USA > Ohio > Ross County > Chillicothe > Ohio centennial anniversary celebration at Chillicothe, May 20-21, 1903 : under the auspices of the Ohio State Archaelogical and Historical Society : complete proceedings > Part 19
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"Heavy firing was kept up along the whole line until about 4 P. M., when a general advance took place. The enemy gave way before the im- petuosity of our troops, and were soon completely routed. This brigade pressed forward with the advance line to, and into, the streets of Win- chester. The rout of the enemy was everywhere complete. Night came on, and the pursuit was stopped. The troops of my brigade encamped with the corps on the Strasburg and Front Royal roads, south of Win- chester."
Keifer was wounded in the left hip by a fragment of a shell (though not disabled), and two horses were shot under him during the day. His left arm was then in a sling from a bullet wound received in the battle of the Wilderness. He was brevetted for gallantry at Opequon, Fisher's Hill and Cedar Creek, Va. - [E. O. R., Editor.]
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In not all of the battles of the war, from Rich Mountain (July II, 1861) to Sailors' Creek (April 6, 1865), were Ohio's officers so dominant and conspicuous as at Opequon, but in many her share of the achievements was still greater by reason of the larger relative number of Ohio's soldiers participating therein.
Of course, in the battle described, officers and soldiers of other states did their duty; but we are not here giving general war history; we are only illustrating Ohio in the Civil War by one battle, wherein two Ohio subordinate officers participated, each of whom became president of the United States, and others from Ohio who participated became distinguished as statesmen, jurists, etc.
OHIO'S HUMAN SACRIFICES.
The scythe of destruction cut a wide swath, and death garnered a superabundant harvest of Ohio's sons during the more than four years war.
There were 24,591 Ohio soldiers killed or mortally wounded in actual combat, or who died, before the expiration of their terms of enlistment, of wounds or disease. Of this number 6,536 were of the mangled slain, who died where they fell on the field of action, and 4,674 others ebbed out their lives in field- hospitals after receiving mortal wounds, and 13,354 died of disease in hospital or prison, from exposure or cruel starvation.
Thirty-seven were killed or mortally wounded, and forty- seven died of disease, etc., out of every thousand of Ohio troops.
The "destroying angel," neither in peace nor war, respects. persons, rank, caste, class or station. The Angel of Death spread wide his wings and swooped in his victims from among the heroes of the bayonet and sabre, the cannon and the sword.
The vigorous, nervous and accomplished General O. M. Mitchell fell a victim to disease. The brave, but gentle, Gen- eral Joshua W. Sill (now buried here) grandly and heroically met his fate at Stone's River. The chivalric and knightly Gen -. eral William H. Lytle, died, as he had wished, of a mortal wound on the field of glory at Chickamauga. General Robert L. Mc- Cook, after a most brilliant career of usefulness, and with still: greater promise, also died of a mortal wound. There was also,
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General Daniel McCook, who, when he entered the army, bade friends farewell with the remark: "Here goes for a star or a soldier's grave," and both came together. A McCook fell each year of the war - father and three sons; the father and two sons on a July 2Ist. Colonel Charles M. was killed at Bull Run, July 21, 1861 ; General Robert L., August 6, 1862; Major Daniel McCook (the father) during the Morgan raid in Ohio, July 21, 1863, and General Daniel McCook at Kenesaw Mountain, July 21, 1864. Alexander McDowell McCook, another of Dan- iel's sons, became a major-general. John McCook (brother of Daniel, Sr.) served and died in the war.
James B. McPherson, of Ohio (a son of a blacksmith), rose through ability, merit and heroism to the command of the Army of the Tennessee, and fell in sight of Atlanta (Peach Tree Creek, July 22, 1864) when thirty-six years of age. He fitly typifies an American soldier and citizen in our free Repub- lic, where the humblest of birth and circumstances may rise to fame or fortune. Such a soldier does not fight for a crown for his own head, nor, like a knight of old, purely for military glory, but with all the characteristics of bravery and chivalry possessed by the most valorous and virtuous, for the principle of universal liberty - for man.
The list of distinguished officers, whose lives paid the forfeit for our Nation's sins, is long. Among the most con- spicuous names are Colonels Lorin Andrews, Minor Milliken, Frederick C. Jones, Wm. G. Jones, John T. Toland, J. H. Pat- rick, C. G. Harker, J. W. Lowe, George P. Webster, J. K. L. Smith, James M. Shane, J. D. Elliott, Leander Stem, Augustus H. Coleman, Barton S. Kyle and M. S. Wooster.
