Public men of Indiana; a political history

NYPL RESEARCH LIBRARIES

3 3433 08230936 4

• *- • • - til

. . '

•v

'

THE

NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY

PRESENTED BY

, c

December 4,1922.

\

\

PUBLIC MEN

of INDIANA

A Political History
From 1860 to 1890

By
FRANCIS M. TRISSAL

Printed for the Author by

W. B. CONKEY COMPANY

Printers and Publishers
HAMMOND, INDIANA

PUBLIC LIBRARY

72505A

**T * : A

TI U * • • •

L

COPYRIGHT, 1922

BT
FRANCIS M. TRISSAL

•

•
» f

' - •-•-.,

•**+•*

PROMINENT SUBJECTS

The Presidential Election of 1860 and Subsequent
Political Campaigns.

The War of the Rebellion of 1861 and Southern
Sympathizers in Indiana.

The Knights of the Golden Circle, Sons of Liberty,
etc.

Slavery, Emancipation, Enfranchisement, Restora-
tion, Reconciliation and Reconstruction.

Conflicts Between Presidents and Senators, and
Quarrels of Rival Politicians.

The Impeachment Proceedings Against President
Johnson, the Issues That Brought Them About,
and the Final Triumph of His Reconciliation
Policies.

Periods of Financial and Industrial Depression.

The Inflation and Deflation of Currency and the
Resumption of Specie Payment of the Govern-
ment's Obligations.

The Credit Mobilier of America, and the Pacific
Railroads.

The Contested Presidential Election of 1876.

The Records of Governors, Senators, Members of
Congress, Judges and Other Officials.

in

it

iLtfM&Moij

FRANCIS M. TRISSAL

BIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR

TjiRANCIS MARION TRISSAL of mixed
-*- German, Scotch, and Irish ancestry, the son of
Joseph and Phoebe Trissal, was born near the
town of Johnsville, Montgomery County, Ohio,
September 30, 1847. His mother's maiden name
was McGriff, her mother's maiden name was
McDonald.

His father was a school teacher by profession,
who moved with his family from Ohio to Cass
County, Indiana, in 1850, and engaged in his pro-
fession as one of the "Hoosier School Masters" of
early days, and followed that occupation in the
Counties of Cass and Miami, until his death in
Miami County, in 1863.

The education that Francis M. obtained was ac-
quired in the public schools of Cass and Miami
Counties, and under the direction of his father
and his uncle John Trissal, who was also a teacher.
When not attending school he was employed at
farm labor until the summer of 1865, when he was
employed as Deputy Clerk in the Hamilton Cir-
cuit Court and continued in that service until
November, 1867, when he was appointed Deputy
Clerk of the Howard Circuit Court at Kokomo,

• •

vii

- Indiana, and served in that position for one year.
These employments brought him in association
with lawyers and judges and at the same time
educated him in forms and methods of legal pro-
cedure in the courts and influenced him to enter
the legal profession. In December, 1868, he
entered the law office of General David Moss at
Xoblesville, Indiana, with whom he was associated
for seven years, two years as a student, and five

V *S

years as a partner. In 1873 he was appointed by
Governor Thomas A. Hendricks to fill a vacancy
for one year in the office of Prosecuting Attorney.
In 1875 he moved to Indianapolis where he
practiced his profession for three years, then moved
to Tipton, where he practiced for a short time and
then took up his residence again at Noblesville,
where he continued in the law practice until 1888,
when he moved to St. Paul, Minnesota, where he
practiced until 1891, when he became a resident of
Chicago and a member of the Chicago bar, and was
soon thereafter employed as the General Attorney
for Corporations and Clients having extensive in-
terests in Indiana, Illinois and Missouri, among
these the Bedford Quarries Company, the Southern
Indiana Railway Compart}7, the Illinois Southern
and Southern Missouri Railway Companies, in
each of which he was also a director. It was under
his guidance and direction that the Southern In-
diana Railroad was extended and constructed
through the coal fields of Southwestern Indiana
and increased the coal operations in the counties of

viii

Daviess, Greene, Clay, Sullivan, and Vigo. It
was also under his direction, in part, that the
Illinois Southern Railroad was extended over the
Ozark Mountains from St. Genevieve to Bismarck,
Missouri.

He was an active trial lawyer, and the Supreme
Court Reports in each of the States of Indiana,
Illinois, Missouri, and Minnesota contain reports
of decisions in cases in which he was counsel.

He was one of the founders and a trustee of the
Illinois College of Law, now the law department
of DePaul University, and received an honorary
degree from that institution. About the year 1898,
he became interested in projects for the improve-
ment of the Kankakee River in Indiana, and the
drainage of lands of its valleys, and acquired a
body of 440 acres that he drained and developed
from a dismal swamp to a high state of produc-
tiveness, where he put in much of his time in later
years in constructing buildings, planting orchards
and otherwise improving it for usefulness.

He was married on the seventh day of October,
1869, to Harriet D. Ross, the daughter of Joseph
W. Ross, a pioneer merchant of Noblesville, In-
diana. Her death occurred on June 15th, 1919,
as the golden anniversary approached. The occur-
rence of this sorrowful event caused him to take up
his residence on the farm that he had developed, in
the western part of Starke County, Indiana, near
what is known as the Ox Bow Bend in the Kan-
kakee River, where General Lew Wallace resorted

ix

while producing his Fair God and Ben Hur. It
was at that place in the years of 1920 and 1921,
when not engaged in farm work, that he put his
powers of perseverance in contest with his hours of
loneliness and leisure in the work of producing the
manuscript for 'Public Men of Indiana," com-
pleting it in 1922 at the home of his son, Julius
Ross Trissal in Chicago, 6823 Anthony Avenue.
March, 1922.

PREFACE

HHHE term "Public Men of Indiana" is sus-
•*• ceptible of indefinite application and extension.
Any Indiana man who attained popular notoriety
in public affairs or in the service of his country dur-
ing the period covered by this work would come
under the title selected for it. It was not possible
that all such characters could be given mention,
consequently the author has selected for descrip-
tion and statement of what they did only those to
whom his personal observations and recollections
extended, and his recollections have been con-
firmed both as to the men and the events with
which they were identified by informaton from
most reliable sources.

In that selection he has chosen many quiet con-
tributors to the country's history, as well as those
who have been crowned with the halo they deserved
in other histories that have been published.

The period covered in this volume is from 1860
to 1890, during which its many exciting and im-
portant public events called forth as participants
in them the best minds and the best men of the
state and made their work and achievements to
form an essential part of the history of the United
States, as well as of their own state.

