"
On the 15th June, 1887, the State of Pennsylvania provided for the erection of a Memorial Tablet, or Monument, for each of the Pennsylvania Commands that participated in the Battle of Gettysburg, July 1st, 2d and 3d, 1863.
At a Re-Union of the 84th Regiment held at Huntingdon, Pa., 21st September, 1887, Captain Thos. E. Merchant, Gen. Geo. Zinn, Adjutant Edmund Mather, Sergeant A. J. Hertzler, and Henry L. Bunker, were appointed a Committee on Monument, with full power to act as to design, inscription and dedication.
The dates, September 11th and 12th, 1889, were named by the Governor of the Commonwealth to be "Pennsylvania Days"Wednesday, the 11th, for the dedication of the Monuments by the Associations of the respective Commands; and Thursday, the 12th, for the transfer of the Monuments to the State.
On the 10th August, 1889, full information of the Day was sent to every Soldier of the 84th, whose address was known, and the response had in the attendance of one hundred and forty-six Comrades, coming from all parts of the State and some from beyond, spoke forcibly to the memory, and testified clearly to the reality of the old Command. The presence of so large a number so many years after the War, tended to, and did, awaken the most earnest feeling, and every one knew how great was the loss to the Comrades not there.
The introductory words at the Monument by the Vice-President of the Regimental Association, Captain Robert Johnson, were highly appropriate to the occasion, and marked the earnestness of the ceremony in which the Soldiers of the 84th were now engaged.
The Chaplain of the Association, Rev. John P. Norman, Surgeon of the Regiment, offered Prayer.
Letters from absent Comrades were read by Adjutant Mather.
Gen. Joseph B. Carr, whose Brigade (the 1st, 2d Division, 3d Corps) in the Gettysburg Campaign included the 84th, had expressed his earnest wish to be present at the dedication, a feeling on his part highly gratifying to Soldiers who had served under so able a Commander.
While desiring it to be understood that he was there as a hearer, to witness the services, he felt that he could not properly refuse to respond to the request for a talk, which he did most cheerfully.
His words, written in granite, would stand as a Monument of Honor to the Regiment so long as the stone would endure.
A group picture, taken at the time of the dedication, will be of lasting interest. At no time since their muster-out had there been so many Soldiers of the Regiment touching elbow, and never, this side, will there be again so many.
The Address by Captain Merchant, Chairman of the Committee on Monument, is published in compliance with the expressed desire of the surviving members of the Regiment.
Soldiers of the Eighty-Fourth Regiment Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers:
If the feeling with which these words of salutation are heard and accepted, is like unto the feeling that prompts their utterance, then are we fully compensated in our coming together.
We name the old Regiment, and what recollections crowd in upon us; memories of the camp, the march, and the field. Some fondmany weighted with the touch of sorrow felt in its heavy burden even until now, through all of so much of time.
In the presence of these recollections I could not hope to control your thought. I would not ask you simply to follow words as I speak them, but rather that you be all of memory, all of feeling, thinking, listening the while if you can, but surely thinking. For in thought you can cover more ground in moments than I could travel for you in days.
Together you comprise the Whole Book, the turning of whose pages wakens memory to every detail, while from the one individual you can have no more than the head-lines to the volume whose contents you are so familiar with.
Together you know what our Regiment was; alone I can but outline to you, and that roughly, a meagre part of the full story of the 84th.
Its history could be found only in the everything that could be told by each of all the hundreds, living and dead, who numbered its total strength. But where your special individual interest lies it is not possible for me to tread. I wish I could tell the story of every Company, relate the incidents of every mess, and note the experiences of every individual.
Many the time we have recalled our comradeship, more especially with those with whom we were brought in the closer association. It would be a pleasant theme were I at liberty to name the latter and their never-forgotten deeds, that I might place on record my keen appreciation of their kindly acts at a time when kindness was most to be valued, and fidelity most to be prized. But in whatever I do upon this occasion, I stand reminded that I am not to tread over again my individual walk, nor speak again my personal conversation. What is saidwhat is doneshall be, so far as may be, of all for all.
Not many of us had the opportunity to know very much outside the limits of the Company; and fewer of us beyond the limits of the Regiment. And it was well for good service that the majority of soldiers were content with the work assigned them, and gave but little heed to the details of location of armies or corps, and but little thought to the place of divisions or brigades.
Who was the best-posted man on the news? Who the readiest army talker? Who the general of the camp? The soldier who was not to be found in the place his enlistment called for at the time when his presence would have told the most. It was well for the service that he did not number many.
The good soldier ought not to think it strange, that while in everything he did his duty well, he does not know much of what was done by regiments other than his own, and would be at a loss to name the number of his brigade. Nor must he think that the comrade who stood side by side with him is the only one mistaken as to the occurrences of the day. It would not always be well to accept a soldier of F Co. as a conclusive witness of what took place in E, if there was dispute as to the bearing of the line, or question as to who were the first to advance; and yet, no one will bend the ear more gladly than myself to the recitals of a soldier in fact, because I know he gives us the truth as he believes it. And if from the data thus gathered, I count that his regiment was killed, or permanently disabled, twice over, I attribute the outcome to a lack somewhere in the arithmetic, and not to a vice in the teller. And, in this connection, we must not overlook the fact of the years that have rolled by.
Twenty-four years and upward in the circle of time measures the distance of our close, very close, comradeship. Years more than many of us had numbered prior to the beginning, four years before, of the long campaign. The time that preceded and that which has followed, make up the life ordinary. The long four years was the life within the other life. In it was contained the greatest of all wars from the world's beginningthe war against the Rebellion of '61.
