glad and proud when I visited the two houses to-day that my home and birth had been in this State. Before the war there was a kind of querulous questioning as to whether the people of this country were equal to their ancestors in bravery and patriotism. Forty years ago a certain poet gave vent to the feeling in such words as these: Is this the land our fathers loved, The freedom which they sought to win? Is this the soil they trod upon? Are these the graves they slumber in? Comrades, you answered this question. The self-sacrificing patriotism that animated your hearts, and achieved such results, gives the answer: The hallowed graves of those patriots and heroes of old are not dishonored by the contiguity of the graves of those who fell fighting at your sides. And when the last trumpet shall sound, awakening those fallen heroes of the olden time, they will not be ashamed of the heroes of 25 years ago-heroes of your own and my native State." [Great applause.] Col. Hooker then introduced ex-Lieut.-Gov. L. K. Fuller, who said that Vermont officers and men were pretty near the top of the scroll of honor. Our Gen. Phelps was the first to arm colored soldiers. On the monuments that are being reared to the valor of the soldiers in the rebellion Vermont's name bears a prominent part, and the names of her dead heroes will go down through the history of the future. Colonel Hooker next called up the military historian of the State. Mr. Benedict said that he had laid his pen down at the end of the second volume of "Vermont in the War" with a far higher sense of the endurance, self-denial, courage and effective service of the Vermont troops than he held before, though he always knew they were of the best. To place in permanent form their noble record had been with him a labor of love; and his only regret was that the task had not been more worthily performed. He extended his sincere thanks to all who had aided him in his laborious undertaking. If the history met the approval of the men who made the history, that would be a sufficient reward. The toastmaster, with a remark that though the Vermonters once went in when General Sykes's regular held back, they were always willing to allow that the regulars were good fighters, called up Major M. B. Adams of the United States Engineers. Major Adams gracefully responded. He said that without disparagement to the citizen soldiers, who furnished leaders like Logan and Hooker, it was West Point that supplied the trained and successful generals, and rendered the successes of the Northern armies possible. The regular service needed no defence at his hands, with such men as Grant, Meade, Sherman, Sheridan and Wilson. Captain H. C. Parsons of Natural Bridge, Virginia, formerly of the First Vermont Cavalry, was next called up, and made a noticeable speech. He said: REMARKS OF CAPTAIN PARSONS. For nearly a quarter of a century my whole association has been with the men who fought on the other side. I look back upon the part I took in the war as a troubled dream; if I was to describe the charge of my own regiment at Gettysburg I should seem to see it as Long and Robertson did, as a charge of maddened horsemen breaking through the woods, over the walls and through the fire. If I were to turn to the moment when the first Vermont cavalry in Kilpatrick's raid crossed the Brook turnpike, I should find myself not with them but in the terrified city where the bells of St. Pauls rang calling the people to prayer -where the whole population expected a charge of squadrons down Front street, and the releasing of the thousands of prisoners, who should run with fire and faggot through the doomed city. Or if I were to turn to the advance of Stannard's division when it almost entered Richmond from the South, and would have entered it had it not been for the recalling order, I should find myself rather among the clerks and old men who ran out to form the three thousand who alone held the hills on the Manchester side until troops could be brought from Lee's army. I have perhaps been able to judge more correctly than you of the conditions upon the other side. I know as no one can understand who has not been with the southern people in their distress, the terrible condition in which the South was left at the close of the war, and the bitterness of soul of the common soldier who returned from a contest in which he had little at stake, who had been ruined, and whose hopes had been destroyed. If you would really understand the people of the South, you must separate the confederate government from the confederate army. In the war in which they suffered and sacrificed so much there were scenes to which the confederate soldier will return while he lives with tenderest and strongest emotion. He may never admit publicly that it was a bad cause; he will never admit that it was bad fighting. Strange as it may seem to you to-night I say in this presence that the next alliance which is to control the politics of the future and the destiny of the nation is between the Union soldiers and the Confederate soldiers. It would not be unnatural if the soldiers of Vermont should be the first to extend the hand of welcome, and to take the right of the line in the march on the new departure;-for, strange as it may seem to you, the soldiers of Virginia seem to have a greater knowledge of and a higher respect for the soldiers of Vermont than for any other division of our army. I was in Logan county up in the mountains. A man said: "Stranger, how large is that 'ar Vermont anyway?" I replied and he doubted my answer. Turning to a man who had been a southern soldier he asked "where were you?" at such and such places he replied. "Ever see any Vermonters?" "Lots of 'em." Then another. "Where were you?" "Oh at Winchester." "Ever see any Vermonters?" "Full of them." Turning to another he said: "Joe, where