AN AFFECTING INCIDENT.–

20. May 2009 by admin.

The State Military Agent of Michigan, at Nashville, L. B. Willard, relates the following affecting incident:

“As I was passing by the post hospital, my attention was arrested by the singing, in a rather loud tone of ‘Rally round the flag, boys,’ by one of the patients inside. While listening to the beautiful music of that popular song, I observed to a nurse standing in the doorway, that the person singing must be in a very merry mood, and could not be very sick. ‘You are mistaken, sir,’ said he; ‘the poor fellow engaged in singing that good old song is now grappling with death–has been dying all day. I am his nurse,’ he continued, ‘and the scene so affected me that I was obliged to leave the room. He is just about breathing his last.’ I stepped into the ward, and, true enough, the brave man was near his end. His eyes were already fixed in death. He was struggling with all his remaining strength against the grim monster, while at the same time there gushed forth from his patriotic soul, incoherently, the words, ‘Rally round the flag, boys,’ which had so often cheered him through his weary march, and braced him up when entering the field of blood in defence of his country. Finally he sank away into his death-slumber, and joined his Maker’s command, that is marching onward to that far-off, better land. The last audible sound that escaped his lips was, ‘Rally, boys; rally once again.’ As his eyes were closing, some dozen of his comrades joined in a solemn yet beautiful hymn, appropriate to the occasion. Take it altogether, this was one of the most affecting scenes I have ever witnessed in a hospital. It drew tears copiously from near one hundred of us. It occurred in the large ward, which occupies the entire body of the church on Cherry Street. The deceased was an Illinoisan, and had been wounded in one of the recent skirmishes.”

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