| A Tribute To Lieut. Bacon.
[ The following obituary notice of Lieut. Bacon ( whose death was announced in the palladium at the time of its occurrence, ) is understood to have been written for the Transcript by a gentleman of this city who knew the deceased well, and was therefore fitted to speak truthfully of his merits as a young man and a youthful soldier, offered as a sacrifice by his friends upon the altar of patriotism.] Lieut. Francis Bacon, a son of Hon. P. C. Bacon, of this city, was killed on one of the battles on the Rappahannock last week. He fell at the post of duty and danger, and sleeps where he fell, his comrades not having been able to recover and bring off his body when they recrossed the river. He was only twenty one years of age at the time of his death. He was a young man of far more than ordinary intellectual endowments, well educated, manly and honorable in his deportment, generous almost to a fault, and brave as one who knows and fears no danger, and in his fall, has added another to the long roll of youthful heroes, who, in this great struggle for National existence, have offered their lives a sacrifice to save the life of the nation.. He obeyed the first call to arms and left his home upon a single days notice, as a member of the Third Battalion of Rifles, under the command of Gen. (then major ) Devens. He served through the three months for which the Battalion enlisted, and returned to this city with his company at the end of that time. After an interval of two or three months, he again enlisted as a private , in the 15th Mass. regiment, then stationed at or near Poolesville. Contrary to his wishes he was detailed for special duty at Camp Cameron in this State, acting for some weeks as drill Sergeant. he was finally permitted to join his regiment after the affair at Ball’s Bluff, and before it started as a part of the Army of the Potomac on the ever memorable Peninsular campaign. He passed through all the battles in which his regiment was engaged on the Peninusla unhurt and returned with the army to Washington, the latter part of August, 1862. At that time his health was becoming greatly impaired, and a soldier of less resolute and earnest spirit than his, would gladly have yielded to the advice of his physician and sought repose in one of the hospitals in Washington. But, although unable to keep up with his regiment on its march, as a part of the army under Gen. McClellan, then moving up through Maryland. for the expulsion of the rebel invaders, yet he started from Washington with a single comrade, Charles --- Barton, and struggled along as rapidly as his emaciated frame would permit, hoping to rejoin his company before the great battle came of, which was then daily expected. And it was at that period that the writer of this notice found him and his companion by the roadside between Rockville and Middlebrook in Maryland. he was then so changed by disease, so weak and emaciated, as hardly to be recognized by those who knew him best. He was still unwilling to return or go into hospital and it was only after the most urgent representations of the necessity of such a course to save his life, that he consented to abandon his purpose of joining his regiment, which was then ten or fifteen miles in advance of him. He remained a few weeks in the hospital and was then detailed to act as a clerk at Gen. Hallack’s headquarters, where hen remained for several weeks, and rejoined his regiment at Falmouth. Here he was again detailed to act as clerk ( for which he had great aptness and capacity) in the Headquarters , I think, of Gen. Sedgewick But about this time through the influence of a friend of the family in New York he received the appointment of Lieutenant in the 102d New York Regiment, and it was while he was acting in this capacity that he fell. That regiment formed a part of the 12th army corps, and after the fight of the 11th corps, the tempest of battle fell upon the 12th. His life, reckoned by the ordinary standard, was brief, but if that life is longest which answers life’s great end, then Frank, as he was familiarly called by his friends, lived many years and died well. It would have been grateful to his friends here could his heroic form, though lifeless, have been brought back to them, and have found a resting place near the homes and graves of his kindred. But after all he sleeps where the soldier best loves to rest, upon the field of battle consecrated by the deeds of the brave; and the wooded banks of the Rappahannock shall ever hereafter be dearer to every loyal heart, because of their baptism in the blood of patriot defenders and all the living loyal should be nerved to a more resolute determination that the fields whereon our heroic dead lie buried, shall never be alien soil, and that pilgrim feet from the free north shall ever be permitted to tread their sacred precincts, without asking leave of a stranger. |