CHAKLES DEVENS 
 
 ORATIONS AND ADDRESSES 
 

CHARLES DEVENS 
 
 Orations and Addresses 
 
 ON VARIOUS OCCASIONS 
 
 CIVIL AND MILITARY 
 
 EDITED BY HIS NEPHEW 
 
 ARTHUR LITHGOW DEVENS 
 
 WITH A MEMOIR BY 
 
 JOHN CODMAN ROPES 
 
 MEMBER OF THE MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY, THE MILITARY 
 HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS, ETC. 
 
 V 
 
 BOSTON 
 LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 
 
 1801 
 
If? 
 
 Copyright, 1891, 
 By Little, Biiowx, akd Company. 
 
 t^nibrrsttg 13rrss: 
 John Wilson and Sox, CAMiuunGE. 
 
COXTEITS. 
 
 Page 
 Memoir 1 
 
 Oration ox General Meade. Delivered before the 
 Society of the Army of the Potomac, at New 
 Haven, May 14, 1873 27 
 
 Address at the Dedication of the Soldiers' Monu- 
 ment at Worcester, July 15, 1874 01 
 
 Oration at the Centennial Annwf.rsary of the 
 
 Battle of Bunker Hill. June 17, 1875 77 
 
 Oration at the Dedication of the Soldiers' Monu- 
 ment at Boston, September 17, 1877 131 
 
 Address at the Commemoration of the Two Hundred 
 and Fiftieth Anniversary of the First Parish 
 Church of Charlestown, November 12, 1882 . . 14 7 
 
 Commemorative Address on General Grant. Deliv- 
 ered at Faneuil Hall, Boston, July 2(i, 1885 . . 155 
 
 Commemorative Address on General Grant. Deliv- 
 ered at Worcester, August 8, 1885 . . . . • . . 1(17 
 
 Address to the Fifteenth Regiment Association, 
 on their Visit to the Battle-field of Gettys- 
 burg. June, 1886 170 
 
VI CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 Addkess as President of the Alumni at the Dinner 
 in Memorial Hall ox the Two Hundred and Fif- 
 tieth Anniversary of the Founding of Harvard 
 College, November 8, 1886 199 
 
 Address before the Loyal Legion in Memory of 
 
 General Sheridan, November 7, 1888 211 
 
 Extracts from Three Addresses as President of 
 the Bunker Hill Monument Association in 1887, 
 1888, 1889 225 
 
 Oration on the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary of the 
 Loyal Legion. Delivered at Philadelphia, April 
 15, 1890 273 
 
MEMOIR. 
 
 To no man of this generation more fully than to 
 Charles Devens can be paid the honor due. to faith- 
 ful and honorable public service. Devotion to the 
 State, obedience to the call of his country, — these 
 were his conspicuous traits. His service was un- 
 grudging. When the war came, he freely stepped 
 forward. He was at the front in some of the 
 bloodiest and most obstinate of the Virginia bat- 
 tles. His public life was long, distinguished, and 
 absolutely unblemished. No cloud ever rested for 
 a moment upon his fair fame. His honors were 
 won by no devious methods, by no unworthy con- 
 cessions. His ambition was lofty, and it was 
 disinterested. It was, moreover, successful. The 
 confidence of the public rewarded his unmistak- 
 able devotion to the public good. The whole 
 community rejoiced to do him honor. Many men 
 in our day have won public attention and some- 
 times public gratitude by advocating great changes, 
 by heading great reforms, or by being inseparably 
 
2 MEMOIR. 
 
 connected with the controversies of the day, moral, 
 political, or religious ; but Charles Devens was 
 not one of these. He was simply a good citizen, 
 a brave soldier, an upright magistrate, a true 
 patriot. 
 
 He was born at No. 30 Union Street, Charles- 
 town, now a part of Boston, on April 4, 1820. He 
 was a son of Charles and Mary (Lithgow) Devens. 
 His mother was the daughter of Colonel Arthur 
 Lithgow of Augusta, Maine. His great-grand- 
 father, Richard Devens, was a member of the 
 Committee of Safety and Commissary-General of 
 Massachusetts during the Revolution. 
 
 He was graduated at Harvard College in 1838 
 at the early age of eighteen, James Russell Lowell 
 and William W. Story being among his classmates. 
 He studied law at the Harvard Law School, and 
 received the degree of LL.B. in 1840, in company 
 with the late Chief-Justice Morton. He pursued 
 his studies in the office of William J. Hubbard 
 and Francis 0. Watts in Boston, and in 1841 was 
 admitted to the bar. 
 
 For some years he practised in Franklin County, 
 residing first at Northfield and afterwards at Green- 
 field. In the years 1848 and 1849 he represented 
 his district in the State Senate. When the Whigs 
 came into power by the election of General Taylor, 
 Mr. Devens was made United States Marshal for 
 
MEMOIR. 3 
 
 the District of Massachusetts, — an office which he 
 held for the four years between 1849 and 1853. 
 
 It was during this time that the Fugitive Slave 
 Bill was passed, as part of the " Compromise 
 Measures of 1850; " and it became on one occasion 
 Mr. Devens's painful duty to make the necessary 
 arrangements for the return of a fugitive. One 
 Sims, a slave belonging in Georgia, escaped to Bos- 
 ton in April, 1851. The United States Commis- 
 sioner under the recent Act heard the case, decided 
 it in favor of the claim of the owner, and directed 
 the United States Marshal to escort the prisoner to 
 the vessel on which he was to be transported back 
 to Georgia. The legal duty thus imposed upon the 
 Marshal was without exception the most repulsive 
 which could by any possibility fall to his lot. A 
 poor slave, who had presumably made his escape 
 either because his fate was exceptionally hard or 
 because his love of liberty was exceptionally strong, 
 was to be refused an asylum in the Commonwealth 
 of Massachusetts, and sent back to slavery. It was 
 against all the natural sympathies of the human 
 heart, contrary to the humane and tolerant spirit 
 of this community, opposed indeed to the natural 
 sense of justice, certainly as we in Massachusetts 
 had for nearly a century recognized it, that this 
 poor black should be sent back to his former help- 
 less and hopeless condition of servitude. No one 
 
4 MEMOIR. 
 
 could wish to have any part in such an action. Its 
 morality depended on the relative weight which a 
 right-minded, public-spirited, and humane citizen 
 would assign to the considerations which have just 
 been stated as contrasted with the obligations 
 resting upon all good citizens, and especially upon 
 those who have assumed the duties of public office, 
 to execute the laws of the land. Fortunately for 
 this community, and for the cause of good govern- 
 ment, Marshal Devens decided in favor of the par- 
 amount and superior authority of the obligations 
 which rested upon him as an officer of the law ; 
 and in face of the unpopularity and miscon- 
 struction of motives and personal abuse in which 
 his action was sure to involve him, he acted with 
 vigor and decision. That he should have so fully 
 and satisfactorily met such a perplexing and trying 
 emergency at the early age of thirty-one, argued 
 well for his future as a public servant. 
 
 While, however, Mr. Devens was determined to 
 do his duty as an officer of the law, he spared no 
 pains to ransom its unfortunate victim. He set on 
 foot negotiations for the purchase of Sims, which, 
 though not successful, failed through no fault of 
 his. No one could feel more keenly than he the 
 pain of participating, even in an official capacity, 
 in the wretched task of surrendering a fugitive 
 slave. 
 
MEMOIR. 5 
 
 When the Whig administration of Mr. Fillmore 
 was succeeded by the Democratic administration 
 of Mr. Buchanan, Mr. Devens returned to the 
 practice of the law, — this time in Worcester, 
 and in partnership with Mr. George F. Hoar, now 
 one of the senators from Massachusetts. 
 
 In April, 1861, upon the first call of President 
 Lincoln for troops, Mr. Devens accepted the com- 
 mand, as major, of the Third Battalion of Rifles 
 
 of the Massachusetts militia. While in command 
 
 « 
 
 of this battalion at Fort McHenry near Baltimore, 
 he was offered by Governor Andrew, and accepted, 
 the commission of colonel of the Fifteenth Regi- 
 ment of Massachusetts Volunteers, — a Worcester 
 County regiment, and one of the best sent out 
 by the State. It was immediately incorporated 
 into the Army of the Potomac. In the unfor- 
 tunate affair of Ball's Bluff, on October 21, 1861, 
 this regiment, under command of Colonel Devens, 
 crossed the river and took its part with a portion 
 of the Twentieth Massachusetts and other troops 
 in one of the most obstinate and bloody encounters 
 of the war. Here Devens distinguished himself for 
 gallantry and coolness. He was slightly wounded, 
 and finally had to swim the river to Harrison's 
 Island. 
 
 He was soon afterward made a brigadier-gen- 
 eral of volunteers, and assigned to the command 
 
6 MEMOIR. 
 
 of an excellent brigade, consisting of the Seventh 
 and Tenth Massachusetts, the Second Rhode Is- 
 land, and the Thirty-Sixth New York, to which 
 in September, 1862, the Thirty-Seventh Massa- 
 chusetts was added. This force formed a part of 
 Couch's division of the Fourth Corps, which was 
 then under the command of General Keyes. This 
 corps and the Third, under General Heintzelman, 
 were thrown across the Chickahominy in the latter 
 part of May, 1862, thus constituting the advance 
 of the army. On these two corps the Confederate 
 general, Joseph E. Johnston, concentrated his 
 forces, hoping to overwhelm them before the 
 remainder of the army could be brought over 
 the treacherous bridges of the Chickahominy to 
 their assistance. On the 31st of May the blow 
 fell ; and in spite of an obstinate and courageous 
 defence, our troops were slowly forced back until 
 .the enemy's strength became exhausted, and our 
 reinforcements under the gallant Sumner and 
 Sedgwick appeared on the field. In this severe 
 action General Devens won new laurels. " With 
 only two regiments," says General Couch in his 
 official report, "he held his own firmly. . . . 
 Severely wounded, he remained bravely on the 
 field until the last shot was fired." 
 
 General Devens's wound prevented his taking 
 part in the Seven Days' battles near Richmond, 
 
MEMOIR. 7 
 
 at the close of which our army took up early in 
 July a strong position at Harrison's Landing on 
 the James. In September, the army was removed 
 to the neighborhood of Washington, and under 
 General McClellan fought the bloody battle of 
 Antietam, which brought Lee's invasion of Mary- 
 land to a sudden and unsuccessful termination. 
 In these operations Couch's division was not ac- 
 tively engaged ; it reached the field of Antietam 
 late in the forenoon of the 18th, the day after 
 the battle. 
 
 In the autumn of 1862, this division, now no 
 longer under Couch, who had been promoted to 
 the command of the Second Corps, was transferred 
 to the Sixth Corps, then under Franklin ; and 
 when that officer was assigned to the command of 
 the Left Grand Division of the Army of the 
 Potomac, a change made by Burnside, who in 
 November replaced McClellan in command of the 
 army, the Sixth Corps was placed under General 
 William F. Smith, and the division was assigned 
 to General John Newton. 
 
 In the movement upon Fredericksburg, on De- 
 cember 11, 1862, the Sixth Corps crossed the Rap- 
 pahannock below the town. Devens's brigade led 
 the advance ; and when, owing to the lateness of 
 the hour, it was thought best to retire all the 
 troops but one brigade, it was that of General 
 
8 MEMOIR. 
 
 Devens which General Newton selected to hold 
 the bridges on the enemy's side of the river dur- 
 ing the night. So when on the 15th, after the 
 loss of the main battle, the Sixth Corps was with- 
 drawn to the north bank of the river, it was again 
 Devens who requested and was given the honor 
 of covering with his brigade the recrossing of the 
 troops. 
 
 In these operations Devens won the high com- 
 mendation of his superiors. " General Devens and 
 Colonel Torbert," says General Smith in his report, 
 " deserve especial mention for the promptitude and 
 precision with which they formed their lines to 
 cover the crossing." " My obligations," says Gen- 
 eral Newton, " are due . . . especially to Brigadier- 
 General Charles Devens, who commanded the ad- 
 vance and rear guard in the crossing and recrossing 
 of the river." 
 
 But war has its cruel surprises for the bravest 
 and steadiest of soldiers. Promoted to the com- 
 mand of a division in the Eleventh Corps under 
 General Howard, it was General Devens's lot to 
 hold the extreme right of our line at Chancellors- 
 ville. The Army of the Potomac, under General 
 Hooker, had crossed the Rappahannock above Fred- 
 ericksburg in the last days of April, 1863, had 
 advanced some miles towards that city on the 1st 
 of May, had then unwisely and unaccountably 
 
MEMOIR. 9 
 
 been ordered to fall back into the dense woods 
 from which it had just emerged, and had taken 
 up a position facing east and south, with its head- 
 quarters at the Chancellor house. This position 
 was at once intrenched and rendered formidable 
 on its southern face. 
 
 General Lee, whose army certainly was not 
 more than half as strong as that of his opponent, 
 could hardly venture on a direct attack ; yet he 
 felt that the situation was one of extreme gravity. 
 There was no telling how large a force the Fed- 
 erals could concentrate, nor when it might suit 
 them to take the offensive in good earnest. It was 
 of extreme importance to drive them at once to 
 recross the river. Hence he listened willingly to 
 the daring and brilliant proposal of Stonewall 
 Jackson, his favorite lieutenant, that he should 
 march around the front of our army and fall upon 
 it from the westward. They had correctly sur- 
 mised that no attack from this quarter would 
 be expected by our generals. The march of 
 Jackson's column was indeed discovered; but 
 although at half-past nine in the morning 
 Hooker ordered Howard to strengthen his right 
 flank so as to be prepared to resist an attack 
 from that direction, should any be made, there 
 can be no doubt whatever that the movement 
 was thought by Hooker, and by Howard also, 
 
10 MEMOIR. 
 
 to be a movement in retreat. Troops were sent 
 out from the main line to harass and annoy the 
 flying foe. One brigade — that of Barlow — 
 was even taken by Hooker from Howard's com- 
 mand to support this attack. But Jackson was 
 not to be diverted from his purpose. In the 
 latter part of the afternoon of Saturday, May 
 2, he attained a position west of the Eleventh 
 Corps line, and, facing to the east, advanced in 
 line of battle on its exposed flank. Devens had 
 indeed placed a couple of regiments and a sec- 
 tion of artillery to repel an assault from this 
 quarter, should any be made. Much more than 
 this he no doubt would have done, had he been 
 in command of the corps. It seems certain * 
 that he early in the day suspected the real 
 character of the enemy's movement; but the in- 
 formation which raised these suspicions in his 
 mind, although transmitted promptly to corps 
 headquarters, failed to elicit any order for him 
 to change his dispositions. 
 
 Had he possessed greater military sagacity or 
 wider military experience, and so been able to 
 divine the object of the enemy, or had the in- 
 formation which he received made a greater im- 
 pression on his mind, — in fine, we may fairly 
 
 1 See his testimony before the Committee on the Conduct of the 
 War (Report 18G5, vol. i. p. 179). 
 
 
MEMOIR. 11 
 
 say, had he dared to take the responsibility of 
 changing the dispositions of his division, — he 
 might at least have rendered the impending dis- 
 aster less overwhelming. But General Devens 
 was not a military man by education, nor was 
 he a military genius ; he had had very little ex- 
 perience in the field ; he was commanding a divi- 
 sion for the first time ; he was directly under the 
 eve of his corps commander, — a regular officer, to 
 whom he had transmitted all the information he 
 had received, and on whom it evidently made no 
 impression whatever. Lastly, the withdrawal of 
 Barlow's brigade by Hooker's express order dur- 
 ing; the afternoon must have convinced Devens 
 that the general commanding the army looked 
 at the whole matter as not deserving serious 
 attention. 
 
 The greater part of his division was facing 
 south. It constituted the prolongation of the 
 front of the army towards the west. Without 
 orders he did not feel justified in stripping a 
 portion of what was considered by his superiors 
 as the main line of battle. He did, as we have 
 seen, make some dispositions for defending his 
 right flank ; but all the dispositions that he 
 could have made on his ow r n responsibility 
 would have been wholly inadequate to the needs 
 of the occasion. At six o'clock in the afternoon 
 
12 MEMOIR. 
 
 the storm broke, and in a few minutes compara- 
 tively Devens's whole division was routed. He 
 himself, wounded severely in the foot, unable to 
 remount his horse, remained with his unfor- 
 tunate command to the last, gallantly striving 
 to rally the troops, and to interpose to the vic- 
 torious advance of the Confederates an obstinate 
 even if an ineffectual resistance. His efforts, as 
 might have been expected, were unavailing. The 
 rout of the Eleventh Corps, badly posted and out- 
 numbered as it was, was complete ; but Devens 
 did all that a brave man and a gallant officer 
 could do to retrieve the fortunes of the fight. 
 
 His wound, which was a serious one, was not 
 cured when his division was again flanked and 
 routed in the bloody battle of Gettysburg. In fact, 
 he never rejoined it after Chancellorsville ; and the 
 next time we see him in the field it is at the head 
 of the Third Division of the Eighteenth Corps, 
 then under Devens's former commander, General 
 William F. Smith. That officer, who, with General 
 Gillmore, had been serving under General Butler 
 on the James River in the latter's ill-planned and 
 unsuccessful movements directed upon Richmond 
 from Bermuda Hundred, was in the latter part of 
 May, 1864, ordered to join the Army of the Poto- 
 mac with a force of about sixteen thousand men. 
 The Army of the Potomac, after a series of bloody 
 
MEMOIR. 13 
 
 and indecisive battles at the Wilderness, Spottsyl- 
 vania, and the North Anna, was then about to cross 
 the Pamunkey. Smith, when he arrived, was or- 
 dered to Cold Harbor, where his command at first 
 took up a position between the Fifth and Sixth 
 corps. On the afternoon of the 1st of June an as- 
 sault on the enemy's lines was made. " The Third 
 Division, under the command of Brigadier-Gen- 
 eral Charles Devens, consisting of the brigades of 
 Colonel Drake and Colonel Barton," says General 
 Smith in his despatch of the 2d of June, u charged 
 across an open field, 1,250 yards in width, swept 
 by a cross-fire of the enemy's artillery, carried the 
 edge of the woods, and drove the enemy from 
 their intrenchments, which were protected by 
 slashings and entanglements, taking some 250 
 prisoners." In the general assault along the whole 
 line, known as the battle of Cold Harbor, which 
 was made on the morning of the 3d of June, 
 " General Devens's command," says General Smith 
 in his formal report, " held my right flank, and 
 had been so much cut up in officers and men during 
 the two days previous that I did not deem it in 
 condition to do more than act on the defensive." 
 In his article in the work entitled " Battles and 
 Leaders of the Civil War," published by the Cen- 
 tury Company, General Smith explains (p. 225) 
 that " a gap of nearly two miles between the right 
 
14 MEMOIR. 
 
 of the Eighteenth Corps and the left of the Fifth 
 Corps under Warren made it necessary to throw 
 back the right flank of the [Eighteenth] Corps to 
 hold the open plain and roads, and to prevent that 
 flank from being turned. This necessarily put the 
 division on the right quite out of the battle, ex- 
 cept in the use of its artillery at rather long 
 range. . . . The plan adopted gave to Devens, 
 with his division, the duty of keeping the right 
 flank secure." This task General Devens faith- 
 fully performed, although suffering so severely 
 from rheumatism that he was obliged to ask for 
 leave of absence. On June 4, " General Dev- 
 ens," says Smith in his report, " who had done 
 duty during the 3d, and [had been] carried about 
 on a stretcher, was relieved, on account of his 
 health, by General Ames." 
 
 On recovering from this illness, General Devens 
 returned with alacrity to duty, this time as com- 
 manding the Third Division of the Twenty-fourth 
 Corps under General Gibbon, which constituted a 
 part of the Army of the James, under General 
 Orel. On the 27th of March, 1865, the final cam- 
 paign began. The greater part of the Twenty- 
 fourth Corps, together with other troops from the 
 Army of the James, took the field, to act in con- 
 junction with the Army of the Potomac. Devens's 
 division remained in the works; and by a great 
 
MEMOIR. 15 
 
 piece of good fortune it fell to him to lead the 
 first Federal troops into the capital of the Southern 
 Confederacy. Early in the morning of the 3d 
 of April, the Federal forces under General Weitzel, 
 the commander of the Twenty-fifth Corps, entered 
 the city ; and the division of Devens led in this 
 triumphant march. 
 
 We have been somewhat particular in giving the 
 details of General Devens' s military services, be- 
 cause they are presumably less well remembered 
 by the public of the present da} 7 than his long and 
 honorable career on the bench. But it is well that 
 it should be known that he was no holiday soldier. 
 He took his full share of fatigue, of responsibility, 
 of danger. His merits were, as we have seen, re- 
 cognized by all his superior officers ; and we may 
 add that it was at the request of General Grant 
 that he received his brevet of major-general of 
 volunteers for gallant and meritorious conduct. 
 
 He continued in the service for about a year 
 after the cessation of hostilities, being for the 
 greater part of that time in command of the 
 Federal troops in South Carolina. In 18GG he 
 was mustered out of service. 
 
 He at once returned to Boston to resume the 
 practice of the law ; but in 18G7 Governor Bul- 
 lock appointed him to the bench of the Superior 
 Court. Here he served about six years, when he 
 
16 MEMOIR. 
 
 was promoted by Governor Washburn to a seat 
 upon the bench of the Supreme Judicial Court. 
 For about four years he filled this position to the 
 great satisfaction of the community. 
 
 In March, 1877, President Hayes offered him a 
 place in his cabinet, — that of Attorney-General 
 of the United States. It is an open secret that 
 Judge Devens hesitated seriously before accepting 
 this offer. He was nearly fifty-seven years of age ; 
 he occupied a seat on the highest judicial bench 
 in his own State ; he would have no right to claim 
 or expect a restoration to this position on his re- 
 turn from Washington ; and he would then be 
 almost too old to resume practice at the bar. Nor 
 would his private means, without a professional 
 income, furnish him a sufficient support. More- 
 over, he had been away from home for five years, 
 and he much preferred living in Massachusetts to 
 a residence far away from his friends and his own 
 people. But the request of the President seemed 
 like a call of duty, and he went. The tasks of 
 his office, though new to him, were of course in 
 the general line of his professional experience, and 
 he discharged them to the evident satisfaction of 
 the government. His life in Washington naturally 
 brought him in contact with many of the distin- 
 guished men of the country, the men who had won 
 our victories in the late war, and who had, in 
 
MEMOIR. 17 
 
 or out of Mr. Lincoln's cabinet, shown states- 
 manship and ability. For society of this kind, 
 and in fact for general society of every kind, 
 General Devens was eminently fitted ; and doubt- 
 less he enjoyed to the full all the opportunities of 
 this nature which Washington official life so richly 
 offers. 
 
 He returned to Massachusetts at the close of 
 Mr. Hayes's administration ; and in April, 1881, 
 he was reappointed to the Supreme Judicial Court 
 by Governor Long, and on that bench he sat until 
 removed by death. 
 
 General Devens's health had always been of the 
 best. Even the harsh experience of the war, al- 
 though endured long after the elasticity of youth 
 had passed away, — for he was forty-one years old 
 when the war broke out, — failed to make any 
 impression on his vigorous constitution. He was 
 always able to get through his official work as a 
 judge without worry, and his evenness of temper 
 and habitual command of a good working phil- 
 osophy of daily life seemed to preserve him from 
 the annoyances and trials which beset most men 
 who do their fair share of work in this world. 
 No change was visible in him until perhaps a year 
 before his death, when he sometimes complained 
 of not feeling; as strons; and well as usual, or, to 
 be more accurate, quietly mentioned the fact to his 
 
18 MEMOIR. 
 
 more intimate friends; but he made no alteration 
 in his daily life. He went as constantly to his ac- 
 customed seat on the bench, to his habitual chair 
 at his club ; he was to be seen as often at the 
 houses of his friends. In the latter part of De- 
 cember, 1890, however, he grew suddenly weaker ; 
 it was feared that there was something wrong 
 about the action of the heart ; still no immediate 
 consequences were apprehended. He apparently 
 did not sutler, and there was little in his condition 
 to indicate a serious illness ; but he was in reality 
 rapidly nearing the end, and on the afternoon of 
 Wednesday, January 7, 1891, he died. His nephew, 
 Mr. Arthur Lithgow Devens, and others of his 
 relatives were present at the last. His death was 
 sudden, and without pain, just as he would have 
 wished it to be. 
 
 He was buried from Trinity Church, Boston, on 
 Saturday, January 10, 1891, with military honors. 
 The coffin was borne by eight non-commissioned of- 
 ficers of the Second United States Artillery. The 
 military escort consisted of detachments of the 
 First Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Militia 
 and of Batteries B and D, Second United States 
 Artillery. The Military Order of the Loyal 
 Legion, of which General Devens had for years 
 been the Commander, attended in force. The 
 bench and the bar were largely represented, Chief- 
 
MEMOIR. 19 
 
 Justice Field being one of the pall-bearers. The 
 church was crowded. The burial service was read 
 by the Rev. Phillips Brooks, D.D. While the coffin 
 was being carried from the church, " taps " were 
 sounded from various parts of the building, and 
 Sullivan's " Lost Chord" was played on the bugle. 
 The remains were interred in the family lot in 
 Mount Auburn Cemetery. 
 
 The life which we have just sketched was an 
 unusually honorable, useful, and happy life. Few 
 men have ever lived who were better fitted to dis- 
 charge the ordinary tasks which belong to public 
 office — whether civil or military — than was 
 Charles Devens. He brought to their accomplish- 
 ment, in the first place, an honest, courageous, 
 and unreserved purpose to do his duty, and in 
 the second place, sound judgment, great tact, and 
 good administrative ability. His duties, it is true, 
 did not lie in the highest regions of the public ser- 
 vice. He never commanded an army, or even an 
 army corps. He was an Associate Justice only 
 of the Supreme Judicial Court. Nor did he ever 
 strongly desire the greater responsibilities or the 
 more conspicuous opportunities of distinction 
 which the chief control alone affords. His 
 ambition, though a strong and an honorable 
 ambition, was under the strict rule of his judg- 
 ment. He never thought of himself more hishly 
 
20 MEMOIR. 
 
 than he ought to have thought. He correctly 
 estimated his own powers and his own attain- 
 ments. That which he knew himself capable of 
 doing he was honorably anxious to do. His stand- 
 ard was high. His work was done thoroughly 
 and effectively, and with a masculine strength 
 and sobriety that won general admiration. 
 
 He was on the whole satisfied with his career. 
 It afforded to his peculiar powers and faculties ex- 
 cellent opportunities for exercise, growth, and suc- 
 cessful activity. 
 
 As an officer of the army he rose by gradual 
 steps and by his own merits as high as most of 
 those who had had no professional training in the 
 art of war, leaving out of the comparison, of course, 
 the two major-generals from this State whom 
 President Lincoln commissioned almost before the 
 first shot had been fired. Devens's promotions in 
 the army were all deserved. -His services, though 
 equalled, no doubt, by those of many others, and 
 not especially conspicuous, were the services of a 
 brave, faithful, and competent officer. 
 
 To his duties as a judge he brought a mind 
 characterized by strong common-sense and actu- 
 ated by an equally strong love of justice. He 
 moreover carried with him always the recollection 
 that a judge is, first of all, a magistrate, whose 
 office it is to decide controversies and disputes 
 
MEMOIR. 2 1 
 
 according to the well-established principles of the 
 law of the land ; and he never lost sight of this 
 fundamental conception of duty. He never used 
 the opportunities which a case presented for the 
 purpose of displaying his own acumen or learning. 
 He kept the main end of the law always plainly be- 
 fore his eyes. He was always serious, candid, willing 
 to hear, able to defer making up his mind until the 
 case had been fully presented. He never aimed 
 at showing himself able to comprehend a tangled 
 question merely by glancing at the pleadings. 
 Though always preserving fully the dignity of his 
 station, he was invariably courteous. It was a 
 pleasure to go before him. He did not possess 
 or pretend to possess deep or varied learning, but 
 he made up for this lack in great part by his long 
 experience and his remarkable ability to under- 
 stand human nature. His mind was not specially 
 acute or deep, but his rare common-sense, his un- 
 failing patience, and his strong desire to possess 
 himself of the facts and law of every cause that he 
 was called upon to hear rendered him one of the 
 most useful judges that have sat on the Supreme 
 Bench in our time. 
 
 It was, however, as an orator that General 
 Devens gained his greatest distinction. Of com- 
 manding presence and fine figure, a notably hand- 
 some man at all periods of his life, possessed of a 
 
22 MEMOIR. 
 
 strong and flexible voice, he had all the external 
 graces and gifts of a public speaker ; but these 
 were the least of his qualifications. He was 
 a master in the art of weaving an oration out of 
 the facts and associations of a famous historical 
 event, out of the strong and heroic qualities of a 
 great man. He invariably rose to the full height 
 of his subject, whatever it was ; and he always 
 carried his audience with him. He knew in- 
 stinctively how to reach their hearts. His very 
 presence attracted them. His language, strung 
 though restrained, his evident deep feeling, kept 
 always sufficiently in check, but yet by degrees 
 infusing itself into the minds of his hearers, his 
 ability to seize on the telling points of the topic 
 to which he was addressing himself, and his evi- 
 dent sincerity and patriotic fervor constituted 
 him one of the most brilliant and effective of our 
 public orators. The events and men of the Revo- 
 lution and of the Civil War were his principal 
 themes ; but his reverence and affection for his 
 Alma Mater made him on many occasions, and 
 notably on that of the celebration of the two 
 i hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the founding 
 of Harvard College, not to be sure, the chosen 
 representative of her literary eminence, but the 
 one to preside over her alumni and to be her 
 spokesman to the outer world. On these occa- 
 
MEMOIR. 23 
 
 sions he was always felicitous, always in touch 
 with both the college and the public, always 
 and unmistakably successful. 
 
 Judge Devens was never married ; but " he 
 lavished on his relatives," as a lifelong friend of 
 his has said, " the love he would have given to 
 wife and children." He was a devoted son and 
 brother. His younger relatives were very near 
 and dear to him ; yet he was eminently a man 
 among men. His acquaintance was very large. 
 He was a man of many friends ; he was always 
 urbane, kindly, tolerant, attractive. His at- 
 tachments to those whom he honored with his 
 friendship were strong and unchanging. He 
 was a good talker, and possessed a delightful 
 sense of humor, which enabled him to gather 
 from his varied experiences many most amus- 
 ing stories ; for though he was a man who took 
 life seriously, there was always ' a wholesome 
 and cheerful tone about his ways and his 
 conversation. 
 
 The orations and addresses which follow have 
 been selected out of a great many. It is hoped 
 that apart from the pleasure which they may be 
 expected to yield in the perusal, they will be wel- 
 comed as presenting the views of an able, well- 
 read, and competent critic and observer, as well as 
 the reflections and deductions of a man of genuine 
 
24 MEMOIR. 
 
 eloquence and patriotic feeling. They possess, no 
 doubt, a special interest for this generation ; but 
 they deserve, it is believed, a permanent place in 
 the historical literature of Massachusetts. The 
 Centennial Address on the Battle of Bunker Hill, 
 the Oration before the Army of the Potomac on 
 General Meade, and the Worcester Oration on Gen- 
 eral Grant are certainly in this category. But 
 perhaps nothing that he ever said was finer than 
 the brief address to his men after their first battle. 
 "We take the following account from the New York 
 Herald of October 30, 1861, and with this most 
 fit and eloquent appeal we bring this memoir to a 
 close : — 
 
 " After parade the regiment was formed in square, 
 and their noble and gallant Colonel Devens made them 
 an address, to which even a faithful verbal report would 
 do injustice, for no description could reproduce the 
 tender, subdued fervor with which the colonel first 
 spoke, the electric sympathy by which his men were 
 affected, or the earnest determination with which the 
 question was asked and answered. 
 
 " ' Soldiers of Massachusetts, men of Worcester County, 
 with these fearful gaps in your lines, with the recollec- 
 tion of the terrible struggle of Monday fresh upon your 
 thoughts, with the knowledge of the bereaved and soul- 
 stricken ones at home, weeping for those whom they will 
 see no more on earth, with that hospital before your 
 eyes filled with wounded and maimed comrades, I ask 
 you now whether you are ready again to meet the trai- 
 
MEMOIR. 25 
 
 torous foe who are endeavoring' to subvert our govern- 
 ment, and who are crushing under the iron heel of 
 despotism the liberties of a part of our country. Would 
 you go next week ? Would you go to-morrow ? Would 
 you go this moment ? ' And one hearty ' Yes ' burst 
 from every lip." 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 DELIVERED BEFORE THE SOCIETY OF THE ARMY OF 
 THE POTOMAC, AT NEW HAVEN, MAY 14, 1873. 
 
 Mr. President and Comrades of the Army 
 of the Potomac, — When, two years ago, our 
 distinguished fellow-soldier, Governor Fairchild, 
 suggested that it would be well to place upon our 
 records, by our exercises upon these occasions, as 
 full an account as we could gather of the part 
 which our army took in the War of the Rebellion, 
 — a suggestion which was then well carried out by 
 himself and afterwards by General Woodford, in 
 the eloquent address delivered last year at Cleve- 
 land, — he also remarked that it could hardly be 
 done consecutively ; but there must of necessity 
 be intervals in the regular progress of the narra- 
 tive. Most unwillingly do I break the thread, 
 and recognize that one of those occasions lias 
 come. One theme only seems appropriate for our 
 meeting to-day, when we remember that of the 
 five commanders of that army in front of Wash- 
 ington which became the Army of the Potomac, 
 but four now survive. He who was its leader 
 from the proud day of Gettysburg unto the yet 
 prouder day when its great rival, the Army of 
 
28 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 Northern Virginia, piled up its arms in sad and 
 sullen submission, and the sword of its leader was 
 laid in the conquering hand of Grant, has passed 
 since we last met from the ranks of living men. 
 No more shall we see that slender yet not un- 
 graceful figure, which seemed the embodiment of 
 the scholar, the soldier, and the gentleman, that 
 of late years has risen so cordially at all our 
 gatherings responsive to our call, as in the times 
 now long past we rose to his ; no more recog- 
 nize that quick and spirited glance ; no more hear 
 that voice whose tones have summoned to high 
 duties and great enterprises always, and never 
 counselled fear or dishonor. 
 
 His loss has been mourned as a public one 
 throughout the Union, especially in the city 
 which w T as his home and in the State whose hills 
 shall guard his fame forever ; but whatever may 
 be the honors paid to his memory elsewhere, 
 there is no place — the sacred circle of home 
 alone excepted — where that memory can be held 
 so dear as among those who with him have 
 borne the weary campaigns and the long marches, 
 by day and night, alike in July's heat and Decem- 
 ber's cold ; have seen with him the sad hours 
 of disaster and defeat ; and have known with 
 him the stern joy of victory. Honored and re- 
 spected as a wise and brave commander, loved 
 as a comrade, always considerate and true, if I 
 dedicate these fleeting moments to him, however 
 imperfect my tribute may be, I feel convinced I 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 29 
 
 shall not want your approval. Nor if I speak, 
 as I must, of the great field by which he is espe- 
 cially endeared to his countrymen, shall I speak 
 of it otherwise than as it stands to-day upon the 
 verdict of history, now that its record, drawn 
 from the reports of the principal commanders 
 on either side, is fully made up, and the victori- 
 ous and vanquished chieftains sleep in the common 
 repose of death. Wounded severely at Chancel- 
 lorsville a few weeks previously, in its dangers 
 I had no part ; to its honor I can lay no claim 
 except to that which was there reflected by you 
 upon every one who could call you " comrade." 
 Yet even from this I would not willingly part, 
 when I remember that as the glad tidings were 
 flashed towards the North, each one of your 
 wounded veterans stood more proudly on his 
 crutch ; and even the fever-stricken patient in 
 the hospital, as he raised himself from his couch 
 and strove with parched lips to join in the ring- 
 ing cheers, murmured, " I too am a soldier of 
 the Army of the Potomac." 
 
 Although born upon foreign soil, yet under 
 the flag of the Union and in its citizenship, 
 George Gordon Meade graduated at West Point 
 in 1835, and was then brevetted as second lieu- 
 tenant of artillery. Resigning in 1836, he passed 
 the intervening years until 1842 as an engineer 
 in the civil service of the United States, when 
 he was again appointed to the army as a second 
 lieutenant of the Topographical Engineers ; and 
 
SO ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 in the discharge of the pursuits and duties of 
 that important corps, for which he had a peculiar 
 aptitude, he continued until the breaking out of 
 the war with Mexico. During this he served at 
 first upon the staff of General Taylor, participat- 
 ing in all the hard-fought fights of that resolute 
 soldier until his line of approach to the city of 
 Mexico was relinquished, when Meade was trans- 
 ferred to the staff of General Scott, and aided in the 
 conduct of the siege operations against Vera Cruz. 
 At the close of the war he resumed with renewed 
 interest the scientific duties of his profession until 
 he was summoned from them in 1861 by the call to 
 arms, when the experiment of firing the Southern 
 heart by the attack upon Fort Sumter was found 
 to have been successful, not in that only, but in 
 fully arousing the North to its danger, and render- 
 ing anything like peaceful secession impossible. 
 
 It will be seen, therefore, that General Meade's 
 early education as a soldier had been in every 
 way calculated to develop his great natural 
 powers. Fully acquainted with all the scientific 
 branches of his profession, and undoubtedly from 
 his tastes strongly attracted by them, he had not 
 run the risk of becoming a mere soldier of the 
 book, but had seen the great actions and served 
 with the great captains of the Mexican War, 
 each of whom possessed qualities worthy of note 
 and study, and from whom he may have learned 
 some lessons of that care in preparation, that 
 vigor in execution, that calmness in difficulty, 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 31 
 
 which he was afterwards to exhibit on a far 
 greater field of warfare. 
 
 Appointed a brigadier-general of volunteers 
 in August, 1861, his military life was with this 
 army. He served in the operations in front of 
 Washington and through all the conflicts of the 
 Peninsula campaign up to the battle of Glendale, 
 in June, 1862, where he was severely wounded, 
 proving himself everywhere a zealous and com- 
 petent officer, as vigorous and brilliant in attack 
 as he was calm in endurance when compelled to 
 stand on the defensive. Returning to the field 
 in September, 1862, he was at once assigned 
 to the command of a division, with which he 
 served through the Maryland campaign, when 
 Lee was driven up through the passes of the 
 South Mountain Range to the field of Antietam, 
 and at Antietam, after the gallant Hooker fell 
 severely wounded, he was placed in temporary 
 command of his corps. 
 
 After Fredericksburg, — in which battle he con- 
 tinued to command the same division, and where 
 he succeeded in breaking the right of Lee's line 
 and threatening formidably his communications 
 with Richmond, although forced finally to re- 
 linquish his hold for lack of support, — General 
 Meade was assigned to the Fifth Army Corps, he 
 having some time previously been made major- 
 general of volunteers. In command of this corps 
 he served at the battle of Chancellorsville, and 
 remained with it until the 28th of June, 1863, 
 
32 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 when he was appointed Commander-in-chief of 
 the Army of the Potomac, .as that army was 
 moving up through Maryland to encounter Lee, 
 — an encounter which, as you all know, resulted 
 in the victory of Gettysburg. 
 
 The causes which led to that bold and remark- 
 able movement on the part of the Rebel Govern- 
 ment — the invasion of Pennsylvania, in 1863 — 
 have never been, so far as I know, completely 
 stated by it. The report of the Rebel commander- 
 in-chief clearly indicates that when it was written 
 he did not intend to develop them. He says 
 there that the Army of the Potomac lay along 
 the Rappahannock in such a position that it 
 could not be attacked to advantage ; that by 
 moving northward through the great valley of 
 Virginia, a fairer opportunity would be offered to 
 strike ; that the plans of the enemy for the sum- 
 mer would be disarranged and time consumed ; 
 and then adds that, actuated by these and other 
 important considerations that he may hereafter 
 present, he determined upon the movement. 
 Those important considerations have never been 
 divulged, and so far as General Lee is concerned, 
 now never can be ; yet they may be reasonably 
 conjectured. 
 
 Two reasons existed which, if it were possible 
 to get a foothold in any Northern State, rendered 
 it vital that it should be done. The Confederate 
 diplomatists had been struggling abroad in vain 
 for recognition as a government. They saw that 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 33 
 
 they could not hope to obtain this as long as the 
 war was confined to the limits of the Southern 
 States, and however formidable in proportions, 
 bore always the aspect of a mere local rebellion. 
 Let but their army maintain itself on Northern 
 soil, and Mr. Davis believed that his ambassadors 
 could obtain recognition from some foreign States 
 at least, and with it all the advantages of a posi- 
 tion in the family of nations. Then there was 
 the necessity of doing something to sustain the 
 courage of the Rebel States under a misfortune 
 which was impending over them, well known to 
 Davis and Lee, and as yet little appreciated 
 generally among the mass of their people. The 
 sword of Grant was knocking fiercely at the 
 gates of Vicksburg ; at any hour it might burst 
 them. With this, Port Hudson must fall ; and 
 cutting the Confederacy in twain, the Mississippi 
 would be open from the mountains to the sea. 
 This was a blow which could neither be warded 
 off nor parried, — it must descend ; and there was 
 left only the hope of dealing another in return 
 elsewhere which would in some degree diminish 
 its weight. 
 
 No sooner were the designs of Lee fully un- 
 masked by his movement from the Shenandoah 
 into the Cumberland valley than General Hooker, 
 who had fallen back towards Washington in 
 obedience to the exigencies of the problem which 
 pressed upon every commander of the Army of 
 the Potomac, — the necessit} 7 of covering Wash- 
 
 3 
 
34 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 ington, — acted with his usual vigor. Crossing 
 the Potomac to the north side, himself, on the 
 25th of June, on the 27th he had concentrated 
 his forces at Frederick. It was on the 28th 
 that Lee — whose cavalry had been cut off from 
 him by the rapidity of this action, and who had 
 then pushed Ewell forward to York and Carlisle, 
 with intent, as he says, to cross the Susquehanna, 
 and was himself at Chambersburg with Longstreet 
 and Hill — learned at the same time, not only that 
 Hooker had crossed the Potomac, but that he was 
 actually at Frederick. " We may search the his- 
 tory of modern campaigns in vain," says Colonel 
 Chesney, one of the most intelligent of the British 
 writers on our war, " to find a more striking exam- 
 ple of the effect produced by operating on the 
 enemy's communications than that of this move- 
 ment of Hooker's. The first sound that reached 
 Lee of the advance of the Federal columns to the 
 north of the river caused him to suspend all 
 action in any direction tending to draw him 
 farther from his base." He resolved at once 
 on concentrating his forces on the east side of 
 South Mountain, and preventing Hooker's farther 
 march westward ; and orders for this purpose 
 were at once issued. Before these facts were 
 known to Lee, which caused him thus to desist 
 from any further movement forward, the change 
 had been made in the Army of the Potomac 
 which placed General Meade in command, — Gen- 
 eral Hooker being relieved at his own request. 
 
 . 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 35 
 
 The immediate cause of this request was the 
 refusal by the War Department to place at his 
 disposal the troops at Harper's Ferry ; and with- 
 out entering into the discussion of this matter 
 here, I may say that I think that there will be 
 found few to-day to defend a course which, when 
 the air was black with the gathering clouds of 
 such a storm as burst in thunder a few da} 7 s 
 later over Gettysburg, would have left out of 
 the conflict ten thousand efficient troops, under 
 the command of a veteran general [French]. 
 
 No tribute to the discipline that prevailed in 
 this army can be higher than that which is paid 
 by saying that this change was made when every 
 one knew that a battle was impending, without in 
 any way affecting the spirits or energy of the troops. 
 The French herald who in the same breath an- 
 nounced the death of one king and the accession 
 of another by the words, " The King is dead ; long 
 live the King!" was never received with more 
 unquestioning loyalty than, in its devotion to the 
 cause it served and not in indifference to its lead- 
 ers, this army received each announcement of a 
 change of commanders. Faithful and devoted 
 to those who had preceded, it prepared to render 
 the same obedience to him who now in the very 
 imminence of a mortal struggle found its heavy 
 cares and responsibilities thrown upon him. The 
 situation was one which might cause anxiety to 
 the most audacious, for the loss of a great battle 
 then might endanger all for which we had been 
 
36 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 struggling ; and yet a great battle must be fought, 
 to relieve the Northern States from the invasion 
 which at that moment seemed to threaten most 
 directly the splendid city of Philadelphia. If 
 Meade could secure the immense tactical advan- 
 tage of compelling the enemy to attack him, that 
 might be rendered certain which without it 
 would be doubtful. It was his opinion that the 
 infantry of Lee must surpass his own by about 
 ten thousand men, supposing that each could 
 bring on to the field substantially his whole 
 army. If any lesson had been clearly taught 
 already, however, — and every day's experience 
 was to confirm it, — it was that in a country like 
 America, with the rough fieldworks that troops 
 may throw up, the improvements in artillery and 
 musketry are so much for the benefit of the party 
 which stands on the defensive that a force decid- 
 edly weaker may in such a position receive the 
 assaults of another with confidence. Cool as he 
 was brave, he resolved that this advantage should 
 be secured by forcing his opponent to attack him, 
 if possible. Accepting his position, in an order 
 issued early in the morning of the 28th, he 
 nobly summoned his troops to their duties, — 
 nor do I like the order less because it is distinctly 
 marked with the manly, healthy, religious feeling 
 which was an essential element in his character. 
 "The country," he says, "looks to this army to 
 relieve it from the devastation and disgrace of a 
 hostile invasion. Whatever fatigues and sacrifices 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 37 
 
 we may be called upon to undergo, let us have 
 in view constantly the magnitude of the interests 
 involved ; and let each determine to do his duty, 
 leaving to an all-controlling Providence the deci- 
 sion of the contest." 
 
 From the nature of the case, as, General Meade 
 states, no precise plan had probably been formed 
 by General Hooker, or could be by himself, 
 other than to be governed by the exigencies of 
 the situation. Already the army was in a posi- 
 tion which threatened Lee formidably ; but the 
 information of any hour might make a change 
 of movements necessary. The 28th was spent in 
 getting together the essential information as to 
 his own army, its various forces, and position, 
 as well as in ascertaining all that was then 
 known at the headquarters in reference to the 
 enemy ; and on the 29th, instead of continu- 
 ing to move westward, which was perhaps 
 the apprehension of Lee, fearful always as 
 to his communications, he commenced to move 
 northward, to compel him to loose his hold on 
 the Susquehanna. From this river, unknown 
 to him, Lee was already drawing back. Moving 
 upon the 29th and on the 30th in a manner 
 which would enable him to concentrate his 
 forces upon Pipe Creek, — a position about fif- 
 teen miles south of Gettysburg, which seemed 
 to afford a good line, alike for the purpose of 
 preventing the crossing of the Susquehanna and 
 of covering Washington and Baltimore, — no 
 
38 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 means were neglected in endeavoring to ascer- 
 tain the exact whereabouts of the enemy, and 
 also of the places where it would be suitable to 
 offer him battle. General Humphreys was di- 
 rected, on the arrival of his division at Emmetts- 
 burg, to report whether the ground there was 
 favorable, the position itself being evidently an 
 important one. On the 30th, Meade was in- 
 formed by Buford, who covered, with his cavalry, 
 the left of our army, of the presence of the 
 enemy near Gettysburg, whither Reynolds, with 
 the First and Eleventh Corps, had already been 
 ordered to proceed. While the orders of the 
 30th thus directed Reynolds, those to the other 
 corps contemplated evidently taking up the line 
 of Pipe Creek, in doing which they would be 
 shielded and masked by Reynolds on their left 
 front. Reynolds was also instructed, as General 
 Humphreys states in his beautiful address upon 
 General Meade, lately delivered in Philadelphia, 
 to report whether Gettysburg itself afforded 
 ground suitable for a battle. All the orders indi- 
 cate that every movement was liable to be changed 
 by the development of events ; and showing the 
 great skill which Meade possessed as a tactician 
 on a large scale, they demonstrate his ability 
 to handle an army in a series of manoeuvres of 
 the greatest importance. He was fully entitled 
 to the praise bestowed by Swinton, the able 
 critic of the operations of the Army of the Poto- 
 mac, who says that in " spite of the malicious 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 39 
 
 detraction of his adversaries, who have tried 
 to make it appear that he shrank from the 
 issue of arms at Gettysburg, it was in reality 
 the moral firmness of General Meade that deter- 
 mined the combat in the form in which it actually 
 occurred." 
 