•
XI

While maintaining its status as a member of
the Federal Union many of them were at the same
time prominent in their personal and official associa-
tion with those of other states in dealing with the
great crisis of a civil war, and its incidental sub-
jects of slavery, emancipation, enfranchisement,
reconciliation and reconstruction, that evolved
problems in the science of government more com-
plex than any that had arisen at any previous
period in the country's history.

To set forth the processes and acts that resulted
in the solution of these great problems necessitated
such a full statement of the events that evolved
them as to make the work a general historic con-
tribution that may be read with some interest by
others as well as by Indiana people.

The production differs from other so-called his-
tories that have been published in that it is not
merely a collection of biographies and personally
written eulogies, prepared to induce subscriptions
by the eulogized, but contains the author's own
narrations and estimates of the characters written
about and in the main records the acts only of
those who have passed from earth.

Xll

Public Men of Indiana

CHAPTER I

TV/TAXY of the men written about in the pages
•L*-"- that follow had their birthplaces in log cabins
or in the more pretentious hewed log houses of early
davs. There was not then such caste in Hoosier so-

.«/

ciety as permitted the occupants of the latter to
hold themselves aloof from the former. They were
so dependent upon each other for acts of neighborly
friendship that reciprocity was a necessity. They
had then no fears of "entangling alliances" or con-
venient ways of communicating with their "foreign
relations," and had to be content with their isola-
tion from the world. The comforts of life were to
them a luxury.

These rustic homes surrounded by the trees of
the forest from which they were built, with their
clapboard roofs and clay or puncheon floors, were
the places where these sons of pioneers first felt the
breath of a mother's love and heard of the manly
darings of a father's bravery.

It was inside their walls where, from the illu-
minations afforded by the chimney corner lamps
and the flames from the burning hickory bark in

1

the old fireplaces, they read of the unseen world's
progress and civilization, and had their minds
trained to religious devotion and kindled with de-
sires to visualize what they read about.

It was from there that the fancies of youth began
their development into living realities that often
ended in disappointments.

It was from there they went to attend the dis-
trict schools of the winter taught in log school
houses that were furnished only with wooden
benches and a wide plank desk fastened to the
wall for writing exercises, and where they were
disciplined in mind and behavior by the sovereign
Hoosier schoolmaster, and told how necessary it
was for them to become availed of the education
he possessed and could impart to them, and were
impressed by his palming off to them as his own
wrords those found in the preface to the old Kirk-
ham's Grammar, reading thus : "We are living in an
age of light and knowledge in which science and
arts are moving on with gigantic strides."

It was in these Brush Seminaries that the young
aspirant for oratorical attainments and fame gave
his first demonstrations of talent in public speak-
ing by committing and repeating the lines of poeti-
cal works. Excessive schooling was not then a
prevailing condition nor were any educated beyond
their intellectual capacity.

These institutions of learning had no annexes
with laboratories where agricultural chemistry was
taught, but the old school readers suggested prac-
tical means of tilling the soil by the picture of a

2

man holding the handles of a plow and another
holding the lines to guide the horses in pulling it,
under which was printed the words:

"He who by the plow would thrive
Must himself either hold or drive."

The verities of this picture, that were fully
realized, caused a longing for more of the "light
and knowledge," to which their teacher had alluded,
on other subjects arts and sciences than agronomy,
and sent many into other lines of human endeavor
and in search of a higher social and scholastic life
that it was believed could only be obtained in cities
and other centers of population. These longings
for other scenes were not diminished or restrained
by the lines of the British poet, William Cowper,
that read: "God made the country, man made the
town." The profession of the law was more allur-
ing than the sciences that teach the ways of convert-
ing the works of nature to the wants of man. No
doubt some who entered it erroneously believed that
it afforded a better shelter for indolence, while
others saw the superior advantages it afforded in
the promotion of political ambitions, but did not
fully anticipate the period of starvation they must
endure while waiting for clients ; but they survived,
and fitted themselves for service to those who em-
ployed them and for public stations at the same
time.

It was not alone the circuit riding lawyer of those
days who had the honors of public admiration and
individual respect, but the itinerant preacher came

3

2 — June — 22

in for his share, and was perhaps more reverently
regarded because of the sacredness of his work.

The lawyers acquired knowledge of the science
and purposes of government as well as the science
and philosophy of law.

They were not "case lawyers," but read and relied
on textbooks for education in elementary principles,
and upon their own powers of reasoning in apply-
ing them to facts.

On the shelves of their libraries were such in-
structive works as Blackstone and Kent's Com-
mentaries, Story on the Constitution, and Equity
Jurisprudence, Chitty on Contracts, and Green-
leaf on Evidence, and in fact textbooks that re-
vealed both the science and literature of the law
upon every subject of jurisprudence. These old
volumes have now almost entirely disappeared from
the libraries of most lawyers of the present day to
make room for cyclopaedias, citators and digests of
decisions and reports almost as numerous as the
volumes that the Roman Emperor Justinian re-
quired his skilled lawyers to condense into the
Pandects. The descendants of the men who en-
tered the profession did not all follow their fathers
in it, but many did, while others became renowned
as statesmen, soldiers, novelists, poets, and in other
ways as contributors to the welfare and literature
of their country, a fact showing that while genius
may descend as an inheritance, it is often diffluent
in its courses of lineage.

The foundations for the civilizing influences of
the Christian religion that has always characterized

4

REV. JAMES HAVENS

the citizenship of the state were well laid by the
pioneer preachers, such as James Havens, known
as "Father Havens," and others of his class. He
was constantlv and conspicuously in his work from

»/ JL «/

the year 1824, until the fourth day of November,
1864, when his death occurred at Rushville.

His son, George Havens, followed him in his
religious work as a member and minister of the
Methodist Episcopal Church. Father Havens
taught patriotism as well as piety. Two of his
sons, Henry Bascom and Benjamin F., were
soldiers of the Civil War, serving in the Union
Army, and Benjamin F. became prominent in
political life as mayor of the City of Terre Haute,
where he was elected as a democrat and was a
member of the Indiana Board of Centennial Com-
missioners at the World's Fair in Chicago.

Col. John W. T. McMullen was called from his
service in the Union Army to preach the funeral
sermon of Father Havens. McMullen was colonel
of the 57th Indiana Regiment, that he organized
and in which he served from the beginning until
the end of the war. The 57th was called the
"Preacher's Regiment," because of the great num-
ber of preachers who wished to serve under
McMullen as thev had with him in his ministrations

*!

as a Methodist minister. He was long regarded as
one of the ablest ministers of the state.

