USA > Kansas > The fighting Twentieth. History and official souvenir of the Twentieth Kansas Regiment > Part 1
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M. L.
Gc 973.894 K13k 1993852
REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
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ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 00825 7120
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2010 with funding from Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
http://www.archive.org/details/thefightingtwent00kans
"FIGATING TWENTIETH'
-
M747ENT 39
-HISTORY AND OFFICIAL SOUVENIR-
GENEALOGY COLLECTION
CORPORAL WILLIAM B. TREMBLEY, COMPANY B.
PRIVATE EDWARD WHITE, COMPANY B.
20th
"THE FIGHTING TWENTIETH."
History and Official Souvenir of the Twentieth Kansas Regiment.
Publication authorized by the execu- tive committee of the non-partisan reception committee appointed by Governor Stanley from the state at large.
Price, 25 cents.
Kan. Inf. 20th Reat.
Topeka, Kansas. 1899.
1898-99
Copyright, 1899, by W. Y. Morgan,
973.894 K13K
18 7281
2 1
EXECUTIVE MANSION. WASHINGTON.
The American Nation appreciates
1993852
The devotion and valor of its soldiers and sailor Amony its hosts of brace defenders, the Twentieth Kansas was fortunate the opportunity and heroic in Cation, dad has won a permanent place in the heart of a grateful people,
September 2016-1899,
$500 Luther, may1-1978 PO 9171
Story of the "Fighting Twentieth" by the Secretary of War.
THE records of the War Department show that the Twentieth regiment of Kansas volunteers sailed from San Francisco on the steamship "Indiana" on the 27th of October, 1898, and on the steamship "Newport" on the 9th of November, 1898, arriving at Manila on the 1st and 6th days of December following; that the regiment was engaged in actual battle, sustaining losses by death or wounds, on each of the following days, viz .: The 4th, 5th, 7th, 10th, 11th, 12th, 17th, 23d, 24th, 26th and 28th of February, 1899: the 11th, 12th, 13th, 23d, 24th, 25th, 26th, 27th, 29th and 31st of March; the 25th and 26th of April; the 4th and 24th of May, and the 16th and 22d of June. Their participation in engagements is specially mentioned in cablegrams from General Otis on the 8th of February, the 28th of April, and the 25th of May, 1899.
The regiment left the Philippines for home on the 3d of September, 1899, just six months after it was entitled to be discharged from service under the act of Congress.
The greater part of the engagements above mentioned were fought, and most of the losses of life were incurred, at a time when there was no obligation for further serv- ice resting upon the members of the regiment, except that which was self-imposed upon them by their own love of country and their determination to maintain the right- ful sovereignty of the United States and the honor of its flag.
The character of the regiment's services in the field is well indicated by the follow- ing recommendations for brevet promotions made by Major-General Arthur MacArthur, commanding the second division of the Eighth Army Corps, and approved by Major- General Elwell S. Otis, commanding the Corps. I quote from the official document:
"Frederick Funston, Brigadier-General, U. S. Vols., to be Major-General, U. S. Vols., by brevet. ( For) Gallant and meritorious services throughout the campaign against Filipino insurgents from February 4tb to July 1, 1899; particularly for daring courage at tha passega of the Rio Grande de le Pampanga, May 27, 1899, while Colonel 20th Kansas Vols."
" Wildor S. Metcalf, Colonel, 20th Kansas Vols., to be Brigadier-General, by brevet. ( For) Gal- Jant and meritorious services throughuot the campaign against Filipino insurgents, from February 4th to July 1, 1899, during which period ha was wounded on two separate occasions."
The officers and enlisted men of the regiment exhibited the same high quality of bravery and efficiency which characterized their commanders.
I beg to join with the people of Kansas in welcoming to their homes these citizen- soldiers, so worthy of the heroic origin and patriotic history of their state.
ELIHU ROOT.
ELIHU ROOT, Secretary of War,
"Crowning Glory of the Closing Century."
