 
 a baptism of suifering, arid had come out of it strong for 
 noble action. 
 
388 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 The Rebellion was destructive to his business prospects, 
 but to that aspect of it he gave no heed. Pecuniary con 
 siderations at such an hour could have no weight with 
 him. He at once applied himself to aiding his brother 
 Wilder, then Major of the Second Regiment Massachusetts 
 Volunteers, in procuring arms for that regiment, and turned 
 his attention, without delay, to seeking a commission for 
 himself in our army. 
 
 He entered the service the 1st of September, 1861, as 
 First Lieutenant in Captain Stackpole's company in the 
 Twenty-fourth Massachusetts Regiment. While he was re 
 cruiting for his company in Northfield, Massachusetts, he 
 received the following letter from his brother Wilder : 
 
 " PLEASANT HILL CAMP, NEAR DARNESTOWN, 
 September 6, 1866. 
 
 " DEAR HOWARD, Advice is cheap. When lost, it goes to 
 the moon, according to the old superstition, and does no harm. 
 Hear mine. General Fremont is on his way to Memphis. As sure 
 as sunrise, he will go there. Go with him. Now is the opportu 
 nity for adventure, for success. Energy and aptitude are in de 
 mand. This autumn they will bear fruit. The wheel is entitled 
 to every man's shoulder ; offer yours. In other words, pack your 
 trunk, take a few letters of introduction and authentication from the 
 Governor and others, go to Fremont, tell him you wish to serve in 
 
 his army You will do yourself credit, and be in the midst of 
 
 some of the most brilliant achievements of the war. I have said 
 my say after reflection, and from a near view of the field. 
 
 " Yours affectionately, 
 
 " WILDER DWIGHT. 
 " To LIEUTENANT HOWARD DWIGHT." 
 
 He returned home without delay, being induced to fol 
 low the advice of his brother by the fact that he had been a 
 citizen of Tennessee for two years previous to the breaking 
 out of the Rebellion ; and where he had faced Secession he 
 chose to fight it. 
 
 The second day after his return from Northfield he had 
 furnished himself with the necessary letters, had taken 
 
Howard Dwight. 389 
 
 leave of his chosen friends and companions of the Twenty- 
 fourth Regiment, from whom it was hard to separate him 
 self, and was on his way to the Department of the West. 
 On October 4, 1861, he was appointed by General Fre'mont 
 a Second Lieutenant in Company C, Fourth Regiment Mis 
 souri Cavalry, Fre'mont Hussars. 
 
 On the 21st of March following he was commissioned by 
 the Governor of Missouri as First Lieutenant, to rank from 
 the 4th of October, 1861. At the battle of Pea Ridge he 
 held a responsible position, concerning which he wrote soon 
 after as follows : 
 
 " On the morning of the 6th of March, when the battle may be 
 said to have opened, I found myself in command of our camp, all my 
 senior officers having been sent with detachments on expeditions, 
 before the enemy's advance was known, not to rejoin us until the 
 7th. I had somewhat over one hundred men under me, and was to 
 have formed the rear-guard of cavalry for Sigel's and Asboth's di 
 visions, but, owing to delay on the part of other cavalry, ordered for 
 advance-guard, the arrangement was suddenly changed at three, A. M., 
 we having been ordered to be ready to march at two, A. M., and I was 
 ordered to the advance with fifty men." 
 
 He showed himself entirely equal to the duties which de 
 volved upon him. On the 7th he made a charge upon the 
 enemy, the effect of which was favorable to the success of 
 our arms during that part of the engagement. From the 
 time of his promotion to a first lieutenancy, he was doing 
 the duty of a captain, although his promotion to a cap 
 taincy was long deferred. 
 
 On the 1st of May, 1862, his name was sent to the Gov 
 ernor of Missouri for promotion to a captaincy, but as late 
 as August 5th he wrote : " You are right in continuing to 
 address me as Lieutenant. My promotion is based on the 
 transfer of one of our captains to a battery of which he has 
 been in command for some time. Until this is accomplished, 
 my title will not come." 
 
 It was not until the 4th of November, 1862, that he was 
 
390 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 appointed and commissioned, by the Governor of Missouri, 
 as Captain, Company C, Fourth Regiment Missouri Cavalry, 
 to rank from the 4th of September, 1862. 
 
 Captain D wight's duties while in the Department of the 
 West were arduous and severe. In the midst of these 
 labors, a year from the time he left his home, he received 
 the sad tidings of the death of his brother Wilder, who fell 
 at Antietam. On this occasion he wrote from Helena, 
 Arkansas, September 31, 1862, as follows : 
 
 " I cannot think of it as real yet ; the void it makes in the home 
 that is almost constantly in my mind is so great. I had seen by 
 telegram, in one of the papers, that Wilder was wounded, but 
 somehow had not for a moment felt it possible that he could be 
 lost to us. To me he has ever been the most affectionate brother 
 and truest friend when I have most needed aid. 
 
 " It is a great comfort to me, however, to reflect that his death 
 was one which had no horrors for him, and to the possibility of 
 which he looked forward so cheerfully ; and I glory in his career 
 as a soldier, though the end is so hard to bear. I need not assure 
 you how fully you and father and all at home have my sympathy 
 in this affliction, and how much I regret that I cannot be at home 
 to be of some use or comfort to you. I feel that I can do nothing 
 better, however, than, where I am, to imitate, as closely as I may, 
 the bright example that Wilder has given me. I am under march 
 ing orders, and shall be more than ever glad of the change to ac 
 tive service." 
 
 He passed unharmed through the hardships and dangers 
 of the Missouri campaign ; and on the 10th of November, 
 1862, he was appointed by the President of the United 
 States Assistant Adjutant-General of Volunteers, with the 
 rank of Captain, and ordered to report in person to Briga 
 dier-General George L. Andrews, United States Volunteers. 
 
 On the staff of General Andrews, Captain Dwight saw 
 active service in the Department of the Gulf. Important 
 duties were assigned him, which he performed ably and 
 faithfully. He participated in all the stirring scenes of the 
 
Howard DwigTit. 391 
 
 Teclie campaign, during the spring of 1863, and there dis 
 tinguished himself by his gallantry as he had done on the 
 battle-field of Pea Ridge. There, too, he escaped unharmed, 
 though constantly exposed to the shot and shell of the ene 
 my, and at one time having his horse shot under him. He 
 escaped, however, only to fall two weeks later, under circum 
 stances peculiarly distressing to his friends, who would 
 have asked for him " a death more consonant with his ar 
 dent and heroic temper." At the time of his death, May 4, 
 1863, he was temporarily attached to the brigade of his 
 brother, Brigadier-General William Dwight, Jr., to whom 
 he was bearing despatches from General Banks. General 
 Dwight's official report of the day's operations contains the 
 following : 
 
 " An event occurred to-day of a nature distressing to me, per 
 sonally, and of such a character as to demand the attention of the 
 authorities in this department, that we may know upon what terms 
 we are waging this war. Captain Howard Dwight, Assistant 
 Adjutant-General to Brigadier- General George L. Andrews, was 
 murdered to-day under the following circumstances. Captain 
 Dwight had passed the artillery attached to this brigade in a wagon 
 in which he was driving, when, finding his progress impeded by the 
 army wagon train, he left his wagon, and mounted his horse to ride 
 forward and join my advance. 
 
 " He had passed a point at which there is a turn in the Bayou 
 Bosuf, when he was ordered to halt. He was in a place where all 
 previous experience authorized him to suppose that he was in little 
 or no danger. In fact, the account given by an eyewitness shows, 
 so far was he from suspecting danger, that, on being ordered to 
 halt, instead of putting spurs to his horse, which would probably 
 have insured his escape, he deliberately turned, and walked his 
 horse back to see what it meant. On reaching the edge of the 
 Bayou, he found himself confronted by three Rebel cavalrymen, 
 who were on the opposite side of the Bayou, at the water's edge. 
 He asked, ' Who are you ? ' The reply was, ' Who are you ? ' and 
 immediately the three rifles were brought to bear upon him. In 
 this position he submitted to the necessity of the case, and surren- 
 
392 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 dered himself a prisoner. One of the Rebels then said, ' He 's a 
 damned Yankee ; let 's kill him.' Captain Dwight calmly replied, 
 ' You must not fire. I am your prisoner.' Again the Rebels said 
 to each other, ' Kill the damned Yankee ' ; and immediately one of 
 them fired. The ball passed through Captain Dwight's brain, kill 
 ing him instantly. The scene was witnessed by two boys, who 
 remained by the body until the arrival of our cavalry, who were 
 but three minutes behind when the event occurred, and hearing the 
 report of the rifle hastened forward. These boys bear testimony 
 to the calm courage with which Captain Dwight met his fate, under 
 circumstances far more trying than those generally presented amidst 
 the excitement of the battle-field. 
 
 " He died with the same imperturbable bravery which had marked 
 his life. His placid features, after death, retained the same expres 
 sion which had been natural to him in life. They showed that, 
 whatever are the horrors of an execution, this execution possessed 
 no terrors to him." 
 
 The body, under the charge of his younger brother, 
 Lieutenant Charles Dwight, was immediately taken to New 
 Orleans and borne to his former residence, there to await 
 the departure of a steamer which should transport it to his 
 home in Massachusetts. A guard of men, detailed for the 
 purpose from the Forty-seventh Massachusetts Volunteers, 
 was placed around the house both day and night. 
 
 The brother and immediate friends of the deceased 
 wrapped the coffin in the American flag, and covered it 
 with flowers. These arrangements being concluded, they 
 left the apartment and retired for the night. When, the 
 next morning, the afflicted brother again entered the room, 
 a scene presented itself which showed that there were oth 
 ers, besides the immediate friends, who sought to pay their 
 tribute of respect to the memory of this brave son of New 
 England. 
 
 Members of the Union Association of Colored Women 
 had visited the room early in the morning. They had 
 brought white linen, with which they had covered the fur 
 niture of the room, and upon which they had sewed green 
 
Howard Dwight. 393 
 
 leaves. They had filled the room and covered the coffin 
 with the freshest and sweetest flowers, made into wreaths 
 and bouquets. They had made the scene one upon which 
 the eye rested with delight. Each morning this labor of 
 love was repeated. Each morning the faded flowers of the 
 previous day were removed, and those of fresh beauty and 
 fragrance took their place. 
 
 Before Lieutenant Dwight left New Orleans, he attempt 
 ed to express his thanks to those who had shown such ten 
 der care for him whom he mourned. He said to one of 
 their number, " I want to thank you, but I know not how 
 to express my thanks." " You owe us no thanks," was 
 the reply ; " who are your friends if we are not ? All we 
 ask of you is, that when you go home, you will tell the 
 Northern people how we feel, and say to them that we want 
 our husbands and our sons to be allowed to fight in this 
 war." 
 
 Captain Dwight was the object of enthusiastic regard in 
 the Department of the Gulf, as he had been in the Army 
 of the West. After his death, resolutions were passed by 
 his brother officers, showing that in that relation he was 
 hardly less valued than he was by the band of classmates 
 who soon after met to give expression to their love and 
 grief in terms so tender and affectionate, and so keenly 
 appreciative of his worth, that they fell like balm upon 
 the wounded hearts of his family. 
 
 General Banks, in a letter to the Rebel General Taylor, 
 in relation to the murder of Captain Dwight, says of him : 
 
 " Captain Dwight was one of the most upright and exemplary 
 young men of his country. Never, in a single instance, in his short 
 but brilliant career, had he failed to recognize what was due from a 
 high-toned and brave officer. On our march to Opelousas, and 
 while in occupation of that town, he exerted himself to the utmost 
 to restrain lawless men from infringement upon the personal rights, 
 or the appropriation to their own use of the property of citizens of 
 that town, and contributed much to bring to the punishment of death 
 
394 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 men who had violated alike the laws of war and of property. His 
 name and character were without blemish. The man does not live 
 who can charge upon him the commission of a dishonorable act, or 
 the omission of any duty imposed upon him by the laws of human 
 ity or of honor. It is deeply to be regretted that such a man should 
 lose his life under such circumstances ; but it illustrates too strongly 
 the conduct of the troops in that and other campaigns, to allow it to 
 pass without permanent correction. And if the sacrifice of his life 
 shall result in suppressing so flagrant an abuse of the rules of war, 
 he will have achieved as great a good as other men accomplish in 
 the longest life. His career will have closed with the evidence of 
 his untiring efforts to restrain lawless men from the commission of 
 crimes ; and the sacrifice of his life will illustrate the open and fla 
 grant disregard of these principles by the men in arms against his 
 country." 
 
 His funeral, in New Orleans, was attended by some of 
 the best and highest in the land. From old and young he 
 had won affection and esteem. The church was thronged 
 with those eager to pay him the last tribute of respect. At 
 the request of a friend, classmate, and brother officer, his 
 favorite hymn which he so often sang, " I would not live 
 alway," was given a place in the funeral services. When 
 they were concluded, a large concourse of people followed 
 the funeral procession to the steamship which was to convey 
 his body to the North ; and as the box containing it was 
 about to be lowered into the hold of the vessel, flowers were 
 strewn upon it by the hands of those who knew Howard 
 D wight only as he would most wish to be known, as a true 
 patriot and soldier, ready, as he had more than once de 
 clared, to give his life for his country. 
 
James Amory Perkins. 395 
 
 JAMES AMORY PERKINS. 
 
 First Lieutenant 24th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), September 2, 1861 ; 
 killed at Morris Island, S. C., August 26, 1863. 
 
 JAMES AMORY PERKINS was born in Dorchester, 
 Massachusetts, on the 9th of July, 1836. His father 
 was William Perkins, a merchant in Boston. His mother 
 was Catherine Callender, daughter of John Amory, Esq., 
 of Dorchester. Both his parents survive him. 
 
 His youth was passed in Boston. At school he is remem 
 bered as having been at first an exceedingly quiet boy, in 
 fact almost too studious and retiring ; by degrees, however, 
 becoming more social in his ways, and developing something 
 of the humorous disposition which afterwards became so 
 prominently characteristic of him. He was not a strong lad, 
 and enjoyed little of that pleasure which comes from robust 
 and exuberant health ; but his powers of endurance, as shown 
 in walking and boating, were excellent, especially for a boy 
 of his apparent want of strength. His force of will could 
 control the sense of fatigue, though it could not impart 
 power to the muscles. At school he was always a hard 
 worker, and a faithful, diligent, and accurate student. His 
 powers of mind were excellent, and his standing was always 
 among the first. 
 
 At the age of sixteen he made a voyage to England for 
 the benefit of his health. At this time, although he had 
 been for years pursuing the study of the classics, he had 
 given up the idea of entering college, thinking that a more 
 active life would agree better with his constitution. Ac 
 cordingly, on his return from Europe, he went into his fa 
 ther's counting-room, but remained there only a short time. 
 He found that he could not be satisfied without availing him 
 self of the advantages of a liberal education, and therefore 
 returned to school, and finally entered college in July, 1853. 
 
396 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 His college life was very successful in every way. He 
 thoroughly enjoyed it. He was active and diligent in im 
 proving the opportunities afforded him of acquiring knowl 
 edge, and his abilities enabled him easily to take a high 
 rank in scholarship. He naturally fell in with the literary 
 tone of Cambridge, and his reading was thorough and ex 
 tensive, chiefly in historical and in critical works. With 
 all this, he was a genuine lover of the social life within the 
 college walls, and no one was more sought after than he for 
 the various societies and friendly clubs which constitute 
 such a delightful part of the student's life. At the close of 
 his course he had risen in rank to a very high place ; he 
 had read much, and to more purpose than almost any one 
 else, and he had participated in the social life of college as 
 much as those who had neglected their studies and literary 
 culture. 
 
 On leaving Cambridge he made up his mind to devote 
 himself to business. He left at once for Calcutta, to ac 
 quaint himself with the East India trade, with which his 
 father's house was mainly concerned. There and in Bom 
 bay he remained about a year. He returned to this coun 
 try by way of Europe, after travelling in Italy, Switzerland, 
 France, and England, and reached home in June, 1859. 
 
 He at once settled down to business in his father's count 
 ing-room in Boston, and remained there, working faithfully 
 and zealously, as was his wont, for two years, until the 
 commencement of the war. He was surrounded by his 
 old friends? classmates, and others, and his society was 
 most eagerly and constantly sought. His literary tastes 
 were always a source of enjoyment to him, and his mind 
 was continually being enlarged and strengthened by sound 
 and various reading. 
 
 On the breaking out of the Rebellion, he threw himself 
 into the service of his country with all the strength of his 
 character. Nothing could restrain him from going into the 
 army. His health was far from being firm, but his power 
 
James Amory Perkins. 397 
 
 of will seemed equal to overcoming even this great obstacle. 
 He sought for and obtained a commission of First Lieuten 
 ant in the Twenty-fourth Regiment Massachusetts Volun 
 teers, which was then being raised by the late lamented 
 General Thomas G. Stevenson. His classmate and old 
 friend, Captain (now Brevet Lieutenant-Colonel) J. Lewis 
 Stackpole, commanded the company. 
 
 The Twenty-fourth Massachusetts was among the troops 
 which constituted the force sent to North Carolina under 
 General Burnside. The regiments destined for this com 
 mand were sent at first to Annapolis in November, 1861, 
 where they spent a short time in preparatory organization 
 and brigade drill. The whole expedition set sail from An 
 napolis on the 9th of January, 1862, and arrived the next 
 day at Fortress Monroe. After a short delay, the fleet, 
 composed in great part of vessels by no means in a fit con 
 dition for such important service, left Old Point, and ar 
 rived off Hatteras Inlet on the morning of the 13th. Here 
 began one of the most trying episodes of the war. The ex 
 treme danger to which the fleet, with its precious freight of 
 eight or ten thousand men, was exposed in endeavoring to 
 pass through Hatteras Inlet, owing to ignorance of the 
 channel and the too great draught of water of most of the 
 transports, the confusion and alarm on board the ships, 
 the noble exertions of Burnside and Foster and other offi 
 cers, and the wonderful passage of the straits at last, with 
 out serious loss, will long be remembered. 
 
 The first object attempted by the expedition was the cap 
 ture of Roanoke Island, which was accomplished early in 
 February. After some feints in the direction of Plymouth 
 and Norfolk, General Burnside landed near the mouth of 
 the Neuse, marched his troops within a short distance of 
 the enemy's works, and on the 14th of March, after a short 
 contest with musketry, in which our troops suffered more 
 than the enemy, carried the lines by a brilliant assault, cap 
 turing many guns and prisoners. He advanced at once to 
 
398 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Newborn, which place was evacuated, and became from this 
 time to the close of the war the head-quarters of our forces 
 in North Carolina. 
 
 The Twenty-fourth Massachusetts was stationed near 
 Newbern all the summer and autumn of 1862, and saw no 
 active service until November, when General Foster, who 
 then commanded the department, made an expedition to 
 Little Washington and Plymouth. Lieutenant Perkins's 
 health had been a good deal impaired by chills and fever ; 
 and after this march, which was wearisome, and followed by 
 exhausting picket duty in the swamp country, he was obliged 
 to go down to Beaufort to recruit. He had by no means, 
 however, regained his strength when he rejoined his regi 
 ment to take part in the expedition to Kinston and Golds- 
 borough, in December, 1862. Nothing but his indomitable 
 pluck enabled him, in his debilitated condition, to stand the 
 fatigues of this long march. 
 
 The Twenty-fourth left Newbern, with other portions of 
 the Eighteenth Corps, for South Carolina, in January, 1863, 
 when General Hunter undertook operations against Charles 
 ton in conjunction with the fleet under the late Admiral 
 Dupont. The land forces, however, effected little, and the 
 great naval contest of the 7th of April ended unsuccessfully 
 for us. In June, General Gillmore relieved General Hun 
 ter, and soon afterwards he commenced the series of opera 
 tions by which he captured Fort Wagner and silenced Fort 
 Sumter. Folly Island was first seized, and then a landing 
 effected on Morris Island, at the northern extremity of 
 which was Fort Wagner. Some of Lieutenant Perkins's let 
 ters written at this time, besides giving an excellent picture 
 of what was going on, show unconsciously how bravely he 
 was bearing up against debility and sickness, and how faith 
 fully he was doing his duty, in spite of all depressing in 
 fluences. 
 
