The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1902-03-30

THIS STATE
Sent to the Front, in One of the Greatest
and Most Unequal Conflicts, Record
ed in History, These Volumes,
Fraught With the Testimony of Comrades
to immortal Courage,
Are Inscribed
TO THE HEROIC WOMEN OF NORTH
CAROLINA
Who Inspired Our Citizen Soldiery
BY Their Faith in God, by Their Magic
Influence and Unreasonable Good
Works, and
TO THEIR FAIR DAUGHTERS,
Whose Unshaken Fidelity Has Preserved
The Fame of
OUR GLORIOUS DEAD.
eWith Such to Inspire The Living and
Honor The Fallen The Men of North
Carolina Will Ever be
EQUAL TO VICTORY-SUPERIOR TO
DEFEAT.
The preface, which is an admirable re-
view of the work done by large number
of the States first sons in peace and war,
is called Review and Conclusion" by the
editor, Justice Walter Clark. 1t is in it
self one of the best chapters in the book,
and is model and concise statement of
the heroism displayed by the North Caro-
lin Confederate soldier. 1t is in full as
follows:
The last line of these five volumes hav-
ing now been printed it is proper 20
write few lines in review and farewell
to be prefixed to this, the last volume.
The origin, the purpose and the scope
l., N4x,1 H. ira
face to Vol. l. and need not be repeated.
In the classic tongue of historic Greece
the word oida. / have seen, is at the
same time both the perfect tense OF the
verb edo, see, and the present tense of
the verb l know. That is, what | have
seen l know 1t is upon this idea that
this work has been compiled. The mar
rative is not by one historian writing
at second hand from information de-
rived from many sources. NBut herein
the narratives are by participants who
have written from the personal knowl-
edge of themselves or of their immediate
comrades and largely of scenes of which
they were eye witnesses.
Their contributions have been laborl-
ously gathered by conference, or CORE
spondence, with surviving comrades and
diligently compared with. the original re-
ports published in the Official Records
of the Union and Confederate Armies"
AS a further assurance of accuracy these
sketches were printed in the newspapers
and criticisms and corrections requested.
1t may be stated here that the dates at
fixed are mostly arbitrary for the ma
jorty of the regimental sketches were
written in. 1895, but being revised again
and again down to the time each went
to press the date April, 1900 or 1901
was affixed to those organizations from
the Army of Northern Virginia and 26
April to those from the Army of the
West these being the anniversaries of
the surrender of the respective armies
In some cases articles written by per-
sons who died before the beginning of this
work have been reproduced where the
name of the writer or the subject matter
has given them special interest.
The writer's herein number $50 and rep
resent every grade in the Army from
Lieutenant General to private, and en-
brace not only men who have filled almost
every vocation in life since the war but
those who have filled every civil office
from IT, S. Senator and Governor to
constable Farmers, lawyers, preachers,
have each and all freely contributed
their time and labor to preserve herein
the memorials of what their comrades
did and suffered at the command of
North Carolina during those four event
full years the memory of which can never
be forgotten.
Among the brave men who have traced
the lines in these volumes are soldiers
he enc
Bethel in the first real battle of the
war 10 June, 1861. and whose ears
caught the patter of mines at Coxs
brigade fired the last volley at Apo
mattox April. 1865. and who missed but
little of the music of war between those
dates. Among these writer's are some
who heard the opening guns at Sumter
IS April 1861; many who heard the crash
of A. p. Hills musketry on that sultry
summers eve as he drove back Burnside
at Sharpsburg and who listened to the
long monotone of artillery at Gettysburg
SO steady and unbroken as to seem the
prolonged reVerberation of a single
broadside; eyes now dim saw the South
ern night lightened with she'll and mortar
over doomed Vicksburg; limbs now stiff
stepped fast and cheerily as the echoes
of Jackson's cannon rolled along the
silver Shenandoah. Such another gather
ing can not be found in any other work
and could not be duplicated now for
nearly one in every ten has passed be-
yond the pale since their articles were
penned. Their comrades of whose deeds
they wrote sleep, many of them, where
the Georgian pines are bare. others by
the Mississippi, the Cumberland, the
Ohio, the Kanawha and where Potomac S
breezes answering low soothe many a
soldiers endless sleep.
With a devotion to duty, only to be ex-
pected of such men, they have written
these volumes and deserve the grateful
remembrance of their countrymen fol
this scarcely less than for the gallant
deeds they aided to perform and which
but for their pens would have been I'M
recorded.
While these articles have been neces-
sarily written from the standpoint OF
each writer which by a natural law
makes each object and event near us
seem larger and more important than
those farther off, still there has been a