Author Description

Excerpt from The Illio, 1909 Although he has been a member of the University community but eight years, few men have become more closely identified with the real life of the University than Colonel F echét. No man is a more loyal supporter of the institution than he or has a stronger hold upon the student heart. Colonel Fechét had had a long and honorable career as a soldier before coming to the University. He was but seventeen years old when, in 1861, he enlisted as a private soldier in the Seventh Michigan Infantry. He wasat once made a sergeant, and at the time of his discharge in 1865 he held the rank of First Lieutenant. He was given the rank of Brevet First Lieutenant and Brevet Captain March 2, 1867, for gallant and' meritorious service at the battle of Antietam, Maryland, September 17, 1862. He was made First Lieutenant of the 8th U. S. Cavalry, July, 1867, was pro moted to the rank of Captain in May, 1870, and was made Major of the 6th Cavalry, April 20, 1891, which rank he held when he came to the University in 1900. He was retired for disability in line of duty, July 9, 1898, and was made lieutenant-colonel April 23, 1904. He participated in nine battles during the Rebellion, among which were the bloody ones of Bull Run and Gettysburg. In the battle of Antietam he was severely wounded, being shot through the right lung. For the fifteen years following the close of the war in 1865 he was almost con stantly engaged in operating against the Indians in the southwest, and he has spent in all nearly thirty years in campaigning against Indians in the Middle West. He was in the campaign against Geronimo, in 1884 - 1885, and commanded the celebrated expedition against Sitting Bull in 1890 which resulted in the death of that warrior and in the capture of a large portion of his immediate hand. He was in command of the cavalry column which suppressed the war between the cattle barons and the rustlers - known as the Johnson County, Wyoming, war. He was for a