History, Winnebago County, Wisconsin: Its cities, towns, resources, people

              852 HISTORY OF WINNEBAGO COUNTY.
pery places, up among the rolling bowlders, clutching to bushes, scrambling on all fours, digging, pitching and climbing over heaps of dead and wounded, overcoming line after line of redoubts, the men who were not to halt finally reached the summit. There were wild hurrahs, the gleam of bayonets, the roar and smoke of the cannon, the shrieks of the dying; then the enemy turned and ran, and Colonel Allen^s men—such of them as were left—were the victors of Alaryes Heights. The Southern-sympathizing correspondent of the ^London Times,^ writing. from Lee^s headquarters about this terrible assault, declared: ^Never -at Fontenoy Albuera, nor at AYaterloo was more undaimted courage displayed,^ And Greeley wrote: ^Braver men never smiled on death than those who climbed the Alaryes Heights on that fatal day.^* The Confederate commander told the AA^isconsin Colonel, as he handed him his sword and silver spurs, that he had supposed there were not troops enough in that entire army of the Potomac to carry the works, and declared that it was the most daring assault he had ever seen.^^
At the charge at Rappahannock Station on November 7, as his regi¬ ment was crossing the parapet of that redoubt and taking possession, his hand was so badly shattered by a bullet as to render him imfit for duty. He was complimented for his gallant service in that action iij general orders by Alajor-General H. G, Wright, commander of the Sixth Corps.
After the time of his regiment had expired, he returned to AYiscon¬ sin, raised seven new companies and returned with them to the seat of the war, where they served in tlie campaign of the Shenandoah Valley imder General Sheridan,
In the charge of the enemy^s works at Petersburg, April 2, the Fifth Wisconsin and Thirty-seventh Massachusetts were led by Colonel Allen, and he again distinguished himself by his gallant conduct.
General Allen returned to Wisconsin at the close of the war and was Secretary of State in 1866 and held that office until 1870, when he moved to Oshkosh and began the publication of the "Northwestern,'^ a daily and weekly paper. His varied experiences, wdiich had given him a large fund of general information and had brought him into contact with many of the leading men of the country, fitted him well for this position. As a writer he was forcible and wielded a vigorous pen, not only for the benefit of Oshkosh and its people, but for the State and country at large as long as he was editor of the "North¬ western.'' His editorials and letters had a beneficial effect on party leaders, until money then, as now, ruled for right or w^rong as interest lay in the balance.    He coukl not stand for wrong: he was a man of