Gallipolis journal. [volume] (Gallipolis, Ohio) 1837-1919, 1880-07-15
A SOLDIERS MONUMENT AT
PAINESVILLE, OHIO.
What Does 1t Mean and What
VIII 1t Teach?--AnSwer by
Hon. j. A. Garfield.


A monument to Lake County soldiers
was dedicated at Painesville, O.. on
Saturday. Hon. James A. Garfield,
who was present, was called upon, and
he delivered the following touching adj
dress, which deserves to he printed in
letters of gold. The sentiments ex-
pressed will touch the heart of every
living soldier, and the friend of every
soldier who risked his life to save our
common country.
FELLOW CITIZENS [applausei: | can
not fail to respond Ia voice "Bravo!'l
on such an occasion, in sight of such
monument, to such cause, sustained by
such men. [Applause and cheers.
While have listened to what my friend
has said, two questions have been
sweeping through my heart. One was,
'What does the monument mean ?" and
the other, "What will the monument
teach ?" Let me try and ask you for
moment to help me to answer what does
the monument mean? Oh, the mOnu-
ment means world of memories and a
world of deeds, and world of tears,
and a world of glories. YOn know
thousands knOw-what is is to offer up
your life to the country, and that is no
small thing, as every soldier knows.
Let me put the question to you for
moment; suppose your country in the
awfully embodied form of majestic law,
should stand above you and say, 81
want your life, come up here on the
platform and offer it," how many would
walk up before that majestic presence
and say, "Here am, take this life and
use it for your great needs" Tapplausel,
and vet almost two millions of men
made that answer [applausel, and a
monument stands there to commem-
crate their answer. That is one of its
meanings.
Bat, my friends, let me try you lit
tie further. To give up life is much,
for 1t is to give up wife and home, and
ambition. But let me test you this way
further. Suppose that awfully majestic
form should call out to you and say, 81
ask you to give up health and drag
yourself, not dead, but half alive,
through a miserable existence for long
years, until you perish and die in your
crippled and hopeless condition. ask
you to volunteer to do that, and it calls
for higher reach of patriotism and
self-sacrifice but hundreds of thou
sands of your soldiers did that. That
| is what the monument means also.
t-- But let me ask you to go one step
further. Suppose your country should
say, "Come here on this platform, and
| in my name and for my sake consent to
be idiots voices, "Hear hearl; consent
that your very brain and intellect shall
be broken down into hopeless idiocy for
my sake" how many would be found
to make that venture? And yet thou
sands, and that with their eyes wide
open to the horrible consequences, obey
ed that call. And let me tell how 100,-
600 of our soldiers were prisoners Of
war, and many of them, when death
| was stalking near, when famine was
climbing up into their hearts, and
idiocy was threatening all that was left
of their intellects-the gates of their
prison stood open every day If they
would quit, desert their flag, and enlist
under the flag Of the enemy; and out of
l80, 600 not per cent. ever received the
liberation from death, starvation, i'd
iocy. All that might come to them, but
they took all these horrors and all these
sufferings in preference to going back
upon the flag of their country and the
/ glory of its truth. [Applause.1 Great
God! was ever such measures of pa
triotlsm reached by any man upon this
earth before? [Applause.l
That is what your monument means.
By the subtitle chemistry that no man
knows all the blood that was shed by
our brethren, all the lives that were de-
/. voted, all the grief that was felt at last
crystalized itself into granite, rendered
| immortal the great truth for which they
died (applausel, and it stands there to-