The Marietta Register (Marietta, Ohio)
Thursday, October 14, 1875  Front Page

NOTE:  Names, Regiments, and Places of Battles have been CAPITALIZED for easy identification.



ADDRESS OF GENERAL T. C. H. SMITH

--On the Occasion of the Dedication Of the Washington County Soldiers’ Monument Delivered in 
Marietta, on Friday, September 17, 1875--

     We meet to-day, the people of the oldest county in the Northwest, the county which once included 
in its borders all of the Northwest then under civil jurisdiction, to dedicate a monument in memory of 
those of our citizens, who fell as soldiers in a great struggle, which, devolved upon us by dissension’s 
growing out of the colonial differences of the Atlantic States, the people of the Northwest, by their 
comparative unity, enthusiasm, and devotion, aided by their controlling geographical position, were 
enabled, in the providence of God, mainly to decide.
     We are assembled in the oldest city of distinctively American origin on the continent, where first, after 
our political independence of Europe had been achieved, the waves of emigration from the various 
colonial States, passing the mountain barrier, commingled in a common tide, and blending different traits 
and varied descents, began, in the great valley of the continent, the formation of a distinctively American 
nationality.
     We are also upon the very scene where the scheme was forecast, and among us in number, and part 
of us are the immediate or near descendants of the very men who planned, and by wise concert with others, 
engrafted such institutions upon the Northwest--notably township organization and the common schools--
as, when the crisis came, induced in the people of our section an intelligent, consistent, and unyielding 
adherence to the cause of liberty and the Union.
     Assembled with us are distinguished officers, not of our community, but who have commanded 
Washington county troops, and are this united with us in sediment for our dead.--They have come great 
distances to testify by their presence their sympathy with us on this occasion.  We thank them and we 
welcome them.  No form of words or legal ceremony is necessary to confer on them an honorary co-
citizenship with the people of this county.  that bond was welded in the heat of war by military adoption, 
and since then we claim a part in them, and gladly yield them a part in us.
     To-day, for the first time, we come together as a county community to perform a duty concerning our 
soldiers.  all previous offices, those connected with the raising of troops and their subsequent care, were 
so spontaneously and universally rendered by individuals, by families, by societies, by neighborhoods, 
by the virorous home forces of the townships, there came no necessity for an assembly of the people of 
the county in their collective capacity.  It is well that this first meeting of the kind comes since the peace,
 for thus those who resented the county; in the field are joined to those who, at home, stood by them and 
the cause;  including always that sex which made the fame of American women honorable by their enduring 
passive courage, and by their busy, thoughtful, and unflagging care for the health of the soldiers, and for
 their families.  If some whom we strongly wish were here have since been taken from us, yet it is a 
satisfaction to us as a public that the generation which has in the interval been maturing, and on which has 
in the interval been maturing, and on which we depend for the transmission of the principles for which we 
contended, thus comes to be largely represented, and can, in this instance, be witnesses and active 
participants of the spirit that animated and sustained the contest.  That spirit is alive to-day.  Let us rejoice 
then, sad as are the memories that mingle with the time, that old Washington for once shows herself in force 
on an occasion wholly related to the war, and be glad that she thus warmly and unitedly remembers those 
who laid down their lives for the cause with which, by her origin, her history, and by all the higher aspirations 
of her people, she was so intimately and thoroughly identified.  It is good for us to he here.
     And as this is the first such assemblage, so is it, in need hardly be added, the last.  And this gives it its 
greatest interest and most solemn significance.  When a man dies the care for him by those who were 
attached to him, and which followed him through life, ends with that closing act which places the headstone 
to tell that though he be dead his memory is to be kept alive.  and this community, in dedicating this 
monument, completes its course of duty performed for those who represented it in arms.  The long series 
of mutual relations and sympathetic officers, which, from enlistment onward, marked and illustrated the 
connection of the soldiers with their fellow citizens, ends here.  It began when the reverberations from 
SUMTER sounded over the land and told us we must fight;  when the cry that the Union was in danger 
stormed all hears.  Then came the fearful separation which patriotism unhesitatingly demanded--when 
wives gave up husbands, children fathers, parents sons, sisters brothers, the betrothed her lover, and all 
their friends, and along our ridges and down our valleys flowed the tide of men who came to take up arms.  
and this was but the beginning.  Again and again, through the long struggle, the recruiting drum meat your 
summons in your midst, and never in vain.  At first, after battles deputations went to see that our wounded 
should not  want.  Soon the perfect working of the Sanitary Commission supplied all such needs, and 
supplies for these Commissions became the rule.  Loving and patriotic hands--for love and patriotism 
were so blended, that even in thought they could not be separated--prepared these supplies, and, what 
was more, sent direct those hundreds on hundreds of tokens, and thousands on thousands of letters, that 
here, as all over the land, aided so much to keep open the way, for a re-absorprion of the vast military 
forces into home citizenship and peaceful work again.  at the polls, whenever the war was put in issue, 
the thunders of your votes cleared and purified the political sky, and strengthened the heart of soldiers 
with the knowledge that they wee still in a majority at home.  Finally came the raising and fitting out of the 
HUNDRED-DAY MEN**, the young reserves that, posted on every communicationg time, enabled the 
veterans to concentrate and deliver with confidence their last blows.
  
