Much of what you are about to read here was written by General J. Madison Drake, Historian, (1837-1913), Civil War Congressional Medal of Honor Recipient
I came across this story twice while researching the 5th New Hampshire Regiment, both times I read it my heart grew sad, not because of the story but because we are rapidly losing the fraternal organizations, choosing online networking over face to face or hand to hand.
One need only take a stroll through Forest Glade Cemetery in Somersworth to see how strongly the fraternal organizations mattered, the symbols of Freemasons, Knight Pythias, and Odd Fellows adorn the majority of the stones.
Although the Masonic lodge, Libanus, closed many years ago I assure you there are still many amongst you.
“In civil life there are ties of affection, of friendship, of family, and in an army during a war the tie of comradeship surpassing in fervor and intensity all other human bonds. During the Civil War perhaps the strongest fraternal tie binding men together was that of Freemasonry, a bond of fellowship that has been recognized and proved the wide world over as a blessing to mankind.”
There were numerous instances in which the sacred tie of Masonry intervened at critical moments not only in battle but in prison pens, where perhaps its luster showed with more brilliance than that radiated by any diamond. Property was preserved, lives protected, and executions stayed by the discovery that the persons involved belonged to the mystic circle, and escaping prisoners of war on both sides, when all hope seemed lost, were succored through its benign influences.
I do not know that I can more forcibly illustrate the truth of this statement than by relating a thrilling incident on the day following the sanguinary battle of Antietam, when a grievously wounded Virginian, who had lain helplessly upon the blood-stained field during the night, with a feeble voice called a member of the 5th New Hampshire Regiment, commanded by that sterling patriot, Col. Edward E. Cross, who was doing picket duty not far from the Confederate lines, and gave him a slip of soiled paper on which had been marked in a circle, apparently with great effort, some mystic signs. In lieu of a pen or pencil a bit of stick had been used, and his life's blood had been substituted for ink.
"My good fellow," said the wounded and apparently dying Confederate officer, "do me the last earthly favor of handing this piece of paper to some one of your officers whom you may know to be a Freemason. I am dying and would like to give my last message to my family through the medium of one of my brethren."
The New Hampshire soldier, whose heart was full of sympathy for the unfortunate Southern, after covering him with his blanket, making him as comfortable as possible, took the strange-looking missive and, making his dangerous way to the rear, delivered it into the hands of Colonel Cross, who, although a member of the fraternity, was unable to decipher the token so singularly inscribed. The Colonel, however, feeling it to be a case of life or death, the bearer of the strange missive having told of the desperate condition of its sender, consulted with Capt J. P. Perry, of his regiment, a member of the thirty-second degree in Masonry, and he had no sooner exhibited to him the missive than the latter somewhat excitedly said: "The man who sent this is a brother Mason in imminent peril and must be rescued."
Colonel Cross, fearfully wounded at Fredericksburg, and who at Gettysburg met the glorious death he had coveted, at once sent for several brother Masons in his command and, after reciting the strange story, gave them permission to make their way to the perilous spot where the wounded Confederate was seen by the Union soldier and rescue him from a cruel fate. Owing to the close proximity of the two lines of battle and the constant firing of small arms and artillery which prostrated the standing corn as if done by sickles, the relieving party was compelled to crawl upon the ground to the spot where a young and handsome Confederate was found lying in the agonies of death. He had been shot through the thigh and breast and, weak from the loss of blood, was in a state of unconsciousness.
Despite the terrific storm of shot and shell which swept the cornfield, imperiling their lives, the New Hampshire brethren shrank not from the performance of a humane duty; and when a lull in the firing came they tenderly placed the young soldier on a stretcher they had thoughtfully taken along and carried him to the field hospital of their regiment, where every attention was given him. Recovering from his insensibility, but too weak to speak, the Confederate manifested his gratitude to his new-found friends, a short time before deadly enemies, for the great service rendered him by mute expressions of love. Removed to the general hospital at Washington, the Southern speedily recovered from his ghastly wounds, and later on was exchanged and permitted to return south.
The soldier thus rescued from the jaws of death was Lieutenant Edon, who belonged to an Alabama regiment and was a member of a Masonic lodge at Mobile.
That same day the colonel of a Georgia regiment, whose body had been riddled with bullets and who had lain helpless on the field all night, made himself known to our soldiers as a member of the Masonic fraternity, and was treated with the utmost kindness by his New Hampshire brethren, with whom but a few hours previously he had been engaged in fierce and deadly combat.
Often were the strongest friendships formed on the battle field; for there, amid carnage and desolating scenes, the true heart opens its floodgates and humanity again asserts itself. The enemy, whom but a short time before one is doing his best to kill, you now endeavor to save. You supply him with water to quench his consuming thirst, with your last morsel of food to sustain his strength, and use sympathizing words to soothe his troubled mind. All that is human or charitable in your nature now rises to your face and you become consecrated by that spirit of mercy that "blesseth him that gives and him that takes."
One afternoon in the prison enclosure at Savannah, which, by the way, was a paradise compared to others in the South owing to the large live oak trees whose luxuriant foliage protected the six hundred Union officers there confined from the burning sun by day and the heavy dews at night, a Confederate captain of the 1st Georgia Regiment, the best set of men that ever guarded a prison, while walking about the enclosure, engaged in conversation with a comrade of mine, in the course of which they happily recognized each other as Masons.
"What can I do to render your situation more comfortable?" I heard the Confederate ask my friend.
"Well, captain," replied the Union prisoner, "if I could be provided with a couple of boards, I would be enabled to build a bunk for myself above the ground."
The Southern, after extending his hand, which was promptly grasped and significantly pressed, took his departure, and a couple of hours afterward a wagon-load of smooth, yellow pine boards was delivered to my companion, whose joy was so great that he divided the lumber among his friends, reserving scarcely enough to answer his own purposes.
I might tell of many instances of this character that came under my observation during the four years' war to show the love that true-hearted man, even though enemies can bear toward one another.
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