fense rather than any unity of institutions or interests or sentiment that welded the colonies together.

As soon as they became free and independent states they confederated for defense, and with jealous care guarded against all nationality; and even while under their confederation the old antagonism of the North and South developed anew without diminution either in interest or sentiment. The history of the constitutional convention of 1787-88 is a record of conflicting interests and of divergent civilization, which required compromise and concession to maintain a union which was more necessary to public defense than conducive to any sentiment of the common feeling and common interests and nationality. All this is old; yea, "old as the hills," and as forgotten as the clouds that once rolled over them, but it is the fact of history, and points the moral and accentuates the truth of that political philosophy which directed the South through all her history from 1789 to 1860.

But, Mr. Chairman and fellow-citizens, all things come to the man or people that wait, and so, with perfect confidence in the rectitude of our motives; in the correctness of our views of the Federal constitution, and of the propriety of our acts in the past, we, surviving Confederates for ourselves, and in behalf of our dead comrades, offer no apology or excuse for our course in 1861-65, but frankly and firmly avouch the facts of our country's history and the teachings and writings of the fathers, as the justification of the Southern states at the bar of impartial history.

The principles in defense of which the South accepted battle were found in the constitution.

Whether right or wrong, the South believed she was right-and the principles in defense of which the South accepted battle, after peaceably seceding from the Union. were found in the constitution and taught by the fathers. The South claimed and asked nothing more than equal rights--not of persons only, but of states. Equal privileges in all parts of the Union; equal protection wherever the flag floated, to every person, to every species of property recognized by any state. Less than that was subordination, not equality.

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In the exercise of that right by the South, an appeal to the court of last resort between sovereign states became absolutely necessary; an appeal to war-that tribunal of force whose judgment is final, whether just or otherwise. In its forum the states joined issue, and when its decree was found against the South, we bowed to it as final without consenting to it as just or righteous. Its irreversible result will not again be questioned, but accepted with natural and unavoidable sorrow. * * *

The South proffers at the bar of history, and in the forum of conscience, a rectitude of motive and warrant of law not less moral and righteous than all that animated the North.

Publicists may draw distinctions between just and unjust wars, but in civil conflicts for inalienable rights, victory cannot sanctify the wrong, nor defeat invalidate the right. Our civil war established beyond controversy that the North was stronger in all the materials of war, and had vastly

greater facilities for making them available, having besides internal resources, the outside world to draw from--but beyond that human reason can draw no rightful conclusion, and the right or wrong is left to impartial history.

And I have not the least apprehension that impartial history will fail to recognize the justification of the South in the records of our country, and find that according to the faith that was in her people, there was no alternative left in 1861 but the appeal to arms-and I affirm, with equal confidence, that any comparison of the two sections, from the earliest time to the present day, will not find the South to have been no less patriotic or less solicitous for the honor, glory and welfare of the Union.

SOUTHERN PATRIOTISM.

The sacrifices made by the Confederate soldier put the question of motive beyond cavil. There never was a time between Fort Sumter and Appomattox, when, even in the death struggle, the Confederate soldier did not feel that he was fighting for his country-for the legal right to local selfgovernment under the existing constitution made by his fathers. And he never doubted the right to claim for the South an equal share of glory won, and sacrifices made by revolutionary ancestry. He remembered with pride that the first declaration for colonial independence was made at the South, in Mecklenburg, N. C.; that Thomas Jefferson, a Southern man, wrote the Declaration of Independence adopted by our fathers. He remembered that Patrick Henry, another Southern man, when doubt and hesitation had paralyzed the popular heart, raised the battle cry, "Give me liberty, or give me death," and aroused all patriots to decision and ac

He also remembered that George Washington, a Southern man, led the army to final victory securing liberty to American colonies; and that when the turning point of the struggle came, Southern heroes from this valley, at King's Mountain, after the misfortune at Camden, turned the tide of war, and were the initial that led to the climax of victory at Yorktown. Such assured historic facts nerved the Confederate on to deeds of valor, and made him a willing sacrifice to his convictions.

The history of our country from 1789 to 1860shows that the patriotism of the South was prolific, of great civil achievements, by which the country grew in power and in wealth, until it became the wonder of the nineteenth century.

History sustains the South in the claim that all the territory brought into the United States government has been by gift from Southern states, or acquired by Southern policy, except Alaska, and that every state in the Union has been carved out of that territory, excepting two-Vermont and Maine. It is a historical fact that every foot of territory secured to the United States, after the treaty with England on the close of the Revolutionary War, was signed by Southern presidents, except that small portion known as the Gadsden Treaty, signed by President Pierce.

