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IN 1844, the Anti-Slavery party nominated as a candidate for the Presidency, James G. Birney, a Southern planter who had become conspicuous as an Emancipationist, and who, after putting his belief into practice, by giving to his slaves their freedom, proclaimed his then peculiar ideas through the columns of a newspaper, which he edited in Cincinnati, and called The Philanthropist. He was a graduate of Yale College, had studied law in Philadelphia, and been admitted to practice in Kentucky, his native State. Afterwards removing to Alabama, he practised with great success, and while residing in Huntsville, his second son, David BELL BIRNEY, was born, on May 29, 1825.

After graduating at Andover, Mass., David B. Birney engaged in business in Cincinnati, soon removed to Michigan as an employé of a firm in the Indian trade, during which time he studied law, and in 1848 went to Philadelphia, where at the opening of the rebellion he was associated with Mr. O. W. Davis in a prosperous law business. He inherited his father's opinions concerning slavery, and although never obtruding those opinions upon his acquaintances, few if any of whom were of the same way of thinking, and never taking any active part in politics until the nomination of Mr. Lincoln, his convictions were well known by his friends. After Mr. Lincoln's election, Birney, who had an extensive Southern acquaintance and correspondence, formed and expressed the opinion that the threats of secession were to be put into execution; that the events which he had been taught to look for, were soon to transpire.

In December, 1860, he procured the commission of lieutenant-colonel in a regiment of Pennsylvania militia, and commenced a course of reading and training which would fit him for the position. When on the 15th of April, 1861, the President called for seventy-five thousand militia, Birney's regiment was the first to respond, and the first from Philadelphia to take the field; leaving on the 22d of April, as the Twenty-third Regiment of Pennsylvania Volunteers. It was stationed along the line of the Philadelphia, Wilmington, and Baltimore Railroad, until the repairs to the bridges were effected, when it was sent to General Patterson, then in the Shenandoah Valley, and participated in the skirmish at Falling Waters. The term of the regiment expired on the 23d of July, but it did not return to Philadelphia until August 17th. Birney, having signified his intention of remaining in the service, re-enlisted many of the men as soon as they had been mustered out, and obtaining authority to retain the same numerical designation for the new regiment, reported himself, with his command, to the Secretary of War, in Washington, on the 22d of August, where with the army he remained during the following autumn and winter."

On the 17th of February, 1862, he was appointed a brigadier-general of volun teers, and assigned to the command of the brigade of General Sedgwick, which was in Heintzelman's division of the Third Corps, afterwards commanded by General Kearney. This was one of the first corps to embark for the Peninsula in March, and, after the evacuation of Yorktown, to meet the enemy at Williamsburg. In this engagement, General Birney won the highest commendation from General Kearney, and foreshadowed his innate military genius. Participating next at Fair Oaks, he again by his action met the full approval of his division commander; but, by misapprehension on the part of General Heintzelman (as the general afterVOL. IV.-30

wards was compelled to admit), he was, at the close of the battle, ordered under arrest for "disobedience to orders." At his trial he was honorably acquitted, without being called to summon a single witness for his defence, and ordered to resume command of his brigade, with which he participated in the fighting during the "Seven Days," and rested with his men at Harrison's Landing, until called to embark for Alexandria on the 20th of August.

As is well known, the Army of the Potomac was put in motion, as fast as it arrived at Alexandria, with the hope of re-enforcing the Army of Virginia, under General Pope, and enabling him to make a stand against the army which Lee had gathered to "invade the Northern States." The Third Corps was pushed towards Centreville, and with it General Birney had his full share in the battle of Manassas Plains the Second Bull Run. On the 1st of September, Kearney's division and Reno's corps again came in contact with the enemy, at Chantilly, when they succeeded in frustrating his attempt to turn the right flank of our army. In this action General Kearney was killed, and General Birney assumed command of the division, by virtue of his rank, and, in common with the remainder of the army, retired within the defences of Washington.

Soon after, he was detailed as a member of a board of inquiry; and when the division was directed to move, General Stoneman was ordered to the command. It was not, however, present at the battle of Antietam. As soon as General Birney was relieved from duty on the board, he rejoined his command, the same day on which General Burnside relieved General McClellan of the command of the Army of the Potomac. At the battle of Fredericksburg, on the 13th, 14th, and 15th of December, he held a conspicuous position, and handled his division in a manner which elicited the warmest encomiums from the corps commander, General Stoneman. Although, in some circles, General Birney's conduct on the 13th was severely criticised, it has stood the most severe scrutiny; in fact, becomes more praiseworthy the more it is discussed. At the battle of Chancellorsville, General Birney's name became more prominent than that of any other division commander, and from the 3d of May he was promoted to be a major-general. The corps was completely decimated during those terrible days, and both the other division commanders, Generals Berry and Whipple, were killed. It was soon thereafter reduced to two divisions, the regiments of the Third Division, with one exception, being added to General Birney's division.

