CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



129 



country, are everywhere to be found among the young 

 men of America. But from his graduation at Williams 

 onward, to the hour of his tragical death, Garfield's 

 career was eminent and exceptional^ Slowly working 

 through his educational period, receiving his diploma 

 when twenty-four years of age, he seemed at one 

 bound to sp'ring into conspicuous and brilliant suc- 

 cess. Within six years he was successively president 

 of a college. State Senator of Ohio, major-general of 

 the Army 01 the United States, and Representative- 

 elect to the National Congress. A combination of 

 honors so varied, so elevated, within a period so brief 

 and to a man so young, is without precedent or paral- 

 lel in the history of the country." 



ARMY LIFE. 



" Garfield's army life was begun with no other mili- 

 tary knowledge than such as he had hastily gained 

 from books in the few months preceding his march to 

 the field. Stepping from civil life to the head of a 

 regiment, the first order he received when ready to 

 cross the Ohio was to assume command of a brigade, 

 and to operate as an independent force in Eastern 

 Kentucky. His immediate duty was to check the ad- 

 vance ot Humphrey Marshall, who was marching 

 down the Big Sandy with the intention of occupying, 

 in connection with other Confederate forces, the en- 

 tire territory of Kentucky, and of precipitating the 

 State into secession. This was at the close of the year 

 1861. Seldom, if ever, has a young college professor 

 been thrown into a more embarrassing and discour- 

 aging position. He knew just enough of military sci- 

 ence, as he expressed it himself, to measure the extent 

 of his ignorance, and with a handful of men he was 

 marching, in rough winter weather, into a strange 

 country, among a hostile population, to confront a 

 largely superior force under the command of a dis- 

 tinguished graduate of West Point, who had seen ac- 

 tive and important service in two preceding wars. 



" The result of the campaign is matter of history. 

 The skill, the endurance, the extraordinary energy 

 shown by Garfield, the courage he imparted to his 

 men, raw and untried as himself, the measures he 

 adopted to increase his force and to create in the 

 enemy's mind exaggerated estimates of his numbers, 

 bore perfect fruit in the routing of Marshall, the capt- 

 ure of his^camp, the dispersion of his force, and the 

 emancipation of an important territory from the con- 

 trol of the rebellion. Coming at the close of a long 

 series of disasters to the Union arms ; Garfield's vic- 

 tory had an unusual and extraneous importance, and 

 in the popular judgment elevated the young com- 

 mander to the rank of a military hero. With less 

 than two thousand men in his entire command, with 

 a mobilized force of only eleven hundred, without 

 cannon, he had met an army of five thousand and de- 

 feated them driving Marshall's forces successively 

 from two strongholds of their own selection, fortified 

 with abundant artillery. Major-General Buellj com- 

 manding the Department of the Ohio, an experienced 

 and able soldier of the regular Army, published an 

 order of thanks and congratulation on the brilliant 

 result of the Big Sandy campaign, which would have 

 turned the head of a less cool and sensible man than 

 Garfield. Buell declared that his services had called 

 into action the highest qualities of a soldier, and Presi- 

 dent Lincoln supplemented these words of praise by 

 the more substantial reward of a brigadier-general's 

 commission, to bear date from the day of his decisive 

 victory over Marshall. 



" The subsequent military career of Garfield fully 

 sustained its brilliant beginning. With his new com- 

 mission he was assigned to the command of a brigade 

 in the Army of the Ohio, and took part in the second 

 and decisive day's fight in the great battle of Shiloh. 

 The remainder of the year 1862 was not especially 

 eventful to Garfield, as it was not to the armies with 

 which he was serving. His practical sense was called 

 into exercise in completing tne task, assigned him by 

 General Buell, of reconstructing bridges and re-estab- 

 lishing lines of railway communication for the army. 

 VOL. xxn. 9 A 



His occupation in this useful but not brilliant field 

 was varied by service on courts-martial of importance, 

 in which department of duty he won a valuable repu- 

 tation, attracting the notice and securing the approval 

 of the able and eminent Judge- Advocate-General of 

 the Army. That of itself was warrant to honorable 

 fame ; for among the great men who in those trying 

 days gave themselves, with entire devotion, to the 

 service of their country, one who brought to that serv- 

 ice the ripest learning, the most fervid eloquence, 

 the most varied attainments, who labored with mod- 



jary's deliverance was Joseph 

 Holt, of Kentucky, who in his honorable retirement 

 enjoys the respect and veneration of all who love the 

 Union of the States. 



" Early in 1863 Garfield was assigned to the highly 

 important and responsible post of chief of staff to Gen- 

 eral Rosecrans, then at the head of the Army of the 

 Cumberland. Perhaps in a great military campaign, 

 no subordinate officer requires sounder judgment and 

 quicker knowledge of men than the chief of staff to 

 the commanding general. An indiscreet man in such 

 a position can sow more discord, breed more jealousy, 

 and disseminate more strife than any other officer in 

 the entire organization. When General Garfield as- 

 sumed his new duties he found various troubles al- 

 ready well developed and seriously affecting the value 

 and efficiency of the Army of the Cumberland. The 

 energy, the impartiality, and the tact with which he 

 sought to allay these dissensions, and to discharge the 

 duties of his new and trying position will always re- 

 main one of the most striking proofs of his great ver- 

 satility. His military duties'closed on the memorable 

 field of Chickamauga, a field which, however disas- 

 trous to the Union arms, gave to him the occasion of 

 winning imperishable laurels. The very rare distinc- 

 tion was accorded him of a great promotion for his 

 bravery on a field that was lost. President Lincoln 

 appointed him a major-general in the Army of the 

 United States for gallant and meritorious conduct in 

 the battle of Chickamauga. 



" The Army of the Cumberland was reorganized 

 under the command of General Thomas, who prompt- 

 ly offered Garfield one of its divisions. He was ex- 

 tremely desirous to accept the position, but was em- 

 barrassed by the fact that he had, a year before, been 

 elected to Congress, and the time when he must take 

 his seat was drawing near. He preferred to remain 

 in the military service, and had within his own breast 

 the largest confidence of success in the wider field 

 which his new rank opened to him. Balancing the 

 arguments on the one side and the other, anxious to 

 determine what was for the best, desirous above all 

 things to do his patriotic duty, he was decisively in- 

 fluenced by the advice of President Lincoln and Sec- 

 retary Stanton, both of whom assured him that he 

 could, at that time, be of especial value in the House 

 of Representatives. He resigned his commission of 

 maior-general on the 5th day of December, 1863, and 

 tooK his seat in the House of Representatives on the 

 7th. He had served two years and four months in 

 the army, and had just completed his thirty-second 

 year." 



ELECTED TO CONGRESS. 



" The Thirty-eighth Congress is pre-eminently en- 

 titled in history to the designation of the War Con- 

 gress. It was elected while the war was flagrant, and 

 every member was chosen upon the issues involved in 

 the continuance of the struggle. The Thirty-seventh 

 Congress had, indeed, legislated to a large extent on 

 war measures, but it was chosen before any one be- 

 lieved that secession of the States would be actually 

 attempted. The magnitude of the work which fell 

 upon its successor was unprecedented, both in respect 

 to the vast sums of money raised for the support of 

 the army and navy, and of the new and extraordinary 

 powers of legislation which it was forced to exercise. 

 Only twenty-four States were represented, and one 



