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PUBLICATIONS
OP THB
Southern History Association
y^-^'f
Publication Committee:
Gen. M. J. Wright. Mr. T. L. C01.B.
Mr. Thomas H. Ci.ark. Dr. Stbphbn B. Wbkks9
Mr. John B. Brownlow. Dr. Coi^y^r Mbriw^thkr.
VOLUME VI.
WASHXNOTOlf, D. C.
THE ASSOCIATION. 1902.
OFFICERS, 1902.
PRESIDENT: Dr. J. L. M. Curry.
VICE-PRESIDENTS:
General M. C. Butler. Mr. Thomas Nelson Page.
General M. J. Wright. President Woodrow Wilson.
Colonel George A. Porterpield. Senator S. Pasco.
SECRETARY AND TREASURER: CoLYER Meriwether, Ph. D., IVashington, D, C.
ADMINISTRATIVE COUNCIL: (In addition to the aboTe-named Officers) :
Professor Kemp P. Battle. Stephen B. Weeks, Ph. D.
Colonel R. A. Brock. Professor H. Schoenfeld.
Mr. T. L. Cole. Professor Lucian Johnston.
Professor R. Heath Dabney. Mr. Thomas H. Clark.
Professor John R. Ficklen. Mr. Alexander Summers.
Professor Chas. Lee Smith. President Geo. T. Winston.
Professor W. C. Stubbs. J. B. Killebrew, Ph. D.
CONTENTS.
No. I. JANUARY, 1902.
PACS
The VntGiNiA Literary Museum, J. W. Wayland. i
WnxiAM L. Wilson, Two Tributes, 15
Discovery of Lake Scuppernonc, 21
Letters from Joseph Martin, 28
Documents on the Texas Revolution, 33
The American Negro, W. H. Councill. 40
Reviews and Notices, 45
Periodical Literature, 73
Notes and Queries, 89
No. 2. MARCH, 1902.
Report of Sixth Annual Meeting, Colyer Meriwether, Sec'y. 109
Journal of Charles Porterfield (to be continued), 113
Southern Poutical Views, 1865 (to be continued), John H. Reagan. 132
BiBUOGRAPHY OF S. C. WoMEN WRITERS, A. S. Salley, Jr. 143^ —
Bi-Centenary of TfiE French Settlement of the Southwest, 158
An Early Deqsion on Imperiausm, D. Y. Thomas. 164
Reviews and >foTiCES, 167
Periodical Literature, 182
Notes and News, 192
No. 3. MAY, 1902.
Journal of Charles Porterfield ^continued) , 199
Southern Political Views, 1865 (concluded), John H. Reagan. 210
Early Quaker Records in Virginia (to be continued), 220
An Old-Time Merchant in South Carolina, Kate Furman. 232
The Spaniards in the South and Southwest, Stephen B. Weeks. 241
Reviewst AND Notices, 253
Periodical Literature, 272
Notes and News, 275
No, 4. JULY, 1902.
Diary of a Texas March (to be continued), W. H. C. Whiting. 283
Journal of Charles Porterfield (continued), 295
Early Quaker Records in Virginia (continued), 304
CONFEDERATE PosT OFFICE DEPARTMENT, John H. Reagan. 314
North Carolina in the Civil War, 328
Development of Historical Work in Mississippi, 335
-A Valuable Book on Louisiana, William Beer. 341
Reviews and Notices, 343
Periodical Literature, 366
Notes and News, 378
1
No. 5. SEPTEMBER, 1902.
PAGE
General Sumter and his Neighbors (to be continued), Kate Furman. 581
Diary of a Texas March (concluded), W. H. C. Whiting. 389
Journal of Charles Porterfield (concluded) 400
Early Quaker R^X)rds in Virginia (continued) 408
Calhoun and Sf^ession, 415
The Hero of the Alamo, 417
Reasons Against Trial of Davis, John H. Reagan. 422
Reviews and Notices, 428
Periodical Literature, 457
Notes and News, 464
No. 6. NOVEMBER, 1902.
A Southern Sulky Ride in 1837 (to be continued), 471
General Sumter and his Neighbors (concluded), Kate Furman. 484
Early Quaker Records in Virginia (continued), 499
CONDITIONS IN North Carolina in 1783, 509
Two Recent Books on Slavery, 512
Reviews and Notices 517
Periodical Literature, 529
Notes and News, 541
Index, 543
[Thxx>ngh overcight there is no pagination corresponding to 105-108, both inclusive.]
PUBLICATIONS
OP THB
Southern History Association
Publication Committee:
Gen. M. J. Wright. Mr. T. L. C01.B.
Mr. THOMiis H. CiiARK. Dr. Stephen B. WbkkS9
Mr. John B. Browni.ow. Dr. Colvbr Mbriwethkr.
VOLUME VI.
WASHINGTON, D. C.
THE ASSOCIATION. 1902.
2 Southern History Association,
"Whilst the Journal will be principally devoted to gen- eral topics of Moral or Physical Science, Philology and Polite Literature, the Editors will not be unmindful of our local and peculiar concerns. They will endeavor to col- lect and diffuse what information they can, concerning the history of Virginia, and the other States — ^their first Settlement — their progress as Colonies and as Indepen- dent States: — their peculiarities in Laws, Manners or Di- alect— their Statistical Details and Natural Phenomena.
"A part of the Journal will communicate information concerning the University. * * *
"Party Politics and Controversial Theology will be ex- cluded; but such exclusion will not extend to religious or political topics, of a general character, discussed with temperance and ability.
*The Journal will consist of sixteen pages super-royal octavo, weekly, and at the end of the year, an Index will be furnished. * * *
"The terms of subscription will be five dollars per an- num, payable on the delivery of the fifth number. The work to be commenced as soon as two hundred sub- scribers shall have been obtained.
********
"University of Virginia, Feb. 26, 1829.''
It seems natural to conclude, judging from the append- ed date, that this prospectus was issued first in circular form, and then reprinted in the first number of the Jour- nal.
Character and Contents.
That the editors of the Museum succeeded well in carry- ing out their purposes concerning their publication, both in respect to character of contents and standards of scholarship, must be apparent to anyone who will take the pains carefully to examine their work ; for although
The Virginia Literary Museum. — Wayland. 3
the Museum diflfers considerably, both in form and con- tents, from most literary periodicals of to-day, — from the University of Virginia's present publications, with the rest, — the older journal does not suflFer materially from the contrast, but gives evidence that its contributors were men of thorough scholarship and broad experience, and that the Institution that is now the pride of so many hearts, owes much of its success to the secure foundations that our fathers laid.
In order that a definite idea may be had of the actual character of the Museum, the headings of the entire con- tents of two numbers will now be enumerated. The num- bers selected are No. i and No. 40, which may be regarded as fair representatives of the rest.
At the head of each number of the Journal stands the following motto:
"POSCENTES VARIO MULTUM DIVERSA PALATO — Hor.
Lib. ii. Ep. 2."
The opening article in No. i is the "Prospectus" already referred to. This occupies most of the first page; but two-thirds down the second column begins an "Introduc- tion*' by the editors, that runs to the middle of the first column on page 3. Here begins a three-column essay on the "Manufacture of Diamonds." Following this is a long collection of clippings, headed, "Australian Adver- tisements." This article ends on page 8, and is followed by a five-column exposition of "Amianth Cloth, Paper, &c." Next is a somewhat shorter essay on "Verbal Crit-
icism."
JEFFERSONIANA.
After this are four columns under the general title, "JefJersoniana." Next, a half column is taken up with a notice of the publication, in Charlottesville,, of "Jef- ferson's Memoir, Correspondence, &c.," a work that was to sell at ten dollars a copy,— three thousand copies (haW
4 Southern History Association,
the edition) having been already subscribed for. Most of the remaining page and a half is taken up with ''Univer- sity Intelligence/* the first item of which reads as follows: "Thomas Jefferson Randolph, Esq., of Edgehill, in this County, has been appointed, by the Executive, a visitor of this University, in the room of W. C. Rives, Esq., ap- pointed Minister to France."
Brief Contributions Asked.
The last third of the last column of No. i contains ''No- tice to Correspondents, &c." One of the paragraphs un- der this head is the following:
**The Editors will thank their contributors not to allow their communications to exceed six printed pages, unless the subject admits of division."
This nile, so modestlv stated, seems to have been an index to the courtesy of the management ; for after several months, when it becomes evident that contributors will sometimes insist upon writing enough to fill eight pages, instead of only six, the notice ceases to appear — the "law," being found ineffective, is. we presume, kindly set aside.
Contexts of Xo. 40.
The first three pages in Xo. 40 are occupied by a "Com- parative \'iew of Modern and Ancient Poetry and Litera- ture in General." Then follow a short article on "Heads," and a longer one on "De Salle's Picture of London." The stor>\ "A Country Belle," takes up the remaining eight and a half pages, ^ith the exception of three-fourths of the last page« which is devoted to "University Intelli- gence." This heading, in this panicu'.ar instance, might to some appear rather ironical, since the whole depart- ment consists of questions in Algebra. Geometry-. Plane and Spherical TrigonometrA-, and Analytical Geonetr>\ that had been propounded at a recent exan^ination.
TJie Virginia Literary Museum, — ^Wayland. 5
University News.
"University Intelligence," as a department, appears in most of the numbers, claiming in some as much as two pages of space ; in others, it is cut off with a single para- graph; and occasionally it is crowded out entirely by other departments, — or else is intentionally omitted. We may infer that the latter supposition is often the correct one, judging from the comparatively small importance that seems to have been attached to local news ; for when there are official announcements to be made, or examina- tion questions to be printed, the department enlarges it- self accordingly ; but when it contains only personal items it shrinks to insignificant proportions. It is possible that this would have been different, and that the "Intelligence gatherer" would have exerted himself more actively some- times, could he have foreseen how eagerly we of to-day seize upon items like the one already quoted, and the fol- lowing :
"The Board of Visitors of the University are now in ses- sion. Mr. Madison, the Rector, has been prevented from attending by his infirm state of health, for although he has recovered from his recent attack of indisposition he has not yet regained his strength. The visitors present are Messrs. Monroe, Cabell, Johnson, and Randolph." — Museum of July 15, 1829,
"John Tayloe Lomax, Esq., Professor of Law in this University, has been appointed, by the Legislature, a Judge of the General Court for the third Circuit." — Mu- seum of Dec, 2S, 1829,
Stories, Reviews, Studies.
The tale, "A Country Belle," has its location in "one of the midland counties of Virginia," and is representative of a respectable class of the Museum stories. Others that belong to localities in Virginia and adjoining States are, "Julia Moncrief," "The Gold Seeker," "The Wilderness,"
6 Southern History Association,
and "Maiden's Adventure." The last is a narrative relat- ing the escape of young Margaret Allen from a party of marauding Indians, an incident from which the name "Maiden's Adventure" was applied to a small creek that flows into the James near Richmond. "De Salle's Pic- ture of London" is a rather appreciative review of a Frenchman's account of his visit to the English metropo- lis. This article is begun in No. 39, and is continued in No. 40 and No. 41. "Heads" is one of the two or three brief phrenological studies that are printed in the Museum, The "Comparative View of Modern and Ancient Poetry and Literature in General" is one of three very excellent critical essays that appear, under the same title, in suc- cessive issues of the Journal.
Jeffersoniana.
"Jeflersoniana" is the general heading under which are published various extracts from the writings of the great statesman and University patron. The following para- graph, which appears as an introduction to the series, will be of interest :
"The kindness of Thomas Jefferson Randolph, Esq. — the grandson of the Patriot and Philosopher, whose ac- tions occupy so large a space in the history of his coun- try's glory, — will enable us to lay before our readers, un- der this head, several extracts from the Common-Place Books of that illustrious individual, which are not des- tined to meet the pubilc eye in any other form. They will be additional evidences of the indefatigable industry, in the prosecution of knowledge, which so preeminently distinguished him through the whole course of his long and useful life."
Eight numbers of the Museum contain "Jeffersoniana ;" and the nature and variety of the several extracts may be inferred from their titles: No. i — "Hume's Political Principles ;" No. 2— "Meteorology ;" No. 3— "Days of the
The Virginia Literary Museum, — Wayland. 7
Week;" No. 4— "Chronology of Inventions;" No. 5— "Titles of Dignity;" No. 6— "Early History of Carolina, Maryland, etc;" Nos. 7 and 8 — "Denmark."
Critical and Industrial Topics.
"Verbal Criticism" is the only article published in the Museum under that particular title; nevertheless, it may be taken as the representative of a rather large class of essays on language, since there appear elsewhere six pa- pers on "Provincialisms," six on "Americanisms," and five on "The German Language."
"Amianth Cloth, Paper, &c." and the "Manufacture of Diamonds" are examples of a large number of composi- tions on industrial and scientific subjects. There are es- says on: "Effects of Charcoal in Suppressing Fermenta- tion," "Disinfecting Agents," "Diseases of the Horse," "Railways," "Roadmaking," "Sugar," etc. In this connec- tion may also be mentioned six connected articles on "The Policy of Encouraging Manufactures."
Politics.
Another series of articles, not suggested by anything in the two copies of the Museum just reviewed, but a se- ries that occupies much space in other numbers of the Journal, and that should be of especial interest to the pub- lic at the present time, are the detailed reports, twelve in number, of the Constitutional Convention that assembled in Richmond on the first Monday in October, 1829. These reports are prefaced, so to speak, by a shorter series of five letters, purporting to have been written to a member of the approaching convention, at his request, by a friend that signs himself "V."
Po:eTRY.
Thus far nothing has been said of poetry. From this circumstance it must not be inferred that the Museum was bereft of the gentle muse's sympathy. The fact is that a
8 Southern History Association,
considerable amount of verse, some of a most excellent quality, is found at intervals throughout the volume. In all. there are thirty-two pieces. Of these, eighteen are sonnets, the rest of various forms. All of the sonnets and seven of the miscellaneous pieces were written by "D. C. T." — Dabney Carr Terrell, concerning whom the editors of the Journal have this to say:
**We publish, to-day [July i, 1829], the first of a man- uscript collection of fugitive pieces, by the late Dabney Carr Terrell, Esq. — ^an individual whose modest and un- assuming merit prevented his being sufficiently appreciat- ed beyond the circle of his immediate acquaintance. An unfortunate and fatal duel with a fellow student, at the age of seventeen, threw over his existence a gloom which is perceptible in all his compositions, and thus exerted a baneful influence on his subsequent success in life. Mr. Terrell died at New Orleans, of the yellow fever, on the sixteenth of August, in the year 1827, at the early age of 29. * * * Many of Mr. Terrell's productions will remind the reader of the immortal Byron, whom he appears, in- deed, to have taken for his model, and all are indicative of unusual poetic talent in the lamented author."
We have space here to give only two selections from Mr. Terrell's poems. The first is the opening stanza of "On An Indian Mound." The second is a sonnet of ex- ceptional beauty, which, without its signature, might be attributed to Wordsworth:
"Can'st say what tenant fills yon grave? Oppressor stern, or crouching slave? Or gallant chieftain, vainly brave, Who for the land he could not save
Was well content to die? Or beauteous maiden in her bloom, WTio rashly sought an early doom. Because unable to resume Her lover's heart? or. in the tomb
Do both united lie?"
— On An Indian ^ found.
The Virginia Literary Museum, — Wayland. 9
"Far from the haunts of man and his abode,
I find, 'midst nature and her works, a home
More fitted to my spirit, when I roam Or by the silent shore or shady wood; Where, though alone, 'tis not in solitude.
For I can read, or in the starry dome
Above, or all around, as in a tome, With none to check my thoughts or to intrude
On meditations, which can woe beguile Of half its bitterness — and dreams which sleep
Hath not engendered: but, alas! the while Gay youth and wit and wealth and beauty keep,
Their midnight revels, must I stand and smile. As one who smiles because he would not weep."
Among the several pseudonymous poets, "Zenobia" contributes "Washington's Dream" and "Thoughts on Visiting the Grave of Jefferson." The excellence of the latter poem may be evinced by its opening stanza :
"Dark shades are gathered o*er thy place of rest!
Thou! who within thy country's bosom sleepest; And grief is swelling in each throbbing breast,
Where fond affection hoards her treasures deepest; But neither shades nor tears can cloud thy fame. Or dim the lustre of thine own great name!"
Rhymes for "Tariff."
Lines on "The Tariff" were suggested "by the remark lately made by Mr. Webster in a celebrated speech in the Senate and which is thus reported: 'It was the tariff! tariff ! tariff ! everything began with it and ended with it. He believed if there was any word to rhyme with it, all their sonnets would be on the same subject.' " To prove that there are some words to rhyme even with tariff, "Mercu- tio" — ^who incidentally turns out to be Professor Tucker — produces twelve stanzas in each of which the supposed an- omaly is made to consort more or less harmoniously With such phrases as "far if," "war if," "cigar if," "star if," and "'Czar— if."
Comparison With To-day.
If by this time the reader has a fairly clear idea of the character of the Museum, he may be aided in his concep-
lo Southern History Associatioft.
tion still further by attending to some of the particular contrasts that are noticeable between it and publications of to-day. First, let us observe that the price of this weekly journal, of sixteen octavo pages, was five dollars a year. How thankful we should be, if we love papers and books, that we were not born a hundred years ago! As regards texture of paper and quality of workmanship, the Museum suffers no great disparagement by being com- pared with more recent journals. In fact, it is doubtful whether many of the papers that are printed now will bear inspection half so well, after the lapse of three-quarters of a century. One of the mechanical features of the Mu- seum, however, that strikes us now as being odd, or in bad taste, is the practice of beginning even long articles al- most at the very bottom of a column, if the preceding piece happens to end there. A few words are spelled in ways that differ slightly from the common American usage of the present day. For instance, we find "gulph," "shew," "waggon," "cyder," "expence," and "anticnt."
Fondness for Quotation.
A preliminary quotation from some famous author seems to have been regarded as a primary essential of composi- tion by almost every contributor, no matter what his sub- ject, or the nature of his treatment. So far is this true, that throughout the 830 pages of the Museum, Vol. I., there can scarcely be found, a dozen essays and stories, putting forth a claim to "correctness," that do not begin with a Latin, Greek, French, or English quotation. Whether the treatise is on "Blondel and Richard Lion- Heart," or on "Superstitions Connected with the Moon," the pithy preface can generally be counted on. We are not surprised that a writer, in discussing "The Policy of Encouraging Manufactures," should put forward a state- ment on the subject from Thomas Jefferson; but then
The Virginia Literary Museum. — ^Wayland. 1 1
another gentleman just as complacently begins his essay on the "Modern Improved System of Road Making" with three lines from Byron!
A Sage Prediction.
A paragraph like the following causes us sensibly to realize that the Museum is not an index of this generation :
{(
Locomotive Engines."
"At a trial of locomotive engines, for a prize of five hundred pounds, offered by the directors of the Liverpool and Manchester rail road; a steam carriage, made by Messrs. Braithwaite & Co. of London, moved along at the surprising rate of thirty miles an hour; and, with three times its own weight, at the rate of twenty-five miles f * * * What astonishing results may be anticipated from this important application of mechanics!" — Museum of Nov. 25, 1829.
Blue Laws ^or the Students.
Occasionally, also, we find some statements which re- mind us that a few things about the University of Vir- ginia have changed, too, since 1829. It is to be presumed that the students of 1901 would be mildly surprised to find on the bulletin board an announcement like this :
"Each student, inhabiting a dormitory, shall have his name painted on the door, at his own expence."
But if such a statement would be regarded with sur- prise, who can imagine the consternation that would seize some gentlemen upon beholding such a declaration as the following:
"The hotel keepers are required to furnish a list of such of their boarders as are absent from breakfast, and of those who appear at breakfast, half an hour after the bell has been rung."
12 Southern History Association.
No Advertisements.
Perhaps the most striking contrast to be found in com- paring the Museum with twentieth century magazines, is its lack of advertisements. The announcement is made in various issues, that "advertisements, when of a purely literary character, will be inserted on the last page of the Journal;" but notwithstanding this tendered privilege, there are only two straight-out **ads." in the whole volume. One of these is a notice by Joseph Martin, that he "will bind the Museum for subscribers, substantially and neat- ly;" the other is a circular by Henry Tutwiler, Jr., an- nouncing that he "proposes to open a School in the neigh- borhood of the University." The only other notice that could at all be classed as an advertisement, is one con- cerning a "New Medical Dictionary," by Professor Dun- glison. But if the contrast just noted does exist in a striking degree, it may be comforting to conservative spirits to know that in another very important respect there has been no change since 1829, — perchance since the invention of printing, — ^as is evidenced by the following paragraph, which appears from time to time, during the latter half of the year, in no less than nine issues of the Journal :
"To Subscribers."
"Those gentlemen who have encouraged the Museum by subscribing to it are earnestly requested to remit the amount of the year's subscription by mail to Mr. William Wertenbaker, the agent, at the University."
Pseudonyms the Rule.
Before closing this sketch of our University's first pe- riodical, it may be pertinent to notice yet one other feat- ure. It is a fact generally accepted, that we always are interested to recognize, behind all literature, the author's personality. In fact, our interest in a work is often main-
The Virginia Literary Museum, — Wayland. 13
ly due to our interest in the man who produced it; and if, perchance, after reading an excellent production, we find the name of the writer torn off and lost, we natur- ally are conscious of an unsatisfied want. In reading the Museum to-day, we are apt to experience the same feeling ; not that we find no signatures, for there is an abundance of them ; but they mean nothing to us, because they are almost invariably pseudonynus. Instead of the author's names at the end of the several compositions, we must be content with such signs and combinations as the follow- ing: "Wy," "Zy," "D," "L," "S," "H," ''Cuspis," "Peter Pascal," "Chris :Cruize," "Indagator," "Psyche," etc. It is not my purpose, in calling attention to this feature of the Journal, to disparage the men who thus signed themselves, but to disparage the custom, — a custom which, happily, I am glad to believe, has also undergone a change since the days of the Museum.
