The record-union., 1899-05-30

Forge and Yorktown, and starvation,
and widowhood, and orphanage, which
the historian has attempted in vain to
put into type or on canvas, as the thlr-
teen colonies were born into life through
this chrism of blood.
The story of the American revo-
luton will never be told as the
horrors of the modern battle
field have been, because engrav-
ers' tools, thd reporters skill and the
telegraphic wire and the power press
had not yet arrived upon the field to
record it. But the graphic story has
been told from generation to genera
tion, and we know that while it did not
take much ink to sign the Declaration
of Independence, it took terrific
amount of blood to maintain it. 1t was
a mountain of opposition that the men
and women of 1776 had to surmount,
| helped win a victory.
| 1t was the same blood that pitched
King Georges tea into Boston Harbor,
that tingled in the veins of the royal pa
triots who leaped into line when the
first gun from the rebel hosts was fired
I'on Fort Sumter. For be it forever re-
membered that the Government of the
United States was not the aggressor.
The men who composed the Union arm
les did not strike the first blow.
The Northern States which remained
true to the Union and the Constitution
had not interfered with the domestic
rights of the men who rebelled. Every
question of governmental policy which
had been raised by the political changes
then taking place could have been
settled by peaceful arbitration.
President Lincoln was not a man Of
war The young men of the North
were not thirsting for blood nor eager
for the glories of. war. On this
side of Mason and Dixon's line not
hint of war had been given. Even the
old-time abohtionists whose influence
the South professed to fear were not
anxious for war. Aggressive measures
and talk of war originated with and
were confined to the Confederate States,
until the Government, in self defense,
was compelled to make preparations for
war, and even when it begun, many
leading Northern men were willing to
let the erring brethren go in peace.
But very effort to prevent an out
break was met by the South with open
defiance. Nothing short of the recog-
| milton of a Confederacy whose corner
stone should be slavery would satisfy
the Southern leaders, and this meant
the dissolution of the Union. 1t meant
the separation of the States into as
many confederacies as the ambitions
and caprices of men might determine
upon in the future. So the Government
h IN I0 p
of the rebellion was not war between
| the States as our European friends sup
posed. 1t was a war between the
| Government of the United States and
| 100000 rebellious subjects, and
when it came to this political opponents
thrust aside their partizanship to sup
port the President of the United States
in the patriotic work of preserving the
Union. THE Unionl one and indssolu-
BILE was the battlecry 1t was no
longer a question of whether men were
politically Democrats or Republicans
it was a question of Union or secession,
and men like General Logan, who left
his seat in Congress to become SOL
der, and Stephen A. Douglas, the great
Democratic leader, who was as stanch
a Union man as the country could
boast forgot political differences and
stood side by side for the Union.
So it quickly followed that the young
men who had been trained in the
school of democracy We're soon march
| ing side by side with the sons of Re
ipublicans to the front to sustain the
Government and preserve the Union.
Hancock, the Democrat, was as brave
and loyal as Garfield, the Republican.
The war had actually begun, and pa
triotisrn welled up in the hearts of the
people. Mothers bade their sons enlist
and sent them forth, trusting in the
God of battles to return them in safety
or to take them to Himself as martyrs
to the cause of freedom. Oh! what a
time it was. four years of homesick-
ness. four years Of brotherly estrange-
ment. four years of massacrei The
confla grafton of cities lit up the whole
continent. Long lines of hospitals,
making a vast metropolis of pain and
paroxysm. Millions of homes in mourn
/ ing from the lakes to the gulf! Who
can ever describe it?
/ Women carrying on the work of the
shop and the farm at home, while the
husbands, fathers and sons were maxi
/ ing history at the front. A man riding
along country road saw two lads
! plowing. He stopped to inquire
where their father was. The eldest
lad, not more than 10 years of age, said
Fathers down South fightin' rebs. We
! boys is diggin' and mother is prayin'.
Don't you think We'll lick the rebs?"
And rehectively, the man replied,
When the fathers are fighting, and
I 6d hn Lov.
are praying, we are sure to win
And yet, during those four years
many good and wise men. North and
South, saw nothing but annihilation.
Many said that with such a war debt
we could never meet our obligations.
With such mortal antipathies North
and South there could never be recon-
ciIliation. Representatives of the Con-
federacy could never again sit side by
side with the Representatives of the
North at the National Capital. Lord
John Russell had declared that we were
a bubble bursting nationality and
many thought it had all come true The
nations of Europe had gathered with a
very resigned and mournful air to at
tend the funeral Of our American repub-
lie. They had lowered their flags at half
mast on Parliament houses and toled
the bells and even the British lion had
whined for the dead Eagle on this side
the water The deep grave was al
ready dug and beside Babylon and
Tyre and other dead nations of the past
our dead republic was to be buried The
epitaph was all ready: Here lies the
American republic; born at Philadel-
phia, July 4, 1776: killed at Bull Run
July u, 1861 Aged S5 years and IL