It is invidious to name any. Almost every cemetery or village graveyard in Ohio attests the number, and many Ohio soldiers are buried in national cemeteries; others where they fell.
The grand total of losses in the Union army, from Sumter to the final peace, was 294,000 men, 9,000 of whom were officers, and 285,000 enlisted men. The loss in Ohio officers alone is known to have reached 872, nearly ten per centum of the grand
o. c. - 13
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total of officers, and every eleventh enlisted man of the Union army who fell in the war was an Ohio soldier.
The total of the losses in battle of all kinds in both the American and British armies in the seven years' war of the Revolution, excluding only the captured at Saratoga and York- town, is 21,526. This number falls 4,000 below Ohio's dead- list alone during the Civil War.
In summing up Ohio's sacrifices, mention has only been made of the dead during the war, omitting those who have since died of wounds and disease contracted in the service, and the many mangled and disabled living soldiers.
The soldiers suffered and died in camp, on the march, as guards and sentinels by day and by night, during the bivouac, in tent, hospital and prison, and while exposed to storms in all seasons and climes. In all the movements of the army, disease and death followed in the train.
I have spoken so far of the blood shed in war, and not of the broken hearts and bitter tears of sorrow incident thereto. Who knows or who can measure the sorrows and sufferings of the agonized hearts left desolate at home? Here all human calculation ceases. Heaven's recording angel has not failed to note these sacrifices.
What a grand army of Ohio soldiers now muster beyond the grave! Such is briefly and imperfectly Ohio's human sac- rifice to the principle of national unity and freedom to all be- neath the stars and stripes.
Costly, Oh! how costly the sacrifice !
Her sons died to atone with their blood for our nation's sins against humanity. Let us now and ever hope and pray that this atoning sacrifice may not have been in vain. Nay; more, let us swear, by the blood and sufferings of our maimed and fallen comrades, and by the tears and sorrows of the broken-hearted widows and orphans of these comrades, to so act that they shall not have died in vain.
Did time permit I might recount other material sacrifices made by Ohio in the war. Those who went to the field were not the only sufferers; nor were they the only persons who devoted their service and lives to their country. The moral
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grandeur of the war was intensified by the heroism with which the loyal ladies labored at home, in hospital and on the field, to ameliorate its horrors.
The work of Misses Mary Clark Barton and Ellen F. Terry in organizing the sanitary commission, at Cleveland, and con- ducting its affairs on a scale co-equal with the magnitude of the war, crowns them as "queens of mercy." To mention names in this connection is again invidious. Florence Nightingale (England) was the central female figure of the Crimean War. Her philanthropic labors, in angelic grandeur, there outshone in glory all others. In their sublimity and holiness they have been pronounced a sufficient compensation for the horrors of a long, bloody war.
The second war for freedom in America produced a thou- sand Florence Nightingales. By their work they closed a hell of agonies and opened a heaven of joy.
OHIO'S GALAXY OF GENERALS.
Grant won his way from retired life to the rank of gen- eral. Skill, pluck and perseverance crowned his career as an officer with uniform success; and success in war is the only royal road to greatness.
Sherman, who succeeded to the rank of general-in-chief of the armies of the United States, forecast the war in the West on too large a scale for the comprehension of many, and for a time he was asked to stand aside (as insane), but the logic of events brought others up to his far-reaching compre- hension. He, too, won his high rank, he did not acquire it by influence or accident.
Philip H. Sheridan was a captain, newly made, when the war broke out. He wrote to a friend thus: "Who knows? Perhaps I may have a chance to earn a major's commission." Such vaulting ambition was never to be realized. He earned a major-general's commission during the war, and with it the acknowledged title of the first general of cavalry. This only does him partial justice, for he was, as an army commander, a great strategist. He leaped over the rank of major, also lieu-
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tenant-colonel in the regular army, and he never held a rank below colonel in the volunteer service. At the head of cavalry he was to Grant what Marshal Murat was to the first Napoleon. He attained the rank of lieutenant-general and general of the United States army.
These three - Grant, Sherman and Sheridan - are the only officers who have held the rank of "general" in the United States army since Washington.
Major-General Rosecrans was by many competent military critics placed at the head of the great strategists of the war. He fought in West Virginia, he triumphed at Iuka, Corinth and Stone's River, and fought, against odds, the great battle of Chickamauga and seized and held Chattanooga, the prize he then fought for.
Quincy A. Gilmore was the greatest of artillerists. It will seem unjust to pursue this review of Ohio's chiefs further.
