Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1894-06-01

from it the streaming folds OF that gle4m-
ing ensign upon whose every stripe and
star is emblszoned Union and Liberty,
waves forth to teach again the lesson of
independence and humanity. May we all
cherish the public school - we do the
Union. 1t is the cradle of liberty, and
every good soldier, every o,d citizen, will
prote ct it against the enrroathment of any
sect or any party.
There are many other lessons which may
be read in the Rebellion and its results
Upon some we look with different eyes. for
it is true that every shield has its golden
and its silver side. But there is one
lesson above all others. We are one
people. united in one nation, under one
flag. Great and magnificent in domain a.
the United States is; it must be necessary
that our interests are diversified. Questions
must arise upon which parties and men may
divide; but there can be no division on the
great I, .uits gained through the war. Lib
ertv m ave.-v man, woman and child that
breatbes God's atmosphere beneath Gods
sun. Right to fih. rty and right to the un-
interrupted pursuit of happiness: From
the limbs of the poor re>'ro Abraham Lin
coin smote tie iron letters ~ bondage and
another slave in America.
And this freedom to all citizens - TO De
upheld, maintained and protected TIN ough
all coming ages by the concord and um'y
of action of this Union of states, which SOW
ereign and imperial in themselves, recog-
nize how much greater and better is that
nation which they form, whose strength,
like the bundle of sticks in the Latin fable,
hrt IN he MI IN
gether.
l am aware that Memorial service is not
the place to refer to matters having politi-
cal bearing; and yet should be faithless
both to you veterans and to my own con-
science did fail to note the cowardly on
slaught upon your vested rights which has
been made by those " no are "clad in little
brief authority" May my tongue cleave to
the roof Of my mouth and my right hand
forget it's cunning when fail to denounce
the spirit of Southern rebellion and North
ern copperheadism that unlawfully and un-
rightfully takes from the poor old veteran
the pension which the government promised
him in the days when his strength was her
salvation. So long as shall live so long
will stand up for the rights of you who
fought when others skulked. l have no
sympathy for any hand that hauls down the
American flag, wherever it waves.
These blessings of peace, liberty and
prosperity were given to us by the Union
soldier. 1t was through his valor and ins
sufferings that they came to us; that they
remain with us. 1t was to secure to his
children and his children's children these
blessings that he left the comforts of home,
and, taking his life in his hand, went forth
to do and to dare, to battle for the right,
to conquer or to die.
1t is not for me, who was child at that
time, to again remind you of all that 1t
meant for him to have gone forth to tight
for his country. To feel the full force OF
what he suffered you should have stood with
him, shoulder to shoulder on the battle
field, suffered with him in the army
hospital, hungered and thirsted with HIN, on
the march-or worse-entered with him INTO
the pestilential prison pen. No words OF
pen pictures can portray all the tria.s ne
went through to accomplish the grand re-
suits which he attained. 1t is not alone to
the general officer with his responsibility
ties, but to the plain private soldier with
his grim determination, his courage, his
faith, that we owe the fruits of the victory.
And to. him be all honor and glory as long
as this Republic stands for it is through
him and through his heroism and self-abne-
CATION that she now sits upon her throne,
very Queen among the nations of the
earth.
The survivors of that dreadful four years
fighting we have with us, and though their
numbers decrease as the successive years
pass by, we have them to honor and to
emulate. They are the living monuments
whose coats of blue and Grand Army badge
tell story more eloquent than craven
bronze or sculptured marble. They are
those who formed history; who gained our
victory; who saved our Union.
The laurel waves for them; but for the
comrade who never returned, whose bones
whiten in the Southern soil far away from
his New England home, we today wear the
cypress. 1t is meet and proper that it should
be so; that for one day in the year we should
pause from the busy hum of industry and
from our active life and once again contem-
plate all that this history means; that we
should do honor and reverence to the
memory of those who laid down their lives
in order that their country might live.
Cheers for the living and flowers and tears
for those who have gone onward to flames
eternal camping ground, and silently
laid themselves down in their places
in the bivouac of the dead. For
them no more rolling of the drum
sslutes with its reveille the morning
sun; for them no more the bugle's call ush-
ers in the glittering stars of night for them
wars and rumors of wars are forever ended;
for them the lannon's rear eternally is
stilled; and yet tonight we gratefully re-
member them, their struggles. their sacri-
fees and their triumphs. And as we de-
part hence to resume the vacations of peace
made possible by their heroism, the eye of
faith and hope can behold them, battle
SCARED warriors, joining again the serried
ranks of the spectral regiments of the
Grand Armies of all Nations on the
Elysian fields of the great beyond. ST.
lently and proudly they fall into the
marching ranks of the heroes who
have fallen for home and country in all the
ages of the world, beneath banners upon
whose mist-like folds are emblazoned in
letters of fire this eternal lesson that the
country is more than the man: mo man
liveth for himself alone, but each for all.
1t is necessary that some must die that the
State may live. The citizen is at best for
today, while the commonwealth is for all
time
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