Morning journal and courier., 1881-11-01
Our Dead,

by request we publish the following re- sponse made by General and Rev Erastus Blakeslee (now of Greenfield Mass, but for merly of this city) to the toast 'Our Dead" given at the recent meeting of the Army and Navy club of Connecticut:
 Of whom, my comrades, did we think as we just now stood together in silence in re- sponse to those two words ''Our Dead? ?' Was it of the 5G 900 men who were killed in battle in defense of the Union? What an army that was ? I shall never forget one
 fine April day in '64 when 40, ,OO0 men passed in review before General Grant Their long lines seemed endless. And their marching columns which for hours swept by were a gallant sight. But for every one of that multitude Union soldier, not decrepit or old, but man in the fulIness of his strength and courage, was either instantly killed, drop ping down at once out of all the tumult of battle into the eternal silence of death or else, mortally wounded, he fingered little, spoke few words of home and more of country, and then, shuddering, gasped and was gone while the sound of the battle was yet un- spent.
 P Was :tyef- thesa We thought, or did we think well of the 35, 900 more who died of wounds received in battle. Men no less he- roic than the others, and men who, to the last great gift of life for country, added days, or weeks, or months even of uncom- plaining pain. Counting these there were 9l 900 in all who at the hands of the rebels met violent death Such q record reveals sone- what of the erceness of the conflict through which we passed and somewhat well of the depth of Dead.n
 But that is not all Our thought is larger still It takes in well the more than twice many more who died of disease while wearing the army blue. There were 184 OOJ of these. A mournful procession of men, who brought health and strength their country's service, but whom levers wasted, and swamps consumed and fatigue and hunger and heat
 
 rate of more than a full regiment week after the had fairly begun, this sorrowful throng, with sunken cheeks and hollow eyes, crept with totterng steps away from all that is glad in e and without of the exultalon of conflict the joy of victory sunk down and died Heroes they were, whose priceless sacrifice seemed to avail but little for their country good, but among whom are named some of the best and bravest of soldier d2a1 Including these have the mighty sgate of not less than 275OOO men who perished in service to save the Union.
 The names and number of these know. But none can tell what uncounted thousands have pre- maturely died since muster out. They were men who before enlistment could run the race of life with any, but on whom wounds and disease had done their work that afterwards they walked halt
 gly and labored weary and fell by the way at last while mourning friends tenderly closed their eyes and said: ''He too died for h1s country" Most of these already gone the yearly lessening ranks remain, although perhaps crippled for life, as our beloved senior Vice President Colonel Rodman, bear ing even yet on their breast the open wound which records their bravery and which soon, alas de- stroy their life.
 Thinking of all this multitude whose vastness we dare not estimate ge. larger apprehension of what it cost to Union, and what it for soldiers of the nation to say ''Oar Dead" But was it of these thought when just sudden silence fell upon us at the sound of those two words. They may indeed have been in the background of thought like the shadowy null titude of forms which Dore likes to put into the backgrounds of his pictures. But it is most likely that if we thought of msn in the at all it was of more than 5000 Connecticut men who died in
 Think of any one of the Connecticut regiments which in the early part of the marched grand ly. They were noble sight. Twenty full piatoons stretching from curb to curb. thousand men who
 filled these streets with the tread of undaunted feet and the glitter of patriot arms. They full of hope and courage and marched unfinchingy, yea, voluntarily away from all the comforts peace of home to all the solemn possibilities of Think of that gallant thousand and then remember that for every of those men and for one-ifth many more Connecticut man was killed in battle. Re member that such full regiments would bare l equal the number of those who either killed
 in battle died of their wounds. And that any five infantry regiments Connecticut sent out-say the Fifth, Sixth Seventh, Eighth and Ninth-noble regiments a-would be insufficient to represent the whole mum Der of Connecticut who perished in the WAT. Remembering this, we as Connecticut SOL dfers may the words ''Our Dead" with Q fuller pea hing and may we better apprehend the darkness of the sorrow which.th war brought to our native State.
 But perhaps our first thought, in response to the words sOur Dead" were not so broad as this even Indeed it is most probable that they quickest busy with some one man whom we knew and loved comrade in arms perhaps, or dear friend or fel- low oficer-sone one by whose side we marched whose courage had proved, and whose life we hon ored. Some brave man. whose taking away seemed then fearful and whose virtues and valor for sanctify the nasty grave wherein we laid him.
 Every regiment had such men: Theirs are the which oftenest heard at the regimental re- unions And theirs the record which lends halo of glory the regimental history. Who for instance of the First Connecticut cavalry ever thinks of the tions dead without first thinking of Warner and Backus and Clark and Parmelee, officers shot members Blake and Dutton and that dreadful day at Cedar Mountain; Who of the Sixth but men, The Seventh cannot forget Burdick and the bloody doings at Fnrt Wagner. Nor the Eighth think of Antietam and the young hero Marvin Waite without thrill Honorable pride. But time fOrD1QS CO c1ll the roll of our honored dead or even of our regi- speak the name of Charles L. Russell of the 10th, killed instantly at Roanoke Island in 62; the first of the most deeply mourned but not the Last o6 ear Connecticut regmenta1 commanders killed in battle. Not the 1ast indeed for none can forget the two immortal colonels of the 14th, Kingsbury killed at Autietam and Stedman killed at the mine in front of Petersburg and that other pair of col o els of the 2Ist Dutton and Burpee both mortally wounded in battle. And Peck of the 12th, and Mer- win of the 27th, for whom as as for beloved sons the least of these special regimental names which ed gallant soldier Elisha Kellogg of the 2d Heavy Artillery, who led his socaled "band-box regiment" into fight from which all who came out at all came out veterans. And who himself was found lying where he fell in front of his men, on the top of the abatts before the rebel works at Cold Harbor These are not all. They but samples Of many at the memory of whose heroic deeds and gallant deaths OuE pulses 5nisfsn a confined alone to our regimental rolls. There were some of almost the earliest and saddest sacri es of the war Lyon, whose star set in the west in blood and with whom went down such undoubted military genius and such unbounded hopes. And what shall say of Mansfield, the veteran, of Rear Admiral Foote the hero Of Island No iO and of that man who twice re Potomac-the idol of the Sixth army eorps-John Sedgwick-the brave, the accomplished, the gentle, the lion hearted John sedgwfck, shot through the head and instantly killed at Spottsylvania Court House.
 TrnIy.1ny comrades.when think of ..our Dead" -eur Connecticut dead-when we recall their deeds and speak their names, whole troops of heroes come Hooking up out of the murky past and greet with their presence. Standing here in sorrow at their but in exu1tation at their deeds greet them in return. We salute them our Nations dead. We bring them honor we crown them victors victors who in dying conquered, and friends and comrades in tender and special sense salute and greet them as sOur Dead"