Brevet Major Luman Harris Tenney: In Memorium

From the Red River Valley News, Glyndon, Minn., Feb. 12, 1880.

Luther Osborn, Editor.

MAJOR TENNEY OF GLYNDON.

HIS DEATH TUESDAY MORNING AT THE AGE OF 38.

We have this week to write of the most impressive event in Glyndon's history which has transpired during the life of the News. Luman H. Tenney, who has been ill for a month, grew rapidly worse on the night of Saturday, was thought to be dying through Sunday, hovered between life and death all the following day, and on Tuesday at 10:30 A. M. quietly breathed out his life.

Although he died as many another man has died with admonition of the approach and progress of disease, after time enough had passed to give warning to friends and the community about him, and in the presence of full preparation on his part, yet a shock is felt among us almost as if he had been taken at a blow. Communities are never ready for the death of such men as Major Tenney! few communities have such men to lose.

The illness which has been apparent to his friends and neighbors has been but five weeks’ duration, and confinement to the house was continuous for three weeks only. He was of the never-give-up type of men who have little tolerance for the idea of sickness in the ordinary sense. His latest planning and anticipating which have been arrested and put aside by his final sickness were of a visit to Florida for rest and health-getting during the remaining weeks of winter; the starting of himself and Mrs. Tenney on this journey was set for the second week in January. February sees him laid to his last rest beside Northern oaks and elms and lindens that grow strong on winds and frosts, instead of breathing soft airs where oranges grow and magnolias bloom and cypress boughs wave. Yet we have his own word for it that it is well with him to take God's disposing in place of his own proposing.

A due estimate of Mr. Tenney’s character this hand cannot pen on this day of his burial; and although the heart that moves the hand be wrung with the task, yet it would not for a world barter the privilege of laying an offering upon the tomb of one who was close as any brother and who has borne a brother's part without the impulse of natural kinship. The village children mourn him as one who seemed to be of them, young men learned of him and will venerate his memory and know why they do so, men of his own age will miss the fit object of their glad deference in daily counsel and action, and grayer and graver men will keenly know that their peer in ripe knowledge and a greater in wise doing has gone out from them forever.

The world knew Major Tenney for his character first, next for his talent, and third for his deeds. Those close to his friendship knew the Christian mainspring that moved him, saw the golden thread of conscience running through his days and years of sunshine and cloud, and were sure of the faith that kept him high-minded, that made him patient in labors whose end other good men sometimes could not see.

In mental characteristics he was obedient to heaven's first law of order, clear, simple, strong. In ways personal and social he was gentle, refined, unstudied, nobly human, and at large liberty as respects mere conventionalities. Sincerity marked his every going out and in before friend or stranger. In business he was a very engine of energy and precision, industrious we fear to rashness, conservative, enterprising, adhering to time-tested methods while teachable in the midst of the new events of a new country, of high integrity and faithfulness, requiring good faith in return from the party of the second part, be he lofty or lowly, employee or customer. For the community he had aspirations beyond the majority of his fellows. In holy fear of the calamities possible to follow the use of rum, he exercised the power he held in colony times to make legal stipulation that it should not be made or sold within the bounds of land conveyed. School and church and society all have felt his elevating influence. Ambitious to do excellent things, he was singularly free even from the willingness to have his excellences told. It would be like him, if he could, to restrain the hand that writes this much in his praise.

Men dying at life's meridian need not be counted lost. Though his mantle may not find a single pair of shoulders on which to fall, yet shall we not find among us here one and there another upon whom its several folds shall rest and who shall finish his work?

This word shall be “The News” memorial of him.

_______________

MILITARY ORDER

OF THE

LOYAL LEGION OF THE UNITED STATES.

MINNESOTA COMMANDERY.

BREVET MAJOR LUMAN HARRIS TENNEY, U. S. V.

(Deceased)

Brevet Major Luman Harris Tenney, of the Second Regiment Ohio Volunteer Cavalry, was born in North Amherst, Lorain County, Ohio, October 1, 1841. His father, Luman Tenney, M.D., formerly of Vermont, was a leading physician of the place. On the side of his mother, Emeline C. Harris, he was descended from a family of sturdy pioneers, who were among the earliest to remove from Massachusetts and settle on the Western Reserve, then almost an unbroken wilderness.

