Gentlemen!--Members of Capt, Thomas Espy Post: In the name of the ladies of this circle, I have the honor of presenting to you this little flag you see draped on the alter [sic]. We know of no gift you would appreciate more highly than the flag of your country. We might have presented you with one more brilliant and costly, but knowing that an alter [sic] flag was the one you stood most in need of at the present. For constant use and durability we have selected this plain and substantial one, asking you to accept it not for its mere cost in dollars and cents, but as a token of high esteem; failing that in this we are only showing you a very slight recognition of the kindness and good feeling you have shown us since the organization of our circle.
You, fathers, husbands and brothers, who left your firesides and all that was dear to you; you have stood at the front when the battle was raging most fierce, you have grown faint under the burning rays of a Southern sun, you have suffered cold and hunger and endured all the privations of a soldiers life; some of you for four long years and all for what? To break the chains of slavery and set this flag on high. At a time when this country was one mass of confusion, and the only topic of the day was war, there came a call for men to the front, but many of you who responded to that call were but mere boys, not fully realizing the meaning of that great call, which to many of your comrades meant death, but as days rolled into months and months into years, like the constant watchings and care of a kind mother over the sick bed of her loving child, waiting, one day hopeful, the next day almost dispairing [sic] lest that dread enemy death, might claim it for its own. Still hoping and praying on as she nurses it back to health [cut off].
Thanks to Robert Gordon, great grandson of Mrs. Fife, for providing a copy of the above information. For further information on this Web site contact James J. White at jw3u at andrew dot cmu dot edu or write to 9th Pennsylvania Reserves, 1887 Old Ramsey Rd., Monroeville, PA 15146.
URL: http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~jw3u/round/Fife.htm
© February 2004