At Gettysburg the part taken by Sickles's corps-small but ever reliable-is too well known to need any comment. When Sickles was wounded, Birney found the command, which he had had during the march from Falmouth to Frederick City, again in his hands; but soon after he was deprived of this well-merited honor by the assignment of French's division to the corps, whereupon General French, as the ranking officer, assumed the command. In the movements subsequent to the battle of Gettysburg, General Birney participated, with the exception of the march from Pennsylvania to Warrenton, Va. During that time bis division had a brilliant skirmish in Manassas Gap, which was dignified with the name of the battle of Wapping Heights. This is believed to have been the only occasion in which General Birney was absent when his command was engaged. In the advance to, and retreat from Culpepper, in September and October, he took part-being engaged but once, at Auburn, the day previous to the second battle of Bristow Station; and when Meade again assumed the offensive, General Birney found the command of the corps devolving upon him. On the 7th of November he crossed the Rappahannock at Kelly's Ford (at the same time General Sedgwick was crossing at Rappa

hannock Station), capturing some three or four hundred prisoners, and driving the .astonished enemy from his camp before he had time to realize that he was attacked. In the Mine Run campaign, which commenced on the 26th of November, Birney's division again sustained heavy losses, in the engagement known as the battle at Payne's Farm. But little has been written concerning this affair, which, whether the result of misapprehension on the part of the corps commander, or brought about by strict obedience to orders, decided the fate of the movement. Our troops held the ground; but we did not succeed in dividing the rebel army. and engaging them in two separate parts, as was evidently originally intended.

Previous to the opening of the campaign by General Grant in May, 1864, the Army of the Potomac was reorganized, and the First and Second Divisions of the Third Corps became the Third and Fourth Divisions of the Second Corps. About the middle of May these two were consolidated, and thus General Birney had under him, in one small division, all that remained of the old Third Army Corps. There were the regiments which he had commanded when first promoted to be a brigadier-general-regiments which had been led by such men as Hooker, Berry, and Whipple, comprising nearly every State from Maine to Illinois. Their badges, the white and red diamonds, dear to them as is the cross of the Legion of Honor to the soldier of the Empire, were still retained, and are worn by them to this day. When, after the fall of Richmond, the division marched through that city, it was thus spoken of:-" The old and honored Third Army Corps appeared reduced to a single division, wearing its own square patch as an insignium, rather than the trefoil of its later affections. These men have been led by Heintzelman; sainted Dick Richardson; universally accepted Joe Hooker; generous, impetuous Sickles; lamented and able Birney, and by French. They still justly remember what has been accorded them for heroism at Gettysburg, and their saving grace at Chancellorsville, where they earned the honors of the day, because they indisputably preserved it to our arms."

It seems unnecessary, while the events of Grant's march from the Rapidan to the James are fresh in every memory, to do more than allude to General Birney's part therein. During the months of May and June, 1864, the names of Hancock and his noble trio of division commanders-Birney, Barlow, and Gibbon-were household words, wherever anxious hearts followed our flag. In the Wilderness, for three long, terrible days, then by the left flank across the Po River, and to Spottsylvania, where Barlow and Birney burst like a whirlwind, on the morning of May 12th, into the enemy's ranks, capturing two generals—Johnston and Stuart— between three and four thousand prisoners, a score of pieces of artillery, and as many colors; from thence to the North Anna, where Birney stormed the redoubt and saved the bridge; thence to Tolopotomy Creek; and once more by the left flank-from the extreme right to the extreme left-the movement which brought them to Cold Harbor. During these thirty days of what may well be termed uninterrupted fighting and marching, days during which the army was not once out from under the fire of the enemy; when men slept with their guns in their hands, and ate with them in their hands; when general and staff officers scarcely knew what sleep was, their swords being ever buckled on and their horses always saddled-during these thirty days, which no one can ever truthfully depict, General Hancock learned the value of his new division, the worth and gallantry of its commander, and that both were worthy of his highest confidence, and neither ever called upon in vain.

The Second Corps was the first of the Army of the Potomac to reach Petersburg, and there it did its full share of work in the assaults, reconnoissances, and with the spade, by which ground was gained and that wonderful network of fortifications thrown up around the city.

On the 23d of July, General Birney was ordered to the command of the Tenth Army Corps, of the Army of the James; lying partly before Petersburg, partly between the Appomattox and James Rivers, and one brigade holding a point on the north bank of the latter river, known as Deep Bottom. He soon succeeded in perfecting arrangements by which it was mostly brought together between the two rivers, and rendered more available, as a corps; although not called upon for any active operations until the 13th of August, when, in concert with the Second Corps, it moved to the north of the James, and attempted the investment of Richmond in that direction. The Tenth Corps lost heavily in the successive battles which ensued; yet, although in a measure successful, as four heavy guns, several stands of colors, and some hundreds of prisoners demonstrated, the end was not gained, and both corps retired to their former positions.