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Old Virginia passed the title to the five original Northwestern states. Old Virginia also gave title to Kentucky. North Carolina gave the United

States title to Tennessee. The next acquisition was the Louisiana Purchase by President Jefferson, from France, carrying with it all the remaining territory to the geographical point where the tide in the Northwest flows to the Pacific Ocean. Then Florida, with certain rights in Oregon, was purchased from Spain by President Monroe. President Tyler signed the treaty with Texas. President Polk signed that with Mexico for California, New Mexico and Arizona.

And singular to say that the treaty with Russia. by which Alaska was secured, although negotiated for under Mr. Lincoln's administration, the final treaty was signed by President Andrew Johnson, a Southern man. So, with the exception named, the treaties that brought every foot of territory added to the United States were signed by Southern presidents, in conformity with Southern policy. The South felt that she had done a full share to the extension of our couutry, and felt sensitive at the proposed denial of her rights. O

But "there is a divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew them how we will"-and it seems the war was inevitable. When our patriotic fathers, by way of compromise, planted certain seeds in our political garden, they proved to be seeds of discord, and after our variable political sunshine, clouds and rains, for three quarters of a century, they at last germinated and blossomed into blood. The process was slow, but sure, just as with the little snowflake that falls on the crag in the Alps, and becomes the necleus of the mighty avalanche when a little sunbeam falls on it, and melts and loosens its hold, the avalanche tumbles, crashing and thundering into the vale below. So did the causes, created with the best intention by our fathers, become the nuclei, which accumulated into mighty proportions, and the avalanche of war came thundering and crashing through the land.

Feeling that their constitutional rights were imperiled, and that they could not be as equals in the government, and having failed, after repeated efforts, to further compromise and reconcile essential differences, eleven of the Southern states, asserting their primary rights as sovereign states, each acting for itself and on its own responsibility, formally and peaceably withdrew from the Union, each placing itself just as it was before entering into the compact of union.

This was not done in anger, nor in indecent haste, but with proper grace and dignity, overcast with sorrow. The time of so doing extended from December, 1860, to June, 1861. Each seceding state, from natural sympathy and common interest, aligned itself alongside of those that had preceded it; and, after the fashion of the original formation of the Union, they united their fortunes and made common cause. Three other border states, Kentucky, Missouri and Maryland, hesitated in the attempt to join their seceding sisters, and finally remained in the Union, while numbers of individuals and organized commands, following their convictions, promptly and bravely left their homes in these states and united their destinies with the land of the South. Believing in the justice and righteousness of their cause, and to maintain their constitutional

These Confederate states were organized and established as a separate government, and moved to its chosen capital-Richmond, Va. I use the term "established" significantly. This organized government, by constitutional designation, gave itself the name of "The Confederate States," having a government for four years-years of battle and of blood-and it was organized after the fashion of the one established by our fathers. It had, in fact, all the machinery and paraphernalia of a thoroughly organized and equipped government.

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It had its national flag and a patriotic and gallant ality and waved over Confederate armies that army to defend it. That flag emblemed its nationguarded its citadel defiantly for four years. It was defensive and not offensive war. The Confederates asked to be let alone-only that. To disestablish it, it required 2,759,059 gallant and well equipped Federal soldiers four years, fighting hundreds of battles with a loss of more than half a million men and at a cost in money of four or five billions of dollars.

It is a historic fact that President Lincoln for

mally called through all sources for 2,759,059 men for military service.

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It is also a historic fact, obtained from the best available data at my command, that the Confederate States had on their army rolls from first to last, during our four years' strife, in round numbers, less than 600,000 men.

When truthful writers come to understand such facts, can it be believed that they will speak of it as a "mere rebellion," and not as the greatest of civil wars?

The word "rebel," while intended as a word of reproach, created no alarm among Confederates. They recognized the fact that wherever you find in history a struggle for liberty, the word "liberty” is preceeded by the word "rebel" as in the struggle of our own revolutionary fathers for independ

ence.

The political theory held at the South-that our Union was a compact-evidenced by the Federal constitution, of which the Federal government was the creature, and the states the creator, the former the agent, the latter the principal, may or may not have been the true theory of our confederation, but it was unquestionably the conscientious conviction of our people, our statesmen and our states.

