Daily Times
(Leavenworth, KS)
May 3, 1861
The Kearney companies, on their way to Ft. Leavenworth, passed through Omaha. Rumors having been current at the latter place that Col. Miles, the commanding officer,—being a Southern man by birth—was a secessionist, the “Nebraskian” says there is no foundation for such rumors. That paper reports the following as the substance of remarks made by the Colonel to some citizens of Omaha:
“I don’t desire to take part against the South or the North. In my long service in the army I have achieved too many glories for the whole country, to have them divided and split up now. They don’t belong to the North nor to the South. But they shan’t tear down that Old Flag—I’ll die first. I was born under the Stars and Stripes, and I expect to die under the same old flag, and I DON’T CARE A CONTINENTAL HOW QUICK!”
There is no secession about the gallant Colonel.