The duties of the
regiments now stationed at Corinth, are very arduous. Almost every day a
regiment or two are called upon to make a trip either to the Tennessee river
for forage, or to the Davenport Mills for lumber to construct fortifications.
Corinth is becoming quite a Gibraltar. The freedmen are all the while kept busy
upon these works. This evening the officers of the Illinois regiments meet in
Music Hall to give expression to their views upon modern democracy, and their
bitter detestation of the treasonable element that is becoming so prevalent in
Illinois. The following are the views of the Illinois soldiers on copperheads
and defunct democracy. The object is to show to Governor Yates and to all our
friends at home that we are still in favor of a vigorous prosecution of the
war, and that we will uphold our President and our Governor in all their
efforts to crush the rebellion and restore the Union. On motion a committee to
draft resolutions was appointed, consisting of the following officers : Colonel
Chetlain 12th Illinois Infantry commanding post; Colonel M. M. Bane, 50th
Illinois Infantry commanding Third brigade, Lieutenant Colonel Wilcox 52d
Illinois Infantry, Colonel Burk, 65th Illinois sharp-shooters, Colonel A. J.
Babcock, 7th Illinois Infantry, Colonel Merser 9th Illinois Infantry,
commanding Second brigade, Lieutenant Colonel Morrill, 54th Illinois Infantry.
The committee submited the following resolutions which were unanimously adopted
:
Whereas, Our government is now engaged in a struggle
for the perpetuation of every right dear to us as American citizens, and
requires the united efforts of all good, true and loyal men in its behalf: and
whereas, we behold with deep regret the bitter partizan spirit that is becoming
dangerously vindictive and malicious in our state, the tendency of which is to
frustrate the plans of the federal and state authorities in their efforts to
suppress this infamous rebellion ; therefore, Resolved, That having
pledged ourselves with our most cherished interests in the service of our
common country in this hour of national peril, we ask our friends at home to
lay aside all petty jealousies and party animosities, and as one man stand by
us in upholding the president in his war measures, in maintaining the authority
and the dignity of the government, and in unfurling again the glorious emblem
of our nationality over every city and town of rebeldom.
Resolved, That we tender to Governor Yates and Adjutant
General Fuller our warmest thanks for their untiring zeal in organizing, arming
and equipping the army Illinois has sent to the field, and for their timely
attention to the wants of our sick and wounded soldiers, and we assure them of
our steady and warm support in their efforts to maintain for Illinois the proud
position of pre-eminent loyalty which she now occupies.
Resolved, That we have watched the traitorous conduct
of those members of the Illinois Legislature who misrepresent their
constituents—who have been proposing a cessation of the war, avowedly to
arrange terms for peace, but really to give time for the exhausted rebels to
recover strength and renew their plottings to divest Governor Yates of the
right and authority vested in him by our state constitution and laws, and to
them we calmly and firmly say, beware of the terrible retribution that is
falling upon your coadjutors at the south, and that as your crime is ten-fold
blacker it will swiftly smite you with ten-fold more horrors, should you
persist in your damnable work of treason.
Resolved, That in tending our thanks to Governor Yates,
and assuring him of our hearty support in his efforts to crush this inhuman
rebellion, we are deeply and feelingly in "earnest.” We have left to the protection
of the laws he is to enforce, all that is dear to man — our wives, our children,
our parents, our homes, — and should the loathsome treason of the madmen who are
trying to wrest from him a portion of his just authority render it necessary in
his opinion for us to return and crush out treason there, we will promptly obey
a proper order so to do, for we despise a sneaking, whining traitor in the rear
much more than an open rebel in front.
Resolved, That we hold in contempt, and will execrate
any man who in this struggle for national life, offers factious opposition to
either the federal or state government in their efforts or measures for the
vigorous prosecution of the war for the suppression of this godless rebellion.
ResoĊved, That we are opposed to all propositions for a cessation of hostilities, or a compromise other than those propositions which the government has constantly offered; “Return to loyalty--to the laws and common level with the other states of the Union, under the constitution as our fathers made it."
SOURCE: Daniel Leib Ambrose, History of the Seventh Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry, p. 135-8
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