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ing Secretary, generally makes these announcements of mortality and sends for suitable communications. His absence embarrasses us somewhat. Do I understand that his family needs any help from this Society in the way of money?

Lieutenant-Colonel Dresser:-No, sir; no one at all. He died in poverty, but the people of Lafayette have seen to the fact that he shall receive good burial.

The President:-Is anybody dependent upon him?

Lieutenant-Colonel Dresser:-No, sir; he was married soon after the war, and in 1869 his wife died, and shortly after his young child, both of whom are buried in Lafayette. He has no relatives living, but his remains will be tenderly cared for.

The President:-I would suggest that you prepare a short, very strong obituary notice of him and send it to General Hickenlooper, so that it may be embodied in our proceedings.

The committee to draw suitable resolutions touching the death of our comrade will be Generals Raum, Henderson, McNulty, Leggett and Colonel Calkins. Those gentlemen will take the matter in hand, if possible this morning, and be ready to report some time tomorrow, that the Society may act upon them. Our next business will be the appointment of a committee on the selection of time and place for the next annual meeting.

The President here named those who constitute the committees heretofore given, viz: For orator, for place and time for next meeting, and for officers of the Society.

Captain Lanstrum:-I would suggest that the chairmen of these committees announce here the place and time of meeting.

Captain Everest:-I would like to have the committee for the selection of orator meet at the Russell House immediately after the adjournment of this meeting, at room No. 10.

Captain Lanstrum:-I would like the committee on time and place meet at room 38 at Russell House.

General Fisk:-I would be glad to see the committee on the nomination of permanent officers at the close of this meeting in the corner of this Opera House, over here.

General Raum:-I would now move as the sense of this meeting, that the President of this Society read his article prepared by him a short time ago.

General Sherman.-Is that the wish of the Society, that I commence? (Yes, yes, from all parts of the house.)

General Sherman:-All right. I am generally on hand. It is written in clear, neat hand, so I won't detain you long, and then I will call upon General Poe.

General Sherman then read his paper as follows:

ADDRESS OF GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN.

DETROIT, September 14, 1887.

COMRADES OF THE SOCIETY OF THE ARMY OF THE TENNESSEE: Since our last annual meeting at Rock Island, Illinois, September 15th, 1886, two of the most prominent and honored members of our Society have passed from earth, Generals John A: Logan and William B. Woods; and my duty, as your President, demands a fuller notice than is usual.

It appears from our records, that on the 14th day of April, 1865 (the civil war being substantially ended), an impromptu meeting of the officers of the Army of the Tennessee occurred in the Senate Chamber of the Capitol of North Carolina at Raleigh, and was called to order by General Frank P. Blair, on whose nomination General William B. Woods was unanimously elected President. At that meeting this Society was born, and a committee was appointed to draft a constitution, which was submitted on the 25th of April, 1865; was unanimously adopted, and remains substantially unchanged unto this day. General Logan, though in hearty sympathy, was not present in Raleigh at these preliminary meetings, simply because he at that time commanded the 15th Corps posted further up the railroad towards Durham.

At the second of these meetings, Brigadier-General John A. Rawlins was elected the first regular President of the Society, but General Woods was empowered to call the Society together at his discretion until such time as General Rawlins could be regularly installed; therefore he was the first presiding officer of the "Society of the Army of the Tennessee."

The first regular meeting was held in Mozart Hall, Cincinnati, Ohio, on the 14th of November, 1866, at which General Rawlins presided and delivered that admirable and comprehensive ad

dress which has formed the text for all subsequent meetings, of which this is the twentieth. In all or nearly all of these annual reunions, General Logan has participated, always manifesting the most lively interest, always being the fervent orator at banquet and on the stage; often presiding, and to my personal knowledge might have been your President, had he not always declined when I offered to resign in his favor.

Only a year ago he electrified us all at our meeting in the city of Rock Island, Illinois, and at the camp of the state guard below that city, near "Black Hawk's tower," with some of his most fervent and patriotic words, and it was there that he called our attention to the fact that at that very moment, only twenty-one years after the close of the civil war, not a single Union man, Democrat or Republican, who had saved the Government from destruction, represented our country abroad. An example of "magnanimity" never before approximated in history or romance on this earth since the days of the "prodigal son."

Both of these generals, after achieving a fame in war which would have satisfied the yearnings of the most ambitious (being possessed of other high qualities), laid aside their swords and embarked in their no less important civil careers, and both achieved the largest measure of honor-the one dying a conspicuous mem ber of the Senate, the other an honored member of the Supreme Court of the United States.