Chaplain John H. Lozier, of the 37th Indiana
Regiment, was also a prominent and powerful
preacher before, during and after the Civil War,
as was Chaplain Ira J. Chase, of the Christian

5

Church, who afterwards became governor of the
state.

It was through the influences and activities of
such men as "Father" Havens, W. W. Hibben,
Milton B. Hopkins and other pioneer preachers
that religious denominations established and main-
tained colleges, liberal in character, that were open
to all whether members of the sect that established
them or not, long before the state in its sovereign
capacity entered upon its policy of fostering edu-
cational institutions by general taxation and legis-
lative appropriations. Scores of eminent men and
women were numbered among the alumni of
Asbury, Wabash, Franklin, Earlham, Hanover,
Northwestern Christian, Notre Dame and others
of sectarian institutions, and went forth from their
halls to represent public trusts, both civil and po-
litical, as did many distinguished educators, orators
and Christian ministers long before that time.

The importance and influence of the State of
Indiana in political contests and national affairs
was recognized by the people of other states and
their representatives at all times following its
admission into the Union of States.

The influence of the speaker of the house of
national representatives over the course of legis-
lation is great, and the parties having a majority in
the house are careful to select one on whose sym-
pathy with their views and aims they can rely.

From 1845 to 1847, John W. Davis, a democrat,
was the speaker who had served as a member from
Sullivan County for many years before.

6

From 1863 to 1869, Schuyler Coif ax of South
Bend, who had served as a member for a num-
ber of terms previously, a republican, was the
speaker.

Michael C. Kerr, a democrat, who served as a
representative of the New Albany district from
1864 until 1878 was speaker from 1875 until
1877.

For eighteen years the United States Senate was
presided over by distinguished citizens of Indiana,
who stood in line for succession to the presidency.
These were Vice Presidents Schuyler Coif ax,
Thomas A. Hendricks, Charles W. Fairbanks and
Thomas R. Marshall.

President Lincoln was the first to call a citizen
of Indiana to a cabinet position, by the appoint-
ment of Caleb B. Smith as Secretary of the In-
terior, who died while holding the office, to be
followed in the office by John P. Usher of Terre
Haute. He also appointed Hugh McCulloch of
Fort Wayne a member of his cabinet as Secretary
of the Treasury, who served also in the cabinet of
Andrew Johnson.

Gen. Walter Q. Gresham, who won distinction
as a Union general serving on General Grant's
staff, and was for many years a federal judge, was
a member of the cabinet of President Arthur, serv-
ing as Postmaster General and Secretary of the
Treasury, also a member of the last cabinet of
President Cleveland as Secretary of State.

»/

James N. Tyner of Peru, Indiana, was for a
short term Postmaster General during President
Grant's second term.

7

Richard W. Thompson of T,erre Haute was
Secretary of the Navy in the cabinet of Rutherford
B. Hayes. William H. H. Miller of Indianapolis
was Attorney General during the administration of
President Benjamin Harrison.

The attitude of the State and its people in re-
spect to the Civil War, that began in 1861, was
watched with great concern by the people of other
States because of its position in bordering slave
territory.

It is an undeniable fact that it contained many
southern sympathizers, but they were far outnum-
bered by loyal Union citizens. In the Presidential
campaign of 1860 Jesse D. Bright of Southern
Indiana, then a United States Senator, was a sup-
porter of John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky for
the presidency; they had been warm personal
friends and political associates while Breckinridge
had presided over the Senate. His colleague, Gra-
ham N. Fitch of Logansport, was also a supporter
of Breckinridge. Bright was accused and found
guilty of complicity with Breckinridge and other
secessionists in furnishing munitions of war to them
and was expelled from the Senate on the 6th day
of February, 1862, a year before his term would
have expired, while Fitch soon after his retirement
from the Senate in 1861 recruited and became
colonel of the 46th Indiana Regiment of Union
soldiers and rose to the rank of brigadier general.

Oliver P. Morton, who had been elected as Lieu-
tenant Governor in 1860, was ex-officio governor
of the State at the time of Bright's expulsion, and

8

was then in his capacity as Governor making a
determined fight against the disloyal elements in
the State. He was not known to have ambitions
to become Senator at that time, but if he had such
aspirations he had to yield them at that particular
time because of overpowering necessities. He
could not turn over the office of Governor to some
one who would appoint him to fill out Bright's
unexpired term, because there was no one legally
eligible to fill the office of Lieutenant Governor in
case of a vacancy, and besides to do such a thing,
had it been possible, would look like desertion in
the face of the enemies he was fighting, conse-
quently he must either appoint a Senator to fill out
the term or leave the vacancv to continue. To fill

«/

it by a member of his own party would be a danger-
ous political experiment for a man of Morton's
temperament. He was not given to the creation
or toleration of political rivals, and he appointed
former Governor Joseph A. Wright, a democrat,
to fill the position until the legislature of 1863 con-
vened, when David Turpie, a democrat, was elected
to serve for six weeks to fill out Bright's unexpired
term, and Thomas A. Hendricks was elected for
the full term. Their election caused the postpone-
ment of Morton's senatorial ambitions for another

four vears, when he could succeed Henrv S. Lane,

«, «/

which he did in 1868, and served with Hendricks,
on the opposite side of the chamber, during the
eventful period of reconstruction following the close
of the great war, and was re-elected in 1873.

Among the pioneer lawyers of Indiana who had

*

exceptional educational advantages was Judge
Stephen Major of Shelby ville, a native of Ireland,
graduate of Oxford University in England, one of
the early Circuit Judges whose circuit was com-
posed of the counties of Marion, Hamilton, Han-
cock, Shelby, Rush, and Decatur. He was the
preceptor of Thomas A. Hendricks and well re-
membered for his dignified mien, urbanity, and
great learning, and seemingly the suavity of
Hendricks was acquired by his observances of and
association with that courtly character.

He was the Father of Charles Major, the author
of "When Knighthood Was in Flower," "The
Bears of Blue River," and other excellent con-
tributions to literature. His first story, "When
Knighthood Was in Flower," brought him quick
fame and popularity, was dramatized, and was as
successful in a play as it was in a novel.

He, too, was a lawyer in active practice when he
produced it, and it has been truly said was greatly
aided in his writings by his wife, who possessed a
striking personality and pronounced literary tastes.
He had but little taste for public life or desires for
political honors, but was elected to the legislature
as a democrat and declined re-election.

Captain Reuben A. Riley, who got his military
title in the war for the Union, a member of the
Hancock County Bar, was the father of the great
Hoosier Poet, James Whitcomb Riley, named in
honor of Governor James Whitcomb.

