The Forty-second Ohio Infantry : a history of the organization and services of that regiment in the War of the Rebellion : with biographical sketches of its field officers and a full roster of the regiment

Front matter

i.

-iR^^K

L.

Dedication

TO THE

WIVES AND MOTHERS OF THE forty-second;

THE LOYAL, DEVOTED WOMEN WHO GAVE THEIR HUSBANDS AND SONS TO THE REGIMENT, SENT IT FORTH WITH THEIR BLESSINGS, FOLLOWED IT WITH THEIR PRAYERS, SYMPATHIZED IN ITS SUFFERINGS, AND WEPT OVER ITS DEAD, THIS BRIEF AND IMPERFECT RECORD IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED.

Chapter I. The Field Officers Of The Regiment

In no episode of American history have there been greater opportunities for men of high character and abib'ty to wield a strong and controlhng influence over large numbers of their fellow citizens, than were given to the officers who organized and commanded the A'olunteer regiments of the Union army during the first two years of the war. The rank and file were then far above the ordinary intelligence of common soldiers ; they were earnest, patriotic, respected and self-respecting men. They formed a material out of which, in proper hands, would naturally grow the most competent and intelligent citizen soldiery of which history makes mention. Their very intelligence, however, made the Union volunteers exacting and critical as to the qualifications of their superiors, and where, as in the case of the Forty-Second, there has existed, not only through its three years of service, but during all the years which have intervened since the close of hostilities, a firm, abiding sentiment of respect and affection between officers and men, it may be safely assumed that on part of the higher officers at least, that esteem has been well deserved. In the characters of its field officers, the Forty-Second'was peculiarly fortunate ; and any adequate record of the services of the regiment must naturally begin with some account of the men who b THE FORTY-SECOND OHIO INFANTRY.

assembled the organization, gave it its inspiration and made it what it was.

JAMES A. GARFIELD,

Tlie first Colonel of the Forty-Second, was born in Orange, Tuyahoga County, Ohio, November 19th, 1831. His parents were of New England extraction, and his father dying in 1831, left the mother with four small children and scanty fortune, on a meagre farm m what was then a thinly settled district. James, the youngest of the children, worked on the little farm during the Summer, attending during the Winter the neighboring district school. To further fit himself for the. life struggle which had begun so early, 'he learned, during his fifteenth and sixteenth years, something of the trade of a carpenter ; but this not proving remunerative, he left home and secured employment as a driver and afterwards boatman on the Ohio canal. The malaria that overhung the canal m those days finally overcame him, and the autumn of 1848 brought him back to his mother's home for a three months' siege with fever and ague. He remained at home during the following winter and attended a high school in an adjoining county, known as "Geauga Seminary." He found in his studies a new and unexpected source of enjoyment, and when the Spring found him still in uncertain health, he decided to defer until Fall his purpose of shipping as a sailor on Lake Erie, and meanwhile to attend school during the Summer term. That decision may almost be said to have shaped the whole subsequent course of his life. Those nine months at school awakened the intellect that has since made General Garfield one of the foremost men of this country, and from that time no obstacle was permitted to thwart his purpose.

Working as a carpenter during summer vacations, teaching when his scanty funds ran low, he managed to attend school most of the time until 1851, when he removed to Hiram and became a student in the "Institute" over which he was eventually to preside. He soon became the most accomplished Latin and Greek scholar that the school had ever produced, and as he was an earnest, self-reliant Christian, whom to know was but to respect, he naturally soon became the oracle and wonder of his classmates. After extraordinary exertions in earning means, he finally entered Williams College, in the fall of 1852, graduating after two years study with the Metaphysical honor, one of the highest gifts of Williams College to a graduating class. He returned home in the Summer of 1856, and became teacher, and the following year President of Hiram Institute, which position he filled with extraordinary ability until politics and the war drew him into more active and public walks of life. In 1859, while still at Hiram, he began the study of law, for which his temperament and attainments gave him rare qualifications. He was already an earnest, powerful, magnetic speaker. He had all the qualities of an orator, fervid, spontaneous sympathies, high convictions, earnestness of purpose, and rich exuberance of language, moulded and chastened by classical study. He was in fact too large and strong a man to be hidden under the Presidency of an incipient College, and in 1859, when men of zeal and courage were wanted in the fight against Slavery, the people of Portage County chose the President of Hiram Institute to represent them in the State Senate. There, during the winter of i860 and '61, Mr. Garfield, with Hon. J. I). Cox and Prof Monroe, of Oberlin, formed a radical triumvirate in the Ohio Senate, which controlled the sentiment of the Legislature and ripened Ohio for her noble part in the war. National politics growing out of the Slavery question engrossed the attention of the Ohio Legislature to an unusual extent in 1 86 1, and in all the debates of that session. Senator Garfield was the leader. The Assembly remained in session until late in the lO THE FORTY-SECOND OHIO INFANTRY.

