The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1891-12-04

the inside. For instance, her richest
laurels are for the men who held the
"Bloody Angle" at Gettysburg, July 8, 1863.
They repelled Pickett's charge.
They held Cemetery Ridge.
They fought with Hancock.
They beat back rebellion's tide at High
Water Mark"
Very good. Hurrah for theml
But how came they to be on Cemetery
Ridge that lucky day and hour?
Lee wanted that stretch of uplands as
vantage ground TO buffet Meade.
A. P. Hills corps dashed for it.
The Confederates of Reth, Pettigrew and
Pender struggled and died to seize it on
July 1.
Why didn't they take its
Ask Reynolds. He is dead, but his deeds
talk
Ask Doubleday.
Ask Wadsworth, also dead, but living in
his record.
Ask gray haired Robinson.
Ask the Iron Brigade.
Yes; ask the Twenty-fourth Michigan
men, who should know little about it.
That regiment lost more men killed st
Gettysburg than any other of the 400 Union
regiments engaged there.
1t lost more killed and mortally wounded
there than any other Union regiment;
more killed and wounded altogether, and
more killed, wounded and captured than
any other, The captured didn't figure
very heavy, by the way. The Confederate
general, Ewell, tried to bag all of them
that walked, at one stage of the fight, and
commenting on his experience to the col
onel commanding, Henry A Morrow, after
the latter had been wounded and made
prisoner, he said that the Twenty-fourth
Michigan was foolish in not surrendering
before it was so badly cut up.
'Gen. Ewell, the Twenty fourth Michi-
gan, came here to fight, not to surrender"
was the reply.
The sound men who surrendered num-
bered 81; the sound men that stuck to the
flag and carried it out for another day, SO.
The killed and mortally wounded were so
and the wounded in addition, 238. Gen.
Ewell thought such fighting was foolhardy.
That was because his men faced it. The
opposing generals had different views.
Wadsworth, who commanded the division
to which the Twenty-fourth belonged, said
to its leader; "Col. Morrow, the only fault
l find with you is that you fought too long.
But God only knows what would have be-
come of the Army of the Potomac if you had
not held your ground as long as you did,"
1t will be idle, of course, to look any
farther than Gettysburg to get a good ac-
count of the Twenty fourth Michigan in
the war, but back of every grand deed lies
a cause, and back Of Oak Ridge, Gettys-
burg, lie some important factors in the
making of the history of that day.
The raoiuoaDt UaQ raised with hr1rrob
in ten days, in Detroit and Wayne county,
and an incident that led to its formation
gives a clew to its makeup. When Lin
coin called for 100000 men in the summer
of 1862 there was riot and talk of resist
ance in Detroit. To reassert loyalty it was
proposed to raise a regiment on the spot,
and after some delay Governor Blair. yield
ing it is said to his wifes solicitation, gave
authority for new regiment when there
were several others in the state still short
Of men.
The ranks were filed speedily by the
best blood in the county, 343 of the men
being Michigan born, 357 Americans born
in other states and $50 foreign born. Its
colonel was a Virginian by birth and had
fought in Mexico. He was judge in the
recorders court. The lieutenant colonel
was sheriff, a man standing 6 feet inches
In his boots.
The regiment went direct to the Army Of
the Potomac, reached there after Antie-
tam and had its baptism of blood at First
Fredericksburg. Previous to that fight the
regiments brigaded with it Stunned its
camps. They were the old, war worn, bat
tie battered, victory winning Iron Brigade
of the First Army corps. The Twenty
fourth men were fresh faced, clean and
polished, and their trousers were sky blue
and innocent of Virginia mud The Iron