Only One Volume Issued.
On the fly-leaf of a bound volume of the Museum, a vol- ume that has recently come to the University library from an alumnus, at the instance of Col. Thomas L. Preston, are written the following lines :
"To the Library of the University of Virginia from W. F. Brand.
Rector of St. Mary's Church
Harford County Maryland
October 1900
u
I do not know how long
the Literary Museum was
continued. I had Vol ii
but as it was not bound, at
the time received in Nos.
It was lost. I have tho't that
this literary effort of some of the
Faculty of 1829 might be of
interest."
14 Southern History Association.
[In the above, the original form, punctuation, capital- ization, etc., is preserved.]
From the foregoing note by Mr. Brand it would appear that at least a second volume of the Museum was pub- lished, but from a notice by the editors, that is printed in No. 52, of Vol. I., it seems probable that the publication was not continued beyond the first year. There is other evidence, moreover, that appears to substantiate this con- clusion. It is possible, therefore, that Mr. Brand, since he wrote the above seventy years after the date he refers to, may have had in mind some other journal ; but he is cer- tainly correct in the opinion that the volume he thus pre- sents is of interest,— of interest, we should say, to all who are in sympathy with the University's past, or concerned with its present and future.
WILLIAM LYNE WILSON.— TWO TRIBUTES.
The following testimonials came too late to be included with the article on Mr. Wilson, in the July, 1901, issue.
I.
From Hon. Hilary A. Herbert.
I was already in the House of Representatives at Wash- ington, when William L. Wilson became a member of that body. We soon began to gravitate toward each other, for we had much in common. Our social antecedents were quite similar; we had both been Confederate sol- diers, and we had been reared in the same political school. In addition to all this, we soon discovered ourselves to be in entire accord on all the leading questions that were un- fortunately destined, while we were in the public service, to divide our party; and when the sorrowful time came for political friends to divide, Wilson and I took the same path. Naturally, we were intimate, so that if I shall be unable, in this short sketch, to do justice to the character of my friend, a reason for it must be sought, not in any want of opportunity to know, but in my inability to portray the man as he was.
He was the rarest compound I have ever known of gen- tleness, modesty, courage, integrity and intellect. Of that quality so often leading to speedy success in public life, which is forcefully called "push, ' he was as absolutely devoid as is a well-bred woman. If he had gone out of Congress at the end of his first term, his intimate friends would have remembered him as a man of great possibil- ities, but he would have left behind him only a fleeting name in his own district; this because he never sought opportunity to display himself. He bided the time when
1 6 Southern History Association.
the occasion should seek him. This lack of self-assertion was not the result of timidity. He had absolute faith in his own conclusions, and it is not possible that he could ever have doubted his ability to defend them. Nor did his modesty come from any disposition to avoid respon- sibility. It was born and bred in him, and the culture that gave him an intimate knowledge of all that is best and highest in literature only served to chasten and deepen his natural modesty, by broadening his conceptions of the responsibilities and privileges of others.
He was thoroughly honest himself, and his mind was equally as honest as his heart. It played him no tricks. Even had it been possible for any selfish purpose ever to prompt the man to reach from premises he accepted as true an incorrect conclusion, his logic would have for- bidden it. Such a man could not be false to friend or country. He was of the stuff of which heroes are made — true heroes, who do not seek martyrdom out of a desire for notoriety, but accept it without hesitation when it lies in the pathway of duty.
Intellectually, Mr. Wilson was wonderfully gifted. This any man can know, for his speeches and writings of record bear him witness. His wit was as nimble as his logic was powerful, and it was never ill-natured. It diffused itself in the brightest of humor, always enlivening his conver- sation, and now and then informing his most eloquent speeches. His bright sayings were never studied up be- forehand ; they were always spontaneous, bubbling out as naturally as did that geniality and warm-heartedness which were the delight of all who were so fortunate as to call him friend. He was like the sunlight brightening and warming everything it touched. My most vivid recollec- tion of him is as he sat at the council table of the President during the last two years of Mr. Cleveland's administra- tion. The personal relations existing between the Presi-
William Lyme Wilson, — Herbert. 17
dent and his advisers were singularly harmonious. The outside world, who, know Mr. Cleveland only through his public acts and who are accustomed to regard hirri as a, man of rugged and uncompromising will, and as many think, even of wilfulness, will, perhaps, never fully under- stand how kindly and courteous the President was to his Cabinet. The meetings of that body were absolutely in- formal, and the freest discussion was invited and had. So- cially, Mr. Cleveland's Cabinet was indeed a happy family. During all the time that Mr. Wilson was one of this fam- ily, the political situation was serious and there was never any lack of grave matters for consideration, but at regular meetings of the Cabinet, before taking up public ques- tions, it was the almost invariable custom to indulge for a time in pleasant gossip and anecdote, nearly every one taking part ; and here Mr. Wilson's wit and humor shone preeminent. If we could only have had from his pen a picture of these meetings, it would have been perfect, ex- cept that we should have had Wilson in the background.
Of Mr. Wilson's heroism in standing steadfast on the tariff, when he knew his district was against him, and in adhering to his own views on the silver question, when his party had, as he thought, left him, and of the willing- ness with which he sacrificed ambition when it came in his way to do it, I need not here speak. All the world knows it. It was this quality in him, combined with the lovable- ness of his character, that bound together him and his great chieftain in ties of friendship that were as beautiful as they were indissoluble.
Peace be to the ashes of my friend ! It would be well for the country which he served with so much fidelity,, could his memory be perpetual in the land 1
1 8 Southern History Association.
II.
From Hon. Oscar S. Straus.
William Lyne Wilson^ was born in Jefferson county, Virginia, which is now West Virginia, on May 3rd, 1843. He died at Lexington, Virginia, on October 17th, 1900, in his fifty-eighth year. He was educated at Charlestown Academy and Columbian College, Washington, D. C, where he graduated in i860. After graduation Mr. Wil- son attended the University of Virginia, but the war break- ing out, he enlisted as a private in the Confederate army and continued such until the end of the war. After the war he became professor of Latin in Columbian University and shortly afterwards he married Miss Huntington, the daughter of the Greek professor in that University.
When the **iron-clad oath'* was repealed in West Vir- ginia, Mr. Wilson returned to practice law in Charlestown until 1882, when he accepted the presidency of the West Virginia University. Only two weeks after accepting this position, through one of those contingencies that often happen in our political life, he was forced to accept the nomination as the candidate of his party for Congress, and he was elected by a bare majority of nine votes. He con- tinued in Congress for six successive terms until 1895, when, by reason of his conspicuous advocacy of tariff re- form and the change of sentiment following that agita- tion in many parts of the country, he was defeated. While in Congress he attained the foremost position in the leg- islative branch of his party, and as the chairman of the Ways and Cleans Committee of the House of Representa- tives he framed the law known as the Wilson Bill, but be- cause of the hopeless division of his party, it was mutilated by some four hundred amendments, so that the bill as fin- ally passed embodied no longer the principles, but at best
* This tribute was read at the Authors* Club in New York. March 28. 1901, and appeared in N. Y. Times of March 29. 1901.
William Lyme Wilson. — Straus. 19
only the tendency, for which the Democratic Party had contended.
In 1895, he was appointed Postmaster General in Presi- dent Cleveland's Cabinet, and at the expiration of his term was elected President of Washington and Lee Uni- versity at Lexington, which position he held when he died.
This is the brief outHne of the life of a man who filled every position he held with conspicuous modesty and rare ability. He was known as the Scholar in Politics, as throughout his public career he displayed such scholarly research and thorough understanding of the questions that came up for consideration.
William L. Wilson was a remarkable man, an ideal of- ficial— he typified all that is best in American statesman- ship,— a scholar by inclination, by temperament and by training, — a statesman by the breadth, the depth and soundness of his views, which were never obscured by temporary phases or by party expediency. With his thor- ough and accurate knowledge of the political development of the country he possessed the rare faculty of convincing oratory which appealed with suggestive force and power to the minds of his fellow citizens, whether on the stump in his native district or in the halls of Congress, or before public assemblages in the leading cities of the country. Though he was in the forefront in some of the most hotly contested issues that agitated political parties during the last twenty years, yet the sweetness of his character and broadness of his views, which reflected themselves in his every utterance, had the charm to elevate even his oppo- nents above the petty wrangles and bitternesses engend- ered by party strife. He never said an unkind word and never did an inconsiderate act. No man ever went from the halls of Congress carrying with him a higher measure of esteem and affection from his colleagues on both sides of the house than William L. Wilson.
This is not the time or place to discuss the correctness
20 Southern History Association,
of his conclusions on tariff questions, but this much must be said even by those who differed from him, that his philosophical and scholarly arguments have a permanent value for the proper study of the principles that underlie revenue legislation, as well as whether under a Democratic government it be just and equitable to levy imposts for purposes of protection, as distinguished from the needs for economical administration. He had the statesman's in- stinct for searching out the fundamental principles of every public question, and the methods and mental quali- ties of a philosopher to measure those principles by the permanent standards of equity and justice. To the pub- lic good he gave his untiring efforts, and he has enriched the public service by a life's work of high ideals, of broad and conservative statesmanship, and by unswerving loy- alty and unselfish devotion to public duty, which will en- shrine his memory among the foremost scholarly leaders of political thought in our country during the closing- years of the nineteenth century.
DISCOVERY OF LAKE SUPPERNONG (PHELPS),
NORTH CAROLINA.
With Notes By Maj. George P. Collins.
The following account of the discovery of Lake Scuppernong, formerly known as Lake Phelps, in Tyrrell and Washington coun- ties, N. C, was prepared about a century ago for Dr. Hugh Wil- liamson's History of North Carolina (Philadelphia, 1812, 2 vols.) by an author whose name has been forgotten. The name Phelps still appears on most of the State maps, although Mr. Josiah Col- lins (3rd) rebaptized it by its Indian name, Scuppernong, and by which name it should be known.
The following note found among the papers of Josiah Collins (ist) in a handwriting which appears in many of his papers and accounts, although it is not known for whom the initials L. S. stand, gives a more definite account in names and dates than the contributor to Williamson, and one which has been more generally accepted as the notes of Major Collins show. — Eds.
"Lake Phelps was first discovered, Aug. 23d, 1755, by Josiah Phelps, James Phelps, Edward Phelps, Edward Massell, John Tarkinton and Benjamin Tarkinton. Benjamin Tarkinton claims the discovery of the Lake by climbing a tree and seeing the water first — and Josiah Phelps claims the discovery by getting into the water first."
The contributor to Williamson says :
In giving a geographical account of the State, perhaps the following account of Lake Phelps may be worthy of a place in your History of North Carolina.
In the County of Tyrrell, which borders on Albemarle Sound, there is one of those large Swamps or pocosens, so often to be met with in the Southern parts of Amer- ica.— ^The one I am now speaking of, from its immense extent and impervious nature, has acquired the appella- tion of The Great Dismal, and until a few years past, this large Tract of Country was considered as of no kind of value whatsoever.
The Inhabitants who had been settled round its borders for more than an hundred years, had never ventured to penetrate it, to the distance of half a mile from its bounds.
22 Soutfiern History Association.
'til at last some Hunters, who lesided near it, led on by curiosity, and in hopes of finding firm Land within it, un- dertook to explore it.
The party, at first, consisted of twelve of the stoutest men in all the County; They had provided themselves with every requisite for such an expedition, and seemed determined to discover what was inclosed in the bosom of this dreary soHtary haunt of Beasts ; but on the second day at night, ten of these valiant adventurers abandoned their design, and left, to their two more hardy comrades, Mr. Josiah Phelps and his brother Joseph, the more hon- orable task of perseverance. These two bolder spirits, continuing their rout, found themselves the next day on the edge of a large Lake, where they spent several days in hunting, with great success.
This beautiful piece of Water is nearly of an oval shape ; it is about eight miles in length, and nearly five wide; its Waters are deep, transparent and full of fish of the most delicious kinds ; There is not a Tree or a bush grows in it, but it is bordered by a Forest of Majestic Poplars of the growth of Centuries.
The Lands immediately round the Lake, to the north and west, are dry and firm ; at the distance of half a mile, they are lower, but of a most superior quality. The Lake is now called Lake Phelps, in honor to Mr. Josiah Phelps & his brother, who discovered it. It is about six miles from The River Scuppernong, which empties itself into Albemarle Sound; and what is very remarkable is, that 'tho' at so small a distance from the River, the surface of the Lake is at least fifteen feet higher than the surface of the River. This circumstance induced Messrs. Josiah Collins, Nathl. Allen & Saml. Dickinson of the Town of Edenton, to form themselves into a Company for the pur- pose of purchasing and improving, the vast Tract of Land around this Lake; They therefore in the year 1787. bought and entered the quantity of one hundred thousand
Discovery of Lake Suppenimg. — Collins.
1 *•
acres, and immediately set about cutting a navigable Canal from the River to the Lake; this great undertak- ing, 'tho attended with an immense expence, they com- pleted in the space of two years. The Canal is six miles long, twenty feet wide and six feet deep; it admits the navigation of Crafts (constructed for the purpose) that carry fifty or sixty tierces of Rice; and any Vessel that does not draw more than eighteen feet water, may lay and take in her Cargo at the mouth of the Canal. By means of this Canal, all the Lands that lie between the Lake & the River, can be laid dry, or put under water at pleasure ; these advantages have given those enterprising Gentle- men the most valuable River estate in America. They now have, at the head of the Canal, a considerable plan- tation in the culture of Rice & Hemp; They have also on the Canal, several Saw and grist Mills with other im- provements, from which they are amply compensated for the vast expence and trouble they have been at, in re- claiming this great & valuable Tract of Country.^
Notes by Maj. GeX)RGE P. Collins.
For the accompanying sketch of the discovery and settle- ment of Lake Scuppernong, written to be incorporated in Dr. Hugh Williamson's History of N. C, the author's name has been forgotten: said lake called on the maps Lake Phelps, was restored to the old Indian name, Scup- pernong, by the father of this writer.
The following errors occur in the sketch, namely: the fall from the lake to the river through Collins' canal, distance about six miles, is eighteen feet not fifteen feet; six feet of the fall occurs in first quarter of a mile, where the mills were located. The fact that the surrounding lands could be located from the lake is said to have first induced the Lake Company to open the property which was first used as rice fields, this was afterwards abandon- ed because it made the negroes unhealthy.
The purchase and entry of the lands must have been prior to 1787 as my great-grandfather in his answer to a cross bill in
* Williamson treats this subject to a slight extent in his chap- ter on the natural features of the State, see II. 181-183.
24 Southern History Association.
cr-.u::y of Dr. Dickinson says, "I went to Boston in the latter part of :pi4 or car'iT :n 178^, among other matters of business to fit GUI the 'Guineaman/ " This name applied to the vessel that brought the negroes from Africa who dug the canaL It seems ver>- in:probablc that such a costly and important step should be tL\:tTs i.z'.c.z to formation of the Lake Company or purchase and ^7.\Ty of the 100,000 acres of land — therefore the company must hive organized and made the purchase, entry. &c., in the later par: of ij&i. The story of the discovery of the lake, as often repeated to me and in my presence by my father. Josiah Collins* ^jrd of that name) is after Josiah and Joseph Phelps, and a compATiion named Tarkinton. had been abandoned by their companions, they pushed on in a westerly course and camped on a krc'il of about one-quarter acre. Such knolls were known in the swarr-p as "Chestnut Oak Islands." on which there were many marks of fire years back showing that they were camping places fcr the In'iians, though the Tuscarcras were ignorant of the existence of the lake — ^the tribe or tribes preceding them camp- e'l and fished near and in the lake as evidenced by arrow and lance heads and broken pottery found in the edge of the water, when low. The island on which Phelps and companions camped is now distinctly visible in the upper western field near the N. E. corner of a grove left as a building site, when the field was cleared, distant about 250 yards from the lake: it was called the ''finder's island." When Phelps, his brother and Tarkinton got breakfast next morning they gave up the search, determined like their fellows to return home, but Tarkinton climbed a tree on the inland and without thinking of consequences or his own fame called out, **there is the lake right there." pointing in a S. W. direction. One of the Phelps* brothers. I think Joseph, ran for- ward, jumped into the water and named it Lake Phelps. As above stated, the name Scuppernong was restored to the lake by my father. Tarkinton was the real discoverer, or first white man to find the lake.
At the request of the Editors, Major Collins has added some valuable biographical notes on Josiah Collins, (ist, 2d. 3d, 4th and 5th). some of whom played an important part in the economic <^evc!opment of North Carolina.
Josiah Collins (ist of the name that came to America, known as Captain Collins, because of his becoming an extensive ship owner.) was born near Taunton. Somersetshire. England, August, 1735; emigrated to America, after death of his wife, about 1773; landed in Boston, after a short stay went to Providence, R. I., remaining about a year. He then came to Halifax, N. C, re- mained awhile and finally settled at Edenton, N. C, where, Janu- ary I. 1777. he organized the firm of Collins. Stewart & Muir, who carried on extensive mercantile business. Capt. Collins bought the interest of his partners and wound up the business; he bought an interest in a rope walk at Edenton, which he and his son. Josiah Collins (2nd), eventually owned entirely. He sent his own ships to Russia, imported the hemp and furnished the cordage to rig the American Navy for the War of 1812. which was done in Edenton Bay. Capt. Edward Preble, afterwards the distinguished commodore of the American Navy, was master of
Discovery of Lake Suppernong, — Collins. 25
one of his vessels, was a warm and trusted friend and was in- duced after much urgent persuasion to join the Navy, for Capt. Preble insisted that he was not fitted for that service, which was disproved afterwards by his success at Tripoli, in 1803. There were many curious and valuable presents in possession of the family brought by Captain Preble from China, Japan and the Mediterranean ports. [Preble's sailing instructions follow] : Josiah Collins (ist), about 1785 or 6, formed with Nathaniel Allen (father of Gov. William Allen, of Ohio, and grandfather of Senator Allen Cranberry Thurman, of Ohio), and Dr. Samuel Dickinson, the Lake Company, to drain and cultivate the lands around Lake Scuppernong (Phelps). The Lake Company cut the first canal in the State from Lake Scuppernong to Scup- pernong river. Captain Collins became sole owner, leaving the estate on the lake to his grandchildren, his son having a life estate in it. There is a tradition, how reliable I cannot say, that the Treasury portfolio in Washington's cabinet was offered to Capt. Collins, who declined, however, because he was too recent an immigrant to be free from suspicion of his motives.
Josiah Collins (2nd), born in England, Nov. 10, 1768, came with his father to America; he married at about 40, Ann Rebecca Daves, daughter of Maj. John Daves, and sister of John Pugh Daves, Esq., of New Bern, father of Maj. Graham Daves. Josiah Collins (2nd), was associated with his father in his business affairs from the time that he was grown until his father's death, and continued as merchant, manufacturer and planter until his death, Feb. 10, 1839; he was a successful business man throughout his career.
Josiah Collins (3rd), born at Edenton, N. C, March, 1808; married Miss Mary Riggs, of New York, 1829; moved from the ancestral home at Edenton to Lake Scuppernong and settled on the place left him by Josiah (ist), his grandfather, called **Somer- set Place" from the shire in England whence the family came. He added to his landed estate and enlarged his operations; was very prominent in public as well as private affairs, and also as a church man. He procured the change of name of the lake from Phelps to Scuppernong, the Indian name of the district and river, and died June 17, 1863, at Hillsboro, N. C, a refugee during the Civil War.
Josiah Collins (4th), born July 19, 1830; died Feby. 14, 1890, was an attorney-at-law; first lieutenant ordnance department, C. S. A., and brother of the writer.
Josiah Collins (5th), born June 17, 1864, resides in Seattle, Washington.
I will mention a fact that struck me when looking over the old papers left by my great-grandfather and grandfather, among which were lists of land entries, titles, &c., that the names of the inhabitants of the five counties lying between Albemarle and Pamlico sounds are or were at the outbreak of the Civil War, the same as they were 100 and more years before and scarcely a family name that was not represented!'
*This is true to a very large extent of the State as a whole. — Ed.
26 Southern History Association.
Sailing Instructions for Captain Preible.
Edknton pth January 1788. — Captain Edward Preble, Sir,
When you have loaded the Schooner Elizabeth of which you are Master you are to proceed to the Bar, but as the Vessel will, I expect, be very deep, I advise you not to attempt to go over the Swash without reducing her draught of Water so as to prevent any risque — Wallace, a Pilot at Portsmouth, has a small Vessel you may get for that purpose, if necessary — From thence, after puttin^c: your Vessel in order for Sea, you are to proceed to Mar- tinico, and on your arrival there to enquire the marketts at that place and at the different Islands to Leeward, to which American Bottoms are admitted; and if you find that a greater price or even as much can be obtained for the Cargo at Martinico, or at any other of the Islands mentioned, you are to dispose of it there to the best ad- vantage, if not, to go where the best price can be got, provided, after estimating the expences that will accrue in consequence of going from your destined Port to another & the difference in the price in the price of such Produce as you are be directed to lay in as a return Cargo, you conceive it will be for the interest of the voyage — The nett proceeds of the present Cargo, I wish you to invest in Molasses and Coffee of a good quality and an equal amount in cash if the latter can be taken on board with- out endangering the Vessel but if it cannot be done, you will lay out the whole amount in Molasses only —
The Rice on board belongs to Mr. Lawrence Baker, you will sell it for the most that can be obtained and in- vest the nett proceeds in Brown Sugar of a good quality if to be done without incurring the risque above men- tioned, or otherwise, purchase Molasses to the amount, unless he gave you any directions to the contrary when
Discovery of Lake Suppemong. — Collins. 27
you saw him, observing not to hazard the top of the Ves- sel, and to keep his property separate from the rest of the Cargoe^ —
I request you will be carefull of your Vessel & Stores, frugal in your expences and to make all the dispatch in your power back to this Port those things being attended to you will probably make a saving voyage, but a con- trary conduct will make it quite the reverse —
Wishing you a pleasant Voyage & a speedy return,
I am Sir your obt svt
Josiah Collins.
