This inspiring rallying song was written by George F. Root, to whom we are indebted for so many songs of camp and field. Mr. Root also composed the music. Perhaps no hymn of battle in America has been sung under so many interesting circumstances as this. It was written in 1861, on President Lincoln’s second call for troops, and was first sung at a popular meeting in Chicago and next at a great mass meeting in Union Square, New York, where those famous singers, the Hutchinson Family, sounded it forth like a trump of jubilee to the ears of thousands of loyal listeners.

It was always a great favorite with the soldiers. Dr. Jesse Bowman Young, of St. Louis, the author of What a Boy Saw in the Army, relates a very affecting and pathetic incident which occurred while a portion of the Army of the Potomac was marching across Maryland. A young officer and his company were in the lead, and just behind them came one of the regimental bands, while ahead of them rode General Humphreys and his staff. As the division marched along, they passed by a country schoolhouse in a little grove at a crossroad. The teacher, hearing the music of the band at a distance, and expecting the arrival of the troops, had dismissed the school to give them a sight of the soldiers. Before the troops came in sight the boys and girls had gathered bunches of wild flowers, platted garlands of leaves, and secured several tiny flags, and as General Humphreys rode up in front of the schoolhouse, a little girl came forth and presented him with a bouquet, which he acknowledged with gracious courtesy. Then the group of assembled pupils began to sing, as they waved their flags and garlands in the air. That song made a tumult in every soldier’s heart. Many strong men wept as they looked on the scene and thought of their own loved ones far away in their Northern homes, and were inspired with newborn courage and patriotism by the sight and the song. This is the chorus which rang forth that day from the country schoolhouse, and which soon afterward echoed through the battle in many a soldier’s ear and heart, miles away, on the bloody field of Gettysburg:—

The first company that passed responded to their captain with a will as he shouted, “Boys, give them three cheers and a tiger!” and the example was imitated by the regiments that followed; so that amid the singing of the children and the cheers of the soldiers, and the beating of the drums, the occasion was made memorable to all concerned.

Richard Wentworth Browne relates that a day or two after Lee’s surrender in April, 1865, he visited Richmond, in company with some other Union officers. After a day of sight-seeing, the party adjourned to Mr. Browne’s rooms for dinner. After dinner one of the officers who played well opened the piano, saying, “Boys, we have our old quartette here, let’s have a song.” As the house opposite was occupied by paroled Confederate officers, no patriotic songs were sung. Soon the lady of the house handed Mr. Browne this note: “Compliments of General —— and staff. Will the gentlemen kindly allow us to come over and hear them sing?” Consent was readily given and they came. As the General entered the room, the Union officers recognized instantly the face and figure of an officer who had stood very high in the Confederacy. After introductions, and the usual interchange of civilities, the quartette sang for them glees and college songs, until at last the General said, “Excuse me, gentlemen, you sing delightfully, but what we want to hear is your army songs.” Then they gave them the army songs with unction: The Battle Hymn of the Republic; John Brown’s Body; We’re coming, Father Abraham; Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, the Boys are Marching; and so on through the whole catalogue to the Star-Spangled Banner,—to which the Confederate feet beat time as if they had never stepped to any but the music of the Union,—and closed their concert with Root’s inspiring Battle Cry of Freedom.

FORT SUMTER
FORT SUMTER

When the applause had subsided, a tall, fine-looking young fellow in a major’s uniform exclaimed, “Gentlemen, if we’d had your songs we’d have licked you out of your boots! Who couldn’t have marched or fought with such songs? while we had nothing, absolutely nothing, except a bastard Marseillaise, The Bonny Blue Flag, and Dixie, which were nothing but jigs. Maryland, my Maryland was a splendid song, but the tune, old Lauriger Horatius, was about as inspiring as the Dead March in Saul, while every one of these Yankee songs is full of marching and fighting spirit.”

Then turning to the General he said, “I shall never forget the first time I heard that chorus, ‘Rally round the Flag.’ It was a nasty night during the Seven Days’ fight, and if I remember rightly, it was raining. I was on picket, when just before ‘taps’ some fellow on the other side struck up The Battle Cry of Freedom and others joined in the chorus until it seemed to me that the whole Yankee army was singing. A comrade who was with me sang out, ‘Good heavens, Cap, what are those fellows made of, anyway? Here we’ve licked them six days running, and now, on the eve of the seventh, they’re singing “Rally round the Flag?”’ I am not naturally superstitious, but I tell you that song sounded to me like the knell of doom; my heart went down into my boots; and though I’ve tried to do my duty, it has been an uphill fight with me ever since that night.”

Perhaps the most romantic and inspiring occasion on which The Battle Cry of Freedom was ever sung was at the raising of the flag over Fort Sumter on the 14th of April, 1865, that being the fourth anniversary of the day when Major Anderson had evacuated the fort after his brave defense. A large number of citizens went from New York in excursion steamers, to assist in the celebration. Colonel Stewart L. Woodford, recently the United States minister to Spain, was master of ceremonies. The oration was delivered by the eloquent Henry Ward Beecher, but the supreme moment of interest came when Major-General Anderson, who had added General to the Major in the past four years, after a touching and tender address, received from Sergeant Hart a bag containing the precious old flag which had waved in the breeze through those days of fierce bombardment, the din of which had been heard around the world. The flag had been saved for such a time as this, and now, by order of Abraham Lincoln, it was brought back to wave again over Fort Sumter. It was attached to the halyards, and General Anderson hoisted it to the head of the flagstaff amid loud huzzas. One can imagine the inspiration of the occasion, as William B. Bradbury led the singing of The Battle Cry of Freedom. How the tears ran down the cheeks, and hearts overflowed with thanksgiving as they shouted the chorus underneath the folds of the very flag that had received the first baptism of fire at the beginning of the Rebellion:—

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HENRY CLAY WORK
HENRY CLAY WORK