Excerpt.....No American boy born during or immediately after the Civil War can have escaped in those years the vivid impressions derived from the sight and speech of men who had fought its battles, or women who had known its terror and grief. Chief among my playthings on that peaceful hillside was the sword my father had borne at Shiloh and on to the sea; and I remember, too, his uniform coat and sash and epaulets and the tattered guidon of his battery, that, falling to my lot as toys, yet imparted to my childish consciousness a sense of what war had been. The young imagination was kindled in[6] those days by many and great names. Lincoln, Grant, and Sherman were among the first lispings of Northern children of my generation; and in the little town where I was born lived men who had spoken with them face to face. I did not know, until I sought them later for myself, the fairy-tales that are every child’s birthright; and I imagine that children of my generation heard less of.....
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