I hereby acknowledge the foregoing to be a true Copy of my instructions which I promise to adhere to Edward
Preble
Hertford the loth Jan 1788 —
LETTERS FROM JOSEPH MARTIN TO PATRICK
HENRY.
[General Martin (1740-1808), pioneer, Indian fighter and agent in North Carolina and Tennessee is sketched in these Publica- tions, Vol. IV. pp. 443-444. A full sketch of him has been pub- lished by Dr. S. B. Weeks in the Report of the American Historical Association for 1893.
The summaries of letters, enclosed in parenthesis, are by the editor.]
(I)
(Treaty making; rascally Indian Agents.) Dear Sir/ Tugoloe in Georgia/ ye 23 July 1789
I attended the Intended Treaty with the Cherokees ye 25 last month at french broad river, wheare the Commis- sioners waited 12 Days over the time appointed for hold- ing the Treaty without hearing a word from the Indians, they then Decampt I went on to meet the Creeks the prospect of that Treaty together with the Situation of this County. I Refer you to the Inclosed papers, one of which is a letter from Genl Clark to Col Clevland which I had permission from Clevland to send for your Information, about the time the Indians was Expected they made an attack on this quarter killd & wounded several among which was Maj Wolton (our Woltan) who is now at my elbow who I Expect will Expire in a few minutes from this time
Who Ever may be in fault I will not undertake to say but I believe you will think after looking over things that had some others been in the appointments things would have been on much better footing.
I also Inclose a Copy of Capt McCluskeys Deposition Respecting the letter I mentioned to you, whether it would be well to send it on to Congress with a letter from me or not I leave to your Judgment, if so I must beg thatj^ou will do that business all & Every Kind of that I leave to
Letters from Joseph Martin to Patrick Henry. 29
you beging that you will make use of my name in any letters you think proper
I am told that Genl Mathew is making Interest for to get in a Relation of his to be superintendant & I suppose will say much about the letter I wrote to McGilvery tho hope that the (D) Delegation from Virginia will have as much wait as those from Georgia.
I have lately had several messages from the Cherokees to Come to their Counsiles but have put them off — Every- thing is like to succeed well, if successfull in my appoint- iment.
There is a Certain Bennett Belue a man of Infamous Character who is set on by Mr. Savier who has Collected a few of the fugitive Cherokees together and forged a number of letters, seting forth that he is appointed by the Chiefs of the Cherokees to do business for that nation & has taken Two Indians of the lower Class with him to put a better face on his villiany, & has Got a Deed or lease from the Indians for Great part of their County I under- take to assure you that not one of the principle (i page hr) Chiefs Knows any thing of the matter This Information I must beg that you will Immediately Transmitt to Con- gress to prevent Imposition, I shall wait hear afue Days Longer to see the final Decision of The Treaty
I much presst by the Commission of Georgia & Genl Clark to attend the Treaty saying they are sorry that any- thing was said Respecting the letter that Every Gent in Georgia are much in my favorer
I shall leave nothing in their power
I shall take a Tour in a few Days Thro some of the tTie Cherokee Towns & make a stand at the long Island un- till sometime in September if opertunity oflfres shall be glad of a few lines, Interim/
Remain as usual your obliged Humble & most obdst
Patrick Henry Esq Jos Martin
30 Southern History Association,
(2)
(Private business matter as to land certificates.)
Dear Sir/ Henry County ye 2d April 1799
You applyd to me in May 1784 thro Mr Fontain for some Certificates to secure some Land in North Caro- lina. I furnished for you * him with Lbs. 302 12s which he passt his rect for — sometime after I received a few goods by William Parks, which no Rect has been given for tho I Recollect the paper Mr Fountain Gave me stands against him or you you will please to adjust the matter as it could not be done if either you or myself was out of the way. With heart felt pleasure I see your appointment as one of our plenipotentiaries to France but am in doubt Whether you will accept or not. Will you be so Good as to drop me a few lines at the ferry by the Return of Capt Rowland
I am Sir with Great Respect Your most ob serv Jos Martin
Endorsed on back in P. Henry's hand :
"These I paid chierfully if not wholly for I do believe nothing is due for them Mr Fontaine's Estate is to pay nothing."
(3)
(Indian Affairs: appointment as Agent to Chickasaws; watching Spaniards.)
Dr Sir/ Jan ye 18 1790
Your much much esteemed favour of ye 10 instant Reachd me on Saterday last — , I have Carefully lookt over it and am sincerely sorry that I Cannot at this Time wait on you which nothing should provent — only the situation of my wife; particulars on that I refer to Mr Funtain, nothing, on this side the Grave can Give me greater pleas- ure then to Serve you, and will with pleasure go to the
Letters from Joseph Martin to Patrick Henry. 31
Chickasaw nation, But I Dont think it will answer any valuable purpose unless I had some appointment from Congress, in the Indian Department, as Savier & Belew has their Eyes on that Spot of Ground Belew is now in the Chickasaw nation & Claims all that Valuable part in your purchase which you will see by his advertisement which I enclose (you will please to send it Back) & should any person be there on that Business without Some au- thority from Congress, their life might be in Danger with- out answering, any Desireable purpose
I am told Savier is Trying hard to be appointed super- tendant, & has several friends in north Carolina assem- bled who have wrote in favour of him to Congress, they are thro him to share part of that Valuable purchase you have lately made.
Could I Git appointed which I think might be aflfected by sending Immediately to Congress, you will see whot Govenor Martin Says about it. The senators from North Carolina, will intefer(e) in my favour I think nothing is now wanting but your friendship which I have long Ex- perranced and Cannot hav the least Doubt of, Govenor Martin is somewhat mistaken. Respecting Belues infor- mation about McGillavrays letter that Complaint Come by way of the Governor of Georgia, altho Belue Lodged sundry Complaints, set on by Savier.
Respecting the letter that has made such a noise, if Ever I had the Interest of the states at hart, never more than at that Time, if you will be so obliging as to Charge your memory, you will I Trust Remember that when you was Govenor last, I informed you that I Reed letter from Mc- Gillavray advising me to Come there if he Could serve he Cheerfully would also a message from the Govenor of Pansacola Desiring I would Come there without loss of time. I immediately sent to you for your advice in that matter which was not to Go myself but send some per- son to Try to find out what his Business might be per-
32 Southern History Association.
haps some scheme might be forming against the united states, perhaps Mr Turnbull might fish it out or some Indian might be of service, if you Remember the letter & will state the matter to the president every Deficulty will be Removed.
Tho eny thing of this I leave to you whether to write in my name as well as your own, or whether in Either
I wrote you some Days past on the subject Inclosing a Report of the Committee by John Rowland he has Re- turnd I am told & left the letter on the Road in his Wag- gin Box
Your advise to me as Govenor of Virginia was aprinci- ple reason why I kept up a Communication with McGil- lavray, by which I obtained many points of Information & had the Spanards made any attempt on the united states I am well assured I should have Got Information in time to give publick notice before any Blow Could be struck
Pray did you send on the Dispatches I sent by the mountain leader, did you get the money from Congress, whither shall I Send the negro boy to Joseph Moltons or not he says he is to be Redeemed in march next. Let me hear from you by Mr Funtain and it Gives me pain that I Cant leave Darow, with him but perhaps it may Do af- ter his Return, my wife will by no means part with me at this time
I am sir
With my Great Regard Your most obd Sevt
Jos Martin
Address on back:
The Honorable Honord by Mr Funtain Patrick Henry Esq Prince Edward County
DOCUMENTS ON THE TEXAS REVOLUTION.^
I. Governor Viesca to the Citizens of Texas.*
Address of the Constitutional Governor to the State of Coahuila and Texas, and Its Inhabitants.
Generous Fellow-Citizens :
Nothing is more reasonable than that I should address you at the moment in which by your suffrages I am placed at the head of the administration of the State. I am about to consummate the sacrifice which I have made to you of my inclinations, of my desires, & of my private comfort. Under circumstances less peculiar nothing would have been sufficient to have drawn me from the peaceful retire- ment in which I enjoyed the tranquility and pleasure af- forded by an innocent family whose education and well- being exclusively occupied my time; but your will desig- nated me as the depositary of your most precious inter- ests. You struggled in your might against power; over- came perils, and obtained your desires. The heroism; the generosity and the firmness of your character will in their time occupy a brilliant page in the national history ; and so much virtue and so much merit should not be answered by me with an ungrateful renunciation which would paralyze your exertions. Now you have me in the capital ; obedient to your call, already I find myself under the necessity of manifesting to you what are to be the governing principles and rules of my administration.
Never did a governor find himself bound to the gov- erned by closer ties than those [which] unite me with you.
* For this original material the Association is indebted to Mr. E. C. Barker, Austin, Tex., who sketched the preparations for the upheaval in our November, 1901, issue.
" From The Texas Republican, May 9, 1835-
3
34 Southern History Association.
besides those which are common, gratitude, excited and so specially compromised, imposes on me the most sacred du- ties, and obliges me not to reserve what I cede on your ac- count, even though among the sacrifices be included that of my natural existence. I dedicate myself then assidu- ously and constantly to afford you such blessings [as] can be given by a government surrounded by difficult circum- stances, and which are too well known to you . Your
legal rights firmly sustained and scrupulously maintained will be sufficient for you to understand that security and all other individual guarantees are not idle words, when their preservation and support are confided to my zeal. No one, therefore, should fear anything else, and I never will permit any other persecution than that which the law commands — a faithful and vigilant guardian of your liberties, they shall not be in any manner infringed so long as the government can prevent it, and confiding in the good intentions which animate me, and the firm purpose of never varying, I hope to be able when my administra- tion closes and I return to the ranks of a simple citizen, to deliver over to you unsullied the sacred trust which you have confided to me.
But if you, my beloved fellow-citizens, have acquired so many claims over me, permit me to remind you that I have them also unanswerable on your co-operation and assistance, upon these I rely; for I am certain that if I fail to receive them I shall not be able to obtain anything. I require from you nothing but that slavery which en- nobles the republican, and which in another compact you have offered, and latterly sustained to the admiration and surprise of those who have observed you. You will un- derstand that I mean the slavery of the law: in thLs true liberty is founded, and without it men can never have a government corresponding to the dignity of their natures. Submissive to the laws and respectful to the authorities which you have freely constituted, the institutions of our
Documents on the Texas Rezfolutiofi. 35
country will be indestructible. The general government will sustain them and that of the State will not vacillate in seconding it, counting on your assistance and decision.
Order and peace are preserved by a rigid observance of the law as well in those who command as in those who obey ; but such precious gifts are not obtained if there is a want of cordial and intimate union among the members of society. One other eflFort of your characteristic gener- osity will cause an abandonment of unjust pretensions by those who have been able to establish them, will cause all to sincerely forget the injuries and resentments which have created divisions, and I really believe my country- men capable of so much nobleness. Let us march openly by the road pointed out in the constitution. I shall have the honor of directing you, and although of your civil vir- tues I have much to learn, I will endeavor in good faith and with due perseverance to comply with the obligations imposed on me by the high position in which you have placed me, giving me upon all occasions examples of moderation and toleration. Fellow Citizens:
I entreat you to assist my efforts directed wholly and exclusively to your good. If I obtain it I shall be more than compensated, and my pleasure will have no bounds when I contemplate you free and happy.
Augustin Viesca. J. Mariano Irala, Se*y.
The foregoing is a hasty translation of the governor's address to his fellow-citizens on taking charge of his high office: never man entered upon his charge with higher motives of gratitude and never has a State required stronger proofs of activity, zeal, firmness and talent in her first magistrate.
The nation generally and Coahuila and Texas, in par-
36 Southern History Association.
ticular, is in the deepest jeopardy. Liberty has become a by-word, and aristocrats now in possession of the govern- ment wish to blot out the very word from our vocabulary ! Citizens of Texas, arouse yourselves, or sleep forever! Your dearest interest, your liberty, your property, nay, your very existence, depend upon the fickle will of your direct enemies. Your destruction is resolved upon and nothing but that firmness and energ>' peculiar to true Re- publicans can save you. The present administration in Texas wish to reduce Texas to a territory, and if the degredation should not prove sufficient to rouse you to take hostile steps, they mean to add insult upon insult, disgrace upon disgrace, until you are ultimately compelled to defend yourselves. They expect that England, in con- sideration of exclusive commercial privileges, will be in- duced to assist them in carrying destruction into your section of the country, and from that, in case of assist- ance from the United States, Texas should become the war field of two rival nations ! The great object in separ- ating you from Coahuila is to have you considered as for- eigners— and your very existence depends upon your re- sisting this separation at this moment. Support the gov- ernment of Coahuila as true citizens. The members which compose that government are the sincere friends of Texas, and their greatest glory will consist in rendering you the first State in the union! Fellow Citizens of Texas, I again repeat, arouse yourselves, gather round your Governor, sustain him against every effort of Des- potism & oppression, & calculate with certainty on all the happiness that can be secured by liberal institutions and a liberal administration. Many powerful States of the union are with you — the mass of the nation is galling under the yoke of aristocratic and fanatic tyranny, and the problem must be solved, whether we are to lire as freemen or con- tinue to exist as slaves, under military despotism.
Coahuiltexanus.
Documents on the Texas Revolution. 37
The editor says: "In publishing the Governor's Ad- dress, & the remarks of Coahuiltexanus, it is more with a view to shew our readers what is circulating in other parts of Texas than to sanction the sentiments contained in either. An express arrived from the Governor, calling upon each department for one hundred men, armed and equipped, to sustain him and a vile congress that have bartered our public lands for a mere song. By way of putting the antidote alongside of the bane, we make an extract from our political chiefs reply to the call of the Governor: *******
"'And that the people view with equal horror and in- dignation the acts of the present State Congress who have manifested a determined disposition to alienate all the most valuable lands of Texas at a shameful sacrifice, and thereby entirely ruin her future prospects. The law of the 14th of March past, is looked upon as the deathblow to this rising country. In violation of the General Constitu- tion and laws of the Nation — ^in violation of good faith and the most sacred guarantees — Congress has trampled upon the rights of the people and the Government, in sell- ing FOUR HUNDRED LEAGUES of land at private sale, at a price far below its value; thereby creating a monopoly contrary to law and the true interests of the country. In consideration, I would suggest to his excel- lency that the remarks made by the anonymous translator on the English translation of his inaugural address, un- der the name of Coahuiltexanus, are very exceptionable, inasmuch as they contain principles TREASONABLE in themselves and calculated to mislead the unwary and en- thusiastic. I enclose for the perusal of his excellency, a copy of his address in English with the remarks of the translator.' "
3^ Southern History Association,
II.
Henry Austin to the Editor of the Texas Republi- can.^ Mr. Editor:
A printed paper, purporting to be a proclamation of the Government of the State is now in circulation in Texas. There is nothing objectionable in the proclamation, but the phraseology [illegible] on the back of the handbill there is an anonymous [illegible] article of the most alarming revolutionary character. The [state] ments in that paper are contradicted in direct terms by [illegible] letter received from Col. Austin, dated Mexico, March [illegible] in which he says: "The territorial question is 1WW dead; the advocates of that measure are now strongly in favor of a state governvtent,
"That subject is now before Congress (a call has been made upon the President for information on the subject).
"I am assured the President will make his communica- tion in a few days and that it will be decidedly in favor of Texas and the State/*
This quotation is from memory: It is apprehended, as the letter is not immediately at hand, that extracts cannot be sent from it to the press in time for the paper. The citizens therefore do well to suspend their opinions until they receive certain information on the subject, lest it should turn out that this firebrand has been thrown among us to profnote the views of desigfiing speculators in the public lavds. Remember the Yazoo affair,
Henry Austin.
* From Tlie Texas Republican, May 9, 1835.
Documents on the Texas Revolution. 39
III.
Henry Austin to James Pkrry.^
Columbia, May 5, 1835. Dear Perry:
There is an effort making for a new fus & Wharton told me S. W. W'S [S. W. Williams] name was to one of the firebrand circulars appended to the gov's proclamation. The proclamation is well enough, It only calls upon the people to support the supremacy of the Laws.
But the article appended to it is a tissue of falsehood, got up apparently to break up Congress & prevent the re- peal of the 400 league law so they may retain their specula- tion.
It asserts that the Gen'l Gov. are determined to ruin Texas & drive all the N. Americans out of it ; that they are about to separate Texas from Coahuila & make it a mili- tary commandancy, for the purpose of having it in their power to represent to the people that Texas is peopled with foreigners, & that then the English will, in considera- tion of commercial privileges, help them to conquer the country, &c., and calls upon the people to take up arms at once for self-preservation, &c. Now this is all stuff. Ste- phen's last letter gives the lie to all of it. Gray, the prin- ter, has got a copy & as usual it will come out in the next paper. It will be a dead stopper to immigration and sales of land & throws us back 2 years at least. In this view of the subject I think the publication of those parts of Ste- phen's letter which I marked with a pencil are important to appear in the next paper to counteract this incendiary paper. If you can get them to the press this week, even at some trouble and expense, I beg you will do so if you view this subject as I do.
Cordially your friend
Henry Austin.
* MS. — Austin Papers.
THE AMERICAN NEGRO: AN ANSWER.
By W. H. Councill."
Mr. Thomas* has given to the public a well-written book containing strong arguments against the Negro race. The book well merits the attention of every Negro who loves his race and seeks its true relation. Unsup- ported denials and unsupported assertions, slander and abuse of Mr. Thomas will not answer his arguments. Every **Yes" and "No" must be backed by facts and proofs. Our answers must be addressed to the charges and assertions of Mr. Thomas and not to Mr. Thomas. His book must stand on its merits. The sins of Mr. Thomas can never wash white the sins of our race.
I can notice only a few charges that Mr. Thomas has made against the race. It will be impossible to give here anything like a full review. My statements are based on my personal contact with, and study of, the Negro during thirty years of actual labor in the school room, Neg^o assemblies, churches, house to house, plantation and city work, and in every way in which it has been possible to know the Negro, good and bad.
Some things which Mr. Thomas has said may be true, not only of the lowest elements of the Negro race, but of all other races in like condition. Mr. Thomas makes refer- ence to the morbid tendency of the Negro as is evidenced by his desire to attend funerals, hangings and the like. That this is not restricted to the American Negro is proven by the crowds of whites that flock to the burning of a
* Mr. Councill, who makes this rejoinder is a Negro himself, President of one of the largest Negro schools in the South.
' The American Negro, what he was, what he is. and what he may become. By William Hannibal Thomas. New York: The Mcmillan Co., igoi, pp. XXVI.+440, 8 vo., cloth, index.
The American Negro. — Councill. 41
Negro, excursions even being run to the scene of the crime. The American Negro, along with the American public, may be degenerate along this line. He accuses the American Negro of lacking worthy ideals and as having no aspirations. Stupid contentment is the usual concomitant of dense ignorance — so it is with the Negro. But my ex- perience has been that wherever a ray of light has pierced the gloom, a desire for better things follows. For over a quarter of a century I have had Neg^o children enter school from the most unfavorable environment, and I have anxiously watched their after life. Only a small per cent, are able to remain in school to graduate, but the under- graduates are wonderfully influential in changing the life of many of their communities, showing that not only they, but those with whom they come in contact, can be influ- enced to better lives.
That the Negro ministry is not up to the desired stand- ard I admit. But that there is an ever-increasing upward trend in the ministry is evident to all fair-minded and thoughtful people. The Negro is a deeply spiritual people, and this spirituality has been a great force in the Hfe of the race and in the history of the two races living together. It has led the Negjo to trust unquestioningly in an over- ruling Providence and deterred him from many crimes common among other people in like condition. That the Negro preacher is a plagiarist to a great extent, I deny. His effusions, be they with or without merit, are usually his own.
Statistics show that the criminals among Negroes are not from the educated classes, only in rare instances. Nor yet among the church members, but among those usually who are not reached by the teachers and preachers of the race. Mr. Thomas holds that the contrary is the case, and from that reasons that Negro religion as a factor in race regeneration is worthless. His reasoning is false and con- clusions unjust.
42 Southern History Association,
In concluding his chapter on Negro characteristics, jSIr. Thomas states that the Negro has caused degeneration in the South, working havoc with its mental and moral habits. If the South has degenerated, is the Negro responsible for it ? Was the poor Negro slave, held as the chattel of her master, responsible for his unholy desires toward her and his satisfying the same at his will and pleasure? It would, too, be a travesty on the South to say that its strong- willed, chivalrous gentlemen were dominated by a race of inferiors.