 "SEABROOK ISLAND, SOUTH CAROLINA, July 10, 1863. 
 " They are banging away furiously on Folly Island. About five 
 
James Amory Perkins. 399 
 
 o'clock this morning the fire commenced, and it has been very 
 heavy down to this time, seven, A. M. Every regiment in the depart 
 ment, but two or three, is up there on Folly. Six companies only 
 of the Twenty-fourth have gone. Four of us, unlucky ones, are 
 left here in garrison by order of General Gillmore. He said they 
 should be of the Twenty-fourth, and the Colonel, or General Ste 
 venson, said that the four companies should be the four largest. 
 .... The society I am in is very good here, but I am inexpressi 
 bly disgusted, of course. I hate to be separated from the regiment. 
 I should like to be ' in ' for anything the regiment had to do, and I 
 do abominate this kind of duty. We run as much risk, in a certain 
 way, as our friends on Folly. Four companies are no force to 
 hold this island if the Rebels choose to try to take it ; and our only 
 way of keeping out of trouble is to humbug the rascals, and make 
 them think we are all here still. The regiments all embarked and 
 left in the night, the steamers not coming for them till after dark. 
 When they left, they went towards the Head, and, in some cases, 
 when the troops left here at too late an hour to land at Stono before 
 daylight, they went all the way to the Head, landed on St. Helena, 
 and at night embarked again, went up to Folly in the dark, and 
 disembarked there before there was light enough for Secesh or any 
 body else to see them. So there is no chance of the Rebels having 
 seen our men leave. And we keep the tents all standing, the bands 
 playing, and drums beating at the usual hours ; even the candles 
 are lighted in the tents at dark, and put out punctually at taps. The 
 part of our four companies consists in keeping up the old picket 
 line, so that the Rebels may not miss us there. I am now picketing 
 the ground which four companies used to occupy. Company C, 
 down at the left, does the other half of the work. My pickets are 
 nearly a mile off in some cases. They distribute themselves along 
 the line of the old posts, show themselves at all the places where 
 we used to have men, patrol where we have not force enough to 
 put posts, and generally give the Secesh an impression that we are 
 ' round.' But there are only twenty -five or thirty men out where 
 there used to be a hundred and fifty, and the support, namely, our 
 company, is necessarily a long distance in the rear, and the main 
 reserve (Companies E and F) is a long distance behind us, and be 
 hind that there is no infantry force except a parcel of cripples and 
 invalids. There is a battery of artillery in the intrenchment in front 
 
400 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 of our camp, and, better still, there is the gunboat South Carolina. 
 It is a very magnificent game of bluff that we are playing. I felt 
 pretty nervous for the first two days, but since they commenced fire 
 on Folly I feel a good deal easier in my mind. The Secesh pickets 
 act just as they used to, out in the field in front. They come down 
 and brandish their sabres from the house nearest our lines, innocent 
 men that they are. But we have got to be careful, and particularly 
 prompt in getting out of the way if they advance in force." 
 
 " MORRIS ISLAND, August 11. 
 
 " At last I have another chance to write you. It happens to be 
 decently cool at this moment, that is, one can sit still in his shirt 
 sleeves, with the sides of the tent all raised, and not be in a per 
 spiration. Moreover, the tent has been made comparatively decent 
 
 by the exertions of W and myself. Above all, I am neither 
 
 on guard or fatigue, therefore I have a chance to write a little. 
 
 .... I hope A is strong again, since you say he is coming 
 
 out. If he feels fresh and energetic, he will be of a great deal of 
 use. Amongst a set of exhausted persons, such as we are, a fresh 
 man would be a great help. All the life is out of us, out of me, 
 at any rate. 
 
 " They work us very hard. Up every morning at half past three. 
 Every man on duty every other day at the least. Every officer 
 nearly as badly off. Yesterday I was on guard. Two days before 
 that I was down at the landing for thirteen hours and a half, work 
 ing for the ordnance officer, landing shot and shell, hauling guns, 
 
 &c. To-morrow night we go into the trenches The men 
 
 don't gain much in strength, of course. I have got up as high as 
 twenty-five privates for duty, with only thirty-three sick, all told. 
 But there I have stuck for five days past. I can't go any higher. 
 A man will go on duty, be immediately set to work, and fall sick 
 again. So it is, only worse, in the other companies. The sun is too 
 much for any one." 
 
 " MORRIS ISLAND, August 17. 
 
 " The fight has begun. Our batteries opened this morning about 
 six o'clock. There had been a good deal of firing, indeed, ever 
 since twelve, but all the guns had not opened. About the same 
 time the Ironsides moved in with the Montauk and another moni- 
 
James Amory Perkins. 401 
 
 tor, the Montauk leading, and going in very close. A little later 
 the other four followed, all but the Nantucket. She is off some 
 where. There are six wooden boats in there too, half a mile or so 
 astern of the monitors. The Ironsides was completely covered 
 with smoke for a long time after she first went in. Her broadside 
 of eleven-inch guns was throwing out flashes of fire and clouds of 
 smoke almost as fast as if it was a line of muskets. 
 
 " . . . . The work lately has been tremendous. Nearly all our 
 regiment was at work last night; every man was, the day and 
 night before ; and half of them the day before that. I was on duty 
 night before last hauling up a hundred-pounder. The tide was 
 high and we had to drag it through the deep sand ; and it took 
 us five hours to get it up. I suppose it is pounding away now. 
 
 " . . . . The men are getting better in spite of the work. I don't 
 see how it is, but our sick-list is six less this morning than it was 
 yesterday. We are gaining very satisfactorily. There are not 
 more than thirty sick altogether." 
 
 " August 22. 
 
 " I had to come down at noon the day we went into the trenches. 
 I was pretty sick then, for me, and I barely managed to walk half 
 the distance. I found an ambulance luckily which brought me the 
 rest of the way. It is the first time since I have been in the ser 
 vice that I have not been able to walk. I got into the tent, took 
 some medicine, had the sand washed off, and felt a good deal better. 
 So it has been ever since. I feel pretty bright at times, especially 
 in the morning ; but a chill comes over me at noon, and I am good 
 
 for nothing until next day Our men are all sick again. We 
 
 are down nearly as low as we were in the worst times. It is dis 
 couraging to be losing ground so, just as we seemed to be gaining 
 so fast. The trouble is mostly chills. 
 
 " There, I have written a very melancholy letter ; but it could not 
 be helped. The next time I write, no doubt everything will be 
 much more cheerful." 
 
 It was the last letter that the brave man ever wrote. 
 Four days afterwards he fell at the post of duty. 
 
 " On the afternoon of the 26th of August," writes a friend and 
 brother officer, " three hundred men of his regiment were ordered 
 to be in line in the foremost trenches, to charge and capture the 
 
 VOL. i. 26 
 
402 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 advanced rifle-pits of the enemy. At this time Lieutenant Perkins, 
 almost conquered by fever, had been prevailed upon to abstain 
 from work for a few days ; but now nothing could induce him not 
 to rejoin his regiment. To use the words in which Brigadier- Gen 
 eral Stevenson wrote, * My friend had been quite ill for two or 
 three weeks and was off duty, but he insisted on going forward 
 with the regiment, notwithstanding all the officers advised him to 
 remain in camp. When the regiment was having extra ammuni 
 tion issued to them before starting, I persuaded him to come to my 
 tent and dine with me, which he did ; and I begged him not to go 
 to the front. He answered that he could not remain behind, he 
 should be so uneasy during all the time the regiment was gone. 
 Colonel Osborne at one time proposed to order him to remain in 
 camp, but did not, as James was so desirous of going.' The 
 regiment charged. In a few moments they had gained the works 
 of the enemy, captured seventy prisoners, and with their spades 
 were throwing up a breastwork in the very front and teeth of the 
 concentrated fire of Fort Wagner. Perkins's men were avoiding 
 this tremendous cannonade by sometimes dodging ; and the work 
 was not so brisk as he wished it. ' It is no use to dodge,' he said, 
 ' do as I do,' and stood upright and firm. The words had hardly 
 left his mouth when a ball struck him in the upper part of his arm 
 and passed through his body. He fell, and never spoke again." 
 
 His remains were brought to Boston immediately, and 
 were buried at Mount Auburn on the 8th of September, 
 1863. 
 
 " Lieutenant Perkins," writes a brother officer, " was especially 
 distinguished for his undaunted and unwearied readiness to do more 
 than his part of whatever was to be done. This did not spring 
 from the physical vigor and restlessness which calls for constant 
 work to do ; though constant exercise had given him strength and 
 endurance, it had not given him a vigorous constitution. It did 
 not spring from the buoyancy and flow of animal spirits which 
 underrates obstacles. He was naturally despondent; disposed to 
 see what he thought were his own shortcomings, perhaps some 
 times to overrate the difficulties that lay in his way. But this 
 tendency, though it often marred his own comfort, never interfered 
 
James Amory Perkins. 403 
 
 with the cheerful performance of any duty And so his friends 
 
 knew that they could lean on him as one to be always trusted." 
 
 Rarely do we see a more robust character than that of 
 James Amory Perkins. Able, untiring, conscientious, lie 
 conquered every difficulty in his path, and thoroughly dis 
 charged every duty he had to perform. His military ser 
 vice was enlivened by little of the " pomp and circum 
 stance of glorious war." His was not a brilliant career, 
 where rank and reputation give excitement. He entered the 
 army, and he left it, with modest rank, and his duties were 
 the simple, unexciting, and laborious cares of a company 
 officer. He exchanged for this life all that wealth and 
 friends and home could give him, and he never murmured 
 at the sacrifice. His nature led him at times to be morbidly 
 despondent in seasons of trial, but his high spirit never 
 allowed him to falter on the road. He deserves the unusual 
 honor of having conquered his own disposition in this respect, 
 and of maintaining in situations where everything around 
 him assailed a nature apt to be depressed at all times, a lofty 
 and cheerful courage ; and this, too, when he was far away 
 from home and friends, and enfeebled by bodily suffering. 
 
 By his classmates and friends his loss will always be most 
 deeply felt. His memory is fresh in the minds of all. His 
 unwearied industry, his thorough scholarshp, his extensive 
 reading, his genial spirit, his playful humor, his unselfish 
 ness, his kindness, his modesty, his true manliness, his deep 
 conscientiousness, all this we shall never forget ; and when 
 we remember how, in the last two years of his life, his char 
 acter shone out so brightly in endurance, bravery, and de 
 votion to his country's service, we may well feel that in him 
 we have lost a noble and heroic man. 
 
404 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 GEORGE WHITTEMORE, JR. 
 
 Private 1st Co. Mass. Sharpshooters, August, 1861 ; Corporal; Ser 
 geant; killed at Antietam, Md., September 17, 1862. 
 
 rilHIS memoir can be but a brief sketch, yet it aims to 
 JL give glimpses of a character of much harmony and 
 strength, and a career of persistent fidelity ; though the one 
 shrank from publicity, and the other was undecorated with 
 the badges of rank. 
 
 George Whittemore, Jr., son of George and Anna Whit- 
 temore, was born in Boston, December 19, 1837. He at 
 tended the public schools of that city, graduating from the 
 Latin School, a medal scholar, in 1853. He immediately 
 entered Harvard College, as a member of the Class of 1857. 
 A few years before this his parents had removed to Glouces 
 ter, Massachusetts ; and there, on the sea-shore and in the 
 woods, during his vacations, were early developed his sim 
 ple tastes and the manly physical habits which added vigor 
 to a naturally strong constitution. As a boy he was usual 
 ly gentle and quiet ; but the earnest spirit under his calm 
 exterior flashed into energetic and lively action whenever 
 he was thoroughly roused by social enjoyment, or moved 
 by invitations to daring adventure. The force of will, nev 
 er hardening into wilfulness, which he exhibited at a later 
 period, was not manifested in his childhood. Under kind 
 ly domestic influence, there was little to call out the innate 
 strength of his nature. 
 
 At Cambridge he was a close student, ranking among the 
 first twelve of his Class. He excelled as a classical scholar. 
 As a writer, he took several prizes for English composition, 
 and he was noted for his clear comprehension of abstruse 
 metaphysical questions. He taught school during the win 
 ters of his Sophomore and Junior years at Gloucester, and 
 
George Whittemore, Jr. 405 
 
 in the winter of his Senior year at Northampton. He was 
 fond of athletic exercises and expert as an oarsman. His 
 devotion to his books and his retiring manners prevented 
 his forming many intimate acquaintances ; but he was re 
 spected by all his associates and classmates for his fine 
 intellectual and moral qualities. 
 
 On leaving college he was engaged as an assistant in the 
 private classical school of Mr. E. S. Dixwell in Boston. 
 Whilst occupying this position, and afterwards in the office 
 of Messrs. J. J. Clarke and Lemuel Shaw, he studied law. 
 He passed the usual examination and was admitted to the 
 Suffolk Bar on the very day when he left home as a soldier. 
 In the summer of 1860, to recruit his health, he went with 
 a small party on an excursion which was to have been con 
 tinued for several months in the Southwest. An unusual 
 drought in that part of the country compelled him to give 
 up the plan when only partially executed, and he returned 
 alone on horseback, visiting the Adirondack regions on his 
 way back. 
 
 The first years of his maturity found him a strong, well- 
 balanced, self-contained man, able to bear and ready to 
 help others bear all the shocks of life, with a rich, warm 
 nature, but one expressing itself in deeds rather than in 
 words, full of tenderness and care for others, and quick 
 of indignation against anything he felt to be unjust, inhu 
 man, or wrong. 
 
 On the breaking out of the war, he joined a drill-club ; 
 but it was not until after the disastrous battle of Bull Run 
 that he fully determined to enter the army. With him, to 
 resolve was to act ; and he enlisted as a private in the First 
 Company of Sharpshooters from his native State, in August, 
 1861. He had no acquaintances in the company, and 
 joined it against the remonstrances of his friends, who felt 
 that he was equal to and ought to take a higher position. 
 He was not afterwards wholly satisfied with the step he had 
 taken ; yet the considerations which decided his course 
 
406 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 were both characteristic and honorable, inasmuch as they 
 prompted him simply to take the place in which he thought 
 he could be the most useful. He was very near-sighted, 
 and constantly used glasses ; was an expert with the rifle, 
 and capable of enduring fatigue ; was doubtful of his mil 
 itary ability to act as an officer, and averse to the restraints 
 and routine of an infantry regiment. For these reasons, 
 he preferred at first, believing that the contest would be 
 short, the independence and the opportunities for individual 
 enterprise he hoped to find in an unattached command, and 
 in the use of the telescopic rifle. 
 
 What it meant for such a man to be a soldier in this way 
 can easily be imagined. His prospect of a peaceful future 
 had been bright. The cherished home of his childhood 
 and youth held him in a loving embrace ; and there was 
 one to be left upon whom he had bestowed his strongest 
 affections. All this was to be put in mortal peril, and yet 
 he did not hesitate. He had everything to lose, nothing 
 to win, as men usually count losing and winning. But 
 the risk must be taken, the privation must be endured ; 
 thus he felt and thus he acted. 
 
 He was a faithful correspondent, writing constantly to 
 his kindred and friends, most frequently to his father ; for 
 between his parents and himself the relation was one of 
 strong and tender mutual regard and entire confidence. 
 His letters tell where and how he served ; what he be 
 came, or rather, how perfectly he continued to be himself 
 during the* twelve months spent amid scenes so strange and 
 so distasteful in many respects to his whole nature. The 
 following extracts need no comment, and are therefore 
 given in one group. 
 
 "NEAR WASHINGTON, D. C., September 9, 1861. 
 
 " You ask if I am satisfied. I am as well satisfied as when I first 
 formed the resolution to go to the war, and the whole affair has the 
 same aspect as then. I have only one wish, which I have had from 
 the first, that the war may be ended as soon as possible (not by 
 
George Whittemore, Jr. 407 
 
 compromise), and that we may go home. Some things here are 
 
 better, and some worse, than I expected Had a delightful bath 
 
 yesterday morning. The creek, though not very wide, is deep in 
 some parts, with high banks, covered with trees except where they 
 open on a little meadow here and there. It reminds me of the 
 North Branch of Concord River. Imagine one swimming up the 
 North Branch. Would n't it be the ne plus ultra of delightful bath 
 ing ? I suppose the creek runs into the Potomac." 
 
 "DISTRICT COLUMBIA, September 10, 1861. 
 
 " The day was intensely hot, and after waiting some time for march 
 ing orders, we went off to the shade of the woods. I was patient 
 and comfortable, lay down, took out l Korner,' and did not care if we 
 stayed there all day. But we were not so fortunate." 
 
 " CAMP NEAR EDWARD'S FERRY, September 29, 1861. 
 " I am very well and strong, and need to be to endure the work 
 we are doing now. Last night some of our company went out on 
 picket. We lay out on the tow-path in our blankets and overcoats, 
 and I slept soundly with my cartridge-box for a pillow. At two, 
 shots were heard, and our line jumped up, thinking the enemy were 
 crossing the river. As I did not find myself killed, nor hear that 
 any one else was, I was disposed to lie still and wait for something 
 more. But the alarm had been given, and every man must pack up 
 his goods and be in marching order." 
 
 "NEAR EDWARD'S FERRY, October 22, 1861. 
 
 " It is dull, of course. It is not the life I should choose, even in 
 pleasant weather, unless I was a colonel or general, in which case 
 there might be some enjoyment in it ; but as a private there is 
 nothing to attract one who has such a home as I have. However, 
 a man will not be miserable unless he has a very sensitive tempera 
 ment, feels everything keenly, and broods over trouble. Now if I 
 were constituted as you are, I could not endure this life a month ; 
 but as I am able to bear disagreeable things, and have a latent rel 
 ish for a loafing life, I am not at all miserable." 
 
 "NEAR EDWARD'S FERRY, October 28, 1861. 
 
 "We have seen our, first fighting. We went over the river on 
 Monday. The colonel or general commanding showed us the posi- 
 
408 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 tion of the enemy, and told us ' to go there and see what we could 
 do.' .... Our company have done all the fighting at this place, with 
 the exception of some shells thrown by the artillery. Our men 
 both on Monday and Tuesday were put up close to the enemy, quite 
 unsupported ; and this, with their being without food for twenty-four 
 hours and doing nearly all the fighting, has, I find, gained them 
 some credit with everybody. Even General Gorman, who calls 
 the guns great humbugs, gives credit to the men." 
 
 "NEAR EDWARD'S FERRY, October 22. 
 
 " I begin to realize the risks and sufferings of war. I cannot 
 well reconcile myself to parting from all I love in the world, but 
 those left behind suffer more. If there is any consolation in the 
 next world, and I believe there is, I shall know it at once. However, 
 I hope for the best, and do not think much about these things." 
 
 " November 1 0. 
 
 " You thought, walking in those splendid autumn woods, it would 
 be far preferable to die there than to die shut up in a sick-chamber 
 with all the paraphernalia of sickness about you. Yes, I think so ; 
 but perhaps the idea as it presents itself to my mind, of a sudden, 
 painless death in full activity, even in battle, is not so pleasant for you 
 to think of. To me it seems the most desirable form in which to 
 
 meet it." 
 
 " CAMP BENTON, November 20, 1861. 
 
 " The principal discomfort here arises from the impossibility of 
 being neat. I was never fastidious, but cannot reconcile myself to 
 the state of things here and to our crowded condition. We have 
 eleven or twelve in tents which were made to hold eight. I shall 
 break off, for the crowd of men and clatter of voices in this 
 smoky tabernacle of ours seem to make the letter unfit to send to 
 you, the pattern of fastidious neatness. I wonder if any of the 
 smoke or other odors goes in the letter to Boston. I believe it 
 can't be helped in the present state of things." 
 
 " CAMP BENTON, December 4, 1861. 
 
 " Will go into the army ? If he does, I should advise him 
 
 to get a commission. I have come to the conclusion that a man of 
 ability and education is not only under no obligation to go into the 
 ranks as a private, but that he ought not to. He thereby puts it 
 
G-eorge Whittemore, Jr. 409 
 
 out of his power to use his advantages. He has no opportunity to 
 
 do any good proportioned to his ability. By looking about, 
 
 may find a situation suited to him. In short, ' every man in his 
 place.' You will see I have come to this conclusion by reflect 
 ing on my own case. You must not infer from this that I am 
 unhappy. I can wait patiently for the end of this dull life, and 
 
 much of it I enjoy." 
 
 "December 13, 1861. 
 
 " Send something more to read or study as soon as you find from 
 my accounts that the mails are tolerably reliable." 
 
 " CUMBERLAND, January 12, 1862. 
 
 " I have had more pleasure and more hard work this week than 
 in any month in camp. This is a mountain country, as you know, 
 the Alleghanies and the Blue Ridge. I like the mountain trav 
 elling ; and to me it is easier than any other, there is so much pleas 
 ant scenery all the way. The air is fresher and more invigorating. 
 There is plenty of water, and the people are far more hospitable 
 and intelligent than in the counties lower down on the river. 
 Climbing these mountains is not so hard as Kearsarge or Mount 
 
 Washington." 
 
 "PAWPAW, March 7, 1862. 
 
 " It is one great satisfaction to me to reflect that you are not and 
 cannot be here, or know anything of this life, and that in a few months 
 (how long they seem !) / shall know it only as a thing of the past. 
 You speak of being plentifully supplied with pure air. I think I 
 can surpass you at your own practice. On our return from Bloom 
 ing Gap we slept on the ground in a thick snow-storm, and I was 
 surprised to find myself not very cold. A good fire at one's feet is 
 a comfortable thing at such a time." 
 
 "NEAR YORKTOWN, April 9, 1862. 
 
 " On Monday our company was not called into play until late in 
 the afternoon, when we came in front of the Rebel batteries in two 
 squads, supported by two regiments. Only our squad fired, and 
 that with only thirty or forty shots ; but the Rebels answered with 
 volleys that would have cut us up if we had not been protected by 
 a small knoll. I posted myself behind a large tree near the top of 
 the knoll, and received some credit for coolness, but it was the cool 
 ness of perfect safety. Some doubts arose in my mind when the 
 
410 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 first shell came. It burst over my head so near that I felt the hot 
 air on my face and the presence of the gas in my ears, and it scat 
 tered the branches all around me ; but I thought it would not happen 
 twice in succession, and stayed where I was. The Colonel, hav 
 ing found out what he wished to, retired, and we with him. It was 
 growing dark, began to rain hard, and the roads, under the tramp 
 of so many men, were mere sloughs. We had the choice to lie 
 down in the mud or sit up all night about the fire. I chose the 
 latter, and with a rubber blanket and a good fire was pretty com 
 fortable." 
 
