—Charles Carroll Sawyer.
Charles Carroll Sawyer was born in Mystic, Connecticut, in 1833. His father, Captain Joshua Sawyer, was an old-fashioned Yankee sea captain. The family moved to New York when Charles was quite young, and he obtained his education in that city. The poetic instinct was marked in his youth, and at the age of twelve he wrote several sonnets which attracted a good deal of attention among his acquaintances. At the breaking out of the war he began to write war songs, and in a few months was recognized everywhere as one of the most successful musical composers of the day. His most popular songs were Who will Care for Mother Now? Mother would Comfort Me, and the one we have selected—When this Cruel War is Over. Each of these three songs named reached a sale of over a million copies before the close of the war, and were sung in almost every mansion and farmhouse and cabin from the Atlantic to the Pacific throughout all the northern part of the Union, as well as in every camp where soldiers waited for battle.
His song, Mother would Comfort Me, was suggested, as indeed were most of his songs, by a war incident. A soldier in one of the New York regiments had been wounded and was taken prisoner at Gettysburg. He was placed in a Southern hospital, and when the doctor told him that nothing more could be done for him, his dying words were: “Mother would comfort me if she were here.” When Sawyer learned of the incident, he wrote the song, the first verse of which runs as follows:—
“Wounded and sorrowful, far from my home,
Sick among strangers, uncared for, unknown;
Even the birds that used sweetly to sing
Are silent, and swiftly have taken the wing.
No one but mother can cheer me to-day,
No one for me could so fervently pray;
None to console me, no kind friend is near—
Mother would comfort me if she were here.”
This song captured the country at once, and spread its author’s fame everywhere.
On another occasion a telegram came to a Brooklyn wife concerning her husband who was killed on the battlefield. The last words of the despatch read: “He was not afraid to die.” Sawyer caught up that note in the telegram, and wrote his splendid song beginning,—
“Like a true and faithful soldier
He obeyed our country’s call;
Vowing to protect its banner
Or in battle proudly fall:
Noble, cheerful, brave and fearless,
When most needed, ever nigh,
Always living as a Christian,
‘He was not afraid to die.’”
Another of his greatest creations found its inspiration in a similar way. During one of the battles, among the many noble men that fell was a young man who had been the only support of an aged and invalid mother for years. Overhearing the doctor tell those who were near him that he could not live, he placed his hands across his forehead, and with a trembling voice said, while burning tears ran down his cheeks: “Who will care for mother, now?” Sawyer took up these words which voiced the generous heart of the dying youth, and made them the title and theme of one of his noblest songs. The first verse is full of pathos,—
U. S. BATTLE-SHIP “MAINE”