To say that Negro manhood has no respect for chaste womanhood is to make a statement entirely foundationless. The Negro was taught respect for chaste womanhood even in blackest slavery. Even then there was a regard for vir- tue among women, and no writer who wrote of the worst conditions of slavery at that time would have dared to im- peach Negro manhood respect for chaste womanhood. On the other hand, many of the writers of that day ob- served Negro manhood respect for chaste womanhood, bordering on sublimity. There may be in this respect some modifications since freedom, but not sufficient to jus- tify the assertions of Mr. Thomas.
The charge of Mr. Thomas of the lack of chastity on the part of Negro women is so false on its face, and so revolt- ing as to make us turn from it with disgust. I have been placed in a position for twenty-five years to know of the virtue of the young girls of my race. I do not hesitate to say that a vast majority of all who have fallen under my observation and study are modest in language and conduct and chaste in their personal character. I know and have known of Negro girls who hold their lives as the price of their virtue.
The charge of the violation of the marriage vow is an- other evidence of the lack of information on the part of Mr. Thomas. There are exceptions here as in other cases, and among all races. But the great majority of marriage
The American Negro, — Councill. 43
relations are properly observed, and families as chaste and pure as any on earth, and in as large a proportion as found among other people. Indeed, the census of 1890 shows that of the whites there were .59 of one per cent, of di- vorces, that among the Negroes .61 of one per cent, of divorces. This shows in a large degree the sanctity of the marriage relation. I admit that Negro women marry at an early age, but none of the causes given by Mr. Thomas for deferring marriage are true to any appreciable degree. The average marriage age of the better classes of white people is from twenty-fiye to twenty-seven years. Early marriage takes place among all races in a low state of civilization. Thousands of Negro girls are learning, as thousands of white girls have learned, that often an early marriage means the leaving of father and mother to carry burdens, and also the assumption of the duties which ought to devolve upon the husband.
Seventy-five Negro men out of every one hundred seek- ing wives, aim to get chaste women. This fact alone, known to every colored girl in the South, has a tendency to elevate chastity.
I do not know upon what facts or information Mr. Thomas bases his charge that the marital immoralities are common among the educated classes of Negroes. So far as my observation, investigation and knowledge of the race go, it is presenting among its educated classes as pure and as chaste marital relations as the world has ever furnished under like conditions.
The unkindest cut of all — really the lunge that seems to be from the demon rather than from the man, is the charge that school authorities have personal knowledge of the sale of the virtue of their pupils. I do not believe that there is a school in the entire Negro race where such conditions exist. On the other hand, it would be impossible for Mr. Thomas or any other living creature to point out a single case to substantiate his charge. That some Negro girls in
44 Southern History Association,
I will not attempt to deny, but this number is insignificant when compared to the great m^ss of young women who are struggling upward in life and who have no more crimi- nal carnal knowledge than their traducer will ever have of heaven. In my life time, I have taught thousands of young women, and I have come in contact with thousands of mothers who are laboring under great disadvantages and sinful environments, standing alone, holding their daugh- ters up, and the daughters holding themselves up to the highest standard of virtue. Nine mothers out of every ten, and all others who have stood in the place of mothers, have been willing that their children should go in rags and patches rather than sacrifice their virtue for purple and gold. The world has never presented a grander woman- hood than that displayed by the black woman of this coun- try to-day. Cursed be the man who would by word or deed drag her down or slander her.
The charge that the negro, in general, is "pre-eminently sensual'* and seeks carnal knowledge of white women is too far from the truth to require hardly a notice. However, I will say that white women, before and since the war, have trusted Negro bodyguards around them, and there are rare cases on record of any violation of that confidence. Yet there was opportunity which would have been seized by vicious persons and which in a more sensual race than the Negro would have tempted violence. The Negro came forth as pure and chaste as his virtuous mistress in that relation. In all of the states where marriages is per- mitted between the races, actual unions are very few and only among that class of Negroes, in this country quite small in number, who are trying to run away from them- selves.
Therefore, I conclude that the charges made against the Negro of America by Mr. William Hannibal Thomas are not true as against the whole race, or even a majority of the race, and where they are true, they constitute the ex- ception under conditions in which they exist in other races.
REVIEWS AND NOTICES.
The True Thomas Jefferson. By William Eleroy Curtis. Philadelphia and London : J. B. Lippincott Com- pany, 1901, 8 vo., pp. 395, cloth, illustrated. Price, $2.00.
In the author's words, this is "not a formal biography," but is "intended to be a series of sketches as graphic and as accurate as possible, without partisanship or prejudice, of a remarkable man." No chronological order is followed, but the subject is presented topically under these thirteen heads : Jefferson's Family ; Jefferson as a Lawyer ; Jeffer- son as a Farmer ; Author of the Declaration of Independ- ence; Jefferson in Office; The Expansionist of 1803; "Jeffersonian Simplicity;" Jefferson's Friends and His Enemies ; Founder of the University of Virginia ; Jeffer- son's Religious Views ; Jefferson's Services to Science ; and In Conclusion.
This is certainly a most appetizing bill of fare, and the author's cookery is unquestionably tempting and savory. The work is exceedingly interesting, and its interest is due not simply to the importance of the subject, but also to the author's treatment. It must be admitted, too, that he has not confined himself to the "garbled eulogy style of hero-chronicling." For he not only speaks of Jefferson's great ability, learning, energy, industry, originality and far- reaching influence upon his own and succeeding genera-
«
tions, but also accuses him of "egotism and verbosity," "duplicity," "underhand" dealings, "malice and mean- ness."
But to grant that the book is interesting, and that it con- tains two-sided opinions of Jefferson's personality, is very far from admitting that the word "true" in the title is de- scriptive of the book's real nature. On the contrary it is so full of inaccuracies and exaggerations as to make the some schools are supported by bad men for bad purposes,
46 Southern History Association.
reader suspicious of many statements which may possibly be true. The following examples of inaccuracy may be cited :
On p. y2 we are told that Jefferson began the practice of law in 1767 "about the time of his twenty-fourth birth- day;'* while on p. 93 we learn that he began practice **when he became of age in 1764.*' Which of those state- ments is correct the reader is left to discover for himself. The author informs us that William and Mary College, Jef- ferson's alma muter, is "the oldest college in America ;' the truth being that Harvard had been in existence nearly sixty years before the birth of the Virginia institution. He also tells us that in 1700 the population of Virginia was only forty thousand, while that of Massachusetts was sev- enty thousand. As a matter of fact Virginia had at that time about two and a half times as many inhabitants as he credits her with. Another erroneous statement is that the "famous Four resolutions" passed by the Virginia Bur- gesses in 1769 were "the first formal act of rebellion com- mitted in the American colonies." The average school boy is aware that four years prior to this date the Burgesses passed Patrick Henry's far more famous Resolutions against the Stamp Act. Mr. Curtis denounces Virginia for ingratitude in not naming one of her counties Jeffer- son. Is he, then, ignorant of, or does he wilfully suppress the fact that Virginia did name a county Jefferson, but that this county was violently taken from her when the North saw fit to erect that monument to the overthrow of the Constitution, West Virginia? The author of this "True" book likewise informs us that, while other states have erected monuments of all sorts to this great Virginian, "nothing bears his name" within the limits of his mother state "except a hotel (lately burned) whose ornate archi- tecture and decoration would have offended his sensitive, classical taste." But if Mr. Curtis had cared as much for truth as for an opportunity to sneer at Virginia, he might
Reviews and Notices, 47
have learned that another hotel (the Jefferson Park Hotel near Charlottesville) commodious, but much less costly and ornate than that in Richmond, was named in honor of the great Democrat; that the theatre in Charlottesville, the mountain on which the astronomical observatory of the University of Virginia stands, and the building in which one of the University's literary socities meets, like- wise bear his name ; and that the University library con- tains a marble statue of him of heroic size, while her Public Hall is adorned by a very large and excellent oil painting of him. Lest Mr. Curtis fail to discern the fact for him- self, it may also be mentioned that the Jefferson National Bank of Charlottesville has recently opened for business.
The author's account of the University of Virginia con- tains much that is valuable — including the excellent illus- trations— but also displays his reckless inaccuracy. The University owes much to the munificence of generous northern men, but it is utterly false to say that, but fpr this, "Jefferson's great monument and his greatest gift to the American people would long ago have perished." For the institution had attained renown before it received a single dime from any one of the individuals named by Mr. Curtis. Moreover, it is a little trying to one's patience to be told that those native-born Virginians, Leander J. Mc- Cormick, Linden Kent and Charles Broadway Rouss are among the Northern benefactors of the University. These sons of Virginia revered their mother and would not ap- preciate the sneers levelled at her by Mr. Curtis.
Mr. Curtis tells us that the Chairman of the Faculty of the University is elected by the body over which he pre- sides. This is another misstatement. He is chosen by the Board of Visitors. Again, Mr. Curtis asserts that "in the regular course each term" lectures are given at the Uni- versity on all sorts of religious and scriptural subjects. This is incorrect. The University has permitted certain gentlemen (paid for their services by parties unconnected
48 Southern History Association.
with the University) to deliver such lectures; but these lectures have had absolutely nothing to do with the "regu- lar course." Mr. Curtis informs us that "the motto of the University is a passage from St. Paul selected by Jeffer- son, and by his orders inscribed upon the frieze of the ro- tunda of the auditorium : *And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.' " A painstaking, truth-lov- ing author could easily have gotten at the truth about this motto ; but Mr. Curtis managed to crowd a whole series of blunders into this single sentence. St. John, not St. Paul, was the author. The "rotunda of the auditorium" has no existence outside of Mr. Curtis's imagination. Nor has the University any motto. There is such a thing as "the rotunda," modelled after the Pantheon by Jeffer- son and now used as a library; but Jefferson never or- dered such inscription upon any of the buildings. The passage was selected by ]\Ir. Armistead Gordon, of Staun- ton, and is inscribed (in Greek) over the entrance of the recently erected building containing a public hall and lec- ture rooms for some of the Academic professors.
According to Mr. Curtis colonial Virginia was peopled bv "rich tobacco barons, many of whom drank to excess, gambled recklessly, raced horses, patronized cock fights, and were carried home bv their slaves insensible from their tavern carousals. Drunkenness, debauchery, licentious- ness, extravagance, disregard of financial obligations, and other moral delinquencies were looked upon with s>Tnpa- thy rather than censure." If this be true, the people of every state or nation that desires to produce a Washington, a Jefferson, a Lee and a Jackson should make haste to plunge into the very mire of debauchery and dishonesty.
As a matter of course Mr. Curtis repeats the usual shal- low clap-trap about slavery — clap-trap that has been re- peated so often that even some people with brains have come to believe it. The possession of slaves, he tells us, "destroyed the energ>' of their masters, swelled their pride.
Reviews and Notices, 4$
and dulled their understanding." Evidently Mr. Curtis is familiar with the history of those hopeless dullards, the Athenians, and could demonstrate that their notorious stu- pidity was due to the fact that Attica contained five times^ as many slaves as freemen. He could also prove that slavery deprived the Romans of all their energy and caused them to remain lazily at home in their little village ; where- as, if they had only been enlightened by a William Lloyd Garrison and a John Brown, they might have founded an empire and made some impressions on the world.
R. H. Dabney. University of Virginia.
A Calendar of Washington Manuscripts in the Li- brary OF Congress. Washington: Government Print- ing Office, 1901, 4 to., pp. 315, cloth.
This valuable, scholarly piece of work by Mr. Charles H. Lincoln under the direction of Dr. Herbert Friedenwald relates chiefly to Washington material not yet published. Whatever portions have seen the public light have been noted as far as possible by the compiler, who, it is safe to say, made most thorough search of available sources.
The volume consists of two parts, manuscripts from Washington, and "documents received by him." Each covers substantially the same time, 1754- 1799, and each is fully calendared in chronological order. Those papers from Washington cover some 92 pages, those to him 82 pages. These two divisions are followed by index com- prising 129 pages.
The great bulk of the entire collection bears on military affairs, though there are several letters touching Indian complications, the founding of the City of Washington, and Washington's management of his estate.
Although not so stated, it is presumable that the index includes all proper names. Not as much emphasis is laid on subjects as desired, notably the City of Washington Be-
4
50 Southern History Association.
ing omitted. Aside from these insignificant points, one suggestion might be offered for a similar publication ; that the number of words in each document be given. To de- scribe each as so many pages of foHo or quarto means al- most nothing as to its length in case any special one is to be copied or printed.
The great interest of the Western people in history is well represented in Til\xsactioxs of the Kansas State Historical Society, 1897-1900, volume 6, edited by the Sec- retary, Geo. W. Martin (Topeka: W. Y. Morgan, State Printer, 8 vo., pp. 507, cloth). We have papers on ser- vices of Kansas soldiers in the Spanish War, on Indian warfare, on the slavery struggle, and numerous biograph- ical sketches, with several detailed bibliographies of ma- terial on Kansas. There are thrilling accounts of personal adventure and hair-breadth escapes, told with fidelity to facts, but many of the contributions are so permeated with a newspaper breeziness of style as not to be sober history until they have been remorselessly pruned. Kansas is parsing through the "strenuous life" now, and most of the<e pages deal with the combative* side of man, with but iiitle on the more peaceful and more permanent accom- plishments, the literary, social, economic and industrial de- velopment of the Commonwealth. But with the overflow- ir.^ energ}- and progressiveness of the place, all these will be treated with fulness and sobriety in time.
Pioneers of Soitherx Literature. Bv Samuel Al- ben Link. Nashville, Tenn. : Barbee & Smith: Vol. I, iSoo, 12 mo., pp. 284, cloth: Vol IL 1900, pp. 285-599, 12 mo., cloth. 75 cents each.
So long have our literary histories been written from a sectional standpoint that the first duty of the student who would survev the whole field of our literar\- effort is to
Reviews and Notices. 51
gather material for the story of Southern letters. No- where else must so much journeyman work be done.
To this class of work belongs these two attractive little volumes of Professor Link. He has grouped together a series of papers most of which, if we mistake not, have ap- peared in serial form. There is an introductory chapter, a Glance at the Field, then follow papers on Hayne, Tick- nor, Simms, Kennedy, Poe. Groups of writers are dis- cussed under such titles as. War Poets of the South, Sing- ers in various Keys, Southern Humorists.
These chapters are of varied interest and value. We are grateful for the reprinting of poems long out of print and for liberal extracts from critical writings not easy of access to. But there is so much to be grateful for, we wish more had been done. The biographical sketches are meager as to facts. Why, for example, do we look in vain to the paper on Hayne for the initials of Lieut. P. H, Hayne ? and for 18^2, the date of the poet's graduation at Charleston College? Yet criticism for shortcomings is disarmed by the confession "the writer is painfully aware of many omissions, and in some cases of having made too little research."
The critical judgments expressed are of such character as to make the reader wish Professor Link had confined himself to the narrative which he tells in an interesting way. His criticism is overlaudatory ; his explanations of unsuccess on the part of Southern writers border on the querulous. A new edition might well omit a part of page 187.
As yet Professor Link has much of his field to himself and we feel sure he will succeed in arousing many to in- terest in the story of Southern letters. We should like, however, for him to rewrite his papers for another edition and give us a thorough-going account of the writers whose fortunes have attracted his attention.
We call attention to some of the points we have marked
52 Southern History Association.
for correction. **Giffen'' is spelled three different ways. **Ramsay" is invariably misspelled. Spenser (p. 140) changes "S" to **C/' and Brums (p. 383) is guiltless of a sib- ilant. P. 29. E. C. Pinkney's Poans contains 76 pages, not 60.
P. 31. Does Meek's short term as Probate Judge jus- tify **ermine''?
P. 35. It is hardly accurate to speak of **Woodlands" as near Charleston.
P. 103. Miss Rowland's emendations of Ticknor do in some cases improve the verse, but is the result Ticknor?
P. 119. What is inconsistent between bookbinding and poetry-writing?
P. 174. We find the almost invariable *iittle Latin" for Jonson's "small Latin."
P. 251. *'Froissart" loses its "a."
P. 353. **Bonnie Blue Flag" was first sung in the theatre at Jackson, Mississippi.
P- 383. Mrs. Weiss loses part of her name.
P. 417. As G. P. R. James died in i860, it is hardly ap- propriate to write "the late English novelist James."
P. 421. Hope wrote as **executor of the late Henry El- len, Esq."
P. 469. It would be well to mention H. T. Lewis as au- thor of "Harp of a thousand Strings," and the book title ought to be given on p. 15.
Because we believe these volumes may be made very useful, we have transcribed thus at length some of the notes made during a rapid review of the chapters.
By all means, let the author pro\'ide the next edition with an index.
William Lander Weber.
Emory College.
Edgar Allax Poe. Bv Colonel John A. Tovce. New York: F. Tennyson Xeely Co., 1901, 12 mo., pp. xvi-j- 218. illus., cloth.
Reviews and Notices, 53
It must be admitted that this book, dedicated to Gen. John B. Henderson, has a martial ring, and the warlike spirit thus inadvertently suggested is in evidence, for Col- onel Joyce, "a chivalric blade," to use his own phrase, is a doughty antagonist, with many a grievance against men and manners.
"Speak nothing of the living or the dead but truth" — Joyce. This aphorism on the title page warns the reviewer and forbids his taking refuge in the critic's thicket of en- ticing generalities. But fortunately neither Col. Joyce nor good taste requires the whole truth. He would doubtless sanction this paraphrase of his chieftain's words. It is well to speak some of the truth all the time and all of the truth some of the time but not all of the truth all the time. For instance, it is not necessary to tell the full story of Col. Joyce's life for that is sufficiently revealed by the frank freshness of his own confessions ; nor is it necessary to test or to pass judgment on his copious comments on things in general, for neither these things nor the com- ments throw any clear light on Poe, with whom they are very remotely connected. But if the author and these abundant and luxuriant comments in prose and verse are omitted, the remainder need not detain us long.
In blowing off the "foam and scum" (see Preface) the author has not been careful to prevent this froth from lodging on his writings, in which exaggerated and fanciful lucubrations but obscure the poet. Nor has the author found the "bed rock" of fact. On the contrary his super- structure, Gothic in its phantasmagoric literary gargoyles and modern in its journalistic "staff" (or "stuff") — ma- terial totters frequently under its overload of verbiage, for it does not rest on the bed rock of fact but on the unsub- stantial and shifting sands of opinion. The facts may easfly be verified by reference to any reliable life of Poe, but in this life they will be found as mixed as are the Colonel's metaphors, and these are confused bevond belief, and
54 Southern History Association.
knowledge too. The author would hardly claim to have added much that is new but he would doubtless let his claim lie in his comments and criticisms. These will fre- quently have the attention of the readers, but they will hardly meet with their approval, for sarcasm and innuendo are not convincing.
Two things in this Biography may be noted. First, the author's inclination to prefer his sailor's story to the usual soldier's story of Poe. The latter, it is true, has the au- thority of the Army Records and conforms to the authen- ticated scheme of facts, but the former has the merit of novelty and better still suitably supplies material for a Httle poem on The Sea. This poem has not much to do with Poe, but that is not important in this biography. Second, the interesting storj' that Poe stole from one Penzoni his Raven — was indeed a sort of Pirate of Pen- zoni — was told Col. Jovce bv Leo Penzoni. Moreover, it was told amid shouts of derisive laughter and sardonically. But even this telling and the plainer written note do not persuade us that The Raven descended directly from The Parrot. But this charge has been taken seriously by a good scholar and we may well await with Col. Joyce the answer to the question, who is the plagiarist? In conclu- sion, in all seriousness it is hard to take this book se- riously. The student's knowledge of Poe will not be con- firmed or enlarged by it, but his knowledge of the author will be materially increased. And after all since we are studying life through literature it surely is not without profit to learn Col. Joyce through his Biography of Edgar
Allan Poe.
Charles W. Kent.
The Unveilixc of. the Bust oe Edgar Allan Poe in THE University of Virginia, October 7, 1899. Com- piled and edited by Charles W. Kent. Lynchburg, Va. : J. P. Bell Co., 1901, large 8 vo., illus., pp. loi, cloth.
Reviews and Notices. 55
This volume records the just and generous, if somewhat tardy, recognition by the University of Virginia of the most famous of her sons.
From Shelley at Oxford to Stevenson at Edinburgh it is usual to find that romantic genius does not strike deep roots in academic soil. Poe was no exception. His uni- versity career began in February, 1826, and ended in the following December when Mr. Allan took him from col- lege. All that can be stated of this period is clearly given in the section * Poe's Student Days at the University of Virginia." Though little is added to what was already known, yet such a restatement of the facts must be of value, if only to refute the erroneous and widespread idea that Poe was expelled or censured by the faculty. The facsimiles of extracts from the University records form an interesting evidence to the contrary.
A brief "History of the Poe Memorial Association" de- scribes the inception and development of the movement which, with a quickness flattering to its promoters, re- sulted in the unveiling of the bust. A sketch and portrait of the artist, George Julian Zolnay, precedes the account of the **Unveiling Exercises." Of these the most notable features are the ode bv Mr. Robert Burns Wilson and the address of Mr. Hamilton W. Mabie. The poem, like those which the volume also contains of Henry Tyrrell, Madison Cawein and Father Tabb, is not below if not above what should be expected of poetry written for an occasion. Mr. Mabie's address, 'Toe's Place in American Literature," notes the striking fact that our literature has "had no childhood," — that its history shows "a fresh field" but "an old race." The literary awakening from 1830 to 1840 is recalled, and Emerson's prophecy of an age of American poetry is quoted. The most noteworthy of our authors came into prominence about this time. All of these, Mr. Mabie thinks, might have been predicted but "Poe alone * * * * could not have been foreseen * * * *
56 Southern History Association.
His contemporaries are explicable; Poe is inexplicable.*' But is this not overstated? The tendency of modern crit- icism is to find the interpretation of a poet in his environ- ment. Baudelaire indeed has declared that this country was for Poe "only a vast prison." Yet the Southern civ- ilization, of which Poe was largely a product, contained certain elements of Romanticism which might perhaps be traced in the poet's sense of the mysterious and of pure aesthetics. Such a view would not interfere with Mr. Mabie's emphasis on the daemonic qualities of the most original of our writers. The message of Poe is justly noted as the Faith in Beauty, — a message to a martial nation. The high position which this gives the poet is eloquently declared, and the address ends with an appeal for a better understanding of the poet than has hitherto been granted to him.
