Dedication

Of all books this one seems least to need a dedication.  Are not the supreme sacrifices of the dead of Knox County inscribed upon the imperishable tablets of our hearts?  Are not the heroic deeds of the living enshrined forever in our memories?  Yet of all books no one more richly deserves a proper dedication.  The men and women whose names are inscribed herein belong to no ordinary race.  The blood of the heroes and heroines of other stirring days ran into their veins and felt at home.  The mantle of an honorable and glorious past fell upon their shoulders; it has been worn worthily and kept unstained.

No words of mine or any other are needed to enhance the lustre of their fame.  They have imprinted on history's most golden page a record of glory in their deeds; and what they have written, they have written.  But it is altogether fitting and proper that we pay honor to whom honor is due, and that we should here set down some expression of our great love and pride for and in these men and women of Knox County.  In our courthouse yard is a plain, but stately monument erected to John Sevier.  Upon it is the inscription: "35 battles-35 victories."  Let us go and chisel upon that sacred marble the story of yet another triumph!  For the great spirit of Sevier still flames in the men of Tennessee, and his civil descendants are worthy such a sire.

Sir John Foster Fraser, speaking here in the Chautauqua last year, said repeatedly: "There is no glory about war."  The statement is true.  When we see troops marching out with polished accoutrements and weapons, with firm tread and shining eyes, with movements that are measured, virile and precise; when we hear the martial notes of the bugle and the patriotic melodies of the band, then our hearts are thrilled and we think of the glory of military life.  But when war actually comes, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, as the Spanish writer, Ibanez, has pointed out, are loosed.  The White Horse of glittering Militarism, the Red Horse of Bloodshed, the Black Steed of Famine and the Pale Horse of Terror -- these four and their riders rush forth above the world.  A cold and icy blast precedes them; destruction, want and sorrow follow in their train.

The men so splendidly accoutred, who went out to war, are called up to battle by the Four Horsemen.  Behold them!  The shining weapons are broken and rusted.  The spick and span uniforms are torn and defiled with mud and the stains of blood.  The ranks that once marched four by four with steady tread have great gaps where men have fallen.  The faces once filled with health and color are now wan and shrunken, and eyes with deep circles under them blaze out, filled with the fires of anguish and with the horrors of what they have seen.  Shot and shell from rifles and great guns whine and burst across the field of war.  Corpses of men and beasts lie putrefying in the sun, unburied because of the haste of battle.  Limbs blown from healthy young bodies lie decaying where they fell.  There is an insufferable stench over the whole expanse.  It is the breath of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.  Within the area of strife are towns and cities once flourishing and filled with youth and laughter, now desolate.  In many homes, in many nations, there are women whose hearts are crushed, there are children who are fatherless, because of men who will never come back.  Beholding all this desolation and heartbreak, we agree that there is no glory about war.

Yet there is glory, resplendent glory, upon the heroism of men willing amidst such scenes to risk their lives for the sake of Right.  There is glory, radiant glory, upon the sacrifices patriotic men and women have made that war shall not come again and that Freedom shall not die.  And if blood spilled counts for anything, if citations and decorations won mean anything, if utmost sacrifices made are anything, then Knox County has earned her crown of glory.  The four mad Horsemen, once stabled in Berlin, rallied their tremendous hosts along the Hindenburg line.  American valor broke that line and overthrew the Horsemen -- let us hope, forever.  That line was broken at various points.  But to the troops of North and South Carolina and Tennessee, fighting with the British at Bellicourt, Nauroy, Premont, and Busigny -- foremost among them Knox County men -- belongs this everlasting honor and distinction; they broke it first.

And in the great distinctively American actions, the battle of St. Mihiel and the forty-seven days' battle of the Argonne Forest, our men were in the front.  Indeed, it was in these engagements that most of Knox County's soldiers were to be found.  They were not organized into one unit.  Going into service at various times, in various units, and in many instances being frequently transferred, each man carried on and did his duty.  Our men were to be found in practically every one of the forty-two American combat divisions, fighting over nearly every landscape on the Western Front.  In the battles we have named they fought with almost super-human bravery.  And in Marshal Foch's great counter-offensive along the Marne, when Chateau-Thierry, Belleau Wood, Bouresches, and Soissons leaped upon History's immortal page, men of Knox County wrote their names in blood.

Nor did our men fail to sustain America's tradition of valor on the sea.  To the courage and skill of all branches of the Naval service is due the world's gratitude that our land troops arrived on schedule time and kept coming till victory was won.  By night and by day, facing storm and tempest and the most hideous terrors of man's invention, watching and fighting on every dangerous water, Knox Countians proved themselves worthy to keep company with the heroic Captain Lawrence and the mighty John Paul Jones.  And for some of them the guns boomed out the mournful salute of honor, that told of life laid down for Liberty and Country.

Honor to whom honor is due!  For our gallant fighting men we have no words of praise too high.  They met the flower of the world's best-trained and fiercest army, and laid it low.  We hold in great pride also our men who did not reach the firing line but ate their hearts out longing to go and prove their mettle, meanwhile faithfully performing their duties where they were.  Theirs, too, were heroes' souls.  Also we bring our grateful tributes to those men and women who served in the various welfare organizations, several of them abroad and at the front, some of them wounded.  They did much in sustaining the army's morale.  There was no branch of service, military, naval or civilian, in which Knox Countians were not found.

Let not our soldiers and sailors think this country will forget.  For over fifty years we have held in reverent memory the men who wore the Blue and the Gray.  And now their sons in Khaki will stand beside them always within the Holy of Holies in the Nation's heart.

Most sacred of all to us are those who sleep beneath the Flag, having poured out for it their last full measure of devotion.  Very tender is our thought of the fathers and mothers and wives who have given their sons and husbands on Freedom's altar.  Their grief is too holy to intrude upon.  If we do not often speak of it, it is only because we would not tear their heart wounds afresh.  But their boys are held in our everlasting love.

"On Fame's eternal camping ground,
Their silent tents are spread;
And glory guards, with solemn round,
The bivouac of the dead."

This volume will be treasured in many a home.  Let us not, however, be content merely with the reading of it.  Our men fought for the ideals of Christian civilization as expressed in free America.  Let us keep those ideals bright in action.  Our men sang time and time again:

"In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me;
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,
While God is marching on."

Let it be our high privilege to see to it that the nation whose destiny they have preserved shall maintain inviolate the liberties made secure at such a price.  May no force, without or within, be permitted to trample upon our gift of Freedom.  In all our ways may we acknowledge Him who brought us to this hour, as we humbly believe, to accomplish justice for mankind.  In all our relations, domestic and foreign, may we prove ourselves a nation whose God is indeed the Lord.

ROY E. VALE
Knoxville, Tennessee
July 2, 1919

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