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MADE HIS FOE’S TOMBSTONE.
The Story of a Wounded Union Soldier's Sympathetic Act.
Mrs. Orra Linghorne, of Lynchburg, Va., writes to The Boston Transcript:.....
“A number of Massachusetts soldiers, wounded in the battle of New Market, were left in my native village in the Shenandoah valley. A few days before, the Confederate authorities, moving their stores to prevent capture by the approaching Federal's, had requested the citizens to take into private houses a few Confederate soldiers too ill for removal from the town. Lieut. Woodly, a West Virginian, was carried to my father’s house, and, though every effort was made to save him, he died in a few days. At my father’s request Dr. Allen*, the surgeon of the Thirty-fourth Massachusetts regiment, left in charge of the wounded Federal's, visited Mr. Woodly at our house and paid him every possible attention.
In my daily visits to the Federal hospital, which was near us, many kindly inquiries were always made for the wounded ‘stranger within our gates.’ One morning I told the Federal soldiers that our guest was dead, and many regrets and much sympathy for his family were expressed.
A soldier, named Adams I believe, who sat on the floor nursing his wounded foot, said to me gently: 'I am a marble cutter by trade, and if you will give me a slab of hard wood I will carve Lieut. Woodly’s name on it so that his family can find his grave after the war is over.’ One of the walnut boards used to mark the soldiers’ graves was sent to the hospital and the wounded Federal forgot his own pain in carving in clear typo the dead Confederate’s name and regiment, with the words, ‘He giveth His beloved sleep.'
In the spring of '65, after Gen. Grant had received Gen. Lee’s surrender and ordered that the ‘boys should keep the horses they would need to make a crop,’ a young widow, with her two lovely boys, the eldest about 6 years old, visited the soldiers' cemetery in our village and, parting the tangled grass, found the name of her husband carved by the foe who had been actuated by love, not hate, though he, too, had suffered. There was no pension for the widow or her babes; a cruel struggle with poverty lay before them, but as she knelt and kissed the sod above her lover-husband, she blessed the man whose care had enabled her to find the grave.
http://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=d&d=SRPD18890309.2.65
*Dr. Charles G. Allen was born in 1833 and raised in Barre, MA. At the age of 26 he taught English and foreign languages at the academy in Bernardston, MA. He left the teaching profession to attend Harvard Medical School and pursued the practice of medicine in Barre. At the onset of the Civil War, Dr Allen enlisted in Company F, 53rd Massachusetts. After serving out his term, he re-enlisted in the 34th Massachusetts as Assistant Surgeon. After the war, he returned to Barre and bought a small farm. He would never practice medicine again. http://www.chasgallen.com/company/history/
The Story of a Wounded Union Soldier's Sympathetic Act.
Mrs. Orra Linghorne, of Lynchburg, Va., writes to The Boston Transcript:.....
“A number of Massachusetts soldiers, wounded in the battle of New Market, were left in my native village in the Shenandoah valley. A few days before, the Confederate authorities, moving their stores to prevent capture by the approaching Federal's, had requested the citizens to take into private houses a few Confederate soldiers too ill for removal from the town. Lieut. Woodly, a West Virginian, was carried to my father’s house, and, though every effort was made to save him, he died in a few days. At my father’s request Dr. Allen*, the surgeon of the Thirty-fourth Massachusetts regiment, left in charge of the wounded Federal's, visited Mr. Woodly at our house and paid him every possible attention.
In my daily visits to the Federal hospital, which was near us, many kindly inquiries were always made for the wounded ‘stranger within our gates.’ One morning I told the Federal soldiers that our guest was dead, and many regrets and much sympathy for his family were expressed.
A soldier, named Adams I believe, who sat on the floor nursing his wounded foot, said to me gently: 'I am a marble cutter by trade, and if you will give me a slab of hard wood I will carve Lieut. Woodly’s name on it so that his family can find his grave after the war is over.’ One of the walnut boards used to mark the soldiers’ graves was sent to the hospital and the wounded Federal forgot his own pain in carving in clear typo the dead Confederate’s name and regiment, with the words, ‘He giveth His beloved sleep.'
In the spring of '65, after Gen. Grant had received Gen. Lee’s surrender and ordered that the ‘boys should keep the horses they would need to make a crop,’ a young widow, with her two lovely boys, the eldest about 6 years old, visited the soldiers' cemetery in our village and, parting the tangled grass, found the name of her husband carved by the foe who had been actuated by love, not hate, though he, too, had suffered. There was no pension for the widow or her babes; a cruel struggle with poverty lay before them, but as she knelt and kissed the sod above her lover-husband, she blessed the man whose care had enabled her to find the grave.
http://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=d&d=SRPD18890309.2.65
*Dr. Charles G. Allen was born in 1833 and raised in Barre, MA. At the age of 26 he taught English and foreign languages at the academy in Bernardston, MA. He left the teaching profession to attend Harvard Medical School and pursued the practice of medicine in Barre. At the onset of the Civil War, Dr Allen enlisted in Company F, 53rd Massachusetts. After serving out his term, he re-enlisted in the 34th Massachusetts as Assistant Surgeon. After the war, he returned to Barre and bought a small farm. He would never practice medicine again. http://www.chasgallen.com/company/history/