“Right here came a critical period in his career, and although there
are men who still assert that his sympathy was with the secessionists,
there is plenty of evidence that the South had no claim upon him,--that
whatever his original sentiments may have been, his public utterances
were always loyal, and that when the crisis came he was on the right
side. The country he lived in was full of Southern sympathizers, his
mother’s family were secessionists, and his surroundings made loyalty
unpopular. The story that he tendered his services to Jefferson Davis
is contradicted by that gentleman, who says he never heard of Logan
until more than a year after the war began.
“There are several witnesses to the fact that in November, 1860, when
Lincoln’s election was assured, and threats were freely made that
he should not be inaugurated, Logan publicly declared that he would
shoulder a musket and escort the ‘Rail-Splitter’ to the White House.
“While he was in Washington, attending the called session of congress
in the summer of 1861, he went to the front, as many representatives
did, to visit the army in Virginia, and being the guest of Colonel
Richardson when the battle of Bull Run took place, he was given a
musket and fought through that eventful July day as a private in the
ranks.”
When congress adjourned in August, he went home, resigned his seat in
congress, raised the Thirty-first Illinois Regiment, was commissioned
its colonel, and led them into battle at Belmont, Missouri, ten months
after they were mustered into service. One has well said, “Logan was
developed by the war. The bugler of the army sounded the key-note of
his character, and in an atmosphere of dust and powder he grew great.”
In that first battle at Belmont he had his horse shot under him, while
leading a successful bayonet-charge. He fought with General Grant at
Fort Henry, and in the siege and terrific contest at Fort Donelson he
bore a brave, conspicuous part, and was wounded in the left arm. He
was off duty for a while, and refused a re-election to congress, but
reported on March 5th to General Grant for duty at Pittsburgh Landing,
only about a month after the Fort Donelson engagement, and was at once
made a brigadier-general.
Nashville had fallen. Tennessee was largely within the Union lines,
and entrance was being effected into Georgia and Mississippi; hence
the stubborn resistance of the foe at Pittsburgh Landing. But victory
brought them to the siege of Corinth, Island No. 10 falling under the
guns of Commodore Foote. Grant and Logan led their armies down to
Vicksburg.
During the winter-campaign in Mississippi and the siege of Vicksburg,
Logan’s bravery was proverbial. He was given command of a division in
McPherson’s corps, and made a major-general in the army, within a year
of entrance.
During the summer of 1862 he was repeatedly urged to “run for
congress,” but his reply was worthy a hero: “I have entered the field
to die, if need be, for this Government, and never expect to return
to peaceful pursuits until the object of this war of preservation has
become a fact established.”
His personal bravery and military skill were so conspicuous in Grant’s
Northern Mississippi movements, where he commanded a division of the
Seventeenth Army Corps, under General McPherson, he was promoted to
the rank of major-general Nov. 26, 1862. He was present in every fight,
his daring bravery animating his men at Fort Gibson, Raymond, Jackson,
Champion Hill, and Vicksburg. He was in command of McPherson’s centre,
June 25th, when the assault upon Vicksburg was made. His column led the
entrance into the city, and he became its first military governor.
In November, 1863, he was called to succeed General Sherman in command
of his famous Fifteenth Army Corps. The following May he joined Sherman
as the Georgia campaign was opening. It was Logan who led the advance
of the Army of the Tennessee at Resaca, who whipped Hardee’s trained
veterans at Dallas, and drove the enemy from Kenesaw Mountain.
On July 22d he was in the fierce assault before Atlanta. In this
desperate attack upon Hood, Logan fought as he never fought before, and
when McPherson fell he took command of the Army of the Tennessee, and
with resistless fury avenged the death of the beloved commander.
After the fall of Atlanta he returned to Illinois, temporarily, to
take part in the presidential campaign. It was our privilege to hear
him then, and never, it would seem, did such withering scorn, such
utter denunciation, such infinite contempt, show themselves, as he
manifested in a great speech, full of vim and fire, not for the brave,
honest rebel in arms, but for the cowardly copperheads in the rear.
He was less than forty years of age, only thirty-eight, but his name
and fame as a soldier were a tower of strength, and he drew together
immense crowds.
Soon after Mr. Lincoln’s second election he returns to the front, and
joins Sherman in his march to the sea, and continued with him until
the surrender of Gen. Joseph Johnston, on April 26, 1865. After the
surrender he marched his men to Alexandria, and rode at their head in
the grand review in Washington. He had taken command of the Army of
the Tennessee, Oct. 23, 1864, and tendered his resignation when active
service was over, being unwilling to draw pay unless on duty in the
field.
