You have called for a brigade of Massachusetts troops; why not call for a brigadier-general and staff? I have some hope of being detailed.During the night a requisition came to the governor for a brigadier-general, and I was notified by telegraph from Washington that such requisition had been made. As will be seen by those who read these pages, I was fully acquainted with the financial condition of Massachusetts in regard
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received from my hands.
On the 5th of February, the legislature appropriated one hundred thousand dollars to put the troops in readiness and provide for their transportation.
This emergency bill was passed at a secret session, at which I was present to give information to the legislature.
On the same 5th of February the governor and council authorized the making of contracts to supply the troops with equipments and clothing.
So that it is a matter of history that I took part in all that was done to have Massachusetts ready for the war, and Schouler did all he could to-have those facts forgotten.
On the 15th of April, Cameron, Secretary of War, sent a requisition by telegraph to Governor Andrew, to send forward at once fifteen hundred men, and in the course of the same day a formal request was received for two full regiments.
On that day I was trying a case before a court in Boston.
As I sat at the trial table the order was placed in my hands, as brigadier-general, that the Sixth Regiment of my brigade should report at Faneuil Hall, on the morning of the 16th.
That regiment was distributed over an extent of territory nearly forty miles square.
After glancing over the order, I arose, and said to the presiding justice:--
“I am called to prepare troops to be sent to Washington, and I must ask the court to postpone this case.”
This was immediately done, and I left the court house at quarter before five, in time to reach my headquarters at Lowell by the five o'clock train.
And that case, so continued, remains unfinished to this day.
Being well acquainted with Secretary Cameron, as we had been Democrats together in the former years, I telegraphed him through Senator Wilson, then chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs:--
A. M. Thayer and Co. 1892.
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