Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1898-02-12

I#NT/r>W lead ers proves
that they had the
stuff in them to fill the bill. Soldiers
were not particular as to the length Of a
colonel's beard or about anything else
except the quality Of leadership. Hence
if a boy got into the saddle with sill
yer decoration on his shoulders the more
honor to him. In writing thus ! have
in mind only the fighting colonies and
fighting regiments and fighting soldiers.
There is a notion abroad that for hun
dreds and hundreds of regiments and
hundreds Of thousands of soldiers the
going to war was only a junketing af-
fair, that they never saw Confederate,
or if they did ran away at the first
view. Such colonels and regiments and
soldiers are never exploited in the ar
ticles signed as below To my mind a
regiment, when considering Federals,
is % body of men which stood like a
rock at Malvern Hill or Stone River or
Gettysburg or Chickamauga or Frank
lin, or which stormed the lines at An
tietam and fredericksburg at Mission
Ridge and Kenesaw, at Spottsylvania
and Petersburg.
Naturally, then, if take a boy colo
mel or any other kind of colonel for
theme, / shall go to very hot place to
find him. Therein lies the key to the re-
mark that boy colonies were not popu-
lar 1t required marvel Of man to
be the colonel Of fighting regiment
that is to say, a staying colonel, and
staying qualities are implied i'll what
have said Of my chosen types of sol
diers. A fighting colonel must be an
ideal master Of men, not a mere driver,
but master in the sense of leadership,
one to draw his men to him and make
them as so many members of his own
body obedient to the very impulses Of
his brain. Now, there were a handful
only of boy colonies Of that stamp.
There were two besides Colonel Arthur
Macarthur in the very field where he
won and kept his unique position, one
of them in the same brigade. Colonel
SilaS Miller of the Thirty sixth Illinois
started as private and at % was COM
manding the regiment. Before he was
25 he fell at the head of his regiment,
storming the slopes of Kenesaw. Colonel
j. B. Forman of the Fifteenth Ken
lucky was only 81 years of age when he
was killed at the head of his regiment
at Stone River. He won the silver eagle
by an act of gallantry at Perryyille two
months before.
A veteran of the Twenty fourth Wis
consin recently gave the war story teller
of The Times H erald some points in the
career of Colonel Macarthur which show
that boy was handicapped i'll many
ways in his race for q colonelcy. Said
he: When the governor made him our
adjutant i'll 1869, he was only II and
small for his age. His voice had not
fully changed. 1t sounded like the crow
ing Of young rooster in its first efforts
We made all sorts Of fun of him, and
felt that we had been imposed upon by
the governor. We wanted man. not a
STRIPPING, for adjutant, an Office almost
as important as that of a colonel.
"You ought to have heard the boy on
dress parade His chicken voice didn' t
reach half way down the line when he
piped out, TO the rear; open order;
march and when he minced to the
center of the regiment, moved out in
front and said, First sergeant to the
front and center, march' there was a
broad grin on the faces of thousand
men and a scowl on that of the colonel.
The first colonel had seen service and
wanted q competent man for adjutant.
The night after the first dress parade he
said, 4 shall write to the governor to
send me a wooden man for adjutant
The boy heard Of some Of the colonel g
comments, and he could see that the
men were guying him. 1t cut him to
the quick.
I'm show them that can fight
anyway. Then maybe they'll come tc
like me better, said the boy as he
brushed away something damp from his
soft check. "
Another story from the same lips
brings out the qualities this boy had
for winning the love Of his men. A,
Kenesaw the veteran who tells the story
was badly wounded and loft behind
when the Twenty-fourth was ordered
back after the repulse. Young Near.
thur was in command, and when hC
learned that Sergeant Dunn was among
the missing III battle he sent file Of
men to the front again 20 search fol
him. Said he, If he is wounded anC
alive, see that he is given in charge q
the surgeon at once; if dead, bring hi
body in, and it shall be sent home. 81
The thought was the impulsiye enc O.
a boy, but the act was that Of firm
and ready commander
McArthrr won his eagle. He was NJ
accidental colonel At the first grea
battle Of the regiment, Stone River
the colonel and lieutenant colonel wer,
both absent, and the command of tn,
Twenty fourth devolyed upon the majol
and the boy adjutant. The regimen
was in Sheridan's division, where il
served all through the war. At Stone
River the three brigade commanders o.
the division were shot down early il
the fight and the regiments left to them
selves. 1t was a terrible struggle. toc
well known To be repeated here The