The Bemidji daily pioneer. [volume] (Bemidji, Minn.) 1904-1971, 1908-11-26

people, should be fttingly commem-
GRATED here at the national capital, and
l am glad indeed to take part in the
unyeiling of this statue to General
Sheridan. His name will always stand
high on the list Of American worthless.
Not only was he great general, but
he showed his greatness with that
genius. Indeed, this quality of bril-
lance has been in one sense disad-
vantage to his reputation, for it has
tended to overshadow his solid ability.
We tend to think Of him only as the
dashing cavalry leader, whereas he
was in reality not only that, but also
great commander. Of course the fact
in his career most readily recognized
was his mastery in the necessarily
modern art of handling masses of
modern cavalry so as to give them the
fullest possible effect not only in the
ordinary operations Of cavalry which
precede and follow battle, but in the
battle ITSELF But in addition he show
ed in the civil war that he was a first
class army commander both as SUBJ
ordinate of Grant and when in inde-
pendent command. His record in the
Valley campaign and again from Five
Forks to Appomattox is one difficult to
parallel in military history. After the
close Of the great war, in field where
there was scant glory to be won by the
general in chief, he rendered a signal
service which has gone almost unno-
ticed, for in the tedious, weary Indian
wars Oh the great plains it was he who
developed in thoroughgoing fashion
the system of campaigning in winter
which; at the cost of bitter hardship
and peril, finally broke down the band
ed strength Of those formidable war
! riors, the horse Indians.
Generals Career EuIogized.
His career was typically American,
for from plain beginnings he rose to
the highest military position in our
land. We honor his memory itself,
and, moreover, as in the case of the
other great commanders of his day,
his career symbolizes the careers of
all those men who in the years Of the
nations direst need sprang to the
front to risk everything, including life
itself, and to spend the days of their
strongest young manhood in valorous
conflict for an IDEAL Often we Amer
leans are tainted with having only
material IDEAL The empty folly Of the
taunt is sufficiently shown by the
presence here today of you men Of the
Grand Army, you the comrades of the
dead general, the men who served
with and under him. In all history
we have no greater instance of subor-
dination of self, of the eXalting of a
lofty ideal over merely material we'll
|. being among the people of a great ma
ton, than was shown by our own peo-
+ pie in the civil war. .
And you, the men who wore the
blue, would be the first to say that
this same lofty Indifference to the
things Of the body, when compared to.
the things of the soul, was shown by
your brothers who wore the gray.
Dreadful was the suffering, dreadful
the loss, of the civil war. Yet it
SLandS alone among wars IN THIS, that,
now that the wounds are healed, the
memory Of the mighty deeds Of valor
performed on one side no less than on
the other has become the common
heritage Of all our people in every
quarter of this country. The COM
pleteness with which this is true is
shown by what is occurring here to-
day. We meet together to raise a
monument to a great Union general
in the presence of many Of the sur
vivors of the Union army, and the Sec
rotary of war, the man at the head Of
- the army, who, by virtue of his Of
fee, occupies special relation to the
celebration, is himself a man who
fought in the Confederate service.
Few indeed have been the countries
where such a conjunction would have