It was a theory of wise men which secured the liberty of local government without weakening the central power for public defense; it left domestic affairs to the care of those most interested in all that relates to home, while it intrusted foreign relations to the watchful care of the general government as the agent of all the states. Capable of extension throughout the continent, it has already extended from ocean to ocean, from lake to gulf, securing the largest liberty to each constituent state, and yet uniting the will and power of the whole for the common defense of all-"Distinct as the billows, yet one as the sea."

BATTLES OF CHICKAMAUGA AND MISSIONARY RIDGE.

The two armies had met before under the same commanders, where they fought the old year out and the new year in, and made Stone's River, or Murfreesboro, a field of historic renown. In that test of prowess, though the contest for two days was bloody, but little advantage was gained by either army, save that after the second day's conflict Bragg retired without pursuit and left Rosecrans the honor of holding the field. It was a second Flodden field, where both Surrey of England, and James of Scotland believed each army vanquished, and neither could claim a victory until the dawn of the next day. Meanwhile, during the winter and spring, Rosecrans had recuperated and filled up his army after the battle of MurfreesboroBragg had depleted his by sending between eleven and twelve thousand infantry to Mississippi. *** The object of Gen. Rosecrans was to drive Bragg through North Georgia-and Bragg did not intend that he should, without a fight. The three days from the 14th to the 17th (the day on which the general order for battle was issued by Bragg) was criticised by the uninitiated as "time and opportunity lost." But subsequent events, when Longstreet arrived, showed the wisdom of this delay.

These two gallant armies, one composed of Western and the other of Southern men, with kindred, in many instances brothers, on opposing sides, were skilled by experience and seasoned by hardship, and with no mean opinion of the prowess of each other. For two days in this valley, under the brows of Lookout, near the border line of Georgia and Tennessee, and on the banks of the sluggish little "River of Death," the terrible onslaught was waged with a destructive fury hardly surpassed in any battle of modern times. With hurrying to and fro, marches and counter-marches, sometimes in "double quick," in adjusting lines, the battle began. What with assault and repulse, with vantage ground gained and lost, salients taken and retaken, lines broken and righted up again, with gaps filled here and flanks covered there, movements checked, flags captured and recaptured, guns taken and retaken, stars and stripes and stars and bars vieing with each other for place, thus did the masterful strife continue until the mantle of night, in its charity, enveloped the scene, without any very decisive permanent advantage to either.

It was a calm, crisp, frosty night, quiet and serene, save the sound of the ax in Federal hands as field works were hastily constructed, indicating Federal pluck that meant to stay. There was on the Confederate lines that stillness of slumber which exhausted nature alone can give.

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The Federals initiated the fight on the evening of the 18th, whether intended or not. Then it was that Rosecrans saw that instead of retreating through North Georgia, Gen. Bragg had assumed the offensive, and tendered the gage of battle. Rosecrans immediately put himself in defensive attitude. Bragg, however, not yet having crossed the Chickamauga in force, gave Rosecrans ample time

time on the evening of the 18th in which to choose his ground and locate his lines. This was advantageously done by placing them on points of slight elevation extending through a level wooded country in a forest abounding in dense undergrowth, with here and there, at long intervals, small fields and small open glady spots. These were the only places where troops would be rendered visible until in very close range. The dense undergrowth concealed the Federal lines and served as masks to batteries. Rosecrans's lines thus situated, his batter

ies were placed advantageously to command the approaches, and were used most effectively on Bragg's advance, while Confederate batteries were practically unused, as it was difficult to move them through the woods and thick underbrush, much less secure advantageous points from which to fire. This put the Confederates at decided disadvantage.

Rosecrans, having assumed the defensive, with lines and batteries advantageously located (although broken here and there in the fight of the 19th, but practically maintained), went to work on defenses early in the night, and kept it up. The sound of the ax in Federal hands was anything but grateful to the ears of the Confederates, who were but a few hundred yards distant, and knew that Bragg's aggressive movement would soon precipitate them upon the defenses. Breastworks, as comfortable as they may be to those behind them, are not very inviting to the attacking party. As courageous as the assailant may be, he is conscious of his disadvantage, and necessarily assaults with more reluctance because of knowing this disadvantage, while the soldier sheltered behind them, however frail they may be, feels a degree of confidence because of that advantage. While all this gave a decided advantage to the resisting party, there was to some extent a corresponding advantage to be gained by an aggressive movement. The soldier gets momentum in a forward movement that often avails much. This was demonstrated next day at several points, where the lines were overrun, but could not

be held.

