Leo Long, Grand Army of the Republic

Oscar Long donated his father’s badge from the Grand Army of the Republic to the Sandusky Library Archives Research Center. Leo Long was a veteran of Company E of the 186th Ohio Volunteer Infantry during the Civil War. In a Sandusky Register article from May 29, 1932, Leo Long recalled a battle from the Cumberland Gap in which the Union band played “Yankee Doodle” after running down the Confederate flag and replacing it with the Stars and Stripes. Mr. Long fondly recalled the Union victory on that foggy Kentucky morning during the war.

For many years Leo Long served as Commander for the McMeens Post No. 19, Grand Army of the Republic, an organization made up of Civil War Veterans. When Leo Long died on March 26, 1934, G.A.R. services were conducted for him at Oakland Cemetery. Two Civil War veterans of advanced age, Charles Cooper and Abraham Eddy, attended the funeral. Officers of the Santa Clara Camp, United Spanish War Veterans also paid tribute to Leo Long. A squad from the Ohio Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Home sounded taps at the gravesite of Mr. Long.

Memorial Day of 1934 was the last time the McMeens Post of the G.A.R. was active in Erie County, Ohio. An article in the May 31, 1934 issue of the Sandusky Register stated that the three remaining members of the local G.A.R. would keep the post alive inactively as long as possible, but the organization passed out of active existence at that time.