It is difficult to adopt a perfectly just and satisfactory rule for crediting Ohio with the names of distinguished men who, in peace or war, served their country with special honor. It has been the custom to claim, as Ohio's contribution, all persons of distinction who were born in Ohio, no matter where their residence might be, and also to claim all others as belonging to Ohio who entered public service while residents of Ohio, re- gardless of where born.
The list given below, prepared chiefly by John Beatty* (himself a distinguished general of the Civil War), is sub- stantially complete, though it leaves out some, notably Gen- erals Eli Long, Charles G. Harker and Samuel S. Carroll (not born in or residents of Ohio), who each commanded an Ohio infantry regiment prior to their promotion; and the list does not include Generals Halbert E. Payne (Wisconsin), Benjamin Harrison (Indiana), Robert B. Mitchell (Kansas), and other dis- tinguished officers, born in Ohio.
(*) Vol. I. Ohio His. Collections, p. 150.
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OHIO GENERAL OFFICERS, WITH STATE AND DATE OF BIRTH.
(The * indicates a graduate of West Point; the t that the officer was major-general by brevet, usually for some special gallantry on the battle-field.)
Generals:
*Ulysses S. Grant, born at Point Pleasant, Ohio, April 27, 1822.
*William T. Sherman, born at Lancaster, Ohio, February 8, 1820.
·* Phillip H. Sheridan, born at Albany, N. Y., March 6, 1831. Major-Generals.
*Don Carlos Buell, born at Lowell, March 23, 1818.
*George Crook, Montgomery County, September 8, 1828. *George A. Custer, Harrison County, December 5, 1839. *Quincy A. Gilmore, Lorain County, February 28, 1825. James A. Garfield, Cuyahoga County, November 19, 1831.
*James B. McPherson, Clyde, November 14, 1828.
*Irvine McDowell, Columbus, October 15, 1818.
*Alex. McD. McCook, Columbiana County, April 22, 1831. *William S. Rosecrans, Delaware County, September 6, 1819. *David S. Stanley, Wayne County, June 1, 1828. Robert C. Schenck, Warren County, October 4, 1809. Wagner Swayne, Columbus, November 10, 1834.
*Godfrey Weitzel, Cincinnati, November 1, 1835. Major-Generals, resident in Ohio but born elsewhere: Jacob D. Cox, born in New York, October 27, 1828. *William B. Hazen, Vermont, September 27, 1830. Mortimer D. Leggett, New York, April 19,. 1831.
*George B. McClellan, Pennsylvania, December 3, 1826. *O. M. Mitchell, Kentucky, August 28, 1810.
James B. Steedman, Pennsylvania, July 30, 1818. Brigadier-Generals of Ohio birth:
*William T. H. Brooks, born at New Lisbon, January 28, 1821.
*William W. Burns, Coshocton, September 3, 1825.
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+Henry B. Banning, Knox County, November 10, 1834. *C. B. Buckingham, Zanesville, March 14, 1808. John Beatty, Sandusky, December 16, 1828. Joel A. Dewey, Ashtabula, September 20, 1840. +Thomas H. Ewing, Lancaster, August 7, 1829. +Hugh B. Ewing, Lancaster, October 31, 1826. *James W. Forsyth, Ohio, August 26, 1836. ** Robert S. Granger, Zanesville, May 24, 1816. +*Kenner Garrard, Cincinnati, 1830.
** Charles Griffin, Licking County, 1827. +Rutherford B. Hayes, Delaware, October 14, 1822. +J. Warren Keifer, Clark County, January 30, 1836. William H. Lytle, Cincinnati, November 2, 1826. *John S. Mason, Steubenville, August 21, 1824. Robert L. McCook, New Lisbon, December 28, 1827. Daniel McCook, Carrollton, July 22, 1834. John G. Mitchell, Piqua, November 6, 1838. Nathaniel C. McLean, Warren County, February 2, 1815. +Emerson Opdycke, Trumbull County, January 7, 1830. Benjamin F. Potts, Carroll County, January 29, 1836. A. Sanders Piatt, Cincinnati, May 2, 1821.
+James S. Robinson, Mansfield, October II, 1828. Benjamin P. Runkle, West Liberty, September 3, 1836. J. W. Reilly, Akron, May 21, 1828.
*William Sooy Smith, Pickaway County, July 22, 1830. *Joshua Sill, Chillicothe, December 6, 1831.
John P. Slough, Cincinnati, 1829. Ferdinand Van De Veer, Butler County, February 27, 1823. +*Charles R. Woods, Licking County.
+Williard Warner, Granville, September 4, 1826. +William B. Woods, Licking County. +Charles C. Walcutt, Columbus, February 12, 1838. M. S. Wade, Cincinnati, December 2, 1802.
