Holmes County farmer. [volume] (Millersburg, Ohio) 1857-1926, 1865-09-21

kept. Remember it was no holiday excur.
sion we undertook, nor was it to meet an
ordinary foe We were to fight our own
flesh and blood; men as brave by nature as
we are, men whose fathers had fought with
ours, to achve the Revolution, aud who H.
lustrated the valor Of their race from the
SHOWS OF Canada to the scorching plains of
Mexico. 1t is due TO ourselves to admit
that the Southern people are brave and
were skilllully led. else we can claim but lit
tie honor for subiuing them with our supe-
rior numbers. They showed devotion wor-
thy better cause, aud 1t was only by supe-
rior numbers and indomitablc perscv crance
we compelled their surrender.
Among the first acts Of the administra-
tion violating our contract was the puhli
cation Of the emancipation proclamation --
At the time ! was confined in Libby prison
as one of Pope fclons," but the suffer
ings OF imprisonment were nothing compar
cd TO the mental torture on finding the high
and noble cause for which had enlisted
debased by being made struggle for giving
freedom to few degraded negroes Lead
ing Republicans, it is true, urged the meas
ure as a military necessity asif twenty mil
| lions Of white men could not subdue eight
millions Of the South without the aid of
/ few cowardly negroes. They also promised
|rcinforccmcnts of white troops. Governor
| Yates spoke of the flaming giants" Of the
j West who would come to our rescue; Gov.
! Andrews said the streets and highways of
the Fast would swarm with patriotic troops;
while even Greely promised his 9O0, 600
more. Yet they never came save in the
shape of some dalkics stolen from the South;
and few needy foreigners imported from
abroad. The natural.rcsult Of this i'll timed
proclamation was to stop recruiting in the
North and from that time large bountics
and heavy draft, had to be rcsortcd to to fill
our armies, while so long as the war was for
thclU Union more volunteers were offered than
the administration would accept.
Another effort was made to consolidate
the South. At the beginning of the war.
according to President Lincoln own state
ment, we had u majority Of friends there
but this measure eXtinguished the last tspark
of unionism South, and united their people
in the attempt to preserve their property.
hold also that the warhas been unneces
sarily prolonged, that competent generals
have been removed and their places supplied
by experimental ones; that our forces were
divided whore where they should have been
consolidated, and that ovcrtWcs Of peace
from the enemy have been rejected. The
doctrine was openly proclaimed that the
last man and the last dollar should be
used in order to lilerate the negroes. Eel
low soldiers, can you affiliate with such men?
y on and | have lost beloved comrades, nay
suffered ourselves, yet we must he nsultcd
with assurances that these friends died. or
we suffered, not for the Union or in dc.
iense Of the Constitution, but to make the
negro our equal. That this war was unduly
prolonged can prove by the highest Rcpub-
lican testimony Greclcy--wh in
speaking of the Niagara Peace Conference
said, Had this wise and brave course been
taken when Alexander H. Stephens first
publicly solicited permission to visit Wash
ington, believe it would have saved quar-
ter OF a million Of lives, an awful amount Of
devastation and misery, and left our ma
tional debt full billion less than it is to-
day" The President, in refusing over
lures Of peace, also forgot that portion of
his annual message Of 1862, which says;
suppose you go to war, You cannot fight
always; and when after much loss on both
sides, and no gain on either, you cease fight
ing, the Identical old questions, as to terms
| OF intercourse, are again upon you.
Another result Of giving freedom to the
negroes and placing them in oul army was
the death Of thousands of our brethren in
southern prisons. Our government refused
! w Ntl ! y thb tht tdl vi exchanges unless
some negroes then held by the enemy were
liberated. What was the consequence? IT.
one year seventeen hundred penu-yyduia
soldiers died at Andersonyilc prison.
know chat General Butter now charges that
Secretary stanton ordered him to cOmpli-
cate the exchange in order that the rebel
forces should not be STRENGTHENED But
what Of this? Instead of trying Captain
Wirz, the keeper of the Andersonyile pris-
ON, | would indict Gcn Butler and hd.
Stanton.
The war being over, the question occurs
how shall we secure the objects for which
we fought? In the first place. we should
return to trial by jury. The time for court
martial Is and military commissions ! appre-
hend, is over, or at least ShoaN be. Those
Sof us who have been in the service know
something about their constitution and
powers While in the army / was several
times IL member OF II court martial, and
Eoucc a judge advocate, and kpo,o that, as
Senator Hale declared, they organized TO
convict, Woe be to the civilian who comes
before them. They are allowed nocounsel,
save ut the discretion Of the court, in general
are Ignorant Of the charges against them,
and have no means oi procuring Witnesses.
The accEScr also selects the judges of the
cumc, and then has the approval Of the
sentence. There HiVSi be Il return To civil
law not only because the Constitution pro.
hlblts any other mean, Of trial than hy Jury,
but even military writer's agree that civil
ians are not subject to military rule. We
have assumed the garb of citizens, and let
us maintain their rights. Let us emulate
the example Of Washington, the FIRST com
) mandcr-inc chief of our armies, who, though
e possessed of boundlcss power, was the first