USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > History of the Cuyahoga County soldiers' and sailors' monument > Part 34
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"Off in the distance, in every direction, were sky- rockets and Roman candles and Greek fire. The street was tinged with all the colors known to man. The buildings about the Square were illuminated in every room. The tower on the top of the store of E. R. Hull & Dutton contained an arc light high on the top and rows of incandescent lamps all around. From the roof of the Lennox sprang streaks of fire, which, winding their way into the bosom of the sky, went out in puffs of colored stars.
" Down on the lake front, in Lake View Park, and on the streets leading thereto, were numbers of spectators who watched the display, sitting on the grass or walking to and fro. The crack yacht, the Say When, came
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in from the home of Hon. W. J. White, wreathed in the national colors, which were given out by the many incandescent lights on board. The small boy made the occasion a succession of deafening noises and wild shrieks of amusement and joy. The cannon cracker ended its peaceful existence with an explosion that shook the neighborhood. The torpedo and the shrieker closed up their accounts together, and the country swain and his sweetheart enjoyed the show as only the ruralist can enjoy a Fourth of July celebration in the city. Slowly the noise and uproar ceased and the pleasure-surfeited public sought home and rest. Finally the night obtained control and the lights went out. The coming of darkness was the end of one of the greatest celebrations of a patriotic nature the Forest City has ever had, and the weary ones who had seen it all were ready to give assent to the statement."
The Plain Dealer reporter thus glowingly describes the carnival :
" The Square last evening resembled the scene of a brilliant carnival, unparalleled in beauty. From the base of the towering electric light staff in the center of the Square to its peak it was twined with a spiral of in- candescent lights, red, white and blue in color, and on the platform around the top were larger globes, all in the national colors. Completely encircling the Square was a row of Chinese lanterns and these lent a softening radiance to the whole effect. The thousand flags con- verging at the top of the tall staff fluttered softly, whiz- zing rockets sped upward and fell in multi-colored brilliance, red and blue lights at intervals cast their strong reflection over the surging crowd that gathered early in the evening and stayed until late, and on the outskirts of the scene the Society for Savings and Cuyahoga buildings, with their every window lighted, loomed above their surroundings. Three strong search-
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lights on the former building were also used to good advantage to enhance the beauty of the scene.
"And the crowd was a jolly, cosmopolitan assemblage. The great grand stand in the northeast corner was filled with people and a still larger, constantly changing crowd promenaded the Square until midnight. The people shouldered and elbowed each other in what seemed sometimes an utterly futile attempt to make any progress, but a better-natured lot of seething humanity was never seen. Everyone realized that Cleveland was en fete and wore his or her happiest smile to grace the occasion. The city's holiday attire, the brilliant lights, the people all combined to make the scene one never to be forgotten.
" Governor Mckinley expressed himself as very much pleased with the Fourth of July celebration in this eity in conversation with a Plain Dealer reporter last even- ing. He characterized it as a mnost fitting observance of the day and said :
". The program was carried out in an excellent man- ner, without jar or collision, and the citizens of Cleve- land inay well feel proud of the celebration. One of the most impressive scenes of the day was the presence of the 3,000 school children on the immense amphitheater singing patriotic songs. The singing of the 'Star Spangled Banner' and the waving of flags above their heads was indeed inspiring.'
"In speaking of the parade, the Governor said that it was one of the finest he had ever witnessed and was handled in a magnificent manner. The troops looked splendid and the independent companies presented a fine appearance. The large number of the boys who wore the blue in line was a very pleasing sight and one of the features of the parade. The industrial display was great.'
"The Governor attached a great deal of interest to
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the presence of so many Veterans and felt a personal interest in that portion of the parade, as two companies of his old regiment were from this locality.
"'Another interesting feature,' he said, 'was the presence at the morning exercises of Mrs. Harris and Mrs. Thatcher, the oldest surviving organizers of the La- dies' Aid Society, who did such noble work during the dark days of the War. Their attendance was an addi- tion that made the affair complete in every particular. The one other thing that put a finish to the grandeur of the day was the decorations, which were profuse and elaborate. Particularly was it true of the Square, Euclid Avenue and Prospect Street.
