Mr. President, Members
of the Shiloh Monument Commission, Veterans of the Civil War, Ladies and
Gentlemen:
For the distinguished honor which is now conferred upon me I
return the acknowledgment of my sincere gratitude. Two score and four years ago
at this hour this splendid nation of ours, now so happy and peaceful and
contented in every section of its territory, was engaged in a tremendous
conflict to determine whether any government deriving its just powers from the
consent of the governed and dedicated to the proposition that all men are
created equal, could maintain its own integrity among the peoples of the earth;
a conflict so significant, so appalling, so unparalleled in the written records
of civilization that the imagination, however vigorous and resourceful, is
incompetent to delineate its immeasurable magnitude. I am profoundly impressed
by the consideration, Mr. President, that we are at this moment assembled upon
one of the principal battlefields of all history. It is a theater upon which,
in April, 1862, there was illustrated the sublimest exhibitions of American
bravery, American endurance, American patriotism. Here the intrepid Johnston,
sustained by the fearless daring of the south, encountered the invincible
Grant, supported by the superb courage of the north. And in the carnage of that
awful collision were blood and death and immortality. The heroes who shall
sleep forever in this sacred soil, whether robed in the blue of victory or in
the gray of defeat, each battled to his grave for a principle which he believed
with every aspiration of his soul to be right; each rendered to his country the
last final measure of duty as he conceived it; and the incomparable valor of
each is now the priceless heritage of all our people. And as, with uncovered
heads, we tarry momentarily at this historic spot made holy by the lives here
sacrificed for free government, in the shadow of this imperial column erected
by the pride and gratitude of a mighty state, let us again highly resolve that
these dead shall not have died in vain, and let us consecrate ourselves anew to
the great cause for which they surrendered their precious lives. When the
statesmanship of the Revolution organized this government and adopted our
constitution, it guaranteed to all citizens, catholic and protestant, puritan
and cavalier, royalist and republican, equal security in life, property and the
pursuit of happiness; and bottomed upon this principle the United States of
America entered upon its long career of prosperity and usefulness and honor.
The student of affairs is interested and yet perplexed when he is compelled to
consider that even at the remote day when Washington was inducted by unanimous
acclaim into the first presidency, there existed radical difference of opinion
respecting the character of the New Republic. One school of thought affirmed
that it was merely a voluntary association of sovereign states subject to be
dissolved at the election of any one or number of its membership. Another
school of thought maintained that it was an Union, inseparable, imperishable,
perpetual. Out of this disparity of belief, honestly entertained and earnestly
defended, there arose as the years elapsed heated discussion, bitter
controversy, crimination and recrimination; all to be adjudicated forever, to
be adjudicated irrevocably, to be adjudicated right, at Vicksburg, and Shiloh
and Appomattox Court House. And in that dark and doubtful day there were
patriots tried and true. It affords us infinite satisfaction to remember, Mr.
President, that in that supreme crisis which wrenched and almost wrecked the
Republic, our own peerless commonwealth sustained no inconspicuous part and
achieved no inconsiderable renown. Her brave boys in blue were on every tedious
march, in every sweltering trench, at every deadly charge; always the first to
the front and the last to the rear. And they did not sheath their swords nor
stack their guns until the emancipation of the slave and the permanence of the
Union were assured.
It is not possible to refer to the heroes living and dead
who struggled here except in language which, in any other connection, would be
condemned as inexcusable extravagance. They are the most resplendent stars in
all the firmament of humanity. Nobler than the Roman, grander than the Greek,
they suppressed an insurrection without a precedent and without a parallel. I
have for every one of them a deep and reverent affection, and I seldom deliver
public address without acknowledging my individual obligation to the men who
rescued this Republic when it was attacked by open treason at the south, and
assailed by covert disloyalty at the north. No hope of conquest induced their
enlistment in the great army of freedom; no ambition of office reconciled them
to the indescribable sacrifices which they embraced. The historian of the
future will not discover in all the annals of the past a more inspiring example
of human grandeur than that presented by the volunteer soldiers of America who
conquered the armed enemies of their government upon the bloody battlefields of
the civil war. Nothing could be more gratifying to the martyrs who perished
here, could they be conscious of it, than the reflection that their unrivalled
exploits are recounted with solemn but exultant approval upon every proper
occasion. So long as we understand the principle of gratitude, so long as we
comprehend the beneficence of liberty, so long as we canonize the exhibition of
loyalty, so long will we preserve the splendid history of the most gigantic
civil struggle in the annals of humanity. The soldiery of any country
represents its physical sovereignty, and no nation can organize an army so
imposing or so powerful as were those invincible battalions which mustered
under the stars and stripes from 1861 to 1865. No soldiery ever entered a field
with such noble purpose, and none ever emerged with a record of such glorious
accomplishment. When our beloved flag was insulted, when our territorial
integrity was threatened, when our national life was imperiled, they promptly
responded to the appeal of President Lincoln, and cheerfully embraced self
immolation to secure the perpetuity of this government of the people, by the
people and for the people, and to render forever positive the certainty that
that government, after being baptized in the sacred blood of the Revolutionary
fathers, should not disappear from the earth, but that it, under God, should
have everlasting life.