Captain Riley is remembered not alone because
of his prominence as a soldier and lawyer, but on

10

account of his observance of the styles of his day,
when lawyers appeared in courts clothed in "spike-
tailed" coats, and Captain Riley's usually had on
shining brass buttons.

That fashion and the head gear of plug hats, it
has been said, was created by Tom Walpole, a
pioneer lawyer of that county.

John S. Tarkington of the Indianapolis bar, still
living, was prominent as a commercial lawyer and
annually published a court calendar for the con-
venience of lawyers of the State, giving the dates
of the commencement and duration of the terms
of the various courts. He was the father of the
distinguished novelist, Booth Tarkington, who was
given the name Booth in honor of the name of his
mother and that of Honorable Newton Booth, her
brother, a United States Senator from California,
prominently mentioned for the republican nomina-
tion for President in 1876. Newton Booth was
born at Salem, Indiana.

Edwin Denby, recently chosen as Secretary of
the Navy in the cabinet of President Harding, is
the son of Colonel Charles Denby, a democrat, who
stood at the head of the bar in Southern Indiana,
some of whose history will appear in future pages
of this work. Edwin's mother was a daughter of
Senator Graham N. Fitch, who was an eminent
surgeon of Logansport, Indiana, when he became
United States Senator. James R. Slack entered
the service as colonel of the 47th Indiana Regiment.
The 46th Regiment, of which Fitch was colonel,
and the 47th were in the same brigade, and both

11

Fitch and Slack were eligible for appointment as
brigadier general, and both had been prominent
democrats. It was claimed that Fitch had the
better claim for the promotion because his regiment
was first organized, but Slack's commission as
colonel was dated prior to the date of that of Fitch
and he got the promotion, while Fitch was assigned
to another brigade and served as brigadier gen-
eral at the siege of New Madrid and in other
engagements.

General Slack served for the greater part of the
war and was succeeded in command by General
George F. McGinnis. Soon after the war closed
he was elected Judge of the Circuit Court for the
counties of Huntington and Wells and held the
office for many years. He was conspicuous as a
democratic leader in the State, and presided at
Democratic State Conventions on a number of
occasions.

Colonel Thomas H. Bringhurst of Logansport
succeeded Fitch as colonel of the 46th and served
until the war ended.

Another prominent soldier of that regiment wras
Major George Burson of Winamac, who raised
and commanded a company of it in all of its marches
and engagements until near the close of the war
when he was commissioned as major of another
regiment, in which he served until the last gun was
fired. Returning home he again engaged in the
law practice that he had left to enlist; served as
a democratic member of the legislature in 1875 and
1877, and was soon after elected Circuit Judge and

12

served for twelve years. At this writing he is still
living in the enjoyment of the admiration of all his
fellow citizens and honored by all of his many
acquaintances.

Martin M. Ray, a pioneer lawyer of Shelby ville,
a man of imposing personal appearance arid high
attainments, after a long residence there became a
resident of Indianapolis, and the head of the law
firm of Ray, Gordon and March, composed of
Walter March, Jonathan W. Gordon and himself.
March had long been prominent as the leader of
the bar at Muncie, Delaware County. Jonathan
W. Gordon was an educated surgeon, practicing his
profession in Ripley County until the Civil War
began, when he enlisted in the Union Army and
became Major of the llth Regiment of Regulars,
serving until the war closed, when he took up the
law practice at Indianapolis and soon took rank
as the leading criminal lawyer of the State, espe-
cially in cases in which questions of medical and
surgical science arose, his education and experience
as a physician and surgeon greatly aiding him in
scientifically mastering intricate complications. He
was also an able advocate and resourceful in origi-
nating and urging upon courts what were then
points of great interest to the legal profession. His
great wit often rivaled his legal acumen.

The first judicial definition of "a reasonable
doubt" was expressed by the Supreme Court in ap-
proving literally a definition contained in Gordon's
brief in what was known as the Nancy E. Clem
case.

13

His contentions in her defense, on the charge of
homicide, in respect to a reasonable doubt, and
other points he urged, secured a reversal of the case,
and on a second conviction and appeal he was again
successful in his contention that where a single act
results in killing two persons that the conviction
for killing one bars a conviction for killing the
other, because the offender has already been once in
jeopardy for the same offense.

He was also credited with having caused the
Supreme Court, in other cases in which he appeared,
to greatly expand the doctrine and right of self
defense.

His early political affiliations were with the demo-
cratic party, but changed during the Civil War and
he became active in republican campaigns and a
republican member of the legislature, and was ap-
pointed clerk of the Supreme Court by Governor
Porter to fill a vacancy.

He was the son-in-law of General Ebenezer
Dumont, a prominent Union General.

Next to Major Gordon as a criminal lawyer and
general practitioner was John S. Duncan, who soon
after his graduation from the Northwestern Chris-
tian University (now Butler College) wras elected
Prosecuting Attorney, and among other cases that
he successfully prosecuted was the Clem case that
Gordon defended. Upon the expiration of his
term as State's Attorney he was sought after in
most important criminal cases, both to defend and
prosecute, and was classed more as a criminal law-
yer than as a general practitioner, but he was both,

14

and was noted for his successes, and was besides a
man of lovable disposition and attractive qualities
in every way.

His father, Robert B. Duncan, was a pioneer
lawyer of Indianapolis. The firm of Duncan, Smith
and Duncan long existed and had an extensive
business. Charles W. Smith, a member of it, was
a graduate of Asbury University and served as an
officer in the Union Army during the war. He was
among the ablest of the many able lawyers of the
State and devoted his entire time conscientiously
and exclusively to the practice representing the
most important interests, and sought no political
or other public honors, but at times served on edu-
cational boards and in the promotion of civic inter-
ests. He was often a successful contender in legal
contests with members of the great law firms of
Porter, Harrison and Hines, Hendricks, Hord
and Hendricks, McDonald and Butler and others
of their class.

Cyrus C. Hines, of the firm of Porter, Harrison
and Hines, was lieutenant colonel of the 57th Indi-
ana Regiment, serving throughout the war and at
its close became Circuit Judge. Of Porter, Harri-
son, and others, much more will hereafter appear.

Ovid Butler, a distinguished lawyer and philan-
thropist of Indianapolis, was of the log cabin class
who availed himself of all the advantages he could
acquire in the old schoolhouses and then completed
a full course of self-education and became a suc-
cessful teacher, and while following that vocation
studied law and became prominent as a practitioner,

15

having as partners Calvin Fletcher, Simon Yandes,
and Horatio C. Newcomb. For twenty years he
was president of the Northwestern Christian Uni-
versity that he founded, that afterwards honored
him by changing its name to Butler College and
its location from Indianapolis to Irvington.