Removing to Oberlin, Ohio, at fourteen years of age, he prepared for college, and in 1859 entered the class of 1863. The disastrous battle of Bull Run was to him, as to many, an imperative call to duty, and in September of that year he left his classes and enlisted as a private soldier in the Second Ohio Cavalry, then organizing at Camp Wade, in Cleveland. He shortly went to the front with his regiment in the capacity of commissary sergeant of his battalion, and thereafter served in the field until two months after the surrender of the Confederate armies. He was successively promoted for merit to the grade of second lieutenant, first lieutenant, and captain in the line, and was subsequently brevetted major by the President, “for gallant service in the campaigns of the Shenandoah Valley in 1864.” He was present in over fifty battles and lesser engagements with the enemy, including Grant’s campaign of the Wilderness, Sheridan's battles of Winchester, Cedar Creek, and Waynesborough, the siege of Petersburg, and the closing campaign about Richmond, culminating with the surrender of Lee's army at Appomattox. At the bloody battle of Five Forks, April 1, 1865, Major Tenney especially distinguished himself for gallantry, coolness, and efficiency, winning the unstinted commendation of his superior officers. In this engagement, his brother, Theodore A. Tenney, fell at his side, fatally hurt by a shell from the enemy's artillery.

Returning to private life, he engaged in business pursuits. On April 16, 1867, he was married to Miss Frances D. Andrews, of Ohio. Later he removed to Minnesota. In 1871 and 1872 he was connected with the work of constructing the Northern Pacific Railroad. Settling at Glyndon, in the Red River Valley, he founded there an agricultural colony of European and American settlers. Here he made his home, engaged on a large scale in growing grain and handling the wheat crop of the Northern belt. Naturally a leader of men, he took a prominent and influential part in every movement that promised a betterment of existing conditions.

On February 10, 1880, Major Tenney died of heart-failure, meeting death as courageously as he had so often faced it on the field of battle.

MAJOR TENNEY'S COMRADES.

The surviving members of the 2nd regiment Ohio cavalry held their annual reunion at Chippewa Lake on Aug. 26th, 1880. A part of the exercises was an eulogistic address on the life and character of the late Luman H. Tenney of Glyndon, Minn., delivered by Capt. H. W. Chester, and a few extracts are here given.

On the morning of the 9th day of September, 1861, five young men, full of love of country and running over with patriotism, left Oberlin for Cleveland, and determined to “go to the war.” They selected as their comrades the boys of the Second Ohio Cavalry— Wade and Hutchins' pet regiment—then being organized at Camp Wade. They cast in their lot with the determined men of Wellington. As in the fall of 1858 Oberlin and Wellington joined hands in their efforts to help the oppressed, so now her sons joined their swords to drive the oppressor from the land, and compel him to let the captive go free; although it would not have been admitted at that time that such was the object, yet the issue was forced upon us, and I am proud of the fact that it was accepted at last, and that in consequence victory perched upon our banners.

Our departed comrade was one of the Oberlin boys. Upon the organization of the Regiment he was appointed Battalion commissary sergeant. While in that position his executive ability was noticed, and promotion followed. It was while in the commissary department that his devotion to duty first appeared. Although he was not expected to take a very active part on the skirmish line, yet he never was known to shield himself behind his position and leave the fighting to others, but where the greatest danger and the greatest need of help was, there he was sure to be found. All of you who were in our first serious fight, at Steubenville, Ky., will remember it not so much for the numbers engaged as for the fierceness of the attack, and the determined resistance made by our colonel, August V. Kautz. It was in this engagement, where Captain Case was so severely wounded and several of our brave men killed, that our comrade acted as aide to our colonel and displayed his coolness and bravery under fire. This was only a faint indication of the spirit that controlled him and became more conspicuous during the following years.

