Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 33.djvu/30

 26 Southern Historical Society Papers.

(From the Baltimore Sun, of November 4, and December 3, 1905.)

THE LOST SWORD OF GEN. RICHARD B. GAR- NETT, WHO FELL AT GETTYSBURG,

Returned to his niece, Mrs. John B. Purcell, Richmond, Va.,

By Col. Winfield Peters, Quarter Master General, U. C. V., with ac- count of how General Garnett met his death.

A valuable relic of the war between the States, which had been in the possession of Mr. James E. Steuart, was yesterday forwarded to the rightful owner. It is the sword of Gen. Richard B. Garnett, who commanded a brigade in the famous charge of Pickett's divi- sion at Gettysburg, in which General Garnett was killed. The sword is after the pattern for artillery officers in the United States Army, and is inscribed "R. B. Garnett, U. S. A.," with the name of the maker. The blade is of fine metal, elaborately embellished, and is in perfect order. The scabbard is of fine steel, but some- what rusty.

General Garnett resigned from the United States Army in 1861, at the outbreak of the war for Southern Independence, and was promptly commissioned in the Confederate Army. Prior to serv- ing under General Pickett he served under General T. J. (Stone- wall) Jackson, and was rated among the bravest and ablest of the Westpointers who served the Confederacy. General Garnett was last seen leading his brigade in Pickett's charge. He was mount- ed and his horse was bleeding from a wound. His body was not identified and will always lie among the unknown Confederate dead.

The recovery of General Garnett' s sword is due to the late Gen. George H. Steuart, of Baltimore, likewise a West Point graduate, who also led his brigade in a desperate charge at Gettysburg a few hours before Pickett's charge. Had both charges (Johnson's and Pickett's divisions) been entirely successful, the two Confederate lines, moving toward each other, from opposite directions, would have overlapped.

Years ago General Steuart found, in a second-hand shop in Balti-