"He needs it more than I do, poor fellow. Yes, give it to him."

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Pennsylvania Governor Andrew Curtin (1861-1867)
Governor Curtin tells the following:

Riding over the field just after the battle of Spottsylvania, I came across a wounded Pennsylvania soldier. He was leaning against a stump, holding a bloody leg. I dismounted and asked him how ho was.

"Is the bone broken?" I inquired, as he explained his injury.

"No," said he, cheerfully, "only a bullet through the flesh." Still, he was faint and thirsty.

" What would you rather have just now, my man?" said I, "if you had but one wish ?"—I was thinking of his home in the Pennsylvania hills.

" I would like to have a good drink of Pennsylvania whisky," he replied, with a smile.

"Then here it is," I replied, extending my flask; "you shall have it.''

He took the flask, held it in his hand a second, then pointed at a dying Confederate soldier near by.

"Better give it to him," he said, "he needs it more than I do, poor fellow. Yes, give it to him."

We turned to the latter. For all we knew, it might have been the very man who shot him. But we propped him up and attempted to pour some of the liquor down his parched throat. He heard every word, and seemed to understand the situation thoroughly.

It was too late. With a grateful look in his eyes as he turned them a moment on the wounded Pennsylvania soldier, he sighed deeply and fell back dead.

I have seen that Pennsylvania soldier since the war. He had nothing to begin life anew with. On the strength of that deed to an enemy at such a time I indorsed him for a sum of money. He prospered. He now owns two mills and a couple of farms, and he deserves all he has.

Ex-Governor Curtin's War Story.
(From the New York Tribune.)
 
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