I

CHAPTER IV

The Soldier Boy Earns His Spurs

N April 1861, when Fort Sumter was fired on, the Ohio youth with whose history we are concerned, was still engaged in the creditable profession of teaching. But the call of patriotic citizens to the defence of their country's flag found him quick to drop the tutor's pen and take up the soldier's sword. At Lincoln's summons the whole loyal North sprang to arms; no part of it with more patriotic ardor than the old Western Reserve, in the borders of which McKinley was living. From every county and town volunteers were soon marching toward the frontier. Every village and hamlet sent its quota. Poland was not behind the rest. June, 1861, a mass meeting was held, at which some stirring speeches were made, and at its close a company was enlisted.

In

Among those who composed this company, many of them boys, was our young teacher, then about eighteen years of age, a palefaced, slender youth of scarcely middle height, but full of boyish energy and vim.

General Fremont inspected and mustered in the recruits. He examined young McKinley, pounded his chest, looked into his eyes and said: "You'll do." That was perhaps the proudest moment the boy had yet known, to be thus treated by the famous “Pathfinder," of whose thrilling adventures he had read with so much.

zest.

The captain and first lieutenant were selected, the company assembled on the village green, where the last good-byes to parents and sweethearts were said, the final tears of regret and homesickness that sprang to their eyes frowned down, and off they marched for Columbus, the State Capital, where the Governor was then

busily mustering the regiments needed for the State quota and despatching them with all speed to the seat of the coming war.

The Poland company was made company E, of the Twentythird Regiment of Ohio Volunteers, its first colonel being William S. Rosecrans, soon to be raised to the rank of general, and in the end to gain great distinction as commander of the Army of the Cumberland, a military organization, only surpassed in size by the Army of the Potomac. Its major was Rutherford B. Hayes, also destined to rise to the rank of major-general, and to become in after years Governor of Ohio and President of the United States.

HIS REGIMENT MUSTERED IN.

The regiment was mustered in by Captain J. C. Robinson, of the Fifth U. S. Infantry, afterwards a major-general of volunteers. It had enlisted for three months' service in response to President Lincoln's call for 75,000 men, but on reaching Columbus it was found that the Ohio quota of twenty-two regiments was already filled. It would have been obliged to disband but for the fact that a second call for volunteers for three years' service had just been made. The regiment, without hesitation, enlisted for this term, and thus took rank as the Twenty-third Regiment, the senior Ohio regiment on the roll of three-year volunteers. Its date of enrollment was June 11, 1861.

For fourteen months McKinley carried a musket in the ranks. He was a good soldier, intelligently obedient to his superior officers and genial and generous to his comrades. There was no more popular man in the regiment, and no harder fighter. Nor was there any lack of fighting to do. Six weeks after it left Columbus the regiment had its baptism of blood and fire at Carnifex Ferry. Then it had to chase the Rebel raiders back and forth across the rugged mountain ranges, was drenched by incessant rains, almost famished at times for lack of food, and exposed to all manner of unpleasant experiences. The young men from Poland thus had

their fighting qualities and powers of endurance put to a hard test. But they stood it admirably.

Colonel Rosecrans did not lead the regiment to the field. His abilities as a strategist were recognized and his promotion to a higher command came before the Twenty-third received its orders to march. He was succeeded by Colonel E. S. Scammon, who led his ardent young soldiers to West Virginia, where the country around Clarksburg was being raided by roving bands, threatening to hold that region for the Confederate cause. This state of affairs was doing much to discourage Union sentiment.

Scammon and his men were bidden to drive these wasps from their nests. This was a trying service for raw troops, most of them boys, or just past the period of boyhood, denizens of a level country, heavily laden with arms and accoutrements, and sent into a wild, mountainous region, there to endure the trials and privations of a soldier's life.

