Phillipsburg herald. [volume] (Phillipsburg, Kan.) 1882-1905, 1890-07-18
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There is sad truth in the picture. 1t
portrays at a stroke the calamities of
war. The sword and the tOrch-the
wholesale destruction of life and prop
erty! That is the very business and
effect of war, and is alwasy so, no mat
ter how just the cause on one side or
the other, or how humanely it is at
tempted to conduct it. The familiar re-
mark Of General Sherman, "War Is
cruelty, and you cannot refine it, may
be extended to the truthful statement
that war Is also destruction and devas-
tatiOn, and you cannot prevent them.
I should like to have a good under
standing with the reader before pur-
suing this theme. Nobody realizes
better than the author that state of
war has existed somewhere on the
globe ever since human beings PEG
pied it, and that such a state of THINGS
IS likely to continue for ages to come.
The wisdom of the old woman who said
she did not understand "why men
would 60 to war and kill each other
when, if the fools would wait, they
would die natural deaths" has not vet
commended itself to the people of the
world. When nations go to war. and
when rebelliOns and revolutions arise.
nobody ever counts the cost. Nobody
cares to. People being ready and eager
to fight for principle, or what they
Ehink to be principle, it is always idle
to try to deter them from fighting bv
making out bills of damage in advance.
1t IS so in every war; it was so in our
war of rebellion. At the time of that
outbreak the people on neither side
were In a mood to count the cost. That
was question which everybody post
Iooned till the end should come.
- It is also true that while actual hos
tilities are going on such a subject as
this is not interesting. Nobody cares
for it. No armed conflict ever paused
and hesitated from any consideration
of the great waste and destruction that
1t was sure to bring
But in time of peace, when the ma
tiOnal as we'll as the individual pulse
beats temperately, it is we'll to recall
and enforce such great truths as this.
They are part of the emphatic lessons
taught by war which cannot be too
nearly brought home to the popular
understanding.
In citing examples of large waste and
spoil from our civil war I shall do so
without intending reprOach to either
side. 1t IS the fact which is sought.
not the cause which was fought for.
Without merely stating statistics,
the statement Will everywhere be adj
United that the greatest and most
striking of the losses of the war are
pretty we'll known to this generation
That there was a frightfuI loss of life.
lnvolving hundreds of thousands upon
both sides; that other hundreds of
thousands were wounded, from which
injuries many died, and from which the
survivors are dying every day, even so
long after the close of the war as this
that thousands of millions of dollars
were expended to maintain the strug-
gle, these things are matters OF
familiar knowledge, and the greatness
of the war is gagged by them.
But how very little does the present
generation realize the fact that this is
but a part-though a great part-Ot
the losses and havoc of the war! How
much more serious will the matter
appear when the whole truth is but
glanced at
OF course, into the great bill Of ex
pense. the millions upon millions that
made the debt of the Union, which vii
he paid, and of the Confederacy, which
will not, enter some items which MAJ
be set down as positive loss, with yer,
little drawback OF benefit. Here ar
some of them.
The number of cannon cast at Pitts
burg and Richmond during the wa
was immense 1t was one Of the mos
costly sources of expense. Vas
fortunes were expended in rifed can
non, bronze guns, steel and iro
artillery of all caibers. Leaving on
of the question the pieces captured b