Veterans of the One Hundred and fifty-fourth New York:
From the beginning of time monuments have been raised and dedicated in all
lands to the memory of great men, and to commemorate great events. Monuments
stand in all our parks and public places, raised there by a loving and generous
people to keep alive the deeds and publics services of statesmen, scholars and
philanthropists. We see bronze or marble figures of Washington, Lafayette,
Scott, Jackson, Webster, Lincoln, Grant and Hancock, telling us in silent
language of the services rendered and heroic deeds done by these men, whose
memory an appreciative and affectionate people will always love to honor. We
dedicate today a monument not to one man, not to one soldier; not to one
civilian, but to 1,000 men. A thousand brave men are represented in this
dedication, whether they be here living witnesses of the ceremony, or sleeping
in the ground upon which we stand, martyrs to the cause of Freedom and victims
of that awful battle fought on this consecrated spot twenty-seven years ago.
Whether they are living yet out among the grand old hills of Cattaraugus or
Chautauqua where the apple blossoms make the whole atmosphere sweet with perfume
in the springtime, or whether their bleaching bones are piled together at Belle
Island, Libby Prison, or Andersonville, whether they may be in the flesh or in
the spirit,- those of them who are here dedicate this monument to them, their
comrades, to mark the spot where they fought and died for home, for country, and
for a Union, one and inseparable.
Well do we remember when they bravely marched away to the grand, wild music of
war, surrendering all they held dear at home, ready to sacrifice the last drop
of their blood, willing to give up life, to be shattered and torn, to lie on the
trodden field mangled and bleeding, dying with thirst and agony. They did this
that the Nation might live; that the government founded by Washington might
continue to exist; that our flag might forever wave over a free people; that
beneath it’s beautiful folds no people should live and not be free; that
whenever the Stars and Stripes float all might know it as an emblem of a free
people, a united Nation with financial integrity untarnished, with a currency at
par, and taken without discount among all civilized nations.
Our soldiers fought that four million human beings governed by the lash might
be forever free, and that we might to-day enjoy the blessing of a free country.
I believe that we ought to regard that awful struggle with a feeling that it
was inevitable, rather than with feelings of bitterness. We must recognize in
the result, great as the cost of life and property was, immeasurable benefits to
all mankind. It was a fight for the eternal right, and it will forever serve as
a lesson to all nations that the right must prevail.
I do not wonder that from time to time this spot was made sacred by the
glorious battle which was waged between those mighty hosts twenty-seven yaers
ago, people come here from the North and South to dedicate the monuments which
now mark this battlefield. I do not wonder that they come from the farm and the
workshop, from the hillside and the valley, from the forge and the spindle, men
of every nationality, now merged into one nationality, American. It was thus the
soldier came from every nook and corner, from the dusty marts of trade and
commerce, from the western prairies, from the rugged, pine-clad hills of
Maine, and the beautiful valley
of the St. Lawrence, from all over this broad land to take part in this grand
struggle which settled the question of national life and liberty.
Every hamlet and village has its war-torn veterans to tell the story of
Gettysburg; that
field of daring achievements. " Every village churchyard has its green mounds
that need no storied monuments to clothe them with a peculiar consecration;
grave that hold the dust of heroes; gravs that all men approach with reverent
steps; graves out of whose solemn silence whisper inspiring voices telling the
young from generation to generation how great is their country’s worth and cost,
how grand it was to die for it."
The people come here from all places and from all classes, meeting on a common
level with one thought and one purpose, to do honor to the memory of brave men
who engaged in that awful battle which decided a nation’s fate.
We remember the partings in the years gone by; we remember the soldiers as
they marched away; and as we think, the shadows some back again, and we live the
old time over as in a dream. Oh! If the Nations soldier dead, sleeping to-day
upon a hundred battle fields, sleeping where they fell in the midst of dreadful
carnage, under the heat of Southern skies, in the storm of shot and shell, and
those who perished on the march in the swamps, and fell by disease, and all of
the thousands who heroically met death by slow disease in Southern prisons, and
died with pictures of home flitting before their dying eyes, and the murmuring
sound of cool, rippling brooks coming to their dying ears, could only see the
greatness and grandeur, and the future of this Union which they saved, they
would feel as we do, that the sacrifice was not in vain.
The War of the Rebellion meant more to us as a people and the world, than any
other war has to any people. Soldiers in other countries from time to time have
fought at the command of monarchs, priests and kings, to maintain a place among
nations and for conquest. The fought for glittering gold; they fought for booty
and beauty; they followed their leaders over Alpine snows and to the foot of the
Pyramids and across seas as hirelings to keep in power some monarch who had
wrongly usurped a throne. Other nations have run red with blood, wars have laid
waste many fair lands. No soldier ever fought from such pure motives as ours; no
soldier ever bore arms in defiance of grander principles than were involved in
the War of the Rebellion.
Every officer who commanded and every private who carried an musket should
live in history and in the hearts of our people, as long as this "government of
the people, for the people, and by the people" shall live among the nations of
the earth.
Where soldiers fought for gold, ours fought for homes; where others fought to
satisfy the ambitions of a king, ours fought to preserve the Union; where others
fought for conquest, ours fought to make all men free; where others fought to
carry the ensign of ambitious monarchs into foreign lands, our own brave men
shed the blood of human beings only to quell the secession and to keep the old
flag flying proudly in its place, without a star obliterated or a stripe erased.
This is a glorious battlefield, the greatest the world has ever known;
greatest in points of numbers engaged on either side, greatest in loss of life
sustained, greatest in results obtained, for it decided the fate of the grandest
nation on the face of the earth.
If this day does not mean to us the renewal of patriotic love; if we do not
say "As these men fought and died for liberty and truth, so we will live for
them; as they fought and died to vindicate the honor of the country, we will
live to preserve it," - if it does not mean this, it means little.
"Still the message of these brave deaths is one of life, a life of broad
Americanism and grand devotion to our country’s interests." We dedicate this
beautiful monument to the memory of the brave men who composed the One hundred
and fifty-fourth Regiment of New York Volunteers. To the memory of all those men,
living or dead, who left their friends and homes up in dear old Chautauqua and
Cattaraugus, left the green fields through which many of them were never more to
wander.
We do not forget to-day any of them, and especially do we remember those who
in the first day of that great battle were surprised and captured upon this
spot. Our very souls are now wrung with agony for them who in the long terrible
months thereafter languished and perished in that hell upon earth,
Andersonville. Better were it for them had they died here on this
consecrated ground; died here amid the tumult and roar; died here underneath our
old banner, victorious in the greatest battle the world has ever known.
Source:
New York at Gettysburg:
Final Report on the Battle of
Gettysburg
(Albany: JB Lyon
CO, Printer, 1900. Page 1047 - 1052)