USA > Pennsylvania > Martial deeds of Pennsylvania, Vol. 1 > Part 35
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And brave old wisdom of sincerity !
They knew that outward grace is dust ;
They could not choose but trust
In that sure-footed mind's unfaltering skill,
And supple tempered will,
That bent like perfect steel to spring again and thrust. . . His was no lonely mountain peak of mind,
Thrusting to thin air o'er our cloudy bars,
A sca-mark now, now lost in vapors blind ;
Broad prairie rather, genial, level-lined,
Fruitful and friendly for his humankind, Yet also known to heaven and friend with all its stars.
He knew to bide his time, And can his fame abide,
Still patient in his simple faith sublime, Till the wise years decide.
Great captains, with their guns and drums, Disturb our judgment for the hour,
But at last silence comes : These all are gone, and, standing like a tower, Our children shall behold his fame, The kindly-carnest, brave, foreseeing man,
Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame,
New birth of our new soil, the first American."
PART II. BIOGRAPHY.
385 - 386
25
CHAPTER I.
THE KILLED IN BATTLE.
DWARD D. BAKER, Colonel of the Seventy-first re- giment, was born in London, England, on the 24th of February, 1811. When seven years of age he came with his parents, who were Quakers, to Phila- delphia. He was early left, with .a younger bro- ther, an orphan with no near relatives to whom he could look for protection or aid. He had, however, learned the handicraft of his father, that of a weaver, and he found work in a small establish- ment in South street, where he earned sufficient for their support. He had, consequently, few oppor- tunities for school education; but he was fond of reading, and eagerly pursued a general and desul- tory course, acquiring a good acquaintance with the standard English poets. While 'yet in boyhood, he removed to Illinois, where he embraced the tenets of the religious sect known as Campbellites, and became an ardent travelling preacher. At the age of nineteen, he married the widow of a distinguished mem- ber of that body. Burdened with the cares of a family he left the itineracy and commenced the study of the law, upon the practice of which he soon entered, and with signal success. He early developed great power in forensic debates, in which he subsequently disputed the palm with Douglas and Lincoln. He was elected, in 1846, as member of the lower house of Con- gress. But, in 1847, the Mexican War breaking out, he only took his seat long enough to record his votes in favor of sustain- ing the Government, when he hastened to join his regiment, the Second Illinois volunteers, which he had raised, and of which he was Colonel. He distinguished himself at Cerro Gordo, and when General Shields was wounded, took command of his
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MARTIAL DEEDS OF PENNSYLVANIA.
brigade, and led it to the close of the action. He was also in the battles of Vera Cruz, Puebla, and the City of Mexico. He had besides seen some desultory service in the Black Hawk war. While engaged in embarking troops upon a steamer near Mobile, Alabama, for service in Mexico, and in the act of bravely quelling a riot between mutinous soldiers, he was dangerously wounded in the neck and throat.
After his return from Mexico he was again elected to Congress, and in 1850, upon the death of President Taylor, who was his intimate personal friend, and whose cause in the recent campaign he had devotedly championed, he delivered a famous culogy upon the Life and Character of his Departed Chief. In 1851, he went to Panama on business, where he was stricken down with the coast fever, which came near proving fatal. The tide of emigra- tion was just then setting towards the golden shores of California, and thither he determined to go. He accordingly removed with his family, with the design of making the Pacific coast his per- manent home. He soon acquired a reputation for eloquence unsurpassed, and took a leading rank at the California bar. Over the dead body of his friend Broderick, who had fallen nomi- nally in a duel, Colonel Baker delivered an eloquent and most impressive eulogy, in which he declared that Broderick had been assassinated because "he was opposed to the extension of slavery and a corrupt administration."
