Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1881-09-30
ACOupIe Of Representative Jour
mails and Our Reunion.

Under the above heading the Chst-
tan9oga Times of of the 9th instant,
contains the following editorial:
The extreme tension of public in.
terest upon the late President has
obscured the only other great national
event Of the summer and restricted
comment upon it. We mean the
Federal Confederate Reunion at this
city on the END instant, and the
attendant and collateral ceremonies
Still, representative papers North and
South have found time to consider
this most impo-tantepisode, and prop.
erly to record popular opinion on. The
Cincinnati Gazette, a Radical Republi.
can journal, calls it the National and
Confederate Reunion" and then pro.
ceeds TO say that
1.-THE meeting Of the Society of the
Army Of the Cumberland at Chatta
nooga was more than a shaking OF
hands over the bloody chasm; it was
an embrace Of national and Confeder-
ate over the closed and overgrown
chasm; the Confederate enthusiastical-
" declaring loyalty to the nation no
less than that Of those who fought
for the flag; Offering the hand Of
friendship IN pledge of fidelity to a
common country, and, in token there
Of, tremendously joining the national
soldiers in raising the national flag
Nationally there is an exaitatiOn Of
feeling on such an occasion, but it does
not settle back to the old plane, and
the meeting will have a beneficial in-
Auence in extinguishing the hates Of
the war, and in breaking down the
sectional line.
mo more fitting place fora friendly
meeting OF National and Confederate
soldiers could well be chosen Than
Chattanooga.
Around Chattanooga as many as
5000 National aud Confederate
soldiers had fallen, dead and wounded.
The sell Of a wide region had been
enriched with brave blood. Here the
soldiers Of the two armies could meet
on grounds which testified to the
valor Of both; here was the most fit
ting scene for such a ceremony Of
reconciliation"
The Memphis LEDGER, edited by a
Confederate soldier, who was literal y
shot to pieces in the conflict, IDENTITIES
the gathering by saying that none
other since the war has had such a
significance or given promise Of such a
glorious fruitage. 1t was a splendid
ratification meeting in which the
highest traits Of American character
were seen, felt and recognized.
Generals Cheatham, Wheeler and
Dibrell were as eagerly sought
by the ex- Union soldiers as by the
men who followed them nearly twenty
years ago. Whilst Wilder, and Cox,
and Cist, and Keifer and other Union
generals were honored by all alike as
though they had been north Of the
Ohio. 1t was a love feast toned down
only by the sad reflections Of the great
grief that rested upon every heart"
Want OF space conpels US to restrict
quotations to these two representative
papers. And we can only further say
that, with the exception of a couple Of
patent weeklies Of the South and as
many of the North Of the same pro-
portions and influence, there has been
universal acknowledgment that it
marks a point Of great importance in
the progress toward complete national
unity and concord; and the opinion is
general, if not universal, that the
reunion signalizes absolutely the end
Of sectional politics; ushers in an ora
Of new issues concerning the educa-
tional and material interests Of our
vast and growing citizenship.