 " CAMP NEAR YORKTOWN, April 13, 1862. 
 
 " DEAR FATHER, I have received ten letters during the week. 
 I cannot tell you how precious they are to me. The love and kind 
 ness in them all are enough to make one contented, if not happy, in 
 far worse circumstances than mine. I wonder if I shall ever see 
 you all again. I have very little fear of being killed, a great deal 
 more of being sick ; but I have not felt as though I were to die yet 
 in either way. We are encamped, if the term may be used, for 
 we have no tents, and are sheltering ourselves in the cellar and out 
 buildings of a little farm-house, while the brigade are out in the 
 fields and woods. Yesterday I spent the day with a dozen of our 
 men in the outskirts of the woods, within two hundred yards of the 
 works. We lay concealed and very quiet, so as not to draw their 
 fire ; our orders being not to fire, unless they opened with cannon 
 upon our troops elsewhere, in which case we were to shoot the gun 
 ners. As they did not fire excepting once, when they did no harm, 
 we did not. The day was beautiful, the woods warm and pleasant, 
 and I could not help enjoying it. How different the woods seem 
 from what they have in former seasons. Now the sun shines warm 
 as ever, the tops of the pine-trees whisper in the wind, and the dry 
 leaves and pine needles are as luxurious to lie on ; but grape-shot 
 and shells may at any moment come cutting everything to pieces. 
 We don't sit in a social circle as in our picnics at home, but each 
 one takes a tree to himself; and, instead of wandering round in 
 pleasant meditations, we creep on our hands and knees, and talk in 
 whispers." 
 
 "CAMP NEAR YORKTOWN, April 21, 1862. 
 
 " Quarter of a mile from the Rebels' first battery is a rising 
 ground, where the ruins of a fine house stand. There is little lef 
 
George Whittemore, Jr. 411 
 
 but three large chimneys and the brick foundations of the house. 
 These ruins have been the scene of the sharpshooters' operations 
 for a few days past, ,and I have been mostly there. So little shoot 
 ing has been going on, that we have been able to make our arrange 
 ments almost as we pleased, and we established ourselves in a style 
 of luxurious comfort quite unknown to privates. From the furni 
 ture lying around, two men took bureaus and set them up by a 
 chimney to rest their guns on. Another found a thick tree that 
 divided about five feet from the ground. He cut out the notch large 
 enough for his gun, and put up a seat behind it, where he spied 
 around very much at his ease. I took a position at the side of a 
 chimney, with a black walnut table in front, the leaf hanging down 
 and making a tolerable protection from bullets, &c., at this distance ; 
 and to cover my head I set up two or three timbers, charred rafters, 
 &c., the ends slanting up over my head, leaving a narrow port-hole 
 for the gun. It happened to do me service. Towards night our 
 batteries, stationed very near the chimneys, threw some shell into 
 the works, while we kept our guns levelled at their embrasures. At 
 last, after our cannon had sprinkled their shot and shell in various 
 parts of the fort, an iron howitzer, on the battery nearest and just 
 opposite to us, which not a man had approached all day, now, 
 touched off by an unseen hand, threw a charge of grape or canis 
 ter at us. It struck the ground a few yards before us, and scattered. 
 Some of the balls struck my table, knocked down one timber from 
 before it, and scattered the nails, charcoal, &c., over the table. One 
 ball glanced and struck a tub behind me. My companion behind 
 the chimney wanted to know if I was ' hit.' He seemed to think 
 a ball that struck behind me must have gone through me. This 
 iron howitzer is the one the negroes fired when the place became 
 
 too hot for the chivalry." 
 
 "NEAR YORKTOWN, May 3, 1862. 
 
 " There has been more or less firing about us all day. Just now 
 it is perfectly quiet, though at intervals there comes back to us the 
 music of a band in the Rebel camp. Only the song of birds, the 
 hum of mosquitoes, and an occasional woodpecker breaks the still 
 ness. A gun goes off now and then, but reminds me, in the quiet, 
 of a sportsman's fowling-piece rather than of a soldier's rifle. It 
 is past three o'clock, and the rifle-pit in which I am writing begins 
 to afford a little shade. Now that the days are longer and we can 
 
412 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 sit out of doors, my interest in these German books increases. I 
 
 wish would be looking about for something more, and send it 
 
 out, if the mails continue regular, in about a fortnight." 
 
 " KENT COURT-HOUSE, VIRGINIA, May 12, 1862. 
 " Three letters from you of different dates have just arrived. The 
 day has been quite hot and dusty, for the passing of so many men, 
 horses, and wagons have worn the sod away already. But how dif 
 ferent everything looks since I received these letters ! It was mere 
 ly hot and dull before, now it might have been ten times hotter and 
 duller, and these letters would have made up for all. So it would 
 have been if they had come to me as they should, one at a time. 
 But coming all at once, they are a greater pleasure, especially as 
 they are all in different tones. I have finished the French books, 
 but not Egmont' as yet. Have just received the ' Parasite,' and 
 hope to be able to hold on to it until I finish it. If we have no 
 longer marches than we have had recently, I shall have no trouble." 
 
 " FAIR OAKS, June 12, 1861. 
 
 " The Rebels continued throwing shell at intervals, and we had 
 orders to go out and see if we could not silence the guns. Most of 
 our available men had been sent in another direction ; but we mus 
 tered a dozen or twenty, and went along the front of our picket lines 
 for a good place to fire from. It was not easy to find, for the Rebel 
 guns were protected by the nature of the ground ; and that is per 
 haps the reason that they have been allowed to annoy us in this 
 way with impunity. It seems, beside, to be the object not to bring on 
 an engagement at present. The artillerymen say they have orders 
 not to fire. We found a place at last within sight of the Rebel bat 
 teries, but also within easy range of their grape and canister and 
 sharpshooters. It was at some old ruins on a ridge in a wheat-field, 
 their cannon "and sharpshooters being in the woods on the farther 
 side, three or four hundred yards off. It was very warm out there 
 in the sun. The stock of one of the rifles was blistered by it, and 
 the barrels were too hot to keep one's hands on. We relieved each 
 other by turns at the old ruins, while the rest stayed in the edge of the 
 woods. A swamp was near by, with quantities of magnolias." 
 
 "June 15. 
 
 " I have enjoyed the day very much, most in picking magnolias 
 for half an hour. It was a perfect delight. They grow on slim 
 
G-eorge Whittemore, Jr. 413 
 
 trees thirty feet high, so slender I could bend them down by 
 my weight, climbing up a few feet. The place was full of them, and 
 every one had five or ten buds just at the right stage for picking, 
 being half open. Many of the flowers are withered, many are in 
 the green hard bud, and others all the way between." 
 
 " FAIR OAKS, June 19, 1862. 
 
 " Our quiet life ended with May. On the 31st, we set out from 
 the camp two miles the other side of the Chickahominy, crossed the 
 river and swamp in water up to our knees, and stumbled on the 
 enemy. Before a line of battle was fairly formed, the firing began, 
 and our company, who have no place in a line of bayonets, and in 
 the hurry of the moment had been assigned no station, was ordered 
 to lie down. The shower of bullets fired over the heads of the line 
 fell all about us, but only one of our men was hit. The fight here 
 on Saturday night lasted not over an hour, but it was well after 
 dark before it was decided. While it lasted it was furious, not 
 broken for an instant, and at times swelling into a louder roar, like 
 gusts of wind in a storm, as the Rebels charged up to one or an 
 other part of our line. The battle of Sunday was in the woods, 
 and hidden from our view ; but we saw the regiments as they filed 
 in, saw the smoke, and s the wounded and prisoners as they were 
 brought out. Our division was not engaged, occupying the battle 
 field of the day before." 
 
 " July 2. 
 
 " Another hard day's fight and another hard night's march yes 
 terday. The Rebels attacked at noon, and the engagement contin 
 ued till long after dark. To-day we have rain, which perhaps pre 
 vents them from following. I begin now to long for one quiet day 
 without a battle. We have carried these rifles on our shoulders 
 lately, and it is wearing the men down fast." [These telescopic 
 rifles weighed from fifteen to fifty pounds.] 
 
 Whilst asleep in a barn, on one occasion, with men of his 
 own and other companies, Whittemore's rifle was stolen 
 from him. This happened a few days before the battle of 
 Antietam ; and at the commencement of that engagement he 
 was unarmed, and at liberty to be a non-combatant. He 
 was urged, if not actually ordered, to remain in the rear. 
 
414 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 This he could not do. He went coolly toward the front, 
 looking for a weapon. An officer saw him take a gun from 
 a fallen soldier and calmly load and fire until he was hit 
 and instantly killed. This occurred in the woods adjoining 
 the corn-field where Sedgwick's division met with its heavy 
 losses. The next day, when the ground came into posses 
 sion of the Federal army, his body was carefully and ten 
 derly buried by his comrades, with a headboard inscribed, 
 " Sergeant Whittemore." It was soon after removed to 
 Mount Auburn. There it rests in a spot that was a favor 
 ite resort of his while in college. It is situated on the 
 slope of Harvard Hill, an enclosure endeared by family 
 associations, and which he was careful to adorn and keep 
 in order. 
 
 In view of his exceeding worth to others, and as we think 
 of all he might have been had he remained with us longer, 
 we cannot help feeling and saying, " George Whittemore 
 died before his time." Yet it is only in this view, and only 
 as we thus think, that we are allowed to deem his death 
 premature. His life had already reached roundness and 
 completeness ; his spirit was already trained^ to follow in 
 its further growth its own aspirations. The memory of 
 that spirit remains with us still, a reality without a 
 shadow on its clearness. And yet, alas ! there are those 
 who will sometimes ask, 
 
 " But who shall so forecast the years, 
 And find in loss a gain to match ? 
 Or reach a hand through time to catch 
 The far-off interest of tears ? " 
 
Samuel Henry Hells. 415 
 
 1858. 
 SAMUEL HENRY EELLS. 
 
 Hospital Steward 12th Michigan Vols. (Infantry), February 7, 1862; 
 Assistant Surgeon, February 1, 1863 ; died at Detroit, Mich., January 31, 
 1864, of disease contracted in the service. 
 
 SAMUEL HENRY EELLS was the son of Rev. James 
 Henry and Maria Antoinette (Fletcher) Eells, and was 
 born in Oberlin, Ohio, August 19, 1836. A few months 
 after his birth, his father was drowned in attempting to 
 cross the Maumee River. Ten years later the family re 
 moved to Boston, and young Eells was placed at the Brim 
 mer Public School. Thence he was transferred to the 
 Quincy School, where he received a Franklin medal ; and 
 thence entered the public Latin School, where he was fitted 
 for college. In 1854 his mother died, and he came under 
 the guardianship of his uncle, George N. Fletcher, Esq., of 
 Detroit, Michigan. 
 
 His college life was quiet and uneventful, and most of 
 his classmates knew him very little. Yet he always looked 
 back with warm aifection upon this period and its associa 
 tions ; as was shown by a very cordial letter which he wrote 
 from Arkansas to the Class Secretary, three months before 
 his death, in which was enclosed a liberal contribution to 
 the Class fund. 
 
 He wrote in the " Class Book," just before graduat 
 ing : 
 
 " My plans for the future are yet somewhat undecided. I think, 
 however, of studying medicine. There has been a great number 
 of clergymen in the Eells family ; and my relations on my father's 
 side have been anxious that I should follow the example of my 
 father, grandfather, great-great-grandfather, and great-great-great 
 grandfather, besides a number of others not in the direct line. But 
 
416 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 for myself, I have been uniformly opposed to the idea, and am still 
 of the same opinion." 
 
 Accordingly, after graduation, he went to Detroit, Michi 
 gan, and began at once the study of medicine with Dr. C. 
 H. Barrett of that city, residing meanwhile in the family of 
 his guardian. He attended also the medical lectures of 
 Michigan University, at Ann Arbor, during the winter of 
 1861-62 ; but before his course of study was completed, the 
 war changed all his plans. 
 
 On February 7, 1862, he enlisted as Hospital Steward in 
 the Twelfth Michigan Volunteers (Infantry), then in camp 
 at Niles, Michigan. He took part in the battle of Shiloh, 
 where he was made prisoner, an experience which is 
 graphically described in one of his letters. 
 
 "PiTTSBURG LANDING, TENNESSEE, April 13, 1862. 
 
 "Mr DEAR FRIENDS, I have not heard a word from you 
 since I left Niles. Don't you write, or do the letters fail of coming 
 through ? I presume it is the latter. At any rate, I presume you 
 would like to hear from me, and to know that I am alive and unin 
 jured after this great battle. Well, I am so ; but I got my share of 
 the bad luck of last Sunday, for I have been a prisoner among the 
 Secesh until last night, and had rather a hard time of it ; but have 
 got back safe to our lines, and mighty glad I was to do so too. 
 
 " The papers will give you the details of the battle better than I 
 could do, but I will tell you all I know about it in brief. Our pick 
 ets had been skirmishing two or three days previously; but our 
 commanders do not seem to have known of the enemy's advance 
 in force. We had no artillery in the front, either, nor any strong 
 force on picket duty. On Sunday morning, about two o'clock, the 
 attack began on our camp. The pickets had been driven in within 
 a mile of the camp, and our men then went out to reinforce them. 
 You must understand that the attack began along the whole line 
 about the same time ; but the camps were disposed irregularly, and 
 ours was the first attacked at this point. The camp was not in 
 trenched at all, and the trees in front of it not even cut down. The 
 first that I saw of the fight was the line of our men drawn up a 
 little way in front of the tents, and firing at the enemy, whom I 
 
Samuel Henry Hells. 417 
 
 could not see. The Rebels greatly outnumbered us, but we were 
 in hopes our men could hold them at bay until reinforcements 
 should arrive. None came, however, and our men were gradually 
 forced back. They retired slowly, fighting as they went, and doing 
 splendidly for green troops, until they came to the camp. Then 
 the enemy began to come in at the sides as well as in front, 
 flanking is the technical term, and our men were forced to run 
 to escape being surrounded. All this time I was in the hospital 
 tents, helping to dress the wounded ; but I managed to run out once 
 in a while to see the fight. 
 
 " The wounded came in pretty fast, and soon filled up the hospi 
 tal, and then they were laid down on the ground outside. We were 
 all hard at work, and only just begun at that, when the rout began. 
 Everybody else was running off as fast as possible ; but the sur 
 geons resolved that they would not leave their wounded, and I was 
 not going either when my services were most required. Most of 
 the hospital attendants ran away, but some remained, and we con 
 tinued our work of attending to the wounded, though the bullets 
 began to come unpleasantly near and thick. One passed through 
 the tent, and within three inches of my head, as I was dressing a 
 wounded man, smashing a bottle of ammonia liniment that stood on 
 a box beside me, and sending the fluid right into my face and eyes. 
 Very soon the Rebels came pouring in on all sides. We, of course, 
 made no resistance, and they did not fire upon us, though some 
 levelled their guns at us, and we rather expected to be shot than 
 otherwise. I know I expected every moment to get hit, for the 
 balls were flying all around, though I do not think they were meant 
 for the hospital or any of us there. The ground outside was 
 covered with the wounded all around, and the yellow flag was 
 over the tent. I did not know but what I should get frightened in 
 the first battle ; but I believe I did n't. I was too busy ; and, if I 
 had been ever so much scared, I don't think I could have run off 
 and left our wounded crying for help. It was a pitiful sight, I can 
 tell you. I hope never to see the like again. Such groans and 
 cries for help, and especially for ' Water ! water ! ' all the time. We 
 could not attend to them half as fast as they needed, though we 
 worked as hard as we could. Soon after the first appearance of the 
 Rebels, General Hindman, of Arkansas, rode up, and placed a guard 
 over us, and assured us we should not be molested, though we must 
 
 VOL. i. 27 
 
418 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 consider ourselves prisoners. Two Rebel surgeons came up too, 
 and established their hospitals right by ours, and made liberal use of 
 our medicines and hospital stores. 
 
 " There we worked all day upon the Rebel wounded as well as 
 our own, for there were a great number of them brought there. 
 Towards night they commenced carrying the wounded away, and 
 Dr. Kedgie and I were sent off with the first load that went of our 
 men. During all the day we could hear the battle still going on 
 between us and the river, which was about four miles off; and every 
 now and then a shot or shell would come crashing through the trees 
 among us, but none of us happened to get hit. Our men were 
 slowly driven back to the river, and many of them were made pris 
 oners ; but when they got to the landing, the gunboats on the river 
 opened fire on the Rebels, and an immense battery of over a hun- 
 dred guns, it is said, on the bluff assisted, and the enemy's advance 
 was effectually stopped. This was about sundown, and next morn 
 ing General Buell arrived with fresh troops, another fight took 
 place, and the Rebels were driven back faster than they drove us 
 the day before. We prisoners, however, knew nothing of this ; for 
 we were marched off with many of our wounded men, some walk 
 ing and some in wagons, to a Rebel hospital about five miles from 
 here." 
 
 He remained a prisoner but a few days, there being an 
 agreement between the surgeons on both sides that the 
 wounded in the joint hospitals should be allowed to return 
 to their respective camps on recovery, and their hospital at 
 tendants with them. After his exchange, he took part in 
 the battle of the Hatchie, in the siege of Vicksburg, and in 
 the expedition into Arkansas, under General Steele. On 
 February 1^ 1863, he was promoted to be Assistant Surgeon 
 on the recommendation of his medical superiors, in spite of 
 his want of a diploma. A letter, written later in the sea 
 son, gives some account of the wearisome and exhausting 
 service on which he now entered. 
 
 " CAMP AT SNTDER'S BLUFF, MISSISSIPPI, July 25, 1863. 
 " I wrote you last from the Big Black. We have returned from 
 that interesting country, after staying long enough to more than 
 
Samuel Henry Eells. 419 
 
 treble our sick-list, and are back here in the old camp, but 
 expecting every day to leave. I understand our division is ordered 
 to Helena, Arkansas, and will leave as soon as transportation can be 
 furnished us. Helena is not -the most eligible place in the world to 
 go to ; but we shall be glad to get away from here, for we can hard 
 ly go to a worse place, unless it should be Vicksburg. That is 
 now the hottest, dirtiest, most unhealthy, and in every respect the 
 most undesirable place within our lines. The regiment marched 
 back here, but I was put in charge of over a hundred sick and con 
 valescents belonging to our brigade, to bring them around by rail 
 road from the Big Black to Vicksburg, and from there to this 
 place by boat, and a nice time I had of it. The heat was intoler 
 able, and the sand on the levee, over ankle deep, fairly scorched 
 one's feet through boots. We had to stay there more than twenty- 
 four hours before we could get a boat to take us on board, though 
 there were half a dozen lying across the river, with steam up ready 
 to go anywhere on the receipt of orders. We got off at last, how 
 ever, and brought all the men safely through. Our sick-list is larger 
 now than it has been for over a year, but there are very few se 
 rious cases. Intermittent fever is the prevailing disease ; and as 
 long as we can get quinine enough, we can manage that. We 
 have not lost a man since we came here, which is more than any 
 other regiment I know of can say ; in fact, we have only lost one 
 man by disease (and that was small-pox) since last November. 
 
 The new regiments suffer most, as would of course be expected 
 
 " I wish I could daguerreotype our camp for you. I have thought 
 that very often you could have so much better an idea of our situ 
 ation here than from any description. The position of the army 
 here would be interesting too, I should think, to you folks at home. 
 From the pictures in the papers of scenes that I know, I am satisfied 
 they can seldom approach the truth, and are not at all trustworthy. 
 If you could see the whole side of the high bluff covered with tents 
 for miles, tents now empty, for most of the soldiers that were here 
 are out at the Big Black, or in that vicinity ; the Rebel rifle-pits run 
 ning all along the edge of the slope, and ours too, sometimes paral 
 lel, sometimes crossing theirs ; the places for guns on every com 
 manding summit ; the Rebel ports partly grassed over now, with 
 the charred remains of gun-carriages, shot and shell lying among 
 
420 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 the weeds and brush ; the exploded magazines ; the caves the 
 Rebs lived in, dug in the side of the bluff ! Then if you could 
 go to Vicksburg, in the miles of captured works ; the big guns 
 that have killed so many of our brave soldiers, some dismounted, 
 some still in position and guarded by blue-coats ; then if you could 
 go into the town, see almost every building torn by shot and shells, 
 some with clean round holes through and through, some with great 
 holes in the roof, and the interior knocked into ruins by the ex 
 plosion of shell ; the streets full of filth, mingled with musket-balls, 
 grape, cannon shot, and every species of missile ; and above all, the 
 old stars and stripes floating from the cupola of the proud old Court- 
 House, the crown of the city, like the State-House at Boston ; the 
 gunboats in the river ; the chartered transports, miles of them lying at 
 the levee ; if you could see all these things, or if I could only give 
 you a pen-picture of them, you would get some idea of the war, of its 
 magnitude, and how it is conducted, how much it is costing every 
 day." 
 
