The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-12-12
LEXINGTON REVISITED.
DR, JUNKIN, STONEWALL JACK
 SON, PO4GUE'S
Battery and tho Rest-Recollections of n Writer After Forty Years Ab- senCe From inc Virginia Valley

| of Writer After Forty Years Alb
 sence From the Virginia Valley.
 Some of the interesting history of tn
 old Virginia valley are recalled by
 writer in the "Richmond Dispatch" an
 it makes good reading: After an ab sence of forty years the impulse cam strong upon me to revisit this classi
 little town nestling in the far-fameC Valley of Virginia, and holding so mucl both of memories and of the actual liv ing present that is dear to all Virgin
 ians. With my arrival in the tow1
 came trooping back on wings of light
 thronging and tumbling over eacf other. the memories of the days oI
 1S601S61, when l was a law student al
 Judge Brockenbrough's law school
 and was in the midst of the stirring
 scenes that ushered in the most dread
 ful war of modern times.
 It seemed to me I could see again the | benign and gentle face of old Judge
 kenbrough--strong, but amiabe
 and kind to the last degree, with his great, dark eyes looking out from be- HctLlI bldCh, DuSuy, SS CDipNo tieth ] could see again the stern and resolute
 Scotch Irish faces of McDowell, Moore, McLaugh, and all the other Mes on this, their native heath, before the
 younger generation of them went forth
 to do battle for the right, as their
 fathers had ever done before them, and
 in a style, and with glory that their
 fathers never knew. It seemed that l
 could see again old Dr. Junkin, as he
 stood in the old court house addressing
 mixed audience of citizens and stu
 dents on the issues of the war and
 peace. There he stood-that queer fig
 ure Che always wore pigeon-tailed coaD the exact image on the title page of the London Punch," and in the face of the jeers catcalls and misses of the students defiantly shouted in his shrill, squeaking voice the hated word,
 Union" when the Union had already been murdered by the maddened Aboli- tionists and John Brown Worshipers Of the North. This old man was still shouting peace when there was no peace" Yet he was brave and l honor him for that. He was consistent and went North, and l honor him still more for that, for he did not stay here to betray his old friends in coming time.
 The students of Washington col lege scattered to their homes and en- tered the various branches of the ser vice, and out went the gallant Rock bridge Battery destined to win immor- tai glory in the coming days of tiresome and awful battle. With it. as officers went Mclaughlin, Poague and 'Bo." Brockenbrough Was there ever a better illustration of the Union of the covenanter and cavalier in the red ranks of war? The first of these, after a long career of usefulness and highest credit upon the bench, passed over the river,' but q few years ago, and the last has just within a few days emerged on the other side and rejoined his com rades who have gone before. The sec- ond, also my friend and comrade in those old days, I am glad-so glad-to say, still lives and still serves his peo- pie and country as the honored treas urer of the Virginia Military Institute. Modest as he is ineritorious, he moves about the streets and looks as if he had never heard a cap pop in his life, and truly no one except some old comrade would ever know from him that he had. As I walked with him over the institute grounds and saw him moving amongst those youthful soldier boys, l could not 1elp wondering to myself whether they 7ver thought who this quiet, modest gentleman Is, and whether many of hem ever knew of his deeds in war. An, boys, if you would but put your aars to the ground some fine day you night hear coming back through the mysterious mountain hollows the lin- sering echoes from his guns, that forty lears cannot silence.
 And lest you forget boys, ol, Hest you 'orget," let me tell you here what Gen ,ral Dick Taylor in his admirable book, Destruction and Reconstruction" says if this old Brockbridge Battery.
 On page 57, speaking of the battle of l he says: Jackson was on he pike, and near him were several | egiments lying down for shelter as the | ire from the ridge was heavy and | A Virginia battery, Rock | ,ridges Artillery, was fighting at great | and already much cut up. | Poetic authority asserts that old Nir- ,inny never tires, and the conduct of | his battery justified the assertion of | he Muses. With scarce a leg or wheel | or man and horse, gun or caisson to tand one, it continued to hammer | way at the crushing fire above"
 As is well known Lieutenant Poague ose to be colonel of artillery before he war ended. On my recent visit he indly took me through the library and howed me the portraits of distin- ushed graduates of the institute and thers, and amongst them, of course, re portraits of Stonewal Jackson, and ne of Major Jackson or "Old Jack" of he institute, as he looked in those piping times of peace" before his name nd fame had encircled the world.
 There he was with clean shaven chin nd upper lip, an fact, with only mili- Try side whiskers, as he looked before
 full beard had and bad portrait ainters had obliterated the prm, stern, nes of that mouth and chin and the litter of those gray eyes. In that pie Ire the man as he was looks out and is whole character as subsequently, aveloped is revealed to the behoder as an open book
 The stern resolve, the unflinching de- impassive-the un- elding Stonewall and the fierce genius