Sherman Daily Democrat
July 22, 1913

WORDS OF FAREWEL
Remarks By Dr. Wharton at the Funeral of Captain Le Tellier (published by request)

This is one of those occasions when it is difficult not to speak.  The sorrow of the entire community that honored him, the bereavement of this church that loved him, and the grief of a wide circle of friends whose hearts are aching today, seek a voice to utter their sense of incalculable loss and some word of tribute and farewell.  The conventional extravagance of eulogy would mock this hour.  Better the silence that fears the failure of words.  To tuter the unaccustomed words of praise - the sterotyped phrases of respect, would chill the sore hearts gathered about this bier.
It is just some simple word of farewell you would have me speak - just some simple word that should strive to utter our grief and also our love and passionate sympathy for those who are in the deepest gloom of this unspeakable sorrow.
We do not weep for him.  We do not weep for the pilgrim who has reached the journey end and who has unburdened his load at the gate.  We do not weep for the victor who has gained the laurel wreath and won his crown of rejoicing.
Who is there here today who does not know that it is well with this knightly spirit?  Who of you ever came into the circle of his fellowship - who ever touched his life and did not read in that patrician face the open secret of his strength and influence?  The abiding faith in Christ that underlays this life was slow of words and not given to great profession.  It revealed itself rather in the gracious manhood that cared only for high things, a manhood that all through the years grew in beauty and gentleness and strength.  It revealed itself most of all in the home life, ideal in its charm and winsomeness.  It revealed itself in life-long loyalty to his work, his church, his friends, his people, and to all things worth while.  It revealed itself in all helpfulness and fruitfulness and in the subtler way that may not be defined but which combined to make the incomparable, the princely, well-nigh flawless Christian gentleman - a Bayard without fear and without reproach.  His like we shall not see again.
Captain LeTellier was born in Charlottesville, Albemarle County, Virginia, January 28, 1842.  He received his elementary training in the private schools of that city and at the Albemarle Military Academy.  He was graduated from Bethany College, Virginia, at which institution he was the pupil and friend of Dr. Alexander Campbell.  His father was a charter member of the first church founded by that distinguished divine.  At the age of nineteen, he joined a Company organized at Central Depot, Virginia, and was mustered into service May 5, 1861 in Company K, 24th Virginia Infantry, famous as Kemper's Brigade.  He took part in all of the bloodiest battles on the soil of Virginia and neighboring states.  He was at Manassas, Williamsburg, Seven Pines, Malvern Hill, Spottsylvania Court House.  He was wounded seven times in battle.  He rose from the ranks to the Captain of his Company.  It was while he was under General Hoke and in the Battle of Plymouth, North carolina that he was seriously wounded, his right limb being shattered by the fragment of a shell.  He was taken to the hospitalat Charlottesville where he remained for many months before recovery, and it was this enforced absence from the service which prevented his rise to brigade rank.  He was in the immortal charge of General Pickett at Gettysburg of which General Lord Woolsey has said that its parallel is not in the annals of war.  He was wounded again in the Bloody Angle on that fateful field.
At the close of the war, he came to Kaufman County, Texas, and a little later in 1871, came to Sherman, founding the Sherman PRivate School of which he was principal to the time of his death.
It is not for the speaker nor for any man to measure the value of Captain LeTellier's service to the young manhood of the southwest.  Into all the lines of commercial and professional life have gone those master-workmen, trained by him for positions of trust and power in this great new world of the west.  I doubt if in all our country, any student ever received such merciless trip-hammer drill in the fundamentals of a practicval education as was given to all who had the rare privilege of attending his classroom.  The graduate went out from him into the world, prepared to think in straight lines and with hair-trigger swiftness, and yet all this was but least of that which was by this past-master in the art of teaching.  The student was unconsciously molded into a love for all that was noblest in life by daily contact with this finished Christian gentleman.  The splendid leaven of this strong and gentle nobleman whose patent was from his Maker, has entered so into the wide life of our west, - and that, too, in its formative period.  God in Eternity alone can measure its worth.
To have known Captain LeTellier was a privilege - to be his friend, was a distinction, and Sherman can never be the same to many of us in this room.  But, brethren and fellow citizens, we do not sorrow as those who have no hope.  It is well with him - nor can we begrudge the peace into which he has entered, and the freedom from all the pain of these last intolerable months.
Someday, somewhere, we shall know our friend again in that day "when God shall heal the breach of His people, and bind up the stroke of their wounds."