HON. THOMAS H. CARTER.
United States Senator from Montana.
One of the Founders of the Society.
“And here let me digest for a moment words which, in my own hearing, fell from the lips of the distinguished General Slocum, speaking of General Sullivan’s great Indian campaign in the presence of General Sherman thirty years ago on the one hundreth anniversary of the same. General Slocum said:
“‘As I have sat listening to the speeches today, I have drawn a parallel between those two expeditions. Sherman’s march was the longer of the two, but, in many respects, he had greater advantages. While he had a great distance to travel he had roads made for him by the enemy; he had his produce brought by mule trains; while General Sullivan made his march through trackless woods and carried his provisions upon the backs of his soldiers. Sherman had good arms; General Sullivan had the old flintlock musket. But after all, the spirit which prompted both expeditions was the same. It was bold and daring, and, although there was no great loss of life in either, yet the results of both were far greater than many battles in which lives by the thousand and tens of thousands were lost.’
“And on the same occasion—it is my excuse for quotations, my friends, that I want you to hear these words from two of the greatest Generals we have ever known—on the same occasion, remembering then, as we remember today, how unjustly General Sullivan was at one time criticised for the harshness of his treatment of the Indians on the Susquehanna expedition, remembering, too, that he suffered these criticisms in silence rather than to lay the blame upon his beloved Chief, Washington, who had given him the orders which were condemned, I quote from the words of General Sherman, spoken also in my hearing on the same occasion:
“‘Our fathers, when they first landed upon this continent, came to found an empire, based upon new principles, and all opposition to it had to pass away, whether it were English or French on the north, or Indians on the west; and no one knew it better than our father, Washington. He gave General Sullivan orders to come here and punish the Six Nations for their cruel massacre in the valley of Wyoming, and to make it so severe that it would not occur again. And he did so. General Sullivan obeyed his orders like a man and like a soldier, and the result was from that time forward your people settled up these beautiful valleys around here, and look at their descendants here, a million almost. If it had not been for General Sullivan and the men who followed him from Easton, and Clinton’s forces that came across from Albany, probably some of you would not have been here today.’
“I still read: ‘Battles are not measured by their death roll, but by their results, and it makes no difference whether one man was killed or five hundred if the same result follows. This valley was opened to civilization. It came on the heels of General Sullivan’s army, and has gone on and gone on until today. The same battle is raging upon the Yellow Stone. The same men endowed by the same feelings that General Sullivan’s army had today are contending with the same causes and the same races two thousand miles west of here, not for the purpose of killing, not for the purpose of shedding blood, not for the purpose of doing wrong at all, but to prepare the way for that civilization which must go along wherever yonder flag floats.’
“It might be thought perhaps, my friends, that this rehearsal of the opinions of General Sherman and General Slocum, two of the greatest military leaders of our country, might have been more properly used here than on the dedication of a tablet somewhat, in its scope as a memorial, limited to your own State, but it has been my purpose, my friends, to illustrate General Sullivan as one of the most admirable representatives of his race; and when I have set before you a parallel drawn in the presence of General Sherman himself between the difficulties and the success of Sullivan’s march from Wyoming to the Genesee and Sherman’s own march to the sea, and have given you the opinions of both General Sherman and General Slocum, I have illustrated my proposition that of all the debts which America owes to Ireland, God bless her, General John Sullivan, in his varied talents, in that which he accomplished, in every spot and place in which we put him, is entitled to rank with the noblest and purest contribution which we, in America, have from the grand old Irish race.
“My friends, my words are in substance ended. I have detained you longer than I meant to, but they who live around me could have told you that you have only to mention the name and memory of Major-General John Sullivan to set going any thoughtful student of American history who lives in the magnificent valleys of the Susquehanna, the Wyoming, and the Genesee. What we owe to this man we can never repay.
“I am proud and happy to have been allowed to participate in the unveiling of such a tribute as this. As I said at the outset, I hope the day will come when every State House in this land will have one, and yet, when I think of what he was and what we owe him, I feel that no monument can make him greater than he is in the affections of our people a hundred and thirty years after his death. And yet I am proud for our own sake, for the uplifting of our own people, that we have thus recognized that which we know of his worth. I might have spoken in his behalf with truth the words of the great Roman: ‘Exegi monumentum aere perennius’—‘I have builded a monument more enduring than brass.’”