 On the morning of the 1st of July, the first 
 encounter took place ; and although to the north 
 and west of Gettysburg, it is still to be consid- 
 ered a part, and an essential part, of the battle. 
 It was a day beginning successfully, but so far 
 as the loss of troops was concerned, ending seri- 
 ously, and yet a conflict of inestimable value ; 
 for although forced from the ground we at first 
 occupied, at its close we held the position to the 
 south of Gettysburg on the crest to be thence- 
 forth forever renowned in the American annals. 
 Hill's corps had moved from Chambersburg 
 through Cashtown, and on that morning was 
 encountered by Buford upon that road which is 
 to the west from Gettysburg beyond Seminary 
 Riclge, which on the next day became the most 
 important part of the army's line. Meeting 
 them at about nine o'clock in the morning, he 
 held them most gallantly in check until the 
 arrival of Reynolds with Wadsworth's divi- 
 sion, who immediately prepared to engage, send- 
 ing back for the rest of his corps and for the 
 Eleventh to hurry forward. To sustain Buford 
 was undoubtedly his most pressing need at the 
 moment, as the delay of the enemy was of im- 
 
40 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 portance, that Meade might be aided in the con- 
 centration of his forces ; but with the knowledge 
 Reynolds had of the anxiety of the commanding 
 general, who was then ignorant of the peculiar fa- 
 cilities afforded by the ground at Gettysburg, it is 
 not likely that he passed over the Emmettsburg 
 road without taking in all the advantage to be 
 obtained by the possession of the crest, or antici- 
 pating that if forced back upon it, he could cling 
 to it until he was sustained by the whole army. 
 Arranging his troops, forming his lines, with his 
 customary rapidity and energy, he advanced at 
 once on the force opposed to him, which already 
 largely outnumbered his own ; but hardly was 
 the movement commenced, when he fell, mortally 
 wounded. Brave men were to die by thousands 
 on that terrible field ; yet no one could fall whose 
 loss was more seriously felt and more deeply 
 deplored. Not the men of the First Corps only, 
 whom he had long led, but the whole army, 
 knew him as a soldier in whose bravery and skill 
 the most implicit confidence might be placed. 
 The senior of Meade in military rank, no jealous 
 thought at his promotion to the command of the 
 army ever entered that loyal heart. Modest 
 and simple in manner, with no trace of affecta- 
 tion or boasting, reliable as steel, a true soldier, 
 he died a soldier's death, grandly contributing to 
 the triumph he was never to share. Yet where 
 could man meet better the inevitable hour 
 than in defence of his native State, his life-blood 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 41 
 
 mingling with the soil on which he first drew 
 breath ? Long may the statue which the love and 
 honor of his comrades of the First Corps have 
 reared to him on the field stand, in glorious 
 though mute resemblance to him, as he stood that 
 day, watching with eager gaze and dauntless 
 heart the advance of the coming foe. 
 
 His troops did not lose the impulse he had 
 given them, even at his fall : gallantly holding 
 the enemy at bay, many prisoners were taken ; 
 and for an hour or two all went well. Sub- 
 stantially the remainder of the First Corps and 
 two divisions of the Eleventh Corps arrived 
 with General Howard, who took command on 
 the field ; but soon the advance of Ewell's troops, 
 who now approached from the north on their 
 way from Carlisle and York to Lee's proposed 
 concentration at Gettysburg, seemed to render 
 necessary an extension of our line round to the 
 north of the town, by which it was weakened 
 seriously. Outnumbered now at all points, the 
 day was fairly turned against us ; and Howard 
 was forced back through the town to the 
 heights where the battle was finally fought. 
 Nor could he effect this withdrawal except at 
 the expense of a severe loss in prisoners, which 
 fell more heavily upon the Eleventh Corps, which 
 had been exposed to the assaults of the columns 
 coming from the north. Although the number 
 of divisions engaged was about equal, it must 
 be observed that at this time each division and 
 
42 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 corps -of the enemy was more than double the 
 size of one of ours. Luckily, or rather prudently, 
 General Howard had left in position on Cemetery 
 Hill, as he advanced, one of his own divisions — 
 Von Steinwehr's — which had not been engaged. 
 General Hancock now arrived with an order 
 from Meade to take command on the field, 
 but without troops ; the confusion of the with- 
 drawal was subdued ; and the men, undiscour- 
 aged by the reverse, prepared to receive the 
 assault of the enemy and maintain their position 
 until after nightfall. A demonstration was in 
 fact made, but not with the usual vigor of 
 the enemy, and was without difficulty repulsed. 
 To Meade, Hancock immediately sent word that 
 the ground was favorable, and that it could be 
 held until after nightfall. The Twelfth Corps, 
 in response to the summons of General How- 
 ard, sent earlier in the day, had now reached 
 the field, — one brigade of the First, which had 
 been delayed, and two of the Third arriving 
 soon after ; and General Hancock, surrendering 
 the command to General Slocum, reported in 
 person to General Meade, who, he found, had 
 already issued orders to all his army to move 
 as rapidly as possible to Gettysburg, and was 
 himself preparing to go thither at once, and was 
 waiting only to hear from the Sixth Corps, which 
 could not reach there until after the middle of 
 the next day, as it was more than thirty miles 
 away. That summer night witnessed a scene 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 43 
 
 in Pennsylvania such as I trust its hills may 
 never behold again, as the whole army — the 
 artillery by every road, and the infantry by every 
 path — were moving to the conflict ; but early in 
 the day everything was ready except the Sixth 
 Corps, and for it they were strong enough to 
 wait. The guns were in position, and some 
 slight breastworks of earth and rails had been 
 hastily thrown up. Meade himself had reached 
 the ground soon after midnight, and directed 
 the arrangement of his troops ; that his tacti- 
 cal dispositions for the coming battle were of as 
 excellent an order as his materials allowed, has 
 not been questioned, that I am aware of, by any 
 one. One of his directions on arriving was 
 that proper examination should be made of all 
 the roads leading from Gettysburg. This order, 
 which proceeded only from the caution of a pru- 
 dent commander desirous to be prepared for any 
 event, how T ever unfortunate, afterwards gave occa- 
 sion to a charge against him that he intended 
 to withdraw without fighting, — a charge that 
 he always felt to be cruelly unjust. In his tes- 
 timony before the Committee on the Conduct of 
 the War, he emphatically denied it in terms of 
 such solemnity that now, when he stands before 
 the tribunal to which he then appealed, it is but 
 just that it should be repeated here. " I utterly 
 deny," said he, " under the full solemnity and 
 sanctity of my oath, and in the firm conviction 
 that the day will come when the secrets of all 
 
44 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 men shall be made known, — I utterly deny ever 
 having intended or thought for one instant to 
 withdraw that army, unless the military contin- 
 gencies which the future should develop during 
 the course of the day might render it a matter of 
 necessity that it should be withdrawn." 
 
 The morning of the 2d of July wore away 
 without anything decisive, — our own army on 
 the crest which stretched from Culp's Hill 
 along Cemetery Hill and Ridge to Round Top ; 
 while the enemy, with Longstreet's and Hill's 
 corps, occupied Seminary Hill, a ridge about a 
 mile distant, overlapping our left and extending 
 round to our right with Ewell's corps. Early 
 in the afternoon, stout John Sedgwick, with the 
 Sixth Corps, was up, after a long march of 
 thirty-six miles ; and the Federal Army stood 
 ready to receive the blow which the Army of 
 Northern Virginia must deliver, or lose the pres- 
 tige it boasted, and acknowledge the invasion a 
 failure. Whether it was wise in Lee to make the 
 attack has been doubted ; but he himself felt 
 that it was forced upon him, and says in his 
 report that " while he had not intended to fight 
 a general battle so far from his base unless 
 attacked, yet finding himself confronted unex- 
 pectedly by the Federal Army, the battle became 
 in some measure unavoidable by him." 
 
 The exact numbers engaged remain to-day in 
 dispute ; yet they were undoubtedly as nearly 
 equal as can ever be expected in a conflict of 
 
ORATION OX GENERAL MEADE. 45 
 
 such magnitude. That theirs exceeded ours seems 
 to be the more general estimate, and by about ten 
 thousand ; although I observe General Humphreys, 
 in the address to which I have referred, places 
 their infantry as exceeding ours by fifteen thou- 
 sand men. 
 
 It was three or four o'clock when the compara- 
 tive silence of the earlier part of the day was 
 broken by the attack upon our left, which was 
 held by the Third Corps under General Sickles. 
 Instead of extending directly from the left of 
 the Second Corps, which was our left centre, to 
 Round Top, he had thrown his line forward to 
 attain a position which he deemed more command- 
 ing upon the Emmettsburg road. While a strong 
 attack was made upon his left and upon the angle 
 where his line receded towards Round Top, a flank- 
 ing force was despatched to carry Little Round Top, 
 which the Rebel commander rightly judged to be 
 the key of the whole position. Before it reached 
 it, however, reinforcements had already arrived 
 from the Fifth Corps ; and the struggle for its 
 possession became at once most furious. No- 
 where during the engagement was more deter- 
 mination shown. Each regiment, as it came up, 
 realized that the point was vital, — that to lose 
 it, was to lose the day, — and fought accordingly. 
 Fiercely striven for, manfully held, nightfall saw 
 it and the whole crest from it to Culp's Hill in 
 our possession. The Third Corps had indeed 
 been forced from its more advanced position on 
 
46 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 the Emmettsburg road ; for after a stubborn re- 
 sistance, in which General Sickles was severely 
 wounded, and a heavy loss in men, it had fallen 
 back to the line from Hancock's left to Round 
 Top, which General Meade always considered the 
 true line. 
 
 The most anxious hours of the whole battle 
 were those in which the possession of Round Top 
 and the line on the Emmettsburg road were thus 
 fiercely debated. In this conflict the Third Corps 
 was assisted by reinforcements from nearly 
 every other ; and the day was at last brilliantly 
 closed by a charge from General Crawford's 
 division, supported by the advance of the Sixth 
 Corps, which drove the enemy finally from too 
 close proximity to Round Top. On our right an 
 advantage had been gained by Ewell, who had 
 secured a position within our lines, weakened, as 
 they had been, by the reinforcements sent to the 
 left of the line ; but of this it was clear to Gen- 
 eral Meade that he would be easily dispossessed 
 in the morning. 
 
 Night descended at last ; and each army, 
 anxious but determined, waited for the coming 
 day, which must decide the momentous issue. 
 For Lee to desist in his attack was to confess 
 defeat, while yet, as he says, "he believed ulti- 
 mate success might be secured ; " and although 
 he knew well that the position from which the 
 Third Corps had been forced was an advantage 
 rather apparent than real, yet he knew also that 
 
ORATION OX GENERAL MEADE. 47 
 
 it had inspirited his troops to a belief that the 
 task before them was not beyond their powers. 
 On the other hand, in our army, while all felt 
 that the hour for exultation had not come, every- 
 thing seemed to indicate, in spite of the loss of 
 the position on the Emmettsburg road, that the 
 true line of defence was untouched ; and that the 
 same determination on the day which was to 
 come as on that which was passed, would insure 
 the victory. To the rule that councils of war 
 never fight, which has become a proverb, the 
 council of war held this night is an exception ; 
 for it was there agreed that to fight was the only 
 thing to be done. 
 
 Unwilling to abandon the scheme of an inva- 
 sion, and confiding in the spirit of his troops, 
 Lee decided on the morning of the 3d of July to 
 try again the fortune of an attack. While not 
 materially changing his position, which, as be- 
 fore, swept round from Seminary Ridge, — relin- 
 quishing any attemp.t to carry Round Top, now 
 securely held and rudely but strongly fortified, 
 — his plan was an assault by main force upon 
 our left centre, which should carry all before 
 it. Nor was this unexpected by Meade, who, 
 in a conversation with Gibbon on the evening 
 of the 2d of July, had predicted that after his 
 ill success on our flanks the next movement of 
 Lee would be on our centre. Any project of a 
 movement in force upon our right was aban- 
 doned also, if entertained. The driving out of 
 
48 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 Ewell's force in the morning from the more 
 forward position it had held the evening be- 
 fore had deprived him of his foothold there, 
 which it would cost a desperate struggle again 
 to obtain. 
 
 It was one o'clock on the 3d of July when 
 all w r as ready within the Confederate lines for 
 that celebrated assault which ranks among the 
 most remarkable in history, alike for the fierce- 
 ness with which it w T as made and the resolution 
 and persistency with which it was met and foiled. 
 It has been compared to the charge of the Old 
 Guard at Waterloo, but not, I think, very hap- 
 pily, for that was but a desperate effort to save 
 a battle already lost. It far more resembles 
 the renowned charge at Wagram, directed by 
 Napoleon himself, then in the zenith of his fame 
 and the full splendor of his great military intel- 
 lect. Aspern and Essling had been doubtful, or 
 indeed, defeats for the Emperor ; and the fate of 
 the day at Wagram was trembling in the scale, 
 when, concentrating the fire of one hundred guns 
 upon the Austrian centre after a furious can- 
 nonade, he launched Macdonald, with ten thousand 
 men, upon it. It was observed that although the 
 Empire had long since come, Macdonald, who led 
 the column in person, as if to inflame his men 
 with all the fire of the French Revolution, wore 
 that day his old uniform of a Republican general. 
 Bursting upon the Austrian line, it was broken ; 
 and instant retreat followed. But Gettysburg was 
 
 
ORATION OX GENERAL MEADE. 49 
 
 to see repeated that favorite movement of Napoleon 
 of striking at the centre, on an even more gigantic 
 scale, yet not with like success. As the wave 
 which beats upon the rocky barriers of our coast 
 is dashed back again in clouds of scattering, dis- 
 solving spray, so this fierce and bloody wave 
 of rebellion was to be hurled back, broken, scat- 
 tered, and in wild disorder, when it struck the 
 adamantine wall of the infantry of the Army 
 of the Potomac. 
 
 Concentrating an immense mass of artillery, not 
 less than one hundred and fifty guns, along his 
 front, the Confederate commander strives first to 
 shake the morale of the Federal troops, whose 
 firmness and courage he clearly does not despise, 
 in order that his infantry columns may more 
 readily do the decisive work he has in store for 
 them. From eighty guns posted upon Cemetery 
 Hill and Ridge, our batteries make stern reply ; 
 and an artillery conflict of unexampled fury 
 rasres from rid ore to ridee and over the vallev 
 of death that lies between. Sheltering themselves 
 as well as they can, by such rude breastworks as 
 they have, from the terrific storm of shot and 
 shell which fills the air, and with its tumult could 
 wake the very dead among whom their lines are 
 drawn, were they sensible to mortal sounds, our 
 troops await the momentous struggle which is 
 coming ; for the mighty roar is but the overture 
 and prelude to a mightier drama. For two hours 
 the tempest continues. Hunt, our prudent Chief 
 
50 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 of Artillery, towards the end slackens his fire, 
 that the ammunition may not fail (when the 
 infantry attempt to close, he knows he shall need 
 it all), and his wisdom is well rewarded after- 
 wards. Hancock, who commands the left centre, 
 his own corps being immediately under Gibbon, 
 knows that somewhere on him the storm is to 
 break, and rides along his whole line, seeing that 
 all is prepared, and rousing his men by his ardent 
 words and magnetic presence to the hot work 
 that is before them. 
 
 And now there is a momentary lull in the 
 fire of the Confederate line. All know it as 
 the lull which precedes the wildest roar of the 
 tempest ; and that for a few moments their bat- 
 teries cannot fire, because their infantry are 
 moving. Out of the wooded crests which have 
 shielded them on Seminary Ridge they are com- 
 ing, now in number nearly or quite eighteen 
 thousand men. From the edge of the w r ood 
 Longstreet directs the assault ; and anxiousky 
 Lee watches the result. Pickett's division, about 
 five or six thousand strong, is the directing force. 
 Upon the right it is supported by Wilcox and 
 Perry, from Hill's corps. Upon the left Heth's 
 division of Hill's corps, commanded by Pettigrew, 
 forms a portion of the assaulting lines, and is 
 strengthened by two brigades from Pender's 
 division, of the same corps. On Pickett, how- 
 ever, the greatest reliance is placed. Let him but 
 reach our line with adequate momentum, and 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 51 
 
 they feel that the day is theirs. The men of this 
 division have not yet fought in the battle, and 
 feel that they have been kept for its very crisis ; 
 they are resolved upon their work, for they know- 
 that the eyes of both armies are upon them. 
 Virginians all, — alas, that the State so honored 
 in the Union as to be termed the mother of 
 its Presidents should send forth so gallant a body 
 of her sons in the mad and wicked effort to 
 destroy it ! Conspicuous in the front, as they 
 move into the more open ground, is Pickett 
 himself, carefully forming his lines ; and almost 
 immediately they come under the fire of our 
 batteries ; yet steadily they move through the 
 valley with a courage that in a good cause 
 should command the admiration of the world. 
 There is no rushing or tumult ; for they are old 
 troops and know well the value of discipline, and 
 that they must keep their formations or they will 
 be driven, as a mob would be driven, from the 
 front of the Army of the Potomac. They close up 
 their ranks too, as the shot and spherical case 
 come plunging through their lines, for they have 
 often looked before upon the sight of blood. 
 The lines of Pettigrew, more exposed by the 
 open character of the ground, waver soon under 
 the terrific cannonade, — for Hunt, economical 
 a little while ago, is liberal enough everywhere 
 now, — and are broken on their left, while the 
 right still clings firmly to the directing force. 
 The supporting columns fail to advance in season 
 
52 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 and with vigor ; and Pickett's division must 
 do the work finally almost alone, if it may. 
 Already it is within the musketry fire of our 
 troops ; but yet they withhold it. Many of our 
 guns have now exhausted their canister, and are 
 drawn back to await the struggle of the in- 
 fantry ; but still the stout army lets its op- 
 ponents come. The Second Vermont Brigade, 
 First Corps, thrown forward upon its flank, is 
 the first to open ; but the column still presses on. 
 It encounters now the Second Corps ; and as 
 it receives a terrific fire from the divisions of 
 Gibbon and Hays, it returns it with desperate 
 energy, and rushing fiercely onward, strikes 
 with its fullest force upon the front of Webb's 
 brigade, pressing back our line from the stone 
 wall which had covered it to the crest imme- 
 diately behind, where the gallant Webb, assisted 
 by Hall, soon restores order. Already their 
 battle-flags are on the low stone wall ; already 
 Armi stead, who leads, as he stands upon it 
 waves his troops forward to their last great 
 struggle. The hour for the Army of the Potomac 
 has come. Up now, men of New England, and 
 show yourselves in the field the same stout 
 defenders of the Constitution and the Union that 
 your statesmen have ever done in the forum ! 
 Up, men of the Middle States, upon whose soil 
 this unholy attempt to strike at the keystone of 
 the arch is made ! Up, men of the West, whose 
 fortunes have so long been cast with this East- 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 53 
 
 ern army, that you may bear back beyond the 
 mountains the tidings of the great victory won 
 to-day on the Atlantic slope ! Up, true men of 
 the South, few though you are in numbers, who 
 fight in our ranks to-day ! There is no need 
 for any one to echo the order of the Duke at 
 Waterloo, to call or command, for now the left 
 centre, as if by a common impulse and instinct, 
 throws itself upon the foe. The point penetrated 
 by the enemy is covered by some regiments ; 
 while others change their front so as to strike 
 them on the flank. There is confusion : organiza- 
 tion is to some extent lost in both brigades and 
 regiments ; but all understand what is to be done, 
 and are resolute. It is the stern confusion of the 
 onset, and not the wretched tumult of disaster. 
 As the long wave of fire bursts upon their charg- 
 ing lines, the colors of our regiments are advanced 
 to meet the battle-flags of the foe. Firmly on our 
 men come, — officers animating by their example 
 at least, when they cannot direct by their com- 
 mands ; for we stand no longer on the defensive, 
 but take the offensive now. Before that deter- 
 mined front and concentrated fire, their men did 
 all that brave though erring and misguided men 
 could do. Killed or mortally wounded, their briga- 
 diers fall ; their lines waver, yield, and break at 
 last ; and while a few wild, disorganized masses 
 struggle to reach the Confederate line, from which 
 they issued so proudly an hour before, the Army 
 of the Potomac gathers up the prisoners by thou- 
 
54 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 sands, and their battle-flags in sheaves, and knows 
 that Gettysburg is won. 
 
 General Meade, who was at the right getting 
 his reserves in order when the assault com- 
 menced, reached the left centre just as the repulse 
 was fairly completed, and speaking to General 
 Gibbon's aide, asked, " How is it going here ? " 
 He was told that the assault w r as repulsed. He 
 repeated, " Is it entirely repulsed ?" and when the 
 aide replied that it was, and all around broke 
 into loud cheers, he raised his hat with a simple 
 " Thank God ! " Nor with him was this the 
 mere repetition of a phrase of custom, but an 
 expression of deep and heartfelt feeling. Al- 
 though thousands in a grateful country attested, 
 by solemn thanksgiving, their gratitude for this 
 great triumph, — worthy to be ranked with what 
 Oliver Cromwell termed the battle of Worcester, 
 " the crowning mercy of the Lord," — I question 
 if from one it came with more deep emotion than 
 from the lips of the commander-in-chief upon 
 the field itself. "A soldier," says Corporal Trim, 
 in Sterne's fine stor}*, — "a soldier, an't please 
 your Rev'rence, must say his prayers when and 
 where he can." 
 
 It has been contended that we should now have 
 attacked in our turn ; but such a movement, even 
 if successful, might of course become seriously 
 compromising ; and it was not in the character of 
 General Meade to put at risk that which he had 
 already gained, when it was of such vast value and 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 55 
 
 importance. The battle had been fought for the 
 key of the country, where he stood, and fought 
 out thoroughly ; it was his beyond doubt or 
 peradventure, — no earthly power could wrest it 
 from him. The invasion was at an end ; and Lee 
 would be compelled to abandon the territory into 
 which he had entered. Nor must it be forgotten 
 that while the losses of the enemy were greater 
 far, ours were yet enormous ; for tested in the 
 merest material way and without regard to the 
 consequences involved, Gettysburg is one of the 
 great battles of the world. The Confederate loss 
 was eighteen thousand killed and wounded, and 
 13, GOO missing, — nearly the whole of the lat- 
 ter being our prisoners, — making a total of 
 31,600 ; our own was 16,500 killed and wounded, 
 and 6,600 missing, — to a large extent the 
 prisoners of the first day, — making a total loss 
 of 23,100. 
 
 It was the 5th of July when Lee commenced 
 his retreat ; and as he reached the Potomac, 
 which he had crossed in such high hope, he 
 learned by a message from Davis that the blow 
 upon Vicksburg, of which he had hoped to break 
 the weight, had fallen, and that the Mississippi 
 was open to the sea. Whether or not he could 
 have been attacked to advantage before he 
 crossed, is }-et an open question, which I shall 
 not undertake here to discuss. 
 
 I would not willingly do injustice to the other 
 great fields of the war and their splendid results ; 
 
56 ORATION OX GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 and yet it has always seemed to me that Gettys- 
 burg was the culminating point of the Rebellion ; 
 and that the blow struck that day for the Union, 
 accompanying the fall of Vicksburg, turned for- 
 ever its bloody tide. Large, varied, and constant 
 as were the services rendered by General Meade 
 before that day and after it to the very end of 
 the war, it is by his judgment in so manoeu- 
 vring his army as to compel the Confederate 
 commander to take the initiative, by his energy 
 in bringing his troops to this decisive field, by his 
 skill in posting his force and arranging his order 
 of battle, by his calmness, courage, and persistency 
 in all its vicissitudes, that he will ever be most 
 gratefully remembered. His fame is built upon 
 the rocks, and is as immovable as the hills of 
 Gettysburg. Great fields were } r et to be fought, 
 great sacrifices endured, great victories won ; the 
 leader, wise of head and stout of heart, who 
 should gather the springs which moved all our 
 armies into a single hand, and control them with a 
 single will, was yet to come before the long-tried 
 Army of the Potomac should see all that it fought 
 for fully secured. Yet although all this was 
 still to be, and although the waves of the Rebel- 
 lion were to come again and yet again, never 
 was its bloody crest to be reared so high as 
 at Gettysburg. 
 
 To do justice to all the valor and heroism of 
 that day, and all its momentous consequences, is 
 a task beyond the reach of language ; yet so far 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 57 
 
 as words may do it, it has been already done. 
 The monuments which the intellect can rear out- 
 last the stateliest that hands can' raise. The 
 columns which the States of Greece reared to 
 the dead of Thermopylae crumbled to the dust 
 hundreds of years ago ; but the noble ode by 
 which Simonides commemorated them is taught 
 to-day in the schools of this University, beneath 
 the budding branches of whose elms we stand, 
 in a world undreamed of then. Athens is in 
 ruin ; conqueror after conqueror has pressed his 
 rude heel upon her ; but the noble oration by 
 which Pericles celebrated the Athenian dead is 
 fresh in immortal youth. And as long as the 
 Union shall stand, will the simple, majestic me- 
 morial by which, with words fresh from his true 
 and honest heart, Abraham Lincoln commemo- 
 rated the great deed done that day be re- 
 membered ; and " government of the people, by 
 the people, and for the people, shall not perish 
 from the earth." 
 
 Already my brief hour draws to its close. 
 You know well that within its limits it would 
 be vain for me to attempt to write the history 
 of the subsequent operations of the Army of the 
 Potomac ; yet to do all this would be necessary 
 to do full justice to our late commanding general. 
 Let me sum them briefly up by saying that the 
 operations of the remainder of the year of which 
 I have been speaking, though important, were 
 indecisive, — both the Army of the Potomac and 
 
58 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 that of Northern Virginia being reduced, by 
 heavy drafts made upon them, to sustain the 
 movements now taking place in the West. 
 
 The succeeding spring witnessed the great 
 change by which our armies came under one 
 head, by the appointment of General Grant as 
 lieutenant-general, who was to command in the 
 field and not from the Bureau, — of which latter 
 style of commanding we had indeed had enough, 
 — and to whose splendid exertions and unflinch- 
 ing determination we owed, under God, our final 
 triumph. Recognizing fully that the pinch of the 
 contest was between this army and that which 
 had so long held the lines of the Rebel capital, and 
 that other operations, however important, were 
 secondary and subsidiary only, the proper place 
 to direct the movements of all seemed to him to 
 be from the field ; and his headquarters were fixed 
 near those of our commanding general. The near 
 presence of an officer of higher rank with him 
 undoubtedly rendered General Meade's position 
 one of some delicacy ; yet it cost him no difficulty 
 to meet all its exigencies. While the responsi- 
 bility for the great movements to be made rested 
 with the lieutenant-general, their tactical ex- 
 ecution, so far as this army was concerned, 
 devolved upon him, and the immediate command 
 was always his ; and his duties were so executed, 
 I hazard nothing in saying, as to command from 
 General Grant a respect and esteem which con- 
 tinued to the day of his death. In the long 
 
ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 59 
 
 series of battles which now commenced, General 
 Meade's splendid abilities as a tactician, his firm- 
 ness and judgment, his devotion to his troops, 
 were everywhere conspicuous, at the Wilderness, 
 Spottsylvania, and Cold Harbor, lavish of their 
 dead ; and in every conflict up to the last, when 
 though the malarial fever that raged within his 
 veins did not permit him to sit on his horse, he 
 still directed the Army of the Potomac in its stern 
 pressure upon the encompassed and beleaguered 
 army of Lee. To the great and high idea of duty 
 which he expressed in taking command of the 
 army, he was faithful to the close of its exis- 
 tence ; and the succeeding years, w r hich witnessed 
 his command in the Southern States, attest that 
 the moderation and firmness, the humanity and 
 love of justice, which were essential attributes 
 of his character, make his civil life as honorable 
 as his military career was splendid. 
 
 Comrades, the army which he commanded so 
 long has passed away. No more shall its bugles 
 break the sweet stillness of the morning air, as 
 with their reveille they salute the coming day ; 
 no more shall the falling night hear the rolling 
 tattoo of its drums. Its tents are struck ; and its 
 cannon have thundered their last notes of defi- 
 ance and of victory. Each year we who were 
 its survivors assemble in sadly diminishing num- 
 bers, as the remorseless artillery of time hurls its 
 fatal missiles into our ranks, until shortly a few 
 old men only shall gather together and strive 
 
60 ORATION ON GENERAL MEADE. 
 
 with feeble voices to raise the thundering battle- 
 cheer with which we once answered the Rebel 
 yells, to sink themselves soon after under the 
 common lot. How fast the coming generations 
 rise to push us from our places, when we re- 
 member all whom we have lost, even since the 
 war, I do not need to remind you. Yet as 
 generation after generation shall come in their 
 long succession, while the great flag that the 
 Army of the Potomac bore at the head of its 
 marching columns waves over a free and united 
 people, it will be remembered that in its day and 
 generation, and in its time and place, that army 
 did for liberty and law, for the Constitution and 
 the Union, deeds worthy of immortal honor. And 
 he who was its leader on so many a hot and 
 bloody day and on so many a well-contested field, 
 — we leave him to his long repose, to his pure, 
 unsullied, and well-earned fame, in the full con- 
 fidence that while a Christian gentleman, a wise 
 and true soldier, a lofty patriot, is honored, he 
 will not be forgotten : — 
 
 "Mild in manner, fair in favor, 
 Kind in temper, fierce in fight, 
 Warrior, nobler, gentler, braver, 
 Never will behold the light." 
 
ADDRESS 
 
 AT THE DEDICATION OF THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT 
 WORCESTER, JULY 15, 1874. 
 
 With the reflections that heave been excited by 
 the noble address to which we have just listened 
 engrossing our minds, with the emotions it has 
 kindled still swelling our hearts, it would hardly 
 seem advisable (were I to consult my own views 
 alone) that more should be added ; and we might 
 well depart, satisfied that all it was in our power 
 to do by the exercises of this day had been done. 
 Yet as it has seemed otherwise to the committee, 
 who have desired that some one should speak upon 
 this occasion who had himself served with those 
 whose deeds we have striven this day to commem- 
 orate, I answer readily to the call. Certainly it is 
 most fitting that in a city whose existence and pros- 
 perity demonstrate more clearly than any labored 
 argument all that has been achieved by the great 
 principles of liberty and equality which are the 
 foundation-stones of the mighty fabric of the 
 American Union, some memorial should rise winch 
 should tell in after times our affectionate and pro- 
 found regard for the heroic self-devotion and ex- 
 alted patriotism of those who have died to preserve 
 
62 SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 
 
 it. Did not the impulse of gratitude constrain us 
 to erect this monument, wisdom alone would dictate 
 such a step ; so that by its mute appeal there might 
 be inculcated upon all, the force and beauty of 
 their noble example. The education of a people in 
 great ideas is not by books alone ; there is a warmth 
 and glow in whatever is brave, noble, and heroic, 
 among the men of our own race and time, which 
 we shall look for in vain among the teachings of 
 the remote past ; and all wise nations have striven 
 to perpetuate the memory of those whom they 
 have deemed worthy of honor, by the pen of the 
 poet, the voice of the orator, and the hand of the 
 sculptor. How strong and potent through every 
 phase of our great struggle was the remembrance 
 that we were endeavoring to preserve that govern- 
 ment which, with infinite care, our fathers had 
 constructed ! As to the lips of many a dying 
 soldier — lips that were to know joy and grief no 
 more — there came a smile as he proudly recalled 
 that he too had trod, and with no unequal foot- 
 steps, in the paths marked out by our great fore- 
 fathers, so hereafter those to whom in a few short 
 years we must surrender this fair land, as they ad- 
 vance in the freshness of their youthful energy to 
 the duties of citizens, shall gather inspiration from 
 the example of these men who were our comrades 
 and brethren. They shall hear of the fierce fights of 
 the Peninsula, of Antietam, Gettysburg, and Nash- 
 ville, of the March to the Sea and the Surrender of 
 Appomattox, and their hearts shall glow with the 
 
SOLDIERS 1 MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 63 
 
 desire to emulate the noble fidelity and courage 
 of the soldiers of the War of the Rebellion. They 
 shall read the sad and wretched story of the hor- 
 rors and systematic tortures of the Southern prison- 
 houses, which history will be compelled by truth 
 to record, and shall be filled with a deeper detesta- 
 tion of that system of slavery which made such 
 cruelties possible, and a loftier respect for that 
 liberty for which these brave men died. To-day 
 we rear no monument to military glory ; we come 
 not to adorn with the laurel wreath the brow of 
 any great chieftain, but to honor those qualities 
 which make men truly great, although their duties 
 were performed in the humblest station. The les- 
 son taught by these noble lives and heroic deaths 
 we seek so to impress that it may sink deep into 
 the hearts of our countrymen long after our own 
 have ceased to beat. 
 
 The duties which the citizens of every free gov- 
 ernment owe to it are of necessity of a higher and 
 more solemn character than the obligations which 
 are due from the subjects of any other State. It 
 is emphatically their own, made by their own will, 
 to be sustained, if sustained at all, by their own 
 power. When menaced by disorder from within 
 or foes from without, it is for themselves to defend 
 it. This duty cannot be avoided or transferred ; 
 they who would be free and they who would pre- 
 serve their freedom alike " themselves must strike 
 the blow." 
 
 We recognize fully that among the causes which 
 
64 SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 
 
 have degraded nations, war, by the evils, moral and 
 social, which it brings in its train, by the debts 
 with which it encumbers industry and burdens its 
 rewards, has been among the worst. We know 
 that at this stage of the world's progress and in 
 this era of civilization every nation which enters 
 upon a war as vast and tremendous as that which 
 was forced upon us, must justify itself and its acts. 
 Before the august tribunal of history, whose sum- 
 mons cannot be disregarded, before the civilized 
 world, we are ready to plead and answer. As a 
 part of the people of the United States, a city from 
 whose limits there went forth, largely recruited 
 here and almost entirely from this county, seven 
 splendid regiments, some of which may fairly be 
 classed as among the most distinguished of the 
 whole army, we assert by the solemn act of to- 
 day, by this bronze and granite, that had not we, 
 had not these men and their comrades done what 
 they did, the fabric of free government bequeathed 
 to us would have been destroyed, and the hopes of 
 freemen throughout the world have been blasted. 
 We assert that the cause for which our own brave 
 men died — that of free government, that of 
 human liberty — forever entitles them to honor, 
 to tender and grateful recollection ; and that the 
 bravery and fortitude they exhibited were the true 
 fruits of the patriotism in which they had their 
 origin. We assert, now that the battle is fought 
 and the victory won, that what they did and what 
 we did was demanded most solemnly by duty ; and 
 
SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 65 
 
 that if we had failed in putting forth every effort 
 to suppress the Rebellion, we should have been 
 worthy to be branded as recreant to liberty. 
 
 By no fault of ours, by the wisdom of our 
 fathers, — and I use the words with the tenderest 
 respect for them, for I realize all their difficulties, — 
 there had been welded together, not in a compact, 
 but by an organic law, two classes of States. That 
 there should be such a union was a matter of 
 political necessity; and no one can contemplate 
 this wonderful form of government without the 
 profoundest respect and reverence for its founders, 
 successfully combining as they did the peace and 
 good order of small States with the strength, power, 
 and widely extended influence of a great govern- 
 ment. That there was a flaw in their work, they 
 knew ; and yet, looking at it as they saw it when 
 it was done, — when they recognized that they were 
 freed from the troubles, the jealousies, the weak- 
 ness of the Confederation which had struggled 
 through the Revolution, and which, after the ex- 
 ternal cohesive pressure of war had been with- 
 drawn, had tried to perform some of the duties of 
 a government, — what wonder that thev trusted 
 that in process of time the States would become 
 essentially alike, and slavery, which they hesitated 
 to acknowledge by name, would by some agency 
 pass away. It was not so to be. Madly resolved 
 to rule or ruin, determined to interrupt the natural 
 progress of events and the victory for freedom 
 which peace was so rapidly winning, the Southern 
 
66 SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 
 
 States determined to dismember the Union. Per- 
 haps even in this we might have acquiesced, had 
 we not seen clearly that two such governments as 
 our own and the one they would have established 
 could not exist together. We should have been 
 side by side with a nation from the very necessi- 
 ties of its existence aggressive, resolute, deter- 
 mined, and compelled to seek out new fields into 
 which to extend its power. There was an instinct 
 which told the American people not only that if 
 they permitted the Union to be once divided, it 
 could never be reunited, but also that if broken 
 into two such States, one or the other must have 
 the mastery. Our war is never to be confounded 
 with the struggles for power or for extended ter- 
 ritory, or the fierce contests of dynasties, which 
 constitute so large a portion of those which have 
 filled the earth with bloodshed ; it was a great 
 elemental struggle in which two opposite systems 
 were placed in direct conflict. Difficult as it had 
 been to deal with the question of slavery within 
 the Union, it was impossible to deal with it in a 
 government outside of the Union ; and it was to 
 be settled then and there whether the continent 
 should be all free or all slave. Like the clouds 
 charged with opposite electricities which sweep 
 over and meet in collision in our summer skies, 
 these two systems came of necessity into collision ; 
 but as after the electric storm the air is purer and 
 fresher, so now that the fury of the tempest has 
 passed, the face of all nature is brighter and fairer. 
 
SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 67 
 
 Perhaps it may be true that if it had been revealed 
 to us how vast the contest, how immense the suf- 
 fering, how terrible the expenditure of life, we 
 should have shrunk back aghast from that sea of 
 fire and blood ; but the heart of no people ever 
 beat more strongly and truly than did that of the 
 American people, as it sent back its answer to the 
 cannon-fire which announced that the flag of the 
 Union no longer protected from insult those over 
 whom it floated. The Union, it said, is no rope of 
 sand such as the winds and waves may toss upon 
 the shore, but a chain whose links, though bright 
 as gold, are yet as strong as adamant. 
 
 Wars have not always been unmixed evils. Out 
 of the fierce conflicts of the English people in the 
 days of our own Puritan fathers came the liberty 
 which England now enjoys ; and it is by wars that 
 France and Spain, blindly, often madly, striving, 
 still force their way on towards the republic, which 
 is their only hope for permanent peace. Who is 
 there to say that, vast as the price was, our own con- 
 flict was not worth all that it cost ? True it is that 
 our treasure was poured out like water ; that noble 
 and valuable lives, not to be estimated in any scale 
 of material wealth, were sacrificed by thousands ; 
 yet the consolidation of a government in which two 
 discordant elements had so Ions; contended was 
 worth even this mighty price. The American 
 people, rejecting all the shallow artifices of com- 
 promise, have placed their feet firmly and forever 
 upon the great rocks of Liberty, Equality, and 
 
68 SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 
 
 Justice, and from them they cannot be moved. 
 The personal feelings engendered between us and 
 the rebellious portion of the Southern States will 
 pass away as the physical signs of the conflict 
 rapidly disappear ; but the work which these 
 hands, now cold and still, have wrought, is to 
 endure as long as freedom has an abiding-place 
 on earth. 
 
 Of the unfortunate victims whom tbe twin 
 furies of Slavery and Rebellion led forth to 
 battle, we, although standing here in honor of 
 the brave who yielded their lives in the great 
 and holy cause of Loyalty and Freedom, will 
 speak no word of harshness. Misled, betrayed, 
 erring, they were our countrymen still ; but it 
 were childish weakness to speak of their cause 
 other than as it was. Already the voices of true 
 men who served in the Confederate army begin 
 to speak out in recognition of the truth that their 
 cause was opposed alike to the government of the 
 country, the civilization of the age, and to human- 
 ity itself. The victories of the sword are sharp 
 and incisive, those of opinion slower, yet more en- 
 during ; but the day will come when throughout 
 the eleven States which were the seat of this 
 gigantic Rebellion, it will be universally admitted 
 that it was better for them as well as for us that 
 it failed. 
 
 For the cordial greeting that has been given to 
 those who have been in the field, for the generous 
 and noble tribute that has been paid to them by 
 
SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 69 
 
 the orator of the occasion, which has been so 
 warmly received, I return thanks on their behalf 
 and my own most sincerely. To-day we that 
 have been soldiers desire to do all honor to the 
 noble spirit of loyalty that prevailed at home, 
 which encouraged the heart and strengthened the 
 hand of every man who went forth to the field. 
 We know well how many there were whom age, 
 infirmity, or duties more immediate and impera- 
 tive even than those of filling the army, pre- 
 vented from being of our number. All who in 
 those hours of trial did their duty are entitled 
 proudly to remember it now and hereafter. Nor 
 ought we to forget the obligations we are un- 
 der to the women of the country, for the cour- 
 age they manifested from the beginning to the 
 very close of the struggle. Even now, when 
 the call for charity is made, — and it must of 
 necessity be, at the close of war so terrible as 
 this, that it is often made, — their ears are 
 never deaf. Hard as is the lot, stern as is the 
 duty of the soldier who swings on his knapsack 
 for the w T eary fields of war, that of the mother 
 who gives up her son, of the wife who gives up 
 her husband, of the maiden who gives up her 
 lover, is harder still ; for it is hers only to weep 
 and watch and wait. For him, if there is the 
 danger, there is the stern joy of the conflict ; for 
 her, only the long weary hours of sadness and 
 suspense. I read of the noble Roman and Gre- 
 cian mothers, of the brave and tender women 
 
70 SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 
 
 whom English literature and English poetry have 
 loved to remember ; but again and yet again in 
 our own day was re-enacted here every beautiful 
 story of feminine self-sacrifice by the women of 
 our own land. Honor to all for their words of 
 encouragement and cheer, with which they strove 
 to fortify the hearts of those whom they loved, 
 even when their own were nearly bursting. But 
 for those who in lonely homes or by bereaved 
 firesides wait still for the footsteps that are to 
 come no more on earth, for the voices that are 
 forever silent, let them believe that the tenderest 
 sympathy and most affectionate regard of a grate- 
 ful people now and always surround them. 
 
 Of the men themselves, whose names are borne 
 upon these tablets, how can I trust myself to 
 speak on an occasion which seems to recall them, 
 as I have known them through all the long and 
 anxious years of the war, — sometimes sad and 
 weary with the long marches under the stifling 
 heat of the July sun, or in the wet and cold of 
 December's snow ; sometimes cheerful and gay 
 as they gathered in merry groups around the 
 evening fires. Again their voices seem to ring 
 out loud and high in the charging cheer of the 
 fierce attack ; again to speak in the old, calm, 
 resolute tones, as they sternly struggle with the 
 sad hours of disaster and defeat. There are 
 names written here that I cannot, dare not, 
 trust myself to utter, lest I lose the self-control 
 proper for the occasion, — for they are the names 
 
SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 71 
 
 of men who have fought by my side in my own 
 commands, who have shared my mess and my 
 blanket, upon whom often my arm has leaned 
 with a confidence that never was betrayed. To 
 many hearts there comes the thought of those 
 dearer and tenderer than any others can be ; yet 
 it is better to recall them together, as they are 
 grouped together by valor in their country's 
 cause, and by their glorious doom. Embracing 
 every condition of our social life, the richest 
 and poorest, the best and the least educated, 
 they were true representative men of the Amer- 
 ican people, citizens before they were soldiers, 
 holding the former as their highest title, and 
 always remembering that they were soldiers only 
 that they and those for whom they died might 
 enjoy forever the proud title of citizens of a 
 well-ordered, peaceful, free republic. By far the 
 larger number were of the enlisted men ; and of 
 those who were borne upon the roll as officers, 
 many have carried the knapsack and the musket 
 in the ranks of the army. The distinctions of 
 position, inseparable from a service where each 
 man must give up to his superior in rank his 
 own. will and judgment, have long since passed 
 away among the living, — how much more among 
 the dead ! To-day we come to do honor to those 
 qualities of courage, fidelity, patriotism, which 
 ennoble him who exhibits them, no matter what 
 his rank or station. That there were differences 
 among these men is no doubt true ; for it would be 
 
i± 
 
 2 SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 
 
 idle to pretend that all were equally actuated by 
 the same lofty patriotism and the same exalted 
 spirit. Yet if among them there is any one less 
 worthy than the others, I use the words of the 
 Athenian orator when I say that " I hold above 
 him, as a shield, his value in his country's be- 
 half." When all deductions are made, if any are 
 to be made, the fact will stand that no army ever 
 went to the field more solemnly resolved upon 
 duty, or animated by a higher sense of its re- 
 sponsibility, than our own. It was no fierce 
 fire of ambition, no thirst for the pomp and 
 glitter of military glory, no wild longing for 
 adventure, that urged our soldiers on ; but with 
 a deep sense of their obligation to their coun- 
 try, with a full knowledge of all their dan- 
 gers, yet with a determination to meet them 
 all, they went forth. They were nobler men, 
 they were braver soldiers, because, calmly re- 
 flecting, they had followed the path to which 
 duty beckoned, in the stern faith that they 
 would follow it still, even though it led them 
 to death. 
 
 To-day there is no time to dwell at length on 
 their deeds, — for to enumerate all the trials of 
 those doubtful years is the province of the his- 
 torian, and not of the casual speaker, — but 
 steadily we pressed on until God had given us 
 the victory. These men could not know when 
 they fell but that their struggles would be use- 
 less, for their dying eyes were permitted to look 
 
SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 73 
 
 only upon the sad spectacle of States " discord- 
 ant, belligerent, and drenched in fraternal blood;" 
 yet now the land itself seems nobler and fairer 
 for these that it bears in its bosom. As the 
 power of association unites the memory of each 
 to the spot where his mouldering dust is laid, 
 so our mountains seem loftier, as they guard 
 the resting-places where they lie, and our rivers 
 to move to the sea with a broader and prouder 
 sweep, because of the brave men whose life-blood 
 has mingled with their streams. 
 
 o 
 
 They fell, devoted but undying ; 
 The very gale their names seems sighing ; 
 The waters murmur of their uame; 
 The woods are peopled with their fame. 
 
 Their spirits wrap the dusky mountain ; 
 Their memory sparkles o'er the fountain: 
 The meanest rill, the mightiest river, 
 Rolls mingling with their fame forever." 
 
 Comrades ! The Monument we have to-day 
 received, I do not permit myself to doubt we 
 shall cherish always as a memorial worthy of 
 every honor. To-day we have dedicated it by 
 the strains of sad yet proud music, by the pen 
 of the poet, by the voice of the accomplished 
 orator who has addressed us, and by solemn in- 
 vocation to Heaven, as our attestation of the 
 truth and bravery of these men. We have com- 
 mended them and their deeds forever to the 
 gratitude of their fellow-countrymen. Yet our 
 
74 SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 
 
 ceremony will be but formal and empty, if we do 
 not endeavor to show in ourselves, now and al- 
 ways, some evidence of the patriotism which they 
 exhibited. The Rebel flag was furled, indeed, at 
 Appomattox ; but our duties as citizens are not fin- 
 ished, and never can be while life shall last. As 
 we stood together in our ranks, in the fields that 
 girdle this fair city, — ere we started on that 
 journey from which so many were never to re- 
 turn, — with bared heads and uplifted hands we 
 solemnly swore to be true to the Republic, and to 
 defend it against all its enemies. From that great 
 oath, the dead alone are absolved, however bravely 
 we may have kept it in the smoke and fire of the 
 battle-field. To-day let us renew that solemn ob- 
 ligation ; to the luxury that enervates a nation, 
 let us oppose the dignity of simple, manly, heroic 
 lives ; to the corruption that seems always to prey 
 upon great and wealthy States, let us show our- 
 selves always resolute and implacable foes ; and 
 as at the dawning of the Rebellion, so now, let us 
 pledge our faith to all our fellow-citizens, and our 
 undying devotion to the Union, wherever the great 
 flag, the symbol of Liberty and Law, waves on the 
 land or on the sea. 
 