". The whole day was a memorable one,' said Gov- ernor Mckinley in conclusion. 'and an event in which I was glad indeed to be able to participate.'
"Ex-Governor Foraker said last evening that he had been most highly gratified with the results of Wednes- day's celebration."
THE MONUMENT COMMISSIONERS.
T' HE companionship of the Commission and the work done by them were referred to in the fol- lowing pleasant vein by the Leader reporter :
"There is something not quite in line with this prac- tical age, in the idea of a number of men banding them- selves together for a purely unselfish object and con- tinuing in this relation and in the efforts for the accom- plishment of the object sought for nearly a score and a half of years. Such has been the case with the Monu- ment Commission, the members of which have labored together in building the structure dedicated for so long that the beginning of the enterprise seems far away. For the first few years, the Commission was composed of only a few members, others being added from time to time, but whether in or out of the organization, the twelve present members have always been in sympathy with the enterprise and have aided in securing its success whenever opportunity offered. The plans that have been proposed and the suggestions offered have been placed before all the members as they came up, and all have had an opportunity of expressing their opinions. The dedication of the Monument will take from many of them a weight of responsibility which has rested somewhat heavily during all the controversy and variance of opinion that has characterized the prog- ress of the enterprise."
The Plain Dealer compliments the Commissioners in the following happy style :
"A better choice of twelve mnen to serve on the
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Monument Commission could hardly have been made. They are all members of the Cuyahoga County Soldiers' and Sailors' Union, and as such were appointed on the Commission by Gov. Joseph B. Foraker. By their fellow-citizens they are highly esteemed, not only for their bravery in war, but for their records in times of peace. There are three generals on the Commission- Leggett, Barnett and Elwell. The other men have all attained to some rank and have served with distinction. In local affairs, several of the men have been honored by being elected or appointed to positions of trust and honor. The handling of the business connected with the building of the Monument has been done in a systematic and business-like manner, and their report of the finances entrusted to their care will show this."
A brief biography of each Commissioner will be found in the succeeding pages, from the souvenir editions of the Leader and Plain Dealer:
MAJOR WILLIAM J. GLEASON.
The member of the Monument Commission who, if any, has had more to do with the enterprise than the others, is Major William J. Gleason, from the first the President of the body. Major Gleason introduced the resolution that placed the members of Camp Barnett Soldiers' and Sailors' Society on record in favor of the erection of the Monument. This was as far in the past as the year 1879. He had been active previous to that time in the agitation of the subject, and in all the years that followed he retained his place in the van of the workers. He was born in the 'famous county Clare, Ireland, in the year 1846, on June 2d, and within six months from that time he was in America. His parents settled in Vermont, but after a short time removed to Cleveland, where they made their home. The son attended the parochial and public schools of the city, and at the age of eleven commenced selling newspapers
Fraternally yours, Une J. Gleason.
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on the street and doing other light work. He received his practical education in the printing office and by hard study, being a genuine self-made inan. He was less than fifteen years of age when the War broke out, and he had been at that time engaged as printer's devil for six months in the composing room of the Plain Dealer. With some of his earnings he purchased a drum and went out to join the Soldiers at Camp Taylor, which was located on the block bounded by Woodland and Scovill Avenues and Maple and Linden Streets. He be- came a drummer under Captain De Villiers and spent three months at the camp. Though at this time only fifteen years old, the next year he became eighteen, so as to enlist, and lie at once did so for three years, or till the close of the War. This time he became a meni- ber of the Sixtieth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, under Captain P. K. Walsh, and his soldier experience lasted just a week. At the expiration of that time, his parents sought him out with a writ of habeas corpus, and he was led home. He was allowed to enter the National Guard, however, and Company E, of the Twenty-ninth Regiment, received him as a drummer boy and gradu- ated him in 1864 as a full-fledged Soldier, able to carry a musket. While a member of the National Guard, he was a compositor in the Plain Dealer office. One morning, he left home as usual with his dinner basket, but he never reached the office. Instead, he enlisted in the 150th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, under Captain J. B. Molyneaux, and the first his parents knew of it they received a letter from Washington, where he was en- gaged in defending the National Capital. He still lacked one month of being eighteen years of age, but this time he was not molested, and he remained with the regiment until it came home.
