CUT DOWN

An antebellum attorney from Chautauqua County, N.Y., William O. Stevens was one of Revere’s most dependable subordinates, loved by his men. He had risen in rank to colonel of the 72nd New York by that fateful May when his regiment’s position along the Plank Road was attacked. Stevens was among the Excelsior Brigade’s killed during the fierce fighting. Two weeks later, fellow attorney Hanson Alexander Risley, a friend of the colonel’s, sent the letter below to the 72nd’s former chaplain, the