In 1860, he removed to Oregon, and was elected a member of the United States Senate. This was an arena where his forensic powers had full scope. It was at a period when a drama was enacting, the most tragic, stirring, and grand known to American history. Amid the stormy scenes of that body, where the open- ing acts of the rebellion were transpiring, where treason was plotted, and treasonable speech was defiantly uttered, he was a master spirit, and met rebellious threats with no cowering or timid front. When Mr. Lincoln came to be inaugurated, his life- long friend, Colonel Baker, came forward and presented him as the President elect, to the assembled thousands of his fellow citizens. The firing upon the flag at Sumter aroused him to bursts of unwonted eloquence, and in the great war meeting convened at Union Park, in New York, on the 20th of April
Piatagraži Entares
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EDWARD D. BAKER.
following, he spoke in a strain of impassioned oratory, which, flashed upon the wires of the telegraph to the remotest hamlets of the Republic, roused the nation to a sense of impending danger. Ile said on that occasion : "The majesty of the people is here to-day to sustain the majesty of the constitution, and I come a wanderer from the far Pacific, to record my oath along with yours of the great Empire State. The hour for conciliation has passed, the gathering for battle is at hand, and the country requires that every man should do his duty. Fellow-citizens, what is that country ? Is it the soil on which we tread ? Is it the gathering of familiar faces ? Is it our luxury, and pomp, and pride ? Nay, more than these, is it power and majesty alone ? No, our country is more, far more than all these. The country which demands our love, our courage, our devotion, our heart's blood, is more than all these. Our country is the history of our fathers-our country is the tradition of our mothers- our country is past renown-our country is present pride and power-our country is future hope and destiny-our country is greatness, glory, truth, constitutional liberty-above all, freedom forever! These are the watchwords under which we fight; and we will shout them out till the stars appear in the sky, in the stormiest hour of battle.
" I have said that the hour of conciliation is passed. It may return ; but not to-morrow, nor next week. It will return when that tattered flag (pointing to the flag of Fort Sumter) is avenged. It will return when rebel traitors are taught obedience and submission. It will return when the rebellious confede- rates are taught that the North, though peaceable, are not cowardly-though forbearing are not fearful. That hour of conciliation will come back when again the ensign of the Republic will stream over every rebellious fort of every con- federate state. Then, as of old, the ensign of the pride and power, and dignity and majesty, and the peace of the Republic will return. . .
" The blood of every loyal citizen of this Government is dear to me. My sons, my kinsmen, the young men who have grown up beneath my eye and beneath my care are dear to me; but if the country's destiny, glory, tradition, greatness, freedom, govern-
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ment, written constitutional government-the only hope of a free people-demand it, let them all go. I am not here now to speak timorous words of peace, but to kindle the spirit of manly, determined war. I speak in the midst of the Empire State, amid scenes of past suffering and past glory ; the defences of the Hud- son above me; the battle-field of Long Island before me, and the statue of Washington in my very face --- the battered and unconquered flag of Sumter waving in his hands, which I can almost now imagine tremble with the excitement of battle, and as I speak, I say my mission here to-day is to kindle the heart of New York for war-short, sudden, bold, determined, forward war. The Seventh regiment has gone. Let seventy and seven more follow. Of old, said a great historian, beneath the banner of the cross, Europe precipitated itself upon Asia. Beneath the banner of the constitution, let the men of the Union precipitate themselves upon disloyal, rebellious confederate states. .. . Let no man underrate the dangers of this contro- versy. Civil war, for the best of reasons upon the one side, and the worst upon the other, is always dangerous to liberty- always fearful, always bloody; but, fellow-citizens, there are worse things than fear, than doubt and dread, and danger and blood. Dishonor is worse. Perpetual anarchy is worse. States forever commingling and forever severing are worse. Traitors and secessionists are worse. To have star after star blotted out ;- to have stripe after stripe obscured-to have glory after glory dimmed-to have our women weep, and our men blush for shame throughout generations yet to come,-that and these are infinitely worse than blood. People of New York, on the eve of battle, allow me to speak as a soldier. Few of you know, as my career has been distant and obscure, but I may mention it here to-day, with a generous pride, that it was once my fortune to lead your gallant New York regiment in the very shock of battle. I was their leader, and upon the bloody heights of Cerro Gordo, I know well what New York can do when her blood is up. . . .
" The national banners leaning from ten thousand windows in your city to-day, proclaim your affection and reverence for the Union. You will gather in battalions,
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EDWARD D. BAKER.