Major Gleason is a printer by trade, a fact of which he declares himself proud.
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As he was a private in active service it becomes necessary to explain his title of major. His friends assert that he was born a major, is a major by nature and by habit, and will die a major. It is said that strangers at first glance always spot him for a major. The spirit of major is thoroughly imbued in him and personified by him. But he came to the title honestly, for though too young to acquire it in war, he served on the staff of the Commander of the Grand Army of the Republic.
After his return from the army, Major Gleason re- stunned the printing trade as a compositor. He was subsequently a hustling reporter and connected with the business department, going through all of the grades of newspaper work. Of late years, however, he has not continued in this, being engaged in the insur- ance business. He has been conspicuous in all things relating to the improvement of Cleveland. He organ- ized the system under which the Board of Elections is working and was its first Secretary. Under the admin- istration of Mayor George W. Gardner, he was City Comptroller. He has been Secretary of the Library Board for three years, and also a member of the Board of Equalization. He has held many positions of trust and responsibility, nearly all of them without pay, dis- charging his every duty with intelligence and [ fidelity. He was President of the Irish National League during its entire practical existence. In all patriotic objects concerning either his native country or the Government of the United States, he has been a tireless worker. His entire life has been marked by thorough executive ability, earnest activity and enterprise. Upon the election of the Permanent Commission, he was made a member thereof, and was subsequently unanimously chosen its President.
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CAPTAIN LEVI F. BAUDER.
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CAPTAIN LEVI F. BAUDER.
Associated with the Monument enterprise from the first and connected with the Commission since its organi- ization as its permanent Secretary, Captain Levi F. Bander has been in close touch with all the work that has been done. The records of the endeavors of the fifteen years that the Commission has been in exist- ence, placed in black and white by him, are voluminous and complete. The main portion of the history of the enterprise is contained within the covers of one huge volume, but aside from this there has been an immense amount of other clerical work.
Captain Bauder was born in the Forest City on Janu- ary 28, 1840. His early life was uneventful. He attended the public schools, and was graduated from the Central High School in 1858. Later, he attended the academy at Port Royal, Va., and Oberlin College, and was engaged as a teacher in Pickaway county when the War broke out. He at once returned to Cleveland, and enlisted in the Sprague Cadets, two or three days after the fall of Fort Sumter. The Sprague Cadets was a Cleveland company, and became a part of the Seventh Regiment. After a few days spent at Camp Taylor, in this city, the company was sent to Camp Dennison, a short distance from Cincinnati. This was a camp of instruction, and there they remained until June 20, when Captain Bauder again enlisted for three years, and was returned to the same regiment. The record of the Seventh Regiment, the "Bloody Seventh," as it became known in after years, is familiar to all who know anything of the history of the Cuyahoga Soldiers. Its long marches and bloody conflicts are historical. Captain Bander participated in twelve of the fifteen engagements of the regiment, and in three others in which the regiment as a whole had no part. He went into the service as a private, and passed up through the
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successive grades of duty sergeant, ordnance sergeant of division, and first sergeant of company. During the trying times around Lookout Mountain, when the regiment became so decimated that only a small part of the original number remained, he had command of his company for four months. Here it was that he gained the title of captain, although that rank was never officially conferred upon him. The reason for this was that the regiment had become so thinned that no more officers were thought to be necessary, and Sergeant Bauder remained a sergeant, although having command of his company.
