Henry Howard Brownell, called “the laureate of the Civil War,” was
born in Providence, Rhode Island, February 6, 1820. His early
manhood was devoted to literary work. He served on the _Hartford_
under Farragut during a part of the Rebellion, and at the close of
the war accompanied that officer upon a cruise to various European
ports. He died in Hartford, Connecticut, October 31, 1872. Thomas
Bailey Aldrich has paid a beautiful tribute to his memory in a
sonnet beginning--
“They never crowned him, never knew his worth,
But let him go unlaureled to the grave.”
The conflict commemorated in this poem, resulting in the opening of the
lower Mississippi, took place on the 24th of April, 1862. The
introductory portion of the poem is omitted, and a few additional
stanzas that retard, rather than accelerate, the forward movement.
=Stanza 1.= “Up the River of Death
Sailed the great Admiral.”
David Glasgow Farragut, generally conceded to be the greatest American
seaman, was born near Knoxville, Tennessee, July 5, 1801. His most
famous victories were those of the “River Fight” and of Mobile Bay,
which Brownell celebrated in a poem entitled “The Bay Fight,” perhaps
his best-known effort, the length of which precludes its use in this
volume. (See poem, “Farragut,” by William T. Meredith). He died in
Portsmouth, New Hampshire, August 14, 1870.
=Stanza 4.= =Porter= (David Dixon, 1813-1891), the naval officer who
succeeded Farragut as vice-admiral and admiral. He had command of the
mortar flotilla in the “River Fight.”
=Last Stanza.= The church-pennant is made of white bunting in the form of
an isosceles triangle, on each side of which is sewed blue bunting in
shape of a cross resting horizontally on the white. This pennant is used
only when religious service is being held, and is then hoisted above the
national ensign.