Spring, weeks after the torch of rebellion had been lit at Fort Sumter and the Governor of Ohio had begun to officer the regiments which flocked to Columbus, and send them into the field. The most powerful and popular man in the Senate, Mr. Garfield might have had a Colonelcy at any time for the asking ; but he never thought of himself He went off some where to a Western State after arms with which to equip the Ohio Volunteers, and on his return would have doubtless accepted a lieutenancy had there been a vacancy in that grade without a ready and competent applicant. It was thought at that time that Mr. Seward had measured accurately the coming struggle when he predicted that it would " be over in ninety days."

But July brought the disaster at Bull Run, and it became apparent that the nation must strip itself for a life and death struggle. On the 27th of July, Governor DennisoN addressed Mr. Garfield as follows :

The State of Ohio.

Executive Department,

Columbus, July 27th, 1861.

Dear Sir :

I am organizing some new regiments. Can you take a Lieutenant- Colonelcy ? I am anxious you should do so. Reply by telegraph.

Cox has entered Charleston and is doing nobly. I have sent him my congratulations. Yours Truly,

I W. Dennison.

This letter, which reached Hiram during a two weeks absence of Mr. Garfield, was finally received by him on the 7th of August. He immediately replied that if the proffered position were still vacant and the Colonelcy of the regiment filled by a graduate of West Point, he would accept. The reply was favorable, and on the 15th Mr. Garfield reached Columbus and on the following morning was mustered into the service as Lieutenant Colonel. He was immediately assigned to duty at Camp Chase, under an order from Adjutant-General Buckingham to "report in

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person to Brigadier-General Hill, for such duty as he may assign to you in connection with a temporary command for purposes of instruction in camp duty and disciphne." With his arrival at Camp Chase on the i6th of August, the military career of the future I\Iajor-General of A''olunteers may be said to have fairly commenced.

After a few weeks of general service, at Camp Chase, he was detailed on recruiting duty, and aided in raising six of the ten companies which formed the Forty-Second O. V I. No Colonel having yet been appointed, on the 5th of September he was commisioned by the Governor of Ohio, as Colonel of the Forty- Second Regiment. He established a School of Instruction for the officers of the Regiment, requiring two hours of recitation and examination in the morning of each day, and continued the work of drilling, arming and equipping the Regiment, during the months of October, November and the first half of December.

The Roster of the Field and Staff, as mustered in, in November, 1 86 1, was as follows :

Colonel, James A. Garfield

Lieutenant-Colonel, Lionel A. Sheldon

Major, Dun A. Pardee

Adjutant, Wm. W Olds

Quartermaster, J. D. Stubbs

Surgeon, JOEL Pomerene

Assistant- Surgeon, John \V. Harmon

Chaplain, Rev. J. H. Jones

On Saturday, December 14th, a telegram came from General D C. Buell, commanding the Department of the Ohio, at Louisville, Ky., ordering the Regiment to proceed with all possible dispatch to Prestonburgh, Floyd County, Ky. At nine o'clock Sunday morning, December 15th, the Regiment left Camp Chase for the railroad depot at Columbus, and before three o'clock p.m., that day, was on the way to Cincinnati, where it arrived at nine in the evening. There Col. Garfield received a telegram from General Buell, directing him to send the Regiment by steamer to Cattlettsburg, Ky., at the mouth of the Big Sandy, and to report in person at his headquarters.