**Transcribers note:  The148th OVI, mustered out of Marietta, was  part of the Hundred Day Men.

Soon all was won.  The history of what occurred at home, to which we thus briefly refer, should be written 
and preserved.  It consititutes as greatful a recollection for all, as that of the deeds in the field in a proud one.  
To-day, in its last link is completed the chain that kept the soldier a citizen, and bound the citizen to a soldier.  
Nothing more can be added;  and the record may be said to be made up, by which our common responsibility 
we are to be judged at the bar of history.  Upon it we are not afraid to stand.
     This much for those considerations which touch the large relations, or again the war homeside of the events 
which the deaths of those whom we are here to remember and honor signalize.  When we turn to the field 
record itself, all else passes at once out of sight, and intense, sharper memories take the place.  It is no longer 
of the cause, even, but of the men we have lost that we have to think.  It is of MELVIN CLARKE falling in 
the sweeping assault of his regiment at ANTIENTAM.  Upon his body, worn next to his heart, they find the 
miniature of his little girl.  It is of FRANKLIN BUELL, in the great artillery contest on the 
REAPPAHANNOCK.  Thrown insensible and crushed soon to die, the first wave of consciousness that 
returns, brings back to him only the thought of duty.  He sees that the men of his battery have gathered around 
him, and his first words, calmly uttered are, “Go back to your guns, men;  there are enough others to take care 
of me.”  It is of BEAL WHITTLESEY, in the grand assault at MISSION RIDGE, in the midst of the struggling 
steep accent, he spring forward to incite his command to new effort, and is shot dead as he takes the lead.  It is 
of TURNER, crowning the height in advance of all, and cheering them on, his sword on high, as he falls.  It is 
of CONDIT, in the desperate cavalry combat on the right at STONE RIVER, fighting to the death.  It is of these, 
and such as these, we think.  For why name instances?  Only as instances.  the deeds that spread loudest spoke 
but for all.  the most fiery feats, impetuous outburst, of bravery, were but brilliant scintillation’s, brighter rays 
thrown out from that latent all pervading and powerful heat that staying quality of valor, that hithered to the mass 
of our army and held it up through battle, sickness, privation and toil, on the determined end.  And, not less brave,
 not less devoted, ---always more touching, ---were the deaths of those who, stricken by disease, many of them 
before even the opportunity for the glorious seal of wounds upon them, in the seclusion and silence of the hospital, 
withdrawn alike from the sustaining excitements of the field and the comforting sympathies of home, passed away.
     We furnished in this county, for the national cause, something over four thousand men, including recruitments.  
The majority of the SEVENTY SEVENTH, over a third of the THIRTY-SIXTH and NINETY-SECOND, and 
two companies each in the THIRTY-NINTH and SIXTY THIRD INFANTRY;  one company in the FIRST, 
SEVENTH, and NINTH CAVALRY;  and HUNTINGTON and DeBECK’S BATTERIES, were from Washington.  
A large number crossed the Ohio and joining with loyal Virginians, formed the SECOND VIRGINIA CAVALRY 
and BUELL’S BATTERY.  Squads from our county enlisted in adjoining districts, and we were thus represented in 
the FIFTY-THIRD, SEVENTY-EIGHTH, and ONE HUNDRED AND FOURTEENTH regiments, and in the 
United States COLORED TROOPS.  Of the National Guards, or hundred-day men, we furnished seven companies 
of the ONE HUNDRED AND FORTY-EIGHTH REGIMENT.  Many citizens or our county, temporarily away in 
other States, inlisted where they happened to be, including the distinguished instance of that able officer who, entering 
the service by a youth, rose to the command of the famous “Iron Brigade,” GENERAL RUFUS R. DAWES.
     It would, of course, be vain to try to give, in the limits of an address, even the barest sketch what those whose 
fame to-day we can memoriate, endured and achieved.  And, on the other hand, it would, in view of the occasion, be 
an ungrateful omission to pass over their services without some mention of events.  We can refer, then, to the more 
important operations of the war which they bore a part, and recall some instances, striking because of the quality 
of the fighting or the amount of sacrifice required.  these, by association, may serve to call up in our minds their 
career, and renew its remembrance this day.
     Our regiments, by which I mean those in which we were more especially represented, first came under fire in 
the spring of 1862---the THIRTY-NINTH and SIXTY-THIRD in March, at the siege of NEW MADRID;  the 
SEVENTY-SEVENTH in April, at SHILOH, and the THIRTY-SIXTH in May, at LEWISBURG.
     Our successes that spring, which broke the first power of the Rebellion and defeated its principal policy, have 
been so shadowed by greater battles and more far-remaing marches since, that we hardly consider their relative 
importance.
     It is well enough to briefly recount them and point out their bearing, not only because this is necessary to 
understand what SHILOH was, but because---if the judgment and plans of the Southern leaders are to count 
as of value in forming an opinion---the danger of what alone could prevent our ultimate triumph was by those 
successes, disposed of--viz., European intervention.
     The succession forces had, that winter, in violation of their professed doctrines, invaded the State of Kentucky, 
and taken up a line which, with its right resting on MILL SPRINGS, extending westward through Glasgow and 
Bowling Green, closed the Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers by Forts DONELSON and HENRY, and the 
Mississippi with the fortifications at ISLAND NO. 10 and NEW MADRID, and occupied at large Southern and 