Patient of toil, serene amidst alarms, Inflexible in faith, invincible in arms ;
and as you gather, every omen of present concord and ultimate peace will surround you. The ministers of religion, the priests of literature, the historians of the past, the illustrators of the present, capital, science, art, invention, discoveries, the works of genius-all these will attend us in our march, and we will con- quer. And if from the far Pacific, a voice feebler than the feeblest murmur upon its shore may be heard to give you courage and hope in the contest, that voice is yours to-day ; and if a man whose hair is gray, who is well nigh worn out in the battle and toil of life, may pledge himself on such an occasion and in such an audience, let me say as my last word, that when, amid sheeted fire and flame, I saw and led the hosts of New York as they charged in contest upon a foreign soil for the honor of your flag; so again, if Providence shall will it, this feeble hand shall draw a sword, never yet dishonored -- not to fight for distant honor in a foreign land, but to fight for country, for home, for law, for government, for constitution, for right, for freedom, for humanity, and in the hope that the banner of my country may advance, and wheresoever that banner waves, there glory may pursue and freedom be established."
Moved by that spirit which was first in his heart, and intent on acting patriotism as well as talking it, though a senator of the United States, he obtained authority from the War Department, and immediately set about raising a regiment, not for ninety days-for he understood too well the nature of the contest to harbor a hope that the war would soon be over-but for three years. It was the first regiment ordered for the long period. HIe called it the California regiment. There were, indeed, a few officers who had been with him in that state, but it was wholly recruited in Pennsylvania, in the counties of Philadelphia and Chester. The states were not prepared, at this time, to accept troops for the war, and this organization was treated as belonging to the regular army, its returns being made accordingly. When it came to be recognized by this Commonwealth, it was known as the Seventy-first Pennsylvania. Its camp was established at Fort Schuyler, in New York harbor, where it was organized and
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MARTIAL DEEDS OF PENNSYLVANIA.
drilled. The command and care of the regiment, until it should take the field, was intrusted to the Lieutenant-Colonel, Isaac J. Wistar, and Colonel Baker still kept his place in the Senate, where a foe not less daring but far more subtle was to be met. Senators who were at heart with the secessionists, and who were in full fellowship and correspondence in their secret conclaves, still held their seats, and by their inflammatory speeches and predictions sought to encourage the rebellious, and scatter fire- brands and discord among the people of the loyal states. As late as August, 1861, Mr. Breckenridge, of Kentucky, who still held his place, in speaking upon the bill for the suppression of insurrection, said : "Gentlemen mistake when they talk about the Union. The Union is only a means of preserving the princi- ples of political liberty. The great principles of liberty existed long before the Union was formed. They may survive it. . . . I venture to say that the brave words we hear now about subjuga- tion and conquest, treason and traitors, will be glibly altered the next time the Representatives of states meet under the dome of the capitol. . .. You may look forward to innumerable armies and countless treasure to be spent for the purpose of carrying on this contest, but it will end in leaving us just where we are now. ... War is separation, in the language of an eminent senator, now no more. It is disunion-eternal, final disunion. . Fight for twelve months, and this feeling will develop itself. Fight for twelve months more, and you will have three con- federacies instead of two. Fight for twelve months more, and we shall have four."
The burning love of the national honor, dignity, and per- petuity in the breast of Baker would not allow him to suffer such sentiments to pass unrebuked. After examining and refuting in a logical and conclusive manner the objections which Mr. Breck- enridge had made to the bill, he thus replied to the general drift of his speech : "I would ask him, what would you have us do now-a confederate army within twenty miles of us, advancing, or threatening to advance, to overwhelm your Government, to shake the pillars of the Union; to bring it around your head. if you stay here, in ruins? Are we to stop and talk about an uprising sentiment in the North against the war? Are we to
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EDWARD D. BAKER.
predict evil, and retire from what we predict? Is not the manly part to go on as we have begun, to raise money, and levy armies, to organize them, to prepare to advance; when we do advance to regulate that advance by all the laws and regulations that civili- zation and humanity will allow in time of battle ? Can we do anything more ? To talk to us about stopping, is idle; we will never stop. Will the senator yield to rebellion ? Will he shrink from armed insurrection ? Will his state justify it? Will its better public opinion allow it? Shall we send a flag of truce ? What would he have ? Or would he conduct this war so feebly, that the whole world would smile at us in derision? What would he have ? These speeches of his, sown broadcast over the land-what clear, distinct meaning have they? Are they not intended for disorganization in our very midst ? Are they not intended to dull our weapons ? Are they not intended to destroy our zeal ? Are they not intended to animate our enemies ? Sir, are they not words of brilliant, polished treason, even in the very capitol of the Republic ?