Brigadier-Generals, resident in Ohio but born elsewhere.
*Jacob Ammen, born in Virginia, January 7, 1808. Samuel Beatty, Pennsylvania, September 16, 1820. ** B. W. Brice, Virginia, 1809.
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Ralph B. Buckland, Massachusetts, January 20, 1812.
H. B. Carrington, Connecticut, March 2, 1824.
George P. Este, New Hampshire, April 30, 1830.
¡Manning F. Force, Washington, D. C., December 17, 1824. +John W. Fuller, England, July, 1827.
¿Charles W. Hill, Vermont.
August V. Kautz, Germany, January 5, 1828.
George W. Morgan, Pennsylvania.
William H. Powell, South Wales, May 10, 1825.
*E. P. Scammon, Maine, December 27, 1816. Thomas Kilby Smith, Massachusetts, 1821.
+John W. Sprague, New York, April 4, 1827.
¡Erastus B. Tyler, New York.
** John C. Tibbal, Virginia.
¿August Willich, Prussia, 1810.
There were twenty major-generals, twenty-seven brevet major-generals, thirty brigadier-generals, and one hundred and fifty brevet brigadier-generals. Two hundred and twenty-nine completes Ohio's list of general officers. (Of those holding the substantive rank of major-general, or higher rank, only one - Alex. McDowell McCook is now living) .*
But - but, boastful as we are of Ohio on account of her military chieftains who won their commissions on fields of blood, and of her other still larger number of officers, holding lesser rank, but equally skillful, brave and meritorious, we are justly more boastful of Ohio on account of her more than 340,000 en- listed volunteer soldiers and sailors of the Civil War.
III. SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR - 1898.
With the close of the Civil War (1865), came a third of a century of peace in the United States, save only the perennial In- dian border wars.
Cuba, long sought to be acquired by the United States, by purchase, to dedicate to slavery, and also because of its being a natural key to our Gulf coast, was, at last, so cruelly oppressed
* Died since, at Dayton, Ohio, June 12, 1903.
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by Spanish authority as to excite the sympathy of the humane people throughout the world. Spain's title by discovery had held good, as to Cuba, for above four hundred years. Meantime there had been exterminated by Spaniards an aboriginal race at one time probably numbering 500,000 people. Spain's tyrannical policy, though, in general, not more severe than in Spain proper, led to insurrections in Cuba. The one of ten years' duration (1868-1877) terminated in an agreement to give Cuban inhab- itants the rights of Spanish citizens, including the right of repre- sentation in the Spanish Cortes. This agreement was not kept in good faith by Spain, and in February, 1895, a new insurrection broke out, supported by Cubans generally in the Island, especi- ally by those not living in the larger coast cities.
Failing to quell this insurrection the Spanish Cuban gover- nor-general (Weyler) inaugurated a policy of extermination, and so far executed it as to (as early as 1896) cause the non-com- batants from the insurrectionary parts of the Island to be as- sembled in closely circumscribed so-called military zones, and there left to starve and to die. Thus were destroyed about one-third (600,000) of Cuba's population before the close of the Spanish War. The civilized world stood aghast at this horrible cruelty. This condition and the blowing up in Havana harbor (February 15, 1898), of the United States battleship Maine aroused the people of this country to a frenzy of excitement. They demanded that Spain should give up Cuba - make her people free, and depart from America as empty-handed as when Columbus sailed on his first voyage of discovery in 1492.
The declaration by Congress (April 18, 1898), "that the people of the Island of Cuba are, and of right ought to be, free and independent" and the demand that Spain "at once relinquish its authority and government in the Island of Cuba, and with- draw its land and naval forces from Cuba and Cuban waters," with authority to the President to enforce the demand by the use of the land and naval forces of the United States and the militia of the states, led, necessarily, to a declaration of war (April 21, 1898).
This policy on the part of our government was without prec- edent in the history of nations. No nation had ever before de-
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clared war on another country because of its inhuman treatment of its own citizens or subjects. No war was ever before declared on humanitarian grounds alone. The precedent was radical as well as new, and it may be far-reaching in its effects and tend strongly towards the universal civilization of man. But this war was the logical and legitimate outgrowth of the results of the Civil War. The victories won, in that war, for humanity and freedom were for the whole human race. But for Appomattox there would have been no Manila Bay or Santiago - no free- dom for Cuba - no new island possessions - and Porto Rico and the Philippines, over which our flag now floats, and our constitution spreads its shield of protection, guaranteeing civil and religious freedom, would still be Spanish.
