Class of 1893

Headquarters, 12th U. S. Infantry, Panique, Luzon, P. I.,

December 31, 1899.

[General Orders, No. 158.]

The regiment again mourns the loss of a tried and valued officer. First Lieutenant Edward Taylor, 12th Infantry, died at Bautista, Luzon, at 4:45 P.M.,  p564 Dec. 26, 1899, from the shock following a railroad accident, in which his right arm was severed at the elbow.

In company with a brother officer he was riding along the railroad embankment, near Bautista, the morning of Dec. 26, when suddenly, from the rear and without due warning, the train was upon them. They were dismounting, when Lieutenant Taylor's horse jumped across the track, pulling the rider along, but too late to prevent the catastrophe which followed. Kind friends at Bautista were quick to do all that skill and attention could do, but in vain.

Dec. 27, 1899, the remains were taken to Manila, and on the 29th appropriate services were held at the First Reserve Hospital, in the presence of a number of the officers of the regiment, after which they were taken to the transport Thomas, en route to their last resting-place at home.

Lieutenant Taylor was born in Boone County, Ill., Mayº 6, 1868, and appointed to the Military Academy from Idaho in 1889. He graduated in 1893, and joined the 12th Infantry at Fort Sully, S. D., during the fall of that year, since which time he has served with the regiment in post and field wherever duty has called.

He participated with honor in the campaign against Santiago de Cuba, 1898, taking part in all the fighting in which the regiment was engaged. He was nominated for a brevet commission in recognition of his gallant conduct at the battle of El Caney, Cuba, July 1, 1898. He contracted fever in Cuba, and for many weeks was critically ill, but returned to the U. S. with the regiment, and later was able to help prepare the regiment for service in the Philippines.

In the campaign against the Insurgents he has been constantly in command of Company E, and has been conspicuous for attention to duty and gallantry on every occasion that his company has been engaged.

He was a man of unusual repose of manner and great reticence, born of a gentle and unassuming yet cheerful temperament; but he was quick to act when occasion demanded, and always with good judgment, nobly justifying the confidence with which superior and subordinates alike regarded him. Of him it can be most truly said that he never spoke ill of others, or harbored hate or resentment in the slightest degree, and of him no one would wittingly speak ill, because there was none to tell. A superb horseman, it seems the sadder that, after undergoing the many vicissitudes and dangers of devoted service with the colors in Cuba and Luzon, he should lose his life in the manner in which he did.

He was an affectionate and attentive husband and father. The bereaved wife and child will be prostrated with grief; but it will be some comfort for them to know that they have in an unusual degree the sympathy of the officers and men of the regiment.

The officers will wear, so far as may be practicable in the field, mourning for thirty days.

By order of Lieut.‑Colonel Bubb.

Frank L. Winn, Captain 12th U. S. Infantry, Adjutant.