There were incidents humorous and pathetic. At one place an aged woman tottered up to him from a wayside house and, leaning on her stick, said: “Let me touch the flag and give my blessing to the bearer. My youngest boy fought for that flag and died for it in your country. He fell with that flag in his hand.” Her son, an Englishman, had given his life fighting for the Union. At another place a grimy sweep, fresh from a job, embraced the American most affectionately. Bates’s quarters at Shepherd’s Bush were at the “Telegraph,” and during the Friday evening the hotel was in a state of siege. Sir John Bennett, an ex-Sheriff of the City of London, had offered to lend the soldier a carriage; but it was ultimately decided to use an open equipage drawn by a pair of greys, one of them mounted by a postilion. The daily papers of the 2nd of December, 1872, give a full account of the proceedings. Seated in the carriage was Sergeant Bates, holding his beloved flag, while two other flags, the Union Jack and the Star-spangled Banner, trailed behind, the horses’ trappings being decorated with international symbols. Up Notting Hill, along Bayswater Road, and through Oxford Street passed the carriage, surrounded and followed by a huge and demonstrative crowd. In Bond Street the horses were taken out, and the carriage was dragged by some twenty-five persons along St. James’s Street, Pall Mall, by Charing Cross, and through the Strand and Fleet Street, up Ludgate Hill, and along Cheapside, to the Guildhall. A dense mass of people had congregated in the Guildhall yard, where a British sergeant was carrying the English standard. The scene beggared description. The Guildhall itself was full to overflowing, and having alighted, Bates had perforce to be lifted on shoulders and hoisted, flag and all, back into the carriage, from which place of vantage he made a speech before refurling his banner. He was delighted with his reception in the heart of the great Metropolis, and never forgot the sea of faces, the endless crowds, the fluttering flags, the waving handkerchiefs, the cheers, and the kindly greeting of that memorable day. His hand seemed to have been wrung into pulp, and he was struck with the phrasing of the oft-repeated salutation, “Give us your hand, old pal.” Cabmen had little American flags mounted on their vehicles or pinned to their horses’ heads, ladies had the Stars and Stripes for carriage-aprons, and children waved toy flags. Sergeant Bates was somewhat annoyed by relic hunters, who, could they have had their way, would soon have whittled his flagstaff into imperceptible pieces and riven the banner into a thousand shreds. He gave a piece of flag and his boots to Madame Tussaud’s Exhibition as a small offering to those of the British public “who,” as he quaintly remarked, “worship such things, and who find at Madame Tussaud’s perhaps the best field for the satisfaction of their curiosity.”