Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-11-06
BATTLE OF THE CRATER
Anniversary Celebrated at
Petersburg, Va, Today.
MAHUNE'S SURVIVORS
LISTEN TO AN ADDRESS BY COL.
WILLIAM H. STEWART.
They Gather on the Old Battlefield and
Recall That Day Of
Carnage.
MAHUNE'S SURVIVORS

Special Dispatch to The Evening Star.
NORFOLK, Va. November 6.-For the
first time since the memorable battle of the
crater out from Petersburg, July 30. 1854,
the confederate survivors of that conflict
met today in reunion on the battlefield. and
stood upon the very spot where many Of
them fell from wounds.
The reunion a remarkable one in
many particulars. The widow of Gen.
William Malone was present, and received
the old soldiers, first with smiles and then
with tears. when she remembered her de-
[ ceased husband and their beloved COM
mander.
The veterans of the regular army and the
surviving confederate sharpshooters lined
up in companies Some who stood side by
side during the great battle thirty nine
years ago were in the same position today.
They marched across the battlefield. and
renewed the old charge they made when
the command was given by Gen. William
Malone in the time of action.
Marked With Union Flags.
The lines occupied by the federal troops
during the battle were marked off with a
line of United States flags. In some in
stances the confederate survivors carried
the same old flags that We're carried in the
time of battle while in other cases the vet
Grams carried handsome new silken confed-
crate flags.
The scene was one of the most interesting
ever witnessed by old soldiers since the
actual conflicts in which they participated
during the civil war. The state militia was
out in full force, and following the charge
of the veterans there was a sham battle.
the smoke being the first to arise from the
old battlefelds since the guns of the fed
eral and confederate forces ceased in GA.
handsome silver medal, representing in
DerfectneSS confederate
presented to each veteran on the field. the
presentation speech being made by Can't
Robertson Taylor of Baltimore, who was
adjutant on the staff of Gen. Malone.
The speaker of the day Col. William
II. Stewart Of Portsmouth, chief of the
crater legion, who was commander of the
61st Virginia Regiment during the BATTLE
Col. Stewart stood on the very line from
which his troops charged during the battle.
Col. Stewards Grafton.
1.-The dust of our uncoffined comrades has
been stirred in these burrows by the plough
Of the unthinking husbandman as the sea-
sons have passed, but we have cherished
their memory as the vestal fire of our
lives he in part said.
While at your posts, yonder at Wilcox
farm, you heard the tremendous explosion
of 5000 pounds of gun powder, which had
been buried twenty-five feet beneath the
surface of the earth, forcing the upheavaI
of an immense cone of more than one hun
dred thousand cubic feet of earth, which
fell around in heavy masses, crushing and
burying alive hundreds of our sleeping SOL
dierS, making clouds of dust and a great
volume of smoke and fire like the outpour-
ing of d great volcano.
The main gallery of the mine from the
enemy'S line to the end, under Pegram's
battery, was 522 feet in length and the side
galleries Were about forty feet each The
excavation made by the explosion was l35
feet long 81 feet broad and 80 feet Deep
The artillery opened along the whole line
and that day the enemy expended 3,SS3
rounds of ammunition weighing seventy-tve
tons.
The $50 men of Mahone's brigade. who
were aligned on that parchng July day.
over thirty-nine years ago, charged into an
army corps.
Praise for Mahone's Men.
rs there another deathless record in
averaging 10 soldiers, charged an army Of
10000 men and took from them fifteen Of
their battle standards?
The testimony of the enemy establishes
the truth of the wonderful victory and the
lamentaton of Grant, 1T is the Saddest af-
fair | have witnessed in the war; re-echoed
the praise bestowed on your valor by the
peerless Lee.
But the cost to you of his praise was
the sacrifice of lit lives of your bravest
comrades, and to them we owe the duty OF
inscribing their names On imperishable
tablets in our temple of fame, soon to he
erected in the capital city Of the south;
and let us also ask for them place on the
walls of old Blandford Church"