distinction. He says, in his official report: "My command met the enemy and defeated him." The admitted facts as they are now disclosed, would have warranted the statement, "The Virginia Military Institute met the enemy and defeated him." For see: Of the two brigades of infantry, one was commanded by Wharton, the other by Echols, both graduates of this Institute; of the regiments and battalions comprising those brigades, they were commanded by George B. Smith, George M. Edgar, William Patton, Peter J. Otey and Scott Shipp, each and all of them graduates of this Institute, who had acquired here that skill and discipline which contributed essentially to the victorious result. And the artillery, commanded by Major McLaughlin; he, while not a graduate, had doubtless acquired through that insatiable inquisitiveness that distinguished him, and the opportunities which his residence in Lexington afforded, much of the knowledge and skill which made his guns so effective on that day. Who can venture to doubt that had these commanders been absent, and that glorious band of young immortals who went out from these halls been supplanted by some other regiment, that the result would have been other than it was.
Many years after the sun of that hallowed day had gone down in triumphant splendor, it was deemed by one, competent to judge, and with adequate knowledge for sound judgment—by General Long, the Military Secretary of General Robert E. Lee—that the conduct of the Cadets on that day was worthy of a place in the life of his great Chief, on which he was then engaged, and he has thus recorded it:
"The Cadets of the Virginia Military Institute formed a portion of Breckinridge's division, and behaved with distinguished gallantry; General Breckinridge wished to shield these youths, but they insisted upon being led forward, and were seen in the hottest of the fight, where they maintained themselves with the steadiness of veterans."
Another witness, hardly less valuable—Major Harry Gilmor—a participant in the battle, a man of large experience in war, and one not given to idle compliments, has said, in his "Four Years in the Saddle":