The civil war was an unprecedented catastrophe. Reflect a
moment. The terrible loss of life, the tremendous destruction of treasure, the
firesides ruined, the hearthstones desolated, the families beggared, the
national travail and wretchedness and misery, the individual suffering and
sacrifice and death! Think of the faithful husband, as he renounces the sweet and
tender associations of home; think of his goodbye to his devoted wife and his
cherished children, and then think of him on the bloody field of battle, slowly
dying of a mortal wound, and all for principle, all for liberty, all to
maintain an united government of indestructible states, one and indivisible,
then and forever! Think of the dutiful son, the silent joy of an affectionate
and solicitous mother, the stalwart support of an aged and declining father,
think of his farewell to those sorrow-stricken parents; farewell, not until
tomorrow, not until next week, not until after a while, but farewell until they
all shall stand at the last day, in the presence of each other, before the
judgment bar of God! Think of the romantic suitor, as he sighs au revoir to the
soft-voiced siren who has long reigned empress in his heart. Behold a splendid
handsome fellow, strolling in a quiet woody place with the maiden he adores!
Perhaps it is the last interview they ever will have on this earth. The
surroundings are of an inspiring character. There is the fife and the drum and
the uniform and the march, and there are the grand old patriotic songs that
stir men's souls. Here are the sweethearts under the shade and sanctity of a
leafy arbor; all without is tumult and confusion, all within is confidence and
love. The fragrant flowers are swinging and swaying and blooming in the summer
sunset, the care-free birds are warbling forth their sweetest strains in the
stately treetops, the solitary nightingale is singing his song of joy and pain,
and this rueful Romeo is whispering to his gentle Juliet the old, old story
which always is new at every repetition. But suddenly the drums beat, the
advance is sounded, they must part for a time — it may be forever. Think of
that young hero as he marches away to the wild, grand music of the war:
“His not to reason why,
His but to do and die.”
And then think of him on this sanguinary field, yielding up
his young life that the Great Republic might live. My countrymen, you may
suggest that in the painting of these pictures I have employed only the darkest
and most somber colors, but I insist that they are only typical of an hundred
thousand similar tragedies. We try to measure all the sorrow and the sacrifice,
and we are transfixed with horror. The eyes grow dim, the lips are silent, the
heart is still. Oh, how superb, how magnificent, how glorious, how cruel, how
terrible, how remorseless is war to the victorious and to the vanquished!
It was a calamity unspeakably sorrowful, that fratricidal misunderstanding
between the people of the north and the people of the south. But we long ago
learned to know beyond all doubting truly, that the Almighty has his own
purposes and that the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.
There could not be a new birth of freedom so long as the old institution of
slavery survived. There could not be a more perfect union in peace until the
doctrine of the states’ rights perished by the sword. There could not be
remission of national sin without the shedding of individual blood. And so the
war was inevitable. It was an awful retribution, but its compensations were
more than manifold, for out of it there emerged the regenerated, the reunited,
the real Republic, which is now the miracle and the marvel of all the civilized
communities of the earth. The conflict itself has become a priceless and
imperishable memory, cherished everywhere throughout the length and breadth of
our common country. And it is our common country now. A little while ago I
witnessed a spectacle which to me was a genuine revelation. There were miles of
carriages, civic societies in full uniform, salvos of artillery, regal pomp,
and military pageantry. The occasion was the unveiling of that historic statue
erected on the Lake Front by the gratitude and generosity of the state of
Illinois in honor of General John A. Logan. Throughout the five miles of that
remarkable procession, the atmosphere was enriched with continuous cheers, as
Federal and Confederate emulated each other in tribute to that redoubtable
warrior, the superb "Black Eagle" of the Fifteenth Army Corps. And as
I looked upon that demonstration, I said to myself, it is our common country
now. In the national park at Chickamauga, the sovereign state of Kentucky has
erected a single monument to her sons in blue and her sons in gray, who fought
and fell on that decisive field. And on that magnificent marble there is
inscribed these significant and inspiring words:
“As we are united in life, and they in death, let one
monument perpetuate their undying deeds, and one people, forgetful of all the
bitterness of the past, ever hold in grateful remembrance all the glories of
the terrible conflict which made all men free, and retained every star upon our
nation’s flag.”