 The results of these labors and exposures soon became 
 apparent. In August he was attacked by chills and fever, 
 followed by camp diarrhoea, and still later by ulcerated 
 sore throat, terminating in bronchial consumption. Early 
 in December he obtained leave of absence, and returned to 
 Detroit, very weak and unable to speak above a whisper, 
 but still retaining his courage and hopeful of ultimate re 
 covery. In the words of his guardian : " When he was 
 told, a few hours before his death, that he could not live, 
 he received it without a fear, and looked on death calmly 
 as his spirit went out, even after he had ceased to move a 
 muscle, being still conscious, seemingly to the last breath. 
 He fully believed God would do rightly with him, and did 
 not fear to trust Him." He died on the last day of Janu 
 ary, 1864. 
 
 Eells had previously written as follows, from the camp 
 near Brownsville, Arkansas, September 5, 1863, to Dr. F. 
 H. Brown of Boston, who was then collecting information 
 as to the Harvard military record : 
 
 "I enlisted as Hospital Steward in February, 1862, and in Feb- 
 
Samuel Henry Eells. 421 
 
 ruary, 1863, was promoted to Assistant Surgeon. Being with the 
 Army of the Tennessee all the time, I have had but little opportuni 
 ty to learn what was going on at the East, and particularly in Cam 
 bridge. I shall be glad to get any information with regard to my 
 Alma Mater and the doings of her sons, especially in the war, and 
 shall be happy to pay any sum which may be necessary for this 
 purpose." 
 
 Before the letter could be answered, he himself had 
 added, in his own modest and silent way, another act of 
 sacrifice to those noble deeds of which he wrote ; and the 
 sum which he contributed was his life. 
 
422 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 JAMES JACKSON LOWELL. 
 
 First Lieutenant 20th Mass. Vols., July 10, 1861 ; died at Nelson's 
 Farm, near Richmond, July 4, 1862, of a wound received at Glendale, 
 June 30. 
 
 JAMES JACKSON LOWELL was the younger brother 
 of General Charles Russell Lowell, whose brilliant ca 
 reer has been narrated earlier in this volume. He was born 
 at Cambridge, on the 15th of October, 1837, at the house of 
 his grandfather, the house now occupied by the raciest of 
 American poets, his uncle. He came of the best Massachu 
 setts stock, being descended on the father's side from John 
 Lowell, one of the framers of the Constitution of the State, 
 and a Judge in the United States courts, whose son, Francis 
 Cabot, was one of the two founders of American cotton man 
 ufactures, and father of the founder of the Lowell Institute 
 of Boston; and on the mother's side from Patrick Tracy 
 Jackson, co-founder with Francis Cabot Lowell of the city 
 of Lowell, and brother of Charles Jackson, Judge of the Su 
 preme Court of Massachusetts. His lineage is referred to 
 for no trivial purpose. Both branches of his family have 
 been long conspicuous for public spirit and the sense and 
 love of justice, qualities which were peculiarly marked 
 in James Lowell's character. 
 
 Lowell passed his early youth in Boston, and went through 
 the course o'f the public Latin School. His family had taken 
 up their residence in Cambridge before he entered college, 
 which was in 1854. In 1858 he was graduated, first scholar, 
 as his brother had been before him. His Class contained 
 men of excellent abilities, with whom he could be closely 
 joined by intellectual and moral sympathies ; among these 
 were Patten and Spurr, who served with him, the one in 
 the same regiment, the other in the same brigade, and met 
 
James Jackson Lowell. 423 
 
 the same fate ; nunc ipsa pericula jungunt I His classmates 
 were proud of him ; he was certainly one of the brightest 
 minds that had appeared in College for a long time. He was 
 liked quite as much as he was admired. His exterior was 
 very engaging, both his looks and his manners. His figure 
 was light and agile, his face radiant with intelligence and 
 moral sweetness. He was full of life, enjoyed keenly and 
 pursued eagerly, and crowded every hour with work or pleas 
 ure. While he would walk a dozen or eighteen miles for 
 wild-flowers, skate all day, and dance as long as the music 
 would play, he found no study too dry, and would have 
 liked to embrace all science and all literature. He was, 
 moreover, habitually meditative, and loved to ponder deep 
 questions of philosophy and of life. His pale, oval face, and 
 his dark, thoughtful eyes, with their drooping lashes, gave 
 an impression of a poetical nature, and the question was 
 often asked in his early days whether he was a poet. Biit 
 his expression was more spiritual and his bent more practi 
 cal than poetical : practical in a sense opposed to imagina 
 tive, not to philosophical, for, as already indicated, his incli 
 nation to speculation was marked. He always sought to 
 see things as a whole ; and though he liked to view every 
 subject in its great features, and in the best light consistent 
 with truth, he loved reality and hated illusion and exag 
 geration. 
 
 That Lowell should have begun early to take an interest 
 in public affairs and public men will readily be supposed 
 from what has been said. He thought it a duty to study 
 and act on all questions of public concern. In one of his 
 books he had written down these words of Marcus Anto 
 ninus : "Every action of yours which has not a near or 
 remote relation to the public good as its end, destroys the 
 harmony and uniformity of life." It is true that boys often 
 copy out these fine things in a glow of feeling, but nothing 
 was more unlike Lowell than superficial enthusiasm. In 
 an oration on " Loyalty," delivered at the College Exhibi- 
 
424 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 tion of October, 1857, he expressed his idea of the true 
 relation of a free citizen to the state in words which no one 
 can read lightly who knows how they were followed up. 
 After describing the inferior forms of devotion manifested 
 among nations who considered that the citizen existed only 
 for his country, he said : 
 
 " But among those who feel the blood of the Teutons running in 
 their veins, there is a loftier feeling even than this. Each feels 
 himself a whole, an individual, a being whose chief end is to live 
 independently for himself. He is willing and glad to die for his 
 country, but he must have his individual rights acknowledged. He 
 thinks that government the best which governs least : the state ex 
 ists for him, and not he for the state 
 
 " The distinction between fidelity and loyalty lies here : in the 
 latter the agent must be free, but even a slave may be faithful. 
 Loyalty is the feeling of one who is independent and self-relying ; 
 but a dog may show fidelity 
 
 " Where is there a more touching example of devotion to free 
 dom and to truth than that of Korner, the warrior-bard? In 1813 
 he writes to his father : ' Germany rises : the Prussian eagle by the 
 beating of her mighty wings awakes in all true hearts the great 
 hope of German freedom.' He then declares his intention to go 
 forth, and adds : ' That I simply offer my life is of little import : 
 but that I offer it crowned as it is with all the flowery wreaths of 
 love, of friendship, and of joy ; that I cast away the sweet sensa 
 tions which lived in the anticipation that I should never cause you 
 inquietude or anguish, this is indeed a sacrifice which can only 
 be opposed to such a prize, our country's freedom.' 
 
 "Let us especially cultivate it, for it belongs to youth, to the 
 heroic age: -let us not prove recreants. Like the world in its 
 youth, let us be strong in loyalty : but while it was loyal to per 
 sons, let us be loyal to principles. One man is but a narrow limit, 
 but a principle is broad as the earth and high as heaven, and with 
 the enlargement of our ideas and views, the field of loyalty also is 
 enlarged. This is the loyalty of to-day and of the future, and we 
 should be leaders in extending it. There needs not a great soul 
 to make a hero : there needs a God-created soul which will be true 
 to its origin ' : therefore let us be foremost in proclaiming our loyalty 
 
James Jackson Lowell. 425 
 
 to our intuitions For is not a liberal education a sham and a 
 
 deception, if it does not clear our intuitions, and expand our minds 
 in every direction ? But the heroes will be, not those who recite 
 best here, or those who know the most, but those whose knowledge 
 best clears their perceptions. Yet clear-sightedness alone will not 
 suffice : firmness and perseverance, true grit, must be added, and 
 then we have the man who is needed now, the man who is loyal to 
 the highest principles, with whom matters of personal interest yield 
 to the state, the state to conscience." 
 
 While Lowell was in college, one of his classmates says, 
 he liked all studies, and had arguments for and against all 
 professions, but inclined most to the law. When the time 
 came to decide, he wisely chose the law. His impartial and 
 philosophical mind fitted him peculiarly for the science of 
 jurisprudence, and he would have made an admirable judge. 
 After some study of the introductory T30oks at home, he 
 entered the Cambridge Law School in 1860. The events 
 of the winter of 1860 - 61 occupied much of his thoughts. 
 He regarded with warm indignation the expedients proposed 
 to save the Union by the sacrifice of liberty, and seeing a 
 more excellent way, began to drill diligently that he might 
 be ready to do his part. When Sumter fell, his brother 
 Charles went straight to Washington, and applied for a 
 lieutenancy in an artillery regiment. James Lowell con 
 ferred with his cousin William Putnam, who was also then 
 studying at the Law School, and in June they began enlist 
 ing men for a company of the Nineteenth Massachusetts 
 Regiment, to be commanded by Mr. Schmitt, the German 
 instructor in the College. When they had raised eighty- 
 five men, and the officers were ready to be commissioned, 
 orders were given to transfer this company to the Twen 
 tieth Regiment. Almost all the men refused to join 
 the Twentieth, and therefore the work of recruiting had 
 to be done over again. The time at which this regiment 
 was raised was unfavorable for enlisting, and the conse 
 quence was, that neither in numbers nor in quality were 
 
426 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 the rank and file up to the average. It is well known 
 that the admirable character of the officers (more than a 
 score of whom were from Harvard College) made the 
 Twentieth Regiment, notwithstanding its original inferi 
 ority, one of the most efficient and distinguished in the 
 whole service. 
 
 Lowell and Putnam received their commissions as First 
 and Second Lieutenants on the 10th of July. A nobler 
 pair never took the field. Putnam with his fair hair, bright 
 complexion, deep eyes, and uncontaminated countenance, 
 was the impersonation of knightly youth. He was our Eu- 
 ryalus, quo pulchrior alter nonfuit Aeneadum. The cousins 
 were beautifully matched in person, mental accomplish 
 ments, and pure heroism of character. The regiment was 
 ordered to the seat of war at the beginning of September. 
 Captain Schmitt's company was the smallest of the ten. In 
 October, Lowell writes that there are fifty vacancies, a 
 dispiriting state of things for both men and officers ; but, 
 though strongly condemning the practice of forming skele 
 ton regiments to the detriment of those already in the field, 
 he was resolved to make the best of circumstances. 
 
 After a few days at Washington, the Twentieth was or 
 dered to Poolesville, Maryland, where it lay in camp until 
 the 20th of October. On the 18th of that month Lowell 
 writes to Patten : " Hitherto our life has been like a perpet 
 ual picnic ; work enough, perhaps drudgery enough, but 
 
 also open air enough, and in a way freedom enough 
 
 We have been here in quiet so long, that we scarcely feel 
 as if this were war; but the bloody fight may come any 
 day, when may we be victorious, live or die." The bloody 
 fight came alas! without the victory in three days. 
 On the 21st of October was fought the battle of Ball's 
 Bluff, in which so many brave men were slaughtered for no 
 military purpose. Lowell was shot in the thigh, Captain 
 Schmitt very badly wounded, and Putnam killed. The deep 
 gloom which followed that most unnecessary calamity will 
 
James Jackson Lowell. 427 
 
 not soon be forgotten. Our only consolation was the gal 
 lant behavior of our troops in a desperate situation, and the 
 firmer resolution which misfortune inspired in an earnest 
 people. Patten and Ropes, two of our best, went into the 
 Twentieth Regiment soon after this battle, Patten in Put 
 nam's place. 
 
 Lowell made light of his wound and wanted to stay with 
 his regiment ; but what with his fear of being an encum 
 brance, and his hope of returning sooner to duty, he yielded 
 to advice and went home. He remained with his family 
 from the middle of November to the beginning of February. 
 He had the less trouble from his wound on account of his 
 vigorous health. There was not a sounder man in the army ; 
 indeed, he was never off duty except while getting well of 
 this hurt. While he was at home, some of his classmates 
 presented him with a sword, to replace one which had been 
 lost in the dreadful confusion of Ball's Bluff. The formal 
 letter in which he acknowledged the gift contained a pas 
 sage which, as a main object in collecting these biographies 
 is to illustrate the spirit with which our soldiers went into the 
 war, deserves especially to be recorded. When the Class 
 meets in years to come, he says, and honors its statesmen 
 and judges, its divines and doctors, let also the score who 
 went to fight for their country be remembered, and let not 
 those who never returned be forgotten : 
 
 " Those who died for the cause, not of the Constitution and the 
 laws, a superficial cause, the Rebels have now the same, but 
 of civilization and law, and the self-restrained freedom which is 
 their result. As the Greeks at Marathon and Salamis, Charles 
 Martel and the Franks at Tours, and the Germans at the Danube, 
 saved Europe from Asiatic barbarism, so we, at places to be famous 
 in future times, shall have saved America from a similar tide of 
 barbarism ; and we may hope to be purified and strengthened our 
 selves by the struggle." 
 
 Once more with his men, he would have been fully con 
 tented if his company had not been so small. When re- 
 
428 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 emits came in, being free to choose, they always preferred 
 to join the large companies. Having one day to go out to 
 battalion drill with only five files, his spirits sunk a little, 
 but only for a moment. This is the way he expresses him 
 self in his letters : 
 
 " I am quite well again, and feel ready for any march which the 
 men could stand. Lander's famous marches must have been on 
 harder ground than we have here : such a march would be simply 
 impossible here on most days. But we have not so far to go to find 
 the enemy. Whenever the work comes I shall try to do my part, 
 and whatever my fate is then, we know that it will be for the 
 best. 
 
 " You must not think that I fret over our small company, be 
 cause I write for recruits. I thank mother for her good advice, 
 but I rarely feel that any injustice has been done our company, and 
 then I have only slight suspicions. I much more commonly attrib 
 ute all the blame, if blame there is, to ourselves, and feel that there 
 may have been something wrong somewhere, or that we are not in 
 our proper places, and are not so well fitted as others for military 
 matters 
 
 " I determined to do what I could to get recruits ; but I can do 
 very well without them if I must." 
 
 On the llth of March the Twentieth left the camp at 
 Poolesville, and were transferred to the Peninsula. They 
 reached Yorktown on the 8th of April, and remained there 
 until the evacuation of that place on the 4th of May. The 
 regiment took no part in the actions at Williamsburg and 
 West Point. They went up the York and Pamunkey to 
 White House. On the 25th, Lowell writes from Chicka- 
 hominy Creek, regretting that he is not in the advance with 
 his brother. The severe fighting at Fair Oaks occurred 
 on Saturday, the 31st of May, and Sunday, the 1st of June. 
 The Twentieth was engaged the first day, but was not in 
 the worst of the fight ; on Sunday they were only spectators. 
 Lowell describes as follows what he saw of the affair of Sat 
 urday, in a letter to a young friend : 
 
James Jackson Lowell. 429 
 
 " We have at last been engaged in a regular battle, though the 
 Rebels have been so shy in using their big guns that shells are a 
 rarity, and grape and canister are still unknown to us. At Ball's 
 Bluff we had very severe firing for the space occupied. It was as 
 if a whole regiment were firing at a wall ten feet square ; the bul 
 lets within that space would be very thick. At Yorktown we saw 
 the Rebels far off in their works, and occasionally saw and felt their 
 
 bullets and shells At West Point we were held as a reserve ; 
 
 and the reserves not being called into action, because the first line 
 and the gunboats drove the Rebels back, we scarcely saw the evo 
 lutions of our own battalions and brigades on the wide plain 
 
 The scene of the fight was just hidden by a wooded hill ; but our 
 batteries were actively engaged within sight. At Fair Oaks we 
 had a foretaste of what is coming before the forts of Richmond. 
 .... On Saturday we had an inspection under the Colonel, and 
 soon afterwards we heard firing in front, and being ordered for 
 wards, though the firing had then ceased, we advanced by a new 
 road through an interminable swamp, and across the Chickahominy ; 
 and then, after a pause to load our pieces, we went on again ; and 
 the cannon beginning once more, we dashed forward through a 
 brook up to our waists and mud up to our knees, and came up into 
 the field of battle in the midst of random shots. The right and 
 centre of the line were already formed and engaged, and shells 
 were flying from both sides. At the centre was a house with out 
 buildings ; near this was a battery of ours, and the battle raged 
 warmly. We formed into line in the rear of the centre (on the 
 right by file into line). As we had been fairly on the run for some 
 minutes, the companies, especially those near the left (since we were 
 marching by the right flank), were broken, and I supposed that 
 some of my own weaker and doubtful men had fallen out on the 
 way. Much to my delight I found that every man was there. The 
 line was formed and dressed, amid much confusion from contrary 
 orders, &c., and the bullets which missed the line before us came 
 whizzing round our heads. The man on my left, one of my cor 
 porals, was mortally wounded, and the corporal next on my right, 
 of the next company, had a ball strike the ground directly before 
 his left foot, and I felt it slightly myself; but I had at no time in 
 
 the fight even a slight graze We marched forward a few 
 
 paces in line of battle close to the Fifteenth Massachusetts, when 
 
430 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Tom Spurr, a classmate of mine, called out to me and waved his 
 sword. But we were soon faced to the left, and marched round to 
 the left of the line, re-formed our own line, with the Seventh Michi 
 gan of our brigade on our left, and marched steadily forward to fire 
 and charge on the enemy, if they waited for us to come. 
 
 " The regiment on the right (Thirty-fourth New York, of our di 
 vision, Gorman's brigade) was a little in front at first, and although 
 the regiment had had a bad reputation at Poolesville, and since we 
 entered Virginia, yet it went forward with great firmness, halted 
 and delivered its fire, advanced again and fired, and would have 
 charged, had not the fire already cleared the woods in front of all 
 the active Rebels. We were even with them before their second 
 fire, and advanced across a fenced road, on the opposite side of which 
 a wood lay before our right wing, and a very deep plain (five hun 
 dred yards perhaps) before our left wing. The Seventh Michigan 
 had another wood in front of their left wing (this wood was not 
 very far from us, as the two regiments joined each other). There 
 was at first a line of Rebels in front of us, and the shots came across 
 the field, but only a scattering fire. As we approached the fence 
 beyond the road, we were on the watch for a sudden attack from 
 behind it, but the Rebels fled back and scattered over the field. 
 The men opened a fire on them, thinking that orders had been giv 
 en, or else the first man from impulse and the others from imitation. 
 We at once stopped them and crossed the fences. Then a volley 
 came from the Rebels in front of the woods on the left, at the Sev 
 enth Michigan. It was very heavy, and looked beautifully in the 
 gloomy twilight. Then we fired with a will, and drove the Rebels 
 back into the woods, and the fight was at an end. We stacked 
 arms and rested where we were, without sleep throughout the 
 night, establishing pickets, and sending out small parties for strag 
 glers and the wounded. With cavalry, or an hour more of daylight, 
 we could have taken a great many prisoners. We secured, as it 
 was, men of twelve different regiments and seven different States. 
 Though we looked for harder work the next day, the men had been 
 so cool and brave, not a man of E shrunk back after we formed 
 the line, that we felt ready for anything. Rebel arms, and here 
 and there their owners, lay scattered about. Our regiment lost two 
 men shot dead, and about seventeen wounded ; one of Company E, 
 at least, mortally. But no volley was fired at us directly, I think ; 
 
James Jackson Lowell. 481 
 
 though I may be mistaken, and there were many bullets which 
 found their way towards us. On Sunday morning we were ready 
 before daylight, and we saw Rebel horsemen and skirmishers in 
 front ; but our batteries had come up in force, most had been un 
 able to get over the river and marshes in time for Saturday's fight, 
 and the Rebs soon beat a retreat from that point. About two 
 hours later, six, A. M., they attacked the left of our force, which was 
 now very large, and for many hours a fearful fire was kept up at 
 that point ; but we could only see the smoke and hear the reports 
 of the guns, and see our new troops constantly entering the woods, 
 for the line was long, the fields wide, and the fight just within the 
 woods. About noon the Rebels retired, unsuccessful in their at 
 tempt to drive us into the river or butcher us. All our troops 
 moved towards the left, and in the afternoon and night an attack on 
 us (we then occupied the centre of the field and the right of the 
 line) was expected, as the balloon had reported very large reinforce 
 ments on their way from Richmond. 
 
 " We had many alarms, but the Rebels did not attack us, and on 
 Monday we secured our position, buried the dead, collected the 
 arms, &c., but got little rest. Since that time we have been on 
 picket duty near the railroad and turnpike, and have now been un 
 able to take off our arms or equipments for a week. We are under 
 arms, ready for an attack, about half the time, day and night, but 
 have had no attack yet ; and I think the Rebel rank and file will 
 scarcely be brought to attack us again, where they have been dis 
 comfited so signally. They had a partial success Saturday morn 
 ing, as at Shiloh on the first day, and in part for the same reason, 
 it is hinted ; but the punishment followed more quickly on this oc 
 casion than the other, for we punished them on the same day. The 
 Rebels did their best to drive us across the river, and laid a deep 
 plot, but we defeated them. They had meant to make it a three 
 days' affair rather than fail ; but their disaster Sunday taught them 
 the impossibility of success, and Monday was quiet." 
 