During 1862 and 1863 he was to be found at his post of duty doing faithfully and well whatever was assigned to him. In the summer of 1863 our comrade was commissioned to second lieutenant, after passing a rigid examination before Colonel Kautz. In November, 1864, he was promoted from second to first lieutenant, and in December commissioned captain, and assigned to duty in command of company C. Under his command that company did its full share of fighting, and I have no doubt but that the members of that excellent company present with us today would testify that in Captain Tenney they had a commander who would lead them wherever their bravest would dare to go, and I know that he found in that company men who would go wherever he would lead the way. Many of you probably remember instances where our comrade displayed his unswerving devotion to duty and where he was conspicuous for his bravery. I will give you one or two only: I well remember his action at Five Forks on the first day of April, 1865. How in that terrible ordeal he appeared to be just as cool and self-possessed as though his command was on dress parade; how he passed along the line encouraging his men and instructing them to take advantage of every opportunity to protect themselves, at the same time unmindful of the danger to which he exposed himself. It was during this engagement that his brother Theodore was mortally wounded by a piece of shell from the enemy's battery in our front. Our comrade was standing near him at the time. I shall not soon forget the evidence of a struggle between his sense of duty as a soldier, and his love for his brother, as to whether he should carry him from the field or remain at his post. Just then the enemy's fire slackened so that he was enabled to accompany his brother to the rear, and receive his dying message to his mother, which was: “Tell mother I only wish I had been a better boy.” He soon came back to his command, and was with them to the end. It was the 6th day of April, five days after the battle at Five Forks, at the battle of Sailor's Creek, that our comrade, in company with four others, formed a line of battle across a forty-acre field, and charged a wagon train guarded by five times their number. They deployed their line so as to present a long line of battle, and made a gallant charge, leading on their pretended battalions, driving the enemy from the field, and cutting their wagon train, which resulted in the capture of a train two miles long, with a loss of one-fifth of the charging party wounded. It was just after this charge that another fifth of this party was killed—Lieut. Stearns, whom you will remember as the gallant commander of company B.

At Appomattox Court House, Harper's Farm (Sailor's Creek), and High Bridge our comrade distinguished himself as a commander that could meet and overcome obstacles that would appal a less resolute spirit. He was in command of a battalion, I believe, at the surrender of Lee's army on the 9th day of April, and returned with his regiment to Washington, and participated with it in the grand review. Again at Cincinnati, when the regiment was en route for St. Louis, he displayed his control over men during great excitement, and succeeded in quieting a disturbance that might have resulted in a blot on the fair name of our regiment had it been managed with less skill. Soon after this he was commissioned major in recognition of his services to his country. It is well to remember the valorous deeds of the defenders of our country, and crown them with wreaths of laurel, and tell of their heroic acts to our children, and children's children. Still it is in civil life where most of us must fight the battles that make us heroes, or defeat us in all our efforts for the good of mankind; so with our comrade, although distinguished in war, it was in civil life that he found scope for his nobler traits of character.

It is quite remarkable how, in the ten short years that he was connected with the growth of northern Minnesota, he impressed his character upon that whole region. I cannot better describe his influence and the respect in which he was held than by §§§ some of the many testimonials culled from the press of that State.

DULUTH NEWS.

“This news will bring sadness to the hearts of hundreds, who have recognized in the one who is so suddenly gone, a noble, Christian man, anxious to do what he believed to be right. We mourn for him as a brother, as those sad words, whose meaning is so hard to realize, force themselves upon us, “We shall see his face no more.”

For ten years he has been a leading spirit in Minnesota, and the town of Glyndon is largely his creation.

He leaves his wife and four children in comfortable circumstances, and leaves them also the remembrance of a devoted husband and father, and the record of a useful life.”

MINNEAPOLIS TRIBUNE.

“The news of the death of Major L. H. Tenney, formerly of Minneapolis, which occurred this morning at his home in Glyndon, will be received with general and undisguised regret. Major Tenney was an estimable man in every relation of life, an active, energetic business man, an excellent citizen.

He dies in the prime of vigorous manhood, and his loss will be deeply felt along the line of the Northern Pacific, where he transacted a large grain business, was widely known and highly esteemed.”

Hon. A. McCrea, State Senator from this district, writes:

“It causes a feeling of sadness to hear of the death of Major Tenney.

Well can I remember the talk we had of our future prospects.

