Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1908-06-06
PANIED BY TAFT SPEECH
Veterans Do Not Relish Reference
To Grants Weakness.
MANY THINK IT BAD TASTE
EuIogy Contained Frank Reference To
Warriors Earlier Yielding To
Strong Drink.

New York, June f.--Old soldiers are
shaking their heads and wondering
why Secretary Taft found it necessary
to speak SO frankly of Grants weak
ness for strong drink"-the darker
page in the warriors life before the
civil war gave him his great opportu-
nifty. The secretary's Memorial Day
address, made inside the Grant tomb,
because OF the rain, was supposed to
be eulogy of General Grant, and in
the main, it was But with the dead
presidents son, Gen. Frederick Dent
Grant, and grandson, Lieut.. u. s..
Grant, within three feet OF him; with
the aged members of u. s. Grant Post.
Grand Army Of the Republic. and the
U. s. Grant Association clinging TO
the white marble balustrades around
the aSerature above the vaults of
Grant and his wife, Secretary Taft de-
picted briefly, but with plainness OF
expression which seemed startlin9eln-
der the circumstances, that phase of
the life OF the great warrior which
heretofore has been avoided by public
speakers.
He did we'll in the Mexican war. as
did other lieutenants," said Mr.. Taft.
He manifested, as regimental quar-
termaster, energy and familiarity with
his duties. But in 1854 he resigned
from the army because he mad to. He
had tielded to the weakness of a taste
FOR strong drink, and rather than be
court-martialed he left the army. He
returned from Vancouver on the Pa
cific Coast, to his family in st. Louis
without money, without property
disheartened man. He accepted from
his father-in-law a loan of Is acres,
upon which he constructed a house
for his family to live in, and there he
carried on farming operations His
chief business seemed to be that of
selling wood, cutting it, and piling it
up in the back yards of well-to-do ST.
Louis people.
After six years of this life he gave
up farming because of i'll health, and
went into the real estate bushes for
a year. He failed in this. His. asso-
date dissolved the partnership. Then
at last his father offered him 5000 as
a clerk in his leather store, at Galena,
H., and then he moved from st. Louis.
He worked there for year also.
During these seven years, although
everything looked dork, he overcame
in great measure his weakness for
strong drink. But he was so constitut-
ed that it seemed impossible for him
to earn livelihood even when he had
given hostages to fortune in the shape
of wife and four children"
The voice of the secretary sounded
full on the ears of the old soldiers
gathered about the ashes of their old
general, the arch high above and the
circular Walls DtlOW IOuuulHS Out CIV
cry word that Mr.. Taft uttered or
course this dark background was
meant to emphasize all the more he
triumph of Gen. Grants subsequent
achievements but while Mr.. Taft was
reading rom this page in the history
of the young life of Grant the veter-
ans looked at the secretary IN panied
wonderment. After the exercises. there
were comments by grizzled veterans.
One man was heard to say:
81 can't stand this. served under
him. This was no place 10 speak
of that chapter in the life of Grant"
The opinion was expressed by a
number of others that Mr.. Taft had
shown poor judgment in raking out
the dark pages in the life of Grant at
his tomb.