War is the work of the element or rather the sport and triumph of death, who here glories not only in the extent of his conquest, but in the riches of his spoil. In the other methods of attack and the other forms which death assumes, the feeble, and the aged who at best can live but a short time are usually the victims: here they are the vigorous and strong.
It is marked by the most ancient of poets that in peace, children bury their parents: in war, parents bury their children - nor is the difference small. But to confine our attention to the number of slain would give us a very inadequate idea of the ravages of the sword. What a scene, then must a field of battle present, where thousands are left without assistance and without pity, with their wounds exposed to the piercing air while the blood, freezing as it flows, bind them to the earth amid trampling of horses and the insults of an enraged foe. Far from their native home, no tender acidiuities of friendship, no well known voice, no wife or mother or sister to relieve their thirst or close their eyes in death! Unhappy man! And must you be swept into the grave unnoticed and unnumbered, and no friendly tear to be shed for your sufferings or mingled with your dust? We have only here adverted to the sufferings of those who are engaged in the profession of arms without taking into account the situation of the countries which are the scenes of hostilities. How dreadful to hold everything at the mercy of enemy, and to receive life itself as a boom dependent on the sword! How boundless the fears which such a situation must inspire where the issues of life and death are determined by no known laws, principles, or customs, and no conjecture can be formed of our destiny, except so far as it is dimly deciphered in characters of blood, and the dictates of revenge and the caprices of power. Written by Meredith Bean McMath's Great Grandfather, David Thomas Dortch. David was born November 19, 1842 among the steep hills of Hardy County, West Virginia. His parents, Margaret Anderson and George Bean had settled there in the town of Fabius, and David was the first of 9 children to make it to adult... just in time to try and get himself killed in the Civil War. He became a member of the infamous MacNeill's Rangers of the Confederate Army but and halfway through the war transferred to the 18th Virginia Cavalry. After the war, he married Adelaide Wingfield Meredith at Oak Shades, her family home in Brunswick County, Virginia where they had seven children. He was incapacitated by rheumatoid arthritis most of his life and died of diphtheria in 1896.
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