A Memorial Day reminiscence

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Private George D. Wilson of the Second Ohio was a militant freethinker
who regularly argued against the Christian faith of his comrades.  His
is described as "a mechanic, from Cincinnati, who, in the exercise of
his trade, had travelled much through the States, North and South, and
who had a greatness of soul which sympathized intensely with our
struggle for national life, and was in that dark hour filled with
joyous convictions of our final triumph."

In April 1862, Wilson volunteered to help capture a locomotive in
Georgia in hopes of cutting the rail link from Atlanta to Chattanooga.
Captured, the group made escape attempts, after one of which, the
Confederates took Wilson out to hang him. Thanks to the black
witnesses of his execution, we have an account of what happened when
Wilson faced his captors and chose  "to make them a brief address. He
told them that though they were all wrong he had no hostile feelings
toward the Southern people, believing that not they, but their
leaders, were responsible for the rebellion; that he was no spy, as
charged, but a soldier regularly detailed for military duty; that he
did not regret to die for his country, but only regretted the manner
of his death; and he added, for their admonition, that they would yet
see the time when the old Union would be restored and when its flag
would wave over them again; and with these words the brave man died."

Pass it on to any of the "lost cause" goofs you might know.

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