Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-05-25
UNWILLING OF TABLETS
ADDRESS BY REV. RANDOLPH h.
M'KIM

Impressive ceremonies marked the unveiI-
ing of number of bronze tablets wednes-
day evening at the University of Virginia,
Charlottesville. The tablets were In mem
DRY of 800 students and alumni of the noted
college who fell in the civil war.
Rev. DR.. Randolph H. McKim of the
Church of the Epiph1ny, this city, deliv-
cred the memorial address. He said:
Fellow citizens, let rot the action or the
words of this day and hour be misunder-
stood. We do not preach a gospel of vain
regret. We do not invite the young men
of the south to brood over the ashes of the
past. No, a thousand times. mol We long
ago bowed to the decree of the Almighty
in the issue of that great conflict. His
will Is wiser and better than ours We
thank God that today the sun shines a
truly reunited country. We love our south
land; we are southern men; but are
glad that sectionaiism Is dead and buried
In the providence of God the Spanish war
became the instrument Of welding the north
and south together in bonds of genuine
brotherhood. Their blood has wRtered the
same soil, their common patriotism has
glorified again the land of Washington.
Men who faced one another In deadly con-
flict at Shiloh and at Gettysburg rushed
side by side, under the stars and stripes
up the heights of San Juan and Ell Caney.
There was no north or south on those fields
tiago harbor, or in Manila bay.
And let me say that these memorial tablets
will contribute not to the perpetuation OF
the spirit of sectionaism, but to the spirit
of triumphant Americanism. The exam
pies of these glorious young men will in
spire future generations of students in this
great university with a lofty sense of the
sacredness of duty. The unselfish heroism
OF these youths whose names are here In
scribed Will foster in those who read them.
in time to come, similar spirit Of high
and self-forgetting endeayOr. Yes, the
young men Of the south will surely claim
their part in the great destiny OF America.
Eagerly. Joyfully, they will accept their
share in the responsibilities. in the oppor-
tun.ties, In the strenuous conflicts of the
future, against foes within and without In
the conquest Of civic and social as well
foreign enemies, in the moral and material
glory Of their country. Holding the past
and especially the associations of those
four years Of heroic confiict-in tender and
reverent memory, they will yet turn their
faces to the future, with resofute pur-
pose to quit them like men for God and for
native land. To its duties, its labors, its
confiicts-civic or social, or military, as
God wills-they will consecrate their
strength and their manhood They will feel
themselves Americans in every fiber. and
nothing that pertains to the honor, to the
welfare, to the glory of America will be
foreign to them
But such thoughts as these must not lead
us away from the sacred theme which be-
longs to this place and hour. Mind and
heart and memory at this time are theirs
to whom these bronzes are dedicated today
There are just 500 names craven on these
tablets Of students and alumni who laid
down their lives for the southern cause.
The number itself Is significant. If 500
died, there must have been more than $780,
perhaps as many as 1900 on the rolls of
the confederate armies who called this
university mother. We have no accurate
register of the number who were living in
1881 and fit Sor military service. But We
do know that of the 604 who were students
here when the tocsin of war sounded, $50
hailed from the seeding states, and of
these $50 about 515 went to the front Two
OF the professors followed their students
our ilustrious professor of Creek Basil L.
Gordon in the valley of Virginia: he still
arship: and Lewis Minor Coleman, our
right loyal professor of Latin, who fell
gloriously while commanding a battalion
of artillery at Fredericksburg.
These numbers, l say, are significant
They bear eloquent witness, not only to the
gallantry of our brother alumni, but to the
unanimity of the southern people in that
great struggle, and they afford convincing
proof of the falsity of the theory held by
some historians of the civil war-that the
uprising of the southern people was the re-
suit of a conspiracy Of a few ambitious
leaders. Fellow citizens. when we see 515
out Of 625 students, representing the flower
Of the intellect and culture Of the south
it's yeomen as well as its aristocracy-
springng to arms at the first sound of the
long roll we realize that the resistance
offered to coercion in 1861 was in no sense
artificial, but free and spontaneous.