The loss to our Society of. two such members during the past year, leaves a terrible void in our midst, and recalls to memory the sacred trust imposed on us by our Constitution "to cause proper memorials of their services to be collected and preserved, and thus transmit their names with honor to posterity."

They themselves have inscribed their names with sword and pen high up on the niche of fame; their peers of the Senate and Supreme Court have already testified to their virtues, ability and patriotism; their own fervent patriotic words are embodied in our printed proceedings and in the records of the Nation; and we have only to gather the more precious memorials of their noble lives from witnesses who knew them best and loved them most -their comrades in arms.

John Alexander Logan was born on the 9th of February, 1826, on a farm in what is now the town of Murphreysboro, Illinois, the first of a family of eleven children. His father, Dr. John

Logan, was an emigrant from the north of Ireland, and his mother was Elizabeth Jenkins, of North Carolina, descended of a Scotch family. He had, in early life, the best advantages of education which that neighborhood afforded, but the probability is that he imbibed his chief knowledge of men and things from hearing the conversation of those men of strong natures, who, from all quarters of the world, were, in 1836-1846, seeking homes in that newly organized state, and who were in the habit of visiting Dr. Logan's house, where they were sure of a hearty welcome and of unbounded hospitality. The early emigrants to our Western states were men of extraordinary character, generally of superior education, the most enterprising and best offshoots from the older communities of the East and of Europe, who carried civilization to the larger and more fertile fields of the then unoccupied plains and valleys of the West, and who in their children have left rich legacies to our common country. Southern Illinois was known as Egypt "the land of darkness," and strange to say, in all generations the men who have moved the world along have come from obscure regions. Napoleon was born in the village of Ajjacio, Island of Corsica, even yet but little known to the Savans of Paris; Cromwell, on whom turned the history of England, was born at Huntington, England; Wellington, at Dungan, Ireland; Washington, the most conspicuous man in all our history, at a poor farm house on the banks of the Potomac. Some years ago

I accompanied Mr. Evarts, the Secretary of State, in a search for the location of the house wherein Washington was born, to mark which Congress had provided the means to erect a monument, and with difficulty we discovered the faint remains of a chimney which indicated the site of the kitchen to the house wherein he was born. Lincoln was born in a common log cabin in Kentucky, and Grant at Mt. Pleasant, Ohio, a village which even now contains but a few hundred inhabitants. There is a tendency even in this, our Democratic America, to trace our conspicuous men back to a noble ancestry, but a sound mind in a sound body is all that modern civilization demands, and these Logan inherited from his honored parents with early lessons of frugality, virtue and manliness, worth more than any patent of nobility. Under these influences he grew up to manhood, with a splendid physique, strong limbs, a broad chest, a handsome swarthy face, hair as black as the raven, and dark flashing eyes which none forgot

who ever saw them in action. In 1846 occurred the Mexican war, and Logan, at twenty years of age, full of ardor and enthusiasm, at the very first call for troops enlisted as a private in the first regiment of Illinois Volunteers, and served therein two years, the best possible school for the profession of arms, in which he was destined to become so conspicuous a leader; but the war being over in 1848, he returned to his home and began his study of the law. After some preliminary instruction at Louisville, he was regularly admitted to the bar and began practice in the office of his uncle, Judge Jenkins, at Murphreysboro, soon becoming his full partner. On the 27th of November, 1855, he married Mary Cunningham, the daughter of his Mexican war captain, and she has been to him a faithful companion, the mother of his children, and now is the honored legatee of his fame and glory.

Logan's nature was too strong and ardent to remain content with the ordinary practice of the law, and he soon took an active part in the local politics of the day, following the lead of Stephen A. Douglas, whom he regarded as his beau ideal of a man and patriot. When the rumblings of the civil war were first heard in the distant South, he, in common with many good men, became fiercely angry with the black republicans who were believed to be agitators and disturbers of the public tranquility, and may have indulged in harsh expressions; but when in 1860-1 Mr. Lincoln had been fairly elected and was duly installed as President of the United States, Logan was outspoken in his determination to cast aside all party allegiance to defend and maintain the Union of our fathers. Douglas voiced the sentiment of that class of men in his famous speech at Chicago, May 1st, 1861, better than I have read elsewhere: "The conspiracy is now known; armies have been raised; war is levied to accomplish it; there are only two sides to the question: every man must be for the United States or against it; there can be no neutrals in this war, only patriots and traitors.

Logan was a member of Congress, and there was no hesitation with him which of the two to choose. He chose to be a “patriot,” and further to manifest his purpose by action, to become a soldier. A man may manifest his patriotism, his devotion to a cause and his country by speech, by generous bequests, by granting means of supply, but from the beginning of time the offer of life and health has been and ever will be the true and largest test. John

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