HARD MARCHING

The regiment reached Clarksburg on July 27th. It was given but a single day to rest, and on the 28th was ordered to Weston, as a central point from which to deal with the mountain bands. Days and nights of weary and largely profitless labor succeeded, labor from which no fame was to be gained, but which played its part in the effort of the Government to suppress the rebellion and restore peace to the land. Up and down the rugged hills and through the ravines and valleys about Rich Mountain the raw recruits marched and countermarched, exposed to incessant rains and rapidly hardening themselves from untrained countrymen into vigorous and capable soldiers. The enemy being made up of small, scattered bands, it became necessary to divide the regiment into detachments and spread those through the hills. The rovers were hard to find and hard to overtake when found, it being their policy to strike, but to avoid being struck, and for six weary weeks the Twenty-third was employed in chasing elusive foes, who were ever on the alert and were adepts at concealment and ambush.

It may well be believed that the order for the reunion of the detatchments was heard with delight. This took place on September 1, the regiment marching to Bulltown. where it joined the main body of General Rosecrans' command. Thence the army proceeded with rapid marches to Carnifex Ferry, where the Confederate General Floyd, with a strong body of troops, was encamped in a strong position.

The previous service of the regiment had been like fox-hunting. The service before them was more like war. They were now in the face of the foe, as eager, apparently, as themselves for battle, and doubtless many a heart beat high and many a hope of glory and fame was indulged in when the sound of the bugles of the enemy reached their ears. With these feelings, we may be sure, were mingled sentiments of dread and alarm, natural to those who, for the first time, face an enemy on the embattled field. This was a different matter from chasing a flying band or guarding against an ambushed enemy, rarely to be seen until their rifles rang out. Yet the latter service had made men of the untrained boys of the Twentythird, and we may safely assure ourselves that the youthful McKinley and his brothers-in-arms awaited the battle with more of hope than of dread.

TRYING TO CATCH FLOYD

Whatever their feelings, their fortitude as soldiers was not put to the test, for the expected battle was not fought. There was a sharp skirmish between the advanced lines of the two armies on the evening of the 10th, and the Union troops lay on their arms during the dark hours of the night, fully expecting to be greeted with the rattle of musketry the next day. They were disappointed. General Floyd decided that prudence was the better part of valor, and when day dawned the troops of Rosecrans gazed upon an empty scene. The Confederates had left their camp and slipped away during the night. Pursuit was made, but in vain. A heavy rain made the creeks impassable, and before they could be crossed the enemy was out of reach.

Returning from this fruitless pursuit with nothing to show except a few stragglers taken prisoners, the regiment marched to Camp Ewing, on New River, where it went into winter quarters. The position proved to be an unhealthy one, the air full of the germs of malaria, and the young soldiers, many of them worn out with their unaccustomed hardships and privations, were ill fitted to withstand the insidious assaults of disease. Malarial fever and other diseases attacked them, and the hospital was quickly filled.

We have reason to believe that young McKinley withstood this creeping foe. The winter was well employed in drilling the new troops and recruiting the regiments, the only active service being an occasional foray after some adventurous band of Confederates that came within striking distance of the camp.

When the Spring of 1862 opened, the old work of the regiment was renewed. On May 1st it reached Princeton, in West Virginia, only to find it in flames and the Confederate band which had held it vanished and gone. The tables were turned against the Twenty-third on May 8th, when the regiment was attacked by General Heth, with a strong force of infantry and six pieces of artillery. Much overmatched, it was obliged to retreat, but fell back in good order to East River.

The next camping-place of the Twenty-third Ohio was at Flat Top Mountain, where it remained until July 13th, suffering severely from want of supplies, which were cut off by the activity of the roving foe. Thence they were ordered to Green Meadows, on New River, and on August 8th came a peremptory command for the regiment to march with all speed to Camp Platt, on the Great Kanawha River. In a little more than three days they made the distance of 104 miles on foot--a highly creditable achievement.

This hasty march had its adequate cause. While the minor war we have chronicled was going on in West Virginia, war on a large scale was being waged elsewhere. McClellan's advance against Richmond had been made, the disastrous Seven Days' fight and the Second Bull Run battle had been fought, General