On the evening of the i6th Col. Garfield reached Louisville, and sought Gen. Buell at his headquarters. He found a cold, silent, austere man who asked a few direct questions, revealed nothing, and eyed the new comer with a curious, searching expression as though trying to look into the untried Colonel and divine whether he would succeed or fail. Taking a map, Gen. Buell pointed out the positions of Marshall's forces in Eastern Kentucky, marked the locations at which the Union troops in that district were posted, explained the nature of the country and its supplies, and then dismissed his visitor with the remark : "If you were in command of the sub-department of Eastern Kentucky, what would you do 1 Come here at nine o'clock to-morrow morning and tell me." Col. Garfield returned to his hotel, procured a map of Kentucky, the last census report, paper, pen and ink, and sat down to .his task. He studied the roads, resources and population of every county in Eastern Kentucky. At daylight he was still at work, but at nine o'clock he was at Gen. Bu ell's headquarters with a sketch of his plans. Buell read it and made it the basis of his Special Order, No. 35, Army of the Ohio, December 17th, 1861, by which the i8th Brigade, Army of the Ohio, was organized, consisting of the 42d O. V I., Col. J. A. Garfield commanding brigade ; 40th O. V I., Col. J Cranor ; 14th Kentucky V I., Col. L. D. F. Moore; 22d Kentucky V I., Col. D. W Lindsay ; a squadron of Ohio Cavalry, two companies, under Major McLaughlin, and three squadrons, (six companies) of the ist Kentucky Cavalry, Lieut.-Col. Letcher commanding. The following autograph letter of instructions was issued to him on the evening of the 17th :

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Headquarters Department of the Ohio,

Louisville, Ky., December 17th, 1861.

Sir:

The Brigade organized under your command, is intended to operate against the Rebel force threatening, and indeed, actually commiting depredations in Kentucky, through the Valley of the Big Sandy. The actual force of the enemy, from the best information I can gather, does not probably exceed two thousand, or two thousand five hundred, though rumor places it as high as seven thousand. I can better ascertain the true state of the case when you get on the ground.

You are apprised of the position of the troops under your command. Go first to Lexington and Paris, and place the 40th Ohio Regiment in such position as will best give a moral support to the people in the Counties on the route to Prestonburgh and Piketon, and oppose any further advance of the enemy on that route. Then proceed with the least possible delay to the mouth of the Sandy, and move, with the force in that vicinity, up that river and drive the enemy back or cut him off. Having done that, Piketon will probably be in the best position for you to occupy to guard against future incursions. Artillery will be of little, if any, service to you in that country. If the enemy have any it will encumber and weaken, rather than strengthen them.

Your supplies must mainly be taken up the river, and it ought to be done as soon as possible, while the navigation is open. Purchase what you can in the country through which you operate. .'^end your requisitions to these headquarters for funds and advance stores, and to the (Quartermasters and Commissary at Cincinnati for other supplies.

The conversation I have had with you will suggest more details than can be given here. Report frequently on all matters concerning your command. Very Respectfully,

Your Obedient .Servant,

D. C. BUKI.L,

Brigadier-General Commanding.

The campaign in the Sandy Valley, the battle of Middle Creek, the capture of Pound Gap, and the part taken by Col. Garfield in the operations of that Winter, form an important chapter in the body of this narrative. During the Winter he was promoted to a Brigadier-Generalship of Volunteers, his commission to date from the loth of January, the date of the victory at Middle Creek.

The campaign in the Valley of the Big Sandy being completed, Gen. Garfield with the Forty-Second and two other regiments of his brigade returned by way of the Ohio river to Louisville, reaching that city on the ist of April. He received an order assigning his command to the Seventh Division, Army of the Ohio, then assembhng under Gen. Geo. W. Morgan at Cumberland Ford, and directing Gen. Garfield to report in person to Major-Gen. BuELL, commanding the Army of the Ohio. Buell was then en 7-oute with his army from Nashville to join the forces of Gen. Grant near Corinth, and Gen. Garfield reported for duty to that officer while on the march, thirty-three miles beyond Columbia- He was at once assigned to the command of the Twentieth Brigade, Army of the Ohio, and though feeling severely the affliction of being separated from his own regiment, which he had done so much to create and inspire, he swallowed his disappointment and, with the hope that the fortunes of war might yet bring himself and the Forty-Second into the same army if not into the relation of commander and command, he took his place at the head of his new brigade, which included the following regiments : 64th Ohio Infantry, 65th Ohio Infantry, 13th Michigan Infantry, and 51st Indiana Infantry.

