The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1880-03-05
FITz JOHN PORTER.

NeW bridge, hanover COurt HOUSE, ,hecnau-
csvlle, Gaines Mill and Malvern-and it
vas Fitz John Porter who commanded tire
,orps in all these battles 1t is needless to
peak of them being among the most san
culinary of the war. 1t was the Fifth Army
Corps who took possession OF Malvern Hill
and held it through hours that by friend
and foe have been deemed among the most
terrible in the history of the war. A series |
in any preceding battles, left Porter where
the enemy found HMM possession of NAL |
vern. When night fell upon the day of
carnage the slope of Malvern Hill ran red
with the blood of the battle. have heard
scores of soldrs, Federal aud Confederate,
say ,thatfrom the summit to base the hillside
was covered with the dead and dying. Ger
tain it H. sill, 1t was Fitz John Porter's corps
that made that last and most terrible bat
tie of the campaign Of the peninsula. No won
der that his commanding general asked that
the highest position then vacant should lie
given to him No wonder that Le should
have said that if still higher positions
we're known to the public service he would
recommend General Porter for all that the
Government could give him The Fifth
Army Corps had among its commanders,
under Porter, men whose names are tamil-
lar to every American. Mccall, Reynolds,
Meade, Buchanan, Morell, Warren, Sykes,
| and Butterfield were the officers who held
| command of its divisions and brigades. 1t
| is quite probable that this narration of the
personal services of General Porter antece
dent to the time when he stood charged
with foul crime against his comrades and
his country, it is but the repetition ofa story
we'll remembered by intelligent men 1t
will not be forgotten that the men who
| fought at Malvern, and the officer who COM
manded them, were the same men and the
same officer against, whom few weeks la
| ter, was charged shameful dsobedence, ="
"retreatipg from the presence of the enemy,
"being within sound of raging batte,and,
believing that comrades were being driven
back and defeated, shamefully left them to
their fate
The Senator went on to speak of public
DISAPPOINTMENT and dissatisfaction which
greeted the finding of the court-martial.
When General Porter's conviction was an
nounced careful readers of the proceedings
in his trial stood confounded at the unex-
pected result. He had been charged with
the most Infamous crime known under the
laws of enlightened governments. Stripped
of all surplusage, the charge that he ood
confronted with was that of treason. Reck'
oned by degrees, no grade of treason could
have been moro despicable in form ormalig'
nant in character than that...on which he
was arraigned. To his own amazement, land
to thousands of loyal men who knew the
evidence in his case he was convicted o.
the monstrous crime with which he hac
been charged. And then what? Adjudged
of this foul crime against himself, he wa.
senten ced And, sir, what was the SEN
tenceT That he should die the death OF {
traitor? That he should be shot to deatt
by the guns of his soldiers-men of th'
corps whose honor and reputation he haC
; betrayed that by their hands he should b'
pierced with all the bullets that could b,
fired into a traitors miserable body? No
No such sentence Although if the charge
had been true in part such death-or an.
death that could have been measured cut b,
ingenious cruelty-would have been to'
small punishment for his offence this wa
| a., al of RI
The judgment that, being convicted o
, treason, he should simply be dismissed from
, the Army of the United States. And so
Mr.. President, it came to pass when thu
people of the country read that Fitz Johl
Porter, charged, tried and condemned o
; treason, was sentenced only to dismissa
from the army of the United States, ques
ton arose in the public mind, intinitel,
? more significant, all.pervading and persist
g ent than anything that the ingenuity o
, General Porter or his friends could have in
vented, asking: "Was ever finding so grave
with punishment so totally inadequate?"
From the day the charges were first pub
lished, but one opinion possessed plain, hon
2 est minded people, and it was that justice de
a manded either his acquittal or his death
, Then followed his appeals to the Executive
not to have his sentence reversed and an
nuled; not that he should be reinstated b.
' Executive order; not to blot out, at the in
t stigation OF personal or political influence
4 by the Executive mandate, the record of hi
alleged oflense. No! through all these ap
Q peals, some of them as touching as it is pos
? sible for pen to write, there is but one cry
e simply to be heardp' simply ct
. be heardr' Such was this brave mans con
n fdence in the strength and justice of hi
t cause, and such his unbiased confident rali
!. ance in the unbiased judgment of his cour
+ trymen, that he asked no other favor, mad
+, no other supplcation than to be hearC
# That single cry, bravely answered at las
# has rung through all these years.