His political affiliations in his early days were
with the democratic party that he abandoned be-
cause of its proslavery attitude, and became a mem-
ber of the Free Soil party and led its members
into the republican party when it was organized,
and educated that party's members to an under-
standing of its principles and purposes in the col-
umns of the Indiana State Journal newspaper that
he established. He died in 1881 in his 80th year.

Noble C. Butler, the efficient clerk of the United
States Circuit and District Courts at Indianapolis,
was appointed to that position in 1879 by Judges
Drummond and Gresham, was one of the young
men who entered the military service as a private
soldier in the 93d Indiana Regiment soon after his
graduation from Hanover College. He served
until the end of the war and then entered the law
office of his father, a pioneer lawyer of Salem,
Indiana, who moved to New Albany and formed a
co-partnership with General Walter Q. Gresham.
Noble C. became the junior member of the firm of
Butler, Gresham and Butler, and remained in it
until its dissolution by the appointment of General
Gresham as Judge of the United States District
Court.

He has been a frequent contributor to news-

16

papers on political, educational, and literary sub-
jects, also to law journals, and while serving as a
register in bankruptcy at New Albany for a num-
ber of years, when the old Bankruptcy Act of 1867
was in force, he rendered many able legal opinions
that appear in Bissell's Reports and Federal Cases.
He had been preceded in the office of clerk by John
D. Howland, who had served as clerk of these
courts for more than twenty years. Howland had

«. •/

previously been long in the law practice as a mem-
ber of the firm of Barbour and Howland. Lucien
Barbour, his partner, had served one term in Con-
gress before the Civil War and was long a
prominent practitioner of Indianapolis.

Typewriters had not come in use to any extent
during the time that Howland was clerk and his
records in his own elegant handwriting were always
clean, correct, and plainly written. He was not
only a rapid wrriter but had a wrell-trained legal
mind that readily suggested to him what to put on
paper. Many lawyers who had business in these
courts and were in doubt as to the methods of pro-
cedure relied upon him for guidance and got their
education in Federal practice from him, and he was
ever ready to accommodate and aid them. His
brother, Livingston Howland, also a lawyer, rose
to the rank of major of an Indiana regiment in
which he served from the beginning until the end
of the war, and was soon after elected and served
for a number of years as Judge of the Circuit Court
composed of the counties of Marion and Hendricks.

The position of Register in Bankruptcy yielded

17

large sums in fees and compensation for services in
bankruptcy cases, of which the United States Dis-
trict Court at Indianapolis had jurisdiction. Col.
John W. Ray had been appointed to the position
of register in 1867, and held it until about two
years before the law went out of existence in 1878,
when Judge Gresham decided to pass prosperity
around by asking Ray to resign so he could ap-
point Col. Henry Jordan, an old army comrade,
in his place, and, of course, Ray complied with the
request. John W. Ray was colonel of the 49th In-
diana Regiment, was long prominent in religious
work and in business affairs, was a man of excel-
lent character, and for many years one of the
trustees of Asbury University, before its name was
changed to DePauw University.

Addison C. Harris and John T. Dye composed
the law firm of Dye and Harris, noted for the abil-
ity of its members. After its dissolution Harris
practiced alone and had a large clientage, was a
State Senator and Minister to Austria during the
administration of President McKinley. John T.
Dye was for many years the general counsel of
the Big Four Railroad Company.

James M. Cropsey was an able lawyer and held
the offices of States Attorney, and was prominent as
a democratic leader.

Napoleon B. Taylor and Judge Frederick Rand
were both judges of the Superior Court at Indian-
apolis. When their terms as judges expired they
formed a law partnership into which Edwin Taylor,
the son of Napoleon B., entered, the firm name be-

18

ing Taylor, Rand and Taylor. Edwin Taylor later
moved to Evansville and formed a partnership with
John E. Iglehart and they were for many years
the general attorneys of the Evansville and Terre
Haute Railroad Company.

John E. Iglehart was the son of Asa Iglehart, a
prominent lawyer of Evansville, who was the author
of an instructive work on practice in the Courts.

For many years the Supreme Court at its pub-
lic terms, in May and November, wras attended at

mf

the opening days by members of the bar from every
county of the state, in person, for the purpose of
submitting their cases.

Asa Iglehart was always a conspicuous figure on
these occasions, as were John Brownlee of Marion,
Walter March of Muncie, John B. Niles and
Andrew L. Osborn of LaPorte. These meetings
of the court served to bring the lawyers of the state
into fellowship and association with each other, and
this association continued until the adoption of a
rule by the court under which the cases are auto-

•

matically submitted so as to avoid personal attend-
ance.

Lawyers have at all times been influential lead-
ers in public affairs and especially in legislative
assemblies, and their activities have sometimes been
subjects of complaint by others. They have never
failed in their patriotism when emergencies called
for it.

They were the first to respond to the call for
soldiers in the war for the Union.

Of forty distinguished civilian citizens of In-

19

3

diana, who rose to or above the rank of brigadier
general, twenty-eight were lawyers. The following
is a list of these generals:

Generals Alvin P. Hovey and William Harrow
of Posey County, James M. Shackelford and John
W. Foster of Evansville, Lew Wallace and
Mahlon D. Manson of Crawfordsville, Reuben C.
Kise and Abram O. Miller of Lebanon, Silas Col-
grove and Thomas M. Browne of Winchester,
Joseph J. Reynolds, Isaac N. Stiles and Charles
Cruft of Lafayette, Newell Gleason and Jasper
Packard of LaPorte, Reuben Williams and George
H. Chapman of Warsaw, Charles S. Parish of Wa-
bash, Pleasant A. Hackelman of Rushville, James
R. Slack of Huntington, Solomon Meredith of
Richmond, John P. C. Shanks of Portland, Mor-
ton C. Hunter of Bloomington, Jeremiah Sullivan
of Madison, Robert H. Milroy of Rensselaer, Milo
S. Hascall of Goshen, Nathan Kimball of Loogoo-
tee, William Grose of New Castle, Walter Q.
Gresham of Cory don, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas
A. Morris, Abel D. Straight, Frederick Knefler,
George F. McGinnis, Ebenezer Dumont, John Co-
burn, Daniel McCauley and John Love of Indian-
apolis, Henry B. Carrington and Jefferson C.
Davis.

Of these Gen. Walter Q. Gresham, as previously
mentioned, served on General Grant's staff, was
severely wounded in battle, long served as a Fed-
eral Judge after the war, and was a member of
the cabinets of Presidents Arthur and Cleveland.