Western Missouri.  Their object in assuming this line, as is shown in an official letter of GENERAL ALBERT 
SIDNEY JOHNSTON, accounting for the disasters upon it, was to entirely cover the cotton region, and thus 
distress us, and compel European intervention by a dearth of that staple.  POPE, in Missouri, by an advance on 
PRICE’S flank and rear, captured some fourteen hundred prisoners, and induced the withdrawal of the rebel 
forces to the Arkansas line.  THOMAS, by the battle of MILL SPRINGS, disposed of their right.  GRANT, by 
his success at HENRY, and his tremendous blow at DONELSON, capturing nearly fifteen thousand prisoners 
and sixty-five guns, sent all of the rebel forces that he did not capture out of Kentucky and Middle Tennessee.  
The capture of ISLAND NO. 10, of which the siege of NEW MADRID had been the preliminary operation, 
followed.  Here were captured nearly seven thousand prisoners and one hundred and twenty-three guns.  POPE 
effected this with such care and skill that the casualties on our side were but a handful, and not a man was killed in 
the THIRTY-NINTH or SIXTY-THIRD, though they were much in the trenches and under fire.  To complete 
the disastrous results of the attempt to control cotton, on the same day on which the garrison of ISLAND NO. 
10 surrendered, the battle of SHILOH was decided in one favor.
     By far the most decisive of these successes was that at DONELSON;  but all aided and the general result 
was, that enough of the cotton region was gained to reasonably supply the world with that was on hand, for 
another year.  By that time England had become sufficiently interested in cotton culture in India to so far separate 
her in purpose from France, and our formal adoption of the emancipation policy raised such an issue, and 
developed such an opinion in our favor abroad, as strengthened indefinitely there the sentiment of neutrality.
     It is only in the light of these disasters, most of which preceded it, that the full significance of the battle of 
SHILOH can be estimated.  Two things the Southern leaders had mainly relied upon--two principal articles 
of faith were held by those who attempted to form the planter’s confederation.  One was that cotton 
confederation.  One was that cotton was king, and foreign powers would allow us but a limited time to stop 
supplies of that article, in an attempt to subjugate the region which supplied it to the world.  The other was that 
the people of the North, if they fought at all, would not, form the circumstance that they were so wholly an 
industrial people, have sufficient military skill and prowless to cope with the South in arms.  But not only had 
the cotton region been opened and large supplies obtained, but at Mill springs, in the open field, and at
 DONELSON, in a fortification, they had been defeated by inferior forces.  thus the general feeling of the 
rebels in the Southwest was that if they did not at once restore their military prestige they were gone, and 
SHILOH became, as SHERMAN, well phrased it, a fight for manhood.  It was fought by the South with 
desperation, and as a battle that was to decide all.
     At SHILOH, the SEVENTY-SEVENTH was posted at the Church, from which the battle-field derives
 its name, the key-point of SHERMAN’S position and in front of his headquarters.  It was there, indeed, that 
during the fight SHERMAN received his wound.  The brigade included also the FIFTY-THIRD and 
FIFTY-SEVENTH.  It was the most advanced of the division and the first to receive the shock of the enemy.  
It was commanded by COLONEL HILDERBRAND, of the SEVENTY-SEVENTH, and of our County, of 
whom SHERMAN said in his official report that a braver man he never saw.  Two companies of the regiment, 
constituting the picket for the brigade, under CAPTAIN McCORMICK, were attacked at daylight, and after 
having been reinforced, were, before sunrise, driven in.  Immediately the line of battle of the enemy, HARDEE’S 
CORPS, came rushing in at a double-quick, and the regiments of the brigade had hardly more than formed 
before they were attacked at their camps.  The FIFTY-THIRD, on the left, which by SHERMAN’S 
designation should have been in line with the others, stood at a considerable angle, its left fully in air, and 
thrust squarely into the enemy’s line.  It was at once hopelessly rolled up.  the FIFTY-SEVENTH and 
SEVENTY-SEVENTH, more fortunate, rallied quickly from a first disorder, clung to the ridge, and, with 
the aid of TAYLOR’S CHICAGO BATTERY on the right of the brigade, held the enemy in check--the 
SEVENTY-SEVENTH under the command of that able soldier, MAJOR (since General) FEARING, or 
our county.  The FIFTY-THIRD soon rallied on their left.  Gradually the enemy flanked the troops on the 
left of the brigade, and after a while they gave way, WATERHOUSE’S BATTERY there losing three guns.  
Next the FIFTY-THIRD and FIFTY-SEVENTH were flanked and overpowered.  The SEVENTY-
SEVENTH still held on, maintaining its possession of the ridge at hat point till about 10 o’clock, when, under 
orders from SHERMAN, it retired slowly, still fighting, to the new line in the rear, which, meantime, he had 
assumed for his division.  when this order was received, FEARING had just sent word that they could still 
hold position if needed.  By this obstinate resistance, SHERMAN, was mainly enabled to gather his reduced 
forces upon his second position, and if we consider how much, under the circumstances which attended the 
opening of this battle, depended on gaining time for better dispositions, we shall be impelled to the conclusion 
that probably no single regiment on that famous field rendered such important service at the opening of the battle 
as the SEVENTY-SEVENTY.  Its loss was heavy.
     This opinion as to the value of the stand made on the ridge is not confined to our community.  LIEUTENANT 
COLONEL COMPTON, of Michigan, in command of the UNITED STATES SHARPSHOOTER in that part 