 The battle was followed by twelve days of extremely fa 
 tiguing duty, which very few of the regiment bore as well 
 as Lowell. He writes thus to his classmate Hartwell : 
 
 " Our fight of the 31st and 1st was followed by the hardest work 
 yet put before us, ten days of unceasing vigilance in the face of 
 
432 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 the enemy. Rain or shine, night or day, we were under arms at 
 the slightest alarm, and remained in line for an hour or two ; we did 
 not mean to be surprised, like Casey's division. For twelve days 
 we kept on our clothes and equipments. As knapsacks and bag 
 gage were not brought near us for nearly that length of time, we could 
 not have changed our clothes even if we had been able to call fifteen 
 or five minutes our own. We were washed by the rain, and then 
 dried ourselves in the sun, or before fires, which were permitted in 
 the daytime. For five days we have been in the rear, near enough 
 the front line to be turned out in case of firing, but far enough back 
 to sleep half of the nights without equipments on, and to indulge in 
 frequent baths ; also to pitch our shelter-tents and think a little of 
 our meals. But even in this place of comparative rest, three, A. M. 
 always finds us in line of battle, and for an hour and a half we are 
 ready for the attack of the enemy. Six o'clock used to seem an 
 early hour to arouse us for prayers, but our day seems nearly half 
 gone at that time." 
 
 Lowell remained near Fair Oaks until the 28th of June. 
 He had entire confidence in the skill of McClellan, and felt 
 sure of his success. He knew nothing of what was prepar 
 ing for the Army of the Potomac, and very little of what 
 was going on. Like a true soldier, he was intent on doing 
 what his hand found to do, even though he was working in 
 the dark. He writes to Hartwell on the 26th : 
 
 " Sunday [22d] was a quiet day with us, but we have since had 
 skirmishes at our front, in which we were generally rumored to be 
 advancing, and yet found our forces in their old position at night, 
 the movements being merely reconnoissances on one side or the 
 other. But to-day there has been quite heavy firing on our left, 
 and we are at last rumored to have advanced, and remained for 
 ward We think we are gaining ground upon the Rebels, not 
 
 merely because we are not losing it (at first we were content with 
 that), but because we beat them generally in the skirmishes. But 
 it is very hard to learn the truth about these little fights ; some men 
 talk one way, some the other, and one can rarely tell which to 
 believe 
 
 " I don't wish to be shot in a skirmish or on picket, but in a real 
 fight, if I am to be hit again 
 
James Jackson Lowell. 433 
 
 " The fighting yesterday [at Oak Grove] was quite severe, and 
 the loss quite heavy; but we still hold our advanced position. 
 To-day our part of the lines has been quiet ; but there has been 
 very heavy cannonading, and probably a severe battle on our 
 right in Porter's corps [Mechanics ville]. It is rumored that he 
 has driven back Stonewall Jackson, and turned the left flank of 
 the enemy ; and all our camps have rung with cheers since dark. 
 But the Rebel bands are playing away vigorously in front, perhaps 
 for a reported victory ; perhaps to deceive and bother us ; perhaps 
 to keep up the spirits of the Rebels ; perhaps, and perhaps, and 
 perhaps. As the truth now appears, it is our own bands, which 
 have been dumb for a month, but are now allowed to play ; but we 
 hear the Rebel drums after. We are looking for orders to march 
 at any moment, and I really have hopes of seeing Richmond before 
 this month is ended 
 
 " June 27. All right, except that we are still in camp ; but a 
 brisk cannonading is going on." 
 
 This is the last letter Lowell ever wrote. The orders 
 came, but not to march on Richmond. He was ordered to 
 Savage's Station (being then in command of his company) 
 to destroy ammunition, and on the 29th joined in the re 
 treat across the Peninsula. He led his company until the 
 afternoon of the 30th, when he received a mortal wound in 
 the fight at Glendale. He was shot in the abdomen while 
 the regiment was advancing over an open field. To those 
 who came to help him when he fell he said, " Don't mind 
 me, men, go forward." He was carried to a neighboring 
 farm-house, which had been taken as a hospital. When told, 
 in answer to an inquiry, that his wound was probably mor 
 tal, he said that he was as ready to die as to live, were it not 
 for his friends. " He felt that his death was altogether right, 
 and hoped they would think so at home." In the evening 
 Patten was brought in wounded. Lowell asked that his 
 comrade might be laid next him, took his hand and held it, 
 and talked of the sudden termination of his life without a 
 regret. When our troops moved on, and orders came for 
 all who could to fall in, he insisted on Patten's leaving him. 
 
 VOL. i. 28 
 
434 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Patten asked if he had no messages for home. " I have 
 written them all," he said ; " tell them how it was, Pat." 
 The officers of his regiment who went to bid him farewell 
 tell us that the grasp of his hand was warm and firm and 
 his countenance smiling and happy. He desired that his 
 father might be told that he was struck while dressing the 
 line of his men ; besides this he had no message but " Good 
 by." He expressed a wish that his sword might not fall into 
 the enemy's hands, a wish that was faithfully attended to 
 by Colonel Palfrey, through whose personal care it was pre 
 served and sent home. All who saw him testify to the per 
 fect composure of his mind and to the beautiful expression 
 of his face. Two of our surgeons who had been left with 
 the wounded at the farm were much impressed by his be 
 havior, and one of them told the Rebel officers to talk with 
 him, if they wished to know how a Northern soldier thought 
 and felt. He lingered four days, and died on the 4th of 
 July. A private of his regiment wrapped him in a blanket 
 and laid him to rest under a tree. The name of the place 
 is Nelson's, or Frazier's, Farm. 
 
 Lowell was among the earliest of the Harvard soldiers to 
 fall by the hand of the enemy. Colonel Peabody preceded 
 him about three months, having been killed at Pittsburg 
 Landing, and Major How died on the field in the same bat 
 tle in which Lowell received his mortal wound. He was 
 also the earliest to fall of seven kinsmen, the lives of five 
 of whom will be found in these volumes. 
 
 While the soul of this noble young soldier was passing 
 slowly away, his sister, who had for some time been serving 
 as volunteer nurse on a hospital steamer, was lying at Har 
 rison's Bar, on the James River, only a few miles off. She 
 heard of his dangerous wound, and tried every expedient 
 to get to him, but without success. Three years after, that 
 same sister, who had continued all this while in the hospi 
 tal service, set out from Richmond to find her brother's 
 grave. Following the line of our army's retreat from Fair 
 Oaks, in his very footsteps, she with some difficulty tracked 
 
James Jackson Lowell. 435 
 
 out the farm-house, and at last discovered the tree which 
 marked the place of his burial. The day happened to be 
 June 30th, the anniversary of that on which he was wound 
 ed, and the grave was found at about the same time in the 
 afternoon when he was brought into the hospital. The re 
 mains were removed by affectionate hands in the succeed 
 ing November, and deposited in Mount Auburn beside those 
 of his brother. 
 
 This was a short life, only a span long : but if the essen 
 tial thing in life be the bringing of our wills into free co 
 operation with the will of God, this life of less than twenty- 
 five years was yet complete. That harmony once achieved, 
 and immortality so assured, it can be of little moment 
 whether dissolution comes sooner or later. Though the 
 final act of sacrifice has importance in our eyes, as setting 
 a visible seal to his integrity, we see, and we should see 
 without surprise, that it cost Lowell no struggle. The 
 serenity with which he received the summons of death 
 must not be misunderstood. It did not come from blind 
 enthusiasm, nor even from an unusual exaltation of feel 
 ing. It was also as remote as possible from apathy : it had 
 no character of insensibility. It has already been said that 
 his enjoyment of life was intense. No one had a keener 
 relish for its every-day pleasures. It was crowned for him, 
 in Korner's words, " with the flowery wreaths of love, of 
 friendship, and of joy." No one could be less indifferent to 
 the grief his death would cause at home ; no one could 
 have taken a deeper satisfaction in witnessing and assisting 
 in the extension of knowledge and the improvement of the 
 condition of mankind. The coexistence of this vivid enjoy 
 ment of the world with a readiness to relinquish all its de 
 lights and hopes at a moment's call, has been portrayed 
 and explained by the one who knew him best, in these verses. 
 
 " Twin fountains sent forth Our Delight. From one 
 Came all that Nature to her darling brings 
 To make a lover of each looker on ; 
 Fair gifts not graces yet nor rooted quite ; 
 Fair silver vessels for the golden fruit. 
 
436 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " But lest the lover's soul, dizzy with joy, 
 Lost in a perfumed cloud should lie before 
 The lovely and the fair, crying, ' No more, 
 I want no more,' from the twin fountain flowed, 
 Deep, simple, stern, a rill of Hebrew life. 
 ' Lord, I am thine : do with me as thou wilt ; 
 Set thou my feet aright ; they seek thy goal/ 
 Thus prayed this rich-fraught soul, and in his thought 
 Beheld himself a pilgrim weak and poor." 
 
 A minuter analysis than it is possible to go into here 
 would show a rare symmetry in Lowell's character, the re 
 sult of a religious discipline acting upon a pure and generous 
 nature. His whole life, says one who knew it all, was u lu 
 minous with love." Even in childhood his love was not the 
 accidental, unspiritual attachment of most boys. Though 
 impetuous, and by no means wanting in energy of will, he 
 was docile and modest. The eagerness with which he pur 
 sued his objects occasioned him many trials of temper, and 
 the self-chastisement which was thus required kept him 
 from thinking highly of himself. He never excused his 
 faults, or used any sophistry in extenuating them, but felt 
 them keenly and repented of them humbly. Towards him 
 self he was rigid ; but though he expected every man to do 
 his duty, for a sense of justice is generally recognized as 
 his distinguishing trait, he was lenient to others. Though 
 he was not given to the expression of religious sentiment, 
 he lived habitually near to God, and in lowly dependence 
 upon him. In a book of extracts, he entered, probably 
 about the time of his leaving college, some lines of Ben 
 Jonson, as & sort of charge to himself, which may serve as 
 an epitome both of his character and of his career. 
 
 " That by commanding first thyself thou mak'st 
 Thy person fit for any charge thou tak'st ; 
 That whatsoever face thy fate puts on, 
 Thou shrink or start not, but be always one ; 
 That thou think nothing great but what is good, 
 And from that thought strive to be understood : 
 These take, and now go seek thy peace in war ; 
 Who falls for love of God shall rise a star." 
 
Edward Bromfield Mason. 437 
 
 EDWARD BROMFIELD MASON. 
 
 Asst. Surgeon 14th Mass. Vols. (1st Mass. Heavy Artillery), March 1, 
 1862 ; Second Lieut. 2d Mass. Cavalry, June 4, 1863 ; died September 14, 
 1863, at Readville, Mass., of injuries received from an accident in camp. 
 
 EDWARD BROMFIELD MASON was born July 2, 
 1837, in Boston. He was the son of William Powell 
 and Hannah (Rogers) Mason, and the grandson of Jona 
 than Mason, who was United States Senator from Massa 
 chusetts from 1800 to 1803. As a boy, he was unusually 
 attractive in person and character, uniting in an uncommon 
 degree gentleness and warm affections with a spirit of daring 
 and cool courage that helped him out of, as well as led him 
 into, many difficulties. 
 
 After going through the usual course of studies in vari 
 ous schools, at fifteen years of age he accompanied his par 
 ents to Europe, and the eighteen months passed there de 
 veloped and fostered a love of adventure, and an enthusiasm 
 for the beautiful in nature and in art, which were most 
 marked features in his character. Naturally modest, and 
 free from any inclination for display, it was only to his 
 most intimate and sympathetic friends that he showed him 
 self freely. With them, his graphic descriptions of what had 
 most interested him abroad, his vivid imagination, his lively 
 and genial humor, and his intense enjoyment of everything 
 that was striking and beautiful in life, imparted a singular 
 glow and charm to his conversation. 
 
 On his return from Europe, at the close of the year 1853, 
 he was fitted for Harvard College by Mr. Samuel Eliot, and 
 entered the Sophomore Class in July, 1855. He graduated 
 with his Class, and after leaving college commenced the 
 study of medicine with Professor Wyman and Dr. Nichols 
 at Cambridge. At this period an incident occurred, strik- 
 
438 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ingly illustrating his kind feelings, his fearlessness, and his 
 disregard of self. A fellow-student, with whom he was but 
 slightly acquainted, was suddenly attacked with a severe 
 form of small-pox. Being at a distance from his relatives 
 and friends, he suffered much from want of suitable attend 
 ance and nursing; and the nature of his disease and his 
 limited means rendered it difficult to obtain assistance. Ed 
 ward, regardless of his own exposure, pitying his helpless 
 and friendless condition, visited and watched with him, and 
 thought so little of these charitable acts that they never 
 came to the knowledge of his family and friends until he 
 himself was taken down with the varioloid in consequence. 
 
 Before the completion of his medical course, the war of 
 the Rebellion broke out, and both he and his brother were 
 anxious to bear their part in defending the Union. Their 
 father, however, just slowly recovering from a long and 
 dangerous illness, which left it uncertain how far he might 
 regain his former state of health, felt so unable to meet the 
 trial of parting with both of his sons at once for so danger 
 ous a service, that they promised that one of them should 
 certainly remain at home with him. The oldest, in Novem 
 ber, 1861, was appointed Aid to Major-General McClellan. 
 Edward, however, remained at home, completed his medical 
 course of studies, and, in July, 1861, after passing a very 
 good examination, received his diploma of M. D. 
 
 No longer occupied by a daily attendance at Cambridge, 
 at the Medical School and the Hospital ; in a high state 
 of health, with a vigorous frame, an active imagination, and 
 a courageous spirit; excited by the daily reports from 
 our armies, he felt a renewal of his original desire to 
 enter the service. He became restless and uneasy, and ex 
 pressed himself strongly as feeling that he was put in a 
 wrong position by remaining quietly at home, while so many 
 of his companions were in the field, or hastening thither to 
 join our Massachusetts regiments. Under these circum 
 stances, his parents, seriously questioning whether they were 
 
Edward Bromfield Mason. 439 
 
 justified in taking advantage of his affection for them, and 
 any longer opposing a desire so natural, patriotic, and hon 
 orable to him, consented to release him from his promise, 
 with the understanding that he should apply for a commis 
 sion as Assistant Surgeon, instead of a more exposed posi 
 tion in the line. , 
 
 To this limited release, he finally, with reluctance, as 
 sented, having previously set his heart upon obtaining a 
 second lieutenancy in a regiment in which some of his 
 former companions were commissioned. After waiting 
 anxiously for a length of time, he finally received a com 
 mission as Assistant Surgeon in the Fourteenth Massachu 
 setts Volunteers, commanded by Colonel W. B. Greene, 
 then stationed at Fort Albany ; and in February, 1862, he 
 joined the regiment. 
 
 As month after month rolled by, and while other regi 
 ments passed to the front, the Fourteenth still remained sta 
 tionary to guard the capital, he became very impatient at 
 the continued inaction ; and but for the pain he knew he 
 would give his parents, would willingly have taken any po 
 sition which would bring him into more active service. 
 
 The dull routine of his duties at Fort Albany was, how 
 ever, unexpectedly interrupted in August, 1862, by an 
 order sent to Colonel Greene to join the Army of the Po 
 tomac, and advance towards the enemy. Dr. Mason wrote 
 home in great spirits at the prospect before him. 
 
 On the 28th of the month, near Fairfax Court-House, 
 Colonel Greene found a cavalry force of the enemy twice 
 as large as his own before him, commanded by General Fitz- 
 Hugh Lee. An immediate attack was expected, which 
 was not made, however, owing to the strength of Colonel 
 Greene's position. Unfortunately the Surgeons, Drs. Dana 
 and Mason, while selecting a house for the accommoda 
 tion of the wounded, just outside the lines of their regi 
 ment, were suddenly captured and taken to the head 
 quarters of General Lee. Here Dr. Mason unexpectedly 
 
440 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 met his former classmate at Cambridge, W. F. Lee, nephew 
 of General R. E. Lee, and a Colonel in the Rebel service. 
 He received the prisoner kindly, and presented him to 
 the General, who, after examining him very closely as to 
 the position and numbers of our troops, released him and 
 his companion, retaining their horses, equipments, and at 
 tendants. Dr. Mason's replies to General Lee's questions 
 proved very satisfactory to Colonel Greene. 
 
 In a letter to Dr. Mason's father, referring to these inci 
 dents, Colonel Greene writes as follows : - , 
 
 " The Doctor was very cool throughout the whole business. The 
 principal surgeon reported that Dr. Mason wanted to fight when he 
 was captured, and that he refused to give up his pistol until he was 
 ordered to do so by Dr. Dana, his immediate superior, who expressed 
 great admiration of his assistant. 
 
 " Dr. Mason told me, when he made his report, that he would 
 apply to Governor Andrew for a position in the line, and that I 
 would soon lose the power of ordering him to the rear. He asked 
 me to give him a letter of recommendation, and to state in it that I 
 
 thought he would do better in the line than as a surgeon I 
 
 gave him as good a letter as I knew how to write. It was certainly 
 my opinion that he would make an excellent line officer." 
 
 Dr. Mason, on writing home, said that Colonel Greene had 
 given him a very handsome letter of recommendation. 
 
 After an absence of about three weeks, the regiment re 
 turned to Fort Albany, much to the disappointment of Dr. 
 Mason, which disappointment was enhanced by the resigna 
 tion of Colonel Greene, which took place shortly afterwards. 
 Early in December, however, he received an order from 
 head-quarters to serve as medical director on the staff of 
 Colonel Cogswell, acting Brigadier-General ; but in January, 
 1863, Colonel Tannett, the new commander of the Four 
 teenth, ordered him to Maryland Heights to look after four 
 companies of the Fourteenth, which were stationed there. 
 He then wrote to his father : 
 
 " I had long wished to make a change and to obtain if possible a 
 
Edward Bromfield Mason. 441 
 
 commission in the First Massachusetts Cavalry, when my present 
 position as medical director was offered me. I accepted it with 
 pleasure, and desired to retain it as long as possible, hoping that 
 something might turn up in the mean time ; but now that I am com 
 pelled to return to my former position and go to Harper's Ferry, 
 this wish of mine is strengthened, and I have decided to write an 
 application to the Governor, desiring him to transfer me from the 
 medical staff, and commission me as a line officer in either the First 
 or Second Massachusetts Cavalry. I am afraid you will consider 
 this step as rash and ill-advised. I am sorry on your and mother's 
 account to feel compelled to take it, but I am not satisfied to re 
 main as Assistant Surgeon in my present situation for the rest of 
 the war, attending only to the sick, and without any opportunity of 
 obtaining experience in the surgical part of my profession. Colo 
 nel Cogswell, who will probably be confirmed as Brigadier- General 
 in a few weeks, has promised to take me on his staff as aide-de 
 camp. If you still feel opposed to my making this change, please 
 write." 
 
 After much delay, during which, following the wishes 
 of his parents, he applied for a transfer as Assistant Surgeon 
 from his present position to a regiment in the field, and 
 found that such a transfer was against the regulations, he 
 accepted a commission as Second Lieutenant in the Second 
 Massachusetts Cavalry, offered him by Colonel Lowell. 
 
 In August he sent in his resignation as Assistant Surgeon, 
 and shortly afterwards reported himself at Readville, where 
 a part of the regiment was recruiting. At an evening pa 
 rade, his horse, an undisciplined one, reared and fell back 
 wards upon him, inflicting a serious injury, which after a 
 fortnight of severe suffering proved fatal to him. 
 
 The following extract from a tribute to his memory which 
 appeared in the papers shortly after his death, from the pen 
 of a friend in no way connected with him, will show how 
 those estimated his character who had an opportunity of 
 forming an unprejudiced judgment of it. 
 
 " No careful observer of his thoughtful and expressive face can 
 have failed to see beneath that clear serenity a latent power capable 
 
442 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 of being brought into earnest action ; and in the nameless slight 
 courtesies, addressed to those who most needed them, which mark 
 the true gentleman, no one could have hesitated to recognize the self- 
 forgetfulness which led him to brave the peril of a fearful disease, 
 from which the umid shrank, in order to minister to the extreme 
 needs of a friend. All honor to the simple goodness which would 
 have refused praise for a deed which was doubtless a necessity to 
 his kindly nature, a deed which won for him the respect of many 
 who would have hesitated to follow his example. 
 
 " Endowed with all the qualities that make home lovely, amia 
 ble, unselfish, intelligent, with a touch, if we mistake not, of 
 romance, which might instigate the possessor to swerve a little from 
 the beaten track, this young man seemed born to make brighter the 
 fortunate circumstances in which he was placed by Providence, 
 while a rare modesty secured the regard of all who really knew 
 him." 
 
 The delineation of Dr. Mason's character in this extract 
 will be accepted by all who knew him intimately as emi 
 nently just. Should those who formerly felt an interest in 
 the subject of this memorial find that it accords with their 
 view of his character, void as it is of any brilliant deeds or 
 great services, they may possibly believe with the writer, 
 that if Dr. Mason had been permitted to follow his inclina 
 tion from the first, he would have borne himself as bravely 
 in defence of his country as those noble companions of his 
 who fell in the field ; and would probably have found with 
 them a soldier's grave. 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 443 
 
 HENRY LYMAN PATTEN. 
 
 Second Lieut. 20th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), November 25, 1861 ; First 
 Lieut., October 1, 1862 ; Captain, May 1, 1863 ; Major, June 20, 1864 ; 
 died at Philadelphia, Pa., September 10, 1864, of a wound received at 
 Deep Bottom, Va., August 1 7. 
 
