THE
BY
EDWARD HENRY CLEMENT
CAMBRIDGE
JOHN WILSON AND SON
University Press
1909
From the
Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society
for March, 1909.
A little paper written years ago by a lately deceased brotherof mine[1] describing the rout of the battle of Bull Run as hesaw it with the eyes of a boy and a boy's love of the marvellousseems to me to possess some value historically for the intimate,unconscious picturing, along with it, of the state of thepublic mind on the eve of the so-called "great uprising." Itseems to illustrate well the truth that the great Civil War, as awar, was really a surprise,—to the people of the North atleast; that the idea persisting up to the day of the battle of BullRun at the back of the mind of everybody was that in someway the war-cloud would blow over, that the actual shock ofcontending armies and the pouring out of blood of citizens incivil war would be prevented or in some way avoided. Theoccasion of the trip to Washington, to carry dainties to asoldier brother, the occasion of the extension of the partlysight-seeing journey to the first battle-field of the great war,the commission from the horror-struck authorities at home tofind and bring back from Virginia the body of the first Massachusettssoldier to fall,—all prove the naïveté of the popularconceptions at that time of what it was to enter upon war.This Chelsea boy,[2] whose body my brother was bidden by themayor of their native place to recover and send home at allcosts, was but the first of the fated host of three hundred andsixty thousand young men about to die for their country inthe ensuing four years. I remember distinctly the consternationof the community when it was found that the Chelseacompany of the First Massachusetts Infantry had been in thesharp action which was the first engagement in the approachingcollision of the main armies, and that men had actuallybeen shot and killed. The sickening realization was akinto that feeling my eldest brother[3] in that regiment had confessedto me when I was visiting him at the assembling andtraining camp at Readville and the new army wagons in theirfresh blue paint and white canvas arrived on the scene in longarray. "It looks as though we were really going," he remarkedruefully.
[1] Andrew J. Clement, First Sergeant, Company M, First Massachusetts Cavalry;died at Morton, Pennsylvania, February 27, 1908.
[2] Philander Crowell, Company H, First Massachusetts Volunteers.
[3] William B. Clement, Company H; died at Chelsea, July 18, 1896.
I find a pretty complete picture of the psychology of thosebewildered and dreadful weeks and months in two speeches ofWendell Phillips in that series of wonderful orations in whichhe rode the storm seeking to direct it to great issues. Someof these speeches I had the fortune to hear. I have been lookingup certain things I heard delivered in that d