And when but yesterday I stood in the shadow of that
imperial column and read that noble sentiment composed by a Colonel who
commanded a Confederate regiment, I said to myself again, it is our common
country now. Who, indeed, can doubt it after the memorable incidents of the
Spanish-American war? That was an unfortunate and sanguinary controversy in
which we became embroiled with a semi-barbarous power, but let it be remembered
that it was not of our own provoking. After exhausting every resource of
pacific diplomacy, the government of the United States was compelled to submit
the questions at issue to the arbitrament of the sword. We forbore until
forbearance ceased to be a virtue, we delayed until dilatoriness was fast
becoming a crime. Yonder on the little island of Cuba, thousands of innocent
women and children were starving at our very threshold. Cruelties and
inhumanities beyond description were daily practiced upon inoffensive
noncombatants. Robbery, rapine, and murder without example characterized the
conduct of Spain toward her impoverished dependencies. We petitioned, and our
petitions were ignored with contempt. We remonstrated, and our remonstrances
were scorned with defiance. We protested, and our protests were spurned with
derision. Finally the good ship Maine was destroyed, and by that last act of
infamy two hundred and sixty-six of our gallant seamen, upon a friendly visit
to a supposedly friendly port, with no moment's warning of impending danger,
were ruthlessly slaughtered, and without a conscious struggle they passed from
the repose of sleep to the repose of death. Then came our declaration of war.
It was a trumpet call to duty, and it unified this country as no other agency
could have accomplished. Party disagreements were forgotten in the national
peril. Personal differences were silenced in the presence of insult to the
flag. Instantly, a million men were ready to respond to the crisis, and they
came from every city, from every town, from every village, from every hamlet in
the broad commonwealth. For the first time in generations there was no north,
no south, no east, no west; only a common country, whose dignity had been
challenged, whose authority had been impeached. Everywhere the old songs, once
sung to symbolize antagonistic sections, were now rendered alternately and
indiscriminately by the grand orchestra of aroused, enthusiastic, united
American patriots. Thus fortified we proceeded from victory to victory, while
vengeance was ours, and until we had repaid. That war was doubly holy because
it was a concrete defense of humanity in the abstract. It was our supreme
privilege to emancipate a beleagured people, to avenge fiendish and brutal
assassination, and once again to banish European tyranny from the occidental
hemisphere. My countrymen, I do not know what your opinion may be, and I trust
that I do not abuse this occasion, but I announce the profound conviction that
there is no place in the territory of this western continent for any but American
institutions; there is no room in the atmosphere of this western world for any
but the American flag. And in that brief but brilliant engagement with Spain,
when I saw the Federal General Merritt and the Confederate General Wheeler
standing side by side and shoulder to shoulder under the stars and stripes of
the national Union, achieving a new and illustrious glory for our resplendent
Republic, I said to myself again, a thousand times, it is our common country
now. From Maine to California, from the great lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, the
veterans in blue and the veterans in gray are unanimously committed to the
proposition that this is a single commonwealth with a single flag and a single
destiny. And thus in harmony of spirit the comrades of Grant and the comrades
of Lee are journeying down to the twilight of life together with charity for
all, with malice toward none. The old anger, the ancient acrimony, all
unfriendly feeling, is rapidly vanishing, aye, we believe it has completely
vanished from the recollections of men. Over the graves of the fallen dead the
spring has cast its tender violets, the summer its gorgeous field of flowers,
the autumn its golden withered leaves, the winter its blanket of crystal snow.