The volume is tastefully prepared and bound. There are several illustrations, but the lack of a larger photo- graph of the bust itself is noticeable.
S. Wardlaw Miles.
Westerfelt. By Will N. Harben. New York and London: Harper Bros., 1901, pp. 330, cloth, $1.50.
The publisher's note informs us that "Westerfelt" is the sixth of twelve American novels to be published by them during the current year ; novels written for the most part by new American writers, and dealing with different phases of contemporary American life.
The author of this volume has endeavored to depict life as found in Northwest Georgia — Cobutta men and women ; and of their Kfe he has succeeded in telling an interesting story.
There is plenty of action, described with spirit : a suicide, a fight, a white-cap raid, and a camp-meeting.
The best part of the book is th« first incident : the sui- cide of a young woman who drowns heiself because John
Reviews and Notices. 57
Westerfelt, a neighbor of higher social rank, does not love her. The best character, possibly, is the mother of the dead girl, who pursues Westerfelt with unrelenting hatred, till she is finally converted at a camp-meeting. The re- morse of the hero, rather weakly portrayed, and another love affair, which, after much complication, ends happily, make up the remainder of the volume. The last part is the weakest : Westerfelt's moody pride is rather tiresome.
In his portrayal of the life of the "mountain" folk the author has accumulated a great number of their queer sayings and doings; but the reader will feel that there is too evident a striving after local color. The true touch, the creation of an atmosphere in which the characters of a great novel live and move naturally, is entirely lacking.
One cannot but feel that the book as a whole is ineffec- tive: that old Sue Dawson loves her daughter is certain, but of all else the reader is unconvinced.
Prof. James P. Kinard.
A White Guard to Satan. By Alice Maud Ewell. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, pp. xii, 187, 12 mo, cloth.
This little book, in the style of a contemporary relation in the first person, is based on the episode of Bacon's re- bellion in Virginia in 1676, drawn chiefly from John Esten Cooke's History of Virginia. It deals in a simple manner with the career of the great leader of the popular revolt against Berkeley, but the author has enlarged on only two phases of Bacon's career; the details of the placing of the *'\vhite aprons" on the ramparts before Jamestown, and the events which relate to the death of Bacon. From the former incident has come the title of the story; since the Berkeleyan dames who were thus forced to give pro- tection to their enemy were called by their own friends ''A White Guard to the Devil."
The book is open to the serious objection that while de-
58 Southern History Association.
scribing one of the most exciting incidents of our colonial history, it gives the scantiest attention to the crisis. The plot is narrow, and the characters are made to come on, and go off, the stage with the merest apology of an appear- ance. To have treated the subject in any way worthy of its possibilities would have required much more space than these few pages of one hundred and sixty-five words each, and would have demanded a greater breadth of imagina- tion. It has, furthermore, been the misfortune of the au- thor to fall into what she evidently is led to think is archaic diction, but if she would examine the Sainsbury papers in the State Library at Richmond, or the mass of contempo- rary documents in the Virginia Historical Society, she would have a juster idea of the diction which was com- monly used by the men and women of the days of Berke- ley and Bacon. Still there is in the book the promise of better work in the future. The author shows that she pos- sesses a simple and direct narrative style, an abihty to get close into the subject, a capacity of understanding the lives of the past, and a real love of the History of Virginia.
Prof. J. S. Bassett.
A Soldier of Virginia; a Tale of Colonel Washing- ton and Braddock's Defeat. By Burton Egbert Steven- son. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin & Co. (the Riverside Press, Cambridge), 1901, illus., pp. 325, cloth.
In his VirginianSy Thackeray gives us a glimpse of the ill-fated campaign of Braddock in the backwoods of Vir- ginia as an incident of a masterpiece of English fiction. That campaign is the burden of Mr. Stevenson's story. He has undoubtedly given close study to it and to every- thing bearing upon it, and around it he has wound a bit of lovemaking which sustains interest in the adventures of the hero, whether he is crossing swords with an arrogant British officer, saving the life of Washington, suppressing
Reviews and Notices. 59
an insane movement of slaves toward insurrection or los- ing a hand but winning a heart in a final bout with Indians. Perhaps some readers may find in the tale too much fight- ing, too much detail of the movement of the little army through the forest, but the romance of the thing will appeal to them strongly. It carries them back to planting days of the Virginia colony, to the later coming of partisans of Charles I and his opponents, to the easy life upon the great plantations as the golden days of the Ancient Domin- ion dawned and to the training of the Virginians in the school of American freedom as they beat back the French and their savage allies from the frontier. With war of those times, as in all times, went love, and our hero, who tells the story himself, handicapped as he was at the out- set of his career, would have made a sorry end of it had he not combined with his loyalty to Mars a tribute, blind at times, to Venus. Through all, though, he manages to present us a pleasant picture of the life of his day, true in the main to fact though garbled as fiction and convincing of its accuracy because he fortunately neglects to employ as his medium of narration the sorry imitation of stilted Seventeenth century English against which so many recent characters in so-called historical romances have inglor- iously and absurdly stumbled.
Edward Ingle.
Stonewall Jackson. By Carl Hovey. Boston: Small, Maynard & Co., 1900, pp. xi-f-131, 18 mo, portrait, cloth, 75 cents. (Beacon Biographies, edited by M. A. DeWolfe Howe.)
In this modest duodecimo is told the story of a man who passed from a professor's chair to the command of an armed host, won victories of startling brilliancy, schooled nations in the almost obsolescent art of war, and filled two hemispheres with the echoes of his military renown. The style of the narrative is vigorous, compressed and clear.
6o Southern History Association.
Much is omitted of course, but nothing seems to have been overlooked. The portraiture of the Man is something more than a finished '^appreciation" in miniature; it is a vigorous free-hand sketch at full length. There is no suggestion of color ; there is not a superfluous touch. It is enough to paint a Jackson or a Cromwell precisely as he was.
A frontispiece portrait gives distinctness to the impres- sions of the text. "That fellow," said a clever cadet, as Jackson entered the gates at West Point, '*has come to stay." The speech aptly depicts the salient characteristic of the man. He bore the imprint of resolution upon every feature. Jockey, constable, cadet, partisan, **fa- natic," drill master, disciplinarian, or leader — in every position, practice or vocation — he was a stayer of the most tenacious type.
His visage reveals the construction of his mind. His cranial configuration is denotive of exceptional capacity and power. The firm, symmetrical contours, the bold frontal mass, the expanded parietal arch, the inter-parietal breadth, and the pronounced fulness without predomi- nance of the posterior brain are r^^cognized marks of phys- ical energy and intellectual force. The facial conforma- tion is strictly in keeping. The square chin (so prominent in modern fiction) is not there; "the chin was oval," it is said ; the mouth was small and firm ; the complexion fresh and clear. In the excitement of battle, his face was flush- ed; at critical moments, slightly pale. The eyes were "dark blue," the vision was strong and piercing; the ex- pression, varying with the mood, was soft or thoughtful; keenly penetrating or coldly repellent; ablaze with pas- sion, or wistful, introspective and sad. The cast of face, in a side view, was strong, clear cut, and bold — as sharply outlined as a silhouette, as strong as a Caesarean profile upon a Roman coin.
It was preeminently the face of a fighter; of a highly
Reviews and Notices. 6i
gifted leader who united to the more familiar coup d*oeil of the tactician that imperial faculty of strategic visualiza- tion which only Napoleon Bonaparte possessed in a higher degree. In this regard, the man who, passing suddenly from a prolonged and passionate denunciation of Ville- neuve, dictated to Daru, at midnight, that incredible cam- paign to Ulm, stands absolutely alone.* Jackson had studied the great captains, and placed Napoleon first. Yet looking upon the field of Waterloo he said, "Here Napo- leon erred ; the vital point of attack was not Hougoumont, but Mt. St. Jean."
The Virginian commander came of a race that was not only steeped to the soul in Semitism, but literally "cradled in war." In his make-up heredity had its part. The men who turned the tide of war at King's Mountain survived in the invincible soldiers of the Valley. "There is noth- ing," says a bold Englishman, "like a tincture of Calvin- ism for stiffening a line of battle ;" and Jackson, not less than Cromwell, appreciated its peculiar fitness to stiffen the sinews of war. He was himself a warrior of the an- tique Hebraic type, and, like the mighty son of Zeruiah (a perfect Biblical prototype) was never so divinely inspired as when the forefront of the battle was against him, before, and behind. The effects of that inspiration are still felt, and current history tells us that the spirit of the Virgin- ian soldier is still moving upon fiercely contested fields and guiding the heady currents of the fight.
T. E. Pickett.
The Minutes of the Sixth Annual Reunion of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, held at Memphis, May 28-30, 1901, make a pamphlet of 105 pages, giving a very full ac- count of the occasion. It is very creditable to the previous Commander-in-Chief, Biscoe Hindman, whose manage- ment of the organization was phenomenally successful.
♦Memoires par le Comte de S6gur Paris, 1877.
62 Southern History Associatiati,
During his tenure of office he added iii camps, bring- ing the total to 290. The finances are also in a very healthy state, the receipts being $1,370, expenditures $698, and surplus $672, the best showing that has ever been made. Substantial progress is also chronicled under the chairman of the Committee, Gen. James Mann, Nottoway, Va., towards raising a fund for the erection of a monu- ment to Confederate women. He reported $752, while over four thousand more were pledged at the gathering. Col. Robert G. Pillow, Little Rock, Ark., made an in- structive report on what is being done by the South for Confederate soldiers.
Besides the official record of proceedings, we have de- scriptions of the parade, balls, and other social features, circular letters and orders issued during the year, lists of officers, sponsors, camps and registered visitors. As well known, Judge R. B. Haughton, St. Louis, Mo., was chosen commander for the next year (p. 345 of July, 1901, issue of these Publications).
BooxESBOROUGH, Its Founding, Pioneer Struggles, In- dian Experiences, Transylvania Days, and Revolutionary Annals, with full historical notes and appendix. (Filson Club Publications, No. 16.) By George W. Ranck. Louis- ville, K. : John P. Morton & Co., 1901, pp. xii.+286, 4 to, paper, illus., portrait.
As might be expected, this volume appears in the splen- did typographical dress of all of the Filson publications, heavy white paper, sumptuous margins, clear print, most copious index, and most excellent pictures. As befitting such externals, Mr. Ranck's labors have been untiring and comprehensive. He has perhaps done more than mere industry and carefulness can accomplish, he has seemed to blaze out a new path of historical writing, with only one or two competitors so far. He has very happily blended the popular and the scholarly. He first gives us an en-
Reviews and Notices, 63
tertaining narrative of this little frontier town, and then follows this with a mass of documents and other "raw material" from which he has fashioned his product, about equally dividing the whole between the two forms of com- position.
Boonesborough represents the attempt of Judge Hen- derson, of North Carolina, to found a proprietary govern- ment in the rich soil beyond the mountains, and he ob- tained from the Indians, by treaty in 1775, the southern half of Kentucky. At a chosen site on the Kentucky River a town was laid off, and families moved in. Then came suffering, privation, destruction of crops, attacks by Indians, and, worst of all, opposition of Virginia to the corporate scheme. In less than half a century the fabric had disappeared so completely that the streets and lots were only a cornfield. All of this story is attractively laid before us with "full and free citation of authorities," in the foot notes.
The second half of Mr. Ranck's work, the appendix, consists largely of the sources of information that he used. The bulk of them have seen print before, but nowhere else have they been so intelligently grouped. They are gath- ered from American Archives, Calendar of Virginia State Papers, North Carolina Records, manuscript collections, journals, pamphlets, scarce books, and other rare reposi- tories. Several of them touch on Henderson, the prime actor in this social experiment, "The Cherokee deed to Henderson and Company ;" "Henderson's Journal ;" "Proclamation of Lord Dunmore ;" "Some of Henderson's letters ;" "Survey Warrant of Henderson and Company ;" "Virginia's land grant to Henderson and Company."
Tennessee Sketches. By Louisa Preston Looney. Chicago: A. C. McClurg & Co., 1901.
The author of this interesting book is a native and resi- dent of Memphis, Tennessee, and the daughter of the late
64 Southern History Association.
Col. Robert F. Looney, a distinguished cit* .en of Tennes- see. The book is dedicated to her father. Its sketches, seven in number, are **The Member from Tennessee, In the face of the Quarantine, Aftermath of the Old Regime, Jared Kerr's Children, Joe's last testament, Places of power, and Gray farm folk." Though there are political motives to some of the sketches, the main interest in each is the exposition of character and social life, which is ad- mirablv done. It mav be said that there is a storv of inter- est in each of the sketches.
The book is written in a fascinatingly simple but effec- tive style of humor and pathos. Moreover it is so delight- fully frank in its tone, so intensely southern in its predilec- tions, so full of the flavor of pure domestic life, and so attractive in personal sketches that the reader who once enters upon its perusal is not likely to lay it do^vn until he has finished it. The volume is artistic in its binding and type, and will no doubt enlist many interested readers.
Documentary History of the Struggle for Re- ligious Liberty ix Virginl\. By Charles F. James, D. D. Lynchburg, Va.: J. P. Bell Company, D, pp. 272; to be had of the author, Dan\nlle, Va., Si.2^, to ministers $1.00.
This volume is a controversial one, and grew out of a lengthy controversy in 1886 with the late Hon. William Wirt Henry as to the relative contributions of Baptists and Preiibyterians to the cause of religious freedom in Vir- ginia. It begins substantially with 176S, when there arose a legal persecution of Baptists in Virginia, and follows in chronological sequence the trend of events until 1802. ^Yhen the glebes were sold under an act of the Assembly. Besides the persecution it considers the work of the Vir- ginia conventions (assemblies'^ of 1775 and 1776. for re- ligious freedom: the tight over the establishment and the super>-is:on of laws in its favor for collecting tithes,i776-
Reviews and Notices, 65
79; the repeal of the law recognizing a State church in 1779 ; the struggle to secure a law providing for a general assessment in which all church bodies should be partici- pants; Jefferson's act for religious freedom, passed in 1786, and the final act of 1802, under which the church lands were sold.
Dr. James summarizes his claims for the Baptists a5 follows (p. 197) : They were the first and only religious de- nomination that struck for independence of Great Britain and the first that made a move for religious liberty before independence was declared; the Baptists were the only denomination that maintained a consistent record in that struggle and who held out until the last vestige of the establishment had been overthrown; Jefferson and Madi- son were on the side of religious freedom, Henry on that of the establishment ; the Baptists were the only denomina- tion who expressed any dissatisfaction with the Constitu- tion of the United States on the ground that it did not provide sufficient security for religious liberty and the only one that asked that it be so amended as to leave no room for doubt and fear.
That his conclusions are substantially true as far as the material presented goes can hardly be denied; but the book bears throughout strong marks of controversy ; like Esau its hand is against every man. It fails too often to maintain the judicial poise of the historian and in historical method is sadly deficient. It is called a "documentary his- tory'," but documents do not predominate. A few con- temporaneous papers, petitions and memorials of religious bodies, are given in full ; there are numerous extracts from the writings of Jefferson, Madison, Mason, from journals of the Legislature, and from Hening. While we may class Fristoe's History (1808), and Semple's (1810), as contem- porary with the events they narrate, and hence primary authorities, there is little effort to go back of their state- ments to their sources. But to put Hawks and Bishop
66 Southern History Associatiofi.
Meade, Foote, a book review published in i860, an his- torical address published since the war, and Chambers' Cyclopaedia of Universal Knowledge on a par in authority with contemporary documents, is to commit the unpar- donable sin in history. It does not appear that the author has made any material addition to what was already known on this interesting subject; he has restated Baptist claims largely in the words of earlier writers, and on their author- ity must these claims stand or fall ; he has no bibliography ; with historical method and the later religious history of Virginia in its broader scope he appears to have little ac- quaintance.
Storiks of Georgia. By Joel Chandler Harris. New York: American Book Co., i2mo., pp. 315, cloth, many illus.
Joel Chandler Harris' **Stories of Georgia" has become, since its first appearance in 1896, widely popular in the South, and deserves its favorable reception. It is eminent- ly sane, and besides serving up the more picturesque epi- sodes of Georgia's history in an attractive way, it injects a good deal of wholesome political philosophy. In twenty- seven short but pithy chapters are treated typical incidents of periods ranging from Revolutionary days through Re- construction to the New South. While the treatment is designedly popular, the author gives evidence of close ac- quaintance with the history of the State, a logical grasp of facts, and a courage of conviction, wdiich in combina- tion with his well-known charm of style would seem to mark him out as one eminently qualified to undertake a more serious study of Georgia's history, and complete the work that McCall and Stevens and C. C. Jones began. It is most unfortunate that no adequate history of Georgia should exist. Perhaps this little volume may prove a fore-runner.
Prof. J. H. T. McPherson.
Reviews and Notices, 67
Like an echo from a long vanished past is a little con- temporary pamphlet giving an account of the Slave Insur- rection in Virginia in 1831, which has recently come un- der the eye of the editor. It is a very rare piece and the cumbrous title may be given in full. Authentic and im- partial/ narrative/ of the/ tragical scene/ which was wit- nessed in Southamp-/ton county (Virginia) on Monday/ the 22d of August last,/ when/ fifty-five of its inhabitants (mostly women and/ children) were inhumanly/ massa- cred by the blacks !/ Communicated by those who were eye-witnesses of/ the bloody scene, and confirmed by the confes-/sions of several of the Blacks while under/ Sen- tence of Death./ Printed for Warner & West./ 183 1./ This account was printed in New York (D., pp. 38) and its author was Samuel Warner. It is embellished by a folding wood cut illustrating one of the scenes described. Like similar performances of this day it was hastily com- piled to meet a popular demand and was published before the capture, trial and execution of the arch-conspirator, Nat. Turner. With this limitation it gives a fairly accur- ate account of the uprising, including a list of the victims and the names of those executed ; there is an account of the attempted uprisings in North Carolina, a history of the slave massacre in Santo Domingo and a description of the Dismal Swamp to which many slaves had escaped from Virginia and North Carolina. The pamphlet ^.nds with unctuous remarks on the evils of slavery.
Perhaps no work by a Southern author has had a greater variety of experiences than one of the novels of the Rev. C. H. Wiley, of North Carolina. The following title has just come into the hands of the writer from Eng- land: Companion to "Uncle Tom's Cabin."/ Utopia;/ an early picture/ of/ Life at the South,/ by C. H. Wiley./ With illustrations by Darley./ [Seven lines quotation.]/ London : — Henry Lea, 22, Warlick Lane./ D. printed in
68 Southern History Association
eighths, pp : title i leaf+ 222, two illustrations only. The object of this note is to inquire into the identity of this ti- tle with No. 21 as given in Weeks's Bibliography of Wiley in the Report of the Commissioner of Education for 1896- 97 (pp. 1465-1474). The book is the same in text and frovi the sanw plates as Weeks's No. 9 : Adventures/ of/ Old Dan Tucker,/ and/ his son Walter :/ A tale of North Carolina./ By C. H. Wiley./ With numerous illustra- tions,/ by Felix O. C. Darley./ [8 lines quotation.]/ London :/ Willoughby & Co., 22, Warwick Lane./ [1851.] That edition is in octavo, with t. p. -f" ii- + 222 and four- teen illustrations. The '^Companion to *Uncle Tom's Cabin' " could not have been published before 1852, the date of Mrs. Stowe's first edition. If it followed Old Dan Tucker why are twelve illustrations omitted? Is it not more probable that Old Dan Tucker was a second Eng- lish edition and that [1851] is an error? The text of both of the above is the same as that of Sartain's Magazine for 1849 (Weeks, No. 4) and of "Roanoke; or *where is Utopia,' " published by Peterson in 1866 and 1886 (Weeks, No. 5 and 6). Weeks also gives (No. 20) "Utopia: A Picture of Early Life at the South." — Philadelphia, Peter- son, 1852. Is this another edition of this book, making six editions published under four different titles? Who can answer?