 And now, dear fellow-comrades, wherever you 
 have found your final resting-place, repose in 
 peace and honor ! We who shared with you the 
 long night-watches, the weary marches, the stormy 
 conflicts, like you are soon to pass away ; but com- 
 ing generations shall take up our eulogy, and you 
 
SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT WORCESTER. 75 
 
 shall be known and honored long after the clods 
 of the valley have pressed ns to our eternal rest. 
 Though to a narrow vision your lives seem short, 
 your deaths to have been premature, yet that life 
 is full and complete which like yours has an- 
 swered life's great end. It is not wealth or 
 power that constitutes the true glory of a State, 
 but noble, high-souled men ; and this imperial 
 Union shall hold your fame forever as the bright- 
 est jewel in her radiant crown. As hearts can- 
 not be divided, as true souls must ever remain 
 united, so are we one army still ; although the 
 great river which rolls between the living ana" 
 the dead yet leaves us on this hither side, 
 although we see that your faces are bright with 
 a light more resplendent than that of the sum- 
 mer's sun, and that the armor you wear " never 
 gleamed upon earthly anvil," still would we be 
 one with you in fidelity to duty, in loyalty to 
 liberty, in devotion to the country which is the 
 mother of us all. 
 
ORATION 
 
 AT THE CENTENNIAL ANNIVERSARY OF THE BATTLE OF 
 BUNKER HILL, JUNE 17, 1875. 
 
 In pious and patriotic commemoration of the 
 great deed which one hundred years ago was done 
 on this immortal field ; in deep thankfulness for 
 the blessings which have been showered upon us 
 as a people with so lavish a hand ; in the earnest 
 hope that the liberty, guarded and sustained by 
 the sanctions of law, which the valor of our fathers 
 won for us, and which we hold to-day in solemn 
 trust, may be transmitted to endless generations, — 
 we have gathered to-day in this countless throng. 
 representing in its assemblage every portion of our 
 common country. 
 
 A welcome, cordial, generous, and heartfelt, to 
 each and all ! 
 
 Welcome to the sons of New England, and their 
 descendants, no matter where their homes may be ! 
 They stand upon the soil made sacred now and for- 
 ever by the blood of their fathers. Among them 
 we recognize with peculiar pleasure and satisfac- 
 tion those allied by family ties to the great leaders 
 of the day. — to Prescott, Putnam, Warren ; to 
 Stark, Knowlton, Poineroy, and equally those in 
 
78 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 whose veins flows the kindred blood of any of 
 the brave men who stood together in the battle- 
 line. 
 
 Insignificant as the conflict seems to us now in 
 regard to the numbers engaged, unimportant as it 
 was then so far as results purely military and stra- 
 tegical were concerned, the valor and patriotism 
 here exhibited, the time when and the opportunity 
 on which they w r ere thus displayed, have justly 
 caused it to be ranked among the decisive battles 
 of the world. 
 
 Welcome to the citizens of every State, whether 
 they have come here from those States which rep- 
 resent the thirteen colonies, or from the younger 
 States of the Union ! We thank them all, whether 
 they come from the great Middle States which bind 
 us together, from the West, or from the South, for 
 the pilgrimage they have made hither in generous 
 appreciation of the great step that was taken here 
 upon the jagged and thorny path on which we were 
 compelled to walk in our journey towards indepen- 
 dence. Fought although this battle was by the 
 men of the colonies of New England, they did not 
 stand for themselves alone, but that there might 
 be founded a structure imperishable as any that 
 man can rear in a free and united government. 
 The corner-stone of the edifice they laid was for 
 all the colonies that were, all the States that are, 
 all the States that are yet to be. 
 
 Welcome to the Vice-President of the United 
 States, the Justices of its Supreme Court, and the 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 70 
 
 General commanding its armies ! They represent 
 to us the government which was the result of the 
 Revolution. In 177-3, Massachusetts was the most 
 populous but one or perhaps two of the colonies, 
 and by the unity of her people the most powerful 
 and warlike of any. She has seen, notwithstand- 
 ing her own vast increase in population and wealth, 
 although a great State has since been taken from 
 what were then her borders, her relative position 
 change ; but she has seen with admiration and not 
 with envy, with pride and satisfaction and not 
 with mean jealousy, the growth of States broader, 
 richer, and fairer than she can hope to be. What- 
 ever changes may have come, her spirit has not 
 changed, her voice has not altered. Then singled 
 out from the colonies to be first subdued and pun- 
 ished, as she lifted her head in stern defence of her 
 ancient liberty, in proud defiance of those who 
 would oppress her, demanding her own great right 
 of local self-government, she called upon her sister 
 colonies for a union that should secure and main- 
 tain the rights of all ; so to-day she demands for 
 all others every right which she asks for herself, 
 and she calls upon all for that cordial and gener- 
 ous obedience which she is ready to render to the 
 Constitution which has united them forever. 
 
 It was to be expected as the controversy between 
 Great Britain and her colonies moved on from the 
 proposed passage of the Stamp Act in 1764, and as 
 its inevitable tendency developed, that its weight 
 should be thrown in the first instance upon New 
 
80 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 England and her chief town and colony. The 
 colonies differed in some important respects in the 
 manner in which they had been settled and in 
 the character of their people. To some there was 
 nothing distasteful in a monarchical government 
 as such, if it had been wisely and liberally admin- 
 istered ; but New England remembered always the 
 race from which she sprung, and why her fathers 
 had crossed the sea. Others had come from a love 
 of adventure, from the hope of wealth, from a de- 
 sire to test the fortunes of a new world ; but for 
 none of these things had her founders left the 
 pleasant fields and loved homes of their native 
 land, and the unquenchable love of liberty which 
 animated them lived still in the bosoms of their 
 descendants. Nor was her stern religious faith 
 averse to the assertion by force of what she deemed 
 her liberties. In Parliament, the spirit that pre- 
 vailed at the time of the accession of George III. 
 was different from that ardent zeal for constitu- 
 tional freedom which had resulted in the dethrone- 
 ment of James II. ; but New England understood 
 her rights, and was prompt to maintain them al- 
 ways in the spirit of the English Commonwealth. 
 " In what law-book, in what records or archives 
 of State," said one to Selclen, " do you find the 
 law for resisting tyranny?" and the great lawyer 
 of that day answered, " It has always been the 
 1 custom of England ;' and the ' custom of England ' 
 is the law of the land." 
 
 It was not merely the right to tax without ' 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 81 
 
 representation ; it was the claim, necessarily in- 
 volved in such a right, to govern in a diflierenl 
 manner, and through officials appointed by the 
 British Crown, that astonished the colonics, and 
 united all at first in remonstrance and afterwards 
 in determined resistance. Her own character and 
 the circumstances of her situation had placed 
 Massachusetts in the van of this conflict, and had 
 caused her, when the policy of coercion was finally 
 resolved on, to be dealt with by a system of legisla- 
 tion unprecedented in the method usually adopted 
 by Britain in governing her colonies. It was in- 
 dustriously circulated in Parliament that she would 
 not be sustained by the others in the resolute atti- 
 tude which she had assumed ; and upon her were 
 rained in rapid succession the statutes known by 
 the popular names of the Boston Port Bill, the 
 Regulating Act, the Enforcing Act, which were 
 intended to reduce her chief town, the most impor- 
 tant in North America, to beggary; which abro- 
 gated the provisions of her charter, and took from 
 the people the appointment of their judges, sher- 
 iffs, and chief officers; which forbade the town- 
 meetings, whose spirit had been too bold and 
 resolute to be pleasant ; which denied to her citi- 
 zens in many cases the trial by jury, and permitted 
 them to be transported to England or to other colo- 
 nics for trial, — a system which, if it could have 
 been enforced, would have reduced her inhabitants 
 to political servitude. Sustained by her own dar- 
 ing spirit, and by the generous encouragement of 
 
82 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 her sister colonies, she had resisted ; and the ten 
 months that had preceded Lexington and Concord 
 had been practically those of war, although blows 
 had not been struck, and blood had not been shed. 
 In the speech of Mr. Burke, delivered March, 1775, 
 upon conciliation with America, memorable not so 
 much for its splendid eloquence (although it is 
 among the masterpieces of the English language) 
 as for its generous statesmanship, he describes 
 Massachusetts, the utter failure of the attempt to 
 reduce her either to submission or anarchy, and her 
 preservation of order even while she rejected the 
 authority of the Governor and judges appointed 
 by the British Crown. He closes by saying, u How 
 long it will continue in this state, or what may 
 arise out of this unheard-of situation, how can the 
 wisest of us conjecture ? " 
 
 Obviously no such condition of things could 
 endure ; and before his words could cross the 
 Atlantic, the question that he asked had been 
 answered by the appeal to arms. The hoof-beats 
 of Paul Revere's horse along the Lexington road 
 had announced, as the yeomanry of Middlesex, 
 Essex, and Worcester sprang to arms to meet the 
 movement of the British from Boston, on the 
 evening of April 18, that the lull was over, and 
 that the storm had come in all its majesty. 
 
 The day that followed had changed the relation 
 of the contending parties forever ; but the battle 
 of Bunker Hill is also one of the definite steps 
 which mark the progress of the American Revo- 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 83 
 
 lution. It was not merely that it was an act of 
 resistance by those who will not submit to be 
 oppressed ; it was the result of a distinctly 
 aggressive movement on the part of those who 
 claimed the right to levy and maintain armies; 
 nor can I better discharge the duty which has 
 fallen on me, by the deeply regretted absence of 
 the distinguished scholar and orator 1 who it was 
 hoped would have addressed you, than by recall- 
 ing its events. Even if to some extent I shall 
 seem to trespass upon the domain of the historian 
 or the annalist, the deeds of brave men are their 
 true eulogy ; and from a calm contemplation of 
 them we may draw an inspiration and encourage- 
 ment greater than could be derived from labored 
 argument or carefully studied reflection. 
 
 Lexington and Concord had been immediatelv 
 followed by the gathering of the militia of New 
 England for the siege of Boston, where Gage, now 
 reinforced by Clinton, was compelled to rest, shel- 
 tered by the cannon of the ships of war, in com- 
 mand of the garrison of the beleaguered town. 
 The force by which he was surrounded was an 
 irregular one ; nor had it any distinct^ recog- 
 nized commander, — for while a precedence was 
 accorded to General Ward, on account of his sen- 
 iority, and because more than two thirds of those 
 assembled were Massachusetts men, yet, inasmuch 
 as no colony could claim authority over another, 
 
 i The Hon. Robert C. Winthrop. 
 
84 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 the army was an army of allies, the troops of 
 each colony being commanded by its own officers, 
 while all the general officers formed a council of 
 war. 
 
 The occupation of Bunker Hill was resolved on 
 at the suggestion of the Committee of Safety of 
 Massachusetts, made with a knowledge that Gen- 
 eral Gage was about to take possession of the 
 heights of Dorchester ; and on the evening of the 
 16th of June the force destined for this formidable 
 movement assembled upon the Common at Cam- 
 bridge. It consisted of some seven or eight hun- 
 dred men, drawn from the regiments of Prescott, 
 Frye, and Bridge, and of some two hundred men 
 from Connecticut, from the regiment of Putnam, 
 under Captain Thomas Knowlton, the whole under 
 the command of Colonel William Prescott. As 
 they formed for their march, Langdon, the Presi- 
 dent of Harvard College, came from his study, and 
 implored the blessing of God upon their then 
 unknown and dangerous expedition. 
 
 So always may the voice of this great institu- 
 tion, which, among their earliest acts and in 
 their day of weakness, our fathers dedicated to 
 the cause of sound learning, be uplifted in solemn 
 invocation in every struggle, whether in the 
 forum or the field, for progress, for liberty, and 
 for the rights of man ! From her halls, then 
 converted into barracks, had come forth the 
 men who, within the thirty-five years that had 
 preceded, had more largely than any others con- 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 85 
 
 trolled and conducted the great debate between 
 England and her colonies, which, beginning dis- 
 tinctly in 1704 by the proposed passage of the 
 Stamp Act, was now to be settled by the arbitra- 
 ment of arms. In 1740 had graduated Samuel 
 Adams, and in his thesis for the Master's degree 
 had maintained the proposition which was the 
 foundation of the Revolution, that it was lawful 
 to resist the supreme magistrate if the common- 
 wealth could not otherwise be preserved. He had 
 been followed, among others hardly less distin- 
 guished, by James Otis, by Cooper and Bowdoin, 
 Hancock and John Adams, by Warren and Quincy. 
 Differing in ages and occupations, in personal 
 qualities and mental characteristics, this remark- 
 able group had been drawn together by common 
 enthusiasm. To their work they had brought 
 every energy of mind and heart ; and they had so 
 managed their share of the controversy, in which 
 all the leading statesmen of Britain had partici- 
 pated, as to have commanded the respect of their 
 opponents, while they inspired and convinced their 
 own countrymen. Many lived to see their hopes 
 fulfilled ; yet not all. Already Quinc} T , the young- 
 est of this illustrious circle, had passed away, ap- 
 pealing with his dying words to his countrymen 
 to be prepared to seal their faith and constancy 
 to their liberties with their blood. Already the 
 gloomy shadow of mental darkness had obscured 
 forever the splendid powers of Otis ; and the hour 
 of Warren was nearly come. 
 
86 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 It was nine o'clock in the evening as the 
 detachments, with Prescott at their head, moved 
 from Cambridge. On arriving at Charlestown, a 
 consultation was held, in which it is believed that 
 Putnam, and perhaps Pomeroy, joined ; and it was 
 determined to fortify Breed's Hill, not then known 
 by the distinctive name it has since borne. Con- 
 nected with Bunker Hill by a high ridge, these 
 two eminences might not improperly be considered 
 as peaks of the same hill ; and for the purpose of 
 annoyance to the British at Boston, Breed's Hill 
 was better adapted. Together they traverse a 
 large portion of the peninsula of Charlestown, 
 which, connected with the mainland by a narrow 
 neck, and broadening as it approaches Boston, is 
 washed on the northern side by the Mystic, and on 
 the eastern and southern by the Charles River. As 
 the line of retreat to the Neck, which was the 
 only approach, was long, Breed's Hill could not 
 be safely held, however, without fortifying Bunker 
 Hill also. 
 
 At midnight work on the redoubt began ; and at 
 dawn the intrenchments, as they were discovered 
 by the British fleet in Charles River, which opened 
 upon them at once, were about six feet high. Well 
 sheltered within them, the men, under a terrific 
 cannonade from the ships and floating batteries, 
 aided by a battery on Copp's Hill opposite, con- 
 tinued to labor at the works until about eleven 
 o'clock, when they were substantially finished. At 
 about this time General Putnam reached the field, 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 87 
 
 and recommended that the intrenching tools be 
 sent to Bunker Hill, where he directed the throw- 
 ing up of a breastwork which, in the confusion of 
 the day, was never completed. 
 
 Oppressed by their severe labor, the terrific 
 heat, and their want of water and provisions, 
 some urged upon Prescott that he should send 
 to General Ward that they might be relieved ; 
 but this he resolutely refused, saying that the men 
 who had raised the works were best able to defend 
 them. At Cambridge, however, much anxiety 
 prevailed. General Ward, who was of opinion 
 that General Gage must attack at once, and would 
 make his principal attack at Cambridge, was un- 
 willing to weaken the main army until his inten- 
 tions should be developed ; but yielding partially 
 to the energetic remonstrances of the Committee of 
 Safety, through Mr. Richard Devens, consented to 
 order to Charlestown the regiments of Stark and 
 Reed, which were under his control. 
 
 The consultation at Boston, begun at the an- 
 nouncement made by the cannonade from the 
 British ships, was spirited and long. It was the 
 opinion of Sir Henry Clinton that troops should 
 be landed at the Neck, and the evidently small 
 force upon the hill, then taken in reverse, would 
 easily be captured. But this plan was rejected by 
 General Gage, for tbe reason that the force thus 
 landed might be placed between two forces of the 
 enemy, in violation of the military axiom that 
 troops should be compelled to deal only with an 
 
88 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 enemy in front. While the rule is sound, its appli- 
 cation to this case might well be doubted, as, by 
 concentrating the fire of the British ships and 
 batteries, it could have been made impossible for 
 any organized force to cross the Neck, had the 
 British forces been landed near this point, and 
 thus imprisoned the Americans in the peninsula. 
 
 To attack the works in front, to carry them 
 by main force, to show how little able the rabble 
 that manned them was to compete with the troops 
 of the King, and to administer a stern rebuke which 
 should punish severely those actually in arms, and 
 admonish those whose loyalty was wavering, was 
 more in accordance with the spirit that prevailed 
 in the British army. Its officers were smarting 
 under the disgrace of the retreat from Lexington 
 and Concord, and would not yet believe that they 
 had before them foemen worthy of their steel. 
 
 It was soon after twelve o'clock when the 
 troops commenced their movements from the 
 North Battery and Long Wharf of Boston, land- 
 ing at about one o'clock without molestation at 
 the extreme point of the peninsula, known as 
 Moulton's Point. On arriving, Major-General 
 Howe, by whom they were commanded, finding 
 the work more formidable than he had antici- 
 pated, determined to send for reinforcements. 
 This delay was unwise ; for the interval, although 
 it brought him additional troops, proved of far 
 more advantage to the Americans. 
 
 When the news of the actual landing arrived at 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 89 
 
 Cambridge, a considerable body of Massachusetts 
 troops was ordered towards Charlestown, while 
 General Putnam ordered forward those of Con- 
 necticut. Of all these, however, comparatively 
 few reached the field before the action was decided. 
 Many never reached Charlestown at all ; others 
 delayed at Prospect Hill, appalled at the tremen- 
 dous fire with which the British swept the Neck ; 
 while others came no farther than Bunker Hill. 
 
 It was nearly three o'clock in the afternoon 
 when, reinforcements having arrived, all was 
 ready in the British line for the attack ; and it 
 is time to consider the character of the defences 
 erected, and their position, as well as the forces by 
 which they were then manned. The redoubt, 
 which enclosed the spot where the monument 
 now stands, was upon the crest of Breed's Hill, 
 — an eminence about seventy feet in height. 
 It was about eight rods square, with its front 
 towards the south, overlooking the town and 
 Charles River. Its southeastern angle directly 
 faced Copp's Hill, while its eastern side fronted 
 extensive fields which lay between it and Moul- 
 ton's Point ; Moulton's Hill, 1 then about thirty 
 feet in height, but now levelled with the surface 
 of the ground, was situated between it and Moul- 
 ton's Point. The eastern side of the redoubt was 
 prolonged by a breastwork detached by a sally- 
 port, which extended for about one hundred yards 
 towards a marsh ; while the northern side over- 
 
 1 Called Morton's Hill in all the accounts of the battle. 
 
90 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 looked the Mystic River, from which it was distant 
 about five hundred yards. 
 
 For the possession of this work the conflict 
 was now about to take place. It had, however, 
 been strengthened upon the side towards the 
 Mystic by a protection without which it would 
 have been untenable ; and this addition had 
 been made while General Howe was waiting 
 for reinforcements, by the forethought of Pres- 
 cott, the skilful conduct of Knowlton, and the 
 fortunate arrival of Stark. Immediately upon 
 the first landing, observing the intention on the 
 part of the British general of moving along the 
 Mystic, and thus attempting to outflank the Amer- 
 icans, Prescott had directed Knowlton, with the 
 Connecticut detachment and with two field-pieces, 
 to oppose them. Captain Knowlton, with his men, 
 who, it will be remembered, were of the original 
 command of Prescott, moved about six hundred 
 feet to the rear of the redoubt upon the side towards 
 the Mystic, and took a position there near the 
 base of Bunker Hill properly so called, finding a 
 fence which extended towards the Mystic, the foun- 
 dation of which was of stone, and upon it two 
 rails. Rapidly making, with the materials he 
 found, another fence a few feet distant, he filled 
 the interval with grass from the fields which the 
 mower of yesterday had passed over, but upon 
 which the great reaper was to gather to-day a rich 
 harvest. While thus engaged, Stark (a part of 
 whose men were detained at Bunker Hill by Put- 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 91 
 
 nam on his proposed works there) followed closely 
 by Reed, arrived, and perceiving instantly the im- 
 portance of this position for the defence of the 
 intrenchments, — for the way, as he says, for the 
 enemy was " so plain he could not miss it," — 
 extended the line of Knowlton by rails and stones 
 taken from adjoining fences until it readied the 
 river, making on the extreme left on the beach a 
 strong stone wall. As the rail-fence was so far to 
 the rear of the redoubt, there was of course an in- 
 terval, which some slight attempt had been made 
 to close, and where also was posted the artillery of 
 the Americans, which, however, insufficient of itself 
 and feebly served, was of little importance during 
 the action. 
 
 In the mean time, few although the reinforce- 
 ments were, there had now arrived some fresh 
 men to inspire with confidence those who had 
 toiled with Prescott through the weary night and 
 exhausting day without food, drink, or rest. Just 
 before the battle actually commenced, detachments 
 from the Massachusetts regiments of Brewer, Nixon, 
 Woodbridge, Little, and Major Moore reached the 
 field. Most of these took their place at the breast- 
 work on the left of the eastern front of the redoubt, 
 and a similar breastwork more hastily made by 
 using a cartway upon the right. 
 
 Upon the extreme right were posted a few 
 troops, extending towards the base of the hill, 
 while two flanking parties were thrown out by 
 Prescott to harass the enemy. 
 
92 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 A portion of the Massachusetts troops who 
 arrive endeavor to fill the gap which exists be- 
 tween the breastwork and the rail-fence, while 
 yet a few take their stand at the rail-fence. No- 
 tably among these latter is the veteran General 
 Pomeroy, of Northampton, too old, as he thinks a 
 few days later, when he is chosen a brigadier by 
 the Continental Congress, to accept so responsible 
 a trust, yet not so old that he cannot fight in 
 the ranks, although the weight of seventy years is 
 upon him. Later in the day, when his musket is 
 shattered by a shot, he waves the broken stock 
 in his strong right hand as he directs the men, — 
 a leader's truncheon that tells its own story of the 
 bravery by which it was won. All know the brave 
 old man ; and as, declining any command, he takes 
 his place as a volunteer, he is greeted with hearty 
 cheers. To the redoubt has now come Warren, in 
 the spirit of a true soldier, who, having advised 
 against a plan which has been adopted, feels the 
 more called upon to make every effort that it shall 
 succeed. The enthusiasm with which he is re- 
 ceived indicates at once the inspiration and encour- 
 agement that the men all feel in that gallant 
 presence ; but when Prescott offers him the com- 
 mand, he having three days before been appointed 
 a major-general by the Provincial Congress, he de- 
 clines it, saying, " I come as a volunteer to serve 
 under you, and shall be happy to learn from a sol- 
 dier of your experience." 
 
 The peninsula where the struggle was to take 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL 03 
 
 place was in full view across the calm waters of 
 the harbor, and of the Charles and Mystic livers, 
 whose banks were lined with people, who with 
 mournful and anxious hearts awaited the issue, 
 while each house-top in the town was covered with 
 eager spectators. From Copp's Hill, General Gage, 
 with Burgoyne and Clinton, surrounded by troops, 
 ready themselves to move at an instant's warning, 
 watched the onset of his forces. 
 
 The champions are not unworthy of the arena in 
 which they stand. To those who love the pomp 
 and circumstance of war, the British troops pre- 
 sent a splendid array. The brilliant light flashes 
 back from the scarlet uniforms, the showy equip- 
 ments, the glittering arms; and as they move, 
 there is seen the effect of that discipline whose 
 object is to put at the disposal of the one who 
 commands the strength and courage of the thou- 
 sands whom he leads. They are of the best and 
 most tried troops of the British army ; and some 
 of the regiments have won distinguished honor on 
 the battle-fields of Europe, in the same wars 
 in which the colonies had poured out their blood 
 on this side of the Atlantic in hearty and gener- 
 ous support of the British Crown. Their veteran 
 officers are men who have seen service in Europe 
 and America ; and their younger officers, like Lord 
 Rawdon and Lord Harris, bear names afterwards 
 distinguished in the chronicles of British warfare. 
 The second in command is Brigadier-General Pigot, 
 slight in person, but known as an officer of spirit 
 
94 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 and judgment ; and their leader, Major-General 
 Howe, bears a name which has been loved and 
 honored in America. The monument which Massa- 
 chusetts reared in Westminster Abbey to his elder 
 brother, Lord Howe, who fell while leading a col- 
 umn of British and Americans at Ticonderoga in 
 1758, still stands to inscribe his name among the 
 heroes of England, whose fame is guarded and 
 enshrined within that ancient pile. Above their 
 lines waves the great British ensign, to which the 
 colonies have always looked as the emblem of their 
 country ; and with them is the " King's name," 
 which even yet is a tower of strength in the land. 
 As nearly as we can estimate, they number about 
 four thousand men. General Gage's report indi- 
 cates sufficiently that he does not intend to state 
 the number engaged when he is compelled later 
 to acknowledge the casualties of the day. 
 
 Upon the other side a different scene presents 
 itself. As the battle is about to open, at the 
 redoubt and upon its flanks are the troops of 
 Massachusetts ; at the rail-fence are the troops of 
 Connecticut and those of New Hampshire, with a 
 few men of Massachusetts. How many there were 
 in all cannot be determined with accuracy. Regi- 
 ments that are frequently spoken of as being pres- 
 ent at the engagement were represented by but 
 weak detachments. Towards the close of the bat- 
 tle a few more arrive, but not more than enough 
 to make the place good of the losses that have in 
 the mean time occurred. No judgment can be 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 95 
 
 formed more accurate than that of Washington, 
 who was so soon after with the army, when many 
 of the circumstances were investigated, and whose 
 mature and carefully considered opinion was that 
 at no time upon our side were more than fifteen 
 hundred men actually engaged. 
 
 As we look down the line, there are symptoms 
 everywhere of determination ; for such has been 
 the confusion, and so little has been the command 
 which, in their movements, the officers have been 
 able to exercise, that no man is there who does not 
 mean to be there. A few free colored men are in 
 the ranks, who do good service ; but it is a gath- 
 ering almost exclusively of the yeomanry of New 
 England, men of the English race and blood, who 
 stand there that day because there has been an 
 attempt to invade their rights as Englishmen, — 
 rights guaranteed by their charters, and yet older 
 than the Magna Charta itself. There are no uni- 
 forms to please the eye ; but as the cowl does not 
 make the monk, so the uniform does not make 
 the soldier; and in their rustic garb they will 
 show themselves worthy of the name before the 
 day is done. No flag waves above their heads ; 
 for they are this day without a country, and they 
 fight that they may have one, although. they could 
 not have dreamed that the emblem of its sover- 
 eignty should float as it now does over millions of 
 freemen from the Atlantic to the far Pacific. The 
 equipments and arms are of all descriptions ; but 
 those who carry them know their use, and all, 
 
96 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 more or less skilled as marksmen, mean in their 
 stern economy of powder, which is their worst 
 deficiency, that every shot shall tell. There is 
 little discipline ; but it is not an unwarlike popu- 
 lation. Among the men are scattered those who 
 do not look for the first time on the battle-field ; 
 and in every man is that sense of individual re- 
 sponsibility and duty which to some extent takes 
 the place of discipline, — that proud self-conscious- 
 ness that animates those who know that their own 
 right hands must work their own deliverance. 
 Poorly officered in some respects, — for haste and 
 bad management have put many important posts 
 into inefficient hands, — there are also with them 
 officers who from experience and ability might be 
 well counted as leaders on any field. They are 
 New England men, fully understanding those they 
 command, and exercising an influence by force of 
 their own characters, by their self-devotion and 
 enthusiasm, which cause all around them to yield 
 respectful and affectionate obedience. 
 
 Roughly done, the works they have hastily 
 made are yet formidable, the weakest part being 
 the imperfectly closed gap between the breast- 
 work and the rail-fence. 
 
 At the rail-fence, and on the extreme left, is 
 Stark, distinguished afterwards by the battle of 
 Bennington ; he has shown the quick eye and 
 ready hand of the practised soldier by the celerity 
 with which he has extended this line to the Mystic 
 River. Knowlton is there also, still with the Con- 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 97 
 
 necticut men, as yet but little reinforced, whose 
 resolute conduct of this day deserves the same 
 eulogy which it received from Washington, when, 
 a year later, he fell gloriously fighting on Har- 
 lem Heights at the head of his regiment, that " it 
 would have been an honor to any country." Gen- 
 eral Putnam, an officer of tried courage and of 
 energetic character, has come to share in the 
 danger of the assault, now that it is evidently 
 approaching, and is everywhere along this portion 
 of the line, inspiring, encouraging, and sustaining 
 the men. All these, like Pomeroy, are veteran 
 soldiers, who have served in the wars with France 
 and her savage allies ; and it is a sundering of old 
 ties to see the British flag upon the other side. 
 
 At the redoubt, sustained by Warren, stands the 
 commander of the expedition which has fortified 
 Breed's Hill. He has himself served in the pro- 
 vincial forces of Massachusetts, under the British 
 flag, and that so bravely that he has been offered 
 a commission in the regular army, but he has pre- 
 ferred the life of a farmer and magistrate in Mid- 
 dlesex. His large and extensive influence he has 
 given to the patriotic cause, and he has been recog- 
 nized from the first as one of those men qualified 
 to command. Powerful in person, with an easy 
 humor which has cheered and inspired with con- 
 fidence all who are around him, he waits the issue 
 with a calmness and courage that will not fail him 
 in the most desperate moment. The hour that 
 he has expected has come ; and the gage of battle, 
 
98 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 so boldly thrown down by the erection of the 
 redoubt, has been lifted. 
 
 As the British army moved to the attack, it was 
 in two wings, — the first arranged directly to assail 
 the redoubt, and led by Pigot, while the other, 
 commanded by General Howe in person, was di- 
 vided into two distinct columns, one of which, 
 composed of light infantry, was close to the bank 
 of the river, and was intended to turn the extreme 
 left of our line, and with the column in front of 
 the rail-fence to drive the Americans from their 
 position, and cut off the retreat of those in the 
 redoubt. 
 
 In his account of the battle, General Burgoyne 
 observes, " Howe's disposition was exceedingly 
 soldier-like ; in my opinion it was perfect." But 
 the arrangements for the battle do not, in a 
 military point of view, deserve such high com- 
 mendation. It was clearly an error on the part 
 of General Howe to divide his forces, and make 
 two points of attack instead of one, and an equal 
 error to move up and deploy his columns to fire, in 
 wmich his troops were at obvious disadvantage 
 from their want of protection, instead of making 
 an assault without firing. He had failed also 
 to recognize the weak point in the line between 
 the breastwork and the rail-fence, easier to carry 
 than any other point, and, if carried, more certain 
 to involve the whole American force. He had 
 sluggishly permitted the erection of the formi- 
 dable fieldwork of the rail-fence, the whole of 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 99 
 
 which had been constructed without any interfer- 
 ence subsequent to his arrival on the peninsula ; 
 nor, when it was constructed, does it seem to have 
 occurred to him that by a floating battery or gun- 
 boat stationed in the Mystic River, it could have 
 been enfiladed, and the force there dislodged at 
 once. 
 
 As the British are seen to advance, the orders 
 are renewed along the whole American line in a 
 hundred different forms not to fire until the 
 enemy are within ten or twelve rods, and then 
 to wait for the word, to use their skill as marks- 
 men, and to make every shot tell. For although 
 those at the intrenchments and rail-fence act 
 without immediate concert, the scarcity of pow- 
 der, and the fact that they are without bayonets 
 and can rely only upon their bullets, is known 
 to all. It had been intended to cover the move- 
 ment of the British by a discharge of artillery ; 
 but the balls were, by some mistake of the 
 ordnance officer, found too large for the guns, 
 and afterwards, when loaded with grape, it was 
 found impossible to draw them through the miry 
 ground, so that they afforded, in the first assault, 
 no substantial assistance. 
 
 The forces of Pigot moved slowly forward, 
 impeded by the heavy knapsacks they were en- 
 cumbered with, and by the fences which divided 
 the fields, and continued to fire as they thus ad- 
 vanced. As they got within gun-shot, although 
 their fire had done but little damage, our men could 
 
100 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 not entirely restrain their impatience ; but as some 
 fired, Prescott, sternly rebuking the disorder, ap- 
 pealed to their confidence in him, and some of his 
 officers, springing upon the parapet, kicked up the 
 guns that rested upon it, so that the men might be 
 sure to wait. This efficient remonstrance had its 
 effect ; and the enemy met within ten or twelve 
 rods of the eastern front of the breastworks when 
 the voice of Prescott uttered the words for which 
 every ear was listening, and the stream of fire, 
 which, by its terrible carnage, checked at once the 
 advance, broke from his line. The attacking lines 
 were old troops, and well led ; our fire was at once 
 sternly returned, but they did not rush on, and in 
 a few moments Pigot ordered his men, wavering 
 and staggering under a fire which was murderous, 
 while their own did little execution, to fall back. 
 
 In the mean time General Howe, after un- 
 successfully endeavoring with a column of light 
 infantry to turn the extreme left of our line on 
 the Mystic, advanced with the grenadiers directly 
 in front of the rail-fence ; and, somewhat an- 
 noyed by the artillery between the breastwork 
 and the rail-fence, which here, directed by Put- 
 nam, did its best service, Howe, as he approached 
 within eighty or one hundred yards, deployed 
 his forces into line. As at the redoubt, in eager- 
 ness, some of our men fired, when the officers 
 threatened to cut down the first man who dis- 
 obeyed ; and thus rebuked, they restrained them- 
 selves until the prescribed distance was reached, 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 101 
 
 when their fire was delivered with such telling 
 effect that, broken and disarranged, the attacking 
 force, alike that directly in front and that upon 
 the banks of the river, recoiled before it, while 
 many of the British officers felt the deadly result 
 of the superiority which the Americans possessed 
 as marksmen. 
 
 Some minutes, perhaps fifteen, now intervene 
 before the second assault, which are moments of 
 enthusiastic joy in the American lines. All see 
 that they are led by men capable of directing 
 them, that they have rudely hurled back the first 
 onset, and that they are not contending against 
 those who are invincible. As they have seen 
 their enemy turn, some of them at the rail-fence 
 in their eagerness have sprung over it to pursue, 
 but have been restrained by the wisdom of their 
 officers. At the redoubt, Prescott, certain that 
 the enemy will soon re-form and again attack, 
 while he commends the men for their courage 
 and congratulates them on their success, urges 
 them to wait again for his order before they fire. 
 Putnam hastens from the lines, his object being to 
 forward reinforcements, and to arrange, if possi- 
 ble, a new line of defence at Bunker Hill, prop- 
 erly so called, where all was in confusion, the 
 men who had reached there being for the most 
 part entirely disorganized. 
 
 The horror of the bloody field is now height- 
 ened by the burning of the prosperous town of 
 Charlestown. This had been threatened as early 
 
102 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 as April 21 by General Gage, if the American 
 forces occupied the town ; and the patriotic in- 
 habitants had informed General Ward that they 
 desired him to conduct his military operations 
 without regard to their safety. Complaining of 
 the annoyance which the sharpshooters posted 
 along the edges of the town gave to his troops on 
 the extreme left, General Howe has requested that 
 it be fired, which was done by the cannon from 
 Copp's Hill. It may be also, as w r as afterwards 
 said, that Howe was under the impression that his 
 assaulting: columns would be covered bv the smoke. 
 The smoke drifts, however, in the other direction : 
 and the provincials behold without dismay a deed 
 which indicates the ruthless mode in which the war 
 is to be prosecuted. As the enemy advance to the 
 second assault, their fire is more effective. At 
 the redoubt. Colonels Buckminster, Brewer, and 
 Nixon are wounded ; Major Moore mortally. No 
 general result is produced ; and again, as they 
 reach the distance prescribed, the fire of the 
 Americans, directed simultaneously along the 
 whole length of the line, alike of the redoubt 
 and breastwork as well as the rail-fence, is even 
 more destructive than before. Standing the first 
 shock, the enemy continue to advance and fire 
 still ; but against so rapid and effective a wave as 
 they now receive, it is impossible to hold their 
 ground, and although their officers, themselves the 
 worst sufferers, are seen frantically summoning 
 them to their duty, all is in vain, — they are swept 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 103 
 
 back in complete confusion. General Howe, 
 opposite the rail-fence, is in the fiercest and 
 thickest ; left almost alone, as his officers are 
 struck down around him, he. is borne along by 
 the current of the retreat rather than directs it. 
 
 This time the repulse was terrific. " In front 
 of our works," says Prescott, "the ground was 
 covered with the killed and wounded, many of 
 them within a few yards," while before the rail- 
 fence " the dead," in the homely phrase of Stark, 
 *• lay thick as sheep in a fold." Disorder reigned 
 in the British ranks ; to stay the rout was for the 
 moment impossible, as many of the companies had 
 entirely lost their officers, and for a short time 
 it seemed that they could not rally again. Had 
 there been a reserve of fresh troops now to 
 advance (which there might have been, had it 
 been possible to organize the scattered detachments 
 which had already reached Bunker Hill), or even 
 proper support and reinforcement, the conflict 
 would have ended by a victory so complete that 
 perhaps it would have been accepted as putting an 
 end to the British power in America. 
 
 Before the third assault some reinforcements 
 reached the rail-fence, especially three Connecticut 
 companies under Major Durkee, and a portion of 
 Gardner's regiment from Middlesex, the colonel of 
 which was killed during the engagement. A part 
 of this regiment was detained by Putnam on his 
 proposed work at Bunker Hill. The company of 
 Josiah Harris, of Charlestown, took its post at the 
 
104 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 extreme left of our line at the rail-fence, and won 
 for its native town the honor, when the retreat 
 commenced, of being the last to leave the field. 
 
 To the redoubt and breastwork no reinforce- 
 ments came ; and although the determined and 
 remarkable man who conducted its defence may 
 well have been disappointed at this failure, no 
 word of discouragement escaped his lips. He 
 knew well the duty which as an officer he owed 
 his men, and at another time might have felt that 
 he ought to retreat from a position, the chance of 
 holding which was so slight ; yet there was still a 
 chance, and he comprehended fully that on that 
 day it was not a question of strategy or manoeu- 
 vre, but of the determination and courage of the 
 American people in the assertion of their freedom, 
 which was there bloodily debated. Calm and 
 resolute, cheerful still in outward demeanor, he 
 moved around his lines, assuring his men, " If we 
 drive them back again, they cannot rally ; " and 
 inspired by their confidence in him, they answer 
 enthusiastically, " We are ready." 
 
 No supplies of powder have been received, and 
 there are not in his whole command fifty 
 bayonets, so that if the fire shall slacken, and the 
 enemy force their way through it, resistance is 
 impossible. No man has over three rounds of 
 ammunition, and many only two; and when a 
 few artillery cartridges are discovered, the powder 
 in them is distributed with the injunction that 
 not a kernel should be wasted. 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 105 
 
 Discipline, which at such moments will always 
 tell, in perhaps half an hour has clone its work 
 among, the British troops ; and no longer self- 
 confident, but realizing the terrible work before 
 them, the men are throwing oft' knapsacks for a final 
 and desperate assault. Some have remonstrated ; 
 but Sir William, less attractive than his brother, 
 General Lord Howe, less able than his brother, 
 Admiral Lord Howe, who now bears the family 
 title, is a stern soldier, and in personal courage 
 and determination in no way unworthy of the 
 martial race to which he belongs. He feels that 
 his own reputation and that of the soldiers he 
 commands is ruined forever if they sustain defeat 
 at the hands of a band of half-armed rustics. 
 Victory itself will now be attended with mortifi- 
 cation enough, after such severe repulses and such 
 terrible losses. 
 
 From the other side of the river General Clinton 
 has seen the discomfiture, and, bringing some 
 reinforcements, comes to aid in rallying the men. 
 Howe has seen, too, what Clinton has also ob- 
 served, the error of the former disposition of his 
 force, and that the weak point of the American 
 line is between the breastwork and the rail-fence. 
 Towards this and against the redoubt and breast- 
 work he now arranges his next attack. Cannon 
 are brought to bear so as to rake the inside of the 
 breastwork ; and making a demonstration only 
 against the rail-fence that may check any move- 
 ment upon the flank of his troops, he divides them 
 into three columns. 
 
106 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 The two at the left are commanded respectively 
 by Clinton and Pigot, while the right he leads in 
 person. They are to assault together, — Clinton 
 upon the left, at the southeastern angle, and 
 Pio-ot upon the eastern front of the redoubt, while 
 Howe's own force is to carry the breastwork, and 
 striking between it and the rail-fence, bar the way 
 of retreat. Against this formidable array no other 
 preparation can be made by Prescott than to 
 place at the angles of his redoubt the few bayo- 
 nets at his disposal, and to direct that no man 
 shall fire until the enemy are within twenty 
 yards. 
 
 The fire of the British artillery, now rendered 
 effective, sweeps the inside of the breastwork, and, 
 no longer tenable, its defenders crowd within the 
 redoubt. Again the voice of Prescott is heard, as 
 the attacking columns approach and are now only 
 twenty yards distant, giving the order to fire. So 
 telling and deadly is the discharge that the front 
 ranks are almost prostrated by it ; but as the fire 
 slackens, the British columns, which have wavered 
 for an instant, move steadily on without returning 
 it. Almost simultaneously upon the three points 
 which are exposed to the assault the enemy reach 
 the little earthwork which so much brave blood 
 has been spent to hold and to gain ; and while 
 they are now so near that its sides already cover 
 them, its commander, determined to maintain it to 
 the last extremity, orders those of his men who 
 have no bayonets to retire to the rear and fire 
 upon the enemy as they mount the parapet. 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 107 
 
 Those who first ascend are shot down as they 
 scale the works, among them Pitcairn, whose 
 rashness (even if we give him the benefit of the 
 denial he always made of having ordered his 
 soldiers to fire at Lexington) still renders him 
 responsible for the first shedding of blood in the 
 strife. In a few moments, however, the redoubt 
 is half filled by the storming columns; and 
 although a fierce conflict ensues, it is too unequal 
 for hope, and shows only the courage which 
 animates the men, who, without bayonets, use the 
 butts of their muskets in the fierce effort to stay 
 the now successful assault. As the enemy are 
 closing about the redoubt, if the force is to be 
 extricated from capture, the word to retreat must 
 be given ; and reluctantly the brave lips which 
 have hitherto spoken only the words of cheer and 
 encouragement utter it at last. Already some are 
 so involved that they hew their way through the 
 enemy to join Prescott, and he himself is again 
 and again struck at by the ba} 7 onet, of which his 
 clothes give full proof afterwards, but defends him- 
 self with his sword, — the use of which he under- 
 stands. As our forces leave the redoubt by the 
 entrance on the northern side, they come between 
 the two columns which have turned the breast- 
 work, and the southeastern angle of the redoubt. 
 These are, however, too much exhausted to use 
 the bayonet effectually, and all are so mingled 
 together that for a few moments the British 
 cannot fire ; but as our men extricate themselves, 
 
108 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 the British re-form, and deliver a heavy fire upon 
 them as they retreat. 
 
 In the mean time the attack has been renewed 
 upon the rail-fence, but its defenders know well 
 that if they would save their countrymen at the 
 redoubt, they must hold it resolutely for a few 
 moments longer, and they defend it nobly, resist- 
 ing every attempt to turn the flank. They see 
 soon that Prescott has left the hill, that the 
 intrenchments are in the hands of the enemy at 
 last ; and, their own work gallantly done, they 
 retreat in better order than could have been ex- 
 pected of troops who have so little organization, and 
 who have looked for the first time on a battle-field. 
 Upon the crest of Bunker Hill (properly so called) 
 General Putnam, with the confused forces already 
 there, gallantly struggles to organize a line and 
 make a new stand, but without success. Our 
 forces recross the neck and occupy Ploughed Hill, 
 now Mount Benedict, at its head ; but there is no 
 disposition on the part of the British to pursue, 
 for the terrible slaughter too well attests the 
 price at which the nominal victory has been 
 obtained. 
 
 The loss of the British, according to General 
 Gage's account, was in killed and wounded 1,054 ; 
 and it was generally believed that this was under- 
 stated by him. There was inducement enough to 
 do this ; for so disastrous was his despatch felt to 
 be that the government hesitated to give it to the 
 public, until forced to do so by the taunts of those 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 109 
 
 who had opposed the war, and the methods by 
 which it had been provoked. 
 
 Sir William Howe seemed to have borne that 
 day a charmed life ; for while ten officers of his 
 staff were among the killed and wounded, he had 
 escaped substantially uninjured. His white silk 
 stockings, draggled with the crimson stain of the 
 grass, wet with the blood of his men, attested that 
 he had kept the promise made to them on the 
 beach, that he should ask no man to go farther 
 than he was prepared to lead. 
 
 On the iVmerican side, the loss, as reported by 
 the Committee of Safety, was in killed and 
 wounded 449, by far the larger part of these 
 casualties occurring in the capture of the redoubt, 
 and after the retreat had commenced. Prescott, 
 who, in the hours that had passed since he 
 left Cambridge, had done for the independence 
 of his country work that the greatest might 
 well be satisfied with doing in a lifetime, was 
 unhurt ; but Warren had fallen, than whom no 
 man in America could have been more deeply 
 deplored. 
 
 Massachusetts in her Congress, and the citizens 
 of all the colonies, united in doing; honor to his 
 heroic self-sacrifice and pure, noble fame ; but no 
 eulogy was more graceful than that of Mrs. John 
 Adams, herself one of the most interesting figures 
 of the Revolution, or more touching than that 
 of the warm-hearted Pomeroy, who lamented the 
 caprice of that fortune which had spared him in 
 
110 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 the day of battle, — an old war-worn soldier whose 
 work was nearly done, — and taken Warren in the 
 brightness of his youth, and with his vast capacity 
 to serve his country. Yet for him, who shall say 
 it was not well ? There are many things in 
 life dearer than life itself : honor in its true and 
 noble sense, patriotism, duty, all are dearer ; to all 
 these he had been faithful. His position is for- 
 ever among the heroes and martyrs of liberty ; 
 his reward forever in the affection of a grateful 
 people. As the dead always bear to us the image 
 which they last bore when on earth, and as by 
 the subtile power of the imagination we summon 
 before us the brave men who stood here for their 
 country, that noble presence, majestic in its manly 
 beauty, seems to rise again, although a hundred 
 3'ears are gone, with all the fire of his burning 
 eloquence, with all the ardor of his patriotic en- 
 thusiasm, with all the loftiness of his generous 
 self-devotion. So shall it seem to rise, although 
 centuries more shall pass, to inspire his country- 
 men in every hour of doubt and trial with a valor 
 and patriotism kindred to his own. 
 
 The story I have told, fellow-citizens, has been 
 often related before you far more vividly ; nor has 
 it been in my power to add anything to the facts 
 which patient and loving investigation has long 
 since brought to light. Tested by the simple rule 
 that whoever holds or gains the ground fought for 
 wins the victory, the battle was, of course, a de- 
 feat for the provincial forces ; but it was a defeat 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. Ill 
 
 that carried and deserved to carry with it all the 
 moral consequences of a victory. As General Bur- 
 goyne gazed from Copp's Hill on the scene which 
 he so graphically describes in a letter to Lord Stan- 
 ley, he was saddened, he says, by " the reflection 
 that perhaps a defeat would be a final loss to the 
 British Empire in America ; " but although the 
 battle was in his eyes a victory, it was one which 
 equally marked a loss to that Empire. 
 
