Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1861-05-14
Attention Volunteers.

volunteer, Wnich contains so much good advice
to young soldiers that we copy the greater po.-
ton of it. The letter is said to have been writ
ten by one of the first men of Alabama. We
earnestly commend its counsel to the volunteers
of Virginia-as follows:
Sin the first place, then, my son. when a SOL
dier shoulders his rifle under the faq of his coun.
try, be must surrender to that country his will,
his whims tastes. fancies and prejudices; and
the first, highest and m ,st solemn duty he owes
to that country is the most implicit and prompt
obedience to the orders Of his superior officers.
Disobedience, even in matters of minor gravity,
frequently forfei:s life If an order is issued that
must be the end of enquiry. The success of q
battle or campaign may depend upon the con-
cealment of the purposes of the command and
it may become necessary to punish with death an
omission to observe that which may seem to be
a very unimportant order to the soldier who does
not understand it.
Napoleon once sued an order that the lights
of the camp must be extinguishcd at o'clock,
and on seeing light burning in the tent of an
officer, after that hour had elsSsed, he repaired
thither in person, and entered the tent just as
the officer had finished writing his wife's name
on the back of letter he had written to her,
| He told the Emperor he had unconsciously vio-
lated the law only for one moment, and it was
done in the enthusiasm of affection, with which
he had been overcome by thoughts of home
"Unseal that letter, said the Emperor, "and
write as dictate. The officer obeyed, and wrote
as follows: "P. S. I die tomorrow morning at
o'clock, for violating the laws of the camp, by
not extinguishing the light in my camp at the
precise time / was commanded to do it."
That decision may have seemed savage and
barbarous but when your intellect shall have
matured to the comprehension OF how much de-
pends upon subordination and rigid adherence
to the laws of the camp, you will see that Ma
poeon could only be just to the thousands OF
lives under his care by assuming the appearance
| of cruelty to this one delinquent.
Obedience is not servility; it is duty. 1t Is,
therefore, not cowardly, but honorable. The
camp is no place for the soft manners OF the
drawing room, and soldiers are proverbially
| blunt; therefore, do not imagine that it an OIL
Ger speaks sharply to you, that he wants to in'-
suit yqa or browbeat you; and, my dear son, as
You value your happiness, and usefulness, do not,
beg of you, listen to the scandal of tattling 60
oetweens, or allow your feelings to become pref
q, iced, either against an officer fellow-sol-
dier, or by anything that may be said TO you
against them in their absence. That man Is a
foe to your county who attempts to SOW dlssen-
sion between brother soldiers, or shake the con-
fdence of the army in its officers; and if he is
inconsiderate and malignant enough to select
Isuch holy spot as the bivouac for such sac
rlfce, he must be too base TO speak the TRUTH and
you will be only melting out to him his just de
serts to give, in place of your respect and conf
dence, your derison and scorn. Nothing can
make me more happy, my dear son, than to know
that, young as you are you enjoy the esteem and
confidence of your brave comrades IN arms; ano
| | therefore warn you against that common fault
of the volunteer soldiers, to wit: murmurng.-
Never murmur, my dear SOD, at anything. In the
first place, it is not manly; ia the second place,
it weans from you those who else might love
Iyou and cleave to you in the third place, 1T de-
Ilnoralizes the army, aud makes moo OF grum-
bers out of men, who, but for this propensity,
might have been much happier themselves, and
been the source of happiness in the very ranks
tin which their puerie complaints must breed dis
content Re cheerful, my dear boy, and it will
make your officers love you. 1t is rot pleasure
excursion you are on, aud you must not expect
that luxuries will fall in showers along your
Ipath. The soldiers of Washington were march
ed barefooted over frozen ground, with the blood
lpouring from the gasbes 10 their feet They
braved the terrors of Northern winter, only
half clad, and won laurels that must flourish ID
perennial verdure, while the Goths and Vandals
of the North, with the exchequer OF mighty
government to provide for their comfort, Will
have been, in charity, forever forgotten
There is but one issue between Lncoln's Gov
ernment and ours. We assert that our fathers
meant to seccre US independence and freedom
He and his Cabinet hold that they only meant to
make US the slaves Of a parchment, instead
of the subjects of George the Third. You, then,
my son, are fighting to assert that State Is a
sovereignty, and a citizen is free man; and you
are fighting those who are guilty OF the paradox
ical folly of insisting that the negroes OF the
South ought to be set absolutely free; and that
the whole people Of the South ought to be held
in political slavery. The sovereignty OF State
| is, like the liberty of an individual, lnalenable
and our fathers never possessed the inclination
or poaoer, to disrobe themselves OF their person
al liberty, or their State Governments OF their
inherent sovereignty And the flag under which
you fight is as essentially the cause OF human
freedom, and our cause the cause of human lib
erty as our fathers supposed the flag under which,
and the cause for which, they fought was the
flag and cause of Independence
Lincoln and his Cabinet seek to ignore the
great principle of efgoyernment. They say
that the people cannot convene when they please,
and alter the government il they choose. I ct
hey claim that the Representatives OF the peo-
pie in Congress assembled have the power to do
that which they deem the people themselves
have not the power to do. 1t amounts to this
then, my son, that men have risen in our day
and generation. who seek to make the dogmas of
a fanatical party the curse of a once happy cOun
try, and, to consu inmate their foul designs, un-
blushing;y violate all the laws of logic, hnmani
II ty, propfiety and decency usually respected
amongst the civilized nations of the earth, seek
ing to do justice between man and man, and up
holding the Government to which they owe their
loyalty,
May God bless you, my noble bay, is the pray
er that is perpetually ascending from the heart of
your angel mother, and perpetualy burning in
the heart of your aHectionate father. d.
| The Baltimore Exchange says:--"No more
slave States'' was the cry OF the North, and the
response to that cry was the election to the
Presidency of the man who was pledged to carry
out that doctrine. What IS the position of the
dominant party now? Whilst declaring its con-
viction that slavery has been curse to the u
nion, it is summoning to arms the leglons of the
North for the purpose OF coercing back into the
Union those slave States which have seeded
and of forcing to remain in the Union those
States which have shown like disposition to 90
out of it. If slavery be truly in Northern eyes
| an evil. surely the readiest way to have gotten
| rid of that evil would have been to allow the
States in which slavery exists to have separated
| themselves peaceably from the States that were
entirely free from the contaminating influence.
Yet the North presents to US at this time, the
singular anomaly of hating thing vehemently
and of clinging to it tenaclously.'N
81 have no faith in quack. Nor have we
frien div reader, but that friend of the sick man.
y De-, H.