A TRIBUTE FROM HON. J. L. BRISTOW, OF KANSAS, FOURTH ASSISTANT POSTMASTER-GENERAL.
T THE soldiers of Napoleon enjoyed the reflected glory of their matchless general. England's soldiers are honored because of the mighty empire which their valor has won and sustains. The American soldier is loved and revered because of the principles for which he fights. The soldiers of the Spanish - American war have broken down the doors of medieval superstition, and per- mitted millions of serfs to breathe the free air of modern civiliza- tion. Their heroic achievments are the crowning glory of the closing century.
In these great achievements the Twentieth Kansas has performed a conspicuous part. It has won the plaudits of the Nation. To have been a soldier of the Twentieth Kansas at Manila is a rare honor. Kansas is proud of the Twentieth. It has gallantly upheld the honor of our country, and courageously maintained the luster of American arms. It has shed glory upon the State, and a patri- otic people, with joyous acclaim, welcome its return from the fields of victory.
A
JOSEPH L. BRISTOW, Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General.
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BRIGADIER- GENERAL FREDERICK FUNSTON.
Battles of the "Fighting Twentieth."
Advance on the enemy, February 5. Independent skirmish, February 7. Caloocan, February 10. Tulijan, March 25. Malinta, March 26.
Poli, March 27. Marilao, March 28. Bigoa, March 29. Guiginto, March 29.
Advance on Malolos, March 30 and 31.
Defense of Malolos, three weeks. Bagbag river, April 25.
Calumpit, April 26. Grand river, April 27.
Santo Tomas, May 4. San Fernando, May 6. Bacolor, May 13. Santa Rita, May 15. Defense of San Fernando, May 25.
Ware's Tribute in Verse.
I have got a wealthy neighbor Who is living without labor - Who has cash and honds and stocks and stuff, and asks me out to dine; And I have another neighbor, Living by the hardest labor, Who's got a Twentieth Kansas boy out on the fighting line.
There's no fun in being weary, But if you should put the query, "Which of these two people's places would you take ?" well, I opine, Not the man that's got the money, But the man that's got the sonny- Got the snorting, rip-cavorting boy down on the fighting line. - Eugene F. Ware.
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Governor Stanley Praises the Twentieth.
Points out that its Splendid Distinction was Won after the Term of Enlistment had Expired.
The members of the Twentieth Kansas regiment have been volun- teer soldiers in an unusual and splendid sense. They enlisted for the Spanish-American war. By the terms of their enlistment their period of service expired when the Spanish-American treaty of peace was signed. Every member of the Twentieth Kansas regiment had a right to lay down his arms and demand transportation home when the treaty of peace with Spain was concluded, but the thought of quitting in the face of a fight never entered the mind of a Kansas soldier. The flag needed defenders, and the Kansas soldiers remained voluntarily to de- fend it. Not a man faltered, not a man stood upon his right to quit, but with that devotion to duty which has characterized the whole history of American freeman and made for the undying glory of the American soldiery they went on until their lives and their services were no longer needed. The splendid distinction the Twentieth Kansas has won has been won while fighting after the term of enlistment had ex- pired. It is a great regiment. All Kansas is proud of it; and what Kansas is proud of is good enough, and will pass muster in any com- munity on carth.
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"The Raggedy Kansas Man."
BY LIEUT .- COL. E. C. LITTLE.
0 H, the flags are in the windows and the folks are in the street,
And I hear a bugle call that never blew retreat,
And the girls begin to cry and the men begin to cheer -
The Twentieth ! The Twentieth ! The Kansas boys are here. CHORUS. Oh, the raggedy man, the raggedy man, He swam a bit and forward ran - The raggedy, raggedy Kansas man.
There's lads who crossed the Tuliahan and fought at Malabon, And chased the Tagal bolos through the jungles of Luzon; By yonder dark-stained blouses and dusty suits of brown - The " raggedy men from Kansas" again have come to town.
There's Eddie White and Trembley, who swam the Rio Grande, And sprinkled on its farther bank a touch of Kansas sand; There's Adna Clarke and sixteen men held Tondo road at night When flashing of the cannon set the dusky way alight.