were you?" "I was at Cedar Creek." "See any Vermonters there?" "Vermonters! why they were all Vermonters thar." And I verily believe he thought that Vermont was larger than Pennsylvania and sent a half a million men to the war. You must come, my friends, to consider the southern confederacy one thing, the southern army, another. When you read the report of the celebration at Macon you doubtless thought you saw a people who were glorifying a cause that was not lost, fanning the embers of a fire that was not dead. I saw there a people who were burying the emblems of a dead cause to be laid away for ever like the baubles of a dead child. If any of you were at the Pickett procession in Richmond the other day, you were outraged by seeing the Pennsylvania Reserves taking the left of the line and marching behind a rebel flag, and I may say the true soldiers of the South looked on with amazement, and yet the unfurling of that old flag had a different significance from what you saw. What other flag could they unfurl? They could not carry the stars and stripes, or hang it at half mast, when the statue of one who had fought against the flag was being unveiled. I saw the bannerless procession, that passed to the mausoleum of Lee, and the mighty gathering of people for the ceremonial in a town over which no flag could float, and I know the great sense of desolation, out of which the unfortunate suggestion of unfurling the confederate flag for the Pickett procession came, and if I could not sympathize with the purpose I could look on with sorrow. And in these bygone years of suffering when that people have been groping their way out from the falling walls and the impenetrable shadows of an old civilization, I confess that while I have not abated one jot of my loyalty to my country or of my love for my comrades, I have yet found strong sympathy with men who offered their lives to a lost cause; who gave everything and lost everything. In the great struggle the North preserved everything, including its manhood. The South lost everything except its manhood. We are a people of common ancestry, and a common destiny. We have the same love of family, the same love of country. We kneel at the same altars, and pray to the same God for common blessings. The shadow which rests on the lakes must rest on the gulf and the prosperity that is coming must send its light thro' all our borders. I remember to-night, after all the mistakes and misunderstandings and the awful cost of reconstruction the grand speech of Mr. Lincoln when he was taunted with having no policy: "I would make every man in the South feel both in his pocket and in his heart that it was better for him that the war ended as it did." In your sympathy for the slave, you have perhaps forgotten that there never yet was a chain that bound a slave, that did not also bind and drag down the master. No one can doubt that the terrible curse of the degradation of labor rested on the master class and destroyed it. Lincoln's proclamation destroyed caste distinctions in the South, and made the majority of the non-slave holding class, the majority of the white men,-free and equal, with an equal place in society, a right to vote and hope for office, and for power. When you have come to understand this you will see the significance of great events and the meaning of the revolution which will destroy the solid South. In the last election in Virginia twenty-five thousand ex-confederate soldiers voted for Harrison and Morton. I spoke for that ticket from the same platforms with Gen. Jas. A. Walker, who succeeded Stonewall Jackson in command, with Gen. John E. Roller of Lee's staff, and other confederate officers of rank. We proved that the republican party was the truest friend the South had ever had. We showed that the prosperity of the South was bound up in the prosperity of the nation; and that the nation could only advance through republican victory. We found a common platform. We made one argument; we have discovered something that reached beyond party lines a community of business interests and a brotherhood of brave men, North and South. I commend these facts to the thoughtful and generous consideration of the loyal veterans of Vermont. (Applause). Captain Parsons' remarks were listened to with the closest interest and evidently made a deep impression on all his hearWith this the after dinner speaking ended. ers. A male quartette under the direction of Captain J. H. Mimms interspersed the speeches with some appropriate glees. The gathering broke up about midnight. TWENTY-SIXTH REUNION. MIDDLEBURY, NOVEMBER 20, 1889. The twenty-sixth annual meeting of the Reunion Society of Vermont officers was held at Middlebury, November 20th, 1889. at The business meeting was held at II o'clock a. m., the Addison House. In the absence of both president and vice-president, it was called to order by Lieut. Fred E. Smith, secretary of the society, and Captain U. A. Woodbury was elected president pro tempore. The meeting then adjourned until 4 p. m., at the Town Hall. At the hour the society reassembled. The record of the last annual meeting was read and approved. The annual report of the treasurer showing a balance in the treasurer's hands of $18.67 was read, accepted and ordered on file. On motion of Col. G. W. Hooker, a committee of one from each organization present was appointed to nominate officers for the ensuing year. On motion of Gen. William Wells, it was voted that the next annual reunion of the society be held at Montpelier, on call of the Executive Committee. The Committee on Nominations reported the following list of officers, and the same were duly elected: OFFICERS FOR 1889-90. President, Lieutenant F. S. Stranahan of St. Albans. tain S. E. Burnham of Rutland. Treasurer, Major L. G. Kingsley of Rutland. Secretary, Lieut. F. E. Smith of Montpelier. |