Lieut. Gen. Longstreet, who had been preceded by a part of his command, arrived at army headquarters late in the night of the 19th. Thereupon Gen. Bragg divided his army into two wings, without disturbing the locality of the troops, and placed Lieut. Gen. Polk in command of the right wing, and Lieut. Gen. Longstreet in command of the left wing. These dispositions having been made, Gen. Bragg ordered an attack at daylight on the next day, to be executed by brigades in eschelon, beginning on the right. The attack was not made, however, until between nine and ten o'clock, when it was done with vigor and fierceness.

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THE SECOND DAY S FIGHT.

Feats of valor were performed that day by commands in both armies that should entitle them to a place alongside of Grecian phalanx, or Roman legion. And in many instances individual prowess displayed itself with Prince Rupert rashness, and with the endurance of Cromwell's "Ironsides."

Lines advanced and recoiled again and again amid the din of battle. The doubtful issue was prolonged, each party holding the lines with dogged tenacity, making the second a more deadly day than the first. The Federal left had been driven back, but was resolutely resisting and still defiantly holding the crown of Snodgrass Hill. The Federal center had been pushed from their works, and had partially regained them. The Federal left was stillfirmly holding its lines behind their works, when near five o'clock the order came to Confederates to charge all along the line. The scales were still trembling in the hand of fate, but slowly balancing to the Confederate side.

That September sun, poising on the verge of equinox, had looked with burning eyes all day on this carnival of blood, was nearing his setting, and seen through the smoke of battle was enlarged and softened into an apparent ball of blood. That softened sunlight falling upon the begrimed, dust covered and powder-burned faces beneath the old slouched hats, gave a weird aspect, as, in elbow touch, the old gray coats stood guard to the little cross of St. Andrew that marked the line of serried ranks, and seemed as it fluttered over these scarred veterans as sacred as the sign to Constantine with its heaven-sent legend of "In hoc signo vinces."

It was truly a battle line of old knights with visors down ready for mortal combat, and would have challenged for the laurel wreath the old Paladins in their impersonation of chivalry.

This line of old gray coats and slouched hats, standing on the crested ridge of the last shock of battle, was the living impersonation and realization of "grim-visaged war" with "wrinkled front."

Standing thus in line of battle, silence, such as precedes the storm, brooded over it, until that fatal word "Forward!" rang down the line as if borne on electric waves, with which the very air was surcharged. The line obeyed-moved at first with slow and measured tread, then with quickened steps as it neared the blazing guns, when with the wild "rebel yell" and resistless charge the opposing lines, after dogged resistance, suddenly gave way, and the battle was won.

Braxton Bragg, the General-in-Chief, commanding Confederate force on this field of Chickamauga, will stand in history the victor and hero of one of the bloodiest and best fought battles of the greatest of civil wars.

The address of Senator Bate, although abridged as much as was admissible, will be concluded in December VETERAN. It will contain an account of the battle of Missionary Ridge, of what the South has done since the war, pay tribute to the "old South" and Southern women in his own happy manner, and conclude with the patriotic reference

to Southern history and touching pathos to Confederate dead.

Gen. R. B. Coleman, of McAlister, I. T., sends to the VETERAN a young soldier's discharge:

To all whom it may concern: Know ye that Alexander C. Thomas, a private of Capt. May's Company (G), Twenty-fourth Regiment of Tennessee Volunteers, was enlisted on the 5th day of August, 1861, to serve the term of twelve months, is hereby honorably discharged from the army of the Confederate States.

I certify that the said private, A. C. Thomas, is a non-conscript by reason of minority.

Said A. C. Thomas was born in the County of Cannon, State of Tennessee; is seventeen years of age, 5 feet 3 inches high, dark complexioned, dark eyes, dark hair; by occupation a farmer, when enlisted.

Given at Tupelo, this the 16th day of June, 1862. Approved, R. D. ALLISON, Colonel commanding Twenty-fourth Tennessee Regiment.

W. W. MAY, Captain Company G, Twentyfourth Regiment, Tennessee Volunteers.

Capt. J. H. Curtis gives vivid reminiscences:

I wish to add briefly to a communication from Adjt. Witherspoon, on the battle of Drewry's Bluff. I was Captain of Company "I," Twenty-fifth Tennessee Infantry, and commanded in this battle by Lieutenant-Colonel John McEwen, of Franklin. Our consolidated Regiment was on the right of the Seventeenth and Twenty-third Regiments.

