O'Hara was a native of Kentucky, and served in the army during the war with Mexico. He wrote "The Bivouac of the Dead" on the occasion of the removal of the bodies of Kentucky soldiers from the field of the battle of Buena Vista to their native State.
At the outbreak of the Civil War O'Hara entered the Confederate army as a colonel. He died in Alabama in 1867, and his body was removed to Kentucky and laid beside those of the soldiers he had commemorated.
The muffled drum's sad roll has beat
The soldier's last tattoo!
No more on life's parade shall meet
That brave and fallen few.
On fame's eternal camping ground
Their silent tents are spread,
And glory guards, with solemn round,
The bivouac of the dead.
No rumor of the foe's advance
Now swells upon the wind;
No troubled thought at midnight haunts
Of loved ones left behind;
No vision of the morrow's strife
The warrior's dream alarms;
No braying horn nor screaming fife
At dawn shall call to arms.
Their shivered swords are red with rust,
Their plumed heads are bowed,
Their haughty banner, trailed in dust,
Is now their martial shroud,
And plenteous funeral tears have washed
The red stains from each brow,
And the proud forms, by battle gashed,
Are free from anguish now.
The neighing troop, the flashing blade,
The bugle's stirring blast,
The charge, the dreadful cannonade,
The din and shout are passed;
Nor war's wild note nor glory's peal
Shall thrill with fierce delight
Those breasts that never more may feel
The rapture of the fight.
Like the fierce northern hurricane
That sweeps this great plateau,
Flushed with the triumph yet to gain,
Came down the serried foe,
Who heard the thunder of the fray
Break o'er the field beneath,
Knew well the watchword of that day
Was "Victory or death!"
Full many a norther's breath has swept
O'er Angostura's plain,
And long the pitying sky has wept
Above the moldering slain.
The raven's scream or eagle's flight
Or shepherd's pensive lay
Alone now wakes each sullen height
That frowned o'er that dread fray.