But for the civil and religious freedom secured by the bloody victories of the Civil War, the armies of the leading monarchies of the civilized world would not have marched, side by side, with an army of our Republic to storm the gates of China's capital to liberate imprisoned and endangered Christian mis- sionaries sent to preach "Christ and Him crucified" and to carry the banner of the Prince of Peace to heathen pagan people.
But what part or lot did Ohio have in the Spanish-American War?
Something. William McKinley, of Ohio, was president of the United States, and though conservative in his views upon the subject of precipitating the country into a foreign war, was far- seeing, and prompt, in preparing for war, both on land and water ; and when the war came, so ordered an Asiatic fleet as to bring it into Manila Bay, in the far-off Philippines, within six days (May I, 1898), after Congress declared (April 25) the war existed, where it (under Admiral Dewey) then destroyed the Spanish fleet, and won a victory which did much to place our nation first among the naval powers of the world.
President McKinley's thoroughness and energy in preparing for the war commanded the admiration of the country and the world.
At the breaking out of the Spanish War the United States had a standing army of 28,183 officers and enlisted men, and so scattered as not to be available by concentration. Not to exceed
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half that number could be utilized for immediate operations against the enemy in Cuba, a mere fraction of the regular and volunteer forces already there.
On April 23 (two days after our minister at Madrid was. handed his passports ) the President called for 125,000 volunteers, and, May 25, 1898, he called for 75,000 more. These were or- ganized and in drill camps within a few days, and some of them were soon hastened, with the available regulars, to Santiago,. Cuba.
Ohio had, at the beginning of the Spanish War, John Sher- man as secretary of state, and William R. Day as first assistant secretary of state. Day soon became secretary of state, and he has the distinguished honor of negotiating the Protocol, and, as president of the treaty commission, the Paris treaty with Spain. He later became a judge of the United States Circuit Court of Appeals, and he is now a justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Without experience or special education in in- ternational affairs, he attained the highest success in diplomacy. John Hay, of Ohio, succeeded Day (September 20, 1898) as sec- retary of state. He, likewise, did much to insure a successful issue of the Spanish War. She had then two distinguished citi- zens, Joseph B. Foraker and Mark A. Hanna, in the Senate of the United States. Another distinguished citizen, Charles H. Grosvenor, was then a leader in the House of Representatives. (He had won distinction as an officer in the Civil War.)
These, and others, in Congress from Ohio, supported the President with singular ability, in preparation for and in prose- cuting the war.
One man, above all others connected with the United States army, is entitled to credit for efficiency and ability in speedily perfecting and organizing and equipping the regular and vol- unteer forces for field service - Henry C. Corbin. He was from Ohio, with a good record in the Civil War. He, through inerit, had been advanced to the rank of brigadier-general, and adjutant-general of the United States army. By his great exec- utive ability he did more than any other man in the United States to put a well-equipped army of volunteers in the field. He is now a major-general, and adjutant-general, United States army.
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Throughout the regular army were many of Ohio's sons. So as to the navy. Ohio had her full quota of officers and men in both - some of whom had won distinction in the Civil War.
When the Spanish War broke out Ohio's population was about one-twentieth of the whole country. Under the first call of the President, Ohio furnished 428 officers and 8,052 enlisted men; under his second call, 73 officers and 6,801 enlisted men, including hospital and signal corps men, engineers and immunes, a grand total of 15,354, and considerable more than her proper quota, based on population. If the call had been for the whole 200,000 from Ohio, it would have been promptly filled, leav- ing many disappointed, patriotic young men still clamoring to be taken. The heroic spirit of the Ohio Civil-War soldiers and sailors had descended to their sons.
The following from Ohio were commissioned general of- ficers in the Spanish War from civil life.
J. Warren Keifer, major-general of volunteers.
George A. Garretson, brigadier-general of volunteers.
Each had commands in camps within the United States and served in drilling, disciplining, etc., troops for active field-ser- vice. General Keifer commanded troops in the vicinity of Ha- vana, and he commanded the United States troops when they marched into and took possession of the city of Havana on its evacuation by the Spanish army (January 1, 1899).
General Garretson commanded a brigade in the operations at Santiago, Cuba, and in Porto Rico.
Others of Ohio in the regular service were promoted to gen- eral officers.
The state furnished ten infantry regiments, all of full strength, save the Ninth Ohio (colored), which had only one battalion ; one volunteer light artillery and one volunteer cavalry regiment, and to the Second United States Volunteer Engineers, 273 men; to the Volunteer United States Hospital Corps, 461 men ; to the United States Volunteer Signal Corps, 50 men, and four companies of United States volunteers (immunes), 424 men.
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