 HENRY LYMAN PATTEN, of the Twentieth Massa 
 chusetts Volunteers, was born in Kingston, New 
 Hampshire, on the 4th of April, 1836. His father, Col- 
 cord Patten, and his mother, Maria (Fletcher) Patten, were 
 substantial New England people, whose children (Henry 
 being the youngest) have all become worthy citizens. His 
 early life gave bright promise of distinction. His sin 
 gularly quick intelligence and love of books caused him, 
 after the usual course of district schools, to be entered at 
 the public Latin School of Boston. There he displayed 
 great abilities, and thence, having graduated with honors 
 and prizes as a medal scholar, he passed into Harvard 
 College in July, 1854, after a very creditable examina 
 tion. 
 
 At this time Patten was a fine specimen of the college 
 student. He was short, but straight, compact, well-knit, 
 vigorous, and elastic. In later years, his shoulders filled 
 and broadened so as to remove any idea of insignificance his 
 small stature might have caused. His face, with its regu 
 lar features, was thoroughly handsome. Remarkably frank 
 and open, it was the trustworthy index of his character, and 
 his passport to confidence and love. His cheeks were ruddy 
 and glowing with health, his keen, blue eyes full of light 
 and meaning, his lips mobile and expressive, his remarkably 
 broad and shapely forehead indicative of rich mental gifts. 
 His college career was a great success. He was almost 
 equally proficient in all the prescribed studies, except the 
 
444 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 modern languages, but perhaps showed the most skill in 
 the classics and metaphysics. Through several college 
 terms he ranked, with slight exertions, as the third or 
 fourth scholar in a class of nearly a hundred. Lack of 
 money, however, (an inconvenience which vexed him for 
 many years,) forced him to be absent through part of his 
 course, employed in teaching schools or private pupils. 
 Even this double pressure and distraction of attention only 
 slightly lowered his numerical rank, and did not touch his 
 prestige among his fellow-students and professors as a bril 
 liant and thorough scholar. 
 
 His character was, in college, a singular mixture of boy 
 ishness and maturity. He was almost excessively fond of 
 athletic and outdoor sports, and passed nearly as much of 
 his college career on the Delta as in the recitation-room. 
 He was a quick and daring football player, and one of the 
 best cricketers in the Class. A friend writes of him, that 
 " his only fault as a cricket-player was that he was too rash, 
 and was frequently put out in attempting to make runs 
 when the ball was almost in the hand of the bowler of the 
 opposite side." So fond was he of college sports, that he very 
 often neglected the Class tasks to play out a match-game, or 
 for a walk, or for skating, or sometimes, it must be owned, 
 for a favorite book, or agreeable company, or a friendly 
 idle chat. The impression he always created was that of 
 frankness, generosity, courage, quickness, intelligence, and 
 an overflow of good-humor and animal spirits. His address 
 was always j)leasing, his words select and forcible, and all 
 his utterances direct and frank. He had no reservations. 
 Sometimes his perfect candor made him talk to people 
 whose own actions or habits had chanced to become the 
 topic of discussion, with a plainness which would have been 
 offensive, had it not been so evidently the free utterance of 
 his whole opinion. There was no worse thing left in his 
 mind to be said after his hearer's back was turned. Some 
 times his ready apprehension, jumping at the end of the 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 445 
 
 sentence before it was finished, made him interrupt the per 
 son talking with him by his own terser response; some 
 times his emphatic style of assent or dissent was unpleas 
 antly brusque : but his vivacity and vigor, and the general 
 bonhommie of his bearing, made him an excellent conversa 
 tionalist and an agreeable companion. 
 
 Being sociable in disposition, and disliking even to study 
 alone, he would seek out a comrade whenever possible. 
 He was an active member, in successive years, of the Ano- 
 nyma, Institute of 1770, Psi Upsilon, and Hasty Pudding 
 Club, and of a much-prized private club. With a fine ora 
 torical delivery, and ringing, melodious voice, he became an 
 effective as well as fluent debater, his countenance being 
 always earnest, honest, and full of expression. He was, 
 too, it may be added here, an unusually good writer, as his 
 college dissertations, exhibition parts, and, above all, his 
 exceedingly entertaining letters, attest. But if among his 
 many noble traits frankness be selected as the most strik 
 ing, his generosity holds at least the second place. He 
 was generous to a fault, spending his money instantly on 
 getting it, yet never on himself alone. He was as chari 
 table in opinions as with money. One of the most judicious 
 of his comrades has said : 
 
 " I do not remember ever to have heard him speak ill of any 
 person not present. I know no one with more liberality in judging 
 other's actions, or more sympathy with the feelings and sufferings 
 of others, or a more prompt and indulgent appreciation of the temp 
 tation under which a wrong or mean action might have been com 
 mitted, than Patten. Nevertheless, he was wonderfully firm in 
 sticking to his own opinions and practices, and settled in his con 
 victions." 
 
 College days being over, and his Commencement speech 
 pronounced, Patten turned to the law. It was the summer 
 of 1858. A twelvemonth earlier, in vacation, he had writ 
 ten to a friend from Kingston : 
 
446 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " My brother, though not a lawyer exactly, is the ' squire,' and 
 has an office in which are several law books, a dozen or so, into 
 which I now and then peep. I think you and I will never repent 
 our choice of a profession. I never have seen a sensible fellow yet 
 who has studied law and did not think it the best of pursuits." 
 
 But the omnipresent question of finances again came up, 
 and the result was a year's devotion to teaching, with the 
 view of accumulating money enough to carry him through 
 a similar period of law study. It need hardly be added that 
 this plan took three years for its accomplishment, instead of 
 one, and was not then entirely successful. After some effort 
 he became a tutor in the Free Academy at Utica, New York. 
 There he kept up a correspondence with some old friends, 
 and sighed to be in Cambridge, " studying law and read 
 ing Plautus." 
 
 His year at Utica being ended, Patten returned home, 
 and being still compelled to postpone his law studies, 
 obtained a situation as private tutor, through the aid of 
 President Walker of Harvard University, who had always 
 been his friend. His pupil, George Appleton, a youth of 
 eighteen, was a grandson of William Appleton of Boston, 
 and son (by a former marriage) of Mrs. Arnold, herself 
 a daughter of George W. Lyman. Her residence was 
 at Montgomery, Georgia, twelve miles from Savannah, on 
 the beautiful Vernon River. Thither Patten went for a 
 year, in the autumn of 1859. As at Utica, he was en 
 tirely successful and highly prized. His leisure was spent 
 in reading ^and healthy exercise. His letters are full of 
 surprised pleasure at the delightful aspect of nature in 
 that region. He passed many days in shooting the abun 
 dant small game, his pupil being extremely fond of field 
 sports. For a while the genial tutor was quite enam 
 ored of his pursuit (though he got surfeited in due time) 
 and enthusiastically wrote : " When you ride horseback 
 or row, you are likely to be thinking about ordinary 
 cares all the time, post equitem sedet atra cura, and 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 447 
 
 perches on the oar-blade, too. But when a covey of par 
 tridges start, whirr, whirr, whirr ! away fly all thoughts 
 but those of the game." In one of his admirable Savan 
 nah letters to friends, we find a scholarly criticism on Dr. 
 Eliot's rendering of the word dpTray/juov as " to be robbed," 
 in a sermon which he discusses. Controversial theology 
 and all metaphysical thought had always great charms for 
 him ; and, with congenial comrades, he would speculate 
 earnestly on these topics for hours together on long walks 
 or before the evening fire. He was much pleased, while 
 at Savannah, with the writings of Hansel. His letters, 
 also, are full of earnest, but candid discussions of sla 
 very. He tells with fidelity what he sees of it. His the 
 ory is that of " necessary evil for the present." He desires 
 its speedy end, but finds " many excuses and palliating cir 
 cumstances for slaveholders," and " insurmountable diffi 
 culties at present " in its legitimate removal. Meanwhile 
 he " can never forget the immense injustice on which the 
 system rests." Politics he reviewed quite as earnestly, it 
 being the year of the Presidential election. His early edu 
 cation and subsequent experience had attracted his sympa 
 thies to the " Constitutional Union" party, whose candidates 
 were Bell and Everett ; but his preference for Mr. Seward 
 had been so strong, that he would gladly have voted for him 
 as the Republican nominee. In the spring of 1860, he at 
 tacked Blackstone again, though not very earnestly, and 
 found " no book more interesting." But lighter reading, as 
 of favorite novels, like " The Virginians," was better suited 
 to the approaching summer ; and outdoor pleasures made 
 him, he says, " dwindle in mind and grow fat in body." 
 As his engagement approached an end, he sighed for 
 " Northern air " and for a more ambitious career. 
 
 In the summer of 1860, accordingly, he returned North, 
 and, still unable to pursue his law studies, he accepted, in 
 September, an assistant professorship in the Academic De 
 partment of Washington University, St. Louis, offered to 
 
448 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 him by his friend Chancellor Hoyt of that University. Here 
 our young pedagogue passed another very successful year, 
 and thence, at last returning, he entered the Cambridge 
 Law School in the summer of 1861, and at the same time 
 received a proctorship in the College. But his legal 
 studies were of brief duration. The great war of Rebel 
 lion, which was to make, to crown, and to terminate his 
 career on earth, had already come. Some of his old com 
 rades were already in the field. In August, directly on 
 returning to Kingston from the West, we find him eager 
 to have a share in the good cause. One of his letters " be 
 lieves it not immodest to say " he could fill a second lieu 
 tenancy as well as some who had been commissioned. But 
 he was working against great obstacles. He writes to an 
 intimate friend : " I feel with you on the military question, 
 
 .... but I have no prospect of a lieutenancy. 
 
 would not lift a finger for me, as he does not wish me to 
 go. But if I could have a lieutenancy, I would accept." 
 He adds, that the want of vigor in the war " alternately 
 drives me frantic and depresses me " ; and closes by asking, 
 " Can you send me up a manual of tactics ? " 
 
 The Twentieth Massachusetts marched away to the front 
 in September, and a month later, at Ball's Bluff, received 
 its baptism of blood. On hearing this news, Patten, who 
 had chafed so long to be away, breaking loose from all 
 hindrances, devoted himself forever to the country. The 
 example of his intimate friend Lowell, for whom he had 
 always great admiration and affection, which were most 
 thoroughly ^reciprocated, had greatly influenced him, as it 
 did many other college classmates. The repulse at Leesburg 
 ploughed grievous gaps in the ranks of the Twentieth, which 
 many young heroes sprang forward to fill, a score for every 
 lad who had fallen. In Company E, Captain Schmitt and 
 First-Lieutenant J. J. Lowell were wounded, and the gal 
 lant Second-Lieutenant Putnam killed. Patten instantly 
 applied to succeed young Putnam, and, thanks to his pres- 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 449 
 
 ence, character, and record, and the enthusiastic support of 
 his friends, after exciting competition, succeeded. He was 
 long on the tiptoe of expectation ; but, resolved to fight in 
 the good cause at any rate, presented himself in the regi 
 mental camp not only before a commission had been given 
 to him, but even before he had had a nomination. A letter 
 soon after, sent to Cambridge, expresses his exultation at 
 his appointment. 
 
 " CAMP BENTON, November 15, 1861. 
 
 " DEAR A , Appointed at last ! one of the fortunate two, 
 
 out of thirty applicants. I have spent a week of anxiety, however. 
 It was doubtful about my appointment, Colonel Palfrey being de 
 termined to select the two he considered the best. For all I know, 
 you are the other. He sent two names to the Governor, of which 
 
 mine was one The officers of this regiment are fine fellows, 
 
 and I consider myself fortunate to be among them. Will you dis 
 pose of my goods and chattels, and have cash paid ? And could 
 you talk with Mr. Lowell about the things I want ? . . . . Tell the 
 Professors why I did not see them and bid them good by. May 
 you soon be with me ! " 
 
 Henceforth the history of the Twentieth Massachusetts 
 is Patten's history. He never was absent, till death, from 
 any battle in that remarkable series of battles which it 
 fought. He never was absent even from any great march 
 or any severe duty. He had taken the resolve to cling to 
 the regiment so long as it carried its banner or its name. 
 His undivided soul was in his country's cause. "We are in 
 for the war," he used to say till the fatal bullet found him, 
 " though it last twenty years." Never, except when struck 
 down on the field or prostrate from disease, did he accept 
 even a brief furlough, and that he reluctantly consented 
 to snatch only when no arduous labor or peril was in 
 prospect. He always hurried back to camp, in trepida 
 tion lest something might have happened and he away. 
 Under his eye, and in his daily round of bivouac, march, 
 and battle, the Twentieth dwindled away to a fragment, filled 
 
 VOL. I. 29 
 
450 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 again, and again and again dwindled and filled, till he saw 
 only in its unquenchable spirit the sign of what he found 
 it in the Maryland camp. 
 
 Some of Patten's young friends joined in buying him a 
 handsome swcrd, which they sent with a complimentary let 
 ter. It was a grateful present for a double reason. Till it 
 arrived, he wore a sword which had been lent him. When 
 it came, his letter of thanks pleasantly traced different 
 parts of the weapon and accoutrements to individual giv- 
 ers> the point, the hilt, &c., according to fanciful anal 
 ogies. " The belt," he concludes, addressing the original 
 source of the little gift, " is yours. For all hangs upon 
 that, and that clasps the closest. But the rest shall be 
 undivided." 
 
 When once he had resolved to give his life to the country, 
 Patten, as was said, went to camp on the chances of a com 
 mission; and fearing he might fail of one, even after ap 
 pointment, he writes thence, " I firmly intend to go in as 
 private rather than go home." Many weeks elapsed, dur 
 ing which he was without rank, sword, or uniform. One 
 letter, in his impatient hand, says he has " expected his 
 
 commission every night for the last two weeks We 
 
 are afraid of dull inactivity this winter. But, pshaw ! I 
 can't write anything till I am settled. I am feverishly im 
 patient." His commission as Second Lieutenant of Com 
 pany E bore date November 25, 1861. That winter he 
 passed with the Twentieth, of Lander's brigade, in Camp 
 Benton, at Poolesville, Maryland, diligently studying, his 
 eyes and "ears wide open to his new duties, and his heart 
 permeated with ever-increasing loyalty and devotion. His 
 letters vividly picture these new experiences, and especially 
 the guard duties, the guard on a beautiful night, with a 
 huge open fire, and the camp-fires of the evening's pickets 
 glimmering against the dark Virginia mountains. " One 
 does not sleep much under such circumstances," wrote 
 Lieutenant Patten ; "there is a little romance in it." Heat 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 451 
 
 once showed himself a thorough and admirable officer ; yet 
 he of course thought otherwise. " My military education," 
 he says, u conies on slowly. Theoretically, I do very well, 
 and find no difficulty in managing my peaceful company. 
 But the grand air is preciously wanting in your humble 
 friend." 
 
 Towards the end of February Lieutenant Patten, who had 
 been chafing all winter at the general inactivity, exultingly 
 writes a hurried line : " We really expect an advance, and 
 the thought thrills every fibre of us. An advance ! and 
 battle ! perhaps death, surely victory and glory. The 
 regiment is ready, on, on to Richmond and victory." 
 Shortly after, in March, the division, Sedgwick's, moved 
 across the Potomac and up the Shenandoah Valley nearly 
 to Winchester in support of Banks's movement, and then 
 was withdrawn to Bolivar. During this operation, our 
 Lieutenant insisted that he had slept better in the open air 
 than under any roof. 
 
 The great Peninsular campaign followed, beginning in 
 April, 1862. At Yorktown, Lieutenant Patten got his first 
 sight of siege and battle. Thence Sedgwick's division 
 was despatched in the column which occupied West Point ; 
 but the Twentieth was only drawn up in support in the ac 
 tion there. The whole of Sumner's corps was now north 
 of the Chickahominy, while those of Keyes and Heintzelman 
 were south of it. By so faulty a disposition the enemy was 
 sure to profit. When at Fair Oaks, on the 31st of May, the 
 left wing of the army was driven back, the danger was im 
 minent. But Sumner, hearing the thunders of battle from 
 the left bank of the river, and reading the necessities of the 
 hour with the inspiration of a genuine soldier, marched au 
 canon, without waiting for orders. Sedgwick's division was 
 in advance, crossed the swaying and dangerous Chickahom 
 iny bridge, made a forced march through the deep mire 
 all day long, and at six at night, after the greatest exer 
 tions, reached the scene of action and deployed column. 
 
452 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 It was not too soon. The enemy, driving all before him, 
 was sweeping down upon our troops with a destructive fire. 
 Sumner at once hurled at him the head of his gallant col 
 umn, composed of Dana's and Gorman's brigades, five 
 excellent regiments in all. In Dana's was the Twentieth 
 Massachusetts. The troops streamed with fixed bayonets 
 into the woods, amid great enthusiasm, checked the enemy's 
 course, drove him back in confusion, and saved the day at 
 Fair Oaks. " That one act of heroic duty," says the histo 
 rian of the Potomac Army, " must embalm brave old Sum- 
 ner's memory in the hearts of his countrymen." 
 
 Sumner's line was again engaged next day for several 
 hours. Then followed the turning of the right wing of the 
 army at Beaver Dam Creek, and the memorable seven days' 
 retreat to the new base on the James. In that terrible 
 time of trial, which brought out from every soldier what 
 ever of virtue there was in him, Patten's gallantry and man 
 liness were so brilliant as to receive special official mention 
 in the report of his commanding officer. In three succes 
 sive battles, at Gaines's Mill, Savage Station, and White 
 Oak Swamp, Sumner's columns held off the exultant rush 
 of the enemy with stubborn grip, and met each dash of 
 Magruder with an answering blow, till the army and all its 
 trains had safely traversed the swamp. But it was a week 
 of hourly fighting and marching. The swamp being passed, 
 the next day, June 30th, A. P. Hill and Longstreet, surg 
 ing up against our rear, were repulsed with great loss in the 
 battle of Glendale. Here Dana's brigade was conspicuous, 
 and the Twentieth Massachusetts plucked fresh laurels, 
 though by the loss of many priceless officers and men. 
 Both officers of Company E were among the wounded, 
 Lieutenant Lowell mortally, Lieutenant Patten with a deep 
 flesh wound in the leg. They were carried from the field 
 and laid side by side in the field hospital. The danger 
 ously wounded, here as elsewhere, fell into the hands of the 
 enemy as he rolled onward in fresh surges, after each re- 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 453 
 
 coil, down the Peninsula. Anguished with pain, Patten 
 nerved himself to go forward with his company and regi 
 ment the same night (the battle was on a Monday after 
 noon), and, exchanging farewells with his comrade, found 
 rest at length for his wounded frame in the camps of the 
 army at Harrison's Landing. 
 
 His duty done, and his anxiety for his company (thence 
 forward under his own charge) being set at rest, he began 
 to feel the effects of his wound. Not dangerous in itself, 
 it was capable of becoming so by further neglect. During 
 the battle he had refused, with characteristic endurance, to 
 yield to it, and had led his company, after Lowell's fall and 
 after his own hurt, till the fighting was done, and they took 
 him away. Colonel Palfrey, his commanding officer, viv 
 idly recalling Patten's conspicuous bravery on that day, 
 wrote thus more than two years after : 
 
 " It was not till the battle of Glendale that he had an opportuni 
 ty to display that singular constancy of which the harder service of 
 his after life furnished numerous instances. His determination on 
 that occasion, when he fought through the battle after receiving a 
 painful wound in the leg, made a deep impression upon me ; and it 
 gave me sincere pleasure to make particular mention of him in my 
 official report of that engagement. His subsequent conduct more 
 than justified the reputation he then acquired." 
 
 A few weeks prior to this letter, the same officer directly 
 addressing a letter of sympathy to Patten, then struggling 
 with his sixth and final wound, had said, " I know your 
 pluck and toughness are almost unequalled. After seeing 
 you fight through Glendale with such a wound, .... I feel 
 that you can bear anything." While, however, his praise 
 was in the mouths of all his brother officers, and especially 
 of his own men, who from that time idolized him, Patten 
 seemed unconscious of having done anything worth men 
 tioning. Indeed, it was nearly a year before he learned 
 that he had been officially mentioned and recommended, for 
 gallantry on that day. He seldom, if ever, explained per- 
 
454 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 sonally his part in the conflict, and never except for pur 
 poses of general illustration, in answer to questions. 
 
 As for that injury which his commander called " such a 
 wound," he made light of it, never would have mentioned 
 it had it not Deen necessary. But, in truth, he had suc 
 cumbed at Harrison's Landing, and they had sent him 
 North among the wounded. Instantly on arriving at An 
 napolis he hastened to discharge the duty which had been 
 weighing on him during the passage ; and, with characteris 
 tic modesty and self-forge tfulness, wrote this letter, of which 
 the first five words and the last two sentences seem, in the 
 original, to have been written some time after the rest : 
 
 " IN HOSPITAL AT ANNAPOLIS, July 5, 1862. 
 
 " DEAR , I write to you sad news, for I know not how to 
 
 write directly to the . I telegraphed to-day to Dr. Walker, 
 
 but very briefly. Jimmy [Lowell] was mortally wounded, in just 
 the same way as Putnam, only more severely, in the fight last Mon 
 day afternoon. When I came in from the field, I found the bri 
 gade surgeon and the two regimental surgeons dressing his wound. 
 He was entirely free from pain ; and, while perfectly aware of his 
 situation, was cheerful and quite talkative. He could not be moved, 
 and we had to leave him behind in a hospital, in charge of one of 
 our surgeons. Of course, as we evacuated that night, the enemy 
 has possession of the hospital. The battle was about a mile and a 
 half, I should think, from White Oak Swamp. As Jimmy fell, 
 knowing at once that his wound was fatal, he said to some of his 
 men, who stopped a moment to assist him, ' Never mind me, men ; 
 go forward.' .... Colonel Palfrey has his sword. They would not 
 let me take it, as it was then quite uncertain whether I could take 
 care of it, and moreover I felt very uncertain whether I should 
 escape the hands of the Rebels. I forgot to say that such was the 
 nature of Jim's wound that Dr. Hay ward said he could not live 
 through the night. 
 