The command made forced marches to Savannah and proceeded thence by steamers to Pittsburgh Landing, where it arrived at one o'clock, p. m., of the second day of the battle. Gen. Garfield's brigade reached the front about three o'clock in the afternoon, an Iowa regiment being temporarily assigned to it, by order of Gen. Grant. On the 8th of April his brigade was detailed with other forces to make an advance on the Bark road towards Corinth, and had a sharp encounter with the enemy's rear guard. It took part in all the operations near Corinth and the brigade was among the earUest to enter that place.

In the month of June he marched Eastward from Corinth to Decatur with his command and rebuilt the bridges and trestlework that had been destroyed on the railroad between those two

THE FORTY-SECOND OHIO INFANTRY. t^

points. It crossed the river at Decatur, and encamped at Mooresville, Ala., early in July.

By Special Order No. 15, 6th Division A.rmy of the Ohio, of June 15th, 1862, Gen. Garfield was made President of "the General Court Martial for the trial of Lieut. Joseph Grant, 58th Indiana Volunteers.

By Special Order, No. 93, Army of the Ohio, of July 5th, 1862, he was made President of the General Court Martial for the trial of Col. Turchin, of the 19th Illinois Volunteers, and others; Capt. P T. Swain of the 19th Infantry, Judge Advocate. The Court held its sessions at Athens, Ala.

During the Summer, he had suffered for several weeks with chronic diarrhoea, and by Special Order, No. 118, Army of the Ohio, of July 30th, 1862, went home on sick leave. Shortly after his arrival in Ohio, he received a telegram from the Secretary of War, directing him to proceed to Cumberland Gap and relieve Gen. Morgan of his command. But he was unable to obey the order, being confined to his bed by serious illness.

Soon after this he received a telegram from the Secretary of War, as follows :

Washington, September ist, 1862.

Brigadier-General J. A. Garfield,

Hiram, Ohio :

As soon as your health permits you will report in person to this

Department for orders. '

E. M. Stanton,

Secretary of War.

In accordance with this order, he reported to the Secretary of War in person, late in September, 1862.

By Special Order of October 25th, 1862, he was detailed as a member of the Court of Inquiry in Gen. McDowell's case.

By Special Order of November 8th, 1862, he was ordered to report to Gen. Hunter for duty on a contemplated expedition to

South Carolina. This order, however, was subsequently superseded, and by Special Order, No. 362, of November 25th, 1862, he was detailed as a member of the General Court Martial for the trial. of Major-General Fixz John Porter, and served on that Court during its sessions.

By Special Order, of January 14th, 1863, Gen. Garfield was assigned to duty in the Army of the Cumberland, under Major- General Rosecrans. He reached the headquarters of that Army at Murfreesboro, near the end of February.

By Department General Orders of February 28th, 1863, he was assigned to duty as Chief of Staff of the Army of the Cumberland, in place of the lamented Col. Garesche, who had been killed in in the battle of Stone River. Early in the Spring of that year Capt. D. G. Swain, his Adjutant-General since the previous April, was directed to organize a Bureau of Military Information. By a system of police and scout reports, very full and trust-worthy information was obtained of the organization, strength and position of the enemy's forces.

Early in June the General Commanding required each General of a Corps and Division of the Army of the Cumberland, to report his opinions in writing in reference to an early or immediate advance against the forces of Gen. Bragg. Seventeen general officers submitted written opinions on that subject. Most of them were adverse to any early movement and nearly all advised against an immediate advance. Gen. Garfield presented to the Commanding General an analysis and review of these opinions, and urged an immediate movement against the enemy. For more than five months the Army of Rosecrans had lain inactive at Murfreesboro while the Commanding General had haggled and bandied words with the War Department. As Chief of Staff, Gen. Garfield did all that adroit diplomacy could do to soften these asperities, and meanwhile gave all his energy to the work of preparing the Army for an advance, and ascertaining the strength of the enemy.

His Bureau of MiHtary Information was the most perfect machine of the kind organized in the field during the War. When at last June came, the Government and the people demanding an advance, and the seventeen subordinate generals of Rosecrans advising against it, the analysis of the situation drawn up and submitted by Gen. Garfield, met and overthrew them all. Speaking of this letter, Mr. Whitelaw I?eid in his " Ohio in the AVar," says : " This report we venture to pronounce the ablest military document known to have been submitted by a Chief of Staff to his superior during the War." This is high praise, but it is history.

