The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1895-08-23
THE GREAT CONFLICT.
Comparison Of the Armies With
the Great Ones Of Europe.
A MOST REMARKABLE WAR.

Battles Not Exceeded In Fierceness Dur
ing This Century-The Lives Lost Would
Have Peopled Great Cities and Furnished
the Bone and sinew of Great States
Enormous Cost of the War In Treasure
The South Devoured Itself In the strug.
gle-The North Expended the Full Value
of All the Seeded States.
! copyright 1895, by American Press Associa.
tion.l
The twenty ninth annual encampment
of the Grand Army of the Republic at
Louisville, Sept. 8 to IA, will be an
| event of unusual interest. The reunion
will take place in the leading city of q
| border state, whose people were in both
armies, and the whole nation, north and
south alike, can but rejoice at this op-
| portunity for former antagonists to shake
the fraternal hand.
For nation of busy people the Amer
leans devote surprising amount of at
tention to a war that ended 30 years
| ago. In the minds Of the unfortunate
few who are not alive with patriotic
feelings and instincts this may appear
childish. Men in whom emotion is
wanting or is under full control would
wish to see others as calm and philo-
sophical as they themselves aim to be-
But this sentiment of veneration seems
to have rational basis, and even in
this new world can scarcely be said to
be farfetched or overdone Both in the
classic and popular form of song and
story the deeds of martial heroes have
been celebrated since the dawn of liter
ature Poems and dramas having war for
their themes take deepest hold upon the
mind and heart.
Remove the war element from history,
and who would read it? The fact is that
the American civil war was one Of the
great, of the very, very few great, wars
of modern times. 1t came upon the
country as a new experience. 1t was be-
ieved that it would be short and trivi-
al; it developed into one Of the fiercest
and bloodiest Of the era, so that men
made haste to forget it when it was
over. But it involved the whole coun-
try, interested the entire population and
shook society from the foundation up;
hence memories of it are hereditary, and
interest in it cannot die out until the
great event is overshadowed by one still
greater On the battlefield enough
men were shot dead to furnish the whole
male population of some of the chief
cities and of some old and populous
states. The treasure expended would
buy out two of the richest states in the
Union today, and the lives lost in the
war, including deaths from all causes,
would furnish the entire male popula-
ton Of the greatest city in the land to-
day.
Great Armies of History.
France has been the one famous fight
ing nation of the century. Her wars
have filed the annals of European peo-
pies with themes for the brightest pens,
with pictures that challenge those of
classic ages as subjects for the artist to
place in enduring stone.
Take Napoleon from the stage of the
world between 1900 and 1915 and what
remains? In those 10 years of war
France lost 1900, 900 men. The north
alone lost equally in proportion from
1861 to 1865. During her periods of
greatest martial activity France never
put into the field at any one stage more
men than the north had under arms the
last twelve months of the war, and the
average in each Of the years from 1869
to 1865, inclusive, was about tho same
as in France in her years of warfare.
But in order to get comprehensive
view Of the magnitude Of the conflict
one must go beyond the figures identi-
fed with any single nation for paral-
lei.
On the battlefield IF Borodino, long
considered one Of Il bloodiest in mod
ern times, there were 100000 men en-
gagged, representing the powerful ma
tions of France and Russia At Gettys-
burg there were 16S, 900 men present,
all Of one nation, for civil war means
the conflict of divided household. AT
the very same time there were 10000
men contending at Vicksburg, and at
Port Hudson and Helena, above and be-
low Vicksburg, there were $4,000 more
Of these same brethren Of one household
battling for control of the great river
This means, then, that while Napoleon,
invading Russia, and the car, stem
ming the tide, mustered in all $50, 900
men, the American nation, in the mas
terly struggles over Washington and the
great highway of the west, brought in
to action 1888, 900 soldiers.
But there is parallel more startling
still. A year after Borodino the allied
peoples arose in their might to wipe out
Napoleon and France. There We're six of
the greatest misunderstanding out Aus
tria-involved, and it was, for France,
and also for her enemies, Russia, Eng
land, Prussia, Spain and Sweden, q war
to the death. They met at Leipsic and
fought three days, bringing to the bat
tlefield the enormous muster of 400, 900
men. One year after Gettysburg Amer
ica's belligerent sons, the blue and the
gray, rallied for the grand encounter in
front of Richmond and before Atlanta.
For 100 days they fought steadily over
the course between the Rapidan and the
James, for 100 days there was thrust
and parry within the mountain glens and
the thicket pagcee IF Gporoia oDd tho