" What would have been thought if, in another capitol, in another Republic, in a yet more martial age, a senator as grave, not more eloquent or dignified than the senator from Kentucky, yet with the Roman purple flying over his shoulders, had risen in his place, surrounded by all the illustrations of Roman glory, and declared that advancing Hannibal was just, and that Carthage ought to be dealt with in terms of peace ? What would have been thought, if, after the battle of Canna, a senator there had arisen in his place and denounced every levy of the Roman people, every expenditure of its treasury, and every appeal to the old recollections and the old glories ? Sir, a senator [Fessenden], himself learned far more than myself in such lore, tells me, in a voice that I am glad is audible, that he would have been hurled from the Tarpeian rock. It is a grand commentary upon the American Constitution that we permit these words to be uttered. I ask the senator to recollect, too, what, save to send aid and comfort to the enemy, do these pre- dictions of his amount to? Every word thus uttered falls as a note of inspiration upon every confederate ear. Every sound thus uttered is a word, and falling from his lips, a mighty word,
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MARTIAL DEEDS OF PENNSYLVANIA.
of kindling and triumph to a foe that determines to advance. For me, I have no such word, as a senator, to utter. For me, amid temporary defeat, disaster, disgrace, it seems that my duty calls me to utter another word, and that word is, sudden, forward, determined war, according to the laws of war, by armies, by military commanders clothed with full power, advanc- ing with all the past glories of the Republic urging them on to conquest.
"Sir, it is not a question of men or money in that sense. All the men, all the money, are in our judgment well bestowed in such a cause. When we give them we know their value. Knowing their value well, we give them with the more pride and the more joy. Sir, how can we retreat ? Sir, how can we make peace ? Who shall treat ? What commissioners ? Who would go? Upon what terms ? Where is to be your boundary line ? Where the end of the principles we should have to give up ? What will become of constitutional government ? What will become of public liberty ? What of past glories ? What of future hopes ? Shall we sink into the insignificance of the grave ---- a degraded, defeated, cmasculated people, frightened by the result of one battle, and scared at the visions raised by the imagination of the Senator from Kentucky upon this floor? No, sir; a thousand times, no, sir! . . . There will be some graves recking with blood, watered by the tears of affection. There will be some privation ; there will be some loss of luxury ; there will be somewhat more need for labor to procure the necessaries of life. When that is said, all is said. If we have the country, the whole country, the Union, the Constitution-free government-with these will return all the blessings of civilization; the path of the country will be a career of greatness and of glory such as in the olden time our fathers saw in the dim visions of years yet to come, and such as would have been ours now, to-day, if it had not been for the treason for which the senator too often seeks to apologize."
For a time, Colonel Baker's regiment was at fortress Monroe, but was not included in the column that participated in the affair at Big Bethel. After the Battle of Bull Run it was brought up to Washington, and was posted in the fortifications upon the Vir-
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EDWARD D. BAKER.
ginia shore. It was afterwards upon the front line in the advance of the army upon Munson's Hill. Early in October it was sent to Poolsville, Maryland, where Colonel Baker was placed in command of a brigade, in which his own regiment was cm- braced, and which was employed in guarding the fords of the Potomac. It was in the division commanded by General Charles P. Stone.
On the 20th of that month, General McCall had a brisk fight with the enemy at Dranesville, Virginia, only a few miles from the position occupied by Colonel Baker's brigade, but on the Maryland side, in which he was victorious, completely routing the enemy. On the evening of the same day, Colonel Devens, of the Fifteenth Massachusetts, was ordered by General Stone to send a sconting party across the river at Harrison's Island, opposite Ball's Bluff on the Virginia shore, and reconnoitre towards Leesburg. Captain Philbrick with twenty men was despatched, who reported a small camp of twenty tents, and no other troops in sight. Whereupon Colonel Devens was ordered to cross with a part of his regiment to destroy it, and Colonel Lec, of the Twentieth Massachusetts, was sent over with picked men to take position on the Bluff, to cover the retreat of Devens, should he be worsted. General Stone seems to have been desirous of cooperating with General McCall, whom he supposed to have been in permanent possession of Dranesville, for the expulsion of the enemy from the Potomac.
