594 NortH Carorina Troops, 1861-’65.

pulsed every charge that was made upon them with very
meagre and rapidly thrown up breast works. Their conduct
in camp, on the march and on the battlefield was everything
that could be expected of them, and I am free to say, was
equal to that of the old soldiers who had passed through four
years of war. On the retreat through Raleigh, where many
passed by their homes, scarcely one of them left their ranks
to bid farewell to their friends, though they knew not where
they were going and what dangers they would encounter.”

It would not be appropriate, even if time permitted, that
I should follow the fortunes of the individual members of the
command after the close of the war. In fact in one respect
it would involve a mortifying confession, for truth compels
me to admit that not a few of them have degenerated into
what Pope calls:

‘*Vile attorneys, now a useless race !”

The earnest and faithful Charles W. Broadfoot of Fayette-
ville; the Christian jurist who now so worthily adorns the
Supreme Court Bench, Judge Walter Clark, of Wake; the
tireless and successful barrister, occupying a position infe-
rior to no member of the profession in the State, John W.
Hinsdale, of Raleigh; the chaste and peerless advocate of the
Chowan, William D. Pruden, of Edenton; the chivalric and
zealous W. Foster French of Robeson, now alas! gone to his
last resting place; the eloquent and courtly Charles Price, of
Rowan; the scholarly and erudite Hugh F. Muray, of Wil-
son dead for some years; the successful lawyer and polished
gentleman, Adjutant Alexander T. London, of Wilmington,
now of Birmingham, Ala.; the lawyer and politician, in the
best sense of the term, Reuben McBrayer, late of Cleveland,
who died in Asheville, are names that suggest themselves. In
the world of business the names are equally numerous: Col-
onel Jno. H. Anderson (now dead), who achieved marked suc-
cess in New York; Colonel W. F. Beasley, so well and widely
known; Major N. A. Gregory, of Oxford, a high type of man-
hood, and a host beside of whom I shall only name a few:

THe Junior Reserves BRIGADE. 595

Such men as Jesse W. Grainger, of Lenoir; Prof. J. M. Ban-
dy, of Trinity College; Dr. LaFayette Foster, of Franklin;
J. J. Laughinghouse, of Pitt; J. S. Peseud, of Raleigh; L.
A. Bristol and H. W. Connelly, of Burke; J. D. Kerr, of Du-
plin; Captain O. C. Wells, of Cleveland; W. H. Overman, of
Salisbury ; Lieutenant Fetzer, of Cabarrus, are men who do
honor to the Junior Reserves in every department of human
activity.

But not to these representative officers, honorable and hon-
ored though they be, do we tender the laurel to-day. When
each recurring spring, with dew and sunshine, breathes upon
the dormant buds and wakes them into tender leaf and fra-
grant blossom, and Southern women, reviving precious memo-
ries, come to pay their never-failing tribute of love to their
dead heroes, their rarest, sweetest flowers will always adorn
the unmarked grave of the Private Soldier. These unlet-
tered lads knew and cared nought about the complex political
problems that could be solved only upon the deadly boards of
war. They only knew that North Carolina had called them
to her defence, and leaving all behind they came, “bearing all
things, believing all things, enduring all things.” They
looked for no personal glory, they shirked no duty, they were

false to no trust.
True, when the long day’s march was over, and under the

sighing pines the tired boys threw themselves supperless upon
the ground to sleep, and thoughts of home and mother came,

unbidden guests, sometimes

‘Something upon the soldier’s cheek washed off the stain of powder.”

But their moistened eyes were hidden by the kindly veil
of night, and the morning’s sun brought brightness in its
train. They were so young, so gallant, and so true. Whether
like young Denmark, with naked, bleeding feet, they were
marching into battle against Grant’s veterans in Virginia, or
fever-stricken in a wayside hospital, are “babbling o’ green
fields” or sinking into the unconscious sleep that presages
death, they kept their courage to the end. Their actions

“Smell sweet and blossom in the dust.”