of the line, in his official report to GENERAL GRAND declares that he is forced to the conclusion that the stand 
made by HILDERBRAND saved the right wing of the army (SHERMAN’S division), and there by the army.
     SHERMAN’S division was composed of troops all raw.  The very arms they fought with had only been issued 
to them at PADUCHA, when about to ascend the river, a few weeks before.  the troops were so debilitated and 
reduced by sickness from the use of water flowing from the swamps, that three hundred per regiment was about 
the average on the sick list the day before the battle.  (The SEVENTY-SEVENTH, for instance, three hundred;  
the FIFTY-THIRD, three hundred and twenty).  There were ordered back at the opening of the fight, and a very 
large proportion of the congregated mass in the rear were men of this class, instead of being runaways from the
 fighting.  
     Next in order comes the first engagement of the THIRTY-SIXTH.  Most fortunate for our regiment, it had been 
throughly drilled by the famous soldier who commanded it, COLONEL (since General) GEORGE CROOKE.
     In renewal of operations in Western Virginia in the spring of 1862, CROOKE, with his brigade, pentrated the
 mountain region to Greenbrier, the wealthist slaveholding county in that quarter, and most allied socially with the 
rulling class east of the mountains, and occupied LEWISBURG, the county seat.  to drive CROOKE out, GENERAL 
HETH was sent with an infantry force double that of CROOKE, and a battery.  “Great confidence,” said a Richmond
 paper, “is felt in this young and talented officer.” The tow opposing commanders had been classmates at West
 Point.  In the gray twilight, on fine May morning, CAPTAIN PALMER, with COMPANY A, sent out to reconnoiter,
 because of information received, found the enemy’s forces forming on a ridge facing LEWISBURG.  As PALMER
 began skirmishing, they began shelling our camps, and the THIRTY-SIXTH and FORTY-FOURTH REGIMENTS, 
formed under this fire and advanced to the attack.  In twenty minutes after the musketry opened, the affair was 
decided, and HETH was defeated, with the loss of about two hundred and fifty killed and wounded, three hundred 
prisoners, and all his guns.  The most resistance offered was on HETH’S right, by the crack regiment of Western 
Virginia, the TWENTY-SECOND, VETERANS OF SCAREY, CROSS LANES, and CARNIFEX, who had 
never been beaten.  These were opposed to the THIRTY-SIXTH, but the latter, compacted by its long winter’s 
drill, never broke its ranks, and pressed its opponents steadily for half a mile, when they gave way altogether.
     The battle of CORINTH, on the 4th of October, the same year, was the great and terrible day for the SIXTY-
THIRD--when it performed its greatest feat of arms, and suffered its greatest loss.--It was posted at the right of 
BATTERY ROBINETT, which was on the right of CORINTH, facing northwest, and commanding the Chevally 
road.  By this road, MAURY’S division debauched and delivered its determined and even desperate assaults.  
There were three of these assaults, each prolonged.--All of them had to be met by the SIXTY-THIRD, without 
being relieved, because its supporting regiment, the THIRTY-NINTH, which extended--being a much larger 
regiment--a considerable distance to the right rear also, was under imperative orders to hold the plank-road 
on its right at all hazards.  The rebel columns, through torn in fragments by the fearful fire to which they were 
subjected over three hundred yards of open ground, repeatedly penetrated in storming groups to the work, 
and the ditch was filled with their dead.  Each time the left of the SIXTY-THIRD, at the appeal of the artillery-
men, charged round in front of the works and beat them back.  In several instances, the thing came to the bayonet.  
Officers, for the only time during the war, used their pistols.  By the time of the third assault, the SIXTY-THIRD 
had to hold its line in squads, as there were but half enough men to fill the space.  It was thereupon relieved on the
 left by the ELEVENTH MISSOURI.  the loss of the SIXTY-THIRD was forty-eight percent killed and wounded,
 and but one line officer was left standing in the left wing at the close of the fight.  LIEUTENANT BROWNING, 
of our county, commanding COMPANY G, was wounded three times before he would leave the line.  In front of 
the work were found, among the dead, GENERAL ROGERS of Texas, one or two colonels, and also a rebel 
chaplain, who had died, bravely leading a company up to that point.  For years afterward, instances were known 
of rebel soldiers who. when taken prisoners, inquired what regiment it was at CORINTH which fought so, armed 
with white-socked rifles.
     Let us now pass to the great operations and deadly fighting which marked the prolonged struggle for the strategic
 heart of the South--CHATTANOOGA.  The THIRTY-SIXTH and NINETY-SECOND, serving together in 
TURCHIN’S brigade, participated in the famous charge, that which THOMAS, in his official report, calls that 
“splendid advance”--the last stroke delivered by him in his battle on the left of the army, and the closing scene in 
the two days contest at CHICKAMAUGA.---Under orders to withdraw to ROSSVILLE, THOMAS, on the 
20th, at 5:30 P.M., having completed his arrangements, notified GENERAL REYNOLDS to commence the 
movement with his division.  Of this division, TURCHIN’S brigade was a part.  On attempting the movement, it 
was found that the enemy had completely turned the left flank, and were in heavy force in the rear and on the 
Rossville road, and already moving up to attack.  The first notification of the fact had in TUREHIN’S brigade 
was grape-shot and shell from batteries behind the.---THOMAS asked if that brigade could bread through 
those lines, pointing to the heavy forces of the enemy.--The answer was in the affirmative.--- “Then do it!” said 