Gen. Benjamin Harrison became a United

20

States Senator and president of the United States.

Gen. Pleasant A. Hackelman lost his life in
battle while leading his command at Corinth.

Gen. Abel D. Streight, and part of his com-
mand, was captured in battle, and confined in a
Confederate prison from which he and other prison-
ers escaped by means of a tunnel that was excavated
under the prison by his direction, was long a
prominent manufacturer and business man of In-
dianapolis, and made an energetic but unsuccessful
campaign for the republican nomination for gov-
ernor in 1880.

Gen. John P. C. Shanks served on General Fre-
mont's staff, and after the war many terms in con-
gress.

Gen. Alvin P. Hovey was a judge of the State
Supreme Court before the war, was prominent as
a general and diplomat and became governor of
the state. Gen. John W. Foster was a prominent
journalist, historian and diplomat. Gen. James M.
Shackelford distinguished himself in battle, and as
the captor of the Confederate general, John Mor-
gan. Gen. John Coburn served many terms in
congress. Lew Wallace was a Major General, a
foreign ambassador and great author. On the
occasion of the death of General Hackelman the
Lafayette Journal published these lines:

"His last words were:

I am dying for my country,

His comrades knelt to hear

What loved message they should carry

To his friends and kindred dear,

21

Dying — he so faintly whispered

While his face in the radiance beamed —

For my country — Then so gently slept as he dreamed.

Of the records and acts of all these militant
heroes much will appear in the pages that follow.
Many men whose careers began in Indiana became
conspicuous in public life elsewhere.

Gen. John Hay was President Lincoln's bio-
grapher and Secretary of State, a prominent Union
General, writer, statesman and diplomat, was born
at Salem, Washington County.

Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside, who succeeded Gen.
George B. McClellan as the commanding general
of the Union Army, was born at Liberty, Indiana.
In January, 1863, he was in charge of the depart-
ment of the Ohio, comprising that state, Indiana
and others with headquarters at Cincinnati, where
on the 13th of April of that year he issued the
celebrated military order, No. 38, prohibiting the
utterance of disloyal sentiments and informing all
persons who committed acts for the benefit of the
enemies of the country that they would be tried as
spies and if convicted would suffer death. Lamb-
din P. Milligan of Huntington and others of In-
diana, and Clement L. Vallandigham of Ohio, were
arrested, tried and convicted of violation of this
order, but escaped death.

Gen. John W. Foster was a native of Pike
County, graduated from the Indiana State Uni-
versity, served with distinction in the Union Army,
was long a prominent journalist of Evansville, In-
diana, became a member of presidential cabinets as

22

Secretary of State and filled many diplomatic posi-
tions, and was the father-in-law of Robert Lansing,
who succeeded William J. Bryan as Secretary of
State.

James M. Eads, the great engineer and ship
builder, who rendered great aid to the national gov-
ernment in outfitting its war vessels in 1861 and
other years of the Civil War, and constructed the
great St. Louis steel bridge, was born at Lawrence-
burg, Indiana.

Charles V. Gridley, the American naval officer,
who commanded the Olympia at Manilla Bay on
May 1st, 1898, and destroyed the Spanish fleet
when Admiral Dewey commanded "Fire} Gridley,
Fire" was born at Logansport.

Gen. Willis A. Gorman, who commanded the
great Gorman Brigade in the Civil War, was a
native of Indiana, appointed by President Pierce
as territorial governor of Minnesota, became prom-
inent in the affairs of that state, and entered the
Union Army as colonel of the 1st Minnesota Regi-
ment and for bravery in action wras soon promoted
to be brigadier general.

Willis C. Vandevanter, now a judge of the Su-
preme Court of the United States and the youngest
member of that great tribunal, was born at Marion
in Grant County, and began his legal education in
the office of Isaac C. Vandevanter, his father, who
was well known as an able lawyer of the Grant
County bar.

John D. Works began the law practice at Vevay,
Switzerland County, was a member of the Indiana

23

legislature in 1879, and author of a law treatise
called Work's Practice, became a judge of the Su-
preme Court of California and represented that
state in the United States Senate.

John Clark Ridpath, a native of Putnam County,
and professor of English literature at Asbury Uni-
versity, acquired fame as a historian, as well as an
educator, was the author of a history of the
United States of many volumes, also of a school
history and an English grammar.

Moses E. Clapp, born near Delphi, Carroll
County, became attorney general of Minnesota and
United States Senator.

John Lane Wilson, a descendant of Governor
Henry S. Lane, became a United States Senator
from the State of Washington.

Henry Lane Wilson, of the same family, became
one of the most prominent of the ambassadors of
the United States.

John C. Spooner, who became a United States
Senator from Wisconsin for two terms, was a son
of Philip Spooner, a prominent pioneer lawyer of
Lawrenceburg, and brother of Gen. Ben Spooner,
who was for many years United States Marshal
for the District of Indiana.

Joel F. Vaile gained a high reputation as a
lawyer before leaving his birthplace at Kokomo,
Indiana, to become a resident of Denver, Colorado,
where he became an associate in the law practice
with United States Senator Wolcott and was for
many years ranked at the head of the Colorado bar.
His father, Rawsom Vaile, was, in early days, an

24

editor of the Indianapolis Journal and quit journal-
ism to engage in the law practice at Kokomo.

William N. Yaile, a member of the sixty-seventh
congress, is a son of Joel F. Yaile.

William M. Springer, a member of Congress
from 1875 to 1895, representing the Springfield,
Illinois, District, was born at Sullivan, Indiana,
and graduated from the Indiana University. While
in Congress was the author of a bill that gave a judi-
cial system to the Indian Territory and established
the State of Oklahoma.

Nathan G. Calkins, an American scientist, was
born at Valparaiso, Indiana. Graduated at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and had
charge of scientific expeditions in Alaska and be-
came instructor in zoology at Columbia University.

Jacob E. Reighard, an American educator, was
born at LaPorte, Indiana, graduated at the Uni-
versity of Michigan, and made a biological survey
of the Great Lakes in 1898.

Russell B. Abbott, a graduate of the University
of Michigan, was principal of the public schools at
Muncie and New Castle, and established the Albert
Lea College in Minnesota.

James M. Callahan, an American publicist,
was born at Bedford, Indiana, graduated at the
University of Indiana, and became lecturer on
American Diplomatic History at Johns Hopkins
University.

Andrew H. Burke, the drummer boy of the 75th
Indiana Regiment, became Governor of North
Dakota.

