Democratic Sentinel, Volume 10, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 August 1886 — A TRUE SOLDIER’S LETTER. [ARTICLE]

A TRUE SOLDIER’S LETTER.

Written by a Man Who “Wouldn’t Soil His Soul for Any Amount of Dirty Dollars.” . 'liead in the House of Representatives at Washington, at-the request us Gen. of Wisconsin.] Soldiers’ Home, ) Hampton, Ya., Julj’ 3. j General— l like your sentiments on the •'business method of coining patriotism,” and chill penury having frozen out modesty, as well as all other softer virtues, I am bold enough to write you to request a special favor which has no relation to “spot cash.” My discharges show that I enlisted April 22, 1881, and was finally discharged in November, 1865. During my re-enlist-ment service the rolls will show “b unty declined” in the column of remarks every time an installment was due, for I am an American, and would as soon take hire to resent a personal indignity as hire to defend my country. I took my wages, which were my due; but I knew the state was entitled to the services and lives of any of its citizens whenever needed for its safety. I am only one of many similar cases of the officers and men of the enrly army who never took bounties or applied for any equalizations, or arrearages, or buncombe back pay; and I think we deserve seme record or recognition to show the youngsters growing up that there were men who fought for their flag alone, and not for their flag and so many dollars. Couldn’t Congress have a list made from the rolls in the A. G. O. and printed by authority? Or couldn’t they give those of us who are living a little nickel medal, something like the two-cent one the Navy Department gives to sailors .who risk their lives to save their shiv m ites from drowning? Those of us who are dead don’t need any, as the Recording Angel has the.r record, and will marshal them to fiont seats, which greenbacks can t purchase. [Laughter and applause.] When the war was over I went to work and made my living as well as I could until some months ago, when infirmities compelled me to quit work aud seek the shelter of the home w hich my country has provided for disabl d soldiers. I am thankful for it, and don’t propose to send in a bill besides for pensions, bounties, arrearages, back pay, clothing, rations, or equalization, or anything else. It ain tin the power of Congress to reduce me to the equality of a $1,300 patriot; but some things here look very strange; for instance: A small tobacco rat on is allowed to non-pensioners, and it worries me to see brave old George H , who saved our colors at Chantilly, marching in the line of paupers for his weekly dole, which he straightway shares with fellow s who draw pensions for a valorous diarrhea or glorious piles—|laughter)—for many of our pensioners depend upon their hospital record rather than their army,record, as claimants for their country’s generosity. Carl E , here, has been twice commended in General Orders for gallantry in action, and twice promo'.ed specially, but he has no hospital record, no dashing rupture lor awkwardly falling off a horse, no cbivalric blindness from too much commissary whisky to show 7 , and no brilliancy in his army record will gain him a pension, though bent double by pains. Nothing but a neat hospital record or perjury will do it.

For myself (but I’ve bio wed my own born bo much that I dislike starting a new tune) I will say that it is lucky for the Treasury that i can’t seqnently connect my present pains and aches and general usedupness with a bad cold I got sleeping in the snow among the S afford Hills after our bloody repulse at Fredericksburg, or a certain thumping I remember under my ribs when I saw (twenty-three years ago today) Pickett’s column advancing against the blazing crest of Bound Top; but, in truth, though my mo6t troublesome pain is in my pocket, I don’t propose to soil my soul for any amount of dirty dollars. If there is any acknowledgment can be made by Congress that we fought for our country without bounties, I for one would be very glad of it, and will always remain, very respectfully, your obedient servant, Thomas May, of Maysville. To General Bragg, Member of Congress. By way of preface to the above letter, and before it was real, General Bragg said: “Mr. Speaker, I am glad that at last we have in the Executive Mansion a man who has the nerve and courage to place his hand upon legislation when he thinks it improper, whet! er it be pension legislation or railroad legislation. [Applause.] We have gone a great way, and in my judgment altogether too far, in this matter of pension legislation. There is a large class of soldiers for whom there is never a voice raised in this House. They are thfe men whom a Confederate General had in his mind when he indorsed his approval upon an application for leave of absence that the soldier might go to see his family. He said: ‘lt was proper such men be permitted to go to their families, for from such men the Nation breeds the soldiers who will defend it in the future.’ In speaking of this class of soldiers I do not speak of those who. were in the service m rely fourteen s, or .sixty days, or ninety davs, and for whom many of your pension bills provide. But I mean that class of men who in April, May, June, and July, 1861, actuated only by patriotic desire to sustain the national flag, tilled the ranks of your army—a class of men but few of whom ever afterward joined it —the men who did not wait to be bought, but who enter, d the service from the pure dictate of duty, recognizing the fact that the Government had a right to ifs blood-tax from its citizens when its necersities demanded it, just as Auch as it had a right to tax their property for the support of the Government—those men who, if they suivived three years' fighting, re-enlisted for three or five years more, or as long as the war might last. There is but a small band of them; they have no medals to commemorate their service; they have no reoogu tion from the friends of the three months’ soldiers. “This House, before it proceeds further in pi- king out the dead-wood, the trash, the men who followed in the wake of the army, and pensioning them, ought to mak9 some provision for the men who fought at the front, who have no hospital records, no such claims for pensions as are ordinarily presumed 1 ere. Some of thes: men I have the honor to know; and fiomoneof this class I received a fewdavsago a letter which I send to the Clerk’s desk to be read that it may go into the Record as a part of my remarks.” Afteb President Cleveland had vetoed bills for the erection of large and unnecessary public buildings in several small Northern towns, the Republican organs

began to crj out that he hated the North and was exercising his veto as he did on the pension bill—because he hated the Union soldier. But now that the vetoes on buildings in Southern towns begin to fall the organs are significantly silent. They haven’t even the chance to feel os the people of Asheville, North Carolina, did when they sent a message to the President as follows: “While your veto of the Court House bill is generally regretted, the confidence of the public in your wisdom and justice remains unshaken, and should you visit North Carolina at any time, you would receive a cordial welcome at Asheville.” —Detroit Free Press.