THOMAS.  Immediately, the brigade was faced to the rear. This brought the THIRTY-SIXTH and NINETY-
SECOND in the first line.---TURCHIN gave the preliminary directions: “Now, when I order you to charge, you 
must charge, and you must keep charging!”  Bayonets were fixed, and at the word, the brigade, raising its peculiar 
yell, rushed at the enemy.  But one volley was received from them, when before they could reload, the front line,
 the THIRTY-SIXTH and NINETY-SECOND, was upon them, and had broken them.---THOMAS, who saw 
it, is our witness, in his official words, that the rebel force was routed and driven in utter confusion beyond the left 
of his division next beyond the interposed rebel force.  For a mile and a half, indeed, the charge continued with 
unabated furry--the rebel batteries, form three different points on the right, poring grape-shot and shell into the 
column, in the endeavor to arrest its progress.  A battery was taken and abandoned. Six hundred prisoners 
were taken, including a colonel and a number of other officers.  About three hundred escaped in the clouds 
of dust and smoke that enveloped all.  At length, having successfully charged and captured the TENTH 
WISCONSIN BATTERY, which had opened upon them as they approached the reserves, it was thus 
ascertained that their work was accomplished.  Making a movement in force immediately into the path thus 
opened, THOMAS, was soon enabled to continue, and complete his retirement in safety.
     The THIRTY-SIXTH was this day commanded by LIEUTENANT-COLONEL (since General) H. F. 
DEVOL.  COLONEL JONES, of the THIRTY-SIXTH, had been killed the day before.  The NINETY-
SECOND was commanded by LIEUTENANT-COLONEL PUTNAM, COLONEL FEARING having 
been very severely wounded the day before.  
     At the battle of ATLANTA the THIRTY-NINTH was obliged to incur the greatest casualties of any 
engagement in its entire term of service, in order to hold its position and aid to save the train.  The SIXTEENTH 
CORPS, to which the THIRTY-NINTH belonged, was in rear of the SEVENTEENTH CORPS, supporting 
it, and suddenly it was learned that the enemy had in great force completely turned the left flank, and where 
moving up to capture the train from the rear.  The corps immediately changed front to the rear, and moved 
rapidly to anticipate the enemy’s attack.  On reaching a ridge which commanded the field, the enemy, 
HARDEE’S CORPS, was found to have already emerged from the woods, three hundred yards distant, 
and to be half way up the ridge.  The brigade, to which the THIRTY-NINTH belonged, fell upon them with 
great determination--after a brief struggle drove them back into the woods--and then seized the ridge the 
better to hold them in check.  Three charges were repulsed.  In one of these, the enemy attacked the brigade 
from the direction of its right front, gaining a fearfully destructive enfolding fire upon it.  then the greatest losses 
occurred.  But the THIRTY-NINTH, with the TWENTY-SEVENTH on its right, obstinately resting, replied 
with such a vigorous right-oblique fire that the enemy were again beaten back.  The regiment, when HARDEE
 retired, still held the position that it had assumed after his first repulse.  The loss of the THIRTY-NINTH, in 
killed and wounded, amounted to one-third of those engaged.
     There was hardly one of the great operations of our Western armies in which Washington county was not 
represented in the persons of its soldiers. 
     The THIRTY-SIXTH, under the able command of COLONEL DEVOL, was in nearly all the more important 
campaigns in the Valley of Virginia, including that driving campaign in which SHERIDAN ended all campaigning 
there.  BUELL’S HUNTINGTON’S and DEBECK’S Batteries shared the varied fortunes of the Potomac Army 
in the debatable land in front of and around Washington, in which that army rendered such important aid toward 
securing a successful result of the war, by its protection of the National Capitol, and of the rich and populous 
States to the north of it several invasions, and ultimately by the capture of RICHMOND.  The THIRTY-SIXTH 
also made on of its finest and most successful charges at ANTIETAM, when it dislodged a rebal force from 
behind a stone-wall breast work, which had been successfully held against all attacks up to that time during the 
day.  It was in this charge that LIEUT. COLONEL CLARKE, commanding the regiment, fell,--HUNTINGTON’S 
BATTERY rendered probable as great a piece of service as any battery during the war, by the desperate and 
successful stand it made, the first evening to save the cemetery hill at GETTYSBURG.  At CHANCELLORVILLE, 
enveloped in the disaster to the ELEVENTH CORPS, it continued to pour grape and canister into the rebel columns
 till the enemy had reached it, when it saved its guns, clubbing the foremost of the enemy with the rammers, and 
fighting them with the saber and revolver while limbering up.  BUELL’S Battery was conspicuous for its services, 
in what GENERAL LONGSTREET calls in his report the battle of the RAPPAHANNOCK, in 1862, when 
POPE was resisting on that river LEE’S  advance, and where its gallant and promising young commander was 
killed.  DEBECK’S Battery, under the command of LIEUTENANT HASKIN, did important service on the left 
at the second BULL RUN, where it handsomely engaged the famous WASHINGTON ARTILLERY;  an on 
various other occasions.  The FIRST and SEVENTH, and NINTH OHIO CAVALRY, were with the Western 
armies, and continually employed in the arduous labors which attended the long marches, might battles, and in the 
far reaching raids within the enemy’s lines, which distinguished this war, and which have never been equaled in 
military history for fatigue and adventurous daring.  The FIRST OHIO, from its superior skirmish drill and firmness, 
was frequently selected to lead the advance, or cover the rear of the cavalry column, in the operation in the 
CHATTANOOGA and ATLANTA Campaigns.  Much of its important service was performed under the 