Soon after, the Tenth Corps moved into the works around Petersburg, holding the line from the Appomattox River to the Jerusalem Plank-road; and during this time General Birney gave great attention to the building of the detached forts in the rear of the main line. On the 28th of September, General Birney once more moved his corps to the north of the James, in conjunction with the Eighteenth, under General Ord. Attacking on the morning of the 29th, at the same point as before, "he carried the works, scattering the enemy in every direction," and moving up the New Market Road, drove them with even greater ease from the second and more formidable line. It was from this point that General Grant, in his dispatch to Mr. Stanton, said, "I left Birney marching on to Richmond." Other and more formidable works soon obstructed this "on to Richmond" movement, and Birney made his men impregnable on what had that morning been the enemy's ground. Richmond was, however, in an uproar, for the cavalry, with Terry's division of the Tenth Corps, had, by sweeping out across the Charles City Road, been nearer than any of our forces since the commencement of the war.

General Birney, who had been suffering from symptoms of fever, now became so ill that, for a great portion of the time, he was obliged to lie on his cot. He refused to accept the advice of the surgeon, or his friends, and leave the field, and insisted upon performing every duty, saying he would be well in a day or two. On the evening of the 6th, it became evident that the enemy were moving to our right, with the intention to attack next morning, and as dispatches were coming in and orders going out all night, he obtained little if any rest, and the morning of the 7th found him completely exhausted. He was dressed, however, by his servant before daylight, and when the first shot was fired which indicated the expected attack as begun, he was lifted upon his horse, and rode out to fight his last battle. It commenced inauspiciously. The cavalry fled before the enemy, abandoning their artillery without offering any resistance, and poured back over Birney's works, and among his men, in a manner which, for a few moments, boded extreme disaster. But with that quick perception which was his peculiarity, Birney saw the design of the enemy, and decided as readily how to frustrate it. His dispositions were scarcely made, before the enemy were advancing to the attack. Having brought · several pieces of artillery to bear upon the piece of open ground in which the left of Birney's line rested, they poured in a perfect shower of missiles, under cover of

which their infantry swept upon the left. Exposed to all this fire, General Birney rode backward and forward, watching the execution of his orders, and the enemy's advance, unharmed. Even then, while so many were struck down and he was spared, the hand of Death was upon him. Excitement gave him strength until the first attack was over, when he was compelled to quit his saddle and pass the remainder of the day in an ambulance, from which he dictated his dispatches and issued his orders. On the following day he consented to leave for his home, and the next morning thereafter started for Philadelphia. He arrived there on the day of the State election, and though scarcely able to stand unaided, insisted upon being driven to the polls, and voting.

His sufferings during the illness which ensued were very great, and for the most of the time his mind wandered, and he was, in imagination, again at the head of his men, in the field. After a few days his symptoms were considered more favorable, and hopes of his recovery entertained; but on the 17th of October he was attacked by a hemorrhage of the bowels, and died the next day, his last words being: "Boys, keep your eyes on that flag!"

As a military leader, General Birney possessed a decision and impulsiveness, under fire, which were influential, both with individuals and masses. As a disciplinarian, he was severe with the skulker and the straggler, but ready to do any thing in his power for those who performed their duty. He was particular to have all drills and inspections properly observed, and in having frequent brigade and division drills at all practicable seasons; in having guard and picket duty well performed, and his picket-guard thoroughly inspected and mounted, with all due honors and form. Believing that every thing took its pace from head-quarters, he always had his own neatly laid out, carefully policed, his guard composed of picked men, and when in camp, mounted every morning, with one of the staff as officer of the day. He cultivated the true esprit du corps among his men; and after Kearney's death the piece of red flannel, which he had ordered to be worn on the caps, assumed the form of a diamond, and from this sprang all the badges now used to designate corps. He distributed among the men who, at Chancellorsville, distinguished themselves, the Kearney medal, and was the leading spirit in forming the Third Corps Union, a society of officers for promoting good feeling, rendering assistance to sick, wounded, or prisoners, and preserving the history of the corps. He favored all kinds of camp amusements, theatricals, balls, &c., and instituted a series of races in 1863, at Falmouth, which, with the balls of 1864, will always be remembered by members of the Army.

As an acquaintance, General Birney was reserved, moody, often taciturn. He was very fond of company, and could be a charming companion, having a fine flow of language and a fund of humor. His forte, however, was sarcasm, as any of his staff know full well, that being the style in which he was accustomed to convey his disapprobation. He attached to him many warm personal friends, yet always preserved the most studied politeness, allowing no coarse familiarity, but receiving and giving, on all occasions, the formal salutations of custom.

In his death many officers felt the loss of a true, faithful friend, and the Army had no more devoted, self-sacrificing member. His heart was in his work there, and, until it ceased to beat, was warm with the love of freedom for all.

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