Malolos and Bocaue's trench know the Kansas yell ; San Fernando and San Tomas the Kansas story swell;
They've Kansas day at Bacolor, and where'er these rifles roam - To a thousand Kansas mothers they bring their valor home.
Upon the bridge at Marilao they left their hero dead, Where swift and sharp the Mausers death's angry message sped. Oh, "they didn't know a lemon and they didn't know the tide," But half a world a-watching knows how the Kansans died.
At Guiguinto's fiercest battle. yon flag in honor flew ; What roaring rifles kept it, all Luna's army knew ; And high it swung o'er Caloocan, Bag-Bag, and Marilao- "Those raggedy Pops from Kansas," 'fore God they're heroes now.
They swarmed o'er swamp and rice field with battle all aflame; Beneath the mystic Southern Cross they wrote the Kansas name;
And so from tropic forest, return o'er ocean wide
To Kansas wives and sweethearts who wait with loving pride.
For the raggedy man, the raggedy man, Who swam and fought and forward ran - "Rock Chalk, Jayhawk !"- the Kansas man.
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Roll of Honor.
KILLED IN BATTLE.
Alfred C. Alford, first lieutenant company B, Lawrence; killed in action February 7, 1899.
Albert S. Anibal, private company G, Independence; killed in action March 25, 1899.
Orlin L. Birlew, musician company G, Independence ; killed in action March 29, 1899.
Morris J. Cohen, sergeant company B, San Francisco; killed in action March 23, 1899.
William Carroll, private Company D, Frontenac; killed in ac- tion March 27, 1899.
Curran Craig, private company E, Garnett; died of wounds March 26, 1899.
Alva L. Dix, private company G, Independence; killed in ac- tion March 29, 1899.
David S. Elliott, captain company G, Coffeyville; killed in ac- tion February 28, 1899.
Troy E. Fairchild, private company B, McCune; killed in ac- tion March 26, 1899.
Ivers J. Howard, private company B, San Francisco; killed in action February 10, 1899.
Adrian Hatfield, private company I, Topeka: died of wounds March 30, 1899.
Larry Jones, private company D, Pittsburg ; died of wounds February 25, 1899.
Orville R. Knight, private company F, Pittsburg; died of wounds February 25, 1899.
James W. Kline, private company L, Kansas City, Kan .; killed in action March 13, 1899.
William Keeney, private company I, Topeka; killed in action March 28, 1899.
Oscar Mallicott, private company K, Virgil; died of wonnds February 24, 1899.
Resil Manahan, private company A, Topeka; killed in action April 26, 1899.
George H. Monroe, private company F, Marinette, Wis .; killed in action February 23, 1899.
John C. Muhr, private company E, Westphalia; died of wounds March 25, 1899.
Henry H. Morrison, private company M, Salina; died of wounds April 28, 1899.
William A. McTaggart, second lieutenant company G, Inde- pendence : killed in action May 4, 1899.
Howard Olds, private company I, Fort Scott; died of wounds February 26, 1899.
Charles Pratt, private company E, New Cambria; killed in action February 5, 1899.
Hiram L. Plummer, private company E, Garnett; killed in ac- tion March 25, 1899.
Alonzo B. Ricketts, private company I, Stanton; killed in ac- tion February 10, 1899.
Ernest Ryan, private company L, Abilene; died of wounds May 25, 1899.
Jay Sheldon, sergeant company I, Osawatomie; dicd of wounds February 9, 1899.
John Sherrer, private company G, Los Angeles, Cal .; killed in action March 27, 1899.
William Sullivan, private company A, Topeka; killed in action May 24, 1899.
Oscar G. Thorne, private company L, La Cygne: killed in ac- tion March 11, 1899.
Albert H. Terry, private company L, Kansas City, Kan .; died of wounds April 29, 1899.
Joseph A. Wahl, private company HI, Lawrence; died of wounds March 31, 1899.
Martin A. Wilcox, private company II, Lawrence; killed in action March 29, 1899.