command of that brave and astute officer, LIEUTENANT COLONEL THOMAS J. PATTIN, of this county.  
The SEVENTH, at NASHVILLE, on the right, charged over and captured field works and their guns.  The 
NINTH formed a portion of KILPRATRICK’S command, in SHERMAN’S conquering march through the 
Southeastern Rebel States.  At WAYNESBORO, December 4th, in the general cavalry engagement, it made 
the second charge and broke the enemy’s lines.
     West of the Mississippi, the SEVENTY-SEVENTH was with STEELE, in Arkansas.  At MARK’S MILLS, 
when guarding a train under command of COL. McCORMICK, it was surrounded by a division of rebels, and, 
after a handsome resistance of tow hours, was compelled to surrender.  Two other regiments at the opposite 
extremity of the train had previously been compelled by the same force, some 7000 men, to accept terms.  
Afterward it aided in the capture of MOBILE, and was engaged in the coast operations in Texas.  The THIRTY-
NINTH and SIXTY-THIRD were with POPE when he lead the advance of Western armies in the operations 
against CORINTH, resulting in the capture of that place.  GENERAL (then Major) NOYES, of the THIRTY-
NINTH, was one of the two officers who first penetrated the town, and raised the national flag on the highest 
building they could find---the Seminary.  These two regiments were in the subsequent operations for opening the 
Mississippi, ending with the capture of VICKSBURG.  In the great re-enlistment the THIRTY-NINTH mustered 
five hundred and thirty-four men into the service as veteran volunteers, the greatest number of any Ohio regiment.  
The THIRTY-SIXTH, THIRTY-NINTH, SIXTY-THIRD, and NINETY-SECOND were in the ATLANTA 
campaign.  the THIRTY-SIXTH came east after the capture of ATLANTA and joined SHERIDAN.  The other 
three regiments remained with Sherman, and were in the great march to the sea and through the Carolinas. The 
THIRTY-SIXTH maintained to the end the soldierly bearing which CROOKE’S labors had impressed upon it at 
the beginning of its service, and it was in more than on instance pronounced, by experienced officers of the regular 
army, to be unequaled in this respect by any volunteer regiment they had ever known.
     The SECOND VIRGINIA CAVALRY rendered important services, mostly in arduous and hazardous marches 
and engagements in the mountain regions;  much of the time under that gallant officer, LIEUTENTANT-COLONEL 
JOHN C. PAXTON, of this county.
     Meantime, the ONE HUNDRED DAY MEN were sent forward to aid in closing the war, and our regiment, the 
ONE HUNDRED AND FORTY-EIGHTH, was called upon to suffer casualties that added to the list of those for 
whom this monument is raised---six names by the explosion at CITY POINT, and by the fearful railroad accident on 
its way there.
     As the THIRTY-NINTH had the fortune to be the first of the regiments in which we had soldiers which were under 
fire, so was it in the last battle in which any of them participated--that at GOLDSBORO’.  the division to which it 
belonged was so completely enveloped by several corps of the enemy that both flanks had to give back in horse-shoe 
fashion to make the fight.  At the very head of this formation, where it stood when the fight opened, the THIRTY-
NINTH still stood when the fight closed, the division being at length relieved by the advance of other forces.  Next 
day, general orders providing for the movement of the troops stated that the THIRTY-NINTH OHIO would remain 
in camp “for distinguished gallantry in the action of yesterday.”  Thus gloriously ended our battle record in the war for 
the Union.
     Such are the bare annals of the military organizations in which Washington County was represented, with a single
 page from the more particular record of each.  The events to whose period they belong are fast sifting from the domain 
of experience into that of history, and we who were part of them already feel, not a few of us, that we have passed 
from the foreground into the middle distance of the panorama of life.  Many of the younger portion of those who hear 
me saw the mighty storm of war sweep to and fro over the land, even as a pageant seen in the wondering eyes of 
childhood, nor knew the strain that tugged at the heart of every grown one of us while the life or death of the Union 
was fought for.  the torpor of reaction from that strain so affects us that we care too little now to dwell upon that on 
which once we could not think too much--the deeper meaning of the struggle.  we are content to see those who 
succeed us enter into and enjoy the rich competence of repose which the labor and burden of war alone provided 
for the, and we neglect to impress upon them the lesson which we--because we so long failed to read its naked and 
apparent text upon the southern sky--had to learn in the darkness of trial, by the red illumination of fire and blood.
     It is apt to be thus after great uprisings of the people, resulting in success.  a generous forgetfulness, in putting out 
of sight the animosities of the contest, lets grow dull also the sense of what was contended for;--and sometimes it has
 been known that those who strove in vain to overturn principles which they hated in the sanguinary but vigilant trial of 
war, proved able by meaner methods to undermine them in the subsequent security of peace.  Let us, then, for once 
commune with you who have come to mingle with us newly upon the stage of action, and are soon to supersede us--
always, believe me, to our content--and consider, before we separate, not merely what were the objects at stake, 
national unity and free society, but what was the innate and abiding impulse which inspired and directed the purpose 
of those who fought for them.
     We should have done injustice to the manhood of these dead if we had neglected to recall this day their deeds as 
soldiers.  We shall do more than injustice--we shall desecrate their memory as citizens who gave their lives for the
