Pioneer history of Ingham County, compiled and arranged by Mrs. Franc L. Adams, secretary of the Ingham County pioneer and historical society.

LANSING TOWNSHIP AND CITY, WITH HISTORY

445

that they got sticks and lined up with the soldiers for instruction
in the manual of arms. This did not suit another pompous officer,
who stood nearby, who was too dignified to recognize the spirit in
the boys, but thought they were mocking the awkward movements of the squad, so he drew his sword and drove them away,
telling them in a haughty tone they were too small for such work.
This rebuff did not dampen our martial spirit for we were so
anxious to go to war that we made a mark on the school yard fence
to measure our height every week. There was a "drummer
boys' mark," and when one of us reached that mark "honest to
goodness without any cheating" he was an officer, put on airs
and ordered us around. He was the commanding officer and we
were nothing but privates.
In a short time the picture changes to a picnic dinner in the
school yard on the leaving of the company for the front. The
picnic dinner interested us more than the sorrowful farewells, for
we were afraid that the hungry soldiers, with the prospect of a
salt pork and hardtack ration before them, would eat all the ice
cream and good things the ladies had provided and leave nothing
for us poor kids. I remember one soldier saying as he was looking
over his equipment that he wished his canteen could always be
full of Weiman's beer so he would not get homesick.
Next picture was a sad one, a soldier's funeral. Andrew
Calkins was brought back to his boyhood home on Willow street
to be buried with soldier honors. His body was accompanied
by a sergeant and four privates in full uniform and equipment.
I can recall his coffin covered with the flag and borne by his comrades, who acted as pallbearers, into the old Franklin street
church, how the soldiers filed into one of the pews at the side of the
pulpit and at the subdued but hoarse command of the officer to
"Ground arms" their muskets struck the floor. I can remember that hollow, empty sound. It had no ring, had no sound of
life, but was empty and dead. The last ceremonies at the grave,
the firing of the volley over it, brought us back to the present,
made us realize that in our country the Southland was strife and
bloodshed as well as death.
Andrew was, if I remember rightly, an only son, and his weeping, sorrowing mother has given her only boy as a sacrifice in the
defense of his country.