Samuel M. Wilson, private company M, Salina; killed in ac- tion May 4, 1899.
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Roll of Honor.
DIED OF DISEASE.
Lewis R. Badger, private company F, Kansas City, Kan .; died January 10, 1899.
William H. Bash, private company F, Fort Scott; died Janu- ary 6, 1899.
Sim F. Barber, private company L, Abilene; died March 27, 1899.
Etoyl P. Blair, private company A, Topeka; died January 11, 1899.
John H. Bartlett, private company F, Watson; died July 14, 1898.
Isaac G. Cooper, corporal company B, Kansas City, Kan .; died February 1, 1899.
David L. Campbell, private company L, Junction City ; died January 19, 1899.
Bert Cornett, private company E, Toronto; died January 3, 1899.
Raymond B. Dawes, private company C, Leavenworth; died at Honolulu, November 22, 1898.
Dallas Day, private company I, Topeka; died November 2, 1898.
Louis Ferguson, private company B, Kansas City, Kan .; died December 24, 1898.
Albert Fergus, private company E, Yates Center; died June 17, 1898.
Cecil Flowers, private company L, Kansas City, Kan .; died July 22, 1898.
Charles Graves, private company C, Centralia; died Novem- ber 25, 1898.
Clifford H. Greenough, private company L, Bennington; died June 24, 1898.
Powhattan Hackett, private company F, Fort Scott; died January 9, 1899.
Norman E. Hand, private company L, Abilene; died January 18, 1899.
Edward R. Hook, private company H, Lawrence; died Sep- tember 13, 1899.
John M. Ingenthron, private company L, Wa Keeney ; died at Yokohama on way home.
Robert M. Lee, private company F, Manhattan ; died on trans- port Tartar, between Manila and Hong Kong.
Fred Maxwell, private company K, Richmond; died February 2, 1899.
Louis Moon, private company B, Kansas City, Kan .; died June 24, 1898.
Fred Maxfield, private company B, Kansas City, Kan .; died June 13, 1899.
Wilson H. McAllister, corporal company M, Salina ; died June 24, 1898.
Elmer Mcintyre, private company E, Neosho Falls; died Au- gust 24, 1898.
Guy Nebegall, private company I, Newton; died May 3, 1899. Harry Pepper, private company I, Topeka ; died June 26, 1898. Edward A. Rethemeyer, private company A, Topeka; died January 8, 1899.
Benjamin W. Squires, private company L, Junction City; died January 14, 1899.
Charles B. Snodgrass, private company B, Winters, Cal .; died February 2, 1899.
William Vancil, private company I, Fort Scott; died on trans- port Indiana, December 7, 1898.
James Wardick, private company E; died at military hospital, San Francisco, October 10, 1899.
John D. Young, private company A, Wamego; died January 15, 1899.
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DAALIEN & ROSE R.G.
GENERAL SHAFTER, GENERAL FUNSTON, COLONEL METCALF AND GOVERNOR STANLEY REVIEWING THE REGIMENT.
A Tribute to the Volunteers.
"Not the Brigadier, not the Colonel, or subatterns alone, but the great American General-the private soldier."
BY JOSEPH G. WATERS.
PROTECTED by the Constitution, proud and arrogant by two hundred years of rule, Slavery at last defiantly challenged the future of this great Republic. The shotted guns ceased their roar. The answer came from the desert. It was an empire of liberty.
From our borders went a lone crusader, mighty only in his cause, to battle it; lifting his dying eyes, he saw victory dangling from the swaying noose of a gallows tree, that even this near hy seems touched with the immortal grace of Calvary.
· The pioneers of the state came here in the cause of liberty. No lure of wealth, no promise nor portent that oftenest causes adventure or change of home. The state was part of a barren, untenanted plaiu, without forest, a baked soil, no seed time nor harvest.
Here commenced the struggle that finally sent our boys to the Philippines. Here was the first drum-beat against slavery, the first human wall to oppose its further advance.