Mr. James O. Carr, of the Wilmington, N. C, bar, has issued privately a little pamphlet containing five letters written by William Dickson, of Duplin county, N. C, be- tween 1784 and 1 81 8, four of them being addressed to Rev. Robert Dickson of Ireland. (Raleigh: Edwards & Broughton, 1901. O. pp. 42.) The Dickson family of North Carolina are descended from Simon Dickson, an English Puritan. John Dickson came to Pennsylvania from Ireland about 1738 and a few years later removed with his large family to Duplin county, N. C. William,
Reviews and Notices. 69
his son (1740-1820), the author of these letters, saw ser- vice in the War of the Revolution, was a member of the four provincial congresses of the State and for many years was clerk of the county court.. Four of the letters here given are printed entire from the originals, the fifth being copied from an extract in the Fayetteville Examiner, the extract illustrating by its omissions the idiocy and con- tempt of the average newspaper editor for the founda- tion facts of history. The letters are devoted mainly to the affairs of a large family connection, but contain many references to public matters. Thus of the battle of Guil- ford Court House he says: "The conflict was long and obstinate and the victory had been in favor of the Amer- icans had it not been for misconduct of the North Caro- lina militia, which broke and left our part of the line ex- posed,"— a bit of contemporary testimony that it will be hard for Judge Schenck to explain away. There is an account of the struggle against the Tories in Bladen and Duplin counties and of the battle of Elizabethtown. His remarks on the new Federal Constitution, penned in 1790, read like a prophecy : "It appears to me that the South- em States will not receive equal benefit in the government with the Northern States. The interest, manners and customs and trade will be more united and by being more numerous and more powerful will form the laws of the gen- eral government more to their own advantage and con- venience. The Southern States will have their vote but w411 not be able to carry any point against so powerful a party in cases where either general or local interests are the object. * * * The most strenuous exertions were made by some of the Northern representatives to liberate and emancipate the slaves in the United States, and though they did not carry their point, they seem determined never to drop the matter until they do.*' Verily this man was a Cassandra. The social side is illuminated by the career
70 Southern History Association.
of Mr. Bryan, "a widower about 36 years of age" who takes to himself his fourth wife.
Thanks are due the editor, Prof. William E. Dodd, for the first instalment of the John P. Branch Historical Papers of Randolph — Macon College (Richmond : Ever- ett Waddey Co., June, 1901, pp. 63, paper, 50 cents; for sale by the Editor, Ashland, Va.). This number one consists of three articles: An essay — Bennett prize — on David Jarratt and beginnings of Methodism in Va., by J. W. Smith; Leven Powell correspondence, 1776-1778; Letters on election of 1800. The first is based largely on the Life of Jarratt, a careful piece of work though not calling for wide research. For the other two, though re- prints, Prof. Dodd is to be warmly commended, as the circulation was so limited as to make both almost inac- cessible. The letters of 1800 indicate considerable fed- eralist distrust of Jefferson, and it was confidently pre- dicted that he would utterly destroy the navy. The Rev- olutionary letters add other evidence of the uncertainty and embarrassments of the patriots.
The College Historical Society aims to continue this pubHcation once yearly, about June i, subscription 50 cents annually, to bear mainly on the local field, with orginal material. This one under review appears through the liberality of Mr. John P. Branch, of Richmond, Va.
It is not often that the serious work of historical com- position is undertaken by a negro, but Prof. John W. Beverly, of the State Normal School for Colored Students, at Montgomery, Ala., has recently published a History OF Alabama for Use in Schools and for Gener.\l Reading (Alabama Printing Co., 1901 ; Svo., pp. 214), which has been generally commended as a fair and im- partial work. It is essentially a work for the use of schools. In its form it consists largely of questions and
Reviews and Notices. 71
answers. It is divided into three parts — History, Geo- grahphy, and The Negro in Alabama. While the two first parts do not affect any attempt at the presentation of new matter, the whole work is written in a simple and pleasing style. To the historical student the portion of the book of real value is Part III. In this has been col- lected all of the important facts in the life of the negro from his advent in the State to the present time.
Mr. John Allison has published a '^Twentieth Century Map of Tennessee," 60 inches long by 42 wide, that com- bines history, geography and statistics (Nashville, Tenn., price $2.08 by mail). Besides the usual natural features it has old historic spots, altitudes, lines of travel and com- munication, and figures of population, area and values. Last spring the Legislature by act provided for the placing of a copy in each public school of the State.
The Bulletin of the N. C. Board of Agriculture for September contains a valuable illustrated article on the Poisonous Plants of North Carolina, by Gerald McCarthy.
The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction has set apart October 12 as North Carolina Day for the public schools of the State to be observed by them in an appropriate manner. To assist them the Department has this year prepared and published a program of exercises (Raleigh: Edwards & Broughton [1901] O. pp. 35). The general subject chosen for the year is the First Anglo- Saxon Settlement in America (Roanoke Island, N. C, 1584-91), with poems and historical readings. October 12 has been observed for more than a century as Founder's Day in the University of North Carolina ; October 3 will henceforth be celebrated by Trinity College in memory of the gifts of the Dukes.
72 Southern History Association.
Mr. William Sharswood, Perch, N. C, has in prepara- tion a book entitled Facts Worth Knowing About North Carolina. It will include half tone portraits of representative native North Carolinians.
Some years since, Miss Margaret V. Smith, of Alexan- dria, Va., gave the public a volume of merit in "The Gov- ernors of Virginia.'' She has again essayed the historical field of the old Commonwealth in Notes on the History OF THE Constitution of Virginia (Glens Falls Pub. Co., Glens Falls, N. Y., 1901). Much light is thrown upon the relation of Virginia to slavery and the slave question. It appears quite clearly that manumission was advocated from an early date by the political leaders of the State. Copies of the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments are given, as also the bill of rights, prepared by George Ma- son, of Gunston Hall. The book appears to be one of much interest.
General Johnson Hagood, Barnwell, S. C, left, in manu- script, at his death a few years since, a full history of his brigade during the Civil War. It may soon be published.
PERIODICAL LITERATURE.
**A11 three of us who had captured him were angry at ourselves for not killing him out on the prairie, to be con- sumed by the wolves and buzzards/' is the realistic refer- ence to the capture of the Mexican General Santa Anna in 1836, after the battle of San Jacinto, that Sion R. Bostick makes in his "Reminiscences" in the October Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association (Vol. V., No. 2, Austin, pp. 85-170). Other stirring incidents of pion- eer days back to 1828 does he narrate, especially the suc- cessful assault of San Antonio by the Texans in 1835.
Of the same order of first hand knowledge is W. D. Wood's backward glance over fifty years of his Texan experiences. Highly interesting and valuable are both of these contributions.
There are two careful studies in general history based on the sources: one by E. T. Miller, showing the con- nection of a renegade Spaniard, Penalosa, with the La Salle expedition in the last quarter of the 17th century; the other by I. J. Cox, on "The Early Settlers of San Fer- nando," a critical investigation of the episode of bringing 16 families, 56 souls, from the Canary Islands to settle on the San Antonio River in Texas in 173 1. A kind of hazy halo of romance has grown up around them similar to that about "the first families of Virginia," but Mr. Cox strips off the tinsel with a ruthless hand, proving that the most of them were of an inferior social grade at their orig- inal home. Mr. Cox vivifies this doubtful experiment for us by mentioning the present migration of Porto Ricans to Hawaii.
The editor, Professor Geo. P. Garrison, has a full and entertaining biographical sketch of Col. Guy M. Bryan (1821-1901), a man of note in the State, of a long and ac-
74 Soutltern History Association.
tive life, crowded with adventures and responsibilities. He was prominent in Texas before it was admitted to the Union, he was elected to Congress in 1858, he was a con- fidential agent during Confederacy days, and he was very influential in politics afterwards. It is just such careers in the South that have been so neglected by history, and Professor Garrison is to be warmly commended for giv- ing him fitting treatment. Smaller men than this have been embalmed, wholesale, by the Massachusetts Histor- ical Society.
Mrs. A. B. Looscan tries to fix the site of an old fort on the San Baba river by furnishing the description of it taken from a German work published in 1847, detailing the tour of Dr. F. Roerner in Texas in 1845- 1847.
A note that it is hoped will rouse discussion is inserted by Mrs. A. P. McNeir, to the effect that at heart the ma- jority of the people of Texas did not favor secession, and that if the votes had been fairly counted Texas would have remained in the Union. A similar statement has for years been floating in the air about North Carolina, but within a few months, Major Graham Daves has made a rather crushing refutation of it. Now, if ever, while so many actors in the scenes are alive, is the time to remove these doubts and save posterity from vexation and exas- peration.
The Transallkgheny Historical Magazine made its appearance as the organ of the Historical Association of that name that was formed at Morgantown, W. Va., last June 19. This first number (Vol I., October, 1901, pp. 118, to come out quarterly) is handsomely gotten up, with a large page, clear print, heavy paper. It has one draw- back typographically, it is wired instead of sewed. If the inner margin is made very wide as in the American His- torical Rez'i^zv, this steel nuisance is not noticed.
As to contents, the leading article is M. C. Lough's
Periodical Literature, 75
"Early Education in Western Virginia," which is sprinkled with bursts of sophomoric rhetoric and vistas of glitter- ing generalities. It was prepared "as a thesis," as we are told by the "Editor's Note," but, let us hope, not ac- cepted as such, though it does very well as prentice work for a young fellow. Perhaps, also, the "much original matter" mentioned will be found in subsequent instal- ments, as in this part the foot notes principally refer to such secondary authorities as Fiske's Civil Government, Boone's U. S. Education, Thwaites's Colonies, McMaster's History, etc.
Only warm commendation can be given Prof. R. E. Fast's "Settlements on the Western Waters," as a contri- bution to the basic stores of historical knowledge. It con- sists almost wholly of "certificates of settlement and pre- emption," copied from county records of the last quarter of the 1 8th century, in what is now West Virginia.
"Van Meter's Journal" of a "tour through the western country" (Ohio), in 1801, is a very interesting estimate of the land through that section as to its agricultural possi- bilities, diversified with views on the new towns and vil- lages that he passed through.
Hu Maxwell furnishes "West Virginia a Century Ago," composed of extracts, with short comments, from Morse's American Gazetteer of 1797.
An account of the organization of the Association last June, with editorial miscellanies winds up this beginning of what promises to be, on the whole, such a useful series.
In the Virginia Magazine of History and Biography for October, 1901 (Richmond, Va., pp. 113-224), the great Virginia authority, Alexander Brown, has an article (5 pp.) on the "Colonial History of Virginia," emphasizing the unreliability of the historical sources so far used on that subject by writers. He holds that for a century and half (1606-1760) the main current of historical life there is the
76 Southern History Association.
struggle between the people and the crown, the latter aim- ing all the time to wrest from the colonists the rights granted them by the early charters. So far all our ac- counts have been based on material that was prepared and preserved under the royal influences, and consequently **they have not conveyed the correct idea of the vast im- portance to mankind of the colonial movement in Vir- ginia, of those engaged therein, and of the motives which inspired them." It is the purpose of Mr. Brown to pub- lish the "various evidences'' which he has collected "thai were written about Virginia from 1617 to 1627, inclusive," if no more.
A very interesting extract appears from the "Diary of a prisoner of War at Quebec" in 1776— an American, iden- tified as Charles Porterfield, of Virginia. He served under General Daniel Morgan, being captured at the assault on Quebec, December 13, 1775, and detained as prisoner till late in 1776. He gives incidents of jail life and mentions many rumors that the poor captives greedily swallowed as true.
The "Letters of Col. William Byrd, 2d," from 1735 to 1738, show him a close observer of crops and trade, and also mark him as a kind of unofhcial physician, as he seemed always ready to prescribe simple remedies for ail- ments.
In the continuation of "Selections from the Campbell Papers," we have correspondence, 1779, of General Wil- liam Phillips, the British commander in charge of the prisoners taken at Burgoyne's surrender. They were at Charlottesville, Va., and the dispatches bear on the ques- tion of their treatment. Other continued papers are "Virginia newspapers in public libraries," Henry county records, the everlasting squabble between Blair and Nich- olson as to William and Mary College matters, document- ary abstracts of 1637, council and court records of 1641- 1682, and names of Virginia miHtia in the Revolution.
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Genealogy touches on Throckmorton, Robards, Towles, Adams, Eskridge and Farrar families. The department of notes and queries is unusually full in this issue.
The West Virginia Historical Magazine, published quarterly, has reached the first milestone, the October is- sue, No. 4, completing volume one (Charleston, W. Va., pp. 72). Fortunate it is that this is not the last, though the editor, J. P. Hale, resigns for reasons of age and health, without any intimation being given of a successor. He can retire with the satisfaction of faithful service in a thankless field of the present, but with the gratitude of the future.
As previously while all the papers are not up to estab- lished standards of to-day, they contain very interesting reading. Even the genalogical articles are lightened with entertaining anecdotes, naturally all the more so are the incidents of the Civil War and those bearing on the life of the Revolutionary soldier, Robert Kirkwood.
The chief contribution, filling more than half the pages, is W. S. Laidley's "The West End of West Virginia," the pedigrees of those families that settled *'the territory front- ing on the Ohio river, from the Kentucky line to Guyan- dotte, a distance of eleven miles, where the level, rich, bottom lands extend from the banks of the Ohio to the hills overlooking the said river.''
In the sketch of David Ruflner we have a narrative of the heavy difficulties encountered by the pioneers in de- veloping the salt industry west of the mountain ranges. Biographical data of family interest are also provided by "Robert Rutherford," who, born in 1728, in Scotland, died in 1803, having been "the first member from beyond the Blue Ridge elected to the United States Congress."
Thomas Swinburn has laid for us the documentary foun- dations for the last use of the whipping post in Kanawha county, W. Va., in 1840, the case of an Irishman "whipped for stealing a coat."
78 Southern History Associatiofi.
There is little more than a page of description of an Indian stone pipe, by L. V. McVVhorter.
The: William and Mary College Quarterly for Oc- tober, 1901 (Williamsburg, Va., pp. 73-144), is filled prac- tically with original historical papers and genealogical ma- terial. Official documents are printed to cover the build- ing of Williamsburg, including the survey, the vouchers and receipts for construction of the capitol there, the char- ter and the deed for the college land. Charles City county patents under the regal government are continued. There are also a list of colonial attorney-generals, tombstone in- scriptions, an early Harrison Will (1712), list of Revolu- tionary soldiers named Mitchell, ancestral information in the shape of Bible records and notes bearing on the Sarah Washington, Manson, Martin, Carr Waller, Hite, James and Walker Maury, Craig, Snead, Gissage, Bickley, and Alexander families.
In an extract from Dunlap's History of the Arts of De- sign in the United States, published in 1834, the editor, Dr. Lyon G. Tyler, states that here is to be found "about the earliest statement of the myth that the bricks of Amer- ican houses were brought from England." Dunlap as- serts this about Westover, one of the most famous seats on the James.
A letter from Col. John Bannister, May 12, 1755, throws some interesting glances on Braddock's ill-fated expedi- tion. He speaks of the lack of money in the colony to pay the taxes, though the people could supply their wants. He puts the expense of moving Braddock's artillery to the Ohio at £20,000, and he also mentions the expectation that '•something remarkable will ensue*' from the incursion — predicting far more accurately and disastrously than he ever dreamed of doing.
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The South Carolina Historical and Genealogical Magazine (quarterly, Charleston, S. C, Vol. II., No. 4, Oct., 1 901, pp. 259-343) contains an elaborate index of 39 pages, being nearly half of the number. The bulk of the remainder is taken up by the genealogical paper on the Capers family, one conspicuous "in the ecclesiastical his- tory*' of the State. The line is traced to William Capers, who died about 1718, and is brought to the present, in- cluding the distinguished Bishop Capers.
The documentary material continues the "Papers of the first Council of Safety" in Revolutionary South Carolina, and begins a series of the "Army Correspondence of Col. John Laurens" to cover to year 1782.
Considering the apathy towards supporting historical publications, the success of the Secretary, Mr. A. S. Sal- ley, Jr., in raising the membership from about sixty to nearly 300 in two years, is really wonderful, and he is to be highly congratulated on the contents of these two vol- umes.
The Lost Cause (Louisville, Ky., Sept., 1901, pp. 18- 30, 4to) aims to be devoted to the Sons of Confederate Veterans, and contains list of principal officers, with sketches of several of them, and Bishop Gailor's address to the organization at the annual meeting in Memphis last May. The new leader, Judge R. B. Haughton, St. Louis, in General Order No. 4, makes an earnest appeal to the camps to cultivate the history of the Confederacy and outlines for them a course of research, a subject to be discussed at each monthly meeting. Naturally he lays special emphasis on getting true descriptions of the great battles. He also urges that effort be made to induce vet- erans to write their experiences — a most commendable suggestion for preserving historical material.
A reprint of General J. A. Early's account of the en-
8o Southern History Association.
gagement at Cedar Creek appears without stating that it has before been published.
A letter relative to the work of Confederate armies in the West practically completes the number.
The October number reprints a dual view of the terrible attack on Fort Fisher, N. C, during the winter of 1864- 1865, one by the commander and the other by his wife, originally a northern woman, born in Rhode Island. Both are very readable, one being a military account, and the other a woman's emotions and experiences. In his narra- tive, Col. William Lamb claims that for the first time in history land defenses were destroyed by gun fire from ships.
A couple of short notes from two persons in Louisville, Ky., seem to show that the Southern '^Decoration Day" began there in the latter part of May, 1862. The pro- gram of studies for the Texas U. D. C. for January, 1901, includes such authors as Stephens, Davis, Tucker, Gregg, Simms.
The Confederate Veteran for September, 1901 (Nashville, Tenn., 4 to., pp., 37) prints half the diary kept in a pocketbook by Major K. Falconer on his march to his Mississippi home after the surrender of Johnston in North Carolina in 1865. It throws considerable light on the des- titution of certain sections that his party passed through. He speaks of women along the line walking five or six miles to pick up the corn left by his horses at feeding time. Besides this journal, the original book contains a number of Johnston's orders which Prof. F. W. Moore, of Van- derbilt University, where it is preserved, thinks have never been published.
J. C. Maccabe contributes a strong appeal for Jefferson Davis, especially emphasizing his attachment to the Un- ion, and his clear comprehension of the enormous diffi- culties before the South.
Periodical Literature. 8i
It develops through a letter from Mrs. J. S. Kersh, Pine Bluff, Ark., that there was another Southern Sam Davis — D. O. Dodd, 17 years old, who was hanged at Little Rock; during the Civil War as a spy, being first offered his liber^ ty if he would reveal from whom he got the dispatches found on him. By public subscription a monument has been erected to him.
The usual collection of incidents and **last roll" sketches finish the issue.
The October, 1901, American Historical Magazine (Vol. VI., No. 4, Nashville, Tenn., pp. 291-384) completes the volume, appearing, with one exception, as a "Tennes- see Historical Society Number." In accordance with an agreement entered into last June to that effect, this issue consists of the charter, by-laws and history of the Society, a catalogue of its manuscripts and museum, a paper on Indian treaties of Tennessee read before it and some frag- ments on Sevier. For historical students the most impor- tant article is the catalogue of the manuscripts, covering 50 pages, indicating material on Blount, Crockett, Jackson, Jefferson, King, Mountain, Lee, Polk, Sevier and a host of Tennessee names.
One contribution goes outside of the Society limits, an appreciative but well-balanced estimate of Professor H. B. Adams, who died July 30, 1901, by one of his old pupils, Professor B. J. Ramage, of Sewanee, Tenn.
The American Historical Review for October ap- pears with Professor Andrew C. McLaughlin, Ann Arbor, Mich., as editor-in-chief. The article of most interest to Southern students is a continuation of the letters on the nullification movement in South Carolina, begun in the last issue. There are letters from James H. Hammond, Robert Y. Hayne, Boiling Hall, Andrew Jackson, and Wm. E. Hayne. Most of the letters are occupied with 6
82 Southern History Association.
administration details relating to army musters, organiza- tion of troops and other means necessary "to repel unlaw- ful force." The cry was for arms and other equipments ; the patriotism of the people was stirred to arm them- selves and James H. Hammond strikes the keynote of the abandon with which the whole Southern people threw themselves, their lives, their property and their sacred honor into the struggle of 1861. He writes: "We shall certainly have to borrow money * * *. In the meantime the private resources of the Whigs should be taken into consideration. On this point I will speak for myself at once. I hold my property, all of it, as much at the service of the State as my life; but to calculate on something short of extremities, I think I can furnish you next year with the proceeds of an hundred bales of cotton, * * *. For this I will take the State's certificate or no cerfificate if the times require it. If it should be preferred I would cheerfully turn over to the service of the State from the time the first movement is made, all my efficient male force, to be employed in ditching, fortifying, building as pioneers, &c.''
There is a long and characteristic letter from Andrew Jackson to Nathaniel Macon in which the President de- fends his proclamation against the nullifiers. "You tell me," he writes, "that a State cannot commit treason. This is true, but it does not follow that all the citizens of a State may not commit treason against the United States. * * * In my opinion, the admission of the right of se- cession is a virtual dissolution of the Union." But the conclusion of this same letter sounds passing strange to have come from the man who wanted to hang John C. Calhoun: "The only right of secession from a govern- ment and more particularly from a government founded upon mutual concessions and obligations among the mem- bers forming it, is the revolutionary right — secession can never take place without revolution ; and I trust, if ever it
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should happen that one section of the Union is subjected to intolerable oppression or injustice by another, and fw re- lief can be obtained through the operation of public opin- ion upon the constituted authorities, that the right may be as successfully conducted by the wronged and oppressed against our present government, as it was against that which we threw off by the revolution which established it/'
Andrew Jackson was then both a nullifier and seces- sionist. He differed from Calhoun only as to when the right should be exercised!
The American Monthly Magazine (organ D. A. R., Washington, 8vo., pp. 355-472) follows its usual custom of giving the bulk of its pages to the work of the Chap- ters and to the official acts of the National Society in the shape of the early minutes. Some of the correspondents show a lamentable tendency to lapse into the whine of the average woman's rights advocate, and want to hanker after strongmindedness — a course that would soon bring the order into disrepute and decay. Original material, Revolutionary military records, and Avery's diary (con- tinued), with several essays, finish the issue.
The names of the Revolutionary ancestors of the North Carolina Daughters of the American Revolution are printed in the November number. Other records of the same war are names of prison ship martyrs, and of sol- diers of the Revolution buried in the Western Reserve of Ohio. A Revolutionary story, a couple of addresses on the flag, work of the Chapters, and official minutes of the order, complete this number.
