Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 23.djvu/94

 88 Southern Historical Society Papers.

at Alexander's bridge. After some difficulty I found Surgeons Little and Turner on the furrowed ground, operating without any light except that of burning fence rails. I immediately asked if they had received my note. They answered: "Yes ; Captain Nott died in the ambulance before reaching the hospital, and his and General Ly tie's body are lying in the straw near by, as it was impossible to obtain sepulture for any of the dead of either side."

I found Captain Nott's body guarded by his two colored ser- vants, Nat and John. I said to them:

" Boys, we must find some means to bury your master," but we could find no implements, except an axe and a broken spade. With those we pried off some of the weatherboarding of the Alex- ander house, dug a shallow grave at the foot of a large Catalpa tree, lined it with the planks, and laid those two soldiers side by side the Blue and the Gray. Two other officers, Major Huger, of Magi- nalt's staff, and Colonel Marast, of the regiment which killed Gen- eral Lytle, were buried near by. These bodies were subsequently all removed General Ly tie's three or four days after he was killed, a casket having been sent through by a flag of truce.

' ' And this is the true account of the death and burial of Briga- dier-General W. H. Lytle, the author of ' I Am Dying, Egypt, Dying.' '

At the reunion of the Blue and the Gray at Chickamauga battle- field last summer Colonel West met several members of General Lytle' s command, many of whom are leading men in the city of Cincinnati. He was made the recipient of many courtesies by them, and specially invited to participate in the exercises incident to the dedication of a handsome monument to General Ly tie's, which had been erected on that historic field. General Lew Wallace was to have delivered an address on the occasion. Colonel West would have accepted the invitation, but owing to General Wallace's failure to be present, some of the arrangements fell through, and Colonel West did not attend.

Captain John C. Parker, an ex- Federal naval officer, formerly a resident of Cincinnati, but now of New Orleans, was well acquainted with General Lytle. He agreed with Colonel West that the poem " I Am Dying, Egypt, Dying," was written a few years before the war. Mr. Parker said he remembered reading it in a Cincinnati paper about the year 1858.

General Lytle, he said, sprang from a military family. He was man of great refinement and culture, and a very gallant soldier, am