Soon with the cavalrymen and the engineers and the national guardsmen the batterymen had struggled into line. Horses were in waiting at the station for the officers and all were mounted in the parade. When the order to march could be heard through the tumult, the procession moved through a gayly decked arch at the station, and Majors Young and Grant rode side by side at the head of the battalion.
The crowd became more dense as the march continued towards Main street, and as far as Liberty Park thousands thronged the avenues. Excited relatives made a military formation impossible by rushing into the ranks to grasp the hand of a veteran.
At the Park the day's ceremonies were held. There were speeches by the Governor and the two Majors, and here the silver medals which the Legislature decided should be presented to the fighting sons of the State were awarded. With the conclusion of the formal exercises, the volunteers were led to an elaborately prepared lunch on beflowered tables beneath the shadows of the locust trees, and while refreshments were being taken fair maidens who ministered at the feast pinned badges on the breasts of the modest volunteers.
That night the celebration reached its full blazonry. The city glowed and sparkled; gayly-bedecked, her flaunting colors were aurioled in the lustres of the night; like an imperial palace, awaiting the return of victorious princes, the lights gleamed and burned into the darkness; and in the center a luminous monument, glowing like the smile of an archangel, stood in vivid brightness the arch of triumph.
When the men of Utah batteries passed out into the darkness that night from the dazzle of color they knew that the glamor of the victorious home-coming, the shouts and the jubilation were over. Yet there was peace in their hearts and on their breast was a badge of honor from a grateful people. And when they slept that night there were in their dreams no spectral visions of distant battlefields. All that was closed.
Officers of the Batteries.
