On the 13th of March, 1865, Gen. Wilson was appointed by the president a brevet brigadier general, for gallant and faithful services during the war.
The armies, including the Seventeenth Corps, which had marched to Washington by way of the sea from their homes near the great lakes and the mighty rivers of the northwest, as they approached the seat of that government for the preservation of which they had fought, were now thrilled to the heart by the sight, for the first time in most of their lives, of the national capitol, whose silvery dome glittered before their eyes in the April sun.
Now came the end of the great rebellion. As sudden relaxation following long muscular tension is accompanied by pain, so the abrupt cessation of the struggle, while it presented to those composing the Union armies many causes for joy and gratulation, yet filled their hearts with a vague sadness occasioned by the contemplation of parting, one with another, and severing those ties of affection which had their origin and growth in a common danger and mutual hardships.
After taking part in the grand review of the army at Washington in May, 1865, Gen. Wilson proceeded with Gen. Logan, then in command of the Veteran Army of the Tennessee, to Louisville, Kentucky, where the western armies were disbanded in June and July, 1865. Before separating with Gen. Wilson, at this joyful and at the same time painful period, Gen. Logan wrote to him in the following kind and complimentary terms:
Louisville, Ky., July 23, 1865.
Brevet Brigadier General James Wilson:
My Dear Sir: The time having arrived that our official relations must cease to exist by the successful termination of this bloody war, I cannot part with you without expressing to you my profound gratitude for the manner in which you have conducted your department while acting as one of my staff officers. Your conduct has at all times since my first acquaintance with you, which was early in the war, been that of a gentleman and true soldier. That peace and prosperity may be yours through life is the wish of
Your sincere friend,
John A. Logan,
Major General.
At the close of the war, when the great armies on both sides of the conflict were disbanded, their subsidence into peaceful citizenship, without turbulence or anarchy, was the wonder of the world, and contrary to the forecasts of European soothsayers. Such a sudden and happy transformation from martial to civil law, from bayonets to plowshares, from military dictatorship to democratic self-government, was in a measure due to the high example set by officers like Gen. Wilson, high in rank and command, to whom the men had been accustomed to look for leadership, displaying a hearty eagerness, when their military services were no longer required, to return to their former avocations of peace.
Thus, returning to Iowa, Gen. Wilson resumed his former occupation as a tiller of the soil on his farm near Newton. But agricultural pursuits after all had, in some measure, lost their charm for him, and ceased to be as attractive as before. So that in 1869, when his business aptitude and experience, discovered and developed first in the distant and romantic island of St. Michael, seemed to be invited to the prosperous town of Newton by the expansion of the commercial interests of the place, he left the farm and established at Newton the Jasper County Bank, of which he became and still remains the president.
There at home, enthroned in the affection of an interesting family, sustained by all the blessings vouchsafed to a man in this life, surrounded by loyal and admiring friends, many of them his former comrades in arms, in a green old age, he can calmly look upon the retrospect of the romance of real life in which he has figured as the hero, congratulating himself that in every difficulty of life, in every danger of battle, in every temptation, he has borne himself truly, bravely, and without blemish.
In person Gen. Wilson is well above the medium in height, erect, square-built and broad-shouldered, with an inclination to plumpness, developed since he renounced the army ration and camp bed. His manner is frank, cordial and engaging. His features, expressive of firmness and benevolence, are well delineated in the accompanying portrait.
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