25

John S. Poland, born at Princeton, Gibson
County, served through the Civil War as a lieu-
tenant and became Brigadier General of Volunteers
in the war with Spain, was a professor of history
at the United States Military Academy.

Edwin H. Terrell, a graduate of De Pauw Uni-
versity, born at Brookville, Indiana, practiced law
at Indianapolis as the partner of Captain Charles
P. Jacobs; later became a resident of Texas and
held diplomatic positions during the administration
of President Benjamin Harrison.

The Congressional Directories of every session of
Congress for the last half century contain the
biographies of members from every western State
who began life in Indiana.

Jacob Newman, a great lawyer and philanthro-
pist of Chicago, began life at Indianapolis, got his
common school education at Noblesville, Indiana,
and took a full literary and law course, graduating
from the University of Chicago, made his own way
in the world, and for half a century has practiced
his profession with great success and been engaged
in the most important litigations. It is said of him
by lawyers that he has made more law in his cases
than any other of Chicago.

William T. Fenton, Vice President of the Na-
tional Bank of the Republic of Chicago, and one of
its founders, continuously identified with it and the
group of great Chicago financiers, began his bank-
ing career at Indianapolis in the old banking house
of Fletcher and Sharpe, was a man of high culture
and literary accomplishments that led him in his

26

early days to compose some elegant poetic effu-
sions that he was too modest to have published,
though they would have taken a high rank with
those of Indiana's numerous and most distinguished
poets and writers.

Thomas A. Goodwin, D.D., of Indianapolis, was
for half a century conspicuous as a publicist, the
author of many books on both religious and secular
subjects, and a forecaster of future events in com-
munications to the public press over the name
'U. L. See." Among his compositions published
over his own signature was an Oriental love story
to which he gave the title "Lovers Three Thousand
Years Ago," in which he commented in the preface
on the fact that all the literature that had come
under his notice on the subject of the Song of
Solomon, there was not found a single presentation
of it in a form that would allow it to be read in its
true character, as in fact a poem describing the
heroine of the song as "a beautiful sun-burnt
maiden in northern Palestine, whose home life had
been made miserable by the oppressions of two half-
brothers who put her to the task of keeping sheep,
where she was visited by procurers who were seek-
ing young women for Solomon's harem, and under
a promise of a good home in the King's palace
induced her to go with them, she not suspecting
their design, against which she protested vigor-
ously." How she escaped with her rustic lover
constitutes a thrilling love story, all the more inter-
esting, so he says, ''because the song had so long
been tortured to refer to Christ and His love for
the Church."

27

In his contributions to the newspapers on current
subjects of interest, his predictions of the conse-
quences that would follow from what was occurring,
made his non de plume a most apt selection. Among
other of his productions was a booklet entitled,
"Facts and Figures," showing, as he contended,
''that state institutions of learning are needlessly
expensive, radically non- American, and unavoid-
ably non-religious," and not contemplated by the
Constitution of the State. His opposition to the
policy of the State in fostering and maintaining
these institutions had its inspiration, doubtless, in
his love for the sectarian institutions of learning,
in one of which he had been educated, nevertheless
his arguments were plausible, but failed to change
the policy of the State. He was followed and sup-
ported in his contentions by William H. Craig of
Noblesville, Indiana, a graduate of Hanover Col-
lege, a regular contributor to the Indianapolis
press, and a member of the editorial staff of the
Indianapolis Star. His writings on the subject are
no less interesting than those of Goodwin.

CHAPTER II

SOME of the experiences of the author, in his ob-
servations of others, intrude themselves for
mention in this chapter.

The association of one object with another is a
natural characteristic in mental processes. An
observance of the course of human events is always
attended with an observance of those identified with
them.

The tendency to observe things has its most
vigorous growth as youth begins to merge into
manhood.

The calendar year I860 was the one that brought
the mind of the author to a keen observance of
events that have lingered in cold storage in his
recollections. It was in that year that his then
young mind was impressed by the lurid scenes pro-
duced by a company of campaign marchers call-
ing themselves 'Wide Awakes," in their uniforms
of oil cloth capes and caps and carrying lighted
torches. He inquired why they called themselves
by that name, and was told by one of mature years
that the name was very appropriate, as their pur-
pose was to awaken the voters of the country to an
understanding of the conditions that had been
brought about by slave owners of the Southern

29

States, who wanted to have slavery extended into
Northern States, and that the republican party
did not intend they should succeed.

The next political event that he observed with
interest was a Democratic rally at Peru, Indiana,
when a procession of men, women, and children
followed a band of music to a grove of trees, where
a high hickory pole was raised and an American
i" ;g was unfurled to wave over a speaker's stand,
on which was seated a number of men dressed in
black broadcloth suits, one of whom was introduced
as the speaker of the day and as the Douglas
candidate for vice-president. This was Honorable
Herschel V. Johnson of Georgia, a very stout man
with long bushy black hair and heavy eyebrows,
who spoke at great length, saying among other
things, as the writer remembers, that the Southern
people would not tolerate any interference with
their property rights in the slaves that they owned,
and any attempt to interfere with their domestic
concerns or privileges of occupying new territories
would justify their separation from their northern
neighbors and the establishment of a separate
government of their own, and closed by saying:
"These are the views of your candidate for vice-

•/

president, and if you don't like them you don't have
to vote for him." There were many mutterings
of disapproval of his speech, some saying he had
insulted the flag that waved over his head, and
many took him at his word and didn't vote for
him; a year later he became one of the leaders of
his State in its attempt to secede from the Union.

30

The candidate of the Southern Democrats for
president was John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky,
then vice-president. Abraham Lincoln was the
Republican candidate for president, and Hannibal
Hamlin of Maine was the candidate for vice-pres-
ident. At the election that followed, Lincoln and
Hamlin received a plurality of votes and the elec-
toral vote of the State, and became president and
vice-president of the United States.

There was no Breckinridge candidate for gov-
ernor of Indiana. Henry S. Lane of Montgom-
ery County was the Republican nominee for gov-
ernor, and Oliver P. Morton of Wayne County
was the nominee for lieutenant governor. The
Douglas Democratic candidate for governor was
Thomas A. Hendricks of Shelby County, and
David Turpie of White County was the candidate
for lieutenant governor. Lane and Morton were
elected.

The legislature of 1861 elected Lane to the
United States Senate, and Morton became ex-
officio governor and was soon known to the entire
country as Indiana's great war governor.

