Major sullivan ballou biography for kids

INTRODUCTION TO SULLIVAN BALLOU'S LETTER

Love of country is not unique to Americans, but in a democracy, sending citizens to war requires far more than a dictator's fiat. In 1861, men on both sides of the conflict were willing to lay down their lives for what they believed to be right. Southerners fought for states' rights and a society built upon human slavery, which many considered the natural order of the universe. When the war started, few volunteers in the northern army marched off to end slavery, but many were ready to fight and die to preserve the Union.

One such soldier was Major Sullivan Ballou of the Second Regiment, Rhode Island Volunteers. Then thirty-two years old, Ballou had overcome his family's poverty to start a promising career as a lawyer. He and his wife Sarah wanted to build a better life for their two boys, Edgar and Willie. An ardent Republican and a devoted supporter of Abraham Lincoln, Ballou had volunteered in the spring of 1861, and on June 19 he and his men had left Providence for Washington, D.C.

He wrote the following letter to his wife from a camp just outside the nation's capital, and it is at once a passionate love letter as well as a profound meditation on the meaning of the Union. It caught national importance 129 years after he wrote it, when it was read on the widely watched television series, "The Civil War," produced by Ken Burns. The beauty of the language as well as the passion of the sentiments touched the popular imagination, and brought home to Americans once again what defense of democracy entailed.

Ballou wrote the letter July 14, while awaiting orders that would take him to Manassas, where he and twenty-seven of his men would die one week later at the Battle of Bull Run.

LETTER TO HIS WIFE (1961)

My very dear Sarah:

The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days -- perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write you again, I feel impelled to write lines that may fall under yo

One hundred and sixty years ago Wednesday, Major Sullivan Ballou of Rhode Island died of wounds sustained in the First Battle of Bull Run, Manassas, Virginia. Two weeks earlier he had written a very eloquent and heartfelt love letter to his wife, Sarah. The letter catapulted to national prominence when a segment of it was read in Ken Burns’ documentary, The Civil War, airing on PBS in 1990. Historians continue to debate its authorship.

Born in Smithfield, RI, Ballou was orphaned at an early age, filling his youth with need and poverty. Nonetheless, he eventually attended Brown University, earned a law degree from the National Law School, and practiced law in Providence.

In 1854, he was elected to the state House of Representatives. The following year he married Sarah Hart Shumway and came to treasure his wife and their two sons, Edgar and William.

With the beginning of the war in 1861, he heard the call of duty, volunteered, and was appointed a major in the 2nd RI Infantry Regiment.

His letters to Sarah had been affectionate, chatty with details about Army life, concerned with money and the health of the family members, and also at times charged with romantic longing.

In her book, “For Love and Liberty: The Untold Civil War Story of Major Sullivan Ballou and His Famous Love Letter,” Robin Young paints the setting when Ballou wrote the famous letter on July 14, 1861. His unit was located at Camp Clark on the outskirts of Washington, DC, preparing for action against “the Secesh” (rebel secessionists).

On the evening of July 14, he was surrounded by the sounds and sights of thousands of soldiers in camp, settling in for the evening: some inaudible distant talk, a cough, the ping of a tin cup, a snore, the lilt of a doleful tune from an harmonica.

Outside of his tent, the faint light from a quarter-moon shone. Scattered campfires and fireflies flickered.

Ballou uncapped his inkwe

Union Army officer

Sullivan Ballou (March 28, 1829 – July 29, 1861) was an American lawyer and politician from Rhode Island, and an officer in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He is remembered for an eloquent letter he wrote to his wife Sarah a week before he was mortally wounded in the First Battle of Bull Run. He was left behind by retreating Union forces and died a week after the battle.

Early life

Ballou was born the son of Hiram (1802–1833) and Emeline (Bowen) Ballou, a distinguished Huguenot family in Smithfield, Rhode Island. He lost his father at a young age. In spite of this, he attended boarding school at Nichols Academy in Dudley, Massachusetts, and Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. After graduation from Phillips, he attended Brown University, where he was a member of Delta Phi, and went on to study law at the National Law School, in Ballston, New York. He was admitted to the bar in Rhode Island and began practice in 1853.

Ballou married Sarah Hart Shumway on October 15, 1855. They had two sons, Edgar and William.

Ballou was active in public affairs. In 1854, soon after beginning his law practice, he was elected to the Rhode Island House of Representatives. He was chosen as Clerk of the House, and later as the Speaker. He was a staunch Republican and supporter of Abraham Lincoln.

Civil War

After the bombardment of Fort Sumter in April 1861, President Lincoln called on the States loyal to the Union to provide 75,000 militia troops. Ballou promptly volunteered, and encouraged others to do the same. He was commissioned a major in the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry Regiment. He was third in command of the Regiment, after Colonel John Slocum and Lieutenant ColonelFrank Wheaton. He was also appointed judge advocate of the Rhode Island militia.

After training at Camp Clark in Washington D.C., the 2nd Rhode Island had joined the Union Army o

Sullivan Ballou was a successful, 32-year-old attorney in Providence, Rhode Island, when Abraham Lincoln called for volunteers in the wake of Fort Sumter. Responding to his nation's call, the former Speaker of the Rhode Island House of Representatives enlisted in the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry, where he was elected major. By mid-July, the swirling events in the summer of 1861 had brought Ballou and his unit to a camp of instruction in the nation's capital. With the movement of the federal forces into Virginia imminent, Sullivan Ballou penned this letter to his wife. His concern that he "should fall on the battle-field" proved all too true. One week after composing his missive, as the war's first major battle began in earnest on the plains of Manassas, Ballou was struck and killed as the Rhode Islanders advanced from Matthews Hill.

Regrettably, the story of Sullivan Ballou does not end with a hero's death on the field of battle and a piercing letter to a young widow. During the weeks and months that followed the battle, Confederate forces occupying the area of the battlefield desecrated the graves of many fallen Federals. As a means of extracting a revenge of sorts against the Union regiment at whose hand they had suffered, a Georgia regiment sought retribution against the 2nd Rhode Island.
Supposing they had disinterred the body of Colonel John Slocum, commanding the Rhode Islanders during the battle, the Confederates desecrated the body and dumped it in a ravine in the vicinity of the Sudley Methodist Church. Immediately following the Confederate evacuation from the Manassas area in March 1862, a contingent of Rhode Island officials, including Governor William Sprague, visited the Bull Run battlefield to exhume their fallen sons and return them to their native soil. Led to the defiled body, the party examined the remains and a tattered remnant of uniform insignia and discovered that the Confederates had mistakenly uncovered the body of Major Sullivan Ballou,