The Savannah morning news., 1903-05-24

"Philete" everybody called him ex-
cept his old comrades in arms of the
Kentish Guards Post %. G. A. R. The
post was made up of $50 members
when Philetus first joined in 70. but
in 81 the old guard was barely thirty
strong.
Only since the last Memorial day,
an observance that Philetus looked
forward TO with more zeal than Christ
mas and Fourth of July combined,
just one little year, and five less MEM
bers had marched in the parade to
place the flags on the graves of their
comrades. Five more flags to carry
and five less boys to carry them.
Philetus was not as spry and his
feet went heavier in trying to keep
time to the music this year. Maybe
the last sick spell had done it.
But Philetus was still strong. he as
sured the old members. Why" he
said, Il am the only five-year man
left on the rolls" and the old mem
bers all said hes right"
Sergt. Williams was six months in
his last camp ground. He and Philetus
had joined on the first call and reach
ed Washington when the Army of the
Potomac was merely an idea in the
leaders brain. And they had stayed
right through to the end. even six
months after Appomattox, before they
were discharged and got their trans
pCrtation home.
Philetus didn't go home at first, he
wasn't married and had no call to go
home, so the transportation money was
used another way, and Philetus made
a whaling voyage, and then another,
and it was eight years before he
reached Apponaug, and the yarns he
insisted on spinning when he Joined
the boys at the armory the first night,
soldier talk mixed with sailor talk.
with hundreds of adventures to draw
from, made Philetus popular.
Then he settled down and soon came
the wife and later the boy, and a lit
tie later the wife was taken away and
Philetus had only the baby boy to
care for and a grave on the bill
Surely there was nothing strange
that man with only a baby boy to
care for should have a lot of time to
spend in the old armory and it there
fore was most unusual thing for the
members TO meet on winter nights and
not catch Philetus giving his old sto-
ries another chance to be heard.
One week during the winter of 70
y
at night but the members all knew it
was Philetus' baby that was. sick and
Philetus was home watching him, be-
cause the landlady was too busy, and
as she told the other boarders, she
wasn't a trained nurse anyway.
Soon the boy was 10, then Is, and
finally he was earning his own living.
and three years ago he married and
moved away where carpenters could
H.-ew
around until the mail was sorted every
afternoon, waiting for a letter from
the boy, and then he would go back
to the dingy hotel Office and answer
1t on the hotel paper, and the boy
would tell the neighbors that his IA
Their was stopping at the hotel.
He never told them that his father
carried the mail bag and cleaned out
the office at the hotel, and for this he
received 81 a month from the govern
ment, and his board and a very small
room in the hotel. No. it wasn't nee
essary to tell the neighbors that, and
they thought that Mr.. and Mrs. Ar
mold would probably have a lot of
money when Mr.. Arnold's father died.
Philetus used to write CHEEKY letters
to the boy, and the boy, of course,
didn't know that his father had been
laid up pretty much all winter with
the rheumatism, and when he was out
again. that the hotel people told him
that he owed them $50, but he could
pay dollar week on account, and
would be all paid up in a year
1t wasn't necessary to put all that
stuff in letter, thought Philetus. so
he told the boy he never was feeling
better in his life and that only that
very day he had been thinking of buy
ing a bicycle at the hardware store,
He said it was a secondhand one just
TO make it sound more like the truth
when the boy read it,
And here it was Memorial day again.
and they were now going into the GEM
etery, and the orator of the day was
telling about the brave boys in blue
This was the oath time Philetus had
done this, and he reckoned on doing
1t great many times more.
If 1t wasn't for this rheuma-
tism,' he said, using some of his sailor
language, Il wouldn't ask for any,
thing better than to run back to the