_December 20_.--Somehow I got thinking to-day of young men's deaths--not
at all sadly or sentimentally, but gravely, realistically, perhaps a
little artistically. Let me give the following three cases from budgets
of personal memoranda, which I have been turning over, alone in my room,
and resuming and dwelling on, this rainy afternoon. Who is there to whom
the theme does not come home? Then I don't know how it may be to
others, but to me not only is there nothing gloomy or depressing in such
cases--on the contrary, as reminiscences, I find them soothing, bracing,
tonic.
ERASTUS HASKELL.--[I just transcribe verbatim from a letter written by
myself in one of the army hospitals, 16 years ago, during the secession
war.] _Washington, July 28, 1863._--Dear M.,--I am writing this in the
hospital, sitting by the side of a soldier, I do not expect to last many
hours. His fate has been a hard one--he seems to be only about 19 or
20--Erastus Haskell, company K, 141st N. Y.--has been out about a year,
and sick or half-sick more than half that time--has been down on the
peninsula--was detail'd to go in the band as fifer-boy. While sick, the
surgeon told him to keep up with the rest--(probably work'd and march'd
too long.) He is a shy, and seems to me a very sensible boy--has fine
manners--never complains--was sick down on the peninsula in an old
storehouse--typhoid fever. The first week this July was brought up
here--journey very bad, no accommodations, no nourishment, nothing
but hard jolting, and exposure enough to make a well man sick; (these
fearful journeys do the job for many)--arrived here July 11th--a silent
dark-skinn'd Spanish-looking youth, with large very dark blue eyes,
peculiar looking. Doctor F. here made light of his sickness--said he
would recover soon, etc.; but I thought very different, and told F.
so repeatedly; (I came near quarreling with him about it from the
first)--but he laugh'd, and would not listen to me. About four days ago,
I told Doctor he would in my opinion lose the boy without doubt--but F.
again laugh'd at me. The next day he changed his opinion--brought the
head surgeon of the post--he said the boy would probably die, but they
would make a hard fight for him.
The last two days he has been lying panting for breath--a pitiful
sight. I have been with him some every day or night since he arrived. He
suffers a great deal with the heat--says little or nothing--is flighty
the last three days, at times--knows me always, however--calls me
"Walter"--(sometimes calls the name over and over and over again,
musingly, abstractedly, to himself.) His father lives at Breesport,
Chemung county, N. Y., is a mechanic with large family--is a steady,
religious man; his mother too is living. I have written to them, and
shall write again to-day--Erastus has not receiv'd a word from home for
months.
As I sit here writing to you, M., I wish you could see the whole scene.
This young man lies within reach of me, flat on his back, his hands
clasp'd across his breast, his thick black hair cut close; he is dozing,
breathing hard, every breath a spasm--it looks so cruel. He is a noble
youngster,--I consider him past all hope. Often there is no one with him
for a long while. I am here as much as possible.
WILLIAM ALCOTT, fireman. _Camden, Nov., 1874_.--Last Monday afternoon
his widow, mother, relatives, mates of the fire department, and his
other friends, (I was one, only lately it is true, but our love grew
fast and close, the days and nights of those eight weeks by the chair
of rapid decline, and the bed of death,) gather'd to the funeral of
this young man, who had grown up, and was well-known here. With nothing
special, perhaps, to record, I would give a word or two to his memory.
He seem'd to me not an inappropriate specimen in character and elements,
of that bulk of the average good American race that ebbs and flows
perennially beneath this scum of eructations on the surface. Always very
quiet in manner, neat in person and dress, good temper'd--punctual and
industrious at his work, till he could work no longer--he just lived his
steady, square, unobtrusive life, in its own humble sphere, doubtless
unconscious of itself. (Though I think there were currents of emotion
and intellect undevelop'd beneath, far deeper than his acquaintances
ever suspected--or than he himself ever did.) He was no talker. His
troubles, when he had any, he kept to himself. As there was nothing
querulous about him in life, he made no complaints during his last
sickness. He was one of those persons that while his associates never
thought of attributing any particular talent or grace to him, yet all
insensibly, really, liked Billy Alcott.
I, too, loved him. At last, after being with him quite a good
deal--after hours and days of panting for breath, much of the time
unconscious, (for though the consumption that had been lurking in his
system, once thoroughly started, made rapid progress, there was still
great vitality in him, and indeed for four or five days he lay
dying, before the close,) late on Wednesday night, Nov. 4th, where we
surrounded his bed in silence, there came a lull--a longer drawn breath,
a pause, a faint sigh--another--a weaker breath, another sigh--a pause
again and just a tremble--and the face of the poor wasted young man (he
was just 26,) fell gently over, in death, on my hand, on the pillow.
CHARLES CASWELL.--[I extract the following, verbatim, from a letter
to me dated September 29, from my friend John Burroughs, at
Esopus-on-Hudson, New York State.] S. was away when your picture came,
attending his sick brother, Charles--who has since died--an event that
has sadden'd me much. Charlie was younger than S., and a most attractive
young fellow. He work'd at my father's and had done so for two years.
He was about the best specimen of a young country farm-hand I ever knew.
You would have loved him. He was like one of your poems. With his
great strength, his blond hair, his cheerfulness and contentment, his
universal good will, and his silent manly ways, he was a youth hard to
match. He was murder'd by an old doctor. He had typhoid fever, and the
old fool bled him twice. He lived to wear out the fever, but had not
strength to rally. He was out of his head nearly all the time. In the
morning, as he died in the afternoon, S. was standing over him, when
Charlie put up his arms around S.'s neck, and pull'd his face down and
kiss'd him. S. said he knew then the end was near. (S. stuck to him day
and night to the last.) When I was home in August, Charlie was cradling
on the hill, and it was a picture to see him walk through the grain. All
work seem'd play to him. He had no vices, any more than Nature has, and
was belov'd by all who knew him.
I have written thus to you about him, for such young men belong to
you; he was of your kind. I wish you could have known him. He had the
sweetness of a child, and the strength and courage and readiness of a
young Viking. His mother and father are poor; they have a rough, hard
farm. His mother works in the field with her husband when the work
presses. She has had twelve children.