Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1910-06-04

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The following is the historical and
reminiscent address delivered at the
Memorial day exercises of the Anda-
lusia Memorial association Monday by
John T. Kenworthy of this city:
Fellow citizens: We have met to-
day to pay our tribute of respect to
the memory of the soldiers who died
in the nations wars. Our hearts are
filed with love, gratitude and rever-
ence for Them that through their eff
forts this nation survives as an undi-
vided people, and is today the might
est empire and the greatest political
power on the face of the earth.
AS 1 stand before you upon this hal,
lowed occasion. my memory goes back
to the days of 1861; and l remember
a squad of young men and boys, of
whom / was one, who, on a day early
in April of that year walked through
the deep mud of the bottom road from
this place to Milan Camden Mills 1t
was them on our way to Davenport
Iowa. to enlist in Captain Brewsters
Company C of the I'd Iowa infantry
volunteers in the war of the rebellion.
I did not enlist then, as there were
plenty of men; they did not need boys.
But this is not the subject upon which
/ am permitted to address you, your
committee have selected another
theme.
RecoIIect1ons Are Many.
Standing before you here today a
thousand recollections come crowding
thickly up for utterance. Andalusia!
~ll NffnT In "
life has my mind reverted to you You
are the home of my earliest infancy
and my childhood; 1t was here l
passed my early manhood. 1t was
here that 1 was born; this is the place
of my happy schoolboy days; in this
village l was married; in this locality
began my professional career; it was
here that 1 dreamed of those bright
visions of my young manhood, little
thinking of the obstacles to be over
come, the difficulties to be encoun-
tered or of the disappointments in
store for me-the dream of youth and
young manhood! Oh! how bright and
gloriousi how seldom realized!
This is the place where my dear old
father and mother lie buried. OH
how 1 loved them-how 1 now revere
their memory with all the associations
it brings up. With the poet, 1 exclaim:
How dear to my heart, are the
scenes of my childhood,
When fond recollection presents
them to view.
The orchard, the meadow, the deep
tangled wildwood;
And every dear spot which my in
fancy knew
Amidst the wild and primeval forest
and the glory of sober autumn, when
all nature is lavish in painting her
Incompatible and indiscribable colors
and pictures of prairie, forest and of
stream, and upon the bank of this
great river, now so majestically run
ming its course to the sea, and with
fits banks then, as now, fringed with
the beautiful flora of this temperate
zone. and now filled with the breath
and perfume of the flowers of mature
spring; and here, in this town, on the
oath day of October, 1876, and when
our country was in the throes Of the
Mexican war and in an old red log
and frame house, located on the south
east corner of Magnolia and Front
streets, your speaker was the innocent
cause of considerable commotion, a
large amount of trouble and of much
care and sOlicitude. While was then
personally present and one of the prin-
cipal actors in that, to me, memorable
and important occasion, yet you will
not, for obvious and apparent reasons,
expect me to detail to you any of the
immediate incidents appertaining
thereto; and Notwithstanding the &C.
casion was a very important and early
one in my life, yet my memory of it is
blank. With one exception, so far as
/ am now advised, all who had any
memory of that event lie up yonder
on the hill.
Knew Them ALL
NV friends of all the multitude who
are now peacefully sleeping in sonder
cemetery, hardly one of them were
strangers to me. 1 knew them all;
many of them were my associates,
and all of them were my friends. The
old and the young are there; many a
bright-eyed beauty that knew in my.
boyhood days and into whose face I
have often looked and saw the glad
and anticipation of future years, now
lies up yonder; they have paid the
last great debt Of nature and passed
into nirvana, or whatever may be the
final end OF man-oblivion or, eternal
felicity and a glorious Immortality.
That city has, in population, outgrown
this village, but ell who are silently
and peacefully sleeping there were,
directly or indirectly, concerned and
identified with the material prosperity
of Andalusia. The majority of them
knew the village in antebellum days
and during the zenith of its prosperity
and glory, which was in 1867. With
the passing away of the wheat fields
of Edgington, Hamlet, Buffalo Prairie
and the surrounding country, the log
and lumber RATS, the steamboats,, the
mills, the warehouses and the change
in the commerce of the country, sic
transit OI0rjao AndaIuSiaa