 " You must either tell this to the family yourself immediately, 
 or, what perhaps would be better, get some old and intimate friend 
 of the family to tell them. 
 
 " I hear that Charley is wounded. I suppose you know all about 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 455 
 
 it. I shall be in Boston in the course of a week, having a slight 
 wound in the calf of the leg from a smooth-bore musket. Love 
 to all. 
 
 HENRY." 
 
 The simplicity of this letter forms only an ordinary ex 
 hibition of his traits and his character. Never, either with 
 tongue or with pen, had he anything to say of his own ex 
 ploits. His thoughts are always with others and for others. 
 As in the present case, the fall of a comrade makes the news 
 of the battle " sad news," no matter how glorious his own 
 conduct, how narrow his escape, or how joyful his safety 
 and prospects. A word at the end of this letter alone ex 
 plained his " slight wound," so described as to make it 
 appear nothing, if he had not unthinkingly mentioned his 
 danger of falling into the enemy's hands and his physical 
 inability to take care of a dear companion's sword. So it 
 was with all his wounds, even to the mortal one. This was 
 the way in which he announced his own exploits and first 
 wound to his friends at home. 
 
 Now, therefore, the young soldier took perforce his first 
 furlough, believing the campaign over, and seeking, before 
 the next one, health for his exhausted frame and healing 
 for his wounds in the bracing air of his New Hampshire 
 home. As he limped about with his cane, his astonished 
 friends found him already developed into a thorough sol 
 dier. He was enthusiastic for the cause, for the Army of 
 the Potomac, and never tired of sounding the praises of his 
 regiment, making up for this generous profuseness of 
 eulogy by his extreme reticence and modesty with regard to 
 himself. He was hardly at home when, unexpectedly, 
 news came of Pope's disastrous campaign. Heedless of the 
 remonstrance of his kind surgeon, away he went on his 
 cane, with his wound unhealed, and, to his inexpressible 
 satisfaction, reached his regiment before it had again en 
 countered the enemy. The battle of Chantilly followed on 
 the 1st of September. There the brigade fought, and then 
 
456 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 brought up and covered the rear of Pope's retreat to Wash 
 ington. Without pause succeeded the great Maryland 
 campaign, consisting of the brilliant battle of South Moun 
 tain, and the terrific and decisive engagement of Antietam. 
 At this latter battle the regiment was most severely en 
 gaged, with very great loss of officers and men ; and Patten 
 was reported to be " in the thickest of the fight." These 
 actions were on the 14th and 17th of September, and closed 
 up the long battle-summer. When, some months later, 
 the fearful losses among the officers of the Twentieth gave 
 young Patten a chance for promotion, his commission as 
 First Lieutenant bore date October 1, 1862. It was a 
 grade tolerably well earned. 
 
 Not long after he received from certain friends the assur 
 ance that, if he would consent to it, he should have a ma- 
 jorship in a new regiment, and all the rest and recreation 
 possible in a long recruiting service at home. The bait 
 might have been tempting, considering his exhaustion, and 
 the fact that some of his young friends were reaching colo- 
 nelships and brigadier-generalships without having been 
 through a half of his service. But it had no attraction for 
 him. With no lack of ambition, he would yet have served 
 always in his subordinate position, rather than have been 
 the commanding officer of any other regiment. 
 
 Burnside's brief but bloody campaign followed. In the 
 memorable attempt to carry the heights beyond Fredericks- 
 burg, the first thing necessary was to throw pontoon-bridges 
 across the Jlappahannock. For hours the Confederate 
 sharpshooters in the town foiled every effort to do this, 
 murderously thinning with their fire the working parties 
 and all their supports. The whole of our artillery then 
 converged its fire on the town, tearing it to pieces and set 
 ting it on fire. Even this was unavailing. Hall's brigade, 
 consisting of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Massachusetts 
 and Seventh Michigan, " volunteered," as General Couch 
 reports, as a forlorn hope for a new and perilous scheme now 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 457 
 
 resolved upon. They were three of those five regiments of 
 Sedgwick's division who had routed the enemy at Fair Oaks. 
 This brigade was sent down the steep bank unsupported, and 
 at its foot they sustained for fifteen or twenty minutes the 
 enemy's cutting fire, while open boats could be prepared 
 and pushed into the stream. In these unprotected boats 
 the brigade, by several instalments, made the passage of the 
 stream, under concentrated fire, till they had gained the 
 cover of the opposite bank. "The affair," says Mr. Swin- 
 ton's History, " was gallantly executed, and the army, as 
 sembled on the northern bank, spectators of this piece of 
 heroism, paid the brave fellows the rich tribute of soldiers' 
 cheers." But the harder half of the task remained. This 
 was the ordeal of marching straight through the town, and 
 driving out the picked marksmen who, having been forced 
 back from the bank, had now taken refuge in the houses. 
 This most severe of trials was too much even for the other 
 fine regiments of the brigade, and the Twentieth marched 
 alone through the town, in column of companies, with the 
 fire of unseen Rebels wasting them in front, in rear, and on 
 either flank, from every house, till the street was strewn 
 with their dead, and nearly one hundred officers and men, 
 being one in three, lay killed or wounded within fifty yards. 
 Nevertheless, they carried the town and the bridge was 
 laid. The brigade commander reported that he "cannot 
 presume to express " what is due to " the Twentieth Regi 
 ment for its unflinching bravery and splendid discipline." 
 Next day the regiment held the extreme right of Couch's 
 corps, in the murderous charge up Marye's Heights ; and a 
 cross-fire of artillery and musketry ploughed lanes in the 
 ranks of the column. The Twentieth lost sixty of about 
 two hundred ; and many supporting regiments broke and 
 fled from the field. In this two days' attempt on Fred- 
 ericksburg, it lost one hundred and fifty-seven killed and 
 wounded, out of the scanty three hundred and seven to 
 which the Peninsula and Antietam had brought it down. 
 
458 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 Patten was one of the two or three officers who were in the 
 thickest of all and escaped unhurt. 
 
 But we must, henceforth, hurry into lines what is worthy 
 of volumes. The next great action for the Twentieth, and 
 consequently for Patten, was Chancellorsville, where the 
 division (the Second of the Second Corps) was assigned 
 to General Sedgwick's famous column on the left, which 
 carried Fredericksburg, stormed Marye's Heights, threat 
 ening Lee's whole army with destruction, and, when Hooker 
 had failed like Burnside, held the line of outposts till all 
 had recrossed the river. 
 
 Meade now succeeded, and Gettysburg was fought. In 
 that tremendous three days' battle the Twentieth, as usual, 
 was under the hottest fire. It was in that division, for 
 example, on Cemetery Ridge, which, during the battle of 
 July 3d, received Pickett's magnificent charge with pluck 
 as matchless. The crest was soon covered with dead and 
 wounded ; but all who survived of the attacking column 
 remained prisoners on the ridge. The Twentieth Mas 
 sachusetts carried to Gettysburg ten officers and two hun 
 dred and eighteen men. Of these, seven officers and one 
 hundred and one men fell in the action ; three officers 
 and one hundred and sixteen men came out unscathed, 
 or too slightly wounded to be reported. Patten was twice 
 wounded, but even after his second wound refused to quit 
 the field. One wound was in the leg, the other in the hand. 
 The middle finger of his right hand was amputated. 
 
 That his wounds might the sooner heal, Patten took 
 a furlough. It was a twelvemonth since he had been 
 home. He now received the rank of Captain, antedated to 
 May 1, 1863 ; he had had the satisfaction, at least, of per 
 forming its duties on a lieutenant's rank and pay for a full 
 year. On this visit, as always, he was full of enthusiasm 
 for his company, his regiment, and, above all, for the im 
 mortal cause. He was loud in his praises of McClellan 
 also, of whose military skill he remained an unyielding 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 459 
 
 champion to the end. On all these points he was never 
 tired of talking, and they seemed to absorb the whole of his 
 once varied and changeable thoughts. There was little 
 now in the army to keep him away from home ; but he re 
 turned, as usual, at the first moment, and went through all 
 Meade's exhausting series of marches and manoeuvres, 
 which resulted in the battle of Bristoe, where Warren thor 
 oughly repulsed A. P. Hill. Warren's Second Division did 
 this work, and the Twentieth captured two of the five guns 
 there taken. Soon after, Patten marched with the army to 
 Mine Run ; and his regiment, deployed as skirmishers, drove 
 in the enemy's skirmishers at Robertson's Tavern with 
 memorable rapidity. 
 
 Patten's days were now nearly numbered. He came 
 back from Mine Run with a debilitating disease of the 
 bowels, almost surely fastened upon him for life. One 
 whiff of fresh Northern air was all he would allow him 
 self. Against the remonstrances of friends, he rushed 
 back to camp the moment he had strength to perform 
 even a part of his duties. On the 24th of January, 1864, 
 he writes : 
 
 " MY DEAR MOTHER, It is indeed a rare luxury to receive 
 
 a letter both from mother and in one week. I am duly 
 
 grateful. There is nothing to excite your sympathy for the poor 
 soldier just at present, except his loneliness. The weather is fine, 
 our camp is clean and cheery, our quarters comfortable, and our 
 regiment in lovely condition. I am perfectly well. 
 
 " I am most sorry to hear that you and father are not well. I 
 shall probably come home and see you by and by. But I must 
 wait until all the rest have had their turn, on account of my visit 
 home in November last. 
 
 " There is no news to tell you. Most of our old men have re- 
 enlisted ; but we did not want to go home as a regiment, so we took 
 the conscripts of the Nineteenth, and let them go. 
 
 " We are in for the war all of us, and the Twentieth will retain 
 its name and organization for three years more, if the war lasts so 
 long. 
 
460 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 "He who puts his hand to the plough must not look backward. 
 And as for the chances of life or death, one learns that neither 
 is welcome without honor or duty, either is welcome in the path 
 of honor and duty 
 
 " Love to all, and cheery hearts. 
 
 " HENRY L. PATTEN." 
 
 In May, 1864, commenced the grand final campaign. 
 The regiment, as always, was in the Second Division, 
 Second Corps. Captain Patten was still suffering from 
 weakness, was scarcely fit to be in camp, much less to do 
 the hard work now forced upon the loyal army. But he 
 dashed into the two days' Wilderness battle with unquench 
 able enthusiasm. Hancock's corps was hotly engaged on 
 both days, and the Twentieth was mowed down as usual 
 under fire. Colonel Macy was wounded, Major Abbott 
 (Patten's exemplar and constant friend, whose praises he 
 was never tired of rehearsing) was killed. Patten himself 
 was shot through the hand. Worn out and wounded as he 
 was, he refused to quit the field, but, as senior Captain, took 
 command of the regiment at Spottsylvania, and fought it 
 thenceforth throughout the long road from the Rapidan to 
 Richmond. It was a period of three months of constant 
 march and battle, march by night and battle by day. 
 Officers and men fell all along by the wayside, with wounds 
 or with exhaustion. He had but three or four officers to 
 aid him in his task, yet he clung to it, marched in every 
 march, led his regiment in every battle, and attracted the 
 notice of the corps and division head-quarters by his ex 
 traordinary intrepidity and steadiness. He fought through 
 the Wilderness on May 5th and 6th ; through the running 
 fight to Spottsylvania; through the fierce battle of the 
 10th at the latter point ; the battle of the 12th, memorable 
 as " the fiercest and most deadly struggle of the war " ; 
 through the murderous battle of the 18th, and all the days 
 and nights intervening. He fought at North Anna, and 
 again at Cold Harbor, where Hancock alone lost three thou- 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 461 
 
 sand men in less than an hour, that unmatched charnel- 
 house of the war. When the overland campaign was aban 
 doned, he fought his shadow of a regiment three days before 
 Petersburg, on the 16th, 17th, and 18th of June, and then 
 moved down in the column which attacked the Weldon 
 Railroad. At length, on the 22d of June, after a score 
 of equally gallant but now indistinguishable achievements, 
 he performed the crowning act of his soldierly career and 
 his life. 
 
 The Sixth, Second, and Fifth Corps had been extended to 
 the left, to seize the Weldon Road, below Petersburg. By 
 improper tactical dispositions, a gap had been left between 
 the Sixth on the left and the Second in the centre. Mahone 
 saw the error, rushed across the right flank of the Sixth 
 Corps, struck the left of the Second, both in front and on 
 the left, and instantly rolled up Barlow's division like a 
 scroll. The retirement of Barlow uncovered Mott to an 
 attack in front, flank, and rear, and he too gave way in con 
 fusion. On the right, Gibbon's veteran division alone re 
 mained, having a point of support and protection in some 
 hasty intrenchments. It in turn was overwhelmingly 
 pressed on all sides. Regiment after regiment gave way, 
 and the rout appeared universal, till the shock reached Cap 
 tain Patten. He had a regiment which never had learned 
 to break. Changing front with the greatest rapidity and 
 skill, he disposed his scanty band of heroes to meet the 
 shock. It was met and stayed. For the first time that day 
 the Rebel column was checked by this officer, and all that 
 was left of the division and of the day was saved. Thus 
 Captain Patten plucked up drowning honor by the locks, 
 and snatched personal glory from a day of utter and disas 
 trous defeat. 
 
 Of this action Major Finley Anderson, soon after of Gen 
 eral Hancock's staff, wrote to the New York Herald, and, 
 depicting the universal rout and destruction, especially on 
 the capture of McKnight's batteries, says : 
 
462 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 " At this point, however, the tide was turned in our favor by the 
 coolness, courage, and skill of a good line officer. It was Captain 
 H. L. Patten, commanding the Twentieth Massachusetts Regiment, 
 who, taking advantage of an angle of the zigzag line of breastworks, 
 executed a change of front, poured some well-directed volleys into 
 the enemy, and checked his farther progress. It is a prevalent 
 opinion that, had other commanders acted as he did, the enemy 
 would have been repulsed in the commencement." 
 
 General Morgan wrote afterwards : 
 
 " When nearly all the other regimental commanders seemed to 
 have lost their wits, Major Patten may be said to have saved his 
 regiment from the fate that overtook those adjacent to it." 
 
 After this crowning exploit, Patten still commanded his 
 regiment, through battle, march, and skirmish, until the 14th 
 of August, when he was relieved by Colonel Macy. Mean 
 while, he had been adjudged worthy of the rank of Major, 
 the assurance of which he received just before his death, 
 antedated to May 1, 1864. Soon after occurred the 
 series of sanguinary feints at Deep Bottom. Major Patten 
 took his regiment into the fight of the 17th of August, at 
 Deep Bottom, where Gibbon's division suffered greatly, and 
 soon, rushing in to the front, as always, received a rifle-ball 
 in the left knee, his fifth and final wound. He was car 
 ried from his last field, and the surgeons amputated the leg 
 above the knee, an operation which he endured with 
 heroic fortitude. But what the soul could bear without 
 flinching was too much for the body. Sent to Turner's 
 Lane Hospital, in Philadelphia, it was soon evident that, 
 in the incessant fatigues of the long campaign, he had 
 poured out his vitality drop by drop. His once vigorous 
 system had broken under the surgical operation, and it 
 was only left for him to bear, as he did, with the fortitude 
 of a fearless soldier and a Christian gentleman, his last 
 agonies. 
 
 On arriving at the hospital on August 24th, he wrote to 
 one of his brothers in the gallant vein which always marked 
 
Henry Lyman Patten. 463 
 
 him, a letter designed to relieve anxiety. But its painful 
 handwriting bore witness against it. 
 
 " August 24. 
 
 " DEAR BROTHER, Am well still, and improving. We must 
 hope in the future. Of course something adverse may happen at 
 any time. But I have been singularly favored in former wounds. 
 I hope to be all right in this. 
 
 " This is a most excellent hospital, and all is done that can be 
 done. Love to all." "HENRY." 
 
 Six days later, he wrote to Professor Child as follows : 
 
 " Your letter gave me great pleasure. We become sometimes 
 almost as weak as children in our exile from home and civilization, 
 and kindly words touch a very weak spot in us. 
 
 " I thank you for your interest in the much-suffering Twentieth. 
 I almost weep myself when I think of its misfortunes. Almost 
 nothing is left of it. Colonel Macy, originally a First Lieutenant, 
 is the only officer remaining who came out with the regiment ; and 
 he, with Curtis and myself, are the only ones remaining of those 
 who went through the Peninsular campaign ; and of the men hardly 
 a corporal's guard of old men remain. 
 
 " You have probably seen by the paper that my left leg is off, 
 above the knee, only an apology of a stump remaining. A minie'- 
 bullet did the work on the 16th of August at Deep Bottom. I 
 am getting on well, but cannot be moved to Boston yet. 
 
 " I must cut short my letter. I have to write lying on my back. 
 " Very truly yours, 
 
 HENRY L. PATTEN." 
 
 On the same day he wrote home that he was " getting 
 along swimmingly"; but the inevitable end drew nigh, 
 and on the 10th of September all that was mortal of him 
 expired. 
 
 His last days were consoled by his brothers and by kind 
 friends, among whom was Mrs. A. H. Gibbons of New 
 York, whose presence and motherly kindness were of in 
 estimable comfort to the agonized young soldier. He sent 
 for her a week before his death, and she instantly went 
 
464 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 to his bedside from Beverley Hospital, fifteen miles distant. 
 She found him " in a very suffering condition," and after 
 wards wrote : 
 
 " In all he manifested a spirit of resignation and entire submis 
 sion as to the firal result, loving, kind, and considerate to the latest 
 moment ; and when he could no longer speak, he took my hand and 
 pressed it to his forehead, giving me a look of recognition and of 
 gratitude for the little I was able to do for him. A very short time 
 before he died, he repeated the names of his brothers, the surgeon 
 at his bedside, who was untiring in his devotion and interest, and 
 my own. I never witnessed more terrible agony than his. He 
 endured it with wonderful patience and fortitude. His manly, he 
 roic bearing was observed by all who were with him." 
 
 After his death, the body of Major Patten, clothed in the 
 blue soldier's uniform he had so worthily worn, was taken 
 to Kingston, his home. All the village gathered to the 
 church at the obsequies. " There was universal sadness," 
 writes his brother ; "for all had known him, and every one 
 had loved him." Amid tears, his friend, the clergyman, 
 pronounced a simple, tender eulogy, and then all the people 
 looked at his handsome face, still noble and firm as ever, 
 " as he lay in his coffin, every inch a soldier." From 
 Kingston the body >of Major Patten was sent to Cambridge, 
 and there buried with impressive ceremonies, with ser 
 vices conducted by the Rev. Presidents Walker and Hill, 
 and the Rev. Dr. Peabody. The solemn procession of 
 the officers and students of the University, the personal 
 friends and admirers of the dead hero, the brother offi 
 cers of his regiment and other regiments, then bore him 
 to his grave in Mount Auburn. 
 
Henry Augustus Richardson. 465 
 
 HENRY AUGUSTUS RICHARDSON. 
 
 Acting Assistant Surgeon, U. S. N., August 12, 1861 ; discharged, on 
 resignation, June 5, 1862; died July 1, 1863, of disease contracted in 
 the service. 
 
 DR. HENRY AUGUSTUS RICHARDSON was born in 
 Boston, November 25, 1836, the son of George C. and 
 Susan Gore (Moore) Richardson. In his childhood the 
 family removed to its present residence in the adjacent city 
 of Cambridge. In the schools of Cambridge he received 
 his early education, and commenced his preparation for a 
 college course. Having completed his preparatory studies 
 at Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, he entered the 
 Freshman Class of Harvard College in July, 1854. There 
 his personal traits soon made him a general favorite among 
 his classmates. He had many friends and no enemies in 
 every circle, and in 1858 he graduated, bearing with him 
 the hearty good- will of all. 
 
 The circumstances of his life did not drive him to labori 
 ous effort, but to a person of his practical nature indolence 
 had no attractions. One of his best inheritances was a de 
 sire to be actively occupied amid the busy scenes of the 
 world. Hardly had he left college, when he began his prep 
 aration for the labors of life, and chose the practice of med 
 icine as his employment. Indeed, the bent of his genius 
 had been manifest in his boyhood. Before and after he 
 entered college he had enjoyed giving a part of his time, 
 with a few congenial minds, to personal investigations in 
 chemistry and comparative physiology and anatomy. Dur 
 ing his Senior year he was a frequent attendant at the lec 
 tures of the Harvard Medical School, and treatises upon 
 medicine and surgery constituted a large portion of his des 
 ultory reading. The views of his parents and friends coin- 
 
 VOL. i. 30 
 
466 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 ciding with his own, he became, in October, 1858, a student 
 in the United States Marine Hospital at Chelsea, then un 
 der the charge of Dr. Charles A. Davis. Here he remained 
 three years. During this period he devoted himself to the 
 study of his profession with great zeal and diligence. He 
 came regularly to Boston to attend the lectures before the 
 Harvard Medical School, and there received the degree of 
 M. D. in July, 1861. The opportunity which his duties at 
 the hospital presented for exact and certain information was 
 well pleasing to the tendency of his mind, which always in 
 clined toward practical rather than theoretical science. He 
 delighted in close surveillance of disease and remedial ex 
 periments, and, though a true student of science in the best 
 sense of the term, was not a great reader of scientific books. 
 His natural self-possession and coolness, his quick sympathy 
 with the sufferings of a patient, and his lively and constant 
 interest in the malady and its development, his reassuring 
 humor and cordial ways, never failed to win the confidence 
 of the rough, warm-hearted men to whom he ministered in 
 the hospital, while at the same time they gave full promise 
 of success among the more congenial associations of civil 
 life. His faithfulness and his natural aptitude for the ex 
 ecutive management of the institution soon brought him the 
 principal control of its details ; and a formal installation in 
 May, 1861, as the assistant physician of the hospital, was 
 but the recognition of services previously performed. 
 
