In Memory of John Pelham

by Hon. William R. Smith, representative from
Alabama, Confederate Congress

Fell by his guns! Oh gallant youth! Renown
Beheld thy fall, and from the battle's rage
Plucked and transferred thee to its lyric page;
Intent to bind thy brow with oaken crown,
And hand thy name in crimson glory down,
Kindling the narrative from age to age
To fire the hearts of hero, saint, and sage.
Above the fear of tyrants or their frown
Come, take thy station by th' intrepid twain
That shout o'er th' Athenian tyrants slain
By that bold boy, that braved Porsena's flame,
And burned his way through torture to his fame --
By him, Horatius, stalwart to the last --
These are thy kin, these great souls of the past.

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Now the phantom guns creak by
They are Pelham's guns
Tht quiet boy with the veteran mouth is Pelham.
He is twenty-two. He is to fight sixty battles
And never lose a gun.

-- Stephen Vincent Benet
"John Brown's Body"