I have a picture of his ten years younger brother.
I have his ten years younger brother's description of himself on his enlistment papers—'of short stature and fair haired'—but I can imagine the man: my great-great uncle Guilford Caswell.
I have stood by his grave, on the banks of the Connecticut River—a tiny, old, forgotten graveyard—so old the newest stone was dated 1880.
My cousins and i brought a flag, and lilacs, to honour his grave, grace his grave.
He was only 33 when he died by his own hands.
The support of his family, a day labourer, hired for perhaps pennies a day.
When Lincoln called, he went, in 1862. Sworn into service at one of the Masonic Halls,in CT. He went—whether for love of this Union or abolition of slavery, I do not know.
But he went.
Bravely, without question.
'Wounded,by the explosion of a shell' at the 2nd battle of Winchester, VA. So read the papers, my great-great grandmother Caswell, in her exchanges with the V.A. of the time.
My cousins and I have conjectured. Closed brain injury? Maybe. PSTD—of course.
He spent time at Saint Elizabeth's, in D.C., suffering from 'acute mania'.
Then he was discharged and sent home.
Never right again, this young man who had half raised his youngest sister, because his mother was het up with caring for her husband, an invalid.
"Gentle, sane a man as I have ever known—a damned good worker," says one of his employers testimomies.
Remanded to the Ledyard Poorhouse, because of his anger, violence and danger, after the War.
Hung himself at the Ledyard Poorhouse, after not even a year there.
"When Lilacs last in the dooryard bloomed,
And the great star early drooped in the western sky in the night,
I mourn'd and yet shall mourn with ever returning spring.
Ever returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring,
Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love."
- Walt Whitman
Today—remember our beloved dead.
Today, remember those who come home scarred in spirit, as well as body.
I have stood by his grave, laid white lilacs upon it. A tiny, tiny forgotten graveyard upon the banks of the Connecticut River.
So small, so forgotten, my cousins and I needed to get down and weed, plant the small flag we had brought, lay the lilacs across it—then say an 'Ave'. (Well, two of us did - Casey's High Church.)
Remember them this day:
Our wounded.
In spirit as well as body.
Guilford Caswell, I salute you, honour you, and pray for you.
Dedicated to the memory of Louis Andrew Cirino, my husband, another hard-working man who, with wounds of his own from a different war, a different time, would sit near me as I typed Guilford's story, saying, "Read it to me. Read it again."
