ABRAHAM LINCOLN

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22566, 9 May 1935, Page 7

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

MAN WHO MET.HIM A CENTENARIAN'S MEMORIES There can now be few men left who met and talked with Abraham Lincoln and who were with General Grant in the American Civil War. One of them, says a writer in the Manchester Guardian, is Dr Griffith Evans, of Bangor, who will be 100 years old in August. Dr Evans has been bedridden for some years, but still possesses a retentive memory and an eager spirit, and lie has given me in an interview some interesting reniiniscenses. Dr Evans, who had a distinguished career as a British army inspecting veterinary surgeon, was attached to the British Artillery at Montreal during the American Civil War, and was anxious to visit the field hospitals of the Northern Army. He secured an interview with the British Ambassador at Washington. The Northern- Army had just suffered severe losses in what was known as the " War in the Wilderness," and the Ambassador thought it unlikely that any visitors would bo allowed. However, lie introduced Dr Evans to Professor Henry, of the Missouri Institute, who promised to get him an interview with President Lincoln. " The result was," Dr Evans told me, "that the following morning Professor Henry wa3 told to bring me to the White House at 10 a.m. After a formal introduction I told Mr Lincoln of my wish. After a general conversation the President said he would talk about me to the military authorities, and asked me to call again the next morning. When I called the second time Mr Lincoln, whom I saw in "his private room, said he would grant me a roving commission to visit the Northern Army, and that he would direct all military authorities in the field to help me to go where I wished. But it was on one condition: That I was to make myself medically useful to the troops and help the wounded. I readily agreed." Dr Evans went to the front, where General Grant, commander of the Northern Army, received him kindly. " General Grant corroborated to me the statement that the Northern Army had suffered a severe reverse in the ' War in the Wilderness,'" said Dr Evans, " but said lie was confident of victory if only because he had limitless reserves he could call upon and tho Southern Army had none. 'ln course of time I am bound to wiii,' he said." " General Grant," Dr Evans added, " has been depicted in Mr John Drinkwator's play, ' Abraham Lincoln' as a ' tippler.' My own observations of him, and I met him at meals every day, and everything I heard of him were quite to the contrary." On his return to Washington Dr Evans again met President Lincoln and thanked him for his courtesy. " The last I saw of Lincoln," said Dr Evans, " was, driving out from Washington to his country house, in a coach. LTe was escorted by cavalry, and I was told that that was much against his wish, but there were rumours of a scheme to kill him. Nine months later he died at the hands of an assassin during a visit to a theatre. Lincoln was a great man and I shall always cherish the recollection of my visit to him and his kindness towards me."

During his visit to the front Dr Evans also met General Meade and General Thomas. " I had been told that if he was not engaged in fighting I should probably find General Meade outside his rent rending his Bible," he told me. "And so I did. ' There is hardly anything else worth rending,' he said to me. ' It is the best book I can find to help me in different ways.'" Traffic in arms caused ill-feeling even in those days. Dr Evans told me that

•when he miet General Thomas, who to of Welsh extraction, he.found him rather sulky. The reason was that his breakfast that morning had been disturbed by an enemy shell. Handing a piece of the .shell to Dr Evans, the general said that it had been made in England, who supplied the enemy with ammunition. Dr Evans remonstrated with him and told him that England was neutral but that the Government had difficulty in restraining private firms from supplying ammunition.

The Northern Army were just then preparing a counter-bombardment, and Dr Evans joined a signal officer who directed the shooting of the Northern battery from a raised platform. Through glasses be could see the headquarters of General Lee, commanding the Southern Army. "Everywhere In the Northern Army I heard nothing but praise of General Lee," Dr Evans told me. "He was universally admired by the Northerners."

After the war Dr Evans visited the confiscated property belonging to General Lee just outside Washington, which had been converted into a settlement for the freed negroes of the south and was called "The Free Men's Village." One of the ex-slaves he met was an old negro who had learnt to read when he was a companion to the boy whose parents bought his mother as a slave. His most precious possession was a copy of the Old Testament, most of which he knew by heart. His great wish was to own a copy of tho New Testament, and Dr Evans presented him with one. Dr Evans is the "father" of the veterinary profession In Great Britain, and during his career made some important discoveries. In 1880 he was sent to India to investigate a fatal disease called surra in horses and camels. He found it was caused by a microbe in the blood, formerly unknown, and afterwards named Trypanosome Evansi. The value of his discovery was not appreciated at first, but later it brought him honour. In 1917 he was awarded the Mary Kingsley medal by the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, and in 1918 the Royal Veterinary Institute's medal. He also received from the University of Wales the honorary D.Sc. dogree. In 1931 he was made a freeman of the city of Bangor "in recognition of the distinguished services rendered by him to the cause of science and as an expression of the high esteem in which he is held by the corporation and citizens."

Dr Evans is a native of Towyn, Merionethshire. He is a descendant of Baron Owen, of JLlwyn, Dolgelley, and on his mother's side he is descended from Ednywain ap Bradwen, a member of one of the 15 tribes of Gwynedd and one of the five royal tribes of Wales.