Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1899-08-01
THEY DIED FOR LIBERTY
Ingerso'PS Eloquent Tribute to the
Soldiers and Sailors OF the
War for the Union.

Col. Ingersoii's tribute to the heroes
who fought and died for liberty and hui
mainly has been characterized as one or
the most eloquent passages in the English
language. 1t is as follows:
The past, as it were, rises before me
like a dream. Again we are in the great
struggle for national life. We hear the
sound of preparatiOn-the music of the
boisterOuS drumS-the silver voices of he
role buglers. We see thousands of as
semblages, and hear the appeals of or
ators; we see the pale cheeks of women,
and the flushed faces of men; and in those
aSSemblageS we see all the dead whose
dust we have covered with flowers. We
lose sight of them 10 more We are with
them when they enlist in the great army
of freedom. We see them part with
those they love. Some are walking for
the last time in quiet, woody places with
the maidens they adore. We hear the
whisperlngs and the sweet vows of eter-
nal love as they lingeringly part forever.
Others are bending over cradles, kissing
babes that are asleep. Some are parting
with mothers who hold them and press
them to their hearts again and again,
and say nothing; and some are talking
with wives. and endeayoring with brave
words spoken in the old tones to drive
away the awful fear. We see them part.
We see the wife standing in the door
with the babe in her arms-standing in
the sunlight, sobbing-at the turn of the
road hand waves-she answers by hold
ing high in her loving hands the child
He is gone, and forever.
I'VE see them all as they march proud
ly away under the Haunting flags, keep
ing time to the wild, grand music OF
war-marchlng down the streets of the
great cities-through the towns and
across the prairies-down to the fields
of glory, to do and to die for the eternal
right.
I'VE go with them, one and all. We
are by their side on all the CORY
fields, in all the hospitals Of pain-on all
the weary marches. We stand guard
with them in the wild storm and under
the quiet stars We are with them in
ravines running with blood-in the fur
rows of old fields. We are with them
between contending hosts, unable to
move, wild with thirst, the life ebbing
slowly away among the withered leaves.
We see them pierced with balls and torn
with shells in the trenches of forts. and
in the whirlwind of the charge, where
men become iron with nerves of STEEL
We are with them in the prisons of
hatred and famine, but human speech
can never tell what they endured.
We are at home when the news comes
that they are dead. We see the maiden
in the shadow of her sorrow. We see the
silvered head of the old man bowed with
the IaSC Sr1eI.
The past rises before us, and we see
100000 Of human beings governed by
the lash-we see them bound hand and
fOOt-We hear the strokes Of the cruel
whips-we see the hounds tracking WON
en- through oangled swamps We see
babes sold from the breasts of mothers
Cruelty unspeakable! Outrage infinite.
-Four million bodies in chains-four
million souls in letters. All the sacred
relations of wife mother. father and
child, trampled beneath the brutal feet
of might. And all this was done under
our own beautiful banner of the free'
1.-THE past rises before US. We hear the
roar and shrek of the bursting shell. The
broken letters fall. There heroes died
We look. Instead of slaves we see men
and women and children. The wand of
progress touches the auction block, the
slavepen and the whipping post, and we
see homes and firesides, and schoolhouses
and books and where all was want and
crime, and cruelty and fear, we see the
faces of the free.
These heroes are dead. They died for
liberty-they died for us. They are at
rest. They sleep in the land they made
free, under the flag they rendered stain
less, under the solemn pines, the sad
hemlOcks, the fearful willows, the en-
bracing vines. They sleep beneath the
shadows of the clouds, careless alike of
sunshine or storm, each in the window
less palace of rest. Earth may run red
with other wars-they are at peace. In
the midst of battle, in the roar of con
fiict, they found the serenity of death
| have one sentiment for the soldiers liv-
ing and dead--cheers for the living and
tears for the dead"