 common weal--if we fail on this occasion to appreciate the animating spirit on our side, as distinguished from the 
passions and purposes which actuated and inflamed those on that side against which we strove, and over which, 
under God, we prevailed.  
     That animating spirit or principle was the same which has reconciled liberty and order, freedom and authority,
 in the English race, until it has become a transmitted political instance, a heredity, the reconciliation of progress and 
conservatism, laying hold of customs or principles of law that have been found to work well, and making them 
precedents to be followed, yet hesitating not to do away with precedent when it has come to be mere obstruction 
or degenerated into abuse. We feel the motions of such a political judgment in us, and we can discern it in the 
instance, though we many not fully describe its character or tell the springs from which its habits took their rise.  
It is as subtle in its essence and difficult of definition as the material bond which keeps the universe in balance.  
It is as apparent and certain in its operation as the motions of the planets or the far and slow procession of the stars.  
It took, in England, a monarchy and aristocracy, and created with their aid greater individual freedom than had ever 
been known under the forms of consolidated government before.  It took in America, a democratic republic, and 
proved it to have greater power to put down internal dissension that any despotism the world had ever seen.  It is 
the spirit that preserves free states by intelligent, voluntary, and ready obedience to law--that loves party and abhors
 faction--that accepts facts and avoids extremes.  It spoke in DOUGLAS, when the Southern voters, whether he 
would support Lincoln, if elected, in enforcing law, and be answered that he would.  It controlled the Republican party 
in the winter before the war, when it accepted the principle of popular sovereignty in its legislation for the Territories, 
thereby compacting the Union sentiment of the North.  It inspired ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS, when, in his speech 
against rebellion, as the rebellion was breaking out, he demanded that his people should consider, not what had been 
thought, but what had been done against them by the North.  It induced Lincoln to withhold the emancipation 
proclamation so long as it might be a hasty disruption of the sanctions of law.  It impelled him to launch its thunders 
when the issue had become hopelessly manifest of Slavery and secession against Liberty and Union.--- Sometimes, 
by a noble reaction, it appears in those who long had seemed to have forgotten it dictates.  It influenced LEE to 
surrender, because warfare conducted after armies could nowhere keep the field, would destroy society.  It spoke
 in Vallandigham, when he counseled his followers to accept the results of the war in good faith, and thus relax the 
tendency to centralization.  Above all, while not afraid to take revolution as the last resort, it never takes it as the first.
     Why was it that the North was all astonished that the people of the South, when lawfully defeated in a lawful 
election, and before any legislation had against them, took up arms?  It was because it would not, under any such 
circumstances, have doe so itself.  It was familiar with the fact, that in Spanish-American populations, often when 
a minority finds itself defeated at the polls, it issues a pronunciamento and institutes bloody rebellion.  It did not 
expect this of men bred in the same traditions as itself.
     There was, then a difference of spirit , a difference in the principle of action, that underlay the contest from which, 
ten years ago, we emerged victorious on the particular issues then presented.
     And this difference is too deep and great to be passed over as mere party variance in politics.  A Mexican might 
sincerely believe that it could so be regarded;  an American must believe it if at all--with a doubt!  It is true that the 
difference grew out of a peculiar institution, and that following the fate of that institution, it may pass away.  It is equally 
true that the spirit which that institution bred may survive it, and on other issues woke mischief in the land again.  
Whether it will do so or not depends on ourselves.  when men are not true to themselves, others will no be true to
 them.  When men are not well convinced themselves, they will not convince others.  If we accept it practically that 
there is no difference between the spirit of English law and the spirit of Mexican anarchy, not only shall we fail to 
make those with whom we fought respect the convictions for which we fought, be we shall even become in time 
as they themselves.
     Do not think I talk party politics.  The men who fought this war for us, to whatever party they many now belong, 
are above criticism as to their motives in public affairs, and their opinions are entitled to respect.  I speak only of that 
on which, then, we all agreed, and ask that by the memory of these dead we many never give it up.  Let us, to whatever
 party we belong, never give up the sentiment and the duty that united us in the war.  The rebellion was a crime against 
free government.  If that conviction is given up by those who held it, the days of our government are numbered.  and 
so long as any considerable portion of our people refuse to accept that conviction, so long is our government in danger.
     Let us remember, then, we who were on the stage of action in the great contest, and you our inheritors, remember,
 for what these dead fought for what they died.  and to all, and to future generations, let the appeal rise from the
 graves of those to whom we now dedicate this monument:  “We, to tell of whom this stone was raided, ask of those 
who come after us that they see to it that we did not die in vain.”