Twelve days after it was submitted the Army moved — against the will and opinion of Gen. Crittenden and nearly all Rosecrans' leading officers. It marched into the Tullahoma campaign, one of the most perfectly planned and ably executed movements of the War. The lateness of the start, caused by the objections which Gen. Garfield's letter finally overcame, alone saved Bragg's army from destruction. There was a certain work to do, which might as well have been begun on the ist of June as the 24th. Had it been begun on the first of these dates, Bragg's army might in all probability have been destroyed. As it was, the heavy rains intervened and saved him from pursuit.

With his military reputation thus strengthened, Gen. Garfield went with his chief into the battle of Chickamauga. His influence over Rosecrans had by this time become almost supreme. His clear and comprehensive mind grasped every detail, and his opinions were invariably consulted on all important questions. He wrote many orders upon his own judgment, submitting them to Rosecrans for approval or alteration. On the field of Chickamauga he wrote every order except one, and that one was the fatal order to Gen. Wood which ruined Rosecrans' right wing and lost the battle. The order from Rosecrans to Wood, as the latter interpreted it, required him to move his command behind another division, leaving a wide gap in the line of McCook's Corps, which held the right. \\'ooD says that he knew this move would be fatal, but it was ordered and he felt impelled to execute it. LoNGSTREET saw the blunder, hurled Hood's division into the gap, and within an hour McCook's Corps was broken and streaming, a disorganized mob of men, back to Chattanooga. Trying vainly to check the tide of retreat. Gen. Garfield was swept with his chief back beyond Rossville. But the Chief of Staff could not concede that defeat had been entire. He heard the roar of ThoxMas' guns on the left, and gained permission of Rosecrans to go round to that quarter and find the Army of the Cumberland. While the Commander busied himself with preparing a refuge at Chattanooga for his routed army, his Chief of Staff went back, accompanied only by a staff officer and a few orderlies, to find whatever part of the army still held its ground and save what there was left. It was a perilous ride. Long before he reached Thomas one of hiS orderlies was killed. Almost alone he pushed on over the obstructed road, through pursuers and pursued, found the heroic Thomas encircled by fire but still firm, told him of the disaster on the right and explained how he could withdraw his right wing and fix it upon a new line to meet Longstreet's column, which had turned the right of Thomas' position and was marching in heavy column upon his rear. The movement was made just in time, but Thomas' line was too short, it would not reach to the base of the mountain. Longstreet saw the gap, drove his column into it and would have struck Thomas' line fatally in the rear, but in that critical moment Gen. Gordon Granger came up with Steadman's division, which moved in heavy column, threw itself upon Longstreet, and after a terrific struggle drove him back. 'I'he dead tHE rORTY-SECOND OHIO INFANTRY. 19

and wounded lay in heaps where those two cohimns met, but the Army of Gen. Thomas was saved. As night closed in around the heroic Army of the Cumberland, Gens. Garfield and Granger, on foot and enveloped in smoke, directed the loading and pointing of a battery of Napoleon guns, whose flash, as they thundered after the retreating column of the assailants, was the last light that shone upon the battle field of Chickamauga. The struggle was over, and the Rebels retired repulsed. Had the two shattered corps of McCooK and Crittenden that night been brought upon the field and enabled Thomas to hold his ground, there might have been a second day to that battle which would have changed its complexion in history.

The battle of Chickamauga practically closed Gen. Garfield's military career. About four weeks after the engagement he was sent by Rosecrans to Washington to report minutely to the President and the \\'ar Department the position, needs, resources and capabilities of the army at Chattanooga. He went, had frequent lengthy interviews with the President and Secretary Stanton, and thus, point by point, made a most thorough and satisfactory report. Meanwhile, Gen. Garfield had been promoted to a Major-Generalship of Volunteers "for gallant and meritorious services at the battle of Chickamauga," to take rank from the 19th of September, 1863. Rosecrans had been removed from the command of the Army at Chattanooga and Gen. Grant appointed to his place.

Gen. Garfield was now called to a new field of duty. In October of the year previous, while the Forty-Second was retreating from Cumberland Gap, the people of the Nineteenth Congressional District of Ohio had elected him as their representative to the Thirty-Eighth Congress.

