Looking Back

100 years ago

Nov. 13, 1914

That war is fought by boys is a familiar truth that we often forget. But the records of our own civil war prove it overwhelmingly. The department rolls show that in the great rebellion there were enlisted in the army of the north 2,778,309 men, and of these 25 were 10 year old and younger, 225 12 years and under, 1,523 14 years old and under, 844,891 16 years and under, 1,151,438 18 years and under, 2,159,798 21 and under and 618,511 22 years and over. Thus the average of the whole army was 19.7 years. When war thus takes away the young manhood of the country, w...