OF THE

TWENTY-FIRST REGIMENT

MASSACHUSETTS VOLUNTEERS

IN THE

WAR FOR THE PRESERVATION OF THE UNION

1861-1865

WITH

STATISTICS OF THE WAR AND OF REBEL PRISONS

BY

CHARLES F. WALCOTT

CAPTAIN IN THE REGIMENT; COLONEL SIXTY-FIRST REGIMENT MASSACHUSETTS VOLUNTEERS;
BREVET BRIGADIER-GENERAL U. S. VOLUNTEERS; MEMBER OF THE MILITARY

HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF MASSACUUSETTS

ILLUSTRATED WITH PORTRAITS AND MAPS

BOSTON
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY

New York: 11 East Seventeenth Street
The Riverside Press, Cambridge

1882

THE CENTENNIAL OF THE AMERICAN FLAG.

Thou hast not always been, as here to-day, so comfortably ensovereigned.
In other scenes than these have I observed thee, Flag,
Not quite so trim and whole, in folds of stainless silk ;
But I have seen thee to tallers torn, upon thy splintered staff,
Or clutched to some young color-bearer's breast, with desperate hands,
Savagely struggled for, for life and death fought over long,
'Mid cannons' thunder-crash, and many a curse and groan and yell, and rifle

volleys cracking sharp,
And moving masses as wild demons surging - - and lives as nothing risked,
For thy mere remnant, yrimed with dirt and smoke, and sopped in blood;
For sake of that, my Beauty, and that thou might'st dally as now, secure up there
Many a good man have I seen go under.

WALT WHITMAN.

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