He was a Major-General, young, popular in the army, and in high favor at Washington ; he was poor and his army pay was

20 THE FORTV-SECOXD OHIO INFANTRY

double the slender salary of a Congressman, but he had been chosen by the people of his District as their representative under circumstances which in his judgment would not permit him to decline the trust. Cien. Thomas offered him the command of a corps, but Lincoln urged him to resign his commission and come to Congress. The President was strenuous and his advice prevailed. There was no want of Major-(ienerals, but there was need of all the zeal, courage and ability that could be assembled in Congress. So his friends argued, and the sequel proved the wisdom of their demand upon him. Yielding to this, he resigned his commission on the 5th of December, 1863, having served in the army more than a year after his election to Congress, and took his seat on the same day in the House of Representatives, where he has been in continuous service since that day.

The influence of Gen. Garfield u|ion the Forty-Second Regiment was unbounded. As Cnlonel, not less than as Professor and Principal of a Collegiate School, he evinced a rare and extraordinary power in controlling, interesting and inspiring young men. It was due largely to his enthusiastic efforts that the Regiment was made up of some of the i)est material that Ohio sent into the field. The careful, laborious education, the discipline, the quickening of individual self-respect that the Regiment underwent at his hands while in Camp Chase, were never lost upon its men. Long after he had gone to other duties the recollection of his words was a source of inspiration to the men, and as they went into their first fisrht at .Middle Creek arainst overwhelminsr numbers with serene confidence because their trusted Colonel had sent them, so afterwards they fought and marched as though conscious that the eye of their first commander was still upon them.

LIONEL A. SHELDON,

The first Lieutenant-Colonel of the Forty-Second, but during more than two years and a half its highest officer, was born in Worcester, Otsego County, X. Y., August 3d, 1830. He was the eighth in a family of eleven children. His immediate ancestors on both sides were of Revolutionary stock, and Col. Sheldon's excellent military career only continued a family record that had begun as far back as the capture of Andre. While he was quite young his parents brought him to Ohio and settled in Lorain County, where Lionel attended district school until his services were needed on the farm. Thenccfor.vard he worked at home during the Summer seasons, attending school during the Winters until his eighteenth year, when he had by working out at $8.00 per month earned enough to enable him to study for two consecutive terms at a select school. After this he taught district school during the Winter and in the Sprmg, Summer and Fall studied at Oberlin. Three months after his twenty-first birthday he was elected Justice of the Peace, which office he held for a year and a half, working hard all the time at his legal studies under the supervision of Messrs. Clarke and Burke, then a leading legal firm of Elyria. In the Spring of 1853, young Sheldon went to Poughkeepsie, studied two terms in the law school there, returned home in the Fall of the same year, and opened a law office on his own account. From that time his progress as an attorney was rapid and substantial, and the year 1861 found him one of che leading citizens of Elyria. Three years before the outbreak of the War he had been elected Brigadier-General of the Militia of Lorain County, and commissioned as such by Governor Chase. It was natural, therefore, that when the State Government began to call upon that County in 1 86 1 for men to resist the RebeUion, it should have called early upon Col. Sheldon, He responded promptly, made speeches to rouse the people, and under special authority of Governor Dennison, raised five companies in six days for the three months service. He was at that time busy with a large and growing legal practice, was married to a charming wife, and surrounded by various cares and pleasures that made it difficult for him to leave everything behind and enter the army. He decUned to do this for the three months service, but promised that if the revolt proved formidable and troops for a longer period were needed, he would go-

The call for three years regiments soon came. Col. Sheldon laid aside his civil pursuits and gave himself up to the work of strengthening the army. He assisted in raising six companies for various regiments, and when the Wade and Hutchins Cavalry was authorized he organized a squadron for that command. A dispute arose between the members of the squadron about ofticers. Sheldon accepted the Captaincy himself to prevent the men from disbanding, as they had not yet been mustered in and could not be held to service against their will. He took the company to Camp Chase, was mustered in, and made Major of the third battalion. Being wholly inexperienced in military matters, and the Wade and Hutchins Regiment being nearly ready to take the field, Major Sheldon felt somewhat unprepared for his new and responsible trust. While ready to do his utmost for the cause, he felt that a place in an infantry regiment, which would give him more time for study and preparation, would be better, both for himself and the good of the service. He had a natural and creditable feeling of unwilhngness to wear the uniform of an office which he could not from the first moment of taking the field, competently fill.