 The lesson drawn from it was the same both in 
 Europe and America. "England," wrote Franklin, 
 "has lost her colonies forever;" and Washington, 
 as he listened with intense interest to the narrative, 
 and heard that the troops he was coming to com- 
 mand had not only withstood the fire of the regulars, 
 but had again and again repulsed them, renewed 
 his expressions of confidence in final success. 
 
 In England the news was received with morti- 
 fication and astonishment ; no loss so serious in 
 proportion to the number engaged had ever been 
 known ; and in the excited debates of the Parlia- 
 ment it was afterwards alleged to have been caused 
 by the misbehavior of the troops themselves. 
 The charge was certainly unjust ; for whatever 
 may be thought of his own management, the 
 troops he directed deserved the praise that General 
 Gage gave them when he said, " British valor had 
 never been more conspicuous than in this action." 
 From his eyes the scales seemed to have fallen at 
 last; and, closely beleaguered still, even after the 
 victory he claimed to have won, he acknowledged 
 
112 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 that the people of New England were not " the 
 despicable rabble they had sometimes been re- 
 presented," and recognized that an offensive cam- 
 paign here was not possible. 
 
 The shrewd Count Vergennes, who, in the hour 
 of the humiliation of France by the loss of her 
 colonial possessions, had predicted that she would 
 be avenged by those whose hands had largely 
 wrought it, and that as the colonies no longer 
 needed the protection of Great Britain, they would 
 end by shaking off all dependence upon her, was 
 now the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and 
 keenly remarked that " if it won two more such 
 victories as it had won at Bunker Hill, there would 
 be no British army in America." 
 
 The battle of Bunker Hill consolidated the 
 Revolution. Had the result been different ; had it 
 been shown that the hasty, ill-disciplined levies of 
 New England could not stand before the troops of 
 the King (or the ministerial troops, as our official 
 documents called them) ; had the easy victory over 
 them, which had been foolishly promised, been 
 weakly conceded, — the cause of independence 
 might have been indefinitely postponed. Nay, it 
 is not impossible that armed resistance might for 
 the time have ended, and that other colonies not 
 so deeply involved in the contest might have ex- 
 tricated themselves, each making such terms as 
 it pleased or as it could. But the coolness and 
 splendid valor with which the best troops then 
 known had been met, the repulses which they had 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 113 
 
 again and again encountered, the bloody and fear- 
 ful cost at which they had finally carried the 
 coveted point which their opponents yielded 
 only when ammunition utterly failed, had shown 
 that the yeomanry of New England were the true 
 descendants of that race who, on the battle-fields 
 of England, had stood against and triumphed over 
 King Charles and his cavaliers. iW New England 
 alone," said John Adams, " can maintain this war 
 for years." He was right; the divisions that ex- 
 isted elsewhere were practically unknown here ; no 
 matter what colonies hesitated or doubted, the path 
 of New England -was straightforward, and her goal 
 was independence. While her colonies deferred to 
 the Continental Congress the form of general gov- 
 ernment which should be adopted, each had taken 
 into its own hands all the powers that rightfully 
 belong; to sovereign States, and exercised them 
 through its provincial Congress and its commit- 
 tees. Heartily desiring and eagerly looking for- 
 ward to a union of the colonies, she had settled 
 that in her local affairs she was competent to 
 govern herself : this she had maintained that day 
 in arms, and her period of vassalage was over. 
 
 Willingly would I pursue the theme further, but 
 the limits which custom prescribes for an address 
 of this nature are too narrow to permit this. 
 You know well the years of doubt, anxiety, and 
 struggle that succeeded ; but, before we part, some- 
 thing should be said of those that have passed 
 since their triumphant close. 
 
 8 
 
114 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 I have forborne to speak of the causes which led 
 to the American Revolution. They have recently 
 been so carefully and ably analyzed by the dis- 
 tinguished orators who aided in the celebrations at 
 Concord and Lexington that I have preferred to 
 devote a few moments to a consideration of some 
 of its effects, for it is by its effects that the pro- 
 priety and wisdom of such a movement in human 
 affairs must always be eventually tested. 
 
 That the formation and adoption of the Con- 
 stitution of the United States has been to us, since 
 our independence was finally achieved, the great 
 event of the century, must be universally conceded. 
 It was the great good fortune and the crowning 
 triumph of the statesmen who guided us through 
 the Revolution, that they lived long enough to em- 
 body its results in a permanent and durable form ; 
 for it is proverbially harder to secure the fruits of a 
 victory than to win the victory itself. Many a day 
 of triumph upon the field has been but a day of 
 carnage and of empty glory, barren in all that was 
 valuable; and the victories that have been won 
 upon the political field are no exceptions to the 
 rule, of which history teems with illustrations. 
 
 Our ancient ally, whose services during the last 
 years of our war were of so much value to our 
 exhausted treasury and armies, and whose gift of 
 the generous and chivalric Lafayette at its opening 
 was almost equally precious, passed a few years 
 later through her own desperate struggle ; yet 
 although that fierce tide swept in a sea of fire 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 115 
 
 and blood over all the ancient institutions of the 
 monarchy, how impossible it has proved to this day 
 for France to supply the place of the government 
 which it so sternly overthrew with one thoroughly 
 permanent, giving peace and security ! Republic, 
 Directory, Consulate, Empire, Kingdom, have each 
 had their turn ; dynasty after dynasty, faction 
 after faction, have asserted their sway over her. 
 
 For a government under the constitutions of the 
 several States, and under that of the United States, 
 this people was prepared alike by its previous 
 history and by that which followed its separation 
 from Britain. It w r as the legitimate outgrowth of 
 experience, and not a government framed, like 
 those of the Abbe Sieyes at the end of their Revo- 
 lution, for the French, by the aid of philosophic 
 speculation, and on the basis of that which should 
 be, and not of that which was. While the colonies, 
 by means of their representative and legislative 
 systems, had been accustomed to deal with their 
 local affairs, and impose their local taxation, and 
 had successfully resisted the attempt to interfere 
 with these rights, yet, from the relation they had 
 also been accustomed to sustain towards Great Brit- 
 ain, it was not to them a novel idea that two gov- 
 ernments, each complete and supreme within its 
 sphere, might co-exist, — the one controlling the lo- 
 cal affairs of each individual State, while the other 
 exercised its powers over all the States in their in- 
 tercourse with each other and with foreign nations. 
 
 Painfully conscious of their weakness, the desire 
 
116 THE RATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 for a union of all had gone hand in hand with 
 the desire of each to preserve its own separate 
 organization. The first Continental Congress had 
 not exercised political authority ; it had assembled 
 only on behalf of the United Colonies to petition 
 and remonstrate against the various arbitrary acts 
 of the British government. Those which succeeded, 
 however, with patriotic courage had boldly seized 
 the highest powers ; yet as they could exercise 
 such powers only so far as each State gave its 
 assent and sustained them, the necessary result 
 followed that their decrees were often feebly exe- 
 cuted, and sometimes utterly disregarded. Later 
 in the war the Confederation had been established, 
 by which it had been sought to fix more definitely 
 the relation of the States by giving more determi- 
 nate authority to the Congress, and thereby to 
 rescue the country from the financial ruin which 
 had overtaken it. 
 
 But the powers of the Congress of the Confed- 
 eration, like those of the Continental Congress, 
 were such as were consistent only with a league of 
 sovereign and independent States, and were in 
 their exercise less efficacious, because they had 
 been carefully defined and limited. The Confed- 
 eration did not constitute a government ; it did 
 not assume to act upon the people, but upon the 
 several States ; and upon them no means existed 
 of enforcing its requisitions and decrees, or of com- 
 pelling them to the performance of the treaties it 
 might make or the obligations it might incur. 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 117 
 
 Among allied powers, from the nature of the case, 
 there is no mode of enforcing the agreement of 
 alliance except by war. 
 
 The great work of achieving independence had, 
 however, been completed by the Confederation in 
 spite of all its weakness and inherent defects. 
 These were, however, more clearly seen when the 
 sense of an immediate and common danger, and 
 the cohesive pressure of war, were withdrawn. 
 A mere aggregation of States could not take its 
 place among the peoples of the world. A national 
 sovereignty was needed, capable of establishing a 
 financial system of its own, of raising money for 
 its own support by taxation, of establishing regu- 
 lations of trade, of forming treaties with sufficient 
 power to execute them, of insuring order in every 
 State, of bringing each State into proper relations 
 with the others, and able, if need be, to declare 
 war or maintain peace, — a sovereignty which 
 should act directly on the people themselves in 
 the exercise of all its rightful powers, and not 
 through the intervention of the States. 
 
 The years of unexampled depression which 
 followed peace with Britain were not attributable 
 only to the exhaustion of war : the impossibility of 
 establishing a financial or a commercial system, 
 the sense of insecurity that prevailed, paralyzed 
 industry and enterprise. Already jarrings and con- 
 tests between the several States presaged the 
 danger which had destroyed the republics of 
 Greece and those of Italy during the Middle Ages ; 
 
118 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 already civil discord, which, although suppressed, 
 had thrown the State temporarily into confusion, 
 had made its appearance in Massachusetts ; already 
 doubts began to be expressed, even by some who 
 had been ardent in the patriotic cause, whether 
 it had been wise to separate from a government 
 which, even if monarchical, was strong and able to 
 defend and protect its subjects ; and it had come 
 to be realized that there must be somewhere a 
 controlling power competent to maintain peace 
 between the States, and to guarantee to each the 
 security of its own government. 
 
 The Convention which met at Philadelphia in 
 1787 gave these States a government, and made 
 them a nation ; and while I know to what is im- 
 personal there is wanting much of the ardor that 
 personal loyalty inspires, yet so far as there may 
 be warmth in the devotion we cherish for an 
 institution, it should awaken at the mention of the 
 Constitution of the United States. The noble 
 preamble declares by whom it is made, and defines 
 its purposes : " We, the people of the United 
 States, in order to form a more perfect union, 
 establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, pro- 
 vide for the common defence, promote the gen- 
 eral welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty 
 to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and 
 establish this Constitution for the United States 
 of America." In the largest measure it has ful- 
 filled these objects ; and the judgment and far- 
 seeing wisdom with which its founders met the 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 119 
 
 difficulties before them more and more challenges 
 our admiration as the years advance and the 
 Republic extends. 
 
 Formed by men who differed widely in their 
 views, — some who clung resolutely still to the 
 idea that it was dangerous to the liberties of the 
 States to constitute an efficient central power, and 
 others who, like Hamilton, preferred a consolidated 
 government whose model should be the British 
 Constitution, — it might easily have been that a 
 government so framed should have been a patch- 
 work of incongruities, whose discordant and 
 irreconcilable provisions would have revealed al- 
 ternately the influence of either opinion. Yet, 
 differing although they did, they were statesmen 
 still ; find, educated in the rough school of adversity 
 and trial, they realized that a government must be 
 constructed capable alike of daily efficient practical 
 operation, and of adapting itself to the constantly 
 varying exigencies in which sovereign States must 
 act. How doubtful they were of their success, how 
 nobly they succeeded in the government they made, 
 to-day we know. 
 
 We have seen its vast capacity for expansion as 
 it has received State after State under the shield 
 on which are emblazoned the arms of the Union, 
 as it has arisen in what was on the day of its 
 formation the untrodden wilderness, and advanced 
 to the blessings of liberty and civilization ; we 
 have recognized the flexibility it possesses in leav- 
 ing to States materially differing in local charac- 
 
120 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 teristics and interests the control and management 
 of their immediate affairs ; and we have known 
 its capacity to vindicate itself in the wildest storm 
 of civil commotion. 
 
 Let us guard this Union well ; for as upon it all 
 that is glorious in the past is resting, so upon it all 
 our hopes in the future are founded. Let us de- 
 mand of those who are to administer its great 
 powers purity, disinterestedness, devotion to well- 
 settled, carefully considered -principles and con- 
 victions. Let us cherish the homely but manly 
 virtues of the men who for it met the storm of war 
 in behalf of a government and a country ; let us 
 conserve their simple faith in what was just and 
 right, a faith that found its root in their unswerv- 
 ing belief in something higher than mere human 
 guidance. Let us encourage that universal edu- 
 cation, that diffusion of knowledge, which every- 
 where oppose themselves as barriers, steadily and 
 firmly, alike to plunder and fraud, to disorder and 
 turbulence. Above all, let us strive to maintain 
 and renew the fraternal feeling which should exist 
 between all the States of the Union. 
 
 We will not pretend that the trial through which 
 we have passed has faded either from our hearts or 
 our memories ; yet no one will, I trust, believe that 
 I would rudely rake open the smouldering embers 
 that all would gladly wish to see extinguished for- 
 ever, or that, deeply as I feel our great and solemn 
 obligations to those who preserved ttnd defended 
 the Union, I would speak one word except with 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 121 
 
 respect and in kindness even to those who assailed 
 it, and who have now submitted to its power. 
 
 In the Union two classes of States had their 
 place, differing radically in this, that in the one the 
 system of slavery existed. It was a difficulty 
 which the fathers could not eliminate from the 
 problem before them. They dealt with it with all 
 the wisdom and foresight they possessed. Strongly 
 impressed with a belief in the equal rights of man, 
 — for their discussions had compelled them to 
 deal with fundamental principles, — they were not 
 so destitute of philosophy that they did not see that 
 what they demanded for themselves should be ac- 
 corded to others ; and believing that the whole sys- 
 tem would fade before the noble influence of free 
 government, as a dark cloud melts and drifts away, 
 they watched, and with jealous care, that the in- 
 strument they signed should bear no trace of the 
 existence of slavery. It was not thus to be ; and 
 the system has passed away in the tempest of 
 battle and amid the clang of arms. 
 
 The conflict is over, the long subject race is re- 
 stored to liberty, and the nation has had " under 
 God a new birth of freedom." No executions, no 
 harsh punishments, have sullied the conclusion ; 
 day by day the material evidences of war fade 
 from our sight ; the bastions sink to the level of the 
 ground which surrounded them ; scarp and counter- 
 scarp meet in the ditch which divided them. So 
 let them pass away forever. The contest is marked 
 distinctly only by the changes in the organic laws 
 
122 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 of tlie Constitution, which embody in more defi- 
 nite forms the immortal truths of the Declaration 
 of Independence. That these include more than 
 its logical and necessary results cannot fairly be 
 contended. Did I believe that they embraced more 
 than these, did I find in that great instrument any 
 changes which should place or seek to place one 
 State above another, or above another class of 
 States, so as to mark a victory of sections or local- 
 ities, I could not rejoice, for I should know that 
 we had planted the seeds of " unnumbered woes." 
 
 To-day it is the highest duty of all, no matter 
 on what side they were, but, above all, of those 
 who have struggled for the preservation of the 
 Union, to strive that it become one of generous 
 confidence, in which all the States shall, as of old, 
 stand shoulder to shoulder, if need be, against the 
 world in arms. Towards those with whom we were 
 lately in conflict, and who recognize that the re- 
 sults are to be kept inviolate, there should be no 
 feeling of resentment or bitterness. To the neces- 
 sity of events they have submitted ; to the changes 
 in the Constitution they have assented. We cannot 
 and we do not think so basely or so meanly of 
 them as to believe that they have done so except 
 generously and without mental reservation. 
 
 We know that it is not easy to readjust all the 
 relations of society when one form is suddenly 
 swept away ; that the sword does its work rudely, 
 and not with that gradual preparation which at- 
 tends the changes of peace. We realize that there 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 123 
 
 are difficulties and distrusts not to be removed at 
 once between those who have been masters and 
 slaves ; yet there are none which will not ulti- 
 mately disappear. All true men are with the 
 South in demanding for her peace, order, honest 
 and good government, and encouraging her in the 
 work of rebuilding all that has been made deso- 
 late. We need not doubt the issue ; she will not 
 stand as the " Niobe of nations," lamenting her 
 sad fate ; she will not look back to deplore a past 
 which cannot and should not return ; but with the 
 fire of her ancient courage she will gird herself up 
 to the emergencies of her new situation, she will 
 unite her people by the bonds of that mutual confi- 
 dence which their mutual interests demand, and 
 renew her former prosperity and her rightful in- 
 fluence in the Union. 
 
 Fellow-citizens, we stand to-day on a great bat- 
 tle-field in honor of the patriotism and valor of 
 those who fought upon it. It is the step which 
 they made in the world's history we would seek to 
 commemorate ; it is the example which they have 
 offered us we would seek to imitate. The wise and 
 thoughtful men who directed the Revolution knew 
 well that it is by the wars which personal ambition 
 has stimulated, by the armies whose force has been 
 wielded alike for domestic oppression or foreign 
 conquest, that the sway of despots has been so 
 widely maintained. They had no love for war or 
 any of its works, but they were ready to meet its 
 dangers in their attachment to the cause of civil 
 
124 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 and religious liberty. They desired to found no 
 Roman republic, whose banners, " fanned by con- 
 quest's crimson wing," should float victorious over 
 prostrate nations, but one where the serene beauty 
 of the arts of peace should put to shame the strifes 
 that have impoverished peoples and degraded 
 nations. To-day let us rejoice in the liberty which 
 they have gained for us ; but let no utterances but 
 those of peace salute our ears, no thoughts but 
 those of peace animate our hearts. 
 
 Above the plains of Marathon, even now, as the 
 Grecian shepherd watches over his flocks, he fan- 
 cies that the skies sometimes are filled with lurid 
 liy-ht, and that in the clouds above are re-enacted 
 the scenes of that great day when, on the field 
 below, Greece maintained her freedom against the 
 hordes who had assailed her. Again seem to come 
 in long array, rich with " barbaric pearl and gold," 
 the turbaned ranks of the Persian host ; and the air 
 is filled with the clang of sword and shield, as 
 again the fiery Greek seems to throw himself upon 
 and drive before him his foreign invader, — al- 
 though all are but shadows that flit in wild, 
 confused masses along the spectral sky. 
 
 Above the field where we stand, even in the 
 wildest dream, may no such scenes offend the 
 calmness of the upper air, but may the stars look 
 forever down upon prosperity and peace, upon the 
 bay studded with its white-winged ships, upon the 
 populous and far-extending city, with its marts of 
 commerce, its palaces of industry, its temples. 
 
THE BATTLE t OF BUNKER HILL. 125 
 
 where each man may worship according to his own 
 conscience ; and as the continent shall pass be- 
 neath their steady rays, may the millions of happy 
 homes attest a land where the benign influence of 
 free government has brought happiness and con- 
 tentment, where labor is rewarded, where manhood 
 is honored, and where virtue and religion are 
 revered ! 
 
 Peace forever with the great country from which 
 the day we commemorate did so much rudely to 
 dissever us ! If there were in that time, or if 
 there have been since, many things which we could 
 have wished otherwise, we can easily afford to let 
 them pass into oblivion. But we do not forget in 
 the struggle of the Revolution how many of her 
 statesmen stood forth to assert the justice of our 
 cause, and to demand for us the rights of which 
 we had been deprived until the celebrated address 
 was passed which declared that the House of Com- 
 mons would consider as enemies to the King and 
 country all those who would further attempt the 
 prosecution of a war on the continent of America 
 for the purpose of reducing the American colonies 
 to obedience. 
 
 From her we have drawn the great body of laws 
 which, modified and adapted to our different sit- 
 uation, protect us to-day in our property, its de- 
 scent, possession, and transmission, and which 
 guard our dearer personal rights by the habeas 
 corpus and the trial by jury. They were our coun- 
 trvmen who from the days of King; John to those 
 
 •J JO 
 
126 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 of George III. have made of England a land in 
 which " freedom has broadened slowly down from 
 precedent to precedent." 
 
 It was she that placed her foot upon the " di- 
 vine right of kings," and solemnly maintained that 
 governments exist only by consent of the governed, 
 when in 1G88 she changed the succession to the 
 British Crown, and caused her rulers to reign there- 
 after by a statute of Parliament. 
 
 From her we learned the great lessons of con- 
 stitutional liberty which as against her we reso- 
 lutely asserted. There was no colony of any 
 other kingdom of Europe that would have dreamed 
 of demanding as rights those things which our 
 fathers deemed their inheritance as Englishmen, 
 none that would not have yielded unhesitatingly 
 to any injunction of the parent State. Whatever 
 differences have been or may hereafter come, let 
 us remember still that we are the only two great 
 distinctly settled free governments, and that 
 the noble English tongue which we speak alike 
 is " the language of freemen throughout the 
 world." 
 
 Above all, may there be peace forever among 
 the States of this Union ! " The blood spilt here," 
 said Washington, " roused the whole American 
 people, and united them in defence of their rights ; 
 that Union will never be broken." Prophecies may 
 be made to work their own fulfilment ; and what- 
 ever may have been our trials and our difficulties, 
 let us spare no effort that this prophecy shall be 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 127 
 
 realized. Achieving our independence by a com- 
 mon struggle, endowed to-day with common insti- 
 tutions, we see even more clearly than before 
 that the States of this Union have before them 
 a common destiny. 
 
 We have commenced here in Massachusetts the 
 celebration of that series of events which made of 
 us a nation ; and let each, as it approaches in the 
 centennial cycle, serve to kindle anew the fires of 
 patriotism. Let us meet on the fields where our 
 fathers fought, and where they lie, whether they 
 fell with the stern joy of victory irradiating their 
 countenances, or in the gloomy hours of disaster 
 and defeat, — alike in remembrance of Saratoga 
 and Yorktown, and of the dreary winter of Valley 
 Forge, at Trenton and Princeton, and at the spots 
 immortalized in the bloody campaign of the Jer- 
 seys, at King's Mountain and Charleston, at Cam- 
 den and Guilford Court House, and along the track 
 of the steadily fighting, slowly retreating Greene 
 through the Carolinas. 
 
 Above all, at the city from which went forth 
 the Declaration that we were, and of right ought 
 to be, a free and independent nation, let us gather, 
 and, by the sacred memories of the great departed, 
 pledge ourselves to transmit untarnished the heri- 
 tage they have left us. 
 
 The soldiers of the Revolution are gone ; the 
 statesmen who embodied their work in the Consti- 
 tution of the United States have passed away. 
 With them, too, sleep those who in the earlier 
 
128 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 days watched the development of this wondrous 
 frame of government. 
 
 The mighty master of thought and speech, 1 by 
 whose voice fifty years ago was dedicated the 
 Monument at whose base we stand, and whose 
 noble argument that the Constitution is not a com- 
 pact, but a law, by its nature supreme and perpet- 
 ual, won for him the proud name of the Expounder 
 of the Constitution, rests with those whose w r ork 
 he so nobly vindicated, happy at least that his eyes 
 were not permitted to behold the sad sight of 
 States "discordant and belligerent," and a land 
 " drenched in fraternal blood." 
 
 The lips of him 2 who twenty-five years ago com- 
 memorated this anniversary with that surpassing 
 grace and eloquence all his own, and with that spirit 
 of pure patriotism in which we may strive at least 
 to imitate him, are silent now. Throughout the 
 cruel years of war that clarion voice, sweet yet far- 
 resounding, summoned his countrymen to the 
 struggle on which our Union depended ; yet the 
 last time that it waked the echoes of the ancient 
 hall dedicated to liberty, even while the retiring 
 storm yet thundered along the horizon, it was to 
 speak words of love and charity to the distressed 
 people of the South. 
 
 But although they have passed beyond the veil 
 which separates the unseen world from mortal 
 gaze, the lessons which they have left remain, ad- 
 juring us, whatever may have been the perils, the 
 
 1 Daniel Webster. 2 Edward Everett. 
 
THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 129 
 
 discords, the sorrows of the past, to struggle al- 
 ways for that " more perfect Union" ordained by 
 the Constitution. Here, at least, however poor 
 and inadequate for an occasion that rises so vast 
 and grand above us our words may be, none shall 
 be uttered that are not in regard and love to all of 
 our fellow-citizens, no feelings indulged except 
 those of anxious desire for their prosperity and 
 happiness. 
 
 Besides those of New England, we are gratified 
 to-day by the presence of military organizations 
 from New York and Pennsylvania, from Maryland, 
 Virginia, and South Carolina, as well as by that of 
 distinguished citizens from these and other States 
 of the Union. Their fathers were ancient friends 
 of Massachusetts ; it was the inspiration they gave 
 which strengthened the heart and nerved the arm 
 of every man of New England. In every proper 
 and larger sense the soil upon which their sons stand 
 to-day is theirs as much as ours ; and wherever 
 there may have been estrangement, here at least 
 we have met upon common ground. They unite 
 with us in recognition of the great principles of 
 civil and religious liberty, and in pious memory of 
 those who vindicated them ; they join with us in 
 the wish to make of this regenerated Union a 
 power grander and more august than its founders 
 dared to hope. 
 
 Standing always in generous remembrance of 
 every section of the Union, neither now nor here- 
 after will we distinguish between States or sections 
 
130 THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL. 
 
 in our anxiety for the glory and happiness of all. 
 To-day upon the verge of the centuries, as together 
 we look back upon that which is gone, in deep and 
 heartfelt gratitude for the prosperity so largely 
 enjoyed by us, so together will we look forward 
 serenely and with confidence to that which is ad- 
 vancing. Together will we utter our solemn aspi- 
 rations in the spirit of the motto of the city which 
 now encloses within its limits the battle-field and 
 the town for which the battle was fought : " As 
 God was to our fathers, so may he be to us ! " 
 
ORATION 
 
 AT THE DEDICATION OF THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT 
 AT BOSTON, SEPTEMBER 17, 1877. 
 
 Mr. Mayor, Fellow-Citizens, and Com- 
 rades, — On the anniversary of a day thrice 
 memorable, as that of the first settlement of this 
 town in 1630 ; as that of the adoption of the Con- 
 stitution of the United States in 1789 ; as that of 
 a great battle fought for the Union on the soil of 
 Maryland in 1862 (the victorious commander in 
 which is to-day among our most honored and il- 
 lustrious guests), — we have assembled to dedicate 
 this Monument to the memory of the brave who 
 fell in that great conflict, which, commencing 
 for the unity of the government, broadened and 
 deepened into one for the equal rights of all men. 
 Before we part, some words should be spoken 
 seeking to express, however inadequately, our 
 gratitude to those to whom it is devoted. Yet 
 our ceremonial will be but vain and empty if its 
 outward acts are not the expressions of feelings 
 deeper than either acts or words. Its true dedica- 
 tion is to be found in the emotions which have been 
 kindled by the occasion itself, and to which every 
 heart has yielded. Here, in this city, the capital 
 of Massachusetts, — a State from which more than 
 
132 THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 
 
 sixty gallant regiments were sent to the field under 
 the inspiration of her illustrious Governor, who 
 now himself sleeps with those whom he sent forth 
 to battle, — we seek to surrender by this solemn 
 act, from the age that is passing to the ages that 
 are coming, for eternal memory and honor, the just 
 fame of those who have died for the Union. 
 
 This is no Monument to the glories of war. 
 While great changes for good have been wrought, 
 and great steps taken towards liberty and civiliza- 
 tion, by the convulsive energies exhibited in wars, 
 these are but exceptions to the great rule that of all 
 the causes which have degraded nations, opposed 
 human progress, and oppressed industry, war 
 has been one of the worst. If this were the ob- 
 ject of this memorial, it were better far that the 
 stones which compose it had slumbered in their 
 native quarries. No pomp and circumstance, no 
 waving of banners, no dancing of plumes, can 
 lend to war true dignity. This is to be found 
 alone in a great and noble cause. 
 
 Nor is this a Monument to valor only. There 
 is something honorable in the true soldier, who, 
 resolutely hazarding life, stands for the flag he 
 follows ; but there is that which is higher and 
 nobler here. Among the finest monuments of 
 Europe is that which is found in the beautiful 
 valley of Lucerne, to the memory of the Swiss 
 Guard who fell around Louis XVI., when the 
 furious mob had stormed his palace. Placed in 
 a niche of the limestone cliff, of which it forms 
 
THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 133 
 
 a part, a lion pierced with a spear still holds in 
 his death-grip the shield on which are carved the 
 arms of the Bourbons. Few works of art are more 
 majestic, or more fully show the hand of the mas- 
 ter. It is courage only that it honors; and you 
 wonder at the power which has so ennobled and 
 dignified it, when the great idea of patriotism 
 was wanting. The Swiss, whom it commemo- 
 rates, simply did bravely the work which they 
 had contracted to do, when the subjects of the 
 king, whose bread they had eaten, and whose 
 wine they had drank, deserted him. The men 
 whom we commemorate were brave as these, yet 
 their place in history is not with them. It is 
 with the soldiers of liberty, who with patriotic 
 devotion have fallen a willing sacrifice for their 
 country. It is with the Swiss who, at Sempach 
 or Morgarten, in defence of their own freedom, 
 broke the power of the House of Austria, and not 
 with the mercenaries whom they sent to fight the 
 battles of Europe. 
 
 The sentiment of this Monument is patriotism. 
 The men whom it honors were soldiers, coura- 
 geous to the death ; but it is their cause which 
 sets them apart for just honor and commenda- 
 tion among the millions who have laid down 
 their lives upon the battle-field. Patriotism such 
 as theirs is the highest of civic virtues, the noblest 
 form of heroism. Those who perilled their lives 
 in obedience to its promptings could gain no more 
 than those who remained at home in inglorious 
 
134 THE -SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 
 
 ease ; and yet they laid aside their hopes of com- 
 fort, to die for us. That the government they 
 had lived under might be preserved, that the 
 just and equal rights of all men might be main- 
 tained, they encountered disease, danger, and 
 death, in all the horrid forms in which they 
 present themselves to every one who takes his 
 place in the ranks of an army, with the solemn 
 belief that in no other way could they discharge 
 the obligation imposed upon them by their birth- 
 right as citizens of a free countrv. Whatever 
 might be its difficulties and dangers, their path 
 was so clearly indicated that they deemed they 
 could not err in following it. When they fought 
 and fell, they could not know but that their efforts 
 would be in vain, and the great flag, the symbol 
 of our united sovereignty, be rent asunder ; but 
 they were ready to risk all, and to dare all, in 
 the effort to deserve success. 
 
 They were animated by no fierce fire of ambi- 
 tion, no desire to exalt themselves, no expecta- 
 tion of attaining those rewards which are gained 
 by great chieftains. They had no such hopes. 
 They knew well that all the honor they could 
 obtain was that general meed of praise awarded 
 to all who serve faithfully, but which would not 
 separate them from others who had been brave 
 and true. No doubt, as the blood of youth 
 was high in their veins, they looked forward 
 in some instances to the stern joy of the con- 
 flict ; but beyond and above its tempest, fire, and 
 
THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 135 
 
 smoke, they beheld and strove for the great ob- 
 jects of the contest. 
 
 To-day they have seemed to come again as 
 when they moved out in serried lines, with 
 the flag which they went to defend waving 
 above their heads. Again we have seemed to 
 see them, their faces lighted with patriotic en- 
 thusiasm ; and we have recalled the varied scenes 
 of their stern and manly service, which was to 
 end in a soldier's death for the country to which 
 they had devoted themselves, — in each and every 
 fortune patient and determined, staining their 
 cause with no weakness or cowardice, dishonor- 
 ing it by no baseness or cruelty. 
 
 When we reflect how little our system of educa- 
 tion is calculated to adapt men to the restraints of 
 military service, how inconsistent its largeness and 
 freedom is with that stern control which necessarily 
 marks a system intended to give to a single mind 
 the power which is embodied in thousands of men, 
 we may well wonder at the ready submission which 
 was always given to its exactions. To some the 
 possession of marked military qualities, adapting 
 them to control others, gave prominence ; to some 
 mere accidents of time or circumstance may have 
 given high commands, while others, not less worthy, 
 filled only their places, and did their duty in the 
 ranks. But those who led must often have felt 
 that their highest desire should be to be worthy 
 of the devotion of those who followed. The dis- 
 tinctions necessary to discipline have long since 
 
136 THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 
 
 passed away. Side by side, on fields bought by 
 their blood, " no useless coffins around their 
 breasts," but wrapped in the blanket which is the 
 soldier's martial shroud, awaiting the coming of 
 the Eternal Day, they rest together. 
 
 What matter is it when men have given their 
 utmost in intellect, strength, and courage and 
 their blood to the last drop, whether they fell 
 with the stars of the general, the eagles of the 
 colonel, on their shoulders, or in the simple jacket 
 of the private ? Wherever " on fame's eternal 
 camping-ground their silent tents are spread," 
 in the tangled wildwood, in the stately cemetery, 
 or in nameless graves not even marked by the 
 word " unknown," the earth that bears them 
 dead bears not alive more true or noble men. 
 To-day we remember them all, without regard to 
 rank or race, seeking to honor those whom we 
 cannot by name identify. 
 
 If we do not commend patriotism such as these 
 men exhibited, to whom are we to turn in the 
 hour of danger which may come to those who 
 are to succeed us, as it did to ourselves ? Lessons 
 such as they have given are not to be idly 
 neglected when the time is gone when their ser- 
 vices have ceased to be of immediate value. We 
 shall not need to go to Marathon and Platea for 
 examples, whose brethren have shed their blood 
 on fields as fiercely contested as those ; and it 
 would be idle to go anywhere for examples, un- 
 less in rendering homage to the valor and patri- 
 
THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 137 
 
 otism displayed by our brethren, we seek to 
 reconsecrate ourselves to the same virtues. Every 
 instinct of justice calls upon us for the appro- 
 priate meed of praise ; every suggestion of wisdom 
 counsels that we omit no opportunity to instil into 
 others the admiration with which these deeds are 
 regarded. The fables of romance, which, in some 
 form, each nation of Europe has, that in great 
 emergencies their illustrious chiefs will return 
 again to rescue them, are not altogether myths. 
 To each people that loves bravery and patriotism 
 come again in their hour of trial the old heroic 
 souls, although the form and garb they wear is 
 of their age and time. 
 
 The time for natural tears has passed. To 
 every heart the years have brought their new 
 store of joys and sorrows since these men made 
 their great sacrifice for country. The struc- 
 ture that we have reared stands to honor, and 
 not to mourn, the dead. So shall it stand when 
 we in our turn are gone, to teach its lesson of 
 duty nobly done, at the expense of life itself, to 
 those who are in turn to take upon themselves 
 the duties of life. 
 
 Those whose names it honors were known and 
 loved by us, and are not to be recalled but with 
 that manly sorrow born of respect and love. 
 There are those also to whom they were even 
 nearer and dearer than to us, who knew them as 
 comrades, whose homes are forever darkened by 
 the absence of the light of affection which their 
 
138 THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 
 
 presence shed around them. But the age comes 
 swiftly on which is to know them only by their 
 deeds. We commend them to the grave and im- 
 partial tribunal of history as patriotic and devoted 
 citizens ; we invoke the considerate judgment of 
 the world upon the justice of their cause ; we re- 
 new and reiterate the assertion that there was a 
 solemn duty laid upon them by their time, their 
 place, their country, and that such duty they met 
 and performed. To them, as to the Spartans who 
 fell around their king in stern defence of the liber- 
 ties of Greece, changing but the name of the battle- 
 field, apply the words which Simonides uttered : 
 
 " Of those who at Thermopylae were slain, 
 Glorious the doom and beautiful the lot, 
 Their tomb an altar, men from tears refrain, 
 Honor and praise, but mourn them not." 
 
 Although this Monument may often be passed 
 as a thing of custom, although the lesson which it 
 teaches may seem to be forgotten, yet in the hour 
 of trial, if it is to come to others as it came to us, 
 this Monument will be freshly remembered. As 
 in the Roman story which tells of Hannibal, the 
 mightiest enemy Rome ever knew, it is related that 
 his father, Hamilcar, himself a chieftain and a 
 warrior, whose renown has been eclipsed by that of 
 his greater son, brought him when a child of nine 
 years old into the Temple of the Gods, that he 
 might lift his little hands to swear eternal hostility 
 to the tyranny of Rome, — so shall those who sue- 
 
THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 139 
 
 ceed us come here to swear hostility, not to one 
 grasping power only, but to every tyranny that 
 would enslave the body or enchain the mind of 
 man, and eternal devotion to the great principles 
 of civil and religious liberty. 
 
 Nor is this Monument, while it asserts our be- 
 lief in the fidelity of these men, in any sense un- 
 kind or ungenerous towards those with whom they 
 were engaged in deadly strife. It bears no words 
 of boasting or unseemly exultation ; and the as- 
 sertion of the justice of our cause, though firmly 
 made, is yet not made in any harsh or contro- 
 versial spirit. We recognize fully that those 
 with whom we warred were our countrymen ; 
 we know their valor and determination ; we 
 know that no foot of ground was yielded to us 
 until to hold it became impossible, and that they 
 resisted until men and means utterly and hope- 
 lessly failed. Whatever we may think of their 
 cause, that as a people they believed in it cannot 
 fairly be questioned. Men do not sacrifice life and 
 property without stint or measure except in the 
 faith that they are right. Upon individuals we 
 may charge unreasonable temper, intolerance, pas- 
 sion, and the promptings of a selfish and ill-regu- 
 lated ambition ; but the whole body of a people 
 do not act from motives thus personal, and have a 
 right to have their bravery and sincerity admitted, 
 even if more cannot be conceded. 
 
 The great conflict was fought out and the victory 
 won which has established forever, if the force of 
 
140 THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 
 
 arms can establish any tiling, that the Republic 
 is one and indivisible ; and amid the roar of 
 battle and the clash of arms, the institution of 
 slavery which divided us as a nation, which made 
 of the States two classes diverse and discordant, 
 has passed away. Perhaps if we had fully 
 known all that it was to cost, both at the North 
 and South, we should have hesitated more than 
 we did before engaging in a strife so deadly and 
 terrible. Yet as we consider all the woes which 
 must have followed the dismemberment of the 
 Union, as we contemplate the vast gain for 
 peace, freedom, and equality by the emancipation 
 of the subject race from slavery and the dominant 
 race itself from the corrupting influence of this 
 thraldom, w T ho shall say that we have any right 
 to deplore the past except with mitigated grief ? 
 We are yet too near the events through which 
 we were swept upon the bloody currents of the 
 war to appreciate their full extent and magnitude, 
 or all the consequences which are to flow from 
 them. We know already that we enter upon a 
 higher plane of national life, when it is estab- 
 lished that there are no exceptions to the great 
 rules of liberty among men, and that each is en- 
 titled to the just rewards of his labor and the 
 position to which his talents, ability, and virtue 
 entitle him. As w T e stand here in memory of 
 our gallant dead, we urge upon all who have 
 contended with them to unite with us in the 
 effort to make of our new and regenerated gov- 
 
THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 141 
 
 ernment, purified by the fires of our civil con- 
 flict, a republic more noble and more august 
 than its founders had dared to hope. 
 
 Among all patriotic men there is everywhere an 
 earnest desire that there shall be full peace and 
 reconciliation between the sections of the Union. 
 Whatever may have been former divisions, there 
 is nothing in the events of the past, there is 
 nothing in the present condition of things, which 
 should forbid this. We can stand, firmly and 
 securely stand, upon that which has been defi- 
 nitely settled by the war. Ours was not a 
 mere conflict of dynasties, or of families, like 
 the English Wars of the Roses, in which the 
 great Houses of York and Lancaster disputed for 
 the English Crown. It was a great elemental 
 conflict, in which two opposite systems of civi- 
 lization were front to front and face to face. It 
 was necessary that one or the other should con- 
 quer, and that it should be settled whether the 
 continent should be all free or all slave. Yet 
 the history of civil wars demonstrates that the 
 widest and saddest differences of religion, the 
 most radical differences as to the form of gov- 
 ernment, have not prevented firm union when 
 the cause of dissension was obliterated. 
 
 Now that it is determined that the Union is to 
 exist, it must be rendered one of mutual respect 
 and regard, as well as of mutual interest. Un- 
 less this is the case, there is no cohesive pressure 
 of either internal or external force strong enough 
 
142 THE SOLDIERS' MONUiMENT AT BOSTON. 
 
 to maintain it. There must have been a party 
 victorious and a party vanquished ; but there is 
 no true victory anywhere unless the conclusion 
 is for the interest of each and all. It is not the 
 least of the just claims that the American 
 Revolution has upon the friends of liberty 
 everywhere that while it terminated in the dis- 
 memberment of the British Empire, it left the 
 English a more free people than they would have 
 been but for its occurrence. It settled for them 
 more firmly the great safeguards of English 
 liberty in the right of the habeas corpus, the 
 trial by jury, and the great doctrine that repre- 
 sentation must accompany taxation. We speak 
 of it as the victory of Adams and Jefferson, but 
 it was not less that of Chatham and Burke. 
 
 I should deem the war for the Union a failure, 
 I should think the victory won by these men 
 who have died in its defence barren, if it should 
 not prove in every larger sense won for the 
 South as well as the North ; if it should not be 
 shown that it is better for her that the contest 
 against its rightful authority failed. 
 
 It is not to be expected that opinion will be 
 changed by edicts, even when those edicts are 
 maintained by force. The changes of opinion 
 must be gradual, and must be the effect of that 
 time which enables feeling to subside and the judg- 
 ment to act. Already there are brave and reflect- 
 ing men who fought against us who do not hesitate 
 to acknowledge that the end was well for them as 
 
THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 143 
 
 for us, and who look forward hopefully to better 
 results than could have been expected from a Con- 
 federacy which, if it had been founded, would have 
 been at the mercy of each individual State. Nor 
 is there any one bold enough to say, now that the 
 system of slavery is destroyed, that he would 
 raise a hand or lift a finger to replace it. That 
 the cause for which they have suffered so much 
 will still be dear to those who fought for it, or 
 with whom it is associated by tender and affec- 
 tionate recollections of those whom they loved, 
 who fell in its defence, is to be expected. To 
 such sentiments and feelings it is a matter of in- 
 difference whether there is defeat or success. They 
 would exist, indeed, even if the reason and judg- 
 ment should concede the cause to have been un- 
 wise. Certainly, we ourselves, had the war for 
 the Union failed, would not the less have believed 
 it just and necessar}^ nor the less have honored 
 the memory of those engaged in it. When re- 
 sults are accepted cordially, we can ask no more 
 until the softening influences of time have done 
 their work. 
 
 On the fields which were ploughed by the fierce 
 artillery the wheat has been dancing fresh and fair 
 in the breezes of the summer that is gone ; and as 
 the material evidences of the conflict pass away, 
 so let each feeling of bitterness disappear, as to- 
 gether, both North and South, we strive to render 
 the Republic one whose firm yet genial sway shall 
 protect with just and equal laws each citizen who 
 
144 THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 
 
 yields obedience to her power. Asking for our- 
 selves no rights that we do not freely concede to 
 others, demanding no restraints upon others that 
 we do not readily submit to ourselves, yielding a 
 generous obedience to the Constitution in all its 
 parts, both new and old, let us endeavor to lift 
 ourselves to that higher level of patriotism which 
 despises any narrow sectionalism, and rejoices in 
 a nationality broad enough to embrace every sec- 
 tion of the Union, and each one of its people, 
 whether high or humble, rich or poor, black or 
 white. 
 
 There is no division to-day among the States of 
 the Union such as existed when the Constitution 
 was formed. In each and all the great principles 
 of liberty and equal rights are the same, to be alike 
 respected as the only basis upon which the govern- 
 ment can stand. Whatever may have been the 
 sorrows or the losses of the war, there is no sor- 
 row that cannot find its recompense in the added 
 grandeur and dignity of the whole country. 
 
 Comrades, — It is the last time that we, who 
 have marched under the flag, and been the soldiers 
 of the Union in its mortal struggle, shall gather in 
 such numbers as meet to-day. We are an army to 
 whom can come no recruits. The steady, resistless 
 artillery of time hurls its deadly missiles upon us, 
 and each hour we are fewer and weaker. But as 
 we stand together thus, as we remember how nobly 
 and bravely life's work was done by these men 
 
THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT AT BOSTON. 14-5 
 
 whom we have sought to commemorate, let us 
 believe that, the tie which binds us to them in a 
 great and holy cause is not wholly dissolved. 
 Their worldly task is done ; their solemn oath, 
 which we took side by side with them, is per- 
 formed. For us life brings each day its new 
 duties and new responsibilities. 
 
 In the classic mythology, which was the reli- 
 gion of the ancient world, it was fabled that the 
 heroes were demi-gods. Raised above the race of 
 man, and yet not so far but that their example 
 might be imitated, they served to animate those 
 who yet struggled with their mortal surroundings. 
 So should these, our heroes, while the dust of 
 life's conflict is yet on us, inspire us to loftier 
 purposes and nobler lives. And as we leave 
 them to their glorious repose and their pure 
 and noble fame, let us go forth exalted by these 
 hours of communion with them. 
 
 Above them, as we depart, we utter the ancient 
 form of words, and yet in no formal way, which 
 conclude the proclamations of the State whose 
 children they were : " God save the Common- 
 wealth of Massachusetts ! " And to this we 
 add, with not less of fervor or solemnity, the 
 prayer which was in their hearts and upon their 
 lips as they died : " God save the Union of the 
 American States ! " 
 
 10 
 

ADDRESS 
 
 AT THE COMMEMORATION OF THE TWO HUNDRED AND 
 FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF THE FIRST PARISH CHURCH 
 OF CHARLESTOWN, NOVEMBER 12, 1882. 
 
 The occasion has been one of the greatest in- 
 terest ; while I have listened with pleasure and 
 instruction, I could have wished that it might have 
 passed without any words from me, — not, cer- 
 tainly, that I would fail in anything that could 
 do honor to the founders of this church, but that 
 I feel how little I can utter worthy of the 
 occasion. 
 
 The anniversary of this church is inextricably 
 connected with that of the First Church of Boston. 
 It- is not so much an outgrowth, or an offshoot, as 
 one of its integral parts ; while its formal organi- 
 zation dates from 1632, its real organization is 
 that of the church formed here in 1630. The 
 charter of the Massachusetts Company had been 
 transformed by a large latitude of construction, 
 and by a yet larger latitude had been deemed to 
 authorize the foundation of a colony which was 
 to govern itself. A State was to be founded here 
 which was to rest upon the rock of the Church. 
 While the immigrants were houseless, scattered 
 
148 THE FIRST CHURCH OF CHARLESTOWN. 
 
 around this hill, seeking to satisfy the most simple 
 and necessary wants, yet spiritual needs must be 
 satisfied first. We stand upon the hill upon which 
 they stood, — almost, it may be, upon the very 
 spot. It was here, too, that the Court of Assist- 
 ants first met, and the political life of the colony 
 commenced almost contemporaneously with that 
 of the church. Clearly, to use the words of Dr. 
 Johnson, " ours is not the frigid philosophy which 
 would conduct us indifferent and unmoved over 
 any ground which has been dignified by wisdom, 
 bravery, or virtue ; " and the place where we stand 
 may well inspire us with elevated thought and 
 solemn reflection as we contemplate these men 
 and their work, aided as we have been by the 
 noble commemorative discourse of the afternoon, 
 and the interesting historical paper of the evening. 
 It has been the pleasure, sometimes, of histo- 
 rians to attribute fabulous qualities to the early 
 chiefs and founders of the nations whose annals 
 they celebrate. The Greeks and Romans claimed 
 theirs to be among the gods of classic mythology. 
 The King Arthurs and King Alfreds of Britain's 
 centuries of romance may be invested with such 
 qualities, or seen through such colors, as romance 
 or poetry may select. But we know the founders 
 of New England as they were. They live for us 
 in their works, in the legislation of their colony, in 
 the chronicles of their churches, so faithfully re- 
 calling their doubts and their trials. We know 
 them in the intercourse of daily life, — in their 
 
THE FIRST CHURCH OF CHARLESTOWX. 149 
 
 struggles with want, with the savages who encom- 
 passed them, and their far severer struggles to 
 reach that exalted faith and experience more val- 
 uable than any earthly blessings. We know them 
 in their most intimate correspondence with friends, 
 revealing the deepest and tenderest secrets of their 
 hearts. Everywhere they are the same in this, 
 — that they have no fears of any earthly power, 
 no repinings, however hard misfortune may be 
 upon them, so long as they feel they are doing the 
 work of the Lord. For them, earthly honors were 
 nothing, their religious and spiritual freedom every- 
 thing ; and yet with this they knew that their 
 civil freedom was united. As we behold them, — 
 grave it may be that they were in aspect, for the 
 responsibility they have assumed is solemn, and it 
 is due to no earthly power ; stern it may be that 
 they were in feature, for an indomitable will can 
 alone sustain them ; plain, it may be, even to 
 rudeness, they may be in dress, for the work they 
 are to do in the world is not for those who wear 
 soft raiment or who dwell in kings' houses, — yet 
 could we see them as they once stood here, we 
 should know how high resolve, earnest purpose, 
 devoted faith, had impressed itself upon and dig- 
 nified their rugo-ed features. 
 
