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THE DYING REBEL BOY.

HURRYING here and there, gathering up the records of the fight, I stopped near the tent of an old friend, to make a note of the killed and wounded of the regiment and brigade to which he belonged. My attention was called to a score or more of wounded rebels, who lay beneath the shelter provided by the broad branches of a huge old oak. The ground was wet, and they had crawled up in small groups, endeavoring to provide for their comfort as best they could, under the circumstances. There was nothing attractive in either their appearance or the sad and dismal surroundings. Some were disposed to be communicative, and related freely what they knew and had experienced in the rebel service. Others were taciturn, and inclined to be morose. When about to leave the spot, I noticed a youth, of fragile form and girlish look, lying a little to the left of the rest. Standing around him were a group of Philadelphia soldiers, belonging to the famous brigade of which the 71st, 72d, and 69th form a part, whose encampment was near at hand. This boy was then experiencing all the agonies of death. His chestnut curls were matted and wet, and thrown rudely back from a forehead of pearly whiteness-the deep-blue veins looked purple under the surface of white, and as he raised his large, lustrous eyes, and extended a tiny hand with a beseeching expression of countenance, begging some one "to rub it, as it cramped so," it made a picture that can never be realized by portrayal. After this and other little favors had been done for his comfort, he requested that his head be raised, and, in answer to an interrogatory, said:—

"I am not a rebel, but they made me fight. My mother and I were both for the Union." Halting a moment in his breath, which had become short, thick, and evidently painful, he raised, or endeavored to raise, his head higher upon the blanket which had been doubled for him, and said, with a sweet smile: "A drink, please." This was given him, and after another brief pause, he rallied his speech, and asked if any of those present would take his name and send it to his mother. The assent was given, and he furnished it, and the town and county in the old Mother of States which bore Washington and others of the patriots. An inquiry was made as to whether he had any message to send. His eye brightened and his lip quivered, as he tremblingly assented: "Yes; please to tell mother to meet me in heaven." And as if the labor was too great, or the excitement too much for him, he sank back exhausted, and, for a moment, those gathered around thought that all was over.

Amid this scene of carnage and death, there were drawn around the dying rebel boy grim heroes who had repulsed the shock of a hundred rebel charges-men who had never shown fear in the face of the enemy, or ever flinched in meeting him. These brave oaks uncovered their heads to the dying boy, and big tears stood in their eyes, while their hearts heaved with emotions that evinced their love for the beautiful and pure, and their appreciation of those ties that cement friend and foe in one common fellowship. It is in viewing a death like this that the fierce raging of the battle loses its acrimony, and the victor is disposed to be generous even to his enemy.

In a few minutes all was over. Our little rebel lay stiff, though beautiful even in death. His ears were hushed and his eyes sightless to the noise and confusion that prevailed around his rude bier. The shrill trumpet that had so often called him into action sounded now in vain. On the outskirts of Gettysburg he lies buried, near where he fell, there to await the final trumpet which shall call him to Christ and his heavenly home.

SACRED MEMORIES.

MAJOR-GENERAL D. B. BIRNEY.

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 his 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 Stuartbetween 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.

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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

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