A very interesting line of historic investigation begins in the December issue, the attempt to locate the homes of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, with a view to marking them if possible. The four Maryland pa- triots are traced with the result that the dwellings of three
84 Southern History Association.
are found to be in existence still. The bulk of the issue consists of the usual "Work of the Chapters" and official doings of the association, with a couple of pages of names of Revolutionary fighters of Dracut, Mass., and a his- torical essay on Colonial South Carolina.
With the enthusiasm of a friend does Professor Charles F. Smith give us a fascinating sketch of Maurice Thomp- son in the November Methodist Review (Nashville, Tenn.). He decides that "Maurice Thompson is at his best in prose, in his nature sketches," though he pays tribute to his work as poet and noveHst.
Rev. Walker Lewis, of the Methodist Church, has a vivid, fervid description, "The Conquest of Georgia by the Baptists and Methodists," in the first half of the 19th century, explaining why these two denominations hold, each, a third of the population of the State. He attributes their success to two institutions: "the association" and "the camp-meeting," that furnished fit theater for the great talents of pulpit orators like Pierce, Boring, Campbell, Knight, and others. In the present period of aloofness and cold criticism it is a revelation to the general reader to come across such an article. All the stranger is it that the author seems really to think that that spell of burning religious emotion might be revived to-day if we had wise leadership.
G. F, Mellen contributes a favorable review of a writer and a book famous in their day, both now slumbering in obscurity, J. P. Kennedy and his Szvallozv Barn.
The Conservative Review for September, 1901 (quar- terly, Washington, D. C, pp. 169-272) begins the first of four instalments of a memoir of R. M. T. Hunter, by his daughter, M. T. Hunter. She intends her sketch more as a stimulus and preparation for a full biography than as an effort adequately to represent the services of this leading
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Virginia statesman. This portion (18 pp.) covers the an- cestry and early years of the subject, very happily giving us some of the letters of the man himself. It is not likely that much new material will be brought to view, as the author acknowledges to being "much assisted by" a paper in the Richmond Dispatch of Dec. 13, 1891.
Rev. W. T. Fitch contributes "Personal Recollections of the Civil War from 1861 to 1864," very readable, but ac- companied by the sermonizing that seems inevitable with a clerical pen (23 pp.). There is a labored sophomoric attempt to estimate the poet Lanier, by G. L. Swiggett, Fellow of University of Pennsylvania (6 pp.). Franklin Smith marshals a mass of signs of decadence in the United States, considerably weakened though by diffuseness of expression, and sweeping statements without sufficient proof (19 pp.).
The North Carolina Booklet for October is by Heriot Clarkson and is called the Hornet's Nest. The title sug- gests Charlottetown and Mecklenburg county, but in- cludes a brief treatment of the leading features of the Southern campaign of 1780-81 (pp. 24). The Booklet for November is by Professor D. H. Hill and deals with Greene's Retreat across North Carolina in January and February, 1781, by which he escaped Cornwallis and thus won in the campaign against the Southern colonies.
In the Sunday News (Charleston, S. C, Sept. 29, 1901) Mr. A. S. Salley, Jr., performs a capital piece of historical criticism in showing how worthless as history is Weems's Life of Marion. Mr. Salley bases his paper on marginal notes made on a copy of Weems by General P. Horry, from whom Weems got material that he did not properly use.
Reprinted in the issue of October 20, 1901, from the New
86 Southern History Association.
York Independent, is a very interesting article, by L. Q. Washington, on the Confederate State Department. He is the only survivor of those connected with it at Rich- mond, and perhaps "the only one living who was in its service at home or abroad."
Hon. W. A. Courtenay, in issue of November 24, 190 1, states that the first volume of Logan's history of Upper South Carolina, published by the Courtenay Brothers in 1859, was a financial success which would have been even more marked had it not been for the Civil War. He also says that the manuscript for the second volume, which was supposed to be lost, is now in the Draper collection of the Wisconsin Historical Society.
In a sharp editorial, taking Gunton's Magazine (New York) to task for seeking to interfere with Southern labor conditions by having Congress pass a general factory act. the Manufacturers' Record (Baltimore) of November 14, 1901, quotes from William and Mary College Quarter- ly (Vol. IX., No. 3) the following extract to show how un- fortunate sectional agitation has proved in the past :
"Virginia passed the first legislative act of any country to prohibit the slave trade. This the State did in 1778. In 1782 an act was passed authorizing emancipation by will, and by virtue of that act more slaves were freed in Virginia than had existed in Massachusetts and New York. The African Colonization Society, championed by John Marshall, Henr}' Clay and other leading Southern men, and the act of Congress in 181 7, drawn by Charles Fen- ton Mercer of Fredericksburg, denouncing the slave trade as piracy, were all steps in this policy of peace. Benja- min Lundy, before he formed a union with Garrison, trav- eled much in the Southern States, preaching peaceful anti- slavery and forming peaceful anti-slavery societies. In 1826 there were 144 anti-slavery societies in the United
Periodical Literature. 87
States, of which 106 were Southern. Before this time Asbury and Coke, the first two bishops of the Methodist Church, had been at work in the South, and the subject of the abolition of slavery had been repeatedly discussed in the Southern legislatures. As late as 1832 this discus- sion went on in the Virginia legislature."
Aside from the very valuable literary and review con- tributions, the Sewanek R:e:view for October, 1901 (Se- wanee, Tenn., pp. 385-512), contains a highly deserved ap- preciation of Gen. Edward McCrady's History of South Carolina, by Prof. D. D. Wallace.
The F1.0RIDA Magazine for November and December, 1901 (Jacksonville, one dol. annually) contains its usual assortment of stories, sketches and descriptive articles.
In the section of the Montgomery (Ala.) Advertiser, for Aug. 25, and Sept. 15, 1901, devoted to the work of the Alabama Department of Archives and History, Col. John W. DuBose, author of the "Life and Times of Wil- liam L. Yancey,'* contributes a valuable paper on the Louisiana Purchase, in which he gives the entire narrative in chronological and historical sequence. He maintains that the "purchase" extended as far east as the Perdido river, south of the 31st degree of north latitude, and that Alabama is therefore entitled to participate in the celebra- tion of the centennial.
The South Atlantic Quarterly is the name of a new periodical projected at Trinity College, Durham, N. C, to begin in January, 1902, and to continue along lit- erary, historical and social lines, with annual subscription at $2.00. Professor J. S. Bassett is to be editor, assisted by men from other institutions. He is a graduate (Ph. D.) of the Johns Hopkins University, and one of the most
88 Southern History Association.
active of the new school of historical investigators, with a feeling for literature not usually found in the scientific historical student of to-dav. Manv a rock strews the magazine route in the South, but tide and breeze may be made auspicious by the pilot.
NOTES AND QUERIES.
Southern Educational Conference. — ^The Winston- Salem Conference of last April was the successor of the Capon Springs Conference and had in its membership prominent persons from North and South. The platform agreed upon affirmed the education of the children of all the people to be the overwhelming and supreme public need of our time. The conference, therefore, desired, by some feasible and effective plan, to associate itself actively wdth the work of organizing better school systems and ex- tending their advantages to all the people. An executive board was authorized and empowered to conduct (i) a bureau of information and advice on legislation and on school organization, and (2) a campaign of education for free schools for all the people by supplying appropriate and informing literature, by participating in educational meetings, so as to improve public school facilities, create a sounder educational sentiment and promote in every way the cause of education. The executive board con- sists of Robert C. Ogden, of New York, as President, who has appointed A. G. Murphy as his Secretary; George Foster Peabody, with historic and suggestive name, as Treasurer; C. D. Mclver, Secretary, and E. A. Alderman, J. L. M. Curry, C. W. Dabney, W. Buttrick, H. B. Frissell, Albert Shaw, Walter H. Page and Wm. H. Baldwin, Jr., as the other members. This board met in New York in November and organized.. The work of investigation and of dispensation of printed matter is to be carried on under the direction of Charles W. Dabney, of Knoxville. The active directors in the field are E. A. Alderman, of New Orleans, H. B. Frissell, of Hampton, and C. D. Mclver, of Greensboro. J. L. M. Curry, of Washington, the executive representative of the Peabody and of the Slater Education
90 Southern History Association.
Funds, will be the supervising director of the work of this new education board, which promises so much of good to the South. We cannot better explain the purpose of this organization than by extracting a few sentences from the Review of Reviews, written by Dr. A. Shaw, the editor, one of the most active and intelligent promoters of this great enterprise, which has no funds to apportion in direct aid of schools, but will wage a deliberate and continuous propa- ganda in favor of educational progress :
"This movement is in hearty sympathy with all useful and valuable forms of education for both races, but it recognizes especially the necessity for radical improve- ment in the public schools for the children of all the peo- ple. It believes that the right kind of education is desir- able for everybody, and that the best future of our demo- cratic institutions calls for universal education more than for any other one thing. It believes especially in those kinds of education that fit men and women for practical life, — those that promote progress in agriculture and industry. It believes that the worst thing that can possibly happen to the negro race in the South is to have any large pro- portion of the white race kept low in the scale of human advancement through ignorance. The South is fortunate in having active and enthusiastic educational leaders of high accomplishments, broad views, and unselfish devo- tion. The North has contributed a great deal of money and much noble effort to the work of negro education in the South, but it ought also to contribute with like gen- erosity to the work of Southern white education.''
The Alabama Department of Archives and His- tory established by the General Assembly of Alabama by act approved Feb. 27, 1901, was organized on March 2, 1901, by a formal meeting of the trustees named in the act, held in the office of the Governor in the State Capitol. The following were in attendance: Governor Samford, Peter J. Hamilton, of Mobile, J. M. Falkner, of Mont-
Notes and Queries, 91
gomery, W. D. Jelks, of Eufaula, Dr. J. Hal Johnson, of Talladega, Dr. W. H. Blake, of Wetumpka, H. B. Foster, of Tuscaloosa, and O. D. Street, of Guntersville. Hon. Wm. Richardson, of Huntsville, and Colonel S. W. John, of Birmingham, were absent.
To the position of director of the Department, Thomas M. Owen was elected unanimously, no other name being presented. Resolutions were adopted defining the scope and duties of his position. Appropriate committees were appointed. The business year of the Department was fixed from Oct. i to September 30 of the following year, inclusive, and the time for the regular annual meeting of the board was fixed for the first Tuesday after September 30th in each year.
The first regular annual meeting of the Board of Trus- tees was held on Oct. i, 1901, in the office of the director, Thomas M. Owen, at the State Capitol, with the Governor, W. D. Jelks, presiding ; present, Peter J. Hamilton, Jeffer- son M. Falkner, J. Hal Johnson, S. W. John ; absent, H. B. Foster, O. D. Street, William Richardson, and W. H. Blake. Resolutions on the death of the previous Gover- nor, W. J. Stamford, were adopted. The Department was also pledged to aid in the movement for a celebration this year in Mobile of its settlement by the French two cen- turies ago. The various reports were all favorable, and provision was made for clerical help.
The Senate Chamber of the State Capitol, in which the Confederate Provisional Congress met for the first time, has been turned over to the Department for an exhibition room for relics and for a gallery of the portraits of Davis, Yancey, Fitts, Ligon, and other locally distinguished men. Naturally, a large number are of Confederate of- ficers from the State. It is likely that the Legislature at its next session will appropriate for a special building for this historical work that is progressing so rapidly under the activity and intelligence of Mr. Owen.
92 Southern History Association.
Coi^ECTiON OF Hebrew Books and Mss. — A rare collection of old Hebrew books, Mss. and antiquities is now in the possession of Mr. E. Deinard, 86 Windsor street, Kearny, N. J., the well-known Hebrew literateur and antiquarian. Mr. Deinard has lately returned from a tour through Europe and Northern Africa, bringing back about i6o old Mss. from Germany, Italy, Tunis, the Crimean Peninsula, Spain, European Turkey, Palestine, Egypt, Persia, Yemen, etc., written on parchment and silk-paper and embracing works on philosophy, exegesis, polemics, homiletics, as well as prayer books, poetry, pro- verbs, legal codes, histories, grammars, responses, studies in the Talmud, Talmudic lexicons. Cabbala, sortilegy, cures and home remedies, memoranda, amulets, etc. There are many Hebrew and Latin incunabula in the lot. Some of Mr. Deinard's old books are printed on fine parchment, being produced in Spain and Lisbon prior to the expulsion of the Jews from those parts. About 500 bear dates of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
A novel achievement of Mr. Deinard is a collection ot books from 225 Hebrew printing houses, at least one work from each, representing all parts of the world, in- cluding Asia Minor, Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Tunis, Al- geria and India. Almost all the Hebrew books that have appeared in this country have been gathered by him. An- other noteworthy feature of his library is an extensive col- lection of Hebrew poetry from the oldest works to the very latest publication.
One of the most valuable parts of Mr. Deinard's collec- tion is that containing all articles used at Jewish religious services, one of great importance for the history of relig- ion. The entire collection is on exhibition at Mr. Dei- nard's home, and there is a pretty full account of it by "D. N. S." in Jewish Chronicle for Oct. 25, 1901 (Mobile, Ala.).
Memoirs 01^ Josiah Turner. — ^Judge Tourgee, author
Notes and Queries, 93
of The Fool's Errand, says somewhere that after defeat in the field the Southern people wrested from their con- querors all the substantial fruits of victory by coining two words : "Carpetbagger" and "scalawag." In North Caro- lina one man contributed more than all others to give these two words their odiousness and to make those who bore them a by-word and a hissing. This was Josiah Turner, Jr., who died in Hillsboro, N. C, Oct. 26, 1901.
Jo. Turner, for this was the name by which men loved to call him when the pall of reconstruction darkness fell heavy over the State, was born in Hillsboro, in 1821 ; he was educated at the State University; was a lawyer by profession; a Whig in politics; ardently attached to the cause of the Union until secession was an accomplished fact; a captain of cavalry in the Confederate service, and later a member of the Confederate Congress. He was elected to the United States Congress in 1865, but was denied admission, and reconstruction with its orgies of ignorance and corruption began. Johnson appointed W. W. Holden military governor; many men then in public Hfe favored making terms with Holden. It was then that Jo. Turner's career began. He went to Raleigh, nomi- nated Jonathan Worth for governor and secured his elec- tion. In 1867 Congressional reconstruction began. Tur- ner moved to Raleigh, purchased The Sentinel, and for the next three years was the head and soul of the conservative element in the State as opposed to the carpetbaggers, scalawags and their negro allies. His fortune was sac- rificed, his life was often endangered, but he was restless and irresistible. He was not an editor in the usual and modern sense. He was far more ; by his sarcasm and sa- tire, by the keenness of his thrusts and his unceasing repe- tition he so encouraged the conservatives that they won a great victory in 1870 and the intelligent citizens of the State came into their own again from which they had been driven by Federal power in 1867. Turner gave the objects
94 Southern History Association.
of his ridicule a fame as great as his own. He made them as immortal as himself, for what citizen of the State has not heard of "Greasy Sam Watts/' "Jaybird Jones," "Windy Billy Henderson who stole Darr's mule," and others of their kind ?
But Turner believed that all of the corruption and rot- tenness was not in the ranks of the radicals. He had the boldness to say so, a fight was precipitated in his own party, and a few years later he was expelled by the Demo- crats from the Legislature to which he had been elected — an act which will make only the more marked the history of his services to the State.
After going into retirement, Mr. Turner wrote his me- moirs. Of their publication, Mr. Chester D. Turner, his son, writes to the editor : "We have not determined what we will do with this manuscript. There are parts of the book which are so severe on certain gentlemen of promi- nence in this State that we hate to publish it. Almost the last words of our father were : 'Truth, give me truth and nothing but the truth.' I have frequently begged him to strike out a certain chapter and his reply was 'it's the truth and nothing but the truth, and all of it shall go in my book.' * * * If it is published it will be as he wished it, truth and nothing but the truth will appear in it re- gardless of whom it cuts."
The Polk Papers. — ^The Chicago Historical Society is now the owner of what is said to be the most valuable set of private papers in America, which remain unworked into historical volumes. It includes the diary and correspon- dence, State and personal, of James K. Polk, and has been purchased from the heirs in Nashville for $3,500, a sum which is considered a bargain by those who are familiar with the collection.
Credit for securing them for Chicago is due to J. W. Fertig, Professor at Lewis Institute and Secretary of the Historical Society. He has tried to secure them for this
Notes and Queries. 95
city since he prepared his doctor's thesis some years ago. When he became secretary of the Historical Society he bent his energies to securing honorary members, whose dues of $500 should go toward the purchase of the collec- tion. He accompHshed this part of the work in two days. He has installed the records in the society's home, 142 Dearborn avenue.
The diary is contained in forty volumes full of interest- ing data and comment. Impressions of the different members of the Polk Cabinet are found under the dates when the meetings were held, and there is much which gives a truer insight into the character of the man and the President, so it is claimed, than anything the historians and critics have ever written.
The correspondence covers a period of twenty years — one of the most important trying periods in American his- tory. It is in Polk*s own handwriting and is remarkably legible. There are letters from Andrew Jackson and re- plies from Polk, negotiations on the Oregon boundary, the reannexation of Texas, communications with the Brit- ish Parliament over what then were vexing questions and, a complete history of the progress of diplomacy of that time.
Jefferson's Memory still green. — On October 12, 1901, at his old home, Monticello, there was dedicated a shaft to Thomas Jefferson, by the Jefferson Club, of St. Louis, Mo., who had come, over 200 strong, for this pur- pose on a pious pilgrimage from their western home. Numerous addresses in honor of Jefferson were made, and a banquet was served in the gymnasium of the Vir- ginia University. After the appropriation by Congress in April, 1882, of $10,000 for a new monument over Jeffer- son's grave, his descendants gave the original stone to the University of Missouri, where it was unveiled on July 4 1885. In return for this courtesy this new memorial of red Missouri granite is set up at Monticello.
96 Southern History Association,
Old age -AND PATRIOTIC DESCENT. — Something over a year ago, the Joseph Habersham Chapter, D. A. R., At- lanta Ga., through the columns of the Constitution, asked for the address of every woman whose father fought in the Revolutionary War. Unexpectedly they received 350 names, an amazing number at this length of time since the struggle. Of these 22 have become **Real Daughters" of the organization. Two of them are over a hundred years of age, ten more above 90, and only four below 80.
U. D. C. Convention. — The eighth annual convention of the United Daughters of the Confederacy held at Wil- mington, N. C, November 13-16, 1901, was very successful in attendance and enthusiasm. There were present about 200 delegates and visitors. The total membership is. put down at about 20,200. The financial statement was favor- able, and $500 were voted to the Davis monument fund, which was reported to be growing steadily. Steps were taken to begin work on this memorial, to cost $50,000, of which $38,000 are already in bank, and it is believed the rest can be easily secured. A choice of designs is to be made from models submitted by March, 1902, and the cere- monies of dedication are to take place in June, 1903, in Richmond, where the memorial is to be erected. The next meeting of the Convention will be held in New Orleans in 1902. The following officers were elected :
President, Mrs. H. A. Rounsaville, of Rome, Ga. ; First Vice-President, Mrs. Mollie McGill Rosenberg, Galveston, Tex. ; Second Vice-President, Mrs. T. J. Latham, Memphis, Tenn. ; Recording Secretary, Mrs. John P. Hickman, Nash- ville, Tenn.; Corresponding Secretary, Mrs. Virginia F. McSherry, West Virginia; Treasurer, Mrs. James Leigh, of Norfolk ; Custodian of Crosses of Honor, Mrs. Gabbitt, Atlanta, Ga. Mrs. Stonewall Jackson was elected an hon- orary president, with Mrs. M. C. Goodlet, of New York, for life.
General Lee Against Guerrilla Warfare. — Mr.
Notes and Queries. 97
Chas. Francis Adams has lately created considerable pub- lic attention by a paper read before the American Antiquar- ian Society in October, showing what a debt of gratitude "this reunited country owes to Robert E. Lee," for his wis- dom in deciding against any continuance of the struggle so* far as his influence went, after the surrender at Appomat- tox. Mr. Adams believes that until Lee made his definite decision on that fateful morning to General E. P. Alex- ander, "it was an absolutely open question, an even chance, whether the course which was actually pursued should be pursued, or whether the leaders of the Confederacy would adopt" the policy chosen by the Boers in South Africa. He concludes that if Lee had given any countenance to such an expedient "the Confederacy would have been re- duced to a smouldering wilderness — to what South Africa is to-day."
Hon. John H. Reagan, the only surviving member of the Confederate cabinet, while giving the highest praise to Lee for this wise decision, claims that Lee was only acting in accord with the views of President Davis and his ad- visers in declaring against guerrilla warfare. He argues thus in an issue of the Houston (Tex.) Post towards latter part of 1901.
Confederate Dead at Arlington. At a total cost to the U. S. Government of about $7,000, the Confeder- ate dead that were scattered over the District of Columbia, have been re-interred in this famous National Cemetery. "The new headstones are of the finest white marble, 20 inches high, 10 inches wide, and 4 inches thick. On each one is inscribed the number of the grave, the name of the soldier occupant, his State, and the letters C. S. A. (signi- fying Confederate States Army)." They reach 264, in a separate plot of 3 1-3 acres, hereafter to be known as the "New Confederate Section," and to be appropriated and cared for regularly as a part of the grounds.
98 Southern History Association.
The Atlanta Constitution for October 27, 1901, prints a list of the 71 Georgians included in the number. The Charles Broadway Rouss Camp, of Washington, has been most active in this labor.