 But although the means of knowing them well 
 are revealed to us in so many ways, it is not easy to 
 judge them fairly. It is because we cannot sepa- 
 rate ourselves from that which surrounds us so 
 as to look out upon life as they looked upon 
 
150 THE FIRST CHURCH OF CHARLESTOWN. 
 
 it. They have a right to be judged from their 
 own standpoint, and from the temper, spirit, and 
 thought of the age which was about them. They 
 were men in lofty conception far above the age in 
 which they lived ; yet the age in which they lived 
 constituted an environment out of which no man 
 ever entirely burst. 
 
 " The Puritans," says Lord Macaulay, " were 
 perhaps the most remarkable body of men the 
 world has ever known." There has been far too 
 great a disposition to describe them by their de- 
 ficiencies and limitations, rather than by their 
 great and positive merits. It is said that they 
 sternly repressed here every form of religious 
 worship except their own ; yet it is to be remem- 
 bered that they lived in an age when no such thing 
 as toleration was known. Persecution was the 
 rule and not the exception. They deemed also — 
 and perhaps rightly deemed — that in no other 
 way could they preserve and sustain the faith 
 which was the anchor of their hope, than by con- 
 fining their colony to those of their own church, 
 or those affiliated to it. This was the extent of 
 their claim. For the enjoyment of that which was 
 dear to them they left the homes of their fathers, 
 they braved the stormy sea, they contended with 
 the stern soil and inhospitable climate, and all 
 the terrors of a savage wilderness. They invited, 
 no one to share their dangers ; they desired no 
 one whose presence might imperil the existence 
 of their faith. It was the peculiarity of their 
 
THE FIRST CHURCH OF CHARLESTOWX. 151 
 
 situation here, rather than any erroneous general 
 view of the rights of all men to civil and religious 
 liberty, that caused them to wish that all who 
 came here should be of their own faith. The emi- 
 gration to New England was largely developed 
 by the struggle which had already commenced be- 
 tween King Charles and his Parliament. However 
 that might end, one place these men were deter- 
 mined should exist where they could worship God 
 in their own way. For this they must hold their 
 power untrammelled by those who cherished other 
 modes of belief. That emigration went on, as it is 
 usually estimated, until something over twenty 
 thousand had arrived here from England. It 
 ceased then, for Charles and his Parliament were 
 at last in open war, and the place of all who 
 thought as they did was in England. Many men 
 who had come to Massachusetts returned to join 
 in the struggle there. They went to stand in the 
 ranks of Skippon and Ireton ; or to ride, it may 
 be, by the side of Oliver himself, as with his Iron- 
 sides, he beat down and trampled under foot Prince 
 Rupert and his cavaliers ; or, it may be, — like 
 the noblest of their number, Hugh Peters and Sir 
 Harry Vane, — to seal their devotion to their faith 
 upon the block. When power came — as it did 
 come — into the hands of the English Puritans, the 
 religious belief of others was respected. Mr. Hume, 
 the bitterest of their critics, says of them : " Of all 
 Christian sects, this was the first which durino- its 
 prosperity as well as its adversity always adopted 
 
152 THE FIRST CHURCH OF CHARLESTOWN. 
 
 the principle of toleration." Of course, Mr. Hume 
 is careful to add one of his usual sneers, by re- 
 marking that it is extraordinary that what is so 
 just should have proceeded, not from reasoning, 
 but from extravagance and fanaticism. 
 
 The connection which our fathers of 1630 made 
 between the government of the Church and that 
 of the State — or more properly, the Colony — was 
 soon dissolved. While the law that each freeman 
 must be a church-member appears to have con- 
 tinued until the colonial passed into the provincial 
 government, yet it was latterly neglected and dis- 
 regarded. The things which were Cassar's went 
 to Csesar. 
 
 But although all this was just and necessary, — 
 and although the Massachusetts which they knew 
 was but a feeble colony, fringing with its scattered 
 hamlets the stormy sea, and that which we know 
 is a wealthy and powerful State, an integral por- 
 tion of a vast nation whose gateways are upon 
 the Atlantic and Pacific seas, — let the example 
 of our Puritan founders remain with us always. 
 The noble lives they led in want and privation 
 and clanger do not pass away utterly. We will 
 strive at least that the lessons they taught of self- 
 devotion, the sacrifices they made for liberty, the 
 high ideals the}- held up of virtue and courage, 
 the lofty standard they maintained of religion 
 and piety, shall not be altogether forgotten. No 
 men have ever impressed themselves more upon 
 a nation than have the Puritan founders of New 
 
THE FIRST CHURCH OF CIIARLESTOWN. 153 
 
 England. The principles dear to them, and to 
 which they devoted their lives, are in the vanguard 
 of every struggle for justice or liberty. 
 
 I cannot conclude without one earnest wish for 
 the prosperity of this ancient church. Apart from 
 its great historic associations, it is dear to me by 
 the tender memory of many who were its honored 
 and respected members, with whom I am con- 
 nected by blood and family ties, two of whom 
 are commemorated on the walls around us. For 
 two hundred and fifty years its voice has been 
 heard, instructing and inspiring thousands of 
 grateful and responsive hearts. So may it be for 
 centuries to come ! Still may its voice go forth 
 summoning men to higher and nobler lives, in 
 solemn remembrance of him to whom they are 
 accountable, rebuking — if rebuke be needed — 
 tenderly and charitably, yet encouraging and con- 
 soling always. Although forms of worship may 
 change, although the solemn swell of the organ or 
 the pealing of the chimes above our heads might 
 have seemed to those who founded this church in- 
 consistent with the severe simplicity dear to them, 
 yet these are but accessories only. We will not 
 doubt that in the brighter light in which they 
 stand, and with the larger vision with which now 
 they see, the}' will acknowledge their communion 
 with it so long as, in the language of the covenant 
 made here, — often quoted to-day, and yet not too 
 often, — it shall teach men to walk in all their 
 
154 THE FIRST CHURCH OF CHARLESTOWN. 
 
 ways according to the rule of the gospel, and in 
 all sincere conformity to the holy ordinances of 
 our Saviour, and " in mutual love and respect, 
 each to the other, so near as God shall give us 
 grace." 
 
 
 
 
COMMEMORATIVE ADDRESS ON 
 GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 DELIVERED AT FANEUIL HALL, BOSTON, JULY 26, 1885. 
 
 Your Excellency, Fellow-citizens, — A na- 
 tion has watched by the dying couch of its great- 
 est citizen. The leader of its armies in battle, 
 the head of its civil government in peace, — anx- 
 iety, hope, and fear have contended, until at last it 
 became certain that human efforts were in vain, 
 and that he who had been a tower of strength 
 in the hour of a people's agony was to pass from 
 among living men. Well may a nation swell the 
 funeral ciw for him whose strong hand and daring 
 heart secured and protected its life. 
 
 As he has waited in the august majesty of 
 impending death, there have seemed to gather 
 round him the tender memories of all who offered 
 their lives for their country in our great civil strife. 
 The crowds that collected about his house in the 
 great city, when some two or three months ago 
 his death seemed immediate, were not mere curi- 
 osity-seekers : there were fathers and brothers; 
 there were mothers that had given their sons ; 
 there were girls (elderly women now) who had 
 given up their lovers. To me these groups seem 
 
156 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 infinitely affecting, for they were of those who in 
 that struggle had parted forever from their best 
 and noblest. To the great chieftain who had led 
 their brave through so many a hot and bloody 
 day they brought the mute offering of their rev- 
 erence and love, for it was to him they owed it 
 that those noble lives had not been sacrificed in 
 vain. As he was the chieftain, so he was the 
 representative of the Federal Army, — that army 
 which, springing from the people itself, vindicated 
 the integrity of the American Union, swept from 
 its States the curse of slavery, and lifted a nation 
 to a higher and nobler life. That great army has 
 passed away long since, yet it shall not be for- 
 gotten that in its day and generation, and in its 
 time and place, it did for this country deeds 
 worthy of immortal honor. It is twenty-four years 
 since the great battle-summer of 1861. To each 
 of us they have brought joy and sorrow in their 
 mingled web ; but we turn back to that time 
 freshly still as the tolling bell and the muffled 
 drum announce that Grant has sunk to his final 
 repose. 
 
 " Ne'er to the chambers where the mighty rest 
 Since their foundation came a nobler guest." 
 
 To-day is not one for criticism, even if it be 
 candid and not unkindly. Our sense of loss is too 
 acute ; our emotions are too keen. Nor perhaps at 
 any time could those of us who have followed 
 him, who have known what it w T as to lean upon 
 that determined will, who have seen him with the 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 157 
 
 light of battle on his cheek, assume to speak of 
 him with the cold neutrality of impartial history. 
 If to that great tribunal all must come, we are not 
 competent to sit thereon as judges. Some future 
 historian, some Parkman, some Bancroft, shall 
 compare him with the great captains of antiquity 
 or of modern history, shall weigh in nice scales his 
 successes or his failures, the means at his com- 
 mand, the purposes he had in view, the results he 
 finally accomplished, and shall then assign him his 
 appropriate place. High although it must be, for 
 this I shall care little, for his name is written 
 indelibly upon a nobler list. His place is not with 
 the Caesars and the Hannibals, the Fredericks or 
 Napoleons, — the conquerors who have waded 
 to fame or empire through blood and carnage, 
 — but with those who in the hour of danger 
 and distress have borne upon their shoulders the 
 weight of mighty States, who have preferred 
 patriotism, duty, and honor to any selfish aggran- 
 dizement, who have drawn the sword reluctantly, 
 who have sheathed it willingly when the time for 
 reconciliation had come, and at the head of whom 
 stands, peerless and immortal, our own Wash- 
 ington. His fame, like that of Washington, shall 
 form forever one of the brightest jewels in the 
 radiant crown of the Eepublic. It shall broaden and 
 widen as her domains shall spread, as her vast and 
 fertile wastes shall be peopled, and as great cities 
 shall rise where to-day only the hum of the wild 
 bee breaks the stillness of the fragrant air. Yet 
 
158 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 to no generation of men can he be all that he has 
 been to us. Already to many almost approaching 
 middle life his achievements are but historical. 
 But with us, who were of his time, there is a 
 personal love and veneration towards him which 
 cannot be communicated to others. All around 
 him throughout the broad land there stretches 
 the wide circle of those who perhaps never looked 
 upon his bodily presence, but who feel his loss as a 
 personal grief. He has so inwrought himself with 
 their just and patriotic feeling in the years 
 that are past that to them the earth itself seems 
 less fair, this gorgeous, glowing summer less 
 bright, now that he is gone. Willingly would 
 I speak some words that shall tell the love we 
 have borne him, the honor in which we hold bis 
 great deeds, the gratitude we have for all he has 
 so splendidly done, but I realize how poor my 
 utterance is. 
 
 The mean and sordid pecuniary cares that vexed 
 his closing years of life but showed how truly 
 resolute and upright he was. In selecting men in 
 military life in whom to repose confidence, his 
 view was singularly correct and just ; it might be 
 said to be perfect. He was a soldier to the 
 inmost core ; he knew everything that he needed 
 then, and made no mistakes. His education and 
 studies had not fitted him with the same judg- 
 ment in civil life. It was an error of a trustful, 
 generous nature that led him to stand by those in 
 whom he had once reposed confidence, even after 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 159 
 
 there was legitimate reason for distrust. He gave 
 generously and withdrew reluctantly, and thus as 
 a civilian he was more than once grievously 
 abused in official life. That he should show the 
 same disposition in dealing with his private and 
 personal affairs might have been anticipated ; but 
 it was an error which most cruelly he was com- 
 pelled to answer. Betrayed by cunning, intrigu- 
 ing knaves, when financial ruin came, he met it 
 with the old calm resolution. He was ready at 
 once to strip himself of all he possessed, even of 
 the very gifts which were the just memorials of 
 his fame, that he might satisfy those who had 
 trusted in him. Financial and commercial honor 
 were as dear to him as any other honor. Calmly 
 and resolutely he devoted himself to those unaccus- 
 tomed labors by which he hoped to provide for 
 those he was to leave behind him ; and although 
 racking pains always assailed him, although the 
 weary brain and the once strong hand from time 
 to time refused their office, he had the satisfaction 
 of knowing that what he had undertaken he had 
 accomplished. Recognition of his great services, 
 even if somewhat tardily, came in his restoration 
 to that position in the army which he had 
 resigned in obedience to the call of the country, 
 and it was a profound gratification to him to feel, 
 ere he passed away, that the pecuniary future of 
 his family would be provided for. Let them 
 believe that the tenderest love of a grateful people 
 will encompass them always. 
 
160 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 It is twenty years s'mce the only name worthy 
 to be mentioned with that of General Grant has 
 passed into history. It seems like a caprice of 
 fortune that while the great soldier of the War of 
 the Rebellion went almost unscathed through an 
 hundred fights, its great statesman should die by 
 the assassin's hand. As to the great Hebrew 
 chieftain who had led Israel through the Red Sea 
 and the desert, it was ordained that he should 
 but look on the promised land, so to Abraham 
 Lincoln it was given but to know that the Union 
 was restored, that his life's work was done, and to 
 die in the hour of final triumph. Between these 
 great men, from the day they met (and they had 
 never seen eacb other's faces until after nearly 
 three years of war) until the day Mr. Lincoln died, 
 there had been the most generous confidence, the 
 most trustful regard, the most firm faith that each 
 had done in the past and would do in the future 
 the utmost possible to sustain the other. How 
 like a wonderful romance it reads, that in that 
 time of less than three years, from a simple 
 captain, whose offer of his services to the War 
 Department was thought of so little consequence 
 that the letter, although since carefully searched 
 for, cannot be found, Grant had risen from rank 
 to rank until he became the lieutenant-general 
 who was to unite all the military springs of action 
 in a single hand, to govern them by a single will, 
 to see (to use his own expression) that the armies 
 of the Union pulled no longer " like a balky 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 161 
 
 team," but were moved and animated by a single 
 purpose. Yet his way had not been one of unin- 
 terrupted success, and there had been no success 
 that had not been won by his own wisdom and 
 courage. He had seized and controlled the Ohio, 
 and held Kentucky in the Union ; he had opened 
 the Tennessee and the Cumberland by the victories 
 of Forts Henry and Donelson ; but the much-misun- 
 derstood battle of Shiloh had reduced him, uncom- 
 plaining always, to a subordinate command under 
 General Halleck, whose own failure at Corinth 
 finally gave to him at last the command of all 
 forces operating to open the Mississippi. Again 
 and again during the often-repeated repulses from 
 Vicksburg there had been attempts to remove him, 
 mainly at the instance of those who did not 
 comprehend the vastness of the problem with 
 which he had to deal. Mr. Lincoln had stood by 
 him, saying in his peculiar way, "I rather like 
 that man ; I guess I will try him a little longer," 
 until at last Vicksburg was taken by a movement 
 marked with the audacity of a master in the art of 
 war, who dares to violate established rules and 
 make exceptions when great emergencies demand 
 that great risks shall be run. The Fourth of July, 
 1863, was the proudest day the armies of the Union 
 up to that time had ever known, for the thunders 
 of the cannon that announced in the East the great 
 victory of Gettysburg were answered from the West 
 by those that told that the Mississippi in all its 
 mighty length ran unvexed to the sea. 
 
 11 
 
162 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 His victory at Chattanooga followed the placing 
 of the armies of the West under his sole control, 
 and the time had come when he was to direct the 
 armies of the whole Union. His place was there- 
 after with the Army of the Potomac, as the most 
 decisive point of struggle, although its immediate 
 command remained with General Meade. It was 
 only thus and through its vicinity to the Capital 
 that he could direct every military operation. As 
 he entered upon the great campaign of 1864, Mr. 
 Lincoln said, " If there is anything wanting which 
 is within my power to give, do not fail to let me 
 know it. And now with a brave army and a just 
 cause may God sustain you ! " And General Grant 
 had answered, " Should my success be less than 
 I desire or expect, the least I can say is, the fault 
 is not with you." Side by side they stood to- 
 gether through all the desperate days that ensued, 
 until in April, 1865, the terrific and protracted 
 struggle was ended between the two great armies 
 of the East ; the long-tried, always faithful Army 
 of the Potomac held its great rival, the Army of 
 Northern Virginia, in the iron embrace of its gleam- 
 ing wall of bayonets ; and the sword of Lee was 
 laid in the conquering hand of Grant. Side by 
 side Lincoln and Grant will stand forever in the 
 Pantheon of history ; and somewhere in the eter- 
 nal plan we would willingly believe those great 
 spirits shall yet guard and shield the land they 
 loved and served so well. 
 
 Whatever General Grant's errors or his weak- 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 163 
 
 nesses, — and he was mortal, — like the spots on 
 the sun, they but show the brightness of the 
 surrounding surface ; and we readily forget them 
 as we remember the vast debt we owe to him. 
 Whether or not we could have achieved success 
 without him, it is certain that only through him we 
 did achieve success. He was thoroughly patriotic, 
 and his patriotism sprang from his faith in the 
 American Union. He had been educated to the ser- 
 vice of the government ; he had looked to this rather 
 than to the parties that exist under it, whose zeal 
 sometimes leads men to forget that there can be 
 no party success worth having that is not for the 
 benefit of all. His political affiliations were slight 
 enough, perhaps, but they had not been with the 
 party that elected Mr. Lincoln. He knew well, 
 however, that this frame of government, once 
 destroyed, could never be reconstructed. He had 
 no faith in any theory which made the United 
 States powerless to protect itself. He compre- 
 hended fully the real reason why the slave States, 
 dissatisfied with just and necessary restraint, sought 
 to extricate themselves from the Union ; and he 
 knew that a war commencing for its integrity 
 would broaden and widen until it became one for 
 the liberty of all men, and there was neither 
 master nor slave in the land. His letter to his 
 brother-in-law, lately published, although written 
 during the first week of the war, his written 
 remark to General Buckner, in their interesting 
 interview just before he died, " that the war had 
 
164 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 been worth all that it had cost," show how 
 strongly he felt that, purified by the fires of the 
 Rebellion, the Union had risen grand and more 
 august among nations. Who shall say he was not 
 right ? Who shall say that if all the noble lives 
 so freely offered could be restored, but with them 
 must return the once discordant Union with its 
 system of slavery, they who gave would consent 
 to have them purchased back at such a price ? 
 
 General Grant was not of those who supposed 
 that the conflict with the South was to be any 
 summer's day campaign ; he knew the position of 
 the South, its resources, its military capacity, and 
 the fact that, acting on the defensive, it would 
 move its armies on interior lines. He recognized 
 the difficulty in dealing with so vast an extent of 
 territory ; and he knew that in a war with a 
 hostile people rather than a hostile army only, we 
 could often hold but the tracts of territory im- 
 mediately under our camp-fires. Yet he never 
 doubted of ultimate success. He never believed 
 that this country was to be rent asunder by 
 faction or dragged to its doom by traitors. He 
 said to General Badeau once, who had asked him 
 if the prospect never appalled him, that he had 
 always felt perfectly certain of success. Thus 
 though to him many days were dark and disas- 
 trous, none were despondent. " The simple faith 
 in success you have always manifested," said 
 Sherman to him, " I can liken to nothing else than 
 the faith a Christian has in the Saviour." His 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 165 
 
 remarkable persistence has caused him sometimes 
 to be looked on as a mere dogged fighter. No 
 suggestion could be more preposterous. He felt 
 sure of his plan before he commenced ; then 
 temporary obstructions and difficulties did not 
 dismay him, and whatever were the checks, he 
 went on with resolution to the end. 
 
 If stern and unyielding in the hour of conflict, 
 in the hour of victory no man was ever more 
 generous and magnanimous. He felt always that 
 those with whom we warred were our erring 
 countrymen, and that when they submitted to the 
 inevitable changes that war had made, strife was 
 at an end ; but he never proposed to yield or 
 tamper with what had been won for liberty and 
 humanity in that strife. 
 
 He has passed beyond our mortal sight, — 
 sustained and soothed by the devotion of friends 
 and comrades, by the love of a people, by the 
 affectionate respect and regard of many once in 
 arms against him. In that home where he was 
 almost worshipped, " he has wrapped the drapery 
 of his couch about him " as one that lies down 
 to pleasant dreams. Front to front on many 
 a field he had met the grim destroyer where the 
 death-dealing missiles rained thick and fast from 
 the rattling rifles and the crashing cannon. He 
 neither quailed nor blenched, although death came 
 at last with a summons that could not be denied, 
 when all that makes life dear was around him. 
 He could not but know he was to live still in 
 
166 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 memory as long as the great flag around which 
 his fighting legions rallied should wave above 
 a united people. To most men the call of death 
 is terrible ; 
 
 " But to the hero when his sword has won 
 The battle of the free, 
 That voice sounds like a prophet's word, 
 And in its hollow tones are heard 
 The thanks of millions yet to be." 
 
 
 
COMMEMORATIVE ADDRESS ON 
 GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 DELIVERED AT WORCESTER, AUGUST 8, 1885. 
 
 Mr. Mayor, Fellow-citizens, — When we who 
 were soldiers of the Army of the Potomac first 
 saw General Grant, he was already illustrious. 
 The great battles on the Cumberland and the Ten- 
 nessee had been fought. Already the Missis- 
 sippi rolled proudly to the sea ; no Rebel fortresses 
 frowned from its banks, no Rebel squadrons cruised 
 upon its waters. His great victory at Chatta- 
 nooga had repaired the disaster of Chickamauga ; 
 and the West seemed to be coming firmly within 
 our grasp. 
 
 Yet the war was pressing heavily, enormous 
 debts were being contracted, thousands of brave 
 men had fallen, and it was seen that thousands 
 must yet fall before we could achieve the task we 
 had undertaken. No wiser act was ever done by 
 Congress than that which created for Grant the 
 office of lieutenant-general, whose station might 
 be with either army, as he might select, but whose 
 control and direction were to be over all. His 
 command over the armies operating west of the 
 Alleghanies had already fully demonstrated his 
 
168 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 vast powers of combination, his capacity for the 
 widest fields of strategy, as well as his terrific 
 energy in battle. Then this new and great respon- 
 sibility was placed upon him. " If I succeed," he 
 said solemnly, as he received his commission from 
 the hands of the President, " it will be due to our 
 brave armies, and, above all, to the favor of that 
 Providence which leads both nations and men." 
 
 He had been urged in accepting this high com- 
 mand to remain with the armies of the West. 
 " Stay with us," said Sherman ; " let us make it 
 dead sure ; " but in the hands of Sherman himself 
 and Thomas, the West was " dead sure " already, 
 and Grant knew that the time had come when he 
 must more immediately measure himself " with 
 the foremost army of the Confederacy led by its 
 foremost man." He knew that to the great strug- 
 gle between the armies of the Potomac and of 
 Northern Virginia other operations, vast although 
 they were, were subsidiary only. Two more tried,' 
 determined, better armies the world had never 
 seen. Battle, disease, defeat, had wasted both, vic- 
 tory had rewarded both ; but for either to rout the 
 other had been impossible. Each when it won 
 had gained but a few miles, or it might be rods, of 
 territory. Each as it drew off from a day of dis- 
 aster drew off sternly in perfect order, and like 
 "slow Ajax fighting still," retired. 
 
 How complete General Grant's control was over 
 every one of the armies of the United States 
 from the day he took supreme command, the 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 169 
 
 records of the War Department bear witness, — 
 as complete in general direction over that with 
 which Sherman marched to the sea. or that which 
 Thomas directed to its splendid victory at Nash- 
 ville as over the Army of the Potomac. No 
 general could falter or hesitate for advice or di- 
 rection which he was not ready to afford ; none 
 needed encouragement or urging when he was not 
 prepared to speak the words which the occasion 
 demanded. Over the vast realm where the gigan- 
 tic conflict was raging, that eagle eye ranged with 
 far-seeing, watchful gaze, anxious that nothing, 
 however small, should escape his care in that 
 one determined purpose of crushing the Rebellion. 
 While the great battle of the Wilderness was be- 
 ing fought around him, he was sending despatches 
 to Sherman, more than a thousand miles away, as 
 to his campaign. 
 
 That his military genius was vast and compre- 
 hensive no one can question or deny. As a gen- 
 eral he was thoroughly aggressive, alike from 
 natural character and from the military position 
 in which he was always placed. He felt deeply 
 the suggestions sometimes made that he was hard 
 and stern, that he sometimes risked the lives of 
 his men needlessly. He knew well that from his 
 constant attacks his losses must of necessity be 
 greater than those of the army he opposed, but he 
 believed that (the advantage of position in stand- 
 ing on the defensive being always with the Rebel 
 Army) the true way to close the war was to strike 
 
170 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 resolutely and hard, and that this was not in the 
 long run to sacrifice, but to save life, although the 
 immediate loss might be severe. No man ever felt 
 more fully that the life of every soldier was his in 
 solemn trust, and that it must not be wantonly 
 imperilled. " I cannot do that," he once said to 
 General Halleck, who had recommended a par- 
 ticular attack ; " it might succeed, but it would 
 cost the lives of more men than I have a right to 
 risk for such an advantage." 
 
 He is often spoken of as if there were some- 
 thing mysterious about his character, as if there 
 were some riddle to unravel. This is evidently an 
 error ; no man had less desire to deceive others or 
 less capacity to do it. He kept his own counsel, it 
 is true. He worked out his plans carefully, but 
 he was always ready to hear those who had any- 
 thing worth hearing. He carefully watched the 
 plans of those opposed to him, using every availa- 
 ble means to enlighten himself. He thoughtfully 
 sought to learn what was the best thing for an 
 opponent to do, and assumed that he would do it. 
 If his opponent did anything less than this, so 
 much the worse for him. He had measured him- 
 self in his career with every great general of the 
 Confederacy ; he respected their abilities, but he 
 had seen no reason to distrust his own. He had 
 confidence in his own judgment, not from any silly 
 or inflated vanity, but because he believed he had 
 mastered the problems submitted to it. Nothing 
 was ever done by him in any half-hearted way, or 
 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 171 
 
 as if he felt that something better might have 
 been attempted. 
 
 No general ever lived more calmly resolute. 
 He by no means despised the wisdom of those 
 who have written upon the art of war, or the 
 soundness of the more general principles which 
 experience has prescribed. But he was no soldier 
 of the book or the school, and he dared to violate 
 their rules when great occasions demanded. Alone 
 in the army that beleaguered Vicksburg, surrounded 
 by chiefs who shrank from no danger through 
 which courage could conduct them, he matured 
 his final plan for its capture, knowing that any 
 council of war would condemn it as too hazar- 
 dous. Silent and self-contained, alone he deter- 
 mined upon it, never flinching, never doubting 
 from the time his plan had its first conception 
 until its triumphant close ; he achieved the grand 
 result by taking counsel of his own calm reflec- 
 tion, his own indomitable will, his own daring 
 heart. 
 
 He was a thoroughly generous and just man in 
 relation to the officers with whom he was associ- 
 ated, to the armies he led, to the armies to which 
 he was opposed. It is hard for a soldier to be 
 generous in matters which concern his own glory 
 and renown, j^et in regard to Fort Donelson and 
 Shiloh he was so generous to his subordinates that 
 his cordial words were used most unjustly to de- 
 preciate his own reputation and to detract from 
 his own merits. He could not leave the armies 
 
172 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 of the West without thanking them and their 
 leaders for their devotion, and expressing to them 
 how strongly he felt that all he had won for the 
 country or gained for himself was due to them; 
 yet he was not less just to the brave army to 
 which he more immediately came. When the 
 preparations for the last struggle in the spring of 
 1865 were being completed, there was a profound 
 anxiety on his part that the war should be ended 
 at once, and that Lee and Johnston should neither 
 unite nor escape. Yet when it was proposed to 
 bring troops from the Western armies to add to 
 the strength of the Army of the Potomac he op- 
 posed it. He felt it to be unwise ; that jealousies 
 would arise with the troops of the Army of the 
 West, each claiming that the victorv was its own. 
 He felt that it would not be generous to the Army 
 of the Potomac. He had full confidence in its 
 strength and courage to finish its work ; and he 
 saw that it would not be just that any other arm} 7 
 should divide with it its final triumph. How well 
 and thoroughly that great army struck its final 
 blow, Appomattox testifies ; and the surrender 
 shows how generously Grant dealt with those who 
 then laid down their arms. It was but in the line 
 of the course he had pursued at Fort Donelson and 
 Vicksburg. While he meant that the full fruits 
 of the victory should be secured ; while he never 
 faltered in his determination that the permanency 
 of the government should be clearly vindicated ; 
 while he never questioned that the States lately 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 173 
 
 in rebellion could only be restored with every 
 guaranty that the freedom of the race once en- 
 slaved should be protected, — he would prescribe 
 no conditions of surrender that could in any sense 
 be deemed to be humiliating. 
 
 We cannot to-day undertake to fix with accu- 
 racy the character of our heroic leader by com- 
 parison with others whom history has rendered 
 immortal, yet there is one historical sketch that 
 bears so many points of resemblance that I shall 
 venture to quote it. It was with much interest a 
 few months since that we celebrated the founding 
 of this town two hundred years ago by three sol- 
 diers (one an officer of rank), who had served 
 under Cromwell, and who, perhaps, had seen him 
 that morning when in the pouring rain in which 
 the battle of Worcester began he rode down the 
 line and bade his soldiers " trust in the Lord 
 and keep their powder dry." The description 
 which Macaulay gives of the great Puritan leader, 
 whom our fathers loved and honored, finds its al- 
 most perfect parallel in General Grant. It is in 
 an altogether imaginary dialogue, assumed to 
 have been between the Royalist poet Cowley and 
 John Milton. I read the words as Milton is sup- 
 posed to utter them, omitting but an unimportant 
 fragment : — 
 
 " Because he was an ungraceful orator, and never said 
 either in public or private anything memorable, you will 
 have it that he was of mean capacity. Sure this is unjust. 
 Many men have there been ignorant of letters, without 
 
174 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 wit, without eloquence, who yet had the wisdom to devise 
 and the courage to perform that which they lacked lan- 
 guage to explain. Such men often have worked out the 
 deliverance of nations and their own greatness, not by 
 logic, not by rhetoric, but by wariness in success, by 
 calmness in danger, by firm and stubborn resolution in 
 all adversity. The hearts of men are their books ; events 
 are their tutors ; great actions are their eloquence ; and 
 such a one in my judgment was his late Highness. . . . 
 His own deeds shall avouch him for a great statesman, a 
 great soldier, a true lover of his country, a merciful and 
 generous conqueror." 
 
 Fellow-citizens, it is a solemn day on which we 
 part from all that was mortal in this illustrious 
 man. If it be a day of mourning, it is one of 
 thankfulness and gratitude also. If much is taken 
 from us, it is because much was given to us. I 
 contrast the noble and beautiful death of this 
 patriot soldier with that of the mightiest con- 
 queror Europe ever knew, and I bow in reverence 
 before the great Controller of events, who has 
 ordained that even in this world men are rewarded 
 according to their works. 
 
 There is in the Corcoran Gallery at Washington 
 the beautiful statue by Vela of Napoleon as he is 
 dying at St. Helena. It is the saddest thing upon 
 which my eyes have ever looked. The Emperor is 
 sitting with his morning gown half wrapped around 
 his naked breast, and on his lap lies outspread the 
 map of Europe. The face, of wondrous beauty, is 
 of unutterable grief. Wasted opportunities, dis- 
 appointed ambition, remorse, have set upon it 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 175 
 
 their ineffaceable seal. His wife is far away ; his 
 only son a prisoner at the Austrian Court. Upon 
 the throne of France, trampled as she is under the 
 feet of the armies of Europe, sits again a Bourbon 
 king, held there by foreign bayonets. The Emperor 
 seems to recall the brave who have died by thou- 
 sands, not that mankind might be nobler and better, 
 but to minister to his thirst for dominion, his in- 
 satiate passion for power. He seems to remember 
 that by his own acts he has brought ruin upon the 
 people who had loved him devotedly, and upon 
 himself. In those last days, says his biographer, 
 M. Thiers, he talked much of his old companions : 
 " Shall I see them again, Desaix and Lannes, Murat 
 and Ney ? " Ah, what comfort could there be in 
 that ? — Lannes, who on the field of Essling, dying, 
 had said to him, " Sire, you will ruin everything by 
 these constant wars ; " or Murat and Ney, who for 
 him had died deaths not altogether honorable to 
 themselves, even if disgraceful to those who in- 
 flicted them. Or what comfort to him to see 
 again that splendid youth of France who had 
 followed him from the sands of Egypt to the 
 snows of Russia, the only reward of whose valor 
 had been the destruction of their own liberty 
 and country ? 
 
 As we turn in sorrow from this scene which the 
 cunning hand of the artist has made so lifelike, we 
 behold that which has been enacted almost before 
 our own bodily eyes. It is sixty-four years later ; 
 and another sits in his chair to die. Upon him is 
 
176 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 the same mortal disease, although in a far more 
 agonizing form. His face had never the Olympian 
 beauty of the great Emperor ; it is marked now 
 with the heavy lines that princely care and rugged 
 war have impressed deep upon it, but it is grave 
 and majestic still. The broad brow and heavy jaw 
 tell alike of the calm thought and resolute will 
 which show him fit to be among the kings of men. 
 He has led great armies on fields as fiercely con- 
 tested as Wagram or Austerlitz or Waterloo itself, 
 and a million of men have sprung at his trumpet- 
 call. He has ruled as constitutional magistrate 
 over a realm broader and fairer than France 
 itself. Life has to him been labor and duty, and 
 until tongue and hand and brain refuse their office 
 he labors still. Around him gathers everything 
 that makes life beautiful and parting from it so 
 hard; but there is no remorse, no thought of duties 
 left undone to the country which in its sore need 
 called to him, no obligations unfulfilled to those 
 who had followed him to danger and to death. 
 The only woman he has ever loved is there with 
 tender hand to moisten the parched lips or wipe 
 the gathering death-damp from his brow. Their 
 children and grandchildren are at their feet. 
 From a grateful country there has come up in 
 a thousand forms the utterances of love and rever- 
 ence. Those lately in arms against the cause he 
 served have generously and tenderly united in each 
 expression of feeling. He looks abroad over the 
 country whose union he fought to preserve ; every- 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 177 
 
 where there is peaee and prosperity ; no hostile 
 armies trample the soil ; no hostile bayonets flash 
 back the sun ; the war-drums long since are silent. 
 The fields are already white with the harvest; the 
 great gateways on the Atlantic and Pacific seas 
 are open, and through them commerce pours its 
 generous tide. Master and slave are known no 
 longer in the land where labor is honored and 
 manhood is revered. To him, too, in those dream- 
 ing and waiting hours came the memories of those 
 who have fallen in battle by his side, or, yielding 
 since to the remorseless artillery of time, have 
 gone before him. Even if he does not utter them, 
 how well we may imagine the thoughts that pass 
 through his mind as he feels that he draws near 
 to them : " Shall I see them again, — McPherson, 
 Reynolds, and Sedgwick, as they died at the head 
 of their army corps; Rawlins, whom I loved as a 
 brother ; Hooker, as when his cannon rang down 
 from among the clouds on Lookout's crest; Thomas, 
 as he triumphed at Nashville ; Meade, as he dashed 
 back the fierce charge at Gettysburg or urged to 
 the last dread struggle the ever-faithful Army of 
 the Potomac ? If it be so, I know they will meet 
 me as comrades and brothers. Nor those alone, 
 not alone the great chiefs who urged forward the 
 fiery onset of mighty battalions. Shall I see again 
 the splendid youth of 1861 as they came in all the 
 ardor of their generous patriotism, in all the fire 
 of their splendid courage, to fill the ranks of our 
 armies ? Shall I .see them as when through the 
 
 12 
 
178 ADDRESS ON GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 valleys the battle poured its awful tide, or as when 
 the hills were made red by their glorious sacrifice? 
 I am very near them now. Almost I can behold 
 them, although the light on their faces is that 
 which never was on sea or land. Almost I can 
 hear their bugles call to me, as the notes softly 
 rise and fall across the dark valley through which 
 I must pass. I go to them ; and I know there 
 is not one that will not meet me as a father and 
 a friend." 
 
 Farewell, pure and noble citizen, wise and gen- 
 erous statesman, illustrious soldier ; farewell ! By 
 these solemn rites which stretch from ocean to 
 ocean, tenderly and tearfully and yet gratefully 
 still, a nation surrenders back to God the great 
 gift which he gave in her hour of utmost need. 
 
ADDRESS TO THE FIFTEENTH REGIMENT 
 ASSOCIATION 
 
 ON THEIR VISIT TO THE BATTLE-FIELD OF 
 GETTYSBURG, JUNE, 1886. 
 
 Comrades and Friends, — We have met, at a 
 distance from our homes, on a great field ren- 
 dered immortal forever by the victory won here 
 for the Union of these States, and for the great 
 principles of liberty and equality on which that 
 Union must live or else have no life, to dedicate 
 this monument to the memory of those of the Fif- 
 teenth Massachusetts Regiment who fell in that 
 terrible conflict. If such be the immediate object 
 of this monument, it has also a wider scope, as in 
 a large sense it commemorates all the brave men 
 who nobly gave or bravely offered their lives, 
 and testifies our own devotion to and faith in 
 the great cause which demanded this solemn sacri- 
 fice. Our gathering is in no sense ceremonial ; 
 yet simple and informal as our words may be, we 
 would willingly, as we stand above these glo- 
 rious graves, say something that shall express, 
 however inadequately, the gratitude we bear 
 these men for their priceless services, and the 
 love and honor in which we cherish their 
 memory. So rapidly do the years move, thai in 
 
180 THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 the near future the language of impartial history 
 will speak in the Solemn and measured tones in 
 which it has recorded its judgment upon brave 
 men and "heroic souls long gone before us in 
 the ages past. But although twenty-three years 
 are gone since these hills rang with the echoes of the 
 dread artillery, and these fields almost shook with 
 the tramp of contending armies, to us these men 
 must ever be what they were that day, — brothers 
 and comrades, husbands, lovers, fathers, and sons. 
 Everything that makes life sweet and beautiful 
 gathers and entwines itself around their memory. 
 
 The Fifteenth Regiment, mustered into the service 
 in July, 1861, in Worcester, was the first of six 
 regiments which were organized in that city for 
 the suppression of the Rebellion. It was composed 
 of Worcester County men almost entirely, and was 
 the offering of ten towns in that county whose 
 names in familiar conversation the companies fre- 
 quently bore to the last in the regiment, as well 
 as the letters which were their proper designation. 
 I name them in the alphabetical order of their 
 designation : A, Leominster ; B, Fitchburg ; C, 
 Clinton ; D, Worcester ; E, Oxford ; F, Brook- 
 field ; G, Grafton ; H, Northbridge ; I, Webster ; 
 K, Blackstone. It was the only one of the regi- 
 ments organized in the County of Worcester that 
 participated in the battle of Gettysburg, although 
 all the others were doing on other fields of the 
 war valuable and faithful service. The battle of 
 Gettysburg indicates the high-water mark of the 
 
THE 15ni REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 181 
 
 Rebellion. Although many great battles were to 
 be fought thereafter, many trials endured, many 
 disasters encountered, yet its culminating poinl 
 was here ; and it was here that the tide was 
 turneds If the so-called Confederacy could es- 
 tablish itself firmly on the soil of one of the 
 Northern States, it would indicate to Europe that 
 the Civil War was something more than a local 
 rebellion, and might, perhaps, gain for the Con- 
 federacy an admission into the family of nations 
 by those who were covertly supporting it. Yicks- 
 burg, it is true, was not yet taken ; but it could 
 not be wrenched from the grasp of the iron hands 
 which encompassed it. Yet the blow might be 
 parried if a victory could be won for the Rebel- 
 lion upon Northern soil. Whatever may have 
 been, however, the motives and the hopes which 
 induced the invasion of Pennsylvania by General 
 Lee, here the3 r were destined to come to naught, 
 here they were utterly blasted. 
 
 In view, it may fairly be presumed, of the 
 consequences of this great victory, of the fact 
 that it was won upon the soil of one of the free 
 States, and that this field is an appropriate 
 memorial of the whole war, the State of Massa- 
 chusetts on March 25, 1884, appropriated to each 
 of its regiments and batteries here engaged a 
 sufficient sum for a suitable monument to be 
 erected on the battle-field. The work of the 
 artist is before us, and it will be conceded that, 
 if simple, it is yet graceful and appropriate. No 
 
182 THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 State has proved more tenderly regardful of the 
 children whom she sent forth to battle than our 
 own Massachusetts. No troops ever went forth 
 more carefully prepared, clothed, and equipped 
 than those which were sent out under our war 
 governor, John A. Andrew, whose name is never 
 to be mentioned but with love and respect. Never 
 were men watched over with more affectionate 
 regard through those stormy days of trial. Since 
 the war closed, no State has been more generous 
 in supplementing the national bounty in behalf of 
 our sick and wounded, oar decayed and broken 
 men. It is to her that we owe the means of 
 erecting this tribute to our fallen comrades, and 
 for this we render to her to-day our grateful and 
 cordial thanks. 
 
 I shall not undertake here, my comrades, at any 
 length to relate the deeds of the Fifteenth Massa- 
 chusetts, or fully to describe this great battle in 
 which it bore so creditable a part. The merest 
 sketch must suffice. Before this conflict the regi- 
 ment had won for itself an honorable, I might 
 safely say an illustrious name, among the foremost 
 and best-disciplined regiments of the army. There 
 is a point with the bravest where organization loses 
 its power, where losses are so severe and men are 
 so utterly broken that discipline fails and can do 
 nothing more ; and yet twice before in its history it 
 had lost more than half its men, and, still unflinch- 
 ing, it had drawn off the remnant resolutely and 
 in good order. At its first battle, that of Ball's 
 
THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG'. 183 
 
 Bluff, unfortunate though the day was, the regi- 
 ment established a reputation for valor and for 
 determined staying power which it never forfeited 
 or lost ; but that reputation was won at the 
 expense of many noble lives. It was in this 
 engagement that General Ward, then lieutenant- 
 colonel, was severely wounded. He was destined 
 afterwards bravely to lose his life on this field 
 of Gettysburg, and the dedication of his monu- 
 ment will be a part of our solemn office to-day. 
 
 The regiment made a campaign in February, 
 18G2, in the Valley of Virginia, and then joined 
 the forces of McClellan on the Peninsula. At 
 Yorktown, having been assigned to the com- 
 mand of a brigade by promotion, my own im- 
 mediate connection with the regiment ceased, and 
 Colonel Ward being utterly disabled, the active 
 command passed for the time to the always 
 brave and reliable Colonel Kimball. The regiment 
 participated in all the conflicts of the Peninsula. 
 I have re-read the reports of Generals Gorman. 
 Sully, Howard, and Sedgwick. In different forms 
 of expression each of those generals has said that 
 better and braver troops no man ever led. It was 
 in the same division with the Nineteenth and Twen- 
 tieth Massachusetts Volunteers, who, it is just to 
 say, received similar commendations. My own 
 words are of little importance compared with 
 those ; but in a report made by myself to Gov- 
 ernor Andrew, December 20, 1862, principally as 
 to the Seventh, Tenth, and Thirty-seventh Massa- 
 
184 THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 chusetts regiments, then in my brigade, I spoke 
 of the Fifteenth in language in which I believe as 
 firmly now as when I wrote it : t( Called upon," 
 I said, "both at Ball's Bluff and at Antietam, 
 when it was commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel 
 (now Colonel) Kimball, to endure the terrific loss of 
 more than one half of its men engaged, it exhibited 
 a courage and fidelity more than worthy of vet- 
 eran troops, for it was worthy of the holy cause 
 which had drawn its men from their peaceful 
 homes." 
 
 At Antietam, when I was moving up with 
 my brigade on the morning after the princi- 
 pal battle, anticipating its renewal, my orderly. 
 George W. Mirick, said to me, " General Sedg- 
 wick is wounded, lying in a hut near the road." 
 I jumped off my horse and ran in for a moment. 
 After speaking of his wound, which, although 
 it disabled him for the time, was not dangerous, 
 General Sedgwick said to me, " Your old Fifteenth 
 was magnificent yesterday ; no regiment of the 
 regular army ever fought better." I thought 
 he might well say this, when at a later period I 
 learned that it had carried 606 officers and men 
 into the battle, and that its list of casualties 
 was 322 men, all but twenty-four of whom 
 were accounted for by name as killed on the 
 field or wounded. It certainly was a sufficient 
 compliment when he says in his report that its 
 " conduct was not different from what it was 
 on all other occasions." 
 
THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 185 
 
 The disastrous battle of Fredericksburg fol- 
 lowed Antietam, and was followed by the not 
 less unfortunate battle of Chancellorsville. In 
 both these engagements the Fifteenth had a part 
 worthy always of its reputation. It cannot be 
 denied that their result was most sorely to 
 depress the North ; and the hope to take ad- 
 vantage of that depression was one of the motives 
 for the campaign which General Lee now inaugu- 
 rated. When the design of Lee was unmasked, 
 General Hooker acted with great vigor, crossing 
 the Potomac only one day later, and moving so 
 rapidly as to threaten Lee's communications, and 
 to interpose between him and his cavalry. As 
 celerity of movement was then of the highest im- 
 portance, it is worthy of note that the Fifteenth, 
 together with the Nineteenth Massachusetts, re- 
 ceived the tribute of an especial complimentary 
 order for their vigorous and compact marching on 
 the day when General Hooker crossed the river 
 in pursuit. At Frederick, in Maryland, General 
 Hooker was relieved from command, and General 
 Meade substituted ; but the Potomac Army ad- 
 vanced so vigorous!}' that General Lee fell back 
 from the Susquehanna, anxious lest his line of re- 
 treat should be barred. The first encounter took 
 place to the north and west of Gettysburg, the 
 battle being opened by Buford's cavalry, the 
 First and Eleventh corps on our side being the 
 only corps engaged ; and, outnumbered by the 
 enemy, they were forced back to the crest on 
 
186 THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 which we are now standing. The Fifteenth Regi- 
 ment, whose fortunes we desire more immediately 
 to follow, was in the Second Corps, Hancock's ; and 
 proudly are its men entitled to wear the clover-leaf, 
 which was the badge of that corps, for the good 
 work of those days. Its division commander was 
 General John Gibbon, and Colonel Ward was act- 
 ing temporarily as brigade commander of the First 
 Brigade, in which it served. General Hancock, 
 who, without troops, had been sent forward 
 to Gettysburg, had reported that the ground 
 was favorable for a battle ; that it could be 
 held until nightfall ; and orders had been at 
 once issued for the concentration of the army at 
 Gettysburg. 
 