The Marietta Register (Marietta, Ohio)
Thursday, October 14, 1875  Front Page
_______________________________________________


NOTES ABOUT THE SOLDIERS’ MONUMENT

The Washington County Soldiers’ Monument is located in the Muskingum Park along Front Street 
in Marietta, next to the Putnam Street Bridge.


The Washington County Soldiers’ Monument Inscription reads as follows:
ERECTED IN MEMORY OF THE SOLDIERS OF WASHINGTON COUNTY, OHIO, WHO LOST 
THEIR LIVES IN THE UNITED STATES SERVICE IN THE WAR FOR THE SUPPRESSION OF 
THE REBELLION OF 1861.
WASHINGTON COUNTY WAS REPRESENTED IN THE FOLLOWING AND MANY OTHER 
ORGANIZATIONS:  THIRTY-SIXTH;   THIRTY-NINTH;  SIXTY-THIRD;  SEVENTY-THIRD;  
EIGHTY-SEVENTH;  NINETY-SECOND AND ONE HUNDRED FORTY-EIGHTH OHIO 
INFANTRY.  FIRST, SEVENTH, NINTH OHIO AND SECOND WEST VIRGINIA CAVALRY 
AND FIRST OHIO AND FIRST WEST VIRGINIA LIGHT ARTILLERY.
NAMES OF THE FALLEN MAY BE SEEN AT THE RECORDERS OFFICE.


Among others attending the dedication were General W. T. SHERMAN, General John POPE, General 
George CROOK, General Edward NOYES and General Manning F. FORCE.

About 3000 people attended the dedication.

Pg. 335 of The History of Washington County, Ohio 1788-1881, by H. Z. Williams
---------------------------------------------------------

THOMAS C. H. SMITH

SMITH, T. C. H., age 42, volunteer, August 23, 1861, 3 years, First Cavalry, Lieutenant Colonel, Attained 
rank of Brigadier General, served four years, mustered out 1865, is paymaster of the United States army.

History of Washington County, Ohio 1788-1881, by H. Z. Williams
Roll of Honor - War of 1861 to 1865
Marietta City-2nd Ward (pg. 304)



Extracted by Debbie (Noland) Nitsche
Diamonddeb@comcast.net
May 2004
Names, Regiments, and Places of Battles have been captilaized for easy identification.
Newspaper donated by Karen Hughes for historical and genealogy use.