Litchfield enquirer. [volume] (Litchfield, Conn.) 1829-current, 1881-01-06

| AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE v Err
MONT OFFICERS REUNION SOCIETY AT THEIH
| SIXTEENTH ANNUAL MEETING AT MoNTPR.
LIER, NOVEMBER 11TH, 1889, BIZ MARTIN T.
MCMAHON, ADJUTANT GENERAL, SIXTH
ARMY CoRPs.. .5.as4s a.a} sss
If felt that any degree of responsibility at.
tached to me for my appearance on this Occa-
sion, other than perhaps certain lack Oi
moral courage to resist the fattering invita-
ton of your committee to deliver this address,
, l shonld fee Obliged to commence with an
apology; for certainly confess to feeling
which has dwelt upon my mind ever since the
invitation was communicated to me and the
suggestion made that it would be agreeable to
the soldiers of Vermont that the subject of the
address should be. "John Sedgwick. I" that
am totally inadequate to do justice to the
memory of that gallant soldier or justice to an
| audience such as this. u sae s.s,fse 14f.esfE
DscIaiming responsibility, however, except
as l have stated, shall proceed at once, with
out loss of time, to say q few words to you,
| fellow citizens, of a man who deserves TO be
kept in perpetual memory by the people whom
he served, and by men of every land who ad
mire honest and sterling manhood, and pure
| and devoted patriotism. = He was
personally known to many of you and dearly
| loved and | venture to say that there are
eyes which rest on mine to night, that were
| dim with tears on one sad summer day in the
Wilderness, when he laid down his earthly
| life and left the Sixth Corps orphaned and the
| army and nation to deplore and weep for John
! Sedgwick ae ''eF a@ .'* So
From Cornwall Hollow in Connecticut, he
entered the military academy in the year 1888.
Upon graduating he was appointed Cd Lieu.
tenant in the ID Artillery, and served on the
plains against the Indians. until the brilliant
J Cr,d L.. fti~a
At Contreras and Cherebnsco he commanded
his company, was complimented in orders and
| breveted captain. At Molina del Rey he was
again especially commended and was breveted
| Major for Cheputepec. He especially dis
| tingushed himself at the attack on the San
| Cosno gate of the City OF Mexico, and was
again especially commended in the reports.
He was made full Captain in 184y and when
the new regiments were created in 1855 he
was appointed Major Of the 3st Cavalry. This
appointment, wholly unsolicited and unexpect-
ed by him, was made, l tIay say. almost by
the unanimous request and desire of the high
tion he figured in the miniature civil war in
bleeding Kansas, conteuding alternately
against the disciples Of John Brown and the
o.der rufians of Missouri In March, 1861
he was made Lieutenant Colonel of the 2d
Cavalry and 10 April of the same year, Col
of the 4th Cavalry. In August 1851 he was
made Brigadier General of Volunteers and
the following year received full rank of Major
General 'Ee ,aaa.a} at esees9sH af-tf
s. On many battlefelds, therefore, from his
boyhood onward, he had ample opportunity
of learning what an American soldier could do,
and this, like all else that came under his OBJ
servation, he laid away for future use and
made available in the greater operations IN
which it was his fortune to be subsequently
engaged. tt @-it @ q
| On the plains, as a commander of cavalry in
the monotonOus, difficult. dangerous and in
glorious contests against the Indians, he sim
ply did his soldierly duty, always winning the
commentator OF bis superiors, the love of mis-
associates and the respect of his men.
During the period of his services at Jeffer-
son barracks the cholera swept through his
command, striking down officers and men
alike. Sedgwick was spared throughout it all,
and great part OF each day he spent in the
hospitals cheering the sick and consoling the
dying. y,7Es ss .aa1:sF9s Fl ~
lie was little known outside OF army cir
Giles, but in the army there was no one, from
| the General commanding down to the private
soldier, better known or more warmly regard.
ed. - h i8d
5 When the civil war commenced he was duly
! ordered from the plains to the East, duly pro-
NOTED to higher commands, and found bim-
self in 1861 Brigadier-general of volunteers,
commanding brigade in the army then being
organized near Washington to retrieve the dis
aster of Bull Run and to carry the colors of
| the Union and the authority of the United
| States into, aud through and over the revolted
| States Tff
His selection for this command, like that of
many of the greatest of our soldiers who were
similarly selected, was due to the wise fore
sight and intimate knowledge of the army
possessed by the first organizer and great COM
mander of the army of the Potomac, George
b. Mcclellan. sH.- u =
When there was vacancy IN the command
of division upon the upper Potomac by the
strange and unaccountahle arrest never ex.
planned, of Gen. Charles P Stone, Sedgwick
was sent to the command of this division, then
described as a corps of observation. But
when at last the army of the Potomac was
completed and took the field in organized
corps. Sedgwick's division became a part of
the second army corps. srest
Down the broad waters of the Potomac on
that early day in spring, amid the thunders
OF artillery from fleet and fort, with waving
flags and streamers gaily ,decked, hundreds of
vessels sailed day after day, conveying the
great army of the Potomac to its destination
at Fortress Monroe to begin the grand advance
an Richmond.
Sedwck's connection with those important
events reveals one grand and magnificent epi.
sode. AT Faira. Oaks. en- the Both of MAY,
when the treacherous. river rose and seemed to
sweep all hope Of succor fran the left wing of
the army of the Potomac, on which the whole
force of the rebellion was suddenly buried
when bridge after bridge so carefully con.
structed had given way. and there remained
but one, over which the water poured In
,H,srr 4 IL L. 4
by ropes attached to the trees upon either
bank, Sedgwick's great will and iron nerve
rose to the occasion higher than the waves,
stronger than the mad river; and over the
trembling bridge, through the surging waters,
he led his men, ragged his artillery, and ac-
complished passage marvellous in its achieve.
ment. magnificent in its results. sa@H
With his arrival on that field all danger to
the army aud the cause was removed The
enemy we're repulsed and driven back at ev
cry point, and the following day defeated on
every portion Of the field. This affair Illus
| trated one peculiar trait in Sedgwick's charac-
ter and life. He was always quietly but de.
cidedly al the right spot at-the right time, and
he seemed 10 get there or be there with such
quiet precision that. there seemed Dething
| strange IN 1t until you critically examined the
| obstacles overcome This feature fitted him
peculiarly for the command Of the Sixth corps,
| which h. attained somewhat later, for through
out the history OF that corps repeated instan-
ces on important occasions are TO be found
when its prompt and timely arrival accom-
| plished decisive results g. II is not to be won
dered at, therefore, that when such CON-
mander succeeded to such corps that the rep
uration OF both should stand high throughout
i the army " -
.. At Antietam, under the blue September
/ sky in the early dawn, the reorganized army
of the Potomac, under its old commander,
/ confronted upon SINGLE field its old oppo-
neut.. Hitherto alloar great battles had been
fought upon one side or the other in detail.
Sedgwick commanding his division under the
gallant Summer, pressed forward on the right,
/ leading his men with that earnest determina
i ton which always implied that the thing he
/ set out to do must be accomplished in spite of
all human resistance. His men melted away
under the steady and destructive Gre, YET he
4 ca.d< Al -