I think the battle was fought on the 16th instead of the twelfth of May, 1864, that Johnson's Brigade arrived in Richmond, about the 12th from the Longstreet East Tennessee Campaign, and went immediately down the river between Drewry's Bluff and Petersburg, guarding both these points. I distinctly remember that the Confederate troops around Richmond and Petersburg called us "Bragg's Pets" before the Drewry's Bluff battle, but after that called us "That Fighting Tennessee Brigade."

Adjutant Witherspoon is right about it being one of the hardest fought battles of the war. My recollection is that our Brigade got out with but one or two field officers, and very few company officers. Our Regiment changed front on Tenth company about same time Seventeenth and Twenty-third did, and moved on the Yankee works in a desperate charge through the thickest shower of shell and shot that I ever was in. When within a short distance of the works, some one hallooed, "We are firing on our own men." Col. McEwen then ordered us to halt and cease firing. The fog was so dense that we could not distinguish a Yankee from a Rebel in thirty yards. When we halted, Major McCarver and I were standing near each other, in front of the left of the Regiment. He asked me whether I thought it was our men or Yankees in front. About that time I saw a Yankee cap come up above the works and called the Major's attention to it, and we both turned to our men and ordered a charge, while Col. McEwen was holding the right of the Regiment thinking the men in front were Confederates; but he soon discovered he was mistaken, and moved forward. We had gone but a few steps when the Yankees ordered us to surrender, swearing they would kill every one of us if we did not, but these Tennessee heroes did not go into the fight to surrender, but to take the works, which they did in a hand to hand conflict, and the chivalry displayed by them on that occasion is equal to anything history has ever recorded.

When within a short distance of the works, Major Sam McCarver and I fell over the telegraph wire, and on getting up, I turned to the men and gave them notice of the wire, hence none fell. When within ten feet of the works, I fell, shot in both legs. McCarver moved on, mounted the works and was shot through the heart. A more generous hearted and courageous officer never gave his life as a sacriffce to the Confederate cause. The gallant McEwen was shot through the calf of one leg. We were together the night after the battle in field hospital, put on boat together the next morning, and carried to Chimborazo Hospital in Richmond, when we were separated by being put in different wards. I never saw him afterward. He lived but a few

hospital. McEwen slept on a bunk over me, and he would call me through the night, and ask if I was suffering. He said that he was suffering intensely.

Neither will I ever forget the last words spoken to me by McCarver. I do not think there has been a week passed since then that I have not thought of these two officers who so gallantly laid down their lives for the cause we so much loved. Private Byrd Terry of my Company, who was one of the best soldiers in the army, fell dead by the side of McCarver, and others lay dead upon the works. Lieutenant B. H. Stockton, of my Company was severely shot in the shoulder, while trying to remove me from the exposed condition in which I lay.

Capt. Curtis concludes his reminiscences with an amusing account of volunteering to climb a tall pine tree and count the Federal gunboats. He had gone about seventy-five feet up, taken a seat upon a good limb and was progressing well, when he was made the target of a gunner who shot tree tops rapidly about him-He "got down out of that tree."

REMEMBERING A WORTHY WORKER.

Camp Sumter No. 250, United Confederate Veterans, Charleston, S. C., took action some time ago in appreciation of a willing worker, saying:

WHEREAS, We, the members of Camp Sumter No. 250, United Confederate Veterans, wish to attest our appreciation of the unselfish devotion of Miss Amanda C. Childress, the Secretary of the United Confederate Veterans at General Headquarters, New Orleans, La., to our order.

Resolved, That as Miss Childress, the daughter of a brother Confederate veteran, has since 1891, when General Moorman, the indefatigable Adjutant-General of the order, took charge, served as typewriter, stenographer and secretary of the United Confederate Veterans, not only at the annual reunions, but from reunion to reunion, doing an immense amount of work without remuneration; working merely because of her enthusiastic love of the veterans who battled for the right. We, the members of Camp Sumter, tender to her our most grateful and appreciative thanks for her unselfish devotion to the cause we all love and venerate.

Resolved, That these resolutions, properly engrossed, be signed by the Commandant and Adjutant, and forwarded to Miss Childress, and that a copy be furnished THE CONFEDERATE VETERAN, with request to publish.

The extracts from the minutes are signed by V. C. Dibble, Commandant, and J. W. Ward, Adjutant.

G. B. Swearingen, who was a Corporal in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Tennessee Cavalry, writes from Wildersville, Tenn.:

At Athens, Ala., in a regiment of Kansas troops, there was a Federal wounded. I carried him off the battlefield to the hospital, and kept one of our regiment from killing him. I carried him on a horse that belonged to one of my messmates who was killed on the field. Would like to know if he is still living; don't remember his name.