Confederate wizards of the saddle /

Bennett H. Young (signature) Commander-in-Chief U. C. V.
Being Reminiscences and Observations of One Who Rode With Morgan By
BENNETT H. YOUNG
Commander-in-Chief of the United Confederate Veterans Association
BOSTON Chapple Publishing Company, Ltd. 1914
Copyright, 1914, by Bennett H. Young
Dedicated to the Women of the South
IN THE DAYS OF PEACE The Creators of Chivalry and Gallantry IN THE DAYS OF BATTLE The Inspiration of Faith and Courage IN THE DAYS OF BLOOD The Angels of Comfort and Mercy IN THE DAYS OF DEFEAT The Spirits of Hope and Help
Forty-eight years and a half have passed, since the last drum-beat of the Confederate States was heard and the furling of their flag forever closed the most wondrous military tragedy of the ages. Numbers and character considered, the tribute the South paid to War has no equal in human records.
Fifteen hundred years ago on the Catalaunian Plain, where Attila, King of the Huns, styled “The Scourge of God,” joined battle with the Romans under Oetius, and the Visigoths led by Thorismund, tradition has it that hundreds of thousands of dead were left on the field. The men who followed the cruel and remorseless Attila were a vast horde, organized for war, with plunder as the highest aim of a soldier’s life, and the Romans and Visigoths were men who followed war solely for the opportunity it afforded to enslave, rob and despoil those they conquered. On both sides the men who filled the ranks had neither intelligence nor patriotism, and with each, war was a profession or pastime, devoid in most cases of any exalted purpose, even the dream of a conviction, or the faintest gleam of a principle.
If the dead on that fatal field were numbered by the hundreds of thousands, their demise was a mere incident in the conflicts which were carried on for no truth, and in their loss the world suffered but little more than if as many beasts of burden had been sacrificed on some heathen altar to appease the God of War.