Show J PREMONITIONS oF DEATH Soldiers Mlio HInD Gone Into Certain Bat tie Perfectly Conscious of Their Fate Soldiers had strange premonitions oi death before going into battle during the war said an old soldier I could not tell you how many times I have seen my comrades foretoll their death They seemed to feel it was coming and went into battle fully prepared to meet their end So common was this and so regularly regu-larly did death follow when foretold thai I often heard officers upbraiding their men for speaking of death remarking A man never speaks of a fear of death without death following shortly after Its like the smallpox the one that dreads it most is sure to be the first victim vic-tim But the officers were reasoning backward In all the cases I saw tho prediction pre-diction of death was caused by an inward in-ward feeling telling that his end was i near It wasnt fear for remember Boss MoKollar as we used to call him who came from Butler county Ho had been a brave soldier serving his full three years never once failing in his duty The day before his three years were up ho went into tho battle of tho Wilderness Wilder-ness Ho was so pale and caroworn and lacked so much the usual vigor with which he entered battle that some of his friends remarked how changed he was Ho looked liko a ghost and was trembling nil over They asked him what was tho matter Why ho re plied my three years are up tomorrow but Ill never see my service out I will be killed in this battlethat I know HiS friends tried to cheer him up betting him that it was only a morbid fancy but no amount of talk could enliven en-liven him He went into the battle and was among the first to fall being hit squarely in the forehead I also remember remem-ber John Dunbar sitting eating crackers with an officer before a campfire on the eve of battle Ho had a sad expression when he turned ana breaking tho cracker in his fingers said in a contemplative contem-plative manner Well boys this is my last night on earth In the dim fire light I saw the big tears well up as tho officer inquired what he meant Ill be shot tomorrow sure The officer seeing see-ing how deeply the man was affected placed his hand npon his shoulder and 31i ithsDl 1ln I vtnell i r k down In the battle next day he was killed among the first I could give you an indefinite number of such instances which show that soldiers really had death foretold to them but these are sufficient To ino it was a most solemn moment when I heard n man say he was going to be killed It invariably turned out that way Exchange |