The election of Lincoln as president was made
the excuse of the southerners for renewing their
threats to secede from the Union and to form their
States into an independent confederacy, and their
declarations clearly foreshadowed the war that they
began. They committed the first overt act of war
by firing upon the American flag at Fort Sumter
and demanding its surrender. Up to this time
public sentiment in the Northern States was di-

31

vided, many in Indiana were of the opinion that
the separation of the Union would be preferable
to a war to maintain it, but the bombardment of
Fort Sumter and its surrender by Major Ander-
son of the United States Army aroused a univer-
sal sentiment of indignation and touched every
patriotic sensibility, and the cry went up every-
where that rebellion must be suppressed and war
to that end vigorously prosecuted. An instance
of the sudden change in sentiments may be given.
General Robert H. Milroy, who had been edu-
cated at a military academy at Norwich, Connecti-
cut, and had served as a captain in the First In-
diana Regiment in the war with Mexico, foresee-
ing the coming conflict before it began, attempted
to raise a company of volunteers, and several weeks
of solicitation only brought two enlistments, but
on the day following the firing on Fort Sumter,
he filled his company of one hundred men before
breakfast and had them prepared to march to the
front before supper. On the first call for 75,000
to fill Indiana's quota of six thousand they were
mustered into the United States service for three
months in the 9th Indiana Regiment, with Milroy
as their captain. He was soon after made the
colonel of the regiment that re-enlisted at the ex-
piration of the three months service, and he was
soon thereafter promoted to brigadier general and
attained and maintained much celebrity during the
entire war; was called by his comrades the "Gray
Eagle," because of his fearless and restless eyes
and gray hair. His early days were spent in Car-

32

roll County, where his father brought him in his
youth. At the time of his entering the civil war
he was engaged in the law practice at Rensselaer.
His brother John B. Milroy enlisted and served
with him throughout the war as major of the 9th
Indiana Regiment, and in after years served as a
member of the Indiana legislature and in other
county official positions.

General Milroy received but scant reward for
his great military services by being appointed as
an Indian Agent in the territory of Washington,
where he died a few years later. Major John B.
Milroy died in Carroll County in 1896.

Another instance of the quick responses to the
call for troops was when Colonel James Gavin of
the 7th Indiana Regiment mustered six hundred
citizens of Decatur County in a few hours and on
the same day telegraphed to Governor Morton:
"These are fighting men and want to fight, and I
want to take them where there is danger." Colo-
nel Gavin served with distinction throughout the
war. Before it began he had become a prominent
lawyer and was associated with Oscar B. Hord,
another able lawyer, in revising and annotating
the statutes of Indiana, knowrn to all lawyers as
"Gavin and Herd's Statutes."

These are only two of many similar instances
of the determination of the people throughout the
State to aid in the suppression of the rebellion.

The people of the State generally were most
liberal in their donations of money to aid in organ-
izing regiments, and in making provisions for the

33

support of the families whose heads entered the
service. In many instances money Contributions
were notably large, one of these is recalled in the
act of Thomas J. Brooks, a farmer and merchant
of Loogootee, Martin County, who donated a
thousand dollars to Colonel Nathan Kimball to
enable him to equip the 13th Indiana Regiment
for service. His son, Louis Brooks, was a cap-
tain of one of the companies of that regiment.
Kimball was soon promoted to be a brigadier
general, and Charles Denby of Evansville suc-
ceeded him as colonel, and upon Denby's resigna-
tion later in the war Louis Brooks succeeded him
as colonel and remained with the regiment until
the war closed.

Thomas J. Brooks, a son of Louis, after getting
a thorough education became a lawj^er and prac-
ticed his profession successfully at Bedford, In-
diana, for many years, and served in the state
senate as one of its ablest members.

The enthusiasm and determination of the peo-
ple in the early periods of the war were greatly
diminished when its horrors and burdens were ex-
perienced and a realization of the purposes for
which it was waged became manifest in the neces-
sity for destroying slavery, and many declared
they would not have enlisted for such a purpose.

So rapidly did the opposition to the war grow
that there were many desertions from the army
and many proposals for the termination of the war
by any means that could be contrived were heard;
the clamor for peace at any price was so loud as

34

to almost produce mutiny in the army that had
been so quickly mobilized. This opposition was
seized upon by the opponents of the political party
in power in their determination to humiliate Gov-
ernor Morton, who it was claimed had caused the
arrest of many citizens on groundless charges of
disloyalty, and because of this opposition the
Democratic party carried the state election and
the state legislature in 1862 by a decisive majority,
and at an earlv dav in the legislative session that

•/ «/ o

followed, in January, 1863, a preamble and reso-
lution were introduced declaring that many citi-
zens of the State had been arrested bv the author-

m

ity of the general government at the suggestion
of Governor Morton, and confined in military pris-
ons and camps without public charges being pre-
ferred against them, and without any opportunity
of being allowed to learn or discover the charges
made or alleged against them, and refused a trial,
and demanding that these outrages should cease;
also resolutions declaring against the abolition of
slavery, and that not another man or another dol-
lar should be contributed for such a purpose. In
the debates upon the plans for ending the war, the
proposition of a northwestern confederacy that
would include the States north and west of the
Ohio river, as a means of becoming separated from
the Eastern States was urged, notwithstanding
that it embodied the very essence of treason.

•/

The bitterness between Morton and the legis-
lature was so intense that instead of his being in-
vited and given an opportunity to deliver his mes-

35

sage to them at the opening of the session, it took a
recess until the week following, and upon its recon-
vening he sent his message to them in printed form.
This act on his part was followed by a resolution
that was introduced in the house, declaring that he
had failed and neglected to deliver an}^ message
and therefore that the house approved and adopted
''the exalted and patriotic sentiments contained in
the message lately delivered to the legislature of the
State of New York by His Excellency Governor
Horatio Seymour," and extending its thanks and
felicitations to him. But the resolution did not
pass.

Another measure introduced provided for the
creation of a military board to be composed of the
newly elected State officers to take all matters per-
taining to the war out of the governor's hands.
The introduction of this revolutionary measure led
to a bolt by the Republican members, who left the
State capitol and went to Madison, Indiana, and
remained until they received assurances from Thom-
as A. Hendricks and others of the more conser-
vative Democrats that the measure should not pass.
While the legislature was still in session, and to
stem the tide of opposition to the war that had
set in, an address to the Democracy of Indiana was
published from Democratic officers in the army
reading as follows:

HELENA, ARK., Feb. 2, 1863.
To the Democracy of Indiana:

Having a deep interest in the future glory and wel-
fare of our country and believing that we occupy a

36

position in which we can see the effects of the politi-
cal struggles at home upon the hopes and fears of the
rebels, we deem it our duty to speak to you openly
and plainly in regard