Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. IV.djvu/57

the age of sixteen he became a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, and was noted for his diligent study of the Bible. When the civil war broke out, in the spring of 1861, he was a clerk in the Poland post-office. Young McKinley volunteered, and, going with the recruits to Columbus, was there enlisted as a private in Company E, of the 23d Ohio volunteer infantry, June 11, 1861. This regiment is one of the most famous of Ohio organizations, including an unusually large number of noted men, among them Gen. W. S. Rosecrans and President Hayes. He participated in all the early engagements in West Virginia, the first being at Carnifex Ferry, September 10, 1861, and in the winter's camp at Fayetteville he earned and received his first promotion, commissary sergeant, April 15, 1862. “Young as McKinley was,” said ex-President Hayes at Lakeside in 1891, “we soon found that in business and executive ability he was of rare capacity, of unusual and surpassing capacity, for a boy of his age. When battles were fought or a service to be performed in warlike things, he always took his place.” At Antietam Sergeant McKinley, when in charge of the commissary department of his brigade, filled two wagons with coffee and other supplies, and in the midst of the desperate fight hurried them to his dispirited comrades, who took new courage after the refreshment. For this service he was promoted