 Dr. Richardson was not a mere student. He preferred 
 the business and activity of the world to the cloister of 
 the scholar. The enterprises of industry, no less than the 
 theories of science, interested him ; and upon all affairs of 
 public concern he held decided and intelligent views. He 
 was cautious, but independent and fearless in his conclu 
 sions, ready, although never forward, in his avowal of them. 
 The dispassionate and reflective mood in which he consid 
 ered all questions of duty or policy gave a conservative 
 tendency to his opinions ; but when fairly persuaded, he fol- 
 
Henry Augustus Richardson. 467 
 
 lowed his convictions zealously and enthusiastically ; for 
 cool arid impassive as was his brain, his heart was ardent 
 and impulsive. 
 
 This contrast of character was exemplified in his conduct 
 during the great civil strife which agitated the nation. Be 
 fore the appeal to arms he had shown a strong preference 
 for the security of ancient constitutional landmarks over 
 the hazards of reform, and honestly deprecated much of 
 the action of reformers. Undoubtedly, too, in the remem 
 brance of hospitalities which he had received while sojourn 
 ing with acquaintances at the South, his ingenuous, grate 
 ful nature influenced his mind in some degree. But when 
 the sword became the arbiter of the destinies of the coun 
 try, he eagerly arrayed himself among the active defenders 
 of his established government. His politics never seduced 
 him beyond the sound of Union music ; his prejudices 
 never carried him out of the shadow of the Union flag. 
 When war came, his sympathies, guided by his judgment, 
 led him irrepressibly toward the service of his country. 
 Those who knew Richardson were sure that whither his 
 sympathies tended his devoted action would follow. 
 
 In August, 1861, he passed the examination of the Naval 
 Board, was commissioned Acting Assistant Surgeon, and 
 soon after joined the North Atlantic Blockading Squad 
 ron as Acting Surgeon on board the United States steamer 
 Cambridge. Thus at the commencement of hostilities he 
 became the first volunteer in his position from New Eng 
 land, and the vessel in which he sailed was the first mer 
 chant steamer that left Charlestown Navy Yard, refitted as 
 a gunboat. 
 
 Dr. Richardson had often declared naval superiority to 
 be the force which would eventually decide the national 
 conflict, and he entered the service in full expectation of 
 active duty and perilous fortunes. But his steamer was 
 assigned to the monotonous though important blockade oft 
 Wilmington and Beaufort. Deeply disappointed that his 
 
468 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 commander had not received a roving commission, Rich 
 ardson still applied himself cheerfully and assiduously to the 
 requirements of his position. The audacity of the block 
 ade-runners, their familiarity with shifting channels and 
 fickle currents, the speed of their craft, and the deficiency 
 of the national government in both pilots and vessels, de 
 manded untiring vigilance and constant exposure on the 
 part of our crews. Ceaseless quest and toilsome travers 
 ing the same ocean wastes was the lot of the patient block- 
 aders, watching and circling, like scattered sea-gulls, along 
 their prescribed line of coast. When the notorious Nash 
 ville was waiting at Beaufort, ready to dart from her ref 
 uge and speed once more upon her hazardous voyage, 
 tedious days and anxious nights of sentinel watch, an 
 chored at the mouth of one narrow outlet, formed a part of 
 the duty of the Cambridge. The lively, adventurous tem 
 perament of her surgeon chafed under this dreary experi 
 ence. Gladly would he have sought more stirring scenes 
 of duty, but he would not for a moment contemplate the 
 abandonment of the service. 
 
 In consequence of exposure to wet and cold during the 
 wintry season, and the restraint from habitual exercise, Dr. 
 Richardson's health failed. These causes, with the bitter 
 disappointment to his aspirations, induced the development 
 of a disease which had proved fatal to his mother and elder 
 brother. Once, when the Cambridge had put into Baltimore 
 for repairs, he visited his home on a brief furlough. Then 
 his decline was painfully apparent. His figure had become 
 thin, gaunt, and bent, and his system was shaken by a rack 
 ing cough. Friends and physicians besought him to resign 
 his commission and seek the restoration of his health. But 
 this he steadily refused to do, declaring that while the war 
 lasted he should remain in the service of his country ; 
 that he could render the best service in her navy, and there 
 he would stay so long as he had strength to perform his 
 duty. 
 
Henry Augustus Richardson. 469 
 
 An incident which occurred at this time illustrates at 
 once the changeless sincerity of his friendship and his un 
 compromising devotion to his government. Recounting 
 one day the formality and coldness of a recent interview 
 between himself and a Southern classmate, an intimate 
 companion of college days, he said, sadly, regretfully, 
 almost bitterly, " We parted, old comrades as we were, with 
 bare civility, and both knew that all which estranged us 
 was the uniform I wore." Then in a moment, as if the 
 refluent surge of his patriotic impulses had swept away all 
 memory of personal considerations, he exclaimed spiritedly, 
 " But, friends or no friends, our old flag must wave, and 
 wave it shall so long as there 's a halyard to hoist it." The 
 earnestness and enthusiasm of voice and action showed the 
 determination of the intrepid spirit which was leading his 
 feeble body on to duty, and, alas ! to death. 
 
 And so, uninfluenced by the arguments and entreaties 
 of his advisers, Dr. Eichardson returned to his ship. He 
 well knew the nature of his ailment, and felt that death 
 was threatening him in a form more terrible than " an 
 army with banners." Yet he did not quail, but went back 
 to his post ; back to the inactivity and exposure of his sea 
 faring life ; back to the fog and spray of ocean ; back to 
 the stormy winds and debilitating climate of the Carolina 
 coast. There, as his friends had anticipated, his condition 
 became daily more alarming. But, steadfast and true to his 
 duties, he would not yield. A few months longer he re 
 mained, hoping to render a little assistance to his country. 
 His zeal appeared to gather the strength that his failing 
 vital forces lost, and not until it became manifest, as he 
 sorrowfully said, that he was a hindrance to the cause he 
 would have aided, did he succumb to the irresistible decree. 
 
 In July, 1862, he was forced to resign his commission and 
 return home. He was a wreck indeed. His associates hardly 
 recognized in that wan, haggard form their hale companion 
 of former days. In the comforts of home he gained some 
 
470 .Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 strength, and then spent the summer months quietly in the 
 salubrious air of Southern New Hampshire. But his health 
 receiving no permanent improvement, he sought a drier 
 climate, and passed the winter and spring in Minnesota. 
 There he obtained small relief. The malady had made too 
 deep an inroad to be stayed by aught that wealth could pro 
 vide or science suggest. In May, attended by a brother, he 
 returned to his father's house, fully impressed with the cer 
 tainty of impending dissolution. But the same warm heart 
 and patriot spirit dwelt in his shattered frame. Slowly 
 wasting and dying as the days ran on, he continued con 
 stantly happy and sociable. With affectionate invitations 
 he called his friends to his chamber, and in their society 
 the old ardor beamed in his countenance and shone in his 
 converse. When Class Day came, too feeble to participate 
 in the festivities on the 'College grounds, he assembled a 
 party of his classmates at his own home, and bore himself 
 so bravely that they almost believed his wasted form would 
 rise from its melancholy ruin. Not an impatient syllable 
 escaped from his lips, not a word of regret for his sacrifice. 
 On the contrary, he gloried in the service he had done for 
 his country, and grieved that it was no greater. 
 
 But more rapidly and surely, day by day, his decline con 
 tinued as the summer advanced, and still calmly and firmly 
 he awaited the final catastrophe. As if the very shadows 
 of his friends relieved the gloom of death, one of his latest 
 acts was to obtain the photographs of his College Class. In 
 their silent company he cheered the lonely hours, recalling 
 memories of a brighter and a happier past. To the last 
 he was eager to learn the progress of the war, and enthusi 
 astic in asserting the ultimate success of the national arms. 
 He passed the last day of his life in hopeful discussion of 
 the military movements which three days afterwards cul 
 minated in the victory of Gettysburg. In the evening he 
 retired, fell into a deep sleep, and slumbered soundly all 
 night ; awoke in the morning languid and weary, con- 
 
Henry Augustus Richardson. 471 
 
 versed a little, then turned and slumbered again, and never 
 more awoke. 
 
 And so, on the 1st of July, 1863, emaciated, feeble, 
 and faint, but patient and " forlornly brave " unto the 
 end, died Harry Richardson. In admiration of the for 
 titude of the patriot, in reverence for the fidelity of the 
 officer, but, more than all, in love of the sterling virtues 
 and endearing qualities of the man, this humble record of 
 his life is placed among the memorials of his classmates 
 and friends. Eulogy his fair memory needs not. All who 
 knew him know the full measure of his worth, and, knowing 
 that, recognize the wealth of the sacrifice, expressed more 
 eloquently to them than labored pages can portray, in his 
 simple epitaph, Pro pair id. 
 
472 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 THOMAS JEFFERSON SPURR. 
 
 First Lieutenano 15th Mass. Vols. (Infantry), November 17, 1861 ; died 
 at Hagerstown, Md., September 27, 1862, of a wound received at Antie- 
 tam, September 17. 
 
 THOMAS JEFFERSON SPURR was born in Worces 
 ter, Massachusetts, February 2, 1838. His grandfa 
 thers were General John Spurr and Dr. Daniel Lamb, of 
 Charlton, Massachusetts ; his parents, Colonel Samuel Dan- 
 forth and Mary Augusta (Lamb) Spurr. Both parents 
 were born in Charlton, but removed to Worcester about 
 1832 or 1833, having at that time but one child, a daughter. 
 Colonel Spurr pursued in Worcester the business of a mer 
 chant until his death, which took place November 3, 1842. 
 Thus in his fifth year Thomas Spurr was left, with his sis 
 ter, under the sole care of his mother ; and it seems well to 
 say here, that perhaps the strongest point in his character 
 was the love which he felt for that mother. 
 
 While at school his zeal as a student and his love of ath 
 letic sports were equally noticeable. He easily led his class 
 at the Grammar School, and completed, in an unusually 
 short time, his preparation for college, at the Worcester 
 High School. He entered college without " conditions," 
 and took at first a high place in his Class, ranking among 
 the first eight scholars at the first Junior Exhibition. Math 
 ematics proved to be his favorite study, though he was faith 
 ful and successful in all. But at the end of the first term 
 of that year he began to suffer from disease of the eyes, 
 and he could only remain a fortnight during the second 
 term. A voyage to Fayal did no good ; and though he re 
 joined his Class, he was compelled to continue his studies 
 with the aid of a reader. This deprived him of rank, al 
 though he was chosen by his classmates a member of the 
 $ B K Society, for which rank is usually held to be essential. 
 
Thomas Jefferson Spurr. 473 
 
 After graduation he remained at home for a time in ill 
 health ; then entered on his law studies, at first with the 
 help of a reader, and afterwards unaided, as his eyes grew 
 better. He studied for a year in the office of Messrs. Dev- 
 ens and Hoar, in Worcester ; and in September, 1860, en 
 tered the Law School at Cambridge. His desire was to 
 become a scholar and a lawyer. 
 
 " If his life had been spared," writes one of those who knew him 
 best, " it would probably have been respected and useful, though 
 not distinguished. His friends might fairly have hoped for him 
 that he would have become one of the leaders of the bar of his 
 native county ; that he would have done his full share to promote 
 all the institutions and schemes for the public good which in our 
 community depend on the voluntary public spirit of the citizens ; 
 and that his purity, his generosity, his rectitude of purpose, his 
 friendly and unselfish nature, would have won for him an enviable 
 place in the public regard." 
 
 He was ambitious of success, but his standard was a very 
 high one. Speaking about an acquaintance just going into 
 business, he said to one of his companions : 
 
 " I think he will succeed ; but I should not wish to succeed by 
 such means as I feel sure he uses. I never could stoop to the 
 little meannesses and deceits which many business men practise 
 without seeming to dream that they are wrong." 
 
 He was in every respect thoroughly manly. Strong of 
 body, he was also self-relying and brave. He had, too, a 
 purity and chastity of nature to which no stain of indeli 
 cacy ever attached itself. Of his love for his mother, about 
 which a strong statement has just been made, his brother- 
 in-law writes : 
 
 " It manifested itself, not much in expressions of endearment, not 
 at all in any mode which would attract the attention of strangers, 
 but in constantly making her comfort and happiness the predomi 
 nant consideration in all his plans of life. When he was in College 
 and in the Law School, no week passed without at least two letters 
 from him to her ; not letters written as in the performance of a 
 
474 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 self-imposed task, but full and complete journals of his life and 
 thoughts. This feeling grew stronger with the separation caused 
 by his life in the army. His dying moments were occupied with 
 thoughts for her welfare, and her name was the last word upon his 
 lips." 
 
 This strong tie made it peculiarly hard for him to go to 
 the war. His mother was a widow, and he her only sur 
 viving child. It was only after a great struggle that he 
 could make up his mind to leave her. He held very strong 
 convictions, and believing that the North was right beyond 
 question in the contest, was fervent in his wishes for its 
 success. He felt, as so many young men felt when the war 
 broke out, that he must do something for his country. He 
 was not moved by the love of glory or adventure, although, 
 being of good constitution, he did not fear hardship. He 
 went because it was his duty to go, feeling, as other noble 
 spirits felt, that he should be ashamed to look his friends in 
 the face, or hold up his head anywhere, if he did not do his 
 part. 
 
 When the war broke out he was in Russia, having taken 
 this long voyage, in the spring of 1861, in the hope of thus 
 doing something for the benefit of his eyes. The Russian 
 merchants, to whom he and his companion had letters, re 
 ceived their accounts of the state of things in the United 
 States through the most hostile English sources ; and what 
 he heard from them, of course, filled him with alarm and 
 dismay. He hastened home, and after a very short time 
 spent in learning the rudiments of military drill, accept 
 ed the position of First Lieutenant in Company G of the 
 Fifteenth Massachusetts Regiment, to which post he was 
 recommended by Colonel Devens, who then commanded the 
 regiment in the field. His recommendation was not sought 
 by him, or by any friend of his for him, but was the result 
 of Colonel Devens's personal knowledge of his qualities. 
 
 " His original appointment," says his brother-in-law, " had not 
 been approved by his men or the other officers of the regiment ; 
 
Thomas Jefferson Spurr. 475 
 
 they thinking that the vacancies should have been filled from 
 among those who had gone through the dangers of Ball's Bluff; 
 and if anything hi him had made it possible, he would have en 
 countered serious discomfort, if not hostility. But all this feeling 
 soon yielded to his friendly and courteous manners and his thor 
 ough and conscientious performance of his duty ; and all persons 
 connected with his regiment agree that he was universally beloved 
 by his comrades, both officers and men." 
 
 He was for a considerable time the only commissioned 
 officer in his company, and his devotion to it was invariable. 
 When they were stationed for some weeks near Washing 
 ton, where he had many friends, he resolutely declined all 
 their invitations, with a single exception, saying that his 
 duty required his constant presence with his men. When 
 he found he was too ill to go into action with his company 
 at Malvern Hill, he burst into tears. He went with his 
 regiment to the Peninsula, returned with it, and received 
 his death wound at the battle of Antietam. The closing 
 scenes of his life are best described by his brother-in-law, 
 George Frisbie Hoar, Esq., who was with him in his last 
 hours : 
 
 " He joined his regiment in the fall of 1861. I never saw him 
 again until I was summoned to Hagerstown after the battle of An 
 tietam. He was dressing the line of his company, about nine o'clock 
 of the morning of the battle, the regiment being under a severe 
 fire, when his thigh was struck by a minie'-ball which shattered 
 the bone. Two of his men came where he lay, and offered to carry 
 him to the rear. He ordered them back to the ranks, and refused 
 all assistance. The place where he lay was a short distance in front 
 of a wood, to which the regiment was almost instantly compelled to 
 retreat. The ground where he fell was not again occupied by our 
 troops until after the battle. He lay on the ground where he fell 
 all of Wednesday and through Wednesday night. On Thursday 
 the enemy occupied the ground. Among them was a college ac 
 quaintance and contemporary (whom I believe to have been a Major 
 Hale of South Carolina), who treated him with kindness, caused 
 him to be removed to a farm-yard near by and laid on the ground 
 between two haystacks, and gave him a blanket, which we are 
 
476 Harvard Memorial Biographies. 
 
 glad to preserve. Thomas lay in this farm-yard until Saturday, 
 when the ground was again occupied by our forces, and he was 
 then removed to a hospital. On Monday he was taken to Hagers- 
 town, where his mother and I, with Dr. Sargent, found him on 
 Wednesday evening. Early the next morning, Thursday, he was 
 carefully examined by the surgeons, who were able, by extracting 
 the splinters of bone from his flesh, to relieve the agony which he 
 had suffered since he was wounded, but found his recovery hope 
 less. He said to me after the examination, ' I suppose you will 
 tell me the result when you think it is best.' It would have dis 
 honored that brave soul to keep it back, and I told him the whole 
 truth. He heard it bravely and cheerfully. He said he hoped his 
 company would be satisfied with him, and feel that he had deserved 
 their confidence ; that he was not conscious of having had a single 
 thought for himself after the first bullet was fired. He added that 
 he believed he had the confidence of Colonel Kimball. He lay 
 through this day and the next suffering a good deal, and gradually 
 growing weaker, but with his mind perfectly clear and calm. There 
 is too much of a private and personal nature in the conversations of 
 those two days to make it proper to repeat them here. Dr. Sargent, 
 the distinguished physician who kindly and generously left his 
 pressing professional duties at home to give his dying young friend 
 the benefit of his skill, writes : * I shall consider myself as more than 
 compensated for any sacrifice I have made, by the elevating and 
 purifying influences of that death-bed, the death of the Christian 
 patriot ; of the excellent son and brother, whose translation in the 
 clearness of his intellect, and even in the fulness of wisdom, was 
 such as I never before witnessed.' 
 
 "At about half past four on Saturday morning he asked his 
 mother, ' Do you think I am failing ? ' She said, ' Yes.' He said, 
 * While my mind is clear, I should like to pray with you.' He 
 then, in a voice as clear and distinct as his usual voice in health, 
 prayed for a blessing on his friends, thanked God for giving him 
 such a kind mother, for the goodness which had followed him 
 through life, and that he had been enabled to pass the last days of 
 his life surrounded by kind friends, without which they must have 
 been days of terrible anguish. He took leave of each of his friends 
 who were present, and sent kind messages to his near relatives who 
 were away. He sent his love to Lieutenant Bigelow, a young offi- 
 
Thomas Jefferson Spurr. 477 
 
 cer (then Sergeant) of his own regiment, who lay wounded in the 
 same house, and said, ' Henry (Lieutenant Bigelow) behaved beau 
 tifully. I want General Devens to know it. He ought to have a 
 commission. He is so modest and quiet, that I don't think General 
 Devens knows how much there is in him.' He then spoke to Dr. 
 Sargent, and said, ' I have no doubt you have done all you can. I 
 am much obliged to you. I am perfectly satisfied.' 
 
 " He then called his man Isaiah, and said, * I hope I have not 
 been unreasonable with you ; I have tried not to be.' The man 
 burst into tears, and replied, * You have always been mighty good 
 to me, sir.' Thomas then said, ' I believe there are no little things 
 I have left unarranged. I should like to have Isaiah ride in the 
 car beside the coffin, so that it shall not be roughly handled. I 
 have tried to do my duty. I hope my example of devotion to my 
 country may not be lost.' 
 
 " After a slight pause he said, ( It may be well for you as sur 
 geons to make a certificate of my death, and send it to Colonel Kim- 
 ball. His address is, " Lieutenant-Colonel Kimball, Fifteenth Reg 
 iment Massachusetts Volunteers, Sedgwick's Division, Washington, 
 District of Columbia." ' He then crossed his hands over his breast, 
 and said, ' Now the sooner it is over, the better.' 
 
 " He then lay for a few hours quietly, giving occasional slight 
 directions for arranging his position, &c., till about nine o'clock, 
 A. M., when he asked for water, which he could not swallow. He 
 then seemed sinking fast. He opened his eyes once more, and 
 said, ' Don't feel badly ; be of good cheer, mother ' ; and in a few 
 minutes quietly breathed his last." 
 
 END OP VOL. I. 
 
 Cambridge : Printed by Welch, Bigelow, and Company. 
 
14 DAY USE 
 
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 IOAN DEPT. 
 
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 Renewed books are subject to immediate recall. 
 
 DEC 3 1979 
 
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 General Library 
 
 University of California 
 
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 224382