Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 26.djvu/120

 110 Southern J/ixtorinil Xor/V/y

THE BATTLE OF MILFORD STATION.

An Address by Serg't Chas. T Loehr, before Pickett Camp, U. C. V., August 31, 1896.

[Sergeant Charles Theodore Loehr, of German birth, has proven himself as good a citizen of Richmond as he was valiant as a sol- dier, as his comrades, to a man, attest. At the organization of George E. Pickett Camp Confederate Veterans, he was elected its Commander, and his zeal in its objects and benefactions, is still as animating and effective in good works as at the beginning of his in- spiring connection with it. He is held widely in warm regard, not only in Richmond, but in many States of our re-united country. Who does not know " Charley Loehr" ?

Soon after the conclusion of the war Mr. Loehr became connected with the Virginia Fire and Marine Insurance Company, of Rich- mond, in a highly responsible position, which he still holds.]

On Friday, May 20, 1864, Kemper's old brigade, with the excep- tion of the 3rd Virginia Regiment, n*iarched through the streets of Richmond. There was nothing extraordinary in this for the move- ment of troops during those days was constant, and the veterans of Pickett' s Division would hardly have been distinguished from other commands that preceded or followed them to join the army of Lee in its struggles with Grant. Yet, there was one thing that might have attracted the spectator's attention in viewing the brigade as it passed. Each one of the regiments carried colors that were cer- tainly not intended for Confederate soldiers. These were flags from Massachusetts and New Jersey, besides the Stars and Stripes in all its glory, the spoils of the battle of Drewry's Bluff where Kemper's men gobbled up nearly the whole of Heckman's Star Brigade, brig- adier and staff inclusive. We marched over Mayo's Bridge, up I4th, Main and Ninth streets to Broad street, where the brigade came to a halt. Here we found a long train of flat cars ready to take a part of the brigade northward on the Richmond and Fredericksburg Railroad.

Most of the men of my regiment, the "Old First," had urgent business on hand just then. They were bound to see their friends and relations, and thus, it did not take long to reduce the small regi-