Woman's Work in the Confederacy. — According to the report of the President, Mrs. Thomas Taylor, on No- vember 29, at the sixth annual convention of the South Carolina Daughters of the Confederacy, held in Sumter, a room in the State Capitol has been secured and fitted up for the numerous relics and records these good ladies have gathered to illustrate the home life of the Confed- eracy. It is the aim also to publish at least two volumes to indicate how much of a factor woman was during the struggle. Sufficient material has already been gathered for one volume, in the shape of lists of relief organizations and rolls of women in hospital service. A part of their exhibit at Charleston also consists of many samples of different kinds of cloth they wove in that period of stress, both cotton and woolen.
Tablet to Founder of William and Mary College. On October 22, 1901, at 11 o'clock, the Colonial Dames of America, from all parts of the land, unveiled a marble tablet to the founders of William and Mary College, at Williamsburg, Va. The formal exercises consisted of prayer by Dr. Lyman B. Wharton, of the faculty; wel- come remarks by President Tyler; presentation of the tablet by Hon. J. Alston Cabell, of Richmond, to the board of trustees, and the acceptance by Hon. James N. Stubbs on behalf of the Board of William and Mary Col- lege; unveling of tablet by Mrs. M. F. Pleasants, of Richmond, address by Col. William Lamb, of Norfolk, and poem by Hon. James Lindsay Gordon, of New York, with a banquet to the Dames and guests.
The tablet is of pure marble, four feet by three, with a raised arch, with the following inscription :
Notes and Queries, 99
In honor of James Blair, M. A., D. D., first president of Wil- iam and Mary College, 1693 to 1743, and of Francis Nicholson, lieutenant governor of Virginia; William Cole, esq., Christopher Wren, gent., Ralph Wormley, esq., Charles Scarborough, gent., William Byrd, esq., John Smith, gent., John Lear, esq., Benjamin Harrison, gent., John Farifold, clerk. Miles Cary, gent., Stephen Fouace, clerk, Henry Hartwell, gent., Samuel Gray, clerk, William Randolph, gent., Thomas Wilson, gent., Mathew Page, gent., who as members of the first board of trustees were, with President Blair, founders of the College February 8, 1693. Erected by the Colonial Dames of America, in the State of Virginia, October 22, 1901.
Monument on First Flag Site. On September 30, 1901, with appropriate ceremony, music and addresses, was dedicated **the monument erected by the State of Kan- sas, marking the site of the Indian village where Lieut. Zebulon M. Pike, September 29, 1806, first raised the flag of the United States over what is now known as Kansas." The adjacent ground to about the extent of six acres has been enclosed with an iron fence to mark the rings of tepees that the red men occupied.
Philip Reed's Grave. — An effort is being made to erect a monument to Gen. Reed, who served in the Revolu- tionary army, and was a brigadier general in the Maryland militia in war of 1812, having command of a body of Kent militia which repelled a landing party from the British fleet, killing Sir Peter Parker, the British admiral, and seven- teen of his men, and wounding others. Of the Maryland militia not a man was killed, and only three wounded. He afterwards sat in both houses of Congress, dying in 1829 and being buried in Kent county beside his wife, with nothing to mark the spot to the present day.
Valley Forge Monument. — ^The first memorial erected at Valley Forge to the Revolutionary soldiers who died there during the winter of 1 777-1 778, was dedicated October 19, 1901, by the Daughters of the Revolution, with addresses by Governor Stone, Senator Penrose and Peter Boyd, of Philadelphia, and Miss Adaline Wheelock Sterling, president general of the Daughters of the Revo-
■i ■> . t
loo Southern History Association.
liition. The monument, bearing the inscription, **To the Soldiers of Washington's Army Who Sleep in Valley Forge, 1777-78," is a handsome obelisk of granite, 50 feet high, with a scene of camp life at Valley Forge, and the original colonial flag of thirteen stars carved in the shaft above.
Tablet to Gen. James White. On Saturday, October 19, 1901, Capt. Richmond Pearson Hobson, of the U. S. Navy, unveiled a memorial tablet to his great-great-grand- father. General James White, the founder of Knoxville, Tenn., erected on the site of Gen. White's old home in that town. The entire exercises consisted of a parade, ad- dresses by Major Heiskell and Capt. Hobson, and a re- ception to Capt. Hobson by Judge and Mrs. J. W. Sneed.
Kanawha Field Dedicated. In the presence of an assemblage of ten thousand persons, many of whom had come half-way across the continent to be present, the beautiful grove at the junction of the Kanawha and Ohio rivers was on October 10, 1901, forever dedicated to the memory of the Virginians who, 127 years ago that day, won a bloody victory over the Indians. The principal ad- dresses were delivered by Col. Bennett H. Young, of Kentucky; Gen. Charles H. Grosvenor, of Ohio, and Hon. William R. Thompson, of Huntington, W. Va., In addi- tion to the monument to be erected at a cost of $50,000, the old log structure, built shortly after the battle, and yet intact, will be converted into a museum, already hundreds of relics having been secured for this purpose.
New Monument to President Wm. H. Harrison. The anniversary of the battle of Tippecanoe was celebrated Nov. 10, 1901, with a very large attendance at the new tomb of Gen. WilKam Henry Harrison, at North Bend, Ohio, near Cincinnati. The late President Benjamin Har- rison, before his death, had a new tomb built over the grave of his illustrious grandfather.
Notes and Queries. loi
Timrod's Grave, in Columbia, S. C, has been enclosed and surmounted with a large granite boulder, as well as the graves of several of his family. This thoughtful act is the work of the Timrod Memorial Association, which under the efficient leadership of Captain W. A. Courtnay, issued an edition of Timrod's poetry, erected a memorial to him in Charleston, and now finish their labors by mark- ing his last resting place. The final steps were taken October 7, the 34th anniversary of Timrod's death, which occurred in 1867. The Memorial Association has carried out its purposes and dissolved. The financial summary shows very capable management. The aim was two-fold ; to raise a sum of money, and to put Timrod's verse before the public. Both have been done. An edition of 4,000 copies was printed, at a cost of 40 cents each, and nearly all sold at an average price of $1.00, leaving 60 cents profit, and netting in round numbers, $2,400, expended as above stated.
Confederate Monument at Hampton, Va. The montunent in old St. John's Episcopal Church cemetery, at Hampton, Va., erected to the Confederate dead by Hampton Chapter, No. 19, Daughters of the Confederacy, was unveiled the afternoon of Oct. 29, 1901, with Capt. William Daougherty master of ceremonies, and large at- tendance, including Magruder Camp, U. C. V. and the Daughters of the Confederacy from Newport News, Va. The exercises included a parade, in charge of Sheriff R. K. Curtis, commander of R. E. Lee Camp, U. C. V., of Hampton ; addresses by Marius Jones, of Newport News, and Col. L. D. Starke, of Norfolk. Miss Bessie Lee Booker drew aside the veil.
Trinity Coi^lege Library (Durham, N. C), has in hand a fund of several thousand dollars to invest in books as soon as the new building is completed. The col- lege seems to be in healthy financial condition, and steadily growing, under the auspices of the Methodist Church.
PUBLICATIONS
OP THB
SOUTHERN HISTORY ASSOCIATION.
Vol. VI. March, 1902. No. 2.
THE REPORT OF THE SIXTH ANNUAL MEETING OF THE SOUTHERN HISTORY ASSOCIATION.
By C01.YER Meriwkthkr, Secretary.
The sixth annual meeting of the Southern History Asso- ciation, for the transaction of business and the election of officers, was held at the residence of General Marcus J. Wright, 1743 Corcoran street, Northwest, Washington, D. C, on the evening of Friday, January 24, 1902. The re- ports of the Secretary and Treasurer were presented, Mr. T. L. Cole being appointed auditor for the latter. It was voted that hereafter this report should be audited by Mr. Cole before the annual meeting so that the auditor's find- ings could accompany the report. All the officers were re- elected- The Secretary's allowance was increased to one hundred di liars, and it was voted that his name should ap- pear as Editor of the Publications. A committee consist- ing of Mr. T. H. Clark, Hon. S. Pasco, and the Secretary was appointed to consider the feasibility of public meetings of the Association. After the close of the regular duties the members present were entertained with refreshments by General Wright.
The officers for 1902 are as follows :
President: Dr. J. L. M. Curry, Washington, D. C.
Vice-Presidents: General M. C. Butler, Edgefield, S. C. ;
no Southern History Association.
General M. J. Wright, War Department; Mr. Thomas Nelson Page, Washington, D. C. ; Professor Woodrow Wilson, Princeton, N. J. ; Hon. S. Pasco, Isthmian Canal Commission; Col. George A. Porterfield, Charles-Town, W. Va.
Secretary mui Treasurer: Colyer Meriwether, Washing- ton, D. C.
Administrative Council (in addition to above officers): Prof. Kemp P. Battle, Chapel Hill, N. C; Col. R. A. Brock, Richmond, Va. ; Mr. T. L. Cole, Washington, D. C. ; Prof. R. H. Dabney, University of Va. ; Prof John R. Ficklen, Tulane University; Prof. Chas. Lee Smith, Lib- erty, Mo.; Prof. W. C. Stubbs, New Orleans; Dr. S. B. Weeks, Santa Fe; Prof. H. Schoenfeld, Columbian Uni- versity; Prof. Lucian Johnston, Baltimore, Md. ; Mr. Thos. H. Clark, Law Librarian of Congress; Mr. Alex- ander Summers, Bureau of Education ; President Geo. T. Winston, Raleigh, N. C. ; Col. J. B. Killebrew, Nashville, Tenn.
The Secretary's Report.
It is a matter of gratification that the sixth annual meet- ing finds our Association in better condition than ever. Tho the growth has not been remarkable, it has been steady. We have printed more pages, we have a larger membership and a greater real surplus than at any other period. Three original diaries have been donated to us; one from Col. Geo. A. Porterfield and two from Gen. M. J. Wright.
Generally through the South the outlook is encouraging. Three States, especially, furnish an inspiring example, by their work for history: North Carolina in her publication of her Records to be accompanied by a most thorough in- dex : Alabama, with an annual appropriation of $2500 for a Department of History : and Mississippi with an annual fund from the legislature for research and publication.
The periodicals, now nearly a dozen in number, are wor-
Sixth Annual Meeting. — Meriwether. iii
thy of all gratitude for their efforts under adverse sur- roundings, considering the wide-spread apathy in the sub- ject of history. One has attained a circulation of nearly a thousand, the Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Asso- ciation. The organs, also, of memorial organizations and State societies show, if anything, increased interest. A new birth, but no death, is to be recorded, the Transalle- gheny Historical Society, Morgantown, W. Va., with a quarterly series of which one number has appeared.
At last two volumes, bearing on our field in the last twelve months, claim our attention.^ One, an instance of those rare books penned in days of poise and reflectiveness by the competent hand of those who took serious share in what they describe, appealing at once to the average reader and to the scholar, deals with the civil side of the Confeder- acy, that place in which it was weakest. The other, by a learned investigator of balanced judgment and apprecia- tiveness, provides a reservoir of original material on the career of a unique political personality, the great Southern leader for so many years.
We may, besides, after reasonable interval hope for the unlocking of two valuable sources of information: the Polk papers, comprising some 40 Mss. volumes, now in possession of the Chicago Historical Society, and the Jack- son papers that are being traced.
But, however, much we are cheered by this glance, there is deep disappointment when we realize what ought to be achieved, and the slender support we receive. Leaving out other forms of historical composition, what a mine, al- most undelved, does biography present us ! The number of leaders in different departments of man's activity that have only remnants of records left of their accomplish- ments, both of to-day and yesterday, need no enlargement upon here. We agree their memory should be preserved. We have a model for doing so, perhaps too uniformly
* The Civil History of the Confederacy, by Dr. J. L. M. Curry; and the Calhoun Correspondence ^ by Prof. J. Franklin Jameson.
112 Southern History Association.
eulogistic, in the Massachusetts Historical Society with its Proceedings largely filled with sketches of those who were prominent in the region. Through generosity and devotion to the cause, it is financially able to carry on this work. It may be a fantastic dream, but we can only trust that in the fullness of time, similar good fortune may come to us.
Treasurer's Report for 1901.
Receipts.
Balance from 1900, $358 75
Membership fees, 234 (including 2 life members), 743 20
Sales, 126 94
Reprints, 53 00
Advertisements, 5 00
Interest, 9 71
Cash turned in, 6 89
Total, $1,303 49
Expenditures for i^oi.
Printing, vouchers 1-13, $614 27
Postage, voucher 14, 72 76
Secretary's allowance, voucher 15, 75 00
Freight and expressage, voucher 16, I7 40
General and miscellaneous expenses, vouchers 17,
18, 16 35
Reprints, voucher 19, 58 50
Rebate, voucher 20, 2 25
Incidental expenditures, voucher 22, 10 00
Cash turned in, voucher 23, 6 89
Total, $873 42
Surplus, voucher 24, certified check, $430 07
CoLYER Meriwether, December jj, ipoi. Treasurer,
I have examined the foregoing account and find it to be correct. T. L. Cole.
Auditing Committee.
JOURNAL OF CHARLES PORTERFIELD.
From March 3, 1776, to July 23, 1776, while a prisoner of war in Quebec.
[The Association is indebted to the generosity of Col. Geo. A. Porterfield, Charles-Town, W. Va., for the original diary. Before coming into his hands a part of it was published in the Virginia Magazine of History and Biography for October, 1901, (Vol. 9, No. 2, pp. 144-152, Richmond, Va.), but for its historical value it is deemed best to issue it entire, especially since there have been enquiries as to its unabridged form. No changes have been made except in the spelling of a few words.
Mr. J. A. Waddell contributes to the Virginia Magazine the fol- lowing as to the Journal and its author:
"Charles Porterfield was a brother of General Robert Porter- field, of Augusta County, who died in 1843, doubtless having had the book in his possession. The late Mr. William Kinney, of Staunton, was a son-in-law and executor of General Porterfield, and thus obtained the book. Judge Hendren was the administra- tor of Mr Kinney, and the book with many other writings came into his hands. ***** "Charles Porterfield * * * * was born in Frederick County, Va., in 1750, and in 1775 joined the first company raised in that county, of which Daniel Morgan was captain. The company served first at Boston, and afterwards con- stituted a part of the command of Montgomery and Arnold in their expedition to Canada. Most of the men, including Morgan and Porterfield, were captured by the British at the assault on Quebec December 31, 1775, and detained as prisoners till late in 1776. Af- ter being exchanged he re-entered the service as a captain in Mor- gan's rifle corps, and participated ***** in the battle of Saratoga. He spent the winter of 1777-7^ at Valley Forge, * * and afterwards marched to South Carolina and was mortally wounded, Aug. 17, 1780."]
Th:B Journal.
3d March. A flag outside of the walls, supposed by the garrison to be a signal from our people. Some time after- wards the flag was taken down and black and white boards put in its place.
6th March. The garrison was alarmed. It proved false (about 7 o'clock).
13 March. While our people opened a battery at Point
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Levi, consisting of 4 embrasures, some of the shot hit the Seminary. It latterly seems designed for the shipping.
22d. They opened another battery of 2 guns on St., Charles river, raised on the remains of an old French bat- tery, opposite Palace Gate.
28. Capt. Thayer detected cutting a door, for which he is confined on board a Schooner.
30th. Capt. Lockwood and Hanchett carried on board the same vessel on suspicion of tampering with one of the sentries.
May orders by Col. Caldwell, officer of the day that no one shall go from his room * * * * after night fall till 6 o^clock in the morning — punctually obeyed by all but one or two men (with the consent of the officer that had the guard) when necessity obliged disobedience.
Saturday, 4th May. At night the garrison was alarmed by a fire-ship designed by our people to set the shipping in the harbour of the Lower town on fire, but by some means miscarried in its execution. The men on board all got off. The vessel soon consumed down to the water.
Monday, May 6th. About 9 in the morning a 24 gun frigate arrived with a number of soldiers, which caused great rejoicing in the garrison. About 2 hours later the Isis, 50 guns, Capt. Douglas, and a small frigate of 14 guns came up. It is said they are from England, whence they sailed the 17th March. We hear that they bring in- telligence that there are now in the river transports with 12,000 or 15,000 men, all destined for Canada. These ves- sels bring about 120 of 29th regiment, who, with part of the old garrison, sallied out with field pieces this after- noon when, it is said, our people scampered oflf without firing a gun, leaving artillery, baggage, &c.
Tuesday, 7th May. Visited by Quarter-Master General, Major Carlton, of the 20th Regt. & Lord Petersham, Cap- tain of the Grenadiers of the 29th Regt., who, with several subalterns, arrived yesterday. Major Carlton (Brother of
Journal of Charles Porterfkld. — Porterfield. 115
his Excellency), from his familiar, open and engaging be- havior, has prejudiced us in his favor. He appeared to feel for and sympathise with us. Every sentence he uttered breathed tenderness & humanity. In fine, both his words & action, during his short visit, displayed the polite gen- tleman & soldier. As a proof of his delicacy & feeling, he replied in a low voice to Col. Caldwell, officer of the day, who was repeating something to us disagreeable and irri- tating, "O, Sir, you should not say any thing to them that is disagreeable. They are all our brothers."
Wednesday, 8th May. A Frigate and arrived
with the remainder of the 29th Regt. and some of the artil- lery. St. Stephen McDougal, of New York, with his servant were brought prisoners to the Seminary this day. They, with 2 soldiers, were taken on board the Mary, schooner, at Caprouqh, on Monday last by 2 frigates sent up the river. There were some officers and a number of soldiers on board. When the frigates made their appear- ance they got in the boats & pushed for shore, leaving 16 barrels and a number of guns, &c., &c-
Thursday, 9th May. A small schooner arrived. The Garrison have parties out every day to pick up what our light-footed gentry thought too troublesome, or of no consequence. Yet I should have thought, field pieces ready mounted, and ammunition all prepared for them, very necessary and convenient companions in the rear of a retreating army. However, they thought otherwise, or they would not have left it in the power of those they ran from, to tell us "Your people fled with such precipitation and fear — even from their artillery, that they did not wait to fire a gun, tho' the matches were standing burning and every thing in order." Gen. Wooster not having an appe- tite for his dinner, it was found ready served, which some of the gentlemen from the garrison had the assurance to set down to, without an invitation. Gen. Montgomery's
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order book, with a number of letters and other papers, were brought in.
Friday, loth May. Arrived two transports, & a brig with provisions, & part of the 47th Regt. from Halifax.
Tuesday, 14th. A transport brig arrived.
Thursday, i6th May. The Hunter, sloop-of-war, sailed with dispatches for England, on which went Col. Caldwell and family & Capt. Hamilton, formerly of the Lizzard.
Saturday, i8th May. This forenoon two small schooners sailed down the river. On board one of these went Maj. Meigs & Capt. Dearborn, whom the General has permitted
to return to their homes on parole. The , one of the
vessels our people took last fall, was brought down the other day.
Wednesday, 22d May. About 8 o'cl'k in the morning the garrison fired 17 guns, which was returned with the same number by the Commodore, and the rest of the fleet fired. We since learn that the cause of said firing was the Gen- eral's embarking on board one of the vessels bound up the river with a number of troops. This day we are in- formed by the Lieut., Andrews, officer of the guard, that the 6th Regt., with a number of Canadians & Indians had an engagement with some of our troops near Montreal, where they killed 150 of our people & put the rest to flight & further that in all probability Montreal was taken. We have different stories about the matter since, that seems more favorable in behalf of our people. There is no cer- tainty, at least, that Montreal is taken.
Sunday, 26th May. About 2. o'cl'k A transport ship sailed from this port down the river.
Monday, 27th May. Before 9 o'cl'k this morning arrived at this place 4 transports & 2 frigates of war, with a large body of troops, said to be directly from Britain, command- ed by Lt. Col. Frazier. Lieut. Smith, officer of the guard, informs us that there are 7,000 men on board. They made no stop at this place, but sailed directly up towards Mon-
Journal of Charles Porterfield, — Porterfield. 117
treal — said Smith, Lieut, in Col. McLain's regiment, in- forms us that one Capt. Foster, of the 8th regiment, with a body of Light troops, consisting of 60 men, joined by 600 Indians & a number of Canadians, coming from Sycock, attacked a number of our men, about 400 at a place called the Cedars. They being entrenched up to their eyes & with 2 field pieces, yet were so surprised as to give up with- out firing a gun — to their eternal disgrace. He further informs us that said Capt. Foster attacked another party of about 90 which he surrounded. They bravely defended themselves, killed a number of their enemy, but being over- powered were at last obliged to surrender. Gen. Arnold, we hear is entrenched at Lyshee, 9 miles above Montreal. We are further informed that there are 26 sail belonging to the fleet which passed this place this morning now in the river & expected up this day. Gen. Haldiman is on board & commands. It is reported that 5,000 Hessians are expected in a short time at this place. Some of the Canadians have gone up the river in batteaux. Capt. Frazier, of Col. McLain's regiment, officer of the day. He appears to be a kind, well disposed man — 11 sail arrived this evening — one large vessel gave a salute of 13 guns. We supposed Haldiman to be on board said ship, but find it not so. Two of our lads brought from the jail to the Seminary, viz: John Wade, of Capt. Morgan's company,
and . They inform us that many of our men
in the Hospital are very ill with scurvy. All the vessels that arrived as yet belong to the same fleet, and we are in- formed that Gen. Haldiman, with another fleet will be up in a few days.
Tuesday, 28th May. Lieut. McClain, officer of the Guard. The vessels that arrived last evening remain be- fore the city, the