President Johnson tendered him the mission to Mexico, but he declined
it, and returning home was elected successively to the fortieth, the
forty-first, and the forty-second congresses. He was selected as one of
a committee of seven to represent the House in the impeachment trial of
Andrew Johnson.
Before he had taken his seat in the forty-second congress, the
legislature of Illinois elected him to the United States senate for
the full term from March 4, 1871, to succeed the Hon. Richard Yates,
the gallant war-governor of that state. He was again chosen for the
senate, and took his seat the second time March 18, 1879. His present
term expires March 3, 1885. He led the delegation of his state in
the national convention of 1880, and was one of the most determined
of the “three hundred and six” who followed the fortunes of “the old
commander,” General Grant.
He has been an active man at military reunions, and was one of the
founders of the Grand Army of the Republic. He was the first national
commander of that organization, and as such issued the order in 1868
for the decoration of the graves of Union soldiers.
His financial views have been the subject of criticism, but they have
generally represented the sentiments of his constituency. In 1866
he took strong grounds in favor of the payment of the national debt
in gold coin. In 1874 he followed the popular Western movement, and
voted for the Inflation bill, which President Grant vetoed. But in the
following year he favored the Sherman Resumption act.
General Logan was always a leader in securing pension legislation. He
has been radical in favoring internal improvements, has always voted
for liberal appropriations for rivers and harbors, and has given his
support to railroad land-grant measures. His property consists of a
residence on Calumet Avenue in Chicago, which is worth from twenty-five
thousand to thirty thousand dollars, and a farm at his old home in
southern Illinois.
He resides in Washington at a boarding-house on Twelfth Street,
occupying two modest rooms, the same in which he has lived for twelve
years.
In 1855 he married Miss Mary Cunningham, of Shawneetown, Ill., and she
has proved a most valuable helpmeet, being as good, if not a better
politician than himself, and a lady of great refinement as well as
intellectual force. There is no woman in public life who possesses
more admirable traits than Mrs. Logan, and her popularity with her own
sex is quite as great as with the other. She can write a speech on
finance, or dictate the action of a political caucus, with as much ease
and grace as she can preside at a dinner-party, or receive her guests.
At the same time she is a devoted mother. She has two children,--a
daughter, who is the wife of Paymaster Tucker, of the army, and a son,
Manning, a cadet at West Point. Both of them have been educated by her,
or under her personal supervision.
As a society woman she is graceful and accomplished; in charities she
is always active and generous; in religion she is a devout Methodist.
During the campaign of 1866 General Logan was running for
congressman-at-large. The multitudes came to hear him; a grand stand
was erected in the court-house yard at Bloomington; thousands were
gathered, filling the grounds and covering the roofs of buildings.
He was in his glory; for three hours he spoke; the people laughed,
and cried, and shouted cheer on cheer. We had heard Douglas, Lovejoy,
Colfax, but never such a speech as that.
The rebel army was whipped and gone, and now the Democratic party
loomed up as an enemy in the land.
In telling why he had left the party and become a staunch Republican,
his sarcasm burned like caustic. He told a story in an inimitable way,
to illustrate the point. It was the story of the flock of sheep the
farmer gave his boys:--
“Tommy was to divide the flock, and Johnny take his choice, so Tommy
put all the fine, large ones by themselves, and all the scabby, scaly,
shaggy ones in another yard, and with them he put Johnny’s little pet
lamb, which he had raised and cared for all summer, feeding it with
fresh, warm milk, and had put a little blue ribbon, with a bell on
it, about its neck; and Tommy knew how he loved it, and so he put it
in with the poor, old, scaly lot of sheep. When Johnny came to look at
the sheep he looked for Nannie, his lamb; he heard its bell, and saw
it was in bad company, with a miserable lot of bad sheep, and so he
said, ‘Nannie, good-bye; I’ve loved you. I tied that blue ribbon about
your neck, and put that bell on it. I’ve fed you and taken care of you
all this time’ (and this description was given with the most dramatic
effect); ‘but, Nannie, we must part. Johnny, I will take this lot,’
pointing to all the best sheep.”
The roar was tumultuous when they saw the point, and it was a terrific
hit for the old party, in with the copperheads and rebels.
It was surely one of the happiest steps of his life, when he came out
on the Republican side of the Republic’s great battle for the liberty
of the enslaved and the citizenship of freemen.
Few soldiers are now living, not excepting the old commander himself,
who in a political campaign will make the heart of the old veterans
beat faster and warmer at the remembrance of former times, and
the achievements of battles now enjoyed, than Gen. John A. Logan,
United States senator from Illinois, and Republican candidate for
vice-president, with James G. Blaine, of Maine, for president.
The old hearts thrill anew, and the old shout rings out again, and the
victory of the past must at their hands be perpetuated in the victory
of the future.
[Illustration: _FINIS._]