A battalion of Baker's regiment, consisting of eight companies, under command of Lieutenant-Colonel Wistar, was ordered to the island on the morning of the 21st, with directions to go to the Virginia shore to the assistance of Devens and Lee, provided the fire indicated hard fighting, and Colonel Baker was directed in that contingency to cross and assume command of all the troops sent over. Devens with five companies moved to near Leesburg without finding the rebel camp reported, but had a skirmish, early in the morning, with a force of the enemy, in which he had one killed and a number wounded. Devens retired towards his supports near the Bluff, and was followed up by the foe, who were being rapidly reinforced, the rebel General Evans, with a body of five thousand men, being upon Goose Creek
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within easy supporting distance. Colonel Baker found the means for transporting troops entirely inadequate, consisting of an old scow, a small metallic boat, and two small skiffs. Meantime Devens was being pushed back; and soon after the arrival of Colonel Baker upon the island, a person came down from the Bluff to the water's edge, and cried out : "Hurry over; we can see three regiments of infantry coming down from Leesburg." Baker stood for a moment in a thoughtful manner, as if consider- ing the whole problem; when, seeming to come to a decision, he shouted back : "Then there will be the more for us to whip." Every energy was now taxed to push troops across from the island to the Bluff, and Colonel Baker himself soon went over and assumed command. Colonel Lee says: "Between one and two o'clock I heard a voice behind me inquiring for Colonel Lee, and Major Revere, I think, said, pointing to me, 'There he stands.' I turned around, and a military officer on horseback presented him- self, bowed very politely, and said: 'I congratulate you upon the prospect of a battle.' I bowed and said: 'I suppose you assume command.' I knew it was Colonel Baker." He was followed by the battalion of his own regiment, and a part of the Tammany, and immediately proceeded to form his line of battle, giving the right to the Fifteenth Massachusetts, Colonel Devens, with two howitzers; the centre to the Twentieth Massachusetts, Colonel Lee ; and the left to the Tammany and his own, a rifled piece being posted to rake the only road that led to the Bluff. The ground on which he stood was cleared, but on three sides it was hemmed in by dense forest, and on the fourth, to the backs of the men, was the Bluff overhanging the river and the island.
The action commenced soon after two o'clock, the enemy apparently in heavy masses, but concealed from view by the wood in which they had taken position, completely hemming in the little Union force, only about 1600 in number. "The fight went on," says Captain Young, of Colonel Baker's staff, "on the part of the enemy systematically. They would give terrible yells in front and on our left ; none on the right. They would yell terribly, and then pour a shower of bullets everywhere over the field."
Horses were soon sent to the rear, and Colonel Baker instructed
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his men to lie down and shield themselves as much as possible, though he himself was moving on every part of the field, even in front of the line, and into the woods, a fair mark by his erect form and venerable appearance for the enemy's sharp- shooters, of which numbers had climbed to the tree-tops from the first, and kept up a constant fire, especially singling out officers wherever they appeared. At the opening of the battle the officers of the two howitzers upon the right were wounded, and the guns were withdrawn and tumbled over the Bluff. The gun upon the left was in like manner unmanned almost before it got into position. Seeing it standing idle when it might do great execution, Colonel Baker put his own shoulder to the wheel, and, with the help of Colonels Wistar and Coggswell, loaded and fired it several times with marked effect, opening lines through the solid ranks of the enemy. He was composed and thoughtful, moving upon the field with his sword drawn while his left hand was thrust into his bosom ; but he was extremely solicitous. In the midst of the fight, a dispatch came from General Stone well calculated to quench what little hope of success had previously inspired his efforts. It read thus: "Sir, four thousand of the enemy are marching from Leesburg to attack you." A sufficient time had elapsed for them to be upon his front, and he knew by the pressure on all sides that they had already arrived. To Colonel Wistar, who said to him " We are greatly outnum- bered in front," he replied: "Yes, that is a bad condition of things." The hopelessness everywhere was apparent to the officers. "I retired to the left," says Captain Young, "and Colonel Coggs- well came to me and said, 'I am acquainted with you and I want you to stay with me on the left. I don't care what anybody says, we are all gone to hell; but we must make a good fight of it." Colonel Baker was, however, composed and resolute, and conducted the battle in every part with a most determined and unyielding valor.
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