For the first time in a thousand years there was dew on the wild grass. It was the blood of our slain. As time parts the shadows, it shall be the chrism of all our acres. We should not wait for slow-moving centuries. Whether history has already chronicled upon its page these scenes of conflict in Kansas, they still are sacred. We need not journey to build a shrine nor debate where to set a monument.
The state heard the first call for troops. The guns had not ceased firing on Sumter before our troops were on the march. The state gave regiments when it could illy spare men. Thousands of our young men left for the front. Bright eyes, rosy cheeks, springing steps, strong arms, and brave hearts. Abounding with ambition. Great loves filled their souls. Youths, in whose lives the day never ended and the night never forgot its stars. Whether they came back and are now wrecked, palsied with years, or stricken with the incurable infirmities of old age, or the long years resting under the turf once sodden with their blood, somewhere, covered by the Nation's green, or beneath the ocean, fast asleep, in their youth, their beauty and bloom, they can never forget the kiss of a mother's good-by, the last view at the turn of the lane, the stir of drums, the wave of handkerchiefs, and all earth blinded with their tears.
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Forgive me, brave boys of the Twentieth Kansas Regiment. I have limned the wrong scene. My poor pencil has drawn the wrong picture. It is your going, your coming, not mine nor your fathers' !
The story has long been told. It has eaten into the life-blood of this magnificent Republic. Their battles were the Nation's, their victories for all mankind. In the fulness of time, when the appetite was no longer whetted for sacrifice, the bugles died away and the drums rolled no more the rally, the charge, the fight; and no more kept beat to the rattle of clods upon the coffin of a soldier. Peace began her victories. On these treeless plains came the great woods. The parched soil took on its first vernal robes. The rains came, each season went its round, and for a lifetime the Autumns bended their branches with the great white harvests of Peace. Great orchards up the divides. Grapes cluster on the sunniest slopes. Herds belly deep in clover. The flow of Nile for all the centuries is in our granaries to-day. All the fat years of Egypt are in our bins. The visitor who treads the tufted floors of Kansas imagines they are the velvets of Paradise.
The state has accomplished more than harvest wealth. It has wiser and better laws than any state or sovereignty has ever had. They are merciful, just, and Christian. No man is condemned on suspicion, and we hurl anathema to those who do. The wife is partner of her husband, and his heir, and no longer obscured by his shadow. The homestead is capacious enough to shelter the brood, it matters not how big the family may be, and no adversity can touch it if the good woman refuses to sign the mortgage. We have injected blood into the iron-clad common law. Our helpless are the apple of our eye. On every crowning summit rises a schoolhouse, and through the timber, over the swell, far down the valley, streams the flag our brave boys have borne across ten thousand ocean leagues, and returned glowing with honor and victory.
The captains of our schools are our great generals of patriotism. Here is bred the tumult, the passion, the riot, the love, for the land, its laws, its homes.
Up in the steeples, far and away, jangle the Sabbath hells, stately, solemn and grand, ebbing and flowing among the bees that loiter in the clover, over the meadows, and down the valleys that race with the streams their seaward way. Processions of children on every highway trudge to school and lengthen the morning with ten thousand miles of childhood song, and fret the state's expanse with innocent gabble or happiest glee. A million and a half of patriotic, intelligent citizens; a mere footstep, here and there, of millions yet to be. Our people blaze their own roads. They shape precedent. They smile at their own mistakes. They are enamored of the skirmish line. The state stands with her schoolhouses and churches upon the crest. She gazes upward into the sky. The dial shows but dawn. This is the mother, and how well she deserves the mightiest sons. She has them; they have just returned from the Philippines.
Brothers, this is a holy seil, and the future of our state is the holicst trust. The Ark of the Covenant rests upon our soil. Danger hides and peril is far away so long as she musters such battalions. As one man, with one voice, the state welcomes them
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home. As one sweetheart, with one love, she plants the kiss of benediction on their foreheads. They have marched through fire and flood. They have not weighed danger nor counted odds. Their valor is on the universal lip. Their glory is not a matter of race. They have been over strange seas, under strange skies, with strange peoples. They have lit an archipelago with the fires of liberty and law. They have held up the flag to the south seas. The under world has caught the meaning of its stars. It has been a blossoming rod to benighted races, their one cure, their one hope, their only redemption.
