BIO: John R. Garden, Tillard Pen Pictures, 1911, Blair County, PA Contributed April 2003 for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Judy Banja Copyright 2003. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/blair/ _________________________________________ Pen Pictures of Friends and Reminiscent Sketches by J. N. Tillard Altoona, PA: William F. Gable & Co., Mirror Press, 1911 Father of Local Militarism MAJOR JOHN R. GARDEN Has Honorable Record in The Civil War - He Organized The Keystone Zouaves THOUGH he is not as young as he once was and his hair, mustache and military imperial are well-streaked with gray, the stranger who never saw him before, who might notice Major John R. Garden pass along the street, would instinctively say, "There goes a soldier," as the bearing and set-up have all the distinguishing characteristics of the West Pointer. Major Garden was never at West Point, but he has all the instincts of the thoroughbred soldier, for all that. He began by shouldering a musket in the Civil War, and all his subsequent life he has been interested in military matters, and is accounted one of the ablest drill masters in the country. The citizen who can remember local events for forty years past will not have forgotten the gay uniforms and brilliant manoeuvres of the Latta Guards, as they paraded about the principal thoroughfares on holidays and summer evenings in 1870. With Major Garden marching at their head and the files handled by as experienced and able a staff of both commissioned and non-commissioned officers as ever drilled a troop, there have been few military organizations in the state at any time that equaled this independent company in military precision or drill, and certainly none that excelled them. At that early day, the National Guard of Pennsylvania, as now constituted, was non-existent. The legislature had made no provision for anything of the kind, and probably felt that it had enough to do to take care of the accumulated Civil War debt. But the country was full of trained soldiers, who had spent three years or more in the field, and, while the older men of the community had had a surfeit of military life and were glad to escape any further burdens of the sort, there were a great number of young men who found it difficult to settle down to the duties of civic life, which, after the excitement of the camp and field, was entirely too tame and vapid. A number of these rallied around the independent standard set up by Major Garden and organized a company. As they were already familiar with the ordinary service tactics, they went a little further and made it a Zouave company, which involved the intricate bayonet exercise that was a feature in the vaudeville shows of the day. They were a stalwart and seasoned lot that responded to the first roll call of the Keystone Zouaves - afterward the Latta Guard. The officers were: Captain, John R. Garden; first lieutenant, Charles Fettinger; second lieutenant, Harry Miller; first sergeant, Theodore Burchfield; second sergeant, Malden Valentine; third sergeant, Hall; and fourth sergeant, L. C. Hegarty. It was for the most part a company of veterans, officered by veterans, with no awkward squads. They went down into their clothes for the price of their uniforms, save for a small amount of militia tax that Captain Garden secured from the county treasurer and distributed among the enlisted men. Their uniforms consisted of wide Turkish red trousers, blue jackets, yellow leggings and yellow turbans, with red fezzes. This was the beginning of the Fifth Regiment, of which the first sergeant, Theodore Burchfield, afterward became colonel. All the sergeants had seen hard service in the field, and the writer very well remembers how "Mal" Valentine and "Lute" Hegarty were accustomed to muster their platoons on off evenings in the fields at Blair Furnace and Greenwood, and put them through the bayonet exercise. A large portion of the company had been enlisted from that part of Logan Township and they were of the stuff of which soldiers were made. Mal Valentine had served nearly four years in the Twelfth Cavalry and had all the instincts of a military man, while L. C. Hegarty had marched away in '6I as a twelve-year-old drummer, and when he came back in '65 had gone to school for a few months and then served with Miles and Custer for three years on the plains, with another year as a guide to emigrant trains through the trackless northwest. The guns of the Zouaves were furnished by the state, but were of the most antiquated pattern, and none of the outfit would compare with the present superb National Guard equipment. But they were soldiers all right, for all that. In a year or two the Zouave Company was merged into the Fifth Regiment, National Guard, Colonel Jim Milliken commanding, and later the command passed to Colonel Burchfield, while Captain Garden, in November, 1872, was appointed aide on the staff of the major general, judge advocate in July 1873, and division quartermaster in August, 1874, under General James A. Beaver. The old Zouave Company drilled in Koelly's Hall, on Twelfth Avenue, and had attached a drum corps, led by "Johnny" Miller, a Civil War drummer. To all intents and purposes, Major Garden is the father of local militarism as it has existed since the Civil War and he has not confined his efforts to drilling soldiers, as his services have been in constant demand in other directions. He was born in Philadelphia, in 1842, and on August 1, 1857, went to Greensburg, Westmoreland County, where he became a messenger to Thomas A. Seabrook, civil engineer on the Pennsylvania Railroad, the office being moved to Altoona the following year. Shortly afterward he started to learn the carpenter trade, under Foreman George Rosenberg, but he never finished, for one day Abraham Lincoln sent a call for troops to defend the country, and Mr. Garden was one of the first to respond, enlisting in April, 1861, in the Third Pennsylvania Regiment of three months' troops. From that time until the last horn blowed in 1865 he was in the fighting game, having served in Company M, Sixty-second Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers; Company K, Ninety-first and Two Hundred and Fifteenth Regiments. He returned to Altoona in 1866 and went to work in the maintenance of way office, under Engineer W. Hazel Wilson, having charge of the coal and wood account. All the intervening years he has been in the service of the railroad company, and has always taken an active interest in all the affairs of the city. He was one of the charter members of the Empire Hook and Ladder Company, but, on the formation of the two engine companies, in company with the late Judge Rose, he left the Empire and helped organize the Vigilant Company, they being elected president and secretary, respectively. Four years later, Mr. Garden was elected chief engineer of the department for the East Side, he having in the meantime joined the Good Will Company. He drilled the Good Will, Excelsior and Logan Hose Companies and on some of their trips to tournaments about the state carried away the prizes for drilling from the crack organizations from the big cities. He also drilled the Uniform Rank, Knights of the Golden Eagle, in a way that enabled them to compete with the best in the state. The major has marched many a mile in his time, but his shoulders are still square, his chin high and his eye clear, and it is the hope of innumerable friends that he may find his paths easier as he nears the end of his long day, and when taps sound he may be able to fold his cloak about him and lie down to pleasant dreams. #