All is forgiven, all is forgotten except the glorious results of the combat in
which our soldiers were engaged, the reminiscences of it in which they alone
have the right to indulge, and the obligation which devolves upon us to
establish appropriate memorials to commemorate their heroism. The past, so
filled with magnificent achievement, is past. We turn with undiminished
confidence to the unexplored future. Today, we are the most important people on
earth, today we are the most progressive, today we are the most enlightened. We
know more than any other people. We have more books on our shelves, more
pictures on our walls, more thought in our brains. We have more pleasant homes
in this country, more happy children, more beautiful women, more intellectual
men; and the world is higher and grander and nobler than ever before. And the
government which the fidelity of the north preserved at Shiloh and on a
thousand other fields of carnage, is the best government ever organized by man.
No other nation so nearly approaches absolute equality, no other republic ever
survived half so long without a successful revolution, and every additional star
that we imprint upon our emblazoned banner is a perpetual evidence that we
intend to advance throughout all eternity. And this shall constitute the
marvelous future of our country; that it is and shall be for all time, the
United States of America. What is he whose heart is not uplifted, whose soul is
not enraptured, whose spirit is not transfigured by the mighty magic of those
symbolic words — the “United States of America”?
“Breathes there the man, with soul
so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
Whose heart hath ne’er within him
burn’d,
As home his footsteps he hath turn’d
From wandering on a foreign strand!
If such there breathe, go, mark him
well;
For him no minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his
name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can
claim;
Despite those titles, power and
pelf,
The wretch, concentered all in
self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust, from whence he
sprung,
Unwept, unhonor'd, and unsung.”
The United States of America! The immortal principles of
justice and equity which underlie it! The incomparable benefits which it
secures to its citizenship! The inestimable sacrifices which have been suffered
to maintain it! It is our home, our country, our beloved government, bequeathed
to us forever by the venerated fathers, the most invaluable inheritance ever
bestowed upon the sons of men! And it shall go forward forever, surmounting one
obstacle after another in the pathway of its development and of its destiny,
until at the last it shall seize and hold and reflect the glory and the
grandeur of all the earth. Joaquin Miller, that erratic, eccentric and almost
insane genius of the Sierra Nevadas, has written a poem of Columbus and his
voyage, of its hope and fear and doubt and despair, and of its ultimate reward
in the discovery of an unsuspected continent. I never read that poem that I do
not instinctively feel that its exalted sentiment typifies the irresistible
progress of my country:
“Behind him lay the gray Azores,
Behind the gates of Hercules;
Before him not the ghost of shores;
Before him only shoreless seas.
The good mate said: ‘Now must we
pray,
For lo! the very stars are gone.
Brave Adm'r'l, speak, what shall I
say?’
“Why say: ‘Sail on! Sail on! and
on.’”
* * * * * * * *
“They sailed and sailed, as winds
might blow,
Until at last the blanched mate
said:
‘Why, now not even God would know
Should I and all my men fall dead.
These very winds forget their way,
For God from these dread seas is
gone.
Now speak, brave Adm'r'l, speak and
say —’
He said: ‘Sail on! Sail on! and on!’
“They sailed. They sailed. Then
spake the mate:
‘This mad sea shows his teeth
tonight.
He curls his lip, he lies in wait,
With lifted teeth, as if to bite!
Brave Adm’r’l say but one good
word:
What shall we do when hope is gone?’
The words leapt like a leaping
sword:
‘Sail on! Sail on! Sail on! and on!”
“Then, pale and worn, he kept his
deck,
And peered through darkness.
Ah, that night Of all dark nights!
and then a speck —
A light! a light! a light! a light!
It grew, a starlit flag unfurled!
It grew to be Time’s burst of dawn.
He gained a world; he gave that
world
Its grandest lesson: ‘On; Sail on!’”
And so, my countrymen, shall this imperial Republic of ours,
proud of yesterday, contented with today, hopeful for tomorrow, sail on and on
and on throughout the countless cycles of its shining career, until finally it
shall realize the loftiest aspiration of the most devoted patriot who ever offered
his best blood to establish it, to maintain it, to defend it. Veterans of the
greatest conflict in all history, living and dead, this is your contribution to
the happiness of humanity, to the welfare of the world! At the last day, when
all men appear to be judged according to the deeds done in the body, surely the
approving voice of the great Master will pronounce upon each of you the
triumphant benediction: “Well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into
the joy of thy Lord.”
SOURCE: Alonzo Abernathy, Editor, Dedication
of Monuments Erected By The State Of Iowa, p. 277-87