In all their voyaging, as the ship might sail, as waves might drift, or gales might drive; through ocean doldrums or its typhoons and midnight tempests; through long nights where glittered stars they never saw before; as they beheld the great morning spread its crimson shafts, or the sun burn its way down ocean depths; as the porpoise played, or as they watched the phosphorescent glow; as they buried our dead at sea, a plunge into eternity ; as they rode into Manila Bay; as they stood alone on sentry; through jungle, across rivers, climbing the broken beam, on the firing line, in the thick of battle, in hospital, sick, wounded or dying, there has not been a moment the mother forgot her sons. There has not been an hour, waking or sleeping, that the good people of this state have not wrestled with the good angels, to guard them and bless them. They have encompassed them on every hand with their love. They have given them tears that shone with their glory as beaded dews with morning sun. They have returned home. What a delicious word! Each one knows its tears, its joy, its glory, who was on the frail planks for thirty days, and then saw the harbor lights at the Golden Gate.
Not the brigadier, not the colonel, the captains or subalterns alone, but above and beyond them, the one great American general, the private soldier who, standing in the shadow of his own gun, nameless and unseen, flashed a blaze of glory over a continent, and set a new sun in the sky for all people, all times, all seas, and all lands. When, in stone and story, in speech and song, the great millions of Kansans yet to be, shall be told of Calumpit and Bagbag river; the fights from Caloocan to San Fer- nando, the broken beam, what victories and all, a generous envy will swell their souls, to dare and do and die in other days of battle, which God grant may never come! If the state were Rome a fillet might crown each brow; some gracious Cæsar bestow his nod, and an Arch of Triumph be built by slaves to honor them. It is another time and another land. Each a Cæsar, sovereign as Augustus, coming home in triumph, to the accustomed place of hearth, and love, and home.
.
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Events in Twentieth Kansas History.
1898.
APR. 26 Governor Leedy called for troops. MAY 13-Officially mustered into service. 16-Regiment left Topeka. 20-Arrived at San Francisco.
Avu. 5-Changed from Camp Merritt to Camp Merriam. OCT. 27- Second and third battalions sailed for Manila in traos-
port Indiana; arrived at lonolulu November 5; left November 5, and arrived at Manila December 1. Nov. 8-First battalion embarked at San Francisco on trans- port Newport; arrived at Honolulu November 16; left November 19, and arrived at Manila Decem- ber 6.
1899.
JAN. 23 Removed from quarters in tobacco warehouse to camp formerly occupied by Wyoming troops.
FEB. 4- Ordered to the front, north of Manila.
7-Lieut. Alfred C. Alford killed in an advance.
10-Kansas troops first to enter Caloocan.
22-Insurgents' attack on Caloocao repulsed.
25-Capt. David S. Elliott killed.
MAR. 24-Advance from Caloocan began.
25-Regiment swam the Tulijan river and captured a blockhouse.
26-Engagements at Malinta and Meycuayan.
28-Band of Kansans swam river at Marilao and captured earth-works on other side, taking eighty prisoners. 29-Major (now Colonel ) Metcalf slightly wounded.
31-Kansas regiment first to enter Malolos, the insurgent capital.
MAR. 31-Captain Watson severely wounded. APR. 24-Advance against Calumpit began.
25-Captain Boltwood's company crossed the Bagbag river under fire.
27 Privates White and Trembley swam the Rio Grande, carrying ropes with which to draw rafts across.
MAY 4-Colonel Funston promoted to be brigadier general. 5-Major Metcalf appointed colonel to succeed Funston.
5-Lieut. W. A. McTaggart killed in the advance against Santo Tomas.
JUNE 1-Rainy season began.
SEPT. 6-Regiment sailed for home.
OCT. 10-Reached San Francisco. 28-Final muster-out.
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