He has gone to realize the facts, while I still remain in a world of uncertainty.

I have no doubt his Christian fortitude held him up in his last moments. Although not intimately acquainted, I entertained great respect for him as a man, a very useful man of business, and one who will be missed not only in your village but all along the lines of railroad in this section of our state. His amiable wife and her family have my heartfelt sympathy. If I had been home in time I would have attended the funeral.”

Then follow the few remaining lines of Capt. Chester's address.

We who are still on the battle-field of life would lay upon his grave our offering of love, our tribute of respect. Having done what we may for the dead, let us remember that devoted wife and the four fatherless children who must wait in vain for the return of the fallen soldier, and renew our expressions of sympathy, and invoke for them the tender care of our great Commander-in-Chief.

HEADQUARTERS 

SECOND OHIO CAVALRY ASSOCIATION,

CLEVELAND, Feb. 21st, 1880.

Whereas, This Association has learned with deep regret of the death of our former comrade in arms

MAJOR LUMAN H. TENNEY,

which occurred at his home in Glyndon, Minn., on the tenth day of February, therefore.

Resolved, That while we bow in humble submission to the will of the Great Captain who has called him from among us, our grief is none the less poignant; our sorrow none the less deep; and we do and ever will cherish the memory of Comrade Tenney as that of one of the best, bravest and most patriotic soldiers of our old command; one who hesitated at no danger when duty called; and whose courage, devotion and Christian character was an example worthy to be imitated by us all. In his death the country has lost one of its noblest defenders, society an honored and useful member; each and all of us a generous friend; and his family has sustained a loss we find no words to express. To them in this hour of great sorrow we can only extend our warmest sympathies. Resolved, That these resolutions be spread upon the records of the Association, and a copy be sent to the family of our dead comrade.

ALBERT BARNITZ,            

Brevet Col. U. S. Army,         

Pres. of Association.

WALTER R. AUSTIN,

Acting Secretary.

LETTER FROM COL. ALBERT BARNITZ TO MRS. LUMAN H. TENNEY.

Cleveland, Ohio, March 1, 1880.

Mrs. Luman H. Tenney,

Glyndon, Minn.

Dear Madam:

Having just signed in the capacity of President of the Association, the engrossed copy of the resolutions passed at a recent meeting of surviving members of the old 2nd Ohio Cavalry, I have thought it not inappropriate, although personally a stranger to yourself, to add a few words, as testifying my personal regard and attachment for your late husband. I knew him scarcely otherwise than as a soldier, and did not indeed, become well acquainted with him until the vicissitudes of the service threw upon me the command of the regiment, in the closing campaign of the war, and then it was that I came to admire his unflinching courage and his soldierly ability; at Five Forks, especially, he rendered distinguished service in command of his squadron—or battalion perhaps. I was near him through a considerable portion of the engagement, and well remember his valorous conduct upon that trying occasion. It was there, too that his brother, a handsome and noble boy, was shot down and instantly killed by a shell from the enemy's battery, as he stood in the act of firing his carbine, and just as I was admonishing him to shelter himself behind a tree near which he stood. I am perhaps the only living eye-witness of the occurrence, and unstrapped from my saddle the talma in which he was carried from the field; and the circumstance is as vivid in my mind as if it had occurred but yesterday and all the other marked events of the engagement, and of the subsequent battles in which your husband participated.

And so it is that although the war has been long ended, “And our great deeds are half-forgotten things,” yet I remember vividly my intimate associates of the war, and think of them always as I knew them in the field; and I think of your late husband only as the faithful comrade, the prompt, energetic and ever-reliable soldier; and you—you who in your cruel bereavement will, more than another, mourn his untimely death, will remember him only in the peaceful and tender relations of domestic life, and may even deem it strange that. by reason of the past, whereof you know not except dimly, and as by tradition, a train of bronzed and weatherbeaten men should come across the intervening years, bearing myrrh and incense, and ask to lay upon a soldier's bier some tribute from his comrades of the war.

Respectfully and sincerely yours,

ALBERT BARNITZ,

Brevet Col. U. S. Army.

SOURCE: Frances Andrews Tenney, War Diary Of Luman Harris Tenney, p. 179-86