deal about them, and particularly about Logan, in the newspapers. Both
were democratic members of Congress, and Logan had been elected from the
southern district of the State, where he had a majority of eighteen
thousand over his Republican competitor. His district had been settled
originally by people from the Southern States, and at the breaking out
of secession they sympathized with the South. At the first outbreak of
war some of them joined the Southern army; many others were preparing to
do so; others rode over the country at night denouncing the Union, and
made it as necessary to guard railroad bridges over which National
troops had to pass in southern Illinois, as it was in Kentucky or any of
the border slave states. Logan's popularity in this district was
unbounded. He knew almost enough of the people in it by their Christian
names, to form an ordinary congressional district. As he went in
politics, so his district was sure to go. The Republican papers had
been demanding that he should announce where he stood on the questions
which at that time engrossed the whole of public thought. Some were
very bitter in their denunciations of his silence. Logan was not a man
to be coerced into an utterance by threats. He did, however, come out
in a speech before the adjournment of the special session of Congress
which was convened by the President soon after his inauguration, and
announced his undying loyalty and devotion to the Union. But I had not
happened to see that speech, so that when I first met Logan my
impressions were those formed from reading denunciations of him.
McClernand, on the other hand, had early taken strong grounds for the
maintenance of the Union and had been praised accordingly by the
Republican papers. The gentlemen who presented these two members of
Congress asked me if I would have any objections to their addressing my
regiment. I hesitated a little before answering. It was but a few days
before the time set for mustering into the United States service such of
the men as were willing to volunteer for three years or the war. I had
some doubt as to the effect a speech from Logan might have; but as he
was with McClernand, whose sentiments on the all-absorbing questions of
the day were well known, I gave my consent. McClernand spoke first; and
Logan followed in a speech which he has hardly equalled since for force
and eloquence. It breathed a loyalty and devotion to the Union which
inspire