After the three years for which Captain Bauder en- listed had expired, he returned home with the regiment and was mustered out. This was in July, 1864. Later, he was offered an adjutancy in a new regiment that was being formed, but he refused it, having just married. Since then, Captain Bauder held the office of County Auditor, from 1877 to 1883, and he was a Justice of the Peace from 1886 to 1892. He was several years a mnem- ber of the Public Library Board, and is one of the Curators of the Western Reserve Historical Society. He has a more than local reputation as a writer of prose and verse, many of his poems being of a high order of merit. He is devoted to his profession as an attorney. at-law, and is well known throughout the county as a quiet, cultured, affable gentleman with hosts of friends.
CAPTAIN JOSEPH B. MOLYNEAUX.
Joseph B. Molyneaux was born near Ann Arbor, Mich., on January 1, 1840. At the age of four years, his mother died, and the father and son removed to Elmira, N. Y., where the little fellow was put out with farmers until he reached the age of seven. Since that time he has been obliged to shift for himself, for his father was lost at sea. Until fourteen years old, he worked on farm, in hotel, saw-mill, stone quarry; in fact,
CAPTAIN JOSEPH B. MOLYNEAUX.
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any place that offered. He met Prof. Lowe, who at that time was traveling as a magician, but later became famed as an aeronaut. For a year the boy assisted the professor to mystify audiences, but quit this business at Belleville, O. His next adventure was the study of medicine with Dr. Whitcomb. Then he came to Cleve- land and learned the printer's trade, working in various offices until the beginning of the War.
He first enlisted as a private in the three-months service, but was appointed sergeant. At the reorgani- zation of the regiment for three years he was elected first lieutenant ; later was appointed adjutant and pro- moted to captain. The men under his command were mostly young fellows, and so well did he care for them that they speak even now words of endearment and devotion for him. At Cedar Mountain, he was wounded in the head, shoulder and leg, and had two horses shot under him. He was then discharged for disability, but when his wounds healed he returned to service as captain of Company E, 150th O. V. I., and was assigned to command at Fort Thayer, near Washington. Since- the War he has been engaged in the printing business, has been Deputy County Recorder, Assistant Post- master, and at present is a member of the Board of Equalization and Assessment.
Capt. Molyneaux's record is a splendid one. On. several occasions he performed special duties. While a sergeant at Camp Dennison, he did duty as a field officer. I11 1862, he was detailed by Gen. McClellan to collect all convalescents of the Army of the Potomac and return them to their commands. This was an arduous undertaking. When so severely wounded at Cedar Mountain, he took command of the regiment, his senior officers being killed. He commanded the division that acted as escort at the burial of General Lander at Patterson Creek, Va. His company had been.
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a part of Lander's division. On the famous raid to Bloomery Furnace, where the command captured more prisoners than its own men numbered, he had acted as aid to the general. The most important battles in which he was engaged were Winchester, Port Republic, Cedar Mountain and Antietam, though there were a host of smaller engagements.
Capt. Molyneaux has the esteem and respect of his fellow-citizens. He was elected a member of the Per- manent Commission and was unanimously chosen its Secretary.
CAPTAIN EDWARD H. BOHM.
One of the most influential members of the Monu- ment Commission is Captain Edward H. Bohm, who has been associated in the Monument enterprise ever since its inception. He was born in Alstedt, Saxe- Weimar, on February 7, 1837. His father was well supplied with the good things of life, being a member of the judiciary of the country, and up to the time he was fourteen years of age, Captain Bohm remained in his native land, in study in a private school. The family removed to this country in 1851, arriving in New York on August 28, and after a week spent in that city, they came West, intending to settle on a Western farm. When they arrived in Cleveland, however, young Bohm was taken seriously ill and a stop of some time was necessitated. When he had recovered sufficiently to go on with the journey, his father had found that the cli- inate of the Forest City was to his liking and it was de- cided to remain in Cleveland. A farm in Newburg township was purchased, and there the family took up their abode. Young Bohm staid on the farm until 1856, when he went to work on the old Cleveland & Toledo Railroad. There he was when the War broke out. He enlisted in Company K, Seventh Ohio Volunteer In- fantry,'on April 18, 1861, under Captain J. G. Wiseman.
CAPTAIN EDWARD H. BOHM.