 The Fifteenth, on the night of July 1, bivouacked 
 about three miles from the field, and moved for- 
 ward on the morning of July 2, with the rest 
 of the Second Corps, at daybreak, reaching the 
 field about seven o'clock. The other brigades of 
 the division were in line. The First Brigade (in 
 which the Fifteenth served) was formed in the un- 
 dulation, or hollow, behind the line indicated by 
 the regimental monument, so that it might be 
 readily moved to the aid of the other parts of 
 the line in column of regiments. Colonel Ward, 
 who had been relieved by the arrival of the 
 brigade commander, now T took command of the 
 regiment. He spoke briefly but spiritedly to the 
 men, urged them to do their duty, and told them 
 of the momentous issues involved in their hold- 
 
THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 1ST 
 
 ing the ground firmly. It was not until about four 
 o'clock that serious conflict took place, by a terrific 
 attack upon the left of the Third Corps, which 
 had been thrown forward to a more advanced 
 position on the Emmitsburg road, which ran 
 diagonally to the front of our general line. 
 The line of the Third Corps, commanded by 
 General Sickles, extended along that road by the 
 peach orchard, then turned back to the foot of 
 Round Top. Its right rested on the Emmitsburg 
 road in echelon, some 550 yards in advance of 
 the line of the Second Corps. To protect his 
 own left and the right of General Sickles' corps, 
 and to fill the gap, General Hancock ordered two 
 regiments to be advanced to the Emmitsburg 
 road north of the Codori House. The Fifteenth 
 Massachusetts, Colonel Ward, and the Eighty-sec- 
 ond New York, Lieutenant-Colonel Huston, were 
 ordered to move forward, which they immediately 
 did, forming along the road, the Fifteenth being on 
 the right and the Eighty-second on the left. Their 
 line did not immediately connect with the extreme 
 right of the Third Corps, but was some two hundred 
 yards from it, nor with the extreme left of the 
 Second Corps, but was partially in front of it. 
 
 The attack, which had commenced at the extreme 
 left of the Third Corps and at the peach orchard, 
 gradually extended to its right until the whole line 
 of the corps was engaged ; and it was nearly seven 
 o'clock in the evening before the storm fell upon 
 the Fifteenth and Eighty-second. The extreme 
 
188 THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 right of the Third Corps was now attacked by Barks- 
 dale's, Wilson's, and Perry's Confederate brigades, 
 and forced gradually back, thus uncovering the left 
 of the line of the two regiments whose actions we 
 are following. Wright's Georgia brigade now ad- 
 vanced, and would have struck or swept around the 
 right flank of the Third Corps but that it was en- 
 countered by these regiments. The engagement was 
 desperate ; from their advanced position the two 
 regiments were to some extent under the fire of our 
 own men as much as that of the enemy. The Eighty- 
 second, whose left was now wholly uncovered, was 
 first forced back, and the whole weight of the assault 
 fell upon the Fifteenth. It was necessary to retire to 
 the line of the Second Corps, and thither it fought 
 its way back. But the two regiments had done 
 their work well in protecting the flank of their 
 own corps, for as the enemy followed closely, they 
 were handsomely repulsed by the Second Brigade of 
 their division, and by a portion of the Thirteenth 
 Vermont, which had just reached that part of the 
 field. In this fearful conflict we had to mourn the 
 loss of many brave officers and men, among them 
 Colonel Ward, who, gallantly righting as his regi- 
 ment steadily retreated, received the mortal wound 
 of which, a few hours later, he died. Lieutenant- 
 Colonel Huston was mortally wounded. But if 
 terrible blows had been received, they had been most 
 terribly returned. The Georgia brigade of Wright 
 had left on the field either killed or seriously and per- 
 haps mortally wounded three of their regimental 
 
THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 189 
 
 commanders. — Colonel Warden of the Twenty- 
 second Georgia, Major Ross, commanding the Sec- 
 ond Georgia, and Colonel Gibson, commanding the 
 Forty-eighth Georgia ; and its loss in subordinate 
 officers and men was proportionately heavy. 
 
 I have spoken somewhat fully of the conduct of 
 the Fifteenth on the second day of July, for, from 
 the isolated position which it and its companion 
 regiment occupied, they rendered a peculiar, dan- 
 gerous, and most gallant service. 
 
 Notwithstanding the forcing- back of the Third 
 Corps, the 2d of July had, taken as a whole, closed 
 successfully for our army. Round Top, which pro- 
 tected our left, was now so firmly held that it could 
 not be torn from us ; and on our extreme right at 
 Culp's Hill, although some advantage had been 
 gained by the Confederates, it was clear that all 
 they had obtained could be taken from them, as it 
 was. indeed, on the next morning. 
 
 It was about one o'clock in the afternoon of the 
 3d of July when the preparations for the terrific 
 assault, intended to break the centre of our line 
 and drive in confusion its two separate fragments 
 on two distinct lines of retreat, began, by one of 
 the most terrific cannonades ever known. The Con- 
 federate Army was especially strong that day in 
 artillery; and General Lee was able to concentrate 
 for this attack one hundred and fifty guns. For 
 some two hours the fire of these guns was directed 
 upon the centre which it was intended to break. 
 Sheltering themselves as far as possible by such 
 
190 THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 rude breastworks as they had been able to make, 
 our troops, whom the artillery fire was intended to 
 demoralize, awaited the struggle which was certain 
 to come when the enemy's infantry moved. The 
 position in which the Fifteenth Massachusetts, 
 now under command of Colonel Joslin, lay during 
 this tempest of shot and shell was some twenty- 
 five to fifty rods to the left of the monument. 
 Hancock knew that somewhere on the Second 
 Corps the weight of the assault was sure to fall, 
 and as he rode along the line, roused his men 
 by inspiring words and his own gallant bearing. 
 
 It is about three o'clock, and the Confederate fire 
 slackens, so that their infantry may move out of 
 the woods that have partially sheltered them. They 
 are coming now, in numbers nearly or quite 
 eighteen thousand men. Longstreet has organized 
 the assault ; but Pickett's division of Virginians is 
 to lead. It contains about five thousand or six 
 thousand men who have not yet fought in the bat- 
 tle, and is supported on the right and left by divi- 
 sions from other corps of their army. It is a relief 
 to see them come, for, fierce as the encounter must 
 be, the recumbent position of our men under the 
 blazing July sun is intolerable, and they spring to 
 their feet with alacrity. The enemy has formed 
 for the attack in two lines, which, as they move, 
 contract their front, and their lines are doubled or 
 trebled by reason of the difficulties and obstructions 
 on the march, thus having the appearance and to 
 some extent the formation of columns, as they are 
 
THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 191 
 
 generally termed. They are severely handled by 
 our artillery, but they come steadily on. 
 
 The assault was directed at first precisely to- 
 wards the point in our line where the brigade was 
 posted in which the Fifteenth served ; but more 
 lately, as it advanced, it was deflected to our right, 
 perhaps because the clump of trees afforded them a 
 prominent landmark, or because the fire of Stan- 
 nard's Vermont brigade, which was now thrown 
 forward on the right flank of the enemy, caused 
 the change of direction. 
 
 The Fifteenth Massachusetts, with other regi- 
 ments of the brigade following it, promptly moves 
 towards its own right to encounter the attack, 
 when it is about to strike on the line of the 
 Second Corps. In this movement many of our 
 men fall, notably Captain Jorgensen, and, a little 
 later, Captain Murkland. As the Fifteenth Regi- 
 ment reaches the clump of trees, the enemy, break- 
 ing through the line of General Webb, which is 
 marked by a low stone wall, for a moment fairly 
 presses the Union line back. It is the last effort 
 of desperation ; the assaulting lines or columns 
 can do no more. There is a moment's pause, 
 but the point penetrated by the enemy is in- 
 stantly covered ; and as if by common consent 
 the order " Forward " is given, and our men reso- 
 lutely advance upon the foe. " The first time I 
 heard the order, ' Advance the colors ! ' ' says Cap- 
 tain Hastings of the Fifteenth, " was from Corporal 
 Cunningham, although it was only the repetition 
 
192 THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 of the order given by Colonel Joslin." The order 
 is uttered and repeated from man to man, as 
 well as from general and colonel along the line. 
 No one can say who gave it first. There is some 
 confusion, for in the rapid movements and the 
 heavy fire, organization is to some extent lost, 
 but all know what is to be done, and are resolute 
 to do it. Firmly on now comes the whole Union 
 front. Officers, if they cannot always direct by 
 their commands, animate by their example. For a 
 few moments the contest is most furious, but such 
 a struggle is too desperate to endure long. The 
 Confederate lines waver, yield, break at last, while 
 many of their men throw down their muskets and 
 throw up their hands in surrender. A few wild, 
 disordered bands strive to fall back to the Confed- 
 erate lines, from which they had issued so bravely 
 an hour or two before ; and the Army of the Poto- 
 mac, as it gathers up the straggling prisoners by 
 thousands, knows that by its steady valor a great 
 victory has been won for the Union. 
 
 In this conflict our regiment had its full share 
 alike of the danger and the glory, for both on the 
 2d and the 3d of July it was at the points where 
 the fiercest fighting was done and where the victory 
 was finally secured. Depleted by its former en- 
 gagements, the Fifteenth brought into the battle 
 only eighteen officers and two hundred and twenty- 
 one men. It lost three officers and nineteen en- 
 listed men killed on the field, and eight officers 
 and eighty-five men wounded (of whom many after- 
 
THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 103 
 
 wards died), — in round numbers, one half of those 
 who were engaged. Tested in a merely material 
 point of view. Gettysburg was one of the great 
 battles of the world. While the loss in our own 
 regiment was fifty per cent., throughout our whole 
 army it was probably from twenty-five to thirty 
 per cent. In the Confederate Army it was without 
 doubt larger, as it had been the attacking force. 
 But, dreadful as the story is when we remember 
 that the killed, wounded, and prisoners of the 
 Federal Army numbered twenty-three thousand 
 men, who shall say, as we reflect how much was 
 done here for freedom and law and good govern- 
 ment throughout not only our country, but the 
 world, that the victory won here was not worth 
 even the noble lives it cost ? 
 
 "The spot is holy where they fought, 
 And holy where they fell; 
 For by their blood the land was bought, 
 That land they loved so well." 
 
 I will not undertake to follow further the history 
 of the Fifteenth Regiment except by a single 
 sentence. It fought in all the battles of the Army 
 of the Potomac that followed in 1863. It was 
 in the great battles of the Wilderness, Spott- 
 sylvania, and Cold Harbor, with which the year 
 1864 opened. Sadly depleted in its ranks, it was 
 never false to its reputation ; and, its full term of 
 service completed, it was mustered out in July of 
 that year at Worcester with only one hundred 
 and fifty men. As its colonel I had carried from 
 
 l:; 
 
194 THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 Worcester, in 1861, 1,065 men, and it had received 
 about seven hundred recruits. Its men who were 
 killed on the field, or died of wounds and disease 
 during its term of service, were 364. This does 
 not include, of course, those who were discharged 
 for wounds or disability, many of whom returned 
 home only to die. Tried by this terrible and 
 bloody test, its place is among the most gallant 
 regiments of the Union Army during the entire 
 war. From an article published in the " National 
 Tribune" of this year, by Mr. B. F. Gilman, for- 
 merly of the Thirty-second Massachusetts, it ap- 
 pears that in percentage of its losses the Fifteenth 
 stands fourth among those who served in the 
 armies of the Union. I have not the means of 
 verifying the accuracy of Mr. Gilman's statement. 
 I am able to state, however, from my own exami- 
 nation in the records of the adjutant-general's 
 office of Massachusetts, that its proportional loss of 
 men who died during its term of service, having 
 regard to the number of men borne upon its rolls, 
 is larger than that of any of the regiments that 
 went from our commonwealth. Its actual losses 
 were greater than those of any other regiment 
 except the Twentieth Massachusetts. But that 
 gallant regiment was in the service eight months 
 longer, and had upon its rolls more than half as 
 many again men, in all 3,030 men. Massachusetts 
 sent to the war sixty gallant regiments, all of 
 whom did honor to the State, whose children they 
 were, and to the cause which they served. To have 
 
THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 195 
 
 gained such a place among them as that won by 
 the Fifteenth is surely a sufficient eulogy. 
 
 How shall I speak, my friends and comrades, of 
 these men, when I remember that it was my duty 
 to command them during nearly a year, and to lead 
 them in the first of the many bloody battles in 
 which they fought ? Certainly no better or braver 
 men ever went forth in obedience to the solemn 
 call of country. They were the young farmers. 
 mechanics, and business men of our County of 
 Worcester, — men who thought and felt as freemen. 
 Before them lay the path of duty ; they could take 
 no other road ; they were animated by no hope of 
 aggrandizement, for most of them left behind far 
 more lucrative positions ; they were stimulated by 
 no hope of bounties ; they were excited by no fires 
 of personal ambition ; they were inflamed by no 
 wild enthusiasm. Calm and deliberate reflection 
 had told them that it was by their hands, and by 
 the hands of men such as they, that the Union must 
 be defended. They were not kinless men, — waifs 
 of society, such as float on the surface of the tur- 
 bulent waters of great towns and cities ; around 
 them were all the most sacred ties which bind us 
 to life. Yet they laid these aside to answer the 
 call of country. They were such men as make 
 the heart and bone and sinew of our nation ; they 
 embraced all that was noblest and purest in its 
 young life. When shall their glory fade ? N< »t 
 surely while the great flag that they followed 
 waves above a free and united country. All who 
 
19G THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 led this regiment in battle that now are living are 
 here to-day. I am sure I speak for all when I say 
 that I wish we could have led and served it better. 
 
 The monument we have reared to them is not a 
 monument to the glories of war. If that were all, 
 it were better that the State of Massachusetts had 
 withheld its gift and that this granite block was 
 sleeping in its native quarry. No one knows better 
 than we who have seen the trampled fields, the 
 desolated homes, the blazing towns, the agonies of 
 the dying on such a field as this (less happy than 
 the dead, who are past all pain), what the horrors 
 of war are. A war can only be justified or en- 
 nobled by a great and solemn cause ; and that cause 
 the American people had. It is the noble spirit 
 and the high resolve that their government should 
 not be destroyed, that freedom should prevail 
 wherever their flag; floated, which we seek to 
 commemorate. Patriotic self-devotion, unflinching 
 loyalty to duty, — these we would honor, these we 
 would hold up to the reverence and imitation of 
 those who are to come hereafter, whether he who 
 displayed those great qualities fell with the stars of 
 the general, or the eagles of the colonel, on his 
 shoulder, or in the simple jacket of the private 
 soldier. 
 
 This memorial is reared in no spirit of hostility 
 towards, or exultation over, the defeated in our late 
 civil war. Let the passions it engendered pass 
 away with the dreadful source from which it 
 sprung. Even though the baffled and beaten 
 
THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 197 
 
 traitor, around whom gather all the* infamies and 
 horrors by which a wretched cause was rendered 
 even more wicked, may still continue with feeble 
 utterances to cry out that the cause is not dead, — 
 secession and slavery are in their dishonorable 
 graves together. The hand of a merciful Provi- 
 deuce will extend to them no resurrection ; but 
 the recollections of the grand results which our 
 brethren achieved, and the heroism with which 
 they achieved them, cannot be allowed to pass 
 away. Over the unfortunate and erring with 
 whom they contended let the long grass wave 
 undisturbed. Yet as we stand by these glorious 
 graves, we cannot confound the heroes and mar- 
 tyrs of a noble cause with those whom the twin 
 furies of treason and slavery led forth to battle, 
 unless by a confusion of ideas worthy of chaos 
 itself. It is the cause which sets our brethren 
 apart among the myriads who people the silent 
 cities of the dead. We should not be true to their 
 just fame if in any sickly sentimental gush of 
 reconciliation we should hesitate to assert that the 
 principles for which they died were right, and 
 that those against which they fought were deeply 
 wrong. That assertion, in no sense unkind or 
 ungenerous to those with whom they were once in 
 deadly strife, this monument makes to-day. It 
 tells of bravery and valor ; but it tells of more 
 than these, for it tells of duty and patriotism, and 
 it summons all who may look upon it hereafter 
 to answer to their call. 
 
198 THE 15th REGIMENT AND GETTYSBURG. 
 
 We dedicate this monument, then, the gift of 
 Massachusetts, to the memory of the dead of our 
 Fifteenth Regiment, who fell on this immortal field, 
 and in the various conflicts in which the regiment 
 fought, to the memory of those who served in it 
 and nobly offered their lives for their country, as 
 they have passed, or shall hereafter pass away, 
 and to the memory of their brave comrades of the 
 whole Federal Army. We dedicate it to the great 
 cause of the Union and the freedom of all who 
 dwell beneath the flag, which is the emblem of its 
 sovereignty, in the solemn trust that " government 
 of the people, by the people and for the people," 
 shall not perish from among men. 
 
 
ADDRESS 
 
 AS PRESIDENT OF THE ALUMNI AT THE DINNER IN 
 MEMORIAL HALL ON THE TWO HUNDRED AND 
 FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF THE FOUNDING OF 
 HARVARD COLLEGE, NOVEMBER 8, 1886. 
 
 Brethren, — Our solemn festival draws to its 
 close. For a few moments we linger still to inter- 
 change our mutual sentiments and feelings, and 
 then to part until the three hundredth anniversary 
 summons the sons of Harvard to unite upon a 
 similar occasion. A few may expect to see that 
 distant clay, but most of us know that for us it is 
 impossible. But whether we are to join in it or 
 not, those who shall then commemorate are to be 
 our brethren, united by that bond of fraternity 
 whose mystic chords draw together all who have 
 drunk at this fountain. Their voices as our own, 
 when they meet and when they part, will utter 
 their salutation to our beloved University, " Salve, 
 magna Parens ! " 
 
 It is well in this time of prosperity, when Mas- 
 sachusetts is a wealthy and powerful State, and 
 yet but a portion of a mighty nation whose gate- 
 ways are on the Atlantic and the Pacific seas, to 
 look back to the day when this college was founded, 
 and to the men who made that day great. It was 
 
200 ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 
 
 six years only since they had reached these shores. 
 They had contended with the inhospitable cli- 
 mate ; the stern soil they had encountered but 
 not subdued. Their settlements were but a fringe 
 alono- a stormy sea which separated them from the 
 land they had loved so well, and had parted from 
 in obedience to a higher call than that of country, 
 to build here their New Jerusalem. Not sustained 
 by any royal favor or power ; not disturbed as yet 
 except it might be by a royal frown ; exercising 
 boldly the powers of sovereignty even if in nom- 
 inal obedience to their parent State ; fixing defi- 
 nitely the status of citizens ; imposing taxes and 
 duties ; determining what should be public charges, 
 — that nothing might be wanting to a full and 
 perfect commonwealth, they established this col- 
 lege, endowing it with the magnificent gift equal 
 to a year's revenue. 
 
 One great principle they contributed to the sci- 
 ence of government, — and the greatest of States 
 and statesmen might well be proud of the contri- 
 bution. That the education of the people is a 
 public duty ; that there is a right in every child 
 and youth in the land to its rudiments, and to the 
 opportunity for a larger and more liberal culture ; 
 that the provision for this is a legitimate public 
 expenditure, — are principles of the gravest im- 
 portance ; and for these the world is indebted to 
 them. The monuments to their own just fame 
 which they reared by the establishment of this 
 college, and by their provision for public schools, 
 
ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNL 201 
 
 are not to be found alone in these halls, or in those 
 where similar institutions teach the higher branches 
 of learning and science, but equally in the hum- 
 blest village schoolhouse, wherever in the broad 
 land it nestles in the valley or by the wayside. 
 
 In marshalling the degrees of honor, Lord Bacon 
 has assigned the highest place to the conditores 
 imperiorum, or founders of States. With other 
 peoples it has been pleasant to invest them with 
 the colors of poetry and romance. It is to the 
 immortal gods that Romulus traces his ancestry ; 
 and the shadowy Arthur who leads the line of 
 Britain's kings is the poetic type of piety, truth, 
 and courage. But the founders of New England 
 we know as they were ; nor is there anv danger 
 in an age that differs so widely from that in which 
 they lived that their defects will not be pointed 
 out and their shortcomings clearly exposed. These 
 men are revealed to us alike by their acts and their 
 own written words. Learned beyond any body of 
 men who ever went forth to tempt the fortunes of 
 a new world, their habit of self-inspection, and. 
 above all, that of bearing true witness, give them 
 to us in their diaries and their notebooks as the}'' 
 were. We see them in their weakness and their 
 strength. In that which they came to do, they 
 were thoroughly in earnest. In the path they had 
 marked out they intended to walk; those who 
 would walk with them were welcome ; for others 
 they had no place. If success was theirs, the}' were 
 willing to ascribe all the glory to God ; but they 
 
202 ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 
 
 knew that in these latter days he works by human 
 means and human agencies, and that it was for 
 them to seek to compass all for which they prayed. 
 They believed in the sword of the Lord and of 
 Gideon ; but the sword of Gideon was the good 
 weapon that hung in their own belts, and whose 
 hilt was within the grasp of their own strong 
 right hands. They looked for no miracles to be 
 wrought : the ground must be tilled if it was to 
 bring forth bread ; the forest must be felled if there 
 were to be fields and pastures ; the sea must be 
 vexed by their lines and nets if they would eat of 
 its fish. They had brought with them an edu- 
 cated clergy trained in the great English univer- 
 sities : they did not propose to be separated from 
 the instructions of its knowledge and culture ; 
 unless these could grow and increase as wealth 
 and numbers came to them, they that builded the 
 city would have builded it in vain. " Learning," to 
 use their own fine expression, was not " to be 
 buried in the graves of the fathers." 
 
 As they sat together in the rude chamber where 
 the General Court met, November 7, 1636, could 
 we have looked upon them, they would have 
 seemed to our eyes plain in dress and manners 
 and stern in aspect, for the responsibilities upon 
 them were heavy and solemn ; yet we should have 
 seen also how high resolve, earnest purpose, de- 
 voted faith, dignified and ennobled their grave and 
 manly features. Henry Vane was there, — 
 
 " Vane young in years, yet in sage counsel old," 
 
ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 203 
 
 as Milton has written of him ; Hugh Peters was 
 there ; both afterwards to die upon the scaffold for 
 their stern assertion of the liberties of England. 
 John Winthrop was there, and without question, 
 as he is always seen in our Annals, sweet and 
 calm, wise and brave. Of all that was there said 
 nothing is preserved ; neither diary, memoran- 
 dum, nor notebook yield a word, although care- 
 fully and lovingly searched. What they did the 
 record tells. Yet the illustrious orator who stood 
 fifty years ago where I most unworthily stand 
 to-day, imagined in words well befitting the occa- 
 sion the speech which John Winthrop might have 
 made ; and we join in the aspiration with which it 
 concludes : " So long as New England or .America 
 hath a name on the earth's surface, the fame and 
 the fruit of this day's work shall be blessed." 
 
 These men were in many respects, certainly in 
 lofty conception, above the age in which they 
 lived : nowhere can it be said that they fell below 
 it. Yet neither they nor any body of men ever 
 burst through the environment of the temper and 
 thought of the age in which their lot was cast. 
 If they were intolerant of other modes of belief, 
 this was the result of their peculiar political situ- 
 ation rather than of indifference to the rights of 
 others. When power fully came to them, as it 
 did come in England, the belief of others was 
 respected. Every sect in its weakness counsels 
 toleration; but Mr. Hume, one of the bitterest 
 of their critics, says of them : " Of all Christian 
 
204 ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 
 
 sects, this was the first which during its pros- 
 perity as well as its adversity always adopted 
 the principle of toleration." 
 
 Certainly this college bears no marks of intoler- 
 ance, if that charge can rightfully be brought 
 elsewhere against the founders of New England. 
 Established primarily for theological instruction ; 
 he whose name it bears, and whose gift made its 
 existence possible, a clergyman ; controlled by the 
 ministry at a time when in all the affairs of the 
 colony their influence was little less than para- 
 mount, — the liberal spirit of each charter and 
 constitution it has received has been such that its 
 advantages and privileges have been at the dis- 
 posal of all, irrespective of differences of belief. Let 
 every one that thirsteth come and drink freely. 
 No creed was ever to be signed, no form of faith 
 professed, no catechism answered by student or 
 professor. In reverent faith its founders enter- 
 tained the then prevalent doctrines of the Protes- 
 tant Church. Their difference with the Anglican 
 Church had been one of ritual and discipline rather 
 than of doctrine. They must have understood how 
 large an instrument of authority and influence a 
 great seat of learning is in its sway over opinion, 
 but they did not seek to control it by any formulas 
 which should bind the consciences of those who 
 resorted to it. 
 
 The quarter of a millennium which has elapsed 
 since the foundation of our college carries us back 
 even more than is indicated merely by the number 
 
ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 205 
 
 of its years. It marks the dawn of the present era 
 in literature and science. Shakespeare and IJacon 
 were but a few. years dead ; Milton was yet in his 
 youth ; Newton was still to come. With all the ad- 
 vance of what may be called modern Europe our 
 University is identified, and steadily it must adapt 
 itself in its high office of instruction to the wants of 
 each generation and its growing needs. Firmly 
 fixed, it stands upon the rocks; but the guidance 
 which it shall give to those who look for its light 
 must be such as they can follow through every 
 channel that learning or science may hereafter dis- 
 cover. The control which its Alumni have by 
 electing its overseers imposes on us the duty of 
 ultimately determining what changes shall from 
 time to time be made, and how it shall best fulfil 
 its great office. It is a grave and solemn trust, to 
 be administered in reverent gratitude to those who 
 have gone before us, whose labors we have enjoyed. 
 and in the earnest wish that those who may follow 
 us may reap an abundant harvest from the seed we 
 shall sow. Proportions vary ; relations change. 
 The mighty march which has been made in phy- 
 sical science; the carefully guarded secrets which 
 Nature, pursued and tortured in a thousand ways. 
 has been compelled to reveal ; the powers and 
 forces which have been discovered and applied to 
 the service of man, — have changed the relative 
 position which the arts and sciences must here- 
 after occupy in any system of general education. 
 The literature of modern Europe, including that 
 
206 ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 
 
 of our own English tongue, to which our own 
 countrymen have contributed much, could not be 
 said to have had an existence on the day when 
 our college was founded. It necessarily demands 
 and must receive a larger place, as it embodies 
 what is best and noblest in modern thought. Yet 
 it does not follow that our obligation to that of 
 the classic ages is to be denied or disowned. Nor 
 need we feel that what has clone so much to dignify 
 and elevate the life of man will lose its genial in- 
 fluence, that the language immortalized by "Tully's 
 voice and Virgil's lay and Livy's pictured page " is 
 to be forgotten, or that the mighty instrument of 
 thought and speech with which Demosthenes ful- 
 mined over Greece is to be cast aside as broken 
 and useless. 
 
 But whatever changes are to come to our 
 University, its faithful spirit in the culture of 
 knowledge is not to change ; nor will it ever 
 be discouraged in the attempt to establish the 
 foundations of that noble and hisrti character 
 which makes useful men able in their own per- 
 sons to exhibit exalted lives. Apart from all 
 direct instruction, religious or moral, there should 
 be an atmosphere which shall impart to those 
 around whom it flows an inspiration to be worthy 
 and true. In the theocracy of the Puritans, those 
 educated here were to be its churchmen, statesmen, 
 and leaders of its people. All this is changed ; 
 but it does not therefore follow that leaders are 
 no longer to exist. We have passed out from the 
 
ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 207 
 
 age of authority, but the foundations upon which 
 authority should rightfully exist are not therefore 
 destroyed. There was never a time when philan- 
 thropic effort met a more generous response, when 
 wise and mature thought met higher appreciation, 
 when carefully considered utterance found larger 
 audience, or when educated men ready to perform 
 the great duties of life could render more efficient 
 service. That this University has fulfilled in a 
 large measure the hopes of its founders in the 
 broad and general aspects in which its anticipated 
 benefits were presented to their minds, we would 
 willingly believe. The list of its scholars, of its 
 lovers of polite literature, of its teachers, its scien- 
 tists, its statesmen, bears honored and illustrious 
 names. But it is not upon these alone that its fame 
 is to rest. Even if it has been said of the majority 
 of men, " They will have perished as though they 
 had never been, and will become as though they 
 had never been born," this, when spoken of brave 
 and faithful men, such as this college has sent forth 
 by hundreds and even thousands, is far from true. 
 Our vision is weak and narrow : it is only when 
 service is marked and peculiar that to our eyes it 
 becomes apparent. The village Hampdens, " the 
 mute, inglorious" Miltons, do not perish as if they 
 had never been. The professional men, who in 
 their clay have served the communities in which 
 they dwelt — the schoolmaster, the physician, the 
 clergyman, who have not only taught but led the 
 way to a higher life — have found here their 
 
208 ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 
 
 moral and intellectual training. Those who have 
 found in commerce or its kindred pursuits their 
 appropriate sphere, or those so placed by fortune 
 that it has not been necessary to pursue the gain- 
 ful callings of life, have been made here men of 
 feeling and culture, dignifying and elevating the 
 world around them. Men like these mould, edu- 
 cate, and control society. They do not look that 
 any laurel wreath of fame shall adorn their brows ; 
 it is enough for them that they are brave and 
 steadfast soldiers in the great army by whose 
 fidelity and courage the world advances. 
 
 Nor in the great crises of the nation has it been 
 found heretofore that this college has been unworthy 
 of its high purpose. In the struggles by which the 
 English people fought their own way to civil and 
 religious liberty, in the great debate which pre- 
 ceded the conflict of arms with Great Britain 
 herself, the men educated here were ever promi- 
 nent. All the signers of the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence from Massachusetts were its children. 
 Nor in the great struggle for national life which 
 came to our own generation were its sons wanting. 
 Certainly, standing in this Hall which pious care 
 has reared to their memory, I cannot forget the 
 young, the beautiful, the brave, who nobly perilled 
 or who nobly surrendered life in that terrible con- 
 flict. A subject race has been rescued from bon- 
 dage ; a nation has been lifted from the thraldom 
 to which itself had been condemned by its own 
 toleration ; and the integrity of the Union has been 
 
ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 209 
 
 established forever. Such a cause has consecrated 
 those who have died in its defence. 
 
 By these festival rites we surrender to the cen- 
 tury that is to follow this University. Adorned, 
 improved, and with greater capacity for the noble 
 work of education, it certainly is ; nor will we for- 
 get the noble spirit by which its founders were 
 actuated. It is not necessary to accept the reli- 
 gious dogmas of the Puritans, or to attach the 
 importance they did to propositions in theology ; 
 but we must admire their spirit of self-sacrifice, 
 their sincere desire to elevate their own lives by 
 a faith which lifted them above all that was icrno- 
 ble in the present, and gilded with a divine light 
 all that was sordid around them. Far below their 
 lofty ideal standards they fell, no doubt, yet these 
 were ever above them. Wealth, rank, worldly suc- 
 cess, were nothing ; where truth led the way they 
 were to follow ; what duty commanded, that they 
 were to do. To them much that we see around us 
 would appear strange ; these splendid edifices, these 
 
 "storied windows richly dight, 
 Casting their dim, religious light," 
 
 would seem at variance with the simplicity they 
 loved ; but we will not doubt our communion with 
 them so long as we are loyal to truth and duty. 
 Nor, if thus faithful, will we doubt that the calm 
 scholar whose figure, moulded by a skilful hand, 
 sits in perennial youth at our portals, were he to 
 come again in bodily presence, would fail to recog- 
 
 14 
 
210 ADDRESS BEFORE THE HARVARD ALUMNI. 
 
 nize us as tlie children for whom his bounty was 
 intended. 
 
 The structure that has been reared here contains 
 in itself all the elements of growth and perma- 
 nence. In each age, those who are to follow us 
 shall repair, restore, and renew it as wisdom and 
 knowledge shall instruct them. The sands of the 
 desert are piled high above the monuments which 
 Egyptian kings have reared to commemorate their 
 conquests and their renown ; those of graceful and 
 artistic Greece, and of mighty Rome, crumble and 
 fall into the dust, — but if their sons are faithful, 
 against this edifice of our fathers the waves of time 
 shall beat in vain. No creeping ivy shall throw 
 out its green and flaunting banner from ruined 
 battlements; but above its towers, strengthened 
 by the noblest thought of each coming age, shall 
 float forever our simple word, " Veritas." 
 
ADDRESS BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION 
 
 IN MEMORY OF GENERAL SHERIDAN, 
 NOVEMBER 7, 1888. 
 
 Mr. Commander and Companions, — As we 
 gather at our first autumnal meeting, there is a 
 shadow thrown over it by the reflection that since 
 we last assembled we have been called to part 
 with the illustrious soldier who was the head of 
 our national organization. In obedience to the di- 
 rection of our Commander, I rise to speak some 
 words, inadequate although they must be, of him, 
 and of the love and honor in which we held him. 
 
 If the hour of friendly intercourse, when hand 
 clasps hand in affectionate recognition, is saddened, 
 it is dignified also by the remembrance of what Gen- 
 eral Sheridan has been to the country of which we, in 
 our more humble capacity, as well as he, have been 
 soldiers. We would recall him to-night not in 
 sorrow only, but in honor, in gratitude for what 
 we have received, not less than in regret for what 
 we have lost. He is but a little in advance on the 
 path we all must travel, as the great historic 
 events in which we have been actors pass into 
 history. It is agreeable to remember that he was 
 the guest of this Commandery for a few clays dur- 
 
212 ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 
 
 ing the past winter, when each one of us enjoyed 
 his cordial greeting. His life ebbed away, too, on 
 the shores of the southern bay of Massachusetts, 
 where he had made his summer, home ; and it was 
 the sad privilege of some of our companions to aid 
 in bearing his remains to the train which was to 
 conduct them to our national capital, there to rest 
 forever anions: those who have offered their lives 
 for the Republic. 
 
 The occasion is not adapted for an elaborate 
 address ; yet you will pardon me if I briefly touch 
 on some of the events in the career of General 
 Sheridan, for of him it may properly be said that 
 his deeds are his eulogy. 
 
 Born at Somerset, in Ohio, on March 6, 1831, he 
 graduated from West Point in the class of 1853. 
 He was a captain in the Thirteenth Infantry at 
 the beginning of the war, and for more than a 
 year thereafter rendered staff duty, which, if val- 
 uable, called for ability of quite a different order 
 from that which he subsequently displayed. It 
 was not until the 27th of May, 1862, that he re- 
 ceived an appointment as colonel of the Second 
 Michigan Cavalry. This gave him the first oppor- 
 tunity for the display of his abilities in the field, and 
 they were not long concealed. Joining, with his 
 regiment, in the operations which accompanied the 
 evacuation of Corinth, his dash, vigor, and judg- 
 ment were at once recognized. On the 1st of July, 
 in command, as colonel, of a brigade of cavalry, 
 composed of but two regiments (one his own), at 
 
ADDRESS OX GENERAL SHERIDAN. 213 
 
 Booneville, in Mississippi, some twenty miles in 
 front of our main army, he was attacked by Gen- 
 eral Chalmers, with a force of some five or six 
 thousand men, — at least three times his own 
 number. This little battle, now almost forgotten, 
 when so many larger conflicts arrest the attention. 
 was one of the most remarkable in the war, for it 
 ended not only in his beating off the enemy, but 
 in putting him to utter rout. Here he won his 
 first star, and his commission as brigadier. Were 
 there time to recall the details of it, you would 
 recognize how fully it shows the characteristics he 
 afterwards exhibited on larger fields. As a general 
 he was essentially aggressive. If compelled to 
 fight, having inferior numbers to his adversary, 
 he yet held it was better to attack than to wait 
 the attack of the enemy. Self-confident, but in no 
 vain-glorious way, naturally sanguine and full of 
 resources, his fiery and almost audacious courage 
 suggested to him plans which might have seemed 
 rash, but that his vigor in execution demonstrated 
 that they could be successfully carried out. He 
 said, in conversation here last winter, " Some gen- 
 erals, and pretty good ones too, fight a battle so 
 that they shall be sure not to -be beaten them- 
 selves ; but I always fight to beat the other man." 
 This was the key to his tactics and his success. It 
 was from "the nettle danger" that, like Hotspur. 
 he strove to "pluck the flower safety." Yet it 
 would be a great mistake to suppose that he 
 lacked prudence. In all that wariness and skill 
 
214 ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 
 
 could do to accomplish his results he was never 
 wanting. 
 
 We speak of General Sheridan often as a cavalry 
 general ; but for more than a year and a half after 
 the battle to which I have alluded he commanded 
 infantry ; and his subsequent command of the 
 Army of the Shenandoah, and his conduct of the 
 pursuit of Lee, show how thoroughly he under- 
 stood each of the great arms of the service. 
 
 In September, 1862, he was transferred to a 
 division in the Army of the Ohio, fighting in the 
 successful battle of Perryville, under Buell. As- 
 signed to a division in the Army of the Cumber- 
 land, at Murfreesborough, in December, 1862, he 
 bore his part most gallantly, under Rosecrans, in 
 that terrible, and, at first, doubtful day. The 
 battle went against us in the wing of the army 
 where his division fought ; and after repulsing four 
 successive attacks, his command was finally com- 
 pelled to fall back to a position where he rallied it, 
 and held it firmly against the enemy, who tried in 
 vain to complete the victory, and who were the 
 next day obliged to abandon the field. For his 
 skilful handling of his troops he received the 
 warmest praise from Rosecrans, who recommended 
 him for promotion as a major-general, a distinction 
 which was promptly accorded. 
 
 At Chickamauga, in September of the following 
 year, he still commanded a division of the Army of 
 the Cumberland. The defeat received there by us 
 was, on the whole, in its anticipated results, the 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 215 
 
 most serious ever inflicted on the Union arms, for 
 it threatened destruction to our control of the Mis- 
 sissippi Valley, which had been won at so much 
 expense of blood and treasure. Sheridan's own 
 division was in the worst of the disaster. No man 
 had ever greater power of inspiring the troops 
 under him with confidence in himself, and with 
 breathing into them the fire of his own courage, 
 than he. That magnetic quality soldiers who 
 may deservedly be called great from their powers 
 to plan campaigns, and from their strategic capa- 
 city, sometimes lack ; but no man without it can 
 be on the field a successful general. All that 
 General Sheridan possessed was needed on that 
 day, and was well used. While the stern bravery 
 of Thomas held firmly on his part of the line, 
 Sheridan succeeded in rallying his broken troops 
 and re-forming his line, and he was advancing to 
 support Thomas when he received the order to re- 
 main where he was, and allow r the army to fall 
 back on him. The day which could not be 
 redeemed from defeat was thus rescued from 
 rout and utter disaster. 
 
 It was at the great battle of Chattanooga, on 
 Missionary Ridge, which followed some two months 
 later, that General Grant is believed to have first 
 seen Sheridan's command under fire, and to have 
 begun to form the opinion which he afterwards 
 entertained, that he was unsurpassed in the world 
 as a general on the field and in the immediate 
 command of troops. The defeat of Chickamauga 
 
216 ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 
 
 had been received with dismay ; but the battle of 
 Chattanooga — one of the most important won by 
 Grant — not only restored our position, but opened 
 the way for Sherman's march to Atlanta. On the 
 day of the battle, the Army of the Cumberland, 
 then under Thomas, held the centre of the line ; 
 and when the hour for the assault came, its troops, 
 among; whom the divisions of Wood and Sheridan 
 were foremost, rushed up the mountain wall, clam- 
 bering from ridge to ridge with a furious energy 
 which swept all before them. Sheridan used to 
 say jestingly that he never knew who ordered 
 such an assault as that ; and that " his division, 
 that day, got away from him." It certainly did 
 not get far away, as he too was up when it 
 crowned the mountain crest, fully prepared to 
 direct the stern pursuit of the retreating foe. It 
 had, in fact, been intended, after taking the first 
 line of the enemy's works, to halt and re-form ; but 
 the blood of the Army of the Cumberland was 
 up, and in the presence of Hooker on the right, 
 with his Potomac troops, and Sherman on the left, 
 with those from Mississippi, it was ready to show 
 itself worthy of those who had come so far to 
 its support. 
 
 General Sheridan came to the East with General 
 Grant, on the appointment of the latter to the 
 command of all the armies of the Union. The 
 Army of the Shenandoah was formed, to be placed 
 under his command late in the summer of 1864. 
 Without alluding, except by name, to Opequan, 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 217 
 
 Winchester, and Fisher's Hill, the battle of Cedar 
 Creek, as illustrating bis vast power over men, and 
 his courage under circumstances the most adverse, 
 must be mentioned in any sketch of him, however 
 imperfect. His army was skilfully attacked in his 
 absence, one division utterly surprised, and all 
 gradually forced back until, in some portions of his 
 army, the retreat had become a rout. Twenty miles 
 away he heard the roar of the conflict, and, waiting 
 for no aids or guards, he started at once for the 
 field. His very progress was blocked as he neared 
 the field by fugitives, to all of whom he cried, " Go 
 back ; go back to your regiments ! we will sleep in 
 our old camps to-night," until, for very shame, his 
 voice was listened to. As he reached the field, the 
 rout to some extent had been checked ; and two 
 divisions had always stood resolute and firm. His 
 presence on the field was an inspiration, regiment 
 after regiment getting into position, men who could 
 not find their own regiments going into others 
 willingly, all animated by the fire of this daring 
 spirit, who seemed to have come upon the scene, 
 as in the Roman mythology, the war-god himself 
 descended when the battle seemed lost to his 
 children. The line was re-formed ; and firmly he 
 awaited the last assault of the Confederate troops, 
 which, vigorously made, was sternly repulsed. And 
 now his own time had come. Riding down his line, 
 received with rapturous cheers by men some of 
 whom had been fugitives but a few hours before, 
 but who were now readv to die for such a leader, as 
 
218 ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 
 
 he cried : " We are going back to the camps we 
 left ; we will have back every inch of ground we 
 have lost, — every inch, remember," — the word 
 for the assault was given ; all that had been lost 
 was regained, and General Early again went 
 " whirling up the valley." 
 
 I do not pretend to be a very wide or accurate 
 reader of military history ; but I believe it contains 
 no account of any battle utterly lost that has been 
 redeemed by the wisdom, the valor, the inspiration 
 that came from only one man. Great fields have 
 indeed often been recovered by the opportune ar- 
 rival of fresh troops, led by a competent general. 
 Marengo, which Napoleon always felt to be one of 
 the greatest of his victories, seemed at the middle 
 of the day so clearly lost that the Austrian general 
 had retired to his tent, leaving the pursuit to his 
 second in command. General Desaix, who had been 
 despatched in a different direction, had marched at 
 the sound of the cannon, and without orders, at 
 once to the scene of the conflict. Behind him were 
 more than ten thousand of the best troops of the 
 French Army. " What do you think of the battle, 
 Desaix ? " said Bonaparte to him. " I think, Gen- 
 eral Bonaparte, "this battle is lost ; but before night- 
 fall, with myself and my troops, you will be sure 
 to win another." The result proved the accuracy 
 of his prediction, although the brave soldier who 
 uttered it gave his own life to verify it. But at 
 Cedar Creek, out of a broken, dispirited, almost 
 formless mob, one man alone had re-created an 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 219 
 
 army, had filled it full with his own patriotic cour- 
 age, and led it to victory over a foe flushed with 
 success, to which it had yielded seven or eight 
 miles of ground. If Sheridan swore a little while 
 he was doing this, as Dr. Bartol thinks he may 
 have done, I am altogether of the Reverend Doctor's 
 opinion also, that he swore in sustaining a great 
 and holy cause, — that of his country ; and I trust 
 that the accusing angel did not deem it necessary 
 to write down every hot word against him. 
 
 In this matter of swearing some injustice has 
 been done General Sheridan. The makers of anec- 
 dotes spice them high, and do not shrink from 
 slight exasperation. Remember what a battle-field 
 is, — that it is no place for calm discussion, but for 
 instant action. If in such moments he used some 
 of those expletives in which the English language 
 is said to be peculiarly rich, remember the intense 
 excitement and ardent passion in which he had 
 to speak. In no sense was General Sheridan a 
 coarsely or vulgarly profane man, far less was 
 he a contemner or clespiser of sacred things. He 
 was faithful to the Church in which he had been 
 reared, respectful to its ordinances and its min- 
 isters always. 
 
 It was the intention of General Grant not only 
 to defeat Lee in the spring of 1865, — which, in an 
 earlier stage of the war, would have been enough, 
 — but to compel his surrender. It would have 
 been a grave disaster if, escaping, he could unite 
 with Johnston, and, moving towards the southwest, 
 
220 ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 
 
 could continue the war. In such a struggle, which 
 would turn out to be finally a race between swiftly 
 moving bodies of troops, the cavalry would play a 
 most important part. To command this, and the 
 infantry which would from time to time support 
 it, General Sheridan came from the Valley of Vir- 
 ginia. In giving his orders to pass to the extreme 
 right of the Confederate Army, it was contemplated 
 by Grant that, in certain contingencies, Sheridan 
 might himself be separated from the Potomac Army 
 and compelled to move towards Sherman. Ob- 
 serving that Sheridan looked somewhat grave at 
 this, General Grant says in his Memoirs, " I told 
 him that, as a matter of fact, I intended to close 
 the war right here with this movement, and that 
 it should go no further. His face at once bright- 
 ened at this ; and slapping his thigh, he said, ' I 
 am glad to hear it, and we can do it.' ' 
 
 Then followed the attack on the Petersburg line 
 by the Army of the Potomac, while, with match- 
 less skill, Sheridan at Dinwidclie, Five Forks, 
 Jetersville, and Sailor's Creek, checked the retreat 
 of Lee to the southward, and at Appomattox closed 
 the last avenue of escape towards the West with 
 his cavalry and the rapidly moving infantry which 
 sustained it. 
 
 His later services, if less splendid than those to 
 which I have called attention, were in a high de- 
 gree valuable and useful to the country. Made 
 lieutenant-general in 1869, on the promotion of 
 General Sherman, he succeeded to the command of 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 221 
 
 the army in 1884, and a few months before he died 
 he received, by the title of general, the highest mil- 
 itary rank which the country has ever bestowed. 
 
 While I have necessarily spoken only of his mili- 
 tary achievements, let us remember, as we part 
 from this illustrious chieftain, that he was not 
 merely a soldier with a passion for war. lie was 
 an intense believer in the high destiny of this 
 nation, and in the preservation of the American 
 Union. He was a thoroughly patriotic man. 
 
 Our citizens of Irish birth and Irish descent have 
 a right to be proud of their record in the Civil War 
 and of the many brave men they contributed to 
 our armies. They have a right also to be proud 
 that this great soldier was of their race and blood. 
 He possessed many of the highest qualities which 
 have distinguished the Irish people. Not having 
 the rare gift of eloquence which has been bestowed 
 so largely upon the countrymen of Burke and 
 Grattan, of Curran and O'Connell, speaking always 
 reluctantly before public audiences, and indeed be- 
 fore gatherings of his old comrades, — when he did 
 thus speak, his keen wit, his terse expression, gave 
 point always to his utterance. But on the battle- 
 field he had the eloquence of intense feeling. He 
 knew just what to say, and how to say it so as to 
 make the deepest impression and insure the readiest 
 response. There his words, short, abrupt, in- 
 cisive, came with the directness of rifle-shots, 
 cheering the hesitating, fiercely rebuking the re- 
 luctant, and directing the storm with a voice that 
 must be obeyed. 
 
222 ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 
 
 To say that he was brave is little, for the same 
 might be said of thousands of other men. While 
 he was fearless as the sabre that swung by his 
 side, he was wise, — regarding the lives of the men 
 he commanded as a trust not to be imperilled ex- 
 cept as the result to be expected would justify risk, 
 but when that time came, launching his troops on 
 the enemy like a thunderbolt. Not Murat, whose 
 brilliant charges did so much to win so many of 
 Napoleon's battles ; not Prince Rupert, whose fiery 
 courage at the head of the English cavaliers al- 
 most saved the crown of his royal kinsman, King 
 Charles, — had more impetuous valor than he ; and 
 neither of them in the fury and rage of the onset 
 had a more sound, unerring judgment. 
 
 He was generous ; no broken soldier approached 
 him who was not kindly received and cordially 
 welcomed. If sometimes quick in temper, he was 
 readily appeased, for his nature was loving and 
 forgiving. 
 
 Not the least interesting or least amiable charac- 
 teristic of the Irish people is their strong attachment 
 to friends and home and family. It was a marked 
 feature in the character of General Sheridan. He 
 was a tender and loving husband ; he was a kind 
 father ; he was a grateful and devoted son. A few 
 years ago, I had the honor of accompanying General 
 Grant and him from Detroit ; and he left us at 
 a way-station in Ohio, saying, " Once a year at 
 least, I try to make a visit to my old mother." 
 Her death, which took place but a little before 
 his own, was concealed from him on account of 
 
ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 223 
 
 the effect it might produce in his then dangerous 
 condition. 
 
 But while General Sheridan possessed many of 
 the finest characteristics of the Irish race from 
 which he was descended ; while he sympathized 
 warmly, I doubt not, with it in all that it has else- 
 where been called to endure, — he was essentially 
 in thought and feeling an American. Born upon 
 the soil of the United States, and within its alle- 
 giance, he knew no country but this as his own. 
 Educated at its expense, he was proud to be one of 
 its children. He was ready to live for it ; he was 
 ready to die rather than that one stripe should be 
 erased or one star obscured in its glorious ensign. 
 He was national in feeling to his very heart's core. 
 When, without joining in the splendid review at 
 Washington, he was sent by Grant with an army 
 corps to the Rio Grande to notify, by his presence, 
 imperial France that her attempt to break down 
 the Republic of Mexico and establish a monarchy 
 there by the bayonets of Europe must cease, he 
 accepted the duty, and his report shows with what 
 alacrity he did so. No notice was ever more vigor- 
 ously served, or more promptly responded to. 
 
 As we render our tribute to-night to this great 
 soldier, whom we have a right to call by the tender 
 names of " comrade " and " companion," we are 
 reminded how fast the numbers diminish of those 
 who were permitted to survive the war. Meade 
 and Thomas, the fiery Hooker, the chivalrous Han- 
 cock. — tlic head of our Order almost from its organ- 
 ization until his death, — Grant himself, in whom is 
 
224 ADDRESS ON GENERAL SHERIDAN. 
 
 united the just renown of all the armies of the 
 Union, are gone. The fall of the leaders tells how 
 s.ternly and steadily the artillery of time is doing 
 its work. Yet the land itself is nobler and fairer 
 by reason of the brave men who have been ready 
 to die for it. 
 
 " The waters murmur of their name ; 
 The woods are peopled with their fame." 
 
 The mountains seem to lift their heads more 
 loftily, and the rivers to move to the sea with a 
 more majestic sweep as they are ennobled by their 
 memory. While that memory lives, they are not 
 dead, for they stand as an example to which the 
 humblest is entitled, and which the highest cannot 
 afford to despise. They stand as an encouragement 
 to duty and patriotism, and their honor is a part 
 of the inheritance of all their countrymen. 
 
 And if (which God avert ! ) war should come to 
 others, as it came to us, it may be that at the close 
 of some hotly contested day, when it shall be de- 
 termined to finish with the advance of the old flag 
 which he loved and under which he fought so well, 
 when the word " forward " shall be heard from 
 captain to captain along the line, the name of 
 Sheridan, as a watchword and a battle-cry, shall 
 ring from rank to rank, and from file to file, to 
 inspire all with something of the daring and the 
 courage of this great and heroic soul. 
 
EXTRACTS FROM THREE ADDRESSES 
 
 AS PRESIDENT OF THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT 
 ASSOCIATION IN 1887, 1888, 1889. 
 
 1887. 
 
 While our meeting is primarily for business 
 purposes, custom has permitted to the President, 
 on occasions when no formal address was delivered 
 before the Society, a few words in relation to the 
 great day whose anniversary it is our immediate 
 object to commemorate, or to that series of events 
 which preceded or followed it. and of which it 
 formed an integral and important part. I avail 
 myself of this privilege to remind you that we 
 reach this year the great Centennial of Peace, in 
 which the battle of Bunker Hill and the bloody 
 fields which followed it found their culmination 
 and well-earned reward. 
 
 The city of Philadelphia has a name in our 
 Revolutionary annals that will ever be honored. 
 It was in refinement and wealth probably then the 
 first city in the Union. Here had met, in 1774, 
 the first Continental Congress, assembled even 
 before the first blow was struck to assert the 
 rights of the colonies. Here, in 1775. the second 
 Continental Congress had determined upon armed 
 resistance to the arbitrary encroachments of the 
 
 15 
 
226 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 Crown, and, upon the suggestion of Mr. John Adams, 
 had, on the 15th day of June (two days only before 
 the battle of Bunker Hill), chosen one of its own 
 delegates, George Washington of Virginia, to be 
 commander-in-chief of all forces raised and to be 
 raised for the struggle. Here too, a year later, on 
 the 4th of July, 1776, adopting for the first time 
 a name forever illustrious, and terming themselves 
 no longer the United Colonies, but the United 
 States of America, our several communities had 
 asserted their right to a place among the nations 
 of the earth and their full and complete inde- 
 pendence of the British Crown. From Philadel- 
 phia, also, the operations of the war had been 
 directed, and here, except for a brief period, 
 had always sat the Revolutionary Congress. 
 Here, after the Articles of Confederation had 
 gone into effect in 1781, had met its Congress, 
 which a few months later had walked in solemn 
 procession to one of the churches, to return thanks 
 to God for the victory over Cornwallis, which it 
 rightly judged was to terminate the war ; and from 
 here the instructions for a definitive treaty of peace 
 and independence had been given, which on the 
 third day of September, 1783, was signed in Paris 
 by the minister of Great Britain, and on our behalf 
 by John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and John Jay. 
 But, solemn and imposing as these events were, 
 Philadelphia, in the year 1787, was to witness one 
 not less august and dignified. It was the session 
 of the convention which ordained the Constitution 
 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 227 
 
 of the United States, and which, assembling on the 
 fourteenth day of May, signed the Constitution, 
 and commended it for ratification to the people of 
 the United States on the 17th of September, 1787. 
 The centennial anniversary of the signature of the 
 Constitution of the United States on the 17th of 
 September will be appropriately celebrated on that 
 day during the present year, under the direction of 
 commissioners from the several States and a com- 
 mittee of citizens and the City Government of 
 Philadelphia. In his annual message to the Legis- 
 lature, his Excellency the Governor of Massa- 
 chusetts recommended that provision be made for 
 assuring on this occasion a representation of Massa- 
 chusetts, in a manner befitting the history and 
 character of this commonwealth. This recommen- 
 dation, I am informed, has been complied with. 
 Whether it shall be our fortune individually to 
 be present or absent, such a celebration can- 
 not but awaken the profoundest interest in this 
 Association. 
 
 To overthrow a well-established government is 
 not an easy task. Many interests of property, 
 many sentiments of affection cling around old 
 institutions, even those which cannot in themselves 
 be commended. It is a far more difficult task out 
 of the confusion which such a downfall creates to 
 rear the structure of a firm, well-ordered State. 
 The difficulties which the American States would 
 have in establishing a firm government when the 
 cohesive pressure of war was withdrawn were 
 
228 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 obvious from the first. Their relations each to the 
 other and to foreign governments must be deter- 
 mined and regulated, the strength and power of 
 all must be consolidated, and yet to each must be 
 left complete control of affairs within its own 
 limits. The States achieved their independence 
 each for itself, although as the ally of others ; yet 
 to have existed as strictly independent States, 
 bound together only by such treaties as are made 
 between sovereigns, was certainly impossible. The 
 belief that a stable government could never be 
 established by us was, at the close of the war, 
 nearly universal in Europe ; it was almost the only 
 consolation of our late King George III., who 
 always took very much to heart what he termed 
 the revolt of America. There was a feeling even 
 of regret in Great Britain that these States had 
 ever been recognized in a treaty collectively, and 
 that peace had not been made with each indi- 
 vidually. An eminent British writer scouted the 
 idea that America could ever be a rising empire, as 
 one of the wildest dreams of romance. "The 
 natural antipathies and clashing interests of the 
 Americans," he said, " their difference of govern- 
 ments, habitudes, and manners, indicate that they 
 will have no centre of union and no common 
 interest. They never can be united into one com- 
 pact empire under any form of government what- 
 ever. A disunited people till the end of time, 
 suspicious and distrustful of each other, they will 
 be divided and subdivided into little common- 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 229 
 
 wealths or principalities, according to natural 
 boundaries, by great bays of the sea and by vast 
 rivers, lakes, and ridges of mountains." 
 
 Frederick the Great, who might' be looked upon 
 as a disinterested observer of the conflict between 
 Great Britain and her subjects, said in 1782 that 
 b * he was persuaded that the American Union could 
 not long subsist under its present form," and held 
 that no inference could be drawn in favor of the 
 American colonies from the States of Venice, 
 Holland, and Switzerland, whose situation and 
 circumstances were entirely different. 
 
 The gravity of the problem had not diminished 
 in the years that had intervened since the treaty 
 of peace in 1783. On the contrary, the expe- 
 rience of those years showed clearly that, de- 
 fective as the government of the Confederation 
 was in time of war, it was even more inadequate 
 in time of peace. The Continental Congress had 
 no defined powers ; it boldly seized on all which it 
 could enforce either by will and energy or per- 
 suasion. The Congress of the Confederation came 
 into existence only in time to take part, in 1781, 
 in the last of the Revolutionary struggle. It was 
 precisely what the name imports, — a league and 
 alliance, and nothing more. If it could incur 
 debts, it could provide no means of paying them, 
 for the revenue must be raised by the States them- 
 selves. It could provide for an army; but it was 
 for the States to furnish the money and the men. 
 The Articles of Confederation declared, indeed, that 
 
230 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 it was their duty to do this ; but if they failed, there 
 were no means of coercion. A government which 
 controls neither purse nor sword, it is needless to 
 say, is but a "mockery king." These defects were 
 at the outset so readily seen that Washington 
 early urged that there must be a power to compel 
 the States to comply with the requisitions made on 
 them for men and money, and expressed his fear 
 that " after gloriously and successfully contending 
 against the usurpations of Britain, we may fall a 
 prey to our own follies and disputes." 
 
 It needed, however, the experience of the four 
 years that followed the war to satisfy the people 
 of the United States that a stronger government 
 must be established. Reluctant as were the several 
 States to yield up any of the powers which they 
 claimed as independent States, yet if there was to 
 be a national sovereignty, while it might be one 
 of defined and limited powers, it must be supreme 
 within those powers, capable of enforcing its own 
 decrees without resort to any agencies but its own. 
 The States of the Union had nearly all adopted 
 written constitutions ; that of Massachusetts, which 
 is in substantial respects the same as that under 
 which we now live, had been established by a 
 convention called, by a curious coincidence, on 
 the seventeenth day of June, 1780. It is the work 
 in its essential parts of John Adams ; and he 
 claimed with justice that in making it he aided in 
 making that of the United States. The con- 
 stitutions of all the American States insist, in 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 231 
 
 opposition to the concessions made by monarchical 
 governments, that all power resides with the 
 people; that it is because the people have granted 
 the right, that those who govern, do so rightfully; 
 and that from them and of such a character must 
 be the grant to any national government. 
 
 That there should be a period of great exhaustion 
 after a war like that for independence was to have 
 been expected. But it was now seen that the great 
 want was of a definitely settled government, com- 
 petent to make war and peace, to make treaties, to 
 regulate commerce, to control the jealousies be- 
 tween the States, and to maintain its own powers, 
 while it sustained a republican government in every 
 State. 
 
 Such a government was formed by the convention 
 which one hundred }*ears ago to-day was in session 
 at Philadelphia. While the weakness and defects 
 of the Confederation had been often pointed out ; 
 while the bitter controversies almost ready to break 
 into open war between certain of the States were 
 known ; while the difficulty of maintaining public 
 order (never more conspicuously broken than in the 
 Shays' Rebellion in Massachusetts, whose conse- 
 quences had been averted only by the courage and 
 prudence of Governor Bowdoin) had been recog- 
 nized, — it was by the invitation of Virginia to 
 the other States that this great convention was 
 summoned. There are many days in the history 
 of that ancient commonwealth worthy of honorable 
 mention. No more generous act was ever done 
 
232 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 than her surrender to all the States of her claim to 
 the vast and fertile region which lay between her 
 western boundaries and the Mississippi, which 
 passed under the great Ordinance of 1787, which 
 provided that there should be neither slavery nor 
 involuntary servitude therein. Yet, side by side 
 with this, may well be placed her frank, bold, clearly 
 expressed summons to her sister States to convene 
 for the purpose of constructing a firm and united 
 government. <* The general assembly of this 
 Commonwealth," she said, speaking by the pen of 
 Madison, " can no longer doubt that the crisis is 
 arrived at which the people of America are to 
 decide the solemn question whether they will, by 
 wise and magnanimous action, reap the fruit of 
 independence and union ; or whether, by giving 
 way to unmanly jealousies and prejudices, or to 
 partial and transitory interests, they will renounce 
 the blessings prepared for them by the Revolution." 
 The convention which met in May, 1787, had 
 before it a solemn and most arduous task, in view 
 of the imminence of the peril and of its conscious- 
 ness of the dangers of disorder and anarchy with 
 which the people of the United States were sur- 
 rounded. The smaller States desired a govern- 
 ment strictly federal, in which the power of the 
 States should be equal. The system of slavery 
 prevailed throughout the Southern States, and its 
 existence must be recognized. It had substan- 
 tially ceased to exist in the Eastern and Middle 
 States, although it had distinctly been abolished in 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 233 
 
 only one, and that our own State of Massachu- 
 setts, — and here not by direct words, but by a 
 judicial decision of the Supreme Court of the 
 State, rendered at Worcester in 1783, which pro- 
 nounced it wholly irreconcilable with the Consti- 
 tution of the State adopted two years before, and 
 especially with the admirable Bill of Rights which 
 forms its preamble. Upon this case, so remark- 
 able in the history of the State, Mr. Justice Gray, 
 now of the Supreme Court of the United States, 
 has written a most interesting paper. 
 
 It was necessary yet difficult for the convention 
 to draw a proper line between the powers of a na- 
 tional government and those of the several States. 
 It is obvious that whatever objects of government 
 were confined in their operation and effect within 
 the boundaries of any particular State should be 
 considered as belonging to the government of that 
 State ; while those objects of government which 
 extended in their operation and effects beyond the 
 boundaries of any individual State should be con- 
 sidered as belonging to the Union. But a prin- 
 ciple easy to state as an abstract proposition is 
 often far from easy in actual application. 
 
 It was early seen that whatever government 
 was created must emanate directly from the peo- 
 ple, and not from the States as such, in order that 
 the allegiance of every citizen should be due alike 
 to the Union and to the State in which he lived. 
 It must have the power of raising its own reve- 
 nues, and the means of compelling obedience to 
 
234 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 its own lawful decrees. It was by reason of the 
 want of this that not only the Confederation, but 
 all other purely federative systems historically 
 known to us, have failed to create a strong and 
 effective nationality ; it is because the Constitu- 
 tion of the United States had this power that it 
 has made of us collectively a people and a nation. 
 
 . It is not my intention, of course, here to re- 
 call the various alternations of hope and anxiety 
 through which the convention passed during the 
 four months of its session. Indeed, it is somewhat 
 hard for any one to do this. Its history is gathered 
 only from the faithful memoranda of Mr. Madi- 
 son, the known opinions of its members, and their 
 subsequent recollections. No formal record of its 
 debates was kept ; the era of reporting had not 
 come. It sat, indeed, with closed doors ; but as 
 against the omnipresent reporter of the present 
 day, closed doors, as you well know, are but feeble 
 barriers. 
 
 Yet I would willingly, if I might, roll back the 
 mists of the century that lies between us, and look 
 upon the faces of two or three of the chief actors 
 in this great historic transaction, as they sat in 
 the modest hall where were gathered the states- 
 men of the Revolution, anxious to preserve by a 
 definite organization all that its soldiers had won. 
 
 Washington, soldier and statesman alike, was 
 its presiding officer. No man realized more fully 
 than he the weakness of the Confederation under 
 which we had been living ; for with all the aid it 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 235 
 
 had been able to afford him, his struggles to keep 
 his little army in the field had been almost des- 
 perate. All his experience and all his observation 
 had convinced him that obedience to the orders of 
 a general government could not be expected, un- 
 less it was provided with the means of enforcing 
 them. For the position of president of the con- 
 vention he was exactly constituted. While he had 
 studied and meditated long on the great problems 
 of government ; while he spoke well and forcibly 
 after careful preparation, for he was not a debater, 
 nor adapted to the controversies of the floor, — 
 his wisdom, his moderation, his calm dignity, 
 fitted him admirably to direct the current of the 
 debate; and his exalted character, his unexampled 
 services, and the universal and profound respect 
 felt for him in the country rendered his presence 
 and countenance necessary in this attempt to 
 establish a government. 
 
 That, after Washington, to two men more than 
 to any others (and large as the services of others 
 were) we are indebted for the formation of the 
 Constitution of the United States, is generally con- 
 ceded. These were James Madison and Alexander 
 Hamilton. Destined to be politically divided later 
 iu life, they were, in this work, which bears 
 throughout the indelible marks of the hand of 
 each, cordially united. The very difference in the 
 opinions they held contributed to the perfection of 
 their work. Tt was for them also, when at a sub- 
 sequent period the Constitution was submitted for 
 
236 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 ratification, to defend it in all its parts before the 
 people of their respective States, and especially 
 before the people of all the States, in a series of 
 essays known as the " Federalist," of which about 
 three quarters were written by Mr. Hamilton and 
 one quarter by Mr. Madison. They are quoted still, 
 whenever a constitutional question is discussed, as 
 giving its contemporaneous construction. 
 
 Mr. Madison was strictly a civilian and publi- 
 cist. He had entered the Continental Congress 
 near the close of the war, in 1780, with a repu- 
 tation which had not then extended beyond the 
 boundaries of his native State ; but it had not 
 required the experience of either the Continental 
 Congress, or of the congresses of the Confederation 
 which followed, to develop him into a national 
 statesman. Although not coming from a commer- 
 cial State, he had from the first seen the necessity 
 of so enlarging the powers of Congress that it 
 should control the foreign commerce of the coun- 
 try. He was now nearly forty years of age, and 
 in the full ripeness of his powers. Possessed of a 
 sufficient fortune, his patriotism and his taste had 
 caused him to devote his life to the public and to 
 the great questions which were then pressing upon 
 it. His grasp of such questions was firm and 
 strong, and no man was ever more sincerely 
 desirous of the good of the whole country. His 
 industry was extraordinary, surpassing that of 
 any of our statesmen, unless it be Mr. John 
 Quincy Adams. His powers of debate were great, 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 237 
 
 and lie had full command of all his resources when 
 he was on his feet, — " never wandering from his 
 subject," says Mr. Jefferson, " into vain declama- 
 tion, but pursuing it closely in language pure, 
 classical, and copious, and soothing always the 
 feelings of his adversaries by civilities and softness 
 of expression." These powers enabled him after- 
 wards, when the question of the adoption of the 
 Constitution was discussed before the people of 
 Virginia, successfully to encounter even the fervid 
 declamation of the great orator of the Revolution, 
 Patrick Henry. 
 
 Yet that no man in that great convention stood 
 above Alexander Hamilton must be admitted by 
 all ; and it would not be worth while now to con- 
 sider whether he might not properly be assigned 
 distinctively the first place. He had, in the words 
 of Washington, " all the qualities essential to a 
 great military character ; " but he united with 
 these the strongest ability as a jurist and the 
 widest capacity as a statesman. He was at this 
 time but thirty years of age. In the early matu- 
 rity of his powers there is but one statesman of 
 the British race known to us who can compare 
 with him. It is the second William Pitt, who was 
 prime minister of England at twenty-four years 
 of age. The political life of Hamilton may be 
 said to have besrun at the as;e of seventeen. At 
 that time, in 1774, while a student in college, he 
 had written a series of essays in answer to the 
 Tory pamphlets of the day, which produced upon 
 
238 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 the public mind the strongest impression, and 
 which evinced a grasp of the whole controversy 
 and a vigor of thought well worthy of any states- 
 man. Before he was nineteen years old he be- 
 came a captain of artillery in the Continental 
 Army ; and when only twenty years of age, in 
 1777, he was selected by Washington as one of 
 his aids, serving with him in that capacity until 
 1782, when he took his seat in the Congress of 
 the Confederation. During these years of military 
 service he wrote much on the financial condition 
 of the country, the defects of the government, and 
 the want of a real executive power. He was early 
 impressed, while a young man of twenty-three, 
 with the necessity of a national system of credit, 
 finance, and government, and by pointing this out, 
 led the way to our later Union. In the Conven- 
 tion of 1787 he was the champion of Nationalism ; 
 nor did this in any way seem to him inconsistent 
 with the just powers and duties of the States, 
 whose expanding glories he delighted to point out, 
 as well as that of the Union as the guardian and 
 the security of them all. He loved liberty in- 
 tensely, but it seemed to him that it could be 
 preserved only in a permanent and settled govern- 
 ment. The charge — for it is hardly less — that 
 has been sometimes imputed to him, that he de- 
 sired a monarchical government, has long since 
 been refuted. He knew America thoroughly, and 
 the tone and temper of its people as it had been 
 developed in the years since 1774, and that no 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 239 
 
 such government was desirable or even possible. 
 But he did believe in a republic fully competent to 
 assert itself : if it could not have strength and 
 stability, "it would be," in his own words, '"dis- 
 graced and lost to ourselves ; disgraced and lost 
 to mankind forever." He doubted, when the work- 
 was done, whether the government was sufficiently 
 strong, although he cordially accepted it as the 
 best that was practicable. But he had builded 
 better than he knew. To him and to those na- 
 tional statesmen, like Mr. Webster, who followed 
 him, that political faith is due which has since 
 carried the nation triumphantly through its 
 striurorle for existence. 
 
 Co 
 
 It was the sad fate of Mr. Hamilton to die in 
 early middle life, in the full maturity of his splen- 
 did powers and with years of usefulness and of, 
 noble fame before him, — a victim to the false code 
 of honor which still asserted its sway. It was the 
 happy lot of Mr. Madison, after years of honorable 
 service as the Secretary of State and President of 
 the Republic he had aided to create, to live to an 
 advanced age, when party feelings had long been 
 forgotten, and when a whole people did honor to 
 his exalted patriotism, his high services, his pure 
 and noble character. But their names are forever 
 associated each with the other in the great instru- 
 ment which their combined genius, wisdom, and 
 noble purposes did so much to create. 
 
 If I have mentioned their names individually, I 
 have not forgotten the great men with whom they 
 
240 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 were associated. No body of men ever assembled 
 with higher or more disinterested objects, more 
 ready to concede to the just claims of others, more 
 conscious of the great trusts imposed upon them. 
 Many of them had borne nobly their part, whether 
 in civil or military life, in the scenes of the Revo- 
 lution. The great experiment made when the 
 States renounced the authority of the British 
 Crown, they knew had now come to its final 
 test. Liberty had been won ; but now there must 
 be union, or the only liberty worth having — that 
 which is embodied in free institutions, and guarded 
 and protected by law — would itself be lost. It 
 was on the 17th of September, one hundred years 
 ago, that the convention completed its work. Its 
 difficulties had been great ; New York had retired 
 by a majority of its delegates, and left Hamilton 
 alone. While he doubted as to some of the features 
 of the Constitution, as a whole he had supported 
 it with his strong logical reasoning and his noble 
 eloquence, and he remained to give to its recom- 
 mendation at least his individual name. 
 
 Its signature was an act of grave importance, not 
 unworthy to be compared with that of the Declara- 
 tion. Whether it would be ratified by the people of 
 the several States was uncertain, and if it was not, 
 the clangers of the situation were far from imagi- 
 nary. Washington, as he signed his name, expressed 
 his fears that if the people should reject this Con- 
 stitution, the opportunity would never again offer 
 to cancel another in peace. To Hamilton, " the 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 241 
 
 establishment of a constitution in a time of pro- 
 found peace by a voluntary consent of a whole 
 people, seemed," as he says, " a prodigy to which 
 he looked forward with trembling anxiety." 
 
 Mr. Madison preserves an anecdote of Dr. 
 Franklin, however, which on his part shows a 
 more hopeful spirit. The genial old man was now 
 eighty-two years of age, and had taken his full 
 share in the labors of the Convention ; as the last 
 members were signing, he looked towards the back 
 of the President's chair, where the representation 
 of a sun was painted, and remarked that painters 
 in their art had often found it difficult to distin- 
 guish between a rising and a setting sun. "I 
 have," said he, " often and often, in the course of 
 the session and the vicissitudes of my hopes and 
 fears as to the issue, looked at that behind the 
 President without being able to tell whether it was 
 rising or setting ; but now at length I have the 
 happiness -to know it is a rising and not a set- 
 ting sun." 
 
 So rose, on that September da}', the sun of a 
 great, free, well-ordered government. It rose above 
 three millions of people and thirteen States that 
 fringed the Atlantic coast. It shines to-day above 
 sixty millions of people, and over an imperial Union 
 whose gateways are on the Atlantic and the Pacific 
 seas, and which has bound together, as with a 
 golden cord, thirty-eight States and nine Terri- 
 tories. " The Constitution of the United States," 
 says Mr. Gladstone in substance (I do not quote 
 
 16 
 
242 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 his exact words), " is the most wonderful instru- 
 ment of government ever constructed in a definite 
 time by the hand of man." In the largest measure 
 it has fulfilled for us all its great objects. It has 
 formed a more perfect Union, established justice, 
 insured domestic tranquillity, provided for the com- 
 mon defence, and secured the blessings of liberty 
 to ourselves and our posterity. The ultimate justifi- 
 cation of every revolution must be found in the 
 ability to construct a better government than that 
 which is overthrown. It is the government which 
 the convention of 1787 created which justifies the 
 Revolution. Deeds become great by the conse- 
 quences which follow them. 
 
 We meet to-day to commemorate a battle indeed, 
 but it is the civic consequences which followed, 
 that have made it renowned. It is the step that 
 was then taken, in the assertion of the great prin- 
 ciple that all power comes from the people, that 
 it is the right of each nation to govern itself 
 through such free institutions as it may designate, 
 and it is the successful demonstration of that prin- 
 ciple in the establishment of the Constitution under 
 which we have lived and prospered for an hundred 
 years, which render the battle of Bunker Hill 
 worthy of eternal memory. If the tranquillity 
 which the Constitution sought to insure has once 
 been broken by a great civil strife, let us rejoice that 
 its fiercer utterances have long since died away ; 
 that the Constitution has shown its full capacity to 
 vindicate itself in a tempest wilder than its framers 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 243 
 
 could ever have foreboded even in their most anxious 
 and despondent hours, and that all now acknowl- 
 edge its firm but genial and beneficent sway. Had 
 these things been otherwise ; had it been found im- 
 possible in 1787 to frame a government ; had civil 
 commotions, whose dark shadow was already above 
 us, followed, — such as have more than once de- 
 stroyed the liberties of republics and induced the 
 friends of peace and order to take refuge even 
 under arbitrary power, — the battle of Bunker Hill 
 would have been remembered indeed as a field of 
 magnificent valor and courage, where a few hun- 
 dred New England yeomanry had encountered and 
 again and again hurled back the resolute assaults 
 of the best soldiers of Europe ; but only thus, and 
 not, as now, as a distinct mark in the history of 
 civilization and of the progress of liberty. 
 
 Tenderly and respectfull} 7 , then, I am sure, gen- 
 tlemen, we all recall that great convention which 
 was sitting in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787 ; 
 and we shall unite in grateful sympathy with every 
 celebration by which honor is sought to be done to 
 its great and crowning act. 
 
 1888. 
 
 Our societ} 7 , gentlemen, connects itself so closely 
 with the whole history of the Revolutionary era, 
 that if I have not alread} T exhausted }'our patience, 
 I am tempted to call your attention to two events 
 of interest which this } T ear have reached their 
 centennial anniversary. 
 
244 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 The settlement of the Northwest Territory, 
 which now contains the great and powerful States 
 of Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin, 
 began on the arrival at Marietta of the colony 
 which was led by General Rufus Putnam, April 7, 
 1788. It was commemorated there last April by 
 an oration from Senator Hoar, and addresses from 
 many distinguished gentlemen, especially one from 
 Hon. J. Randolph Tucker of Virginia. This expedi- 
 tion was the result of a meeting in Boston, at the 
 Bunch of Grapes Tavern, on March 1, 1786, whose 
 call was especially addressed to all officers and sol- 
 diers of the late war who might wish to become pur- 
 chasers of lands in the Ohio country. It was to be 
 led by General Rufus Putnam, of Massachusetts ; 
 and it was determined that those only should go 
 who were men of some means, of character, and who 
 intended to become actual residents of the new 
 country. The State of Virginia, with unexampled 
 generosity, had surrendered her claim to this vast 
 and fertile region to the Congress of the Confecl- 
 eration. The scheme for the settlement of it occu- 
 pied a very near place in Washington's heart. He 
 was the counsellor and friend of General Putnam 
 at every stage of its progress. Yet while they 
 were willing to purchase the lands they desired for 
 the Ohio Company, as it was called, those who con- 
 trolled the plan in Massachusetts felt that there 
 must be guaranteed to them civil and religious 
 •liberty in their new homes, and that slavery should 
 not exist therein. While Putnam was to superin- 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. '_! ! 5 
 
 tend the expedition, Dr. Manasseh Cutler was the 
 envoy to Congress to settle definitely these im- 
 portant points. The Ordinance of 1787 was the 
 last great act of that Congress so soon to pass 
 away, and it crowned its long and checkered career 
 with glorious light. By that ordinance neither 
 slavery nor involuntary servitude was ever to exist 
 in the States to be formed from the Northwest Ter- 
 ritory. Nor should it be forgotten that in this 
 great act the representatives of Virginia concurred 
 with those of Massachusetts, as it passed with the 
 objection of but a single vote. I intend, of course, 
 but a passing allusion to this great event ; but to 
 us it is of profound interest in many ways. To 
 quote a remark of Mr. George W. Curtis, although 
 not with verbal accuracy, no body of men have 
 ever impressed themselves on a whole nation as 
 the Puritan founders of New England. This colony 
 was the first swarm from the New England hive. 
 It finally embraced nearly fifty officers of the Revo- 
 lutionary Army ; it was led by one of the best men 
 that Massachusetts ever produced. He was a lieu- 
 tenant-colonel in a Worcester County regiment on 
 the day of the battle of Bunker Hill, and became 
 an engineer of the American Army on the arrival 
 of Washington.' He planned and executed the last 
 works on Dorchester Heights, by which General 
 Howe was compelled either to fight or to fly. Al- 
 though mainly self-taught, he was a natural mathe- 
 matician, and in a letter to Congress Washington 
 said of him that he was the best engineer, French 
 
246 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 or American, that the army ever had. He was of 
 the near kindred, a cousin, of General Israel Put- 
 nam, with whom he is often confounded. Fort 
 Putnam and the remains of the fortifications which 
 still exist at West Point were constructed by him, 
 as a part of the plan for the capture of Burgoyne, 
 by preventing his junction with the British troops 
 at New York. These are often erroneously sup- 
 posed to have been the work of General Israel Put- 
 nam, whose abilities were rather those of courage 
 and action in the field. The confusion, however, 
 is very natural, as General Israel Putnam actually 
 commanded the troops at that part of the Hudson 
 River, and in a certain sense, there directed the 
 works. 
 
 But the profounclest interest in this colony still 
 is due to the fact that it went forth to make of the 
 principles of the Declaration of Independence and 
 of the Ordinance of 1787 living realities, and that 
 millions live in the enjoyment of liberty and pros- 
 perity to bless its founders for their noble enter- 
 prise. Virginia and Massachusetts — I use the 
 words of Senator Hoar — " may well clasp each 
 other's hands anew as they survey the glory of 
 their work. These two States, the two oldest of 
 the sisterhood, — the State which framed the first 
 written constitution, and the State whose founders 
 framed the compact on the " Mayflower ; " the 
 State which produced Washington, and the State 
 which summoned him to his high command ; the 
 State whose son drafted the Declaration of Indepen- 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 247 
 
 dence, and the State which furnished its leading ad- 
 vocate on the floor; the mother of John Marshall, 
 and the mother of the President who appointed him ; 
 the State which gave the general, and the Slate 
 which furnished the largest number of soldiers, to 
 the Revolution ; the State which gave the terri- 
 tory of the Northwest, and the State which gave 
 its first settlers, — may well delight to remember 
 that they share between them the honor of the 
 authorship of the Ordinance of 1787. . . . The 
 estrangements of four years have not obliterated the 
 common and tender memories of two centuries." 
 
 The centennial anniversary of the other event 
 to which I would allude is to be celebrated this 
 week in Concord, N. H., by an address before the 
 Historical Society and the citizens. Simple as I 
 understand the ceremony is to be, the act com- 
 memorated is one of the highest magnitude. AVe 
 spoke at our last meeting of the convention to 
 form the Constitution of the United States, which 
 was in session a hundred years before in Philadel- 
 phia. As recommended to the people, it was pro- 
 vided that it should <j-o into full effect when it had 
 received the assent of nine of the thirteen States, 
 and to the Congress of the Confederation was in- 
 trusted, as its last duty, that of then setting in opera- 
 tion the new government. The year that followed 
 was one of immense anxiety. The Constitution was 
 in fact, as Mr. John Quincy Adams has said, "ex- 
 torted from the grind in l;; necessities of unwilling; 
 States." To us who have known no other govern- 
 
248 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 merit than this ; who have seen in how large 
 measure it has fulfilled the noble words of the 
 preamble, which declare that it is ordained by the 
 people of the United States " in order to form a 
 more perfect union, establish justice, insure domes- 
 tic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, 
 promote the general welfare, and secure the bless- 
 ings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity," — it 
 is somewhat difficult to understand the serious op- 
 position it encountered. The causes of it are not, 
 however, far to seek. It involved the relinquish- 
 ment of some of their own highest powers of gov- 
 ernment by the States, and the consequent fear that 
 those thus relinquished might be used disadvan- 
 tageous^ to them. The small States were appre- 
 hensive of being crushed by the larger, while the 
 latter felt that too much power had been conceded 
 to the former. The system of slavery, from its 
 very nature demanding peculiar guaranties, had 
 strong influence in some, although not all, the slave- 
 holding States. Nor had the Constitution of the 
 United States been preceded by a bill or declaration 
 of rights, such as then and now precedes the Con- 
 stitution of Massachusetts, and such as were in 
 existence in most of the other States of the Union. 
 Such a declaration, asserting the equal rights of 
 all before the law, — freedom of speech and of the 
 press, freedom of conscience in religious matters, 
 freedom of elections, security against unreasonable 
 searches and seizures or excessive fines or punish- 
 ments, trial by jury in civil and criminal cases, the 
 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 249 
 
 protection of property against public use except on 
 full compensation, the independence of the judi- 
 ciary, — would have comprehended only the great 
 principles of English liberty as we had always 
 asserted them. It was said in the convention that 
 this was unnecessary ; that the government to be 
 funned was one of limited powers ; that these prin- 
 ciples were applicable to the relation between the 
 States and their immediate citizens ; and that so far 
 as they were appropriate to the general govern- 
 ment they were necessarily implied. Whatever 
 may be the logical merit of this answer, and it cer- 
 tainly has some, it did not take into account the 
 natural feeling of a people proud of their liberty. 
 who had endured great sacrifices to maintain it, 
 and who were jealous of surrendering the power 
 they possessed into other hands without ample 
 security against its abuse. It was therefore one of 
 the few mistakes made by the convention, that 
 it had not accompanied the Constitution with a 
 solemn assertion of the great principles of liberty 
 which formed its groundwork. All these are found 
 in the first ten amendments to the Constitution, 
 passed in pursuance of its provisions, and so nearly 
 contemporaneously with it as to be treated now 
 almost as an original part. They were all pro- 
 posed at the first session of the First Congress. 
 
 As the Constitution was to be operative on all 
 the people, it was determined by the convention 
 that it must be adopted by the people themselves 
 in each State, acting through conventions specially 
 
250 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 called for the purpose by the legislatures of their 
 respective States. Although the convention of 
 Pennsylvania, at the instance of Franklin, who was 
 the President, as he was termed, of the State, and 
 who thus rendered his last great public service, was 
 called previously to that of Delaware, the latter 
 has the honor of being the first to accept the Con- 
 stitution, which it did on the 6th day of December, 
 1787, at a convention in Dover in that State, and 
 by a unanimous vote. Nor does the language used 
 want anything in explicitness, for the record says, 
 " The deputies of the Delaware State fully, freely, 
 and entirely approved of, assented to, ratified, and 
 confirmed the Federal Constitution," and on the 
 next day each delegate subscribed his name. It was 
 in the debate in the convention of Pennsylvania 
 that the objection to the Constitution arising from 
 the fact that it was not prefaced by a bill of rights 
 first became manifest. But, excited by the example 
 of Delaware, the Federalists (of course I use the 
 word as it was then used, indicating supporters of 
 the Constitution, and not as afterwards used, when 
 it designated a great political party) determined 
 to press the matter to a close ; and on the 12th 
 of December, 1787, by a vote of two to one, the 
 Constitution was adopted, Pennsylvania thus prov- 
 ing herself worthy of the name she has sometimes 
 received, as the keystone of the American arch. 
 New Jersey followed by a unanimous vote on the 
 18th of December ; and thus the three central 
 States of the Union formed a pillar of strength in 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 251 
 
 all the subsequent controversy. On the 2d of 
 January, 1788, Georgia unanimously ratified the 
 Constitution in convention at Augusta ; and Con- 
 necticut on the 9th of January, at Hartford, fol- 
 lowed her example by a majority of three to one. 
 
 Much anxiety was now 7 felt as to the action of 
 the convention in Massachusetts, which was to as- 
 semble on the same day as that on which the con- 
 vention in Connecticut finished its work. It was 
 known that there was a strong party in Massachu- 
 setts opposed to the Constitution, and her example 
 might be decisive of the project. Madison and 
 Hamilton; in their respective States of Virginia and 
 New York, were bending every energy to complete 
 the work the inception of which they had so nobly 
 aided, and w r ere encountering strong and powerful 
 opposition from men who represented much of the 
 wealth and the talent of those States. Reinforced 
 by the example of Massachusetts, they might hope 
 each to conclude the struggle successfully. John 
 Hancock, then the Governor of the commonwealth, 
 was chosen President of the convention, and from 
 the first the Federalists adopted the plan of treating 
 their opponents with great deference and courtesy. 
 It was found that in all the commercial and sea- 
 shore towns, and especially in Boston, there was a 
 strong feeling in favor of the Constitution. The 
 rural population was less inclined to it. Samuel 
 Adams was supposed to be less favorably disposed 
 than most of the leading; citizens of the State: 
 but the strong attitude taken by the mechanics 
 
252 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 of Boston, who had always been his supporters, 
 had its influence upon him. The objection most 
 strongly pressed was the want of a distinct bill 
 of rights and privileges. This was finally met 
 with adroitness, but entire fairness. While the 
 ratification must be positive and explicit ; while 
 to have annexed any condition would have de- 
 prived it of any force, — it was competent, while 
 accepting the Constitution fully, freely, and as 
 it was written, to recommend that certain amend- 
 ments should be subsequently adopted. Hancock, 
 who had been kept from the chair by the gout, on 
 the 31st of January took his place and proposed 
 this plan. He suggested nine several amendments 
 to be recommended, while the ratification by the 
 State should be unqualified. These were drawn 
 with great clearness and force, and are under- 
 stood to have been the workmanship of Theophilns 
 Parsons, afterwards Chief-Justice of Massachusetts. 
 The most important of them is found in what is 
 now the tenth amendment to the Constitution, 
 which declares : " All powers not delegated to the 
 United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited 
 by it to the States, are reserved to the States re- 
 spectively, or to the people." The skilful plan 
 thus proposed was acceded to ; and on the 6th of 
 February the motion to ratify the Constitution was 
 passed by a vote of 187 to 168. With this every 
 symptom of unpleasant opposition here vanished. 
 Massachusetts was the sixth State to ratify the 
 Constitution. The bells were runs; and cannon 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 253 
 
 fired in every part of the town, while as night 
 approached, bonfires illuminated the scene. The 
 Long Lane, as it was called, upon which stood the 
 meeting-house where the convention met, had its 
 name changed by common consent to Federal Street, 
 which it bears to-day. " The Boston people," Gen- 
 ral Knox wrote to Chancellor Livingston, " have 
 lost their senses with joy." 
 
 The centennial of this interesting day was cele- 
 brated last February in the hall where we are now 
 gathered, by a most appropriate address from the 
 accomplished President of the Society w r hose hospi- 
 tality we are now enjoying; and if they made some- 
 what less noise than their ancestors, yet those who 
 were privileged to participate met, I trust, with no 
 less grateful hearts. 
 
 Maryland ratified the Constitution on April 25, 
 1788, by a majorit}^ of six to one, and on May 23, 
 South Carolina did the same by a majority of more 
 than two to one; each State, like Massachusetts, 
 suggesting amendments, but making its ratifica- 
 tion unconditional. 
 
 Eight States had now given their assent, and 
 but one more was needed to make nine, which 
 would complete the government. From that time, 
 whether other States came in or stayed out, the 
 experiment would be tried, and the position of all 
 the hesitating States would necessarily change. 
 The conventions of New York and Virginia were 
 in session, and debate in each was high and hot, 
 when, exactly a hundred years ago today, on the 
 
254 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 18th of June, 1787, the convention of New Hamp- 
 shire met at Concord, by adjournment from Exeter, 
 in that State. Of this convention Mr. Ebenezer 
 Webster, the father of Daniel Webster, was a 
 member. How New Hampshire should decide 
 was a matter of supreme importance ; for if she 
 favored the Union, and its government was in- 
 augurated, New York and Virginia would have to 
 face a formidable problem in confronting such a 
 government. A system of express riders had been 
 arranged between Hamilton and some of the leading 
 Federalists of New England, including Rufus King 
 and General Knox, to which General Sullivan, the 
 President of the New Hampshire convention, was 
 without doubt a party, that Hamilton should have 
 the earliest intelligence at Poughkeepsie, where the 
 convention of New York was in session, while he 
 in turn would despatch it to Madison, at Richmond, 
 by another system of riders. The post travelled 
 then only about fifty miles a day, and for that he 
 could not wait. Every moment was precious. On 
 the 21st day of June, 1788, after a session of only 
 four days, the convention of New Hampshire rati- 
 fied the Constitution, and the new government was 
 thenceforth a fixed and settled fact. The record 
 states that the vote was taken at one o'clock in the 
 afternoon, and is supposed to have been thus par- 
 ticular in order that if Virginia voted the same 
 day, she should not dispute with New Hampshire 
 the honor of giving life to the Constitution. An 
 express messenger immediately started, sent by 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 255 
 
 General Sullivan to Governor Hancock ; and the 
 glad tidings went forward at once to Hamilton, 
 while Boston again broke into one of its outbursts 
 of joy. The message on the 24th of June reached 
 Hamilton at Poughkeepsie ; and as the distance 
 was two hundred and fifty miles, the feat was 
 then thought a marvel of enterprise. Who the 
 stout riders that bore it so rapidly were, there is 
 no one to relate ; but the wallet thrown across 
 their shoulders bore the news that a nation had 
 sprung into life fully armed, as it is fabled that 
 the Athenian goddess was born, and that the 
 sword of liberty and justice to all men was in her 
 hand. On the same day the message went for- 
 ward from Hamilton to Madison at Richmond ; 
 but before it could reach him, Virginia had 
 spoken. In her convention had ensued the most 
 remarkable debate that had occurred in any State. 
 Its leaders on opposite sides were Patrick Henry 
 and James Madison. Nor were they unequally 
 matched ; for while Madison had none of the im- 
 passioned eloquence of Henry, yet, cool, calm, and 
 judicious in a protracted debate, — which, if main- 
 tained long enough, will be decided by reason and 
 argument, and not by emotion or passion, — he 
 was a most formidable opponent. On the 25th 
 of June, without the knowledge that the Constitu- 
 tion had already been adopted by the requisite 
 number of States, Virginia ratified it absolutely, 
 although, as in Massachusetts, certain amendments 
 were recommended. The conduct of Henry was 
 

 256 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 manly and patriotic. When the result was reached, 
 he gave his assent to it as a citizen who would seek 
 only to amend what he deemed the defects of the 
 system in a constitutional way. It is pleasant to 
 remember that in after years he was offered the 
 position of Chief-Justice of the United States lyy 
 Washington, although his then broken health com- 
 pelled him to decline it. 
 
 The conflict in New York was bitter to the last ; 
 but when ten States had ratified, Hamilton had in 
 his hands a weapon whose thrusts could not be par- 
 ried. As fast as horse and man could carry it, the 
 joyful news from Madison of the vote of Virginia 
 reached him ; yet this was not until the 8th of 
 July. On the 26th day of July, by the slender 
 majority of three votes, New York ratified the 
 Constitution, in terms less explicit than could have 
 been wished, yet which may fairly be termed un- 
 conditional. For Hamilton it was indeed a day of 
 just and splendid triumph. North Carolina and 
 Rhode Island alone were left, and their ratification 
 soon followed ; nor is it easy to see how they could 
 have done otherwise. 
 
 Throughout the long struggle, the words of 
 Washington had been heard in every contested 
 State, in letters which show how wise and far- 
 seeing he was, urging upon his countrymen the 
 adoption of the Constitution. The universal be- 
 lief that he was the one to be first called to ad- 
 minister it, and to try whatever of experiment it 
 involved, had, without doubt, a strong influence 
 on the result. 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 2-j7 
 
 The Congress of the Confederation met for the 
 last time in July, 1788, to give direction for the 
 organization of the new government and practi- 
 cally to read its own death-warrant. It made New 
 York the temporary seat of the new government, 
 and the first Wednesday of the next March, which 
 was that year the 4th, was designated to com- 
 mence proceedings under it. It fixed a time for 
 the choice of the electors of President and Vice- 
 President, and it left to the States each for itself 
 the times and places of choosing their senators and 
 representatives. It was not, in fact, until the 6th 
 of April of the next year that the Senate and 
 House formed a quorum, and that the votes were 
 counted by John Langdon, the President of the 
 Senate, in the presence of the two Houses. Each 
 elector had at that time two votes on a single 
 ballot, the President and Vice-President being voted 
 for on the same ticket, and the highest in number 
 being the chosen President. Every one of the 
 electoral ballots w r as for Washington ; and John 
 Adams, having the next highest in number, was 
 declared Vice-President. 
 
 Washington arrived in New York on the 23d of 
 April, and the 30th was appointed for his inaugu- 
 ration. The hall of the Senate w T as upon Wall 
 Street, where he was ceremoniously received by the 
 two Houses on the day fixed. He was then fifty- 
 seven years old, in the manly vigor of his mature 
 life, before age with its frosty touch had laid its 
 hand upon him. As he stepped out on the balcony 
 
258 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 which had been reared in front of the hall before 
 the vast crowd that filled the streets, all felt that 
 no more majestic and stately presence had ever 
 been seen among magistrates or the rulers of men. 
 Even this seemed but little when his high char- 
 acter, his grave wisdom,»his self-sacrificing patriot- 
 ism, were remembered. The oath of office was 
 administered to him by Chancellor Livingston, who 
 added, " Long live George Washington, President 
 of the United States ! " while the streets rang with 
 acclamations. He returned to the Senate chamber, 
 and as he closed his inaugural speech, trembling 
 with emotion, he said : " It would be peculiarly 
 improper to omit in this first official act my fer- 
 vent supplications to that Almighty Being who 
 presides in the councils of nations, that his bene- 
 diction may consecrate to the liberties and hap- 
 piness of the people of the United States a 
 government instituted by themselves. .• . . The 
 preservation of liberty and the destiny of the re- 
 publican model of government are justly consid- 
 ered as deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the 
 experiment intrusted to the American people." 
 
 From the masses of the people in many forms 
 of expression, from "public meetings, from the 
 most eminent citizens at home, from friends of 
 the country and of republican institutions abroad, 
 Washington received most cordial good wishes as he 
 entered upon his great task. As the opening suc- 
 cess of his administration began to develop itself, 
 he had the pleasure of receiving from Franklin, a 
 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 250 
 
 short time before the aged patriot died, a letter of 
 congratulation, in which he said, " For my own 
 persona] case I should have died two years ago ; 
 but though those years have been spent in ex- 
 cruciating pain, I am pleased that I have lived, 
 since they have brought me to see our present 
 situation." 
 
 On the 4th of March next a hundred years will 
 have passed since the government commenced un- 
 der this illustrious man came into existence. It 
 began in doubts and anxieties long since dispelled, 
 as its wonderful elasticity and its imperial strength 
 have been recognized. While the highest have 
 not been above its power, the humblest have not 
 been below its fostering care. It has not only 
 borne us with favoring gales over sunny seas ; it 
 has weathered the wildest storm that ever raged 
 on sea or land. 
 
 There have been twenty-five Presidential elec- 
 tions. We now approach the twenty-sixth, which 
 will be the first in our second century of national 
 life. Of course there are differences of opinion, 
 which are expected to find in it their appropriate 
 expression. Nor would it be desirable that such 
 occasions should pass without discussion and delib- 
 eration, as it would argue an indifference to public 
 affairs in which no citizen has a right to indulge. 
 It was intended by the fathers that power should 
 return to the people at short intervals, that they 
 might express their wish as to its exercise. Yd 
 as there can be no administration of public affairs 
 
260 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 which, if successful, will not shed its benefits on all, 
 nor any which, if disastrous, will not involve all in 
 a common misfortune, the contest may well be 
 fraternal, and such as becomes those who seek 
 alike the general welfare. The glory and the hap- 
 piness of the country are dear to all its children. 
 Let our actions and our example, then, always 
 show that, as the people are the rightful authors 
 and depositaries of power, so they are also its 
 safest and wisest guardians. 
 
 1889. 
 
 I would remind you that at our last meeting we 
 spoke of the trials that attended the adoption 
 of the Constitution of the United States, and of 
 the fact that, before our meeting of to-day, the 
 Centennial Anniversary of the Inauguration of 
 Washington as our first President would be com- 
 memorated. 
 
 The War of the Revolution had been fought 
 through on the great basis of the sovereignty of 
 the people, yet by States which had asserted their 
 independence not only from any foreign govern- 
 ment, but each from the other. The Continental 
 Congress and the Congress of the Confederation 
 had done their work through many difficulties and 
 trials. Alternately urging and imploring the 
 respective States, having no executive powers to 
 enforce their decrees, and no executive head 
 through whom they could act, they had still ended 
 the war in triumph by the peace of Versailles in 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 261 
 
 1783. Inadequate for the time of war, it was 
 obvious that a mere Congress of distinct States 
 could never govern when the danger and pressure 
 of war were withdrawn. All saw that in some way 
 the States must be united in a single government, 
 alike as regarded foreign nations and in those 
 relations with each other upon which their inter- 
 course, commerce, and safety depended. Their 
 citizens must be made one people, as they had 
 asserted themselves to be in that sentence of the 
 Declaration which prefaces the statement of the 
 causes which induced them as one people to 
 dissolve the political bands which had connected 
 them with another. Yet the jealousies of the 
 different States, the reluctance of the people to 
 yield any portion of their power except to their 
 own immediate State government, the fear, en- 
 gendered by the long and desperate struggle with 
 the British Crown, of executive authority, which 
 they knew must be partially surrendered if the 
 government they sought to create w^as to be 
 efficient, were formidable obstacles. The great 
 executive powers which are in the hands of the 
 President of the United States we look at to-day 
 without any apprehension or fear that they can be 
 used to the injury of the people or the diminution 
 of its liberties. We recall how wisely and judi- 
 ciously, taken as a whole, they have always been 
 exerted ; and we have lived when the safety of a 
 nation demanded that they should be exercised 
 to their utmost limit. It is doubtful if a hundred 
 
262 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 years ago they would have been confided to any 
 one but for the thought that Washington would be 
 the first to exercise them, and that by him the new 
 government w r ould be tested. The sword they 
 placed in his hands, strongly wielded as it would 
 be against domestic disorder or foreign aggression, 
 they knew would never be used to oppress those 
 who had invested him with power. The vast obli- 
 gations they w r ere under to him as a warrior they 
 recognized, but his fame had not been that of a 
 soldier only ; his wisdom, calmness, and moderation 
 had been tried often, and had never failed. His 
 unselfishness was as conspicuous as his valor. If 
 he had ambition, it was that which was to be 
 satisfied by serving highly a great and noble cause, 
 and not by empty honors or rich emoluments. 
 Among all the men the world has known, history 
 has recorded none so fit as he to be the guardian 
 of the only liberty worth having, — the liberty 
 which is enshrined in and defined and protected by 
 law. Profound as was the wisdom of Hamilton, 
 Madison, and the other statesmen who framed the 
 Constitution, skilfully and bravely as they dealt 
 with the many trials in their path, had it not 
 been that Washington presided over their delib- 
 erations, and consented, reluctantly, yet yield- 
 ing to a high sense of duty, to endeavor to 
 make of that Constitution a living thing by 
 demonstrating its capacity for practical operation, 
 it may be that their work would have come to 
 naught. 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 2G3 
 
 It was therefore most fitting that the Centennial 
 Anniversary of the Inauguration of our first 
 President should have been celebrated as it was in 
 our great commercial metropolis, where the event 
 took place ; nor does anything appear to have been 
 wanting; to the magnificence of the scene. The 
 naval parade in the harbor ; the march of sixty 
 thousand soldiers through the streets, — soldiers 
 only because they were citizens ; the array of 
 veterans ; the splendid exhibitions of trade and 
 commerce ; and, above all, the hundreds of 
 thousands of happy, contented people, — united to 
 constitute, not an empty pageant, but the tribute 
 which the occasion demanded ; while the utter- 
 ances of the distinguished orator, of the President 
 and the two ex-Presidents of the United States, 
 were replete with patriotic fervor, and appealed to 
 no sentiments but those which are the common 
 property of all true American hearts. Not less 
 interesting was it that, in response to the pro- 
 clamation of the President, and in memory of the 
 fact that a hundred years before, prayer had been 
 offered in all the churches of New York for the 
 success of the new government, so many of our 
 churches and religious societies throughout the 
 entire country gathered together in thankfulness 
 for the past, in hope for the future, in earnest 
 prayer that as God had been to our fathers so 
 might he be to us. It was a day. whatever our 
 creed or party, whatever our fortune or station, 
 when all desired to meet, united only by the tie of 
 
264 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 American citizenship. It is not my purpose to 
 call attention to the difference between that day of 
 prayerful anxiety when the first President was 
 inaugurated, and the splendid ceremonial which 
 celebrated its Centennial Anniversary, or to attempt 
 to point out in detail the vast growth of the United 
 States within the past century, its widely extended 
 boundaries, or the great increase in wealth, not 
 merely in the hands of a few, but in its wider 
 diffusion through all ranks. It may be said that 
 with a fertile continent at our disposal, even had 
 we remained colonies, it would not have been far 
 otherwise. If to some extent this must be recog- 
 nized as true, it is also true that much is due to 
 the Constitution under which we have lived. The 
 lesson of America to the world is the capacity of* 
 the people for self-government ; and she has herself 
 reaped the advantage of the lesson she has taught. 
 Nor do I doubt that if those who framed this 
 wondrous scheme were permitted to look upon 
 their work, they would feel that, in spite of all 
 deductions, it has been carried forward in the 
 spirit in which they commenced it. It is said 
 that one of Napoleon's marshals, who always re- 
 tained ardently his republican faith, as he stood 
 most unwillingly at the coronation of the emperor, 
 was asked, " Is there anything wanting to the 
 splendor of this scene?" He answered gloomily, 
 " Nothing but the presence of the half-million men 
 who have died on the battle-field that it should be 
 impossible." But it seems to me, that if, upon such 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 265 
 
 a scene as that which commemorated the Inaujm- 
 ration of Washington, those who have served us 
 wisely and bravely through the past one hundred 
 years, and are gone before us, had been permitted 
 to look, — the wise men who have made for us just 
 and equal laws ; the saintly men who, not by per- 
 suasion only, but by the higher example of their 
 noble lives, have pointed us up the highest paths of 
 charity and religion ; the brave from our hundred 
 battle-fields, from the snows of Valley Forge or 
 from Saratoga and Yorktown, and those who came 
 from Gettysburg and Appomattox, — that invisible 
 host with one voice would have said, " Whatever 
 we gave, in the way of thought or teaching, ex- 
 ample or even life, we gave willingly, that the 
 American people might be thus free, great, and 
 happy." On such an occasion, as we look forward 
 as well as back, our glance is no doubt colored with 
 fear or with hope, to some extent, by our own 
 peculiarity of temperament. Each age lias its 
 trials ; the coming one will not be free from them. 
 In all that we can recall of the past, in all that we 
 see around us in the present, I can see no ground 
 for that distrust of the future in which gentlemen 
 sometimes indulge. The past has always about it 
 a glamour that attracts the fancy, a haze that 
 obscures its harsher and more distasteful features. 
 There were never better or more hopeful times than 
 those in which we live ; nor do I allude now to 
 material wealth, but to those higher qualities which 
 ennoble and dignify life. A republic must depend, 
 
2G6 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 finally, upon the character of the mass of its people, 
 and upon their fitness to bear the burdens of that 
 citizenship which is cast upon them. Wise and 
 great as Washington was, he would have had no 
 success in his trying task if the intellect and heart 
 of America had not responded cordially to his. 
 It is the character which the great body of our. 
 people have exhibited, the responsibilities they 
 have felt, the patriotism they have displayed, that 
 have brought the nation to the proud position in 
 which it stands to-day. If the statelier manners 
 of a former generation are gone, I am far from 
 thinking that ours have degenerated into either 
 rudeness or vulgarity. In all the various grades of 
 the social scale, in all the walks of life, no people 
 ever showed more regard and consideration each 
 for the other than do the American people now. 
 And as none was ever more regardful of others, so 
 none was itself ever more dignified and calmly 
 self-respectful. 
 
 If wealth has been showered upon us in large 
 measure, never was wealth more generously used 
 in the sacred causes of education, charity, and re- 
 ligion. Our temples of religious worship, our 
 universities and schools, our hospitals, attest the 
 lavish hands with which it is poured out through 
 the wide channels of public and private munifi- 
 cence. How instant was the response when the 
 news of the sad disaster in Pennsylvania was 
 spread abroad ! The losses of the great capital- 
 ists and manufacturers could not be repaired ex- 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 207 
 
 cept in time, through their own enterprise and in- 
 dustry ; but every village recognized that a suffer- 
 ing people was its kindred, and was ready with 
 its contribution, that they should instantly have 
 food, clothing, and shelter. 
 
 Nor, as in retrospect we recall the terrible 
 struggle through which, more than twenty-five 
 years ago, we were called upon to pass, shall we 
 feel that patriotism has been or will be wanting. 
 The men who then seized their muskets grow old 
 and gray, and move somewhat heavily now ; but 
 their successors come with the swinging stride of 
 youth, with equal courage, and if the sacrifice shall 
 be demanded of them, we cannot doubt, with equal 
 self-devotion. The bronze of the old heroic ages 
 can be recast again and again, and lose neither its 
 strength nor its fibre. As our great Civil War drew 
 on. there were not wanting those who said, " It is 
 useless to try to preserve a Union between States 
 so discordant ; " or who, deeply sensible of the 
 evils of slavery, still said, " Let the wayward sis- 
 ters go in peace ! " Not such was the answer of 
 the patriotic heart of the country. As the start- 
 ling news was spread abroad that our flag had 
 been fired upon, our sovereignty denied, came 
 back the stern response : " The United States is 
 a nation competent everywhere to assert its right- 
 ful authority." How grand was that uprising, 
 how magnificent were the results achieved, I do 
 not need to remind you. The brave dead lie on 
 many a field made sacred by their valor; but 
 
268 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 heavy as was the price, who shall say that what 
 they accomplished was not worth it ? Who shall 
 say that if they might be restored to us again, 
 but with them must be restored the discordant 
 Union with its system of slavery, we could wish 
 them back ? Nay, who believes that they would 
 themselves accept life again at such a price ? The 
 fathers of the Constitution knew the flaw in their 
 work, but it was a difficulty that they could not 
 extricate from the problem before them ; they 
 trusted it would pass away before the advancing 
 light of freedom and knowledge. It was not thus 
 to be. It was to vanish only in the storm -and the 
 tempest ; but now that it is gone, earth and sky 
 are sweeter and fairer than before. 
 
 It is the immediate object of our Society to 
 honor the patriots of the Revolution, but it is es- 
 pecially their example which we strive to incul- 
 cate. With the men of our war that memory was 
 present always as an inspiration and a guide, — a 
 pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night ; and 
 by the law of natural association, the fame of the 
 patriots of the Revolution gathers to itself always 
 that of those who faithfully, wisely, or bravely 
 serve their country. Standing on the verge of 
 the second century of our national life, the future 
 waves towards us its beckoning hand. The call 
 must be answered, and the nation goes forward to 
 meet it. Let it advance, not in the sordid spirit 
 of those who seek only material gain, but in the 
 firm belief that an exalted love of country, and 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 269 
 
 an earnest wish for the elevation of its people, 
 will guide it safely through all the rocks and over 
 all the shoals that ma}' beset its onward way. 
 
 Before I leave this theme, it may not be im- 
 proper to remind you that within the past year 
 has died almost the only great English statesman 
 who steadfastly and unflinchingly upheld our 
 cause during; the late Civil War. It is said that 
 " the troubles of one nation are the opportunities 
 of another," as then the latter may urge her 
 claims and pursue her demands to advantage. 
 No such worldly maxim of statecraft ever entered 
 his loyal heart. With an eloquence that had made 
 for him one of the highest places among orators 
 who speak in the English tongue, his voice was 
 heard on our behalf alike on the platform and 
 in the House of Commons. Fronting the great 
 commercial and industrial interests which would 
 willingly have seen so formidable a rival as the 
 United States crushed, and with whom his own 
 fortunes were identified, he always insisted that 
 the cause of the Union was the cause of law 
 and order as against disorder and anarchy, of 
 right and justice as against wrong and injustice, 
 of liberty against slavery. The American who 
 visits the great manufacturing city which was the 
 home of this great and good man, may well pause 
 for a moment in grateful memory at the humble 
 Friends' burial-ground, where John Bright, to use 
 his simple phrase, rests " among his own people." 
 It is an interesting fact also, not unworthy 
 
270 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 of passing notice, that the same week that wit- 
 nessed on this continent the close of the Ameri- 
 can Revolution by the inauguration of Wash- • 
 ington on April 30, saw upon the other side of 
 the ocean the commencement of that great move- 
 ment in political affairs, the French Revolution, by 
 the assembling of the States-General on the 5th of 
 May, 1789. The principles then avowed are not 
 to be confounded with those which controlled four 
 years later. The right of the governed to partici- 
 pate in the government so far as to determine for 
 what and the amount for which they shall be 
 taxed, the right of all to be taxed alike and to 
 stand equal before the law, the concurrence of the 
 nation and the ruler in making the laws, the re- 
 sponsibility of those who execute them, are princi- 
 ples not contested by any constitution?J monarchy 
 in Europe. When we recollect that at that time 
 the subjects of some of the European princes were 
 sold as sheep to fight in wars in which they 
 had no interest, that a formidable part of the 
 British Army during the last years of the War 
 of the Revolution consisted of those who would 
 themselves most willingly have been harmless 
 German peasants, and whom we knew under the 
 general name of Hessians, it must be conceded 
 that something like a revolution was sorely 
 needed in Europe. The excesses, deplorable as 
 they were, into which at a later period the French 
 Revolution fell, when confronted with the armies 
 of all the monarchical powers of Europe, in its as- 
 
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 271 
 
 sertion of the right of the French people to govern 
 themselves, must not blind us to the fact that it 
 marked a great step in the progress of self-govern- 
 ment. This great event France is now celebrat- 
 ing by her magnificent Exposition, for which in 
 aid of our interests the Congress of the United 
 States has made a most liberal appropriation. 
 She has wisely made it the occasion for a celebra- 
 tion of peace, with no disposition to awaken the 
 memory of the wars which desolated Europe. It 
 was perhaps not to be expected that the represen- 
 tatives of the monarchical governments, even of 
 those which have themselves conceded all that was 
 demanded by the States-General of 1789, would be 
 represented at its opening ceremonial ; but I have 
 observed that two hundred and sixty-three mem- 
 bers of Parliament, with the illustrious Mr. Glad- 
 stone at their head, have protested against the 
 absence of the British minister on that occasion. 
 The republics of the world were there, our own 
 at the head ; and I cannot but consider it a for- 
 tunate circumstance that the banquet given by 
 them to the President and the French Govern- 
 ment was presided over by Mr. McLane. the re- 
 tiring American minister, and attended by Mr. 
 Whitelaw Reid, the incoming minister (whose 
 credentials had not then been formally presented), 
 for I feel that the good people of both our great 
 parties unite in the wish that France, our earliest 
 friend and our always faithful ally, may enjoy all 
 the advantages of a permanent, well-settled, orderly, 
 
272 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 
 
 free government. For the third time in her his- 
 tory of the century she is a republic. That her 
 difficulties are many, is readily seen. Compelled 
 to maintain a great army, subjected to the jeal- 
 ousy of the governments about her, beset by the 
 supporters of the regal and imperial families, there 
 is no easy task before those who strive to guide 
 her destinies ; but I warmly wish that she ma/ 
 rise above them all. 
 
 Never, since the Napoleonic wars, was there a 
 time when Europe was so oppressed with vast 
 armies and armaments, as to-day. It is our 
 fortune to try the problem of republican govern- 
 ment under happier conditions, and such as have 
 never before existed. No armies oppress our 
 people with their vast expenditure, no factions 
 threaten our form of government ; there is use- 
 ful and honorable employment for all. It is for 
 us as faithful citizens to show that we are wor- 
 thy of the political blessings that have so gen- 
 erously been bestowed upon us. 
 
ORATION ON THE TWENTY-FIFTH ANNI- 
 VERSARY OF THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 DELIVERED AT PHILADELPHIA, APRIL 15, 1890. 
 
 Companions of the Army and the Navy, — 
 I congratulate you that we are assembled in such 
 full numbers to celebrate the Twenty-fifth Anni- 
 versary of the formation of this Order. Sur- 
 vivors of many a hard-fought battle and many 
 a desperate day, you come alike from the long 
 marches and fierce conflicts which gave us pos- 
 session of the South and West ; from the banks 
 of the Cumberland, Tennessee, and Mississippi ; 
 from the narrower, yet not less terrible field 
 where the Army of the Potomac fought out 
 finally to the bitter end its bloody and pro- 
 tracted duel with the Army of Northern Vir- 
 ginia ; and from every scene by land or sea made 
 red by heroic strife. The mountain ranges, the 
 deep bayous, the rich and broad plains, the mighty 
 rivers of flie fairest portion of a continent, attest 
 your constanc}* and valor. Time as well as war 
 has been generous to you in this. — that for a 
 quarter of a century it has permitted you to enjoy 
 the just regard of a nation and the full fruition 
 
 18 
 
274 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 of your deeds. For this bounteous gift let us 
 render the homage of grateful hearts. 
 
 We are fortunate in the place where we as- 
 semble. The city of Philadelphia w T as the capital 
 of our Revolutionary era. Here were proclaimed 
 the birth and independence of the United States. 
 Here, too, was framed that Constitution which is 
 the crowning glory of the Revolution. The peace 
 with Great Britain, in 1783, had left us without 
 a settled government, and the discords of jealous 
 States had already appeared. The years that im- 
 mediately followed were filled with profound dis- 
 trust and anxious forebodings. The convention 
 that met here in 1787 made of these States a 
 people and a nation. Where should those who 
 offered their lives to defend that Constitution 
 meet more happily or more proudly than in the 
 city in which it received its birth ? 
 
 Nor ought we to forget that in the hour of the 
 Rebellion this city lost none of its ancient repu- 
 tation for patriotism. Its gallant sons were among 
 our earliest and bravest soldiers ; its generous con- 
 tributions, its sanitary commissions, its Christian 
 commissioners, its cordial supplies of provisions to 
 the soldiers going to or returning from the front, 
 its unfailing care of the sick and wounded, are 
 embalmed in sacred remembrance. We whose 
 residence is to the north and east had from our 
 position the largest share of this lavish hospitality. 
 One who has been through here, as I have been, 
 with a hungry regiment, and seen every man 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 275 
 
 bountifully fed, or has conic, as I have come, a 
 
 wounded soldier, and known the kind care of its 
 citizens and the skill of its justly renowned sur- 
 geons, may certainly speak with something like 
 personal feeling. 
 
 The Military Order of the Loyal Legion had its 
 inception on that saddest day, at the conclusion of 
 the Civil War, when humanity throughout the 
 world was shocked by the death of Abraham Lin- 
 coln. In honor of that illustrious memory, and 
 of the great cause for which we had fought ; in 
 recognition of the affectionate friendships which 
 had been inspired among the officers of the army 
 then about to disband ; in historic recollection of 
 the Society of the Cincinnati, which had embraced 
 the officers of the Revolutionary Army, — it was 
 determined to form this Order ; and at a meeting 
 of a few officers in this city the initial steps were 
 that day taken for its organization. It was the 
 first of the military societies which followed, or 
 rather accompanied, the close of the war. I do 
 not intend to pursue the details of its history, 
 except to say that when, some time later, the 
 society of the Grand Army of the Republic was 
 formed, intended to comprehend all of whatever 
 rank who had honorably served, no antagonism 
 was created to this, nor was any reason seen why, 
 in its more limited sphere, this might not also be 
 properly maintained. To the Grand Army of the 
 Republic we have always fully and cordially ac- 
 corded as its rightful place the position of the 
 
276 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 great representative society which includes and 
 gathers into itself every association of that whole 
 American army which subdued the Rebellion. 
 That society has extended wide its generous and 
 open-handed charity ; it has cherished the noblest 
 patriotism ; and if there are those of this associa- 
 tion who are not also members of that, I urge 
 them respectfully to join its ranks, and to give to it 
 their cordial support in its purest and highest aims. 
 Of the officers who listen to me, many, almost a 
 majority, have carried the musket and the knap- 
 sack in the ranks, and are justly proud that they 
 have won their way by their own ability and de- 
 termination. To some the possession of high mili- 
 tary qualities may have given command, yet in all 
 armies rank and promotion are often the result of 
 circumstance and opportunity, and thus accident 
 contributes to success. It was especially so in our 
 own. springing as it did from the ground at once 
 in answer to the call of an imperilled country. 
 Long and faithful service brought to many a man 
 only the proud consolation of duty nobly clone, of 
 sacrifice generously offered, and of that self-respect 
 which one may well maintain even in the hum- 
 blest home. As I would speak to-night of all our 
 armies as but one, so would I speak of those who 
 composed it as but a single body of men. Side by 
 side, on many a field won by their valor, no use- 
 less coffins around their breasts, but wrapped in 
 the blanket which is the soldier's martial shroud, 
 officers and men await together the coming of the 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 277 
 
 eternal day. Side by side those more fortunate 
 who have returned, have returned with equal 
 claims to the regard and love of those for whom 
 they fought. When one has done his whole dui \ . 
 so far as his title to respect is concerned, it can 
 and ought to make no difference whether he did it 
 with the stars of the general or the eagles of the 
 colonel on his shoulder, or in the simple jacket of 
 the private. The fame of every general, even in 
 the highest rank, must depend largely on the men 
 whom he leads. However far-reaching and saga- 
 cious his plans may be, it is still by strong hands 
 and stout hearts that they must be carried out 
 and results achieved. 
 
 When we consider how little adapted the edu- 
 cation of the American citizen is to that system of 
 discipline which is intended to make of the soldier 
 a machine, in order that the physical strength and 
 power of thousands may be wielded by the will of 
 one alone ; when we remember how prone we all 
 of us are to criticise the acts of others or their 
 orders and directions, — we realize how difficult it 
 must have been to yield that unquestioning obedi- 
 ence which is the necessary rule of the military 
 service. Yet how generously our men gave their 
 confidence, how nobly they strove, sometimes in dis- 
 aster, often under the most trying circumstances, 
 to execute the orders they received ! To one who 
 held any command the wish must often have come 
 that he could have led them better and done fuller 
 justice to their merits. 
 
278 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 Companions, we meet not merely for a few 
 hours of social enjoyment, nor alone to renew our 
 friendships formed, although many of them were 
 formed when the death-shots were falling thick and 
 fast ; we meet also to reassert our devotion to the 
 great cause of the Constitution and the Union ; we 
 meet to honor the memories of those who bravely 
 died in that righteous cause, or who have passed 
 from our side in the years that have followed, and 
 to dedicate ourselves anew to our country and to 
 the great principles of liberty and justice. 
 
 In the lonsf annals of wars with which the earth 
 
 o 
 
 has been filled, it would be difficult to find any 
 less justifiable than the War of the Rebellion. 
 The flimsy dogma of the right of a State to secede 
 from the Union at its own will and pleasure, and 
 assert its sovereignty against that of the govern- 
 ment of which it formed a component part, was a 
 pretence only by which the leaders of the slave 
 States sought to disguise their project of erecting 
 an empire whose corner-stone was to be (to use 
 Mr. Vice-President Stephens's own words) the 
 system of slavery. 
 
 Had any one in Philadelphia in 1787 uttered 
 the gloomy foreboding that every State might with- 
 draw from the Union at its own pleasure, and that 
 the Constitution had thus provided for its own dis- 
 solution, his fears would have been scouted and 
 laughed to scorn. He would have been told that 
 this Union is not one of States, but of the people 
 of all the States, — so it is expressly declared ; as 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 279 
 
 such alone can it be accepted. It was a necessity 
 of the task that the framers of the Constitu- 
 tion had before them, that the government they 
 had met to form should include two classes of 
 States. Nor did the difficulty appear to them so 
 formidable as it afterwards proved. Fresh from 
 their own struggle for liberty, they could not 
 but be conscious that slavery was utterly incon- 
 sistent with the principles upon which a free 
 government must rest ; they fully believed that 
 it would die out and drift silently away. It 
 was not thus to pass away, but in the wildest of 
 storms and tempests that ever raged on sea or 
 land ; but now that it is gone, earth and sky are 
 fairer than before. 
 
 Without dwelling on the various phases of the 
 protracted controversy to which this system gave 
 rise under the influence of men who were willing 
 to sacrifice the Union to its perpetuity, the failure 
 to make of Kansas a slave State, and the election 
 of Mr. Lincoln, had settled that there was to be no 
 more slave territory added to the Union. Madly 
 resolved to rule or ruin, those who controlled the 
 public opinion of the South determined to dissolve 
 the Union. No real grievance existed, but im- 
 aginary ones could be trumped up. No right of the 
 Southern States was invaded, or even threatened. 
 The President-elect had solemnly pledged himself 
 to protect them in every right ; nor could he, if 
 he would, have done otherwise, as, while they 
 remained, his administration would have had an 
 
280 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 adverse majority in both Houses of Congress, which 
 they could substantially control. But his election 
 was made at once the occasion of secession by the 
 cotton States, which stood, however, alone during 
 the anxious winter of 1860-61. The Union feel- 
 ing was still strong in the States that lay north 
 of them, and they were as yet reluctant to take 
 the decisive step. Something must be done to 
 involve them, — something to "fire the Southern 
 heart," as the phrase of the day was, and to in- 
 duce them to make common cause ; and so the 
 tempest of shot and shell was let loose upon 
 Fort Sumter. The experiment had the success 
 which was anticipated, and a success which was 
 not anticipated ; for if the Southern heart was 
 fired, so was the Northern also. How majestic 
 was that uprising, how former political differences 
 were forgotten, how strongly all felt that the great 
 tie of American citizenship was above all party, 
 I do not need to remind you. There were not 
 wanting those who, aghast at the gulf of fire that 
 seemed opening before us, said, " Let the way- 
 ward sisters go in peace ; " there were not wanting 
 others who, deeply sensible of the evils of slavery, 
 were ready to grasp at the opportunity of separa- 
 ting from the States which tolerated it. The loyal 
 head of the country was wiser, the loyal heart of 
 the country truer than this. As the startling news 
 flew from city to city and village to village, east 
 and west, that our flag had been insulted and tram- 
 pled upon, and the integrity of our government 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGIOX. 281 
 
 assailed, the stern tones of the answer of the 
 people always came back, " The United States is 
 a nation competent to assert its own sovereignty, 
 and to subdue and punish traitors." To them the 
 Union was not a rope of sand to be blown about 
 by every breeze, or washed away by a summer sea, 
 but a chain whose golden links were strong as 
 adamant. Forged in the fire of that great strife 
 which had finally separated us from the most 
 powerful nation on the earth, it was clear that 
 if the Union were once destroyed, all hope of 
 erecting any stable government upon its ruins 
 must for the time be abandoned. The conflicts 
 of discordant States were before us, grinding 
 against each other their bloody edges in fierce 
 contentions, which, like the wars of the Saxon 
 Heptarchy, would be worth no more to the ad- 
 vancement of the world than the wars of the 
 kites and crows. Nor if two distinct confed- 
 eracies could have been framed, was permanent 
 peace between them possible. Two great sys- 
 tems of civilization were front to front and face 
 to face. The conflict in arms, to which we had 
 been summoned by the cannon which bombarded 
 Fort Sumter, was indeed irrepressible. It was a 
 necessity of empire that one or the other should 
 conquer. Rich and broad as the continent is, 
 with its great gateways on the Atlantic and the 
 Pacific seas, it was not broad enough for both. 
 
 It was a groat elemental struggle, where the 
 differences had their origin in the foundations of 
 
282 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 society itself. There are times in the history of 
 nations when the conduct of its wars may be 
 left to its regular forces ; yet no such time had 
 come to us. It was a war of the people, waged 
 unhappily against a portion of the same people, 
 yet not the less in obedience to the plainest princi- 
 ples of justice and right. Nor let it ever be for- 
 gotten that although the leaders of the Rebellion 
 were successful in drawing into it most of the 
 States of the South, there were true men every- 
 where who never yielded and never faltered 
 in their allegiance. If I could properly give a 
 warmer welcome to any above others, it should 
 be to the gallant soldiers of Kentucky and Ten- 
 nessee, of Maryland, West Virginia, Missouri, and 
 other States of the South, who came to rejoice 
 our hearts and strengthen our hands. 
 
 It was in the feeling of the mOst exalted pa- 
 triotism that the national army was formed, and 
 the men who composed it embraced all that 
 was purest and bravest in the young life of a 
 nation. Counting all the cost, recognizing all 
 the danger, the path of duty before them was 
 plain, and they followed it. No doubt the blood 
 of youth was high in their veins, and they looked 
 forward not unwillingly to the stern joy of the 
 conflict; but love of country was still the great 
 moving principle which actuated them. It is 
 not a penalty, it is a just responsibility, that a 
 government founded by a people should look to 
 them for its legitimate defence. Certainly, I 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 283 
 
 would speak, neither to-night nor at any other 
 time, any words of harshness or unkindness in- 
 dividually of those with whom we were lately at 
 war. There is no body of men more anxious to 
 be at peace with all their countrymen than are 
 the soldiers of the national army ; there are no 
 utterances more cordial in favor of a generous 
 oblivion and forgetfulness than are theirs ; but 
 they cannot, and they ought not to forget that the 
 cause for which those who opposed them stood 
 was gravely wrong. It is the cause for which 
 our brave have died that forever sets them apart 
 among the myriads who people the silent cities 
 of the dead. Let us be generous to those with 
 whom we had to contend, but let us be just to 
 our own cause. We willingly do honor to their 
 courage and valor ; but those high equalities have 
 sometimes gilded with a false light causes which 
 cannot command the approval of the world, or 
 bear the clear, white light of time. We know 
 the allowances which must be made for erro- 
 neous beliefs, for mistaken education, for old 
 associations, for the example of others, even for 
 temporary feeling and passion. Let us make 
 them freely. Yet, when all are made, neither 
 the living nor the dead of a great and holy 
 cause can be confounded with those who fell in 
 the wretched struggle to destroy a nation or 
 erect a system of government false to the great 
 principles of liberty. Their cause, as well as 
 ours, is rapidly passing into history. Before 
 
284 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 that great tribunal we are ready to hold up our 
 hands and plead and answer. Nor shall we fear 
 that its verdict can be otherwise than that ours 
 was the cause of order against disorder, of just 
 and righteous government against rebellion, of 
 liberty against slavery. If it be less than this, 
 then was Mr. Jefferson Davis the patriot he has 
 been somewhere lately eulogized, and we, and 
 the brave who offered their lives with us, but 
 successful traitors. 
 
 It is not for us here to review, even in the most 
 cursory way, the events of that tremendous strug- 
 gle. Such would be the office of the historian, not 
 of the casual speaker. The problem before us we 
 underrated in the beginning, nor since have we 
 taken the credit which is fairly due for overcoming 
 its difficulties. To conduct a war over such an ex- 
 tended territory with success, to seize and hold its 
 strategic points in the midst of a hostile and war- 
 like population, to maintain the lengthened lines 
 of communication for armies operating far from 
 their base, constituted an enterprise unparalleled 
 in its demand for men and resources. That the 
 contest must broaden into one for the liberty of all 
 men, and that the plague spot which had troubled 
 the peace of the Union must be cut out by the 
 surgeon's knife, was obvious from the first. The 
 year 1862 stands forever memorable as including 
 one of those events whose occurrence marks the 
 opening of a new era, and shows that the great 
 bell of time has struck another hour. " I had 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 285 
 
 made a solemn vow," says Mr. Lincoln himself, 
 tk that it* General Lee was driven from Maryland 1 
 would crown the result by a declaration of freedom 
 to the slaves." That vow was faithfully kept, for 
 on the Monday which followed the information 
 that the battle of Antietam was won, such a dec- 
 laration was issued, and it was followed on Jan- 
 uary 1 by the more formal proclamation which 
 declared all persons to be free within the insurgent 
 States, stating the act to be demanded by military 
 necessity, and invoking upon it " the considerate 
 judgment of mankind and the gracious favor of 
 Almighty God." Such an act was, from its very 
 nature, irrevocable. On that day the shifting 
 sands of concession and compromise passed from 
 under the feet of the American people, and they 
 planted themselves firmly on the great rocks of 
 liberty and justice to all men, to be moved there- 
 from, we will believe, no more forever. 
 
 The succeeding year witnessed the splendid vic- 
 tory of Gettysburg, which, accompanying the fall 
 of Vicksburg, marks definitely the culminating 
 point of the conflict by the joint triumph of the 
 Eastern and Western armies, aided by our gallant 
 navy. Although the waves were to come again 
 and yet again, no wave w r as to come higher than 
 that which was dashed back in clouds of broken, 
 dissolving spray as it struck the iron wall of the 
 infantry of the Army of the Potomac. The causes 
 of the movement of the Confederate Army into 
 Pennsylvania were never fully stated by General 
 
286 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 Lee. He intimates distinctly in his report that 
 others existed than those of a purely military char- 
 acter. Without doubt, among them was the hope 
 to break something of the force of the impending 
 fall of Vicksburg, which, grasped in the iron em- 
 brace of Grant and the Army of the Tennessee, 
 must soon surrender. A victory won on Northern 
 soil would do this. It is the good fortune of the 
 patriotic State in which we stand that it contains 
 within its borders not only this memorable field, 
 but that its fame is allied to the victory by the 
 memory of three of its most illustrious command- 
 ers. The calm and judicious Meade, whose wisdom 
 brought about the encounter in which the enemy 
 was obliged to attack, and in which the Army of 
 the Potomac was able for once to stand on the de- 
 fensive ; the splendid Hancock, the idol of the 
 Potomac Army, whose fiery words and majestic 
 presence infused into all around him something of 
 the courage of his own daring heart, — are gone to- 
 day. They lived long enough to be assured of the 
 honor and love in which they were held by their 
 countrymen ; but on the field and at the head of 
 the First Corps died Reynolds, then, as always, 
 unassuming, modest, brave, contributing nobly to 
 that victory whose fruits he was never to enjoy. 
 Yet where could man die better than in the de- 
 fence of his native State, his life-blood mingling 
 with the soil on which he first drew breath ? The 
 4th of July, 1863, was the proudest day which up 
 to that time the Union arms had ever known, for 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 287 
 
 the cannon which ushered in a nation's natal day 
 were mingled with those which told through the 
 North the victory of Gettysburg, and were echoed 
 and re-echoed from the West and South along 
 with those which in thunder tones announced that 
 Vicksburg had fallen, and that the Mississippi ran 
 •• unvexed to the sea." 
 
 The terrible year of 1864 was yet to come. The 
 control of all the armies was to pass into the hands 
 of General Grant alone, and to be directed by his 
 single will. The region west of the Alleghanies was 
 secure under the direction of Sherman ; and as he 
 made his great march from Chattanooga to At- 
 lanta, and from Atlanta to the sea, the conflicts of 
 the Army of the Potomac with its formidable op- 
 ponent were renewed again and again on the 
 desperate fields of the Wilderness, Spottsylvania, 
 and Cold Harbor. In the spring of 1865 that 
 great army moved to its last series of battles, and 
 the surrender of Appomattox followed. The sword 
 of Lee was laid in the conquering hand of Grant, 
 and the War of the Rebellion was over. Hence- 
 forward no shot was fired in anger, and the 
 surrender of the other armies of the Confederacy 
 followed. No executions, no harsh punishments 
 were to mark its close ; yet under God the Union 
 had received a new birth of freedom, and, purified 
 by the fires through which it had passed, had risen 
 grander and more august among the nations. 
 
 Silently as snowflakes melt into the sea, the 
 men who composed our armies passed into the 
 
288 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 general life of that community which they had 
 saved, yet not as drones or idlers, but to carry with 
 them into the occupations of peace the lessons of 
 courage, fidelity, and patriotism which they had 
 learned on the grim fields of war. Their bugles 
 will wake no more the morning echoes as they 
 salute with their reveille the coming day ; the de- 
 scending night will hear no more the rolling tattoo 
 of their drums ; their cannon long since have ut- 
 tered their last note of defiance or of victory ; yet 
 impartial history shall record that no army was 
 ever assembled with higher aims and loftier pur- 
 poses, none more ardent with the sacred flame of 
 patriotism, none more calm and resolute in disaster, 
 and none more generous and forgiving in victory. 
 So long as the flag that it bore at the head of its 
 marching columns shall wave above a free and 
 united people, it shall be remembered with grati- 
 tude that in its day and generation it did for this 
 country deeds worthy of immortal honor, and that 
 the army that preserved is worthy to stand side 
 by side with the army that achieved the liberty of 
 the Republic. 
 
 The material evidences of the conflict pass rapidly 
 away. The earthworks with which the land was 
 covered sink to the level of the surrounding soil, 
 and scarp and counterscarp meet in the ditch that 
 once divided them. So let the evil feelings which 
 the strife engendered fade away. The war is 
 marked definitely only by the great amendments 
 to the Constitution of the United States. That 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 289 
 
 these embody more than the fair results of the 
 contest; that they are intended to do more than 
 to state in a definite and permanent form the 
 principles of justice, freedom, equality before the 
 law for all men, — cannot be seriously main- 
 tained ; that they should be fully and generously 
 obeyed, cannot be seriously contested. The vic- 
 tory gained was for the South as well as the North. 
 Already in agriculture, formerly almost her only 
 source of revenue, her production has vastly in- 
 creased ; while the opening of mines, the develop- 
 ment of manufactures, the rise of great towns 
 and cities where formerly existed but scattered 
 hamlets, attest the inspiration she has caught from 
 freedom. Year by year, as time rolls on, she is 
 destined to feel the influences of that steady 
 force which is impelling the country forward, nor 
 will she lag behind in the march of peace and 
 prosperity. 
 
 Companions, while we have a right to rejoice in 
 all that brave hearts and strong arms have Avon, 
 no occasion that draws together those who survive 
 of the armies of the Union can be one of unmixed 
 joy. With proud memories come also those that 
 are grave and sad. Nor if I recall those who are 
 gone before us, would I do so to diminish by one 
 jot or tittle the pleasure of our present gathering, 
 but rather to ennoble and dignify it. I would re- 
 member them as each one of us would wish to be 
 recalled in the hour of decent mirth and of social 
 enjoyment, when hand clasps hand in friendship 
 
 19 
 
290 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGIOX. 
 
 and mutual esteem. There are no words which 
 can render a just tribute to those whose deeds are 
 their true eulogy ; there, is no honor too high for 
 those who gave their lives willingly rather than 
 that a single star should be obscured on the mighty 
 shield on which are emblazoned the arms of the 
 Union. 
 
 Nor do yon need to be reminded how many have 
 passed away since the war, and how steadily the 
 fierce artillery of time is doing its work. Close up 
 the ranks as best we can, we are an army to which 
 there come no recruits. Generous as is this gath- 
 ering at our Twenty-fifth Anniversary, how few 
 can expect to join in the Fiftieth ! Without doubt 
 there will be some who will with more feeble 
 voices seek to raise the ringing cheer with which 
 we once answered the Rebel yell, even if soon they 
 too must yield to the common lot of man. The 
 chiefs of this organization, the predecessors of its 
 present Commander (who I trust may long be 
 spared), — General Cadwalader, that model of a 
 gentleman and soldier, the splendid Hancock, the 
 fiery and impetuous Sheridan, — all are gone. Yet 
 let me not mention names, — lest by mentioning 
 some I might seem to omit others equally worthy, 
 — save the great name of Grant alone. He was the 
 Commander of all the armies, to his trumpet-call 
 each one of us has answered, and to him it was 
 given to end our great strife with a victory which 
 enabled him to exclaim, " Let us have peace." 
 
 How many are missing to-day at the roll-call 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 291 
 
 you know but too well. Even if our voices may 
 falter and our utterances choke as the name of some 
 honored chieftain who has led us rises to our lips, 
 or of some dear friend, it may be, who has shared 
 our mess and our blanket, we recall them in honor. 
 and not in sorrow. So would we remember all, — 
 not alone the great chiefs who urged forward the 
 onset of mighty battalions, but the humble, faith- 
 ful soldier who did his duty manfully. Wherever 
 those gallant spirits have passed to their long re- 
 pose, — whether they sleep in the bayous of the 
 Mississippi, or by the waters of the Potomac, the 
 Cumberland, or the Tennessee, in the tangled wild- 
 wood, or in the shadow of their own homes with 
 the monumental marble high above their breasts, — 
 all in memory are welcome here. " The whole 
 earth," says Pericles, " is the sepulchre of illus- 
 trious men ; " and our mountains seem to lift their 
 heads more loftily for the brave 'who lie upon their 
 crests, and our rivers to move to the sea with 
 a prouder sweep for those whose life-blood has 
 mingled with their streams : — 
 
 "They fell devoted hut undying; 
 The very gale their names seems sighing ; 
 The waters murmur of their name 
 The woods are peopled with their fame; 
 The meanest rill, the mightiest river. 
 Roll mingling with their fame forever." 
 
 Nor, Companions, in this hour do we fail to re- 
 member him. not a soldier indeed, but to whose 
 military capacity, developed by years of anxious 
 study, tardy justice is just beginning to lie don;'. 
 
292 ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 who was. by the Constitution, the Commander of 
 the army and navy, the then President of the 
 United States, — him upon whom the faith of all 
 citizens and soldiers, old and }*oung, rich and poor, 
 alike, had rested secure during those terrible years, 
 and whose own heart was large enough to embrace 
 in love and charity all that people over whom 
 Providence had placed him, to be their ruler and 
 guide in the supreme hour of their destiny. 
 Twenty-five } 7 ears ago to-day he passed from the 
 ranks of living men, yet each year has added to 
 that pure and splendid fame. Every record, every 
 newly discovered act or letter which loving industry 
 brings to light, but serves to reveal how kind and 
 good, how wise and great he was. 
 
 On the day after its capture, when he visited 
 Richmond, it was my own good fortune to ride 
 side by side with him in the headquarters' army- 
 wagon which conveyed him through the streets of 
 that city so long the citadel of the Confederacy. 
 He seemed weary and tired, graver than I had 
 ever seen him, less rejoicing in the triumph that 
 had been won than anxious about the new prob- 
 lems looming up before him. It may be that I 
 interpret the recollections of that hour in the bale- 
 ful light of the dreadful tragedy that so soon fol- 
 lowed ; yet, as I recall it, he seemed to me like 
 one who felt that his life's work was done, and 
 who would willingly rest from his labors, that his 
 works might follow him. The wavs of Provi- 
 dence are not always ours; it may be that it was 
 decreed that this great life should end in the very 
 
ORATION BEFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 293 
 
 hour of victory by the assassin's hand, because it 
 was seen by a wider vision than we possess that to 
 that life of self-sacrifice and patriotic devotion the 
 noblest close was that which has invested him for- 
 ever with the martyr's crown. It is not always 
 to those who achieve success that its temporal 
 enjoyment is granted; the reward of high heroic 
 souls is in their own sense of duty performed, of 
 trial and sacrifice resolutely endured, in the con- 
 sciousness that others will reap all for which they 
 have bravely striven. 
 
 In the older Scriptures the statety figure of the 
 great Hebrew law-giver and warrior stands on the 
 lonely hill in the land of Moab to gaze out over 
 the Promised Land, which it is decreed he shall 
 never enter. Fair before him stretch the fertile 
 fields, yet no crops from them shall ever fill his 
 garners. The sparkling waters dance in the sun- 
 light, yet no draught from them shall ever refresh 
 his weary lips. He has crossed at the head of the 
 children of Israel the stormy w T aters of the Red 
 Sea ; he has led them through the forty years of 
 wandering in the wilderness. For them the hour 
 of enjoyment has come. His work is done ; for 
 him it remains but to rest in his lonely grave. 
 So to this our Moses, who had led us through 
 the Red Sea of Rebellion, is vouchsafed but a 
 glimpse of the Promised Land, as he passes from 
 mortal sight forever. 
 
 '•Beautiful upon the mountains," says the 
 prophet Isaiah. " are the feet of him that bring- 
 
294 ORATION BPJFORE THE LOYAL LEGION. 
 
 eth good tidings." Yet as the messengers approach 
 we see that their countenances are grave, that their 
 garments are worn, that their feet are torn by the 
 flinty way; but beautiful are they still for the 
 glad tidings which they bear. And as in imagina- 
 tion there rises again before us the tall figure of 
 Abraham Lincoln, not graceful according to the 
 rules of classic art, yet not without its own sim- 
 ple majesty ; as we behold again that rugged coun- 
 tenance, deep graven with the lines of princely 
 care, — we see it illumined with a nobler light 
 than the cunning hand of the Greek could give to 
 the massive brow of the Olympian Jupiter ; beau- 
 tiful in the radiance of truth and justice, while the 
 scroll that he holds in his strong right hand bears 
 the glad tidings of liberty to all men. 
 
 Companions, my brief task is ended. In the 
 conflict and in the years which have followed the 
 war, half of what were once our numbers, it is 
 probable, have passed the barrier which separates 
 the seen from the unseen world. They are the 
 advance of that army of which we are the rear- 
 guard. Somewhere they have halted for us, some- 
 where they are waiting for us. Steadily we are 
 closing up to them. Let us sling on our knapsacks 
 as of old ; let us cheerily go forward in the full 
 faith that by fidelity to diuyy, by loyalty to liberty, 
 b^ devotion to the country which is the mother 
 of us all, we are one army still. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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