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A short time was spent in Camp Taylor, and the com- pany started for Camp Dennison, in Cincinnati, on the first Sunday in May. He remained with the company in its career through West Virginia until August 20, 1861. On that day he was sent out with a reconnoiter- ing party of nineteen men in citizen's clothes. Their route led them across the Gauley River and into an am- bush of two companies of rebel cavalry. Young Bohm was a sergeant by this time. The members of the party who had escaped the first murderous fire that was poured upon them ran for safety. But Sergeant Bohm, himself uninjured, staid with his captain, who had re- ceived a mortal hurt. He saw his captain pass from life, and for his devotion he paid the penalty of being captured by the Confederates. For nearly nine months, until May 30, 1862, he remained a captive in various rebel prisons, being released on the latter date at Little Washington, N. C. He at once returned to Cleveland, and in January, 1863, was commissioned by Governor Tod as second lieutenant in Company D, in his former regiment, his commission dating from November I of the previous year.
On March 17, he was given command of the com- pany, and was at its head during the battles of Chan- cellorsville, Gettysburg, and Ringgold. In the first- named battle his company lost more than any other in the regiment. Out of fifty-three men in line, twenty- three were lost, four being killed, eleven wounded, and the remainder missing. For his valor in that engage- ment he was named in general orders. At the battle of Gettysburg the only man in the regiment killed was a member of his company. Captain Bohm was wounded in the fierce charge made by the regiment in the battle of Ringgold, when, in less than thirty minutes, of the fifteen officers in the regiment, five were killed and the remaining ten wounded. After he was cured of his
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wound he remained with the regiment until it was mustered out in Cleveland on July 6, 1864. He was several times recommended for the rank of major, and once the commission was sent to him. He refused the rank, however, being on the eve of marriage, and he did not re-enter the army, the struggle being nearly over. In January, 1865, he was married, and he then opened an office for the prosecution of Soldiers' claims against the Government. In 1870, he was elected to the Public School Board, and while in that capacity introduced the resolution which created the present Normal Train- ing School. He was County Recorder for six years, be- ginning with 1870, and the Anzeiger was founded by him as a daily German newspaper while he held that position. In four years he succeeded in losing $20,- ooo in that venture and he then gave up the control of the paper. He was president of the North American Sængerbund and the Sængerfest, in 1874, and in 1876 he was Presidential elector at large on the Republican State ticket. In 1875, he lost his wife and the year fol- lowing he married again. He was elected as Justice of the Peace in 1885, and he has held that office until the present. In all the matters of the Monument Commis- sion, he has exerted a strong influence.
CAPTAIN LEVI T. SCOFIELD.
In the presence of the huge work which is formally dedicated to the people of Cuyahoga County, in honor of the brave men who upheld the Union in its dark- est days, something about the designer and architect of the structure is of especial interest. It was Cap- tain Levi T. Scofield, a member of the Commission, who prepared the designs and had personal super- vision of the work from the beginning to the pres- ent time. Captain Scofield was born in Cleveland on November 9, 1842, and has resided here most of his life. His father had been an old settler, coming here-
CAPTAIN LEVI T. SCOFIELD.
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in 1816, and had erected the first house on Walnut Street. The lad was brought up in this city, and studied engineering and architecture. The year before the War he went to Cincinnati to continue his studies, but came home when men were needed, and enlisted in Company D, First Ohio Light Artillery. Here-enlisted in the infantry when his term expired, and was com- missioned Second Lieutenant in Company E, One Hun- dred and Third Regiment. At intervals he received promotions, being made a First Lieutenant in February of 1863, and a Captain in November of 1864.
His time was divided between service in the infantry and in the engineer corps. His ability as an engineer was recognized and he was often assigned to that duty. His early training in that work proved valuable to hin. The duty of the engineer corps often takes it ahead of the lines of the army in its work of laying out roads, building bridges or making maps of the country. The advanced positions are dangerous in an enemy's country. In time of battle the engineers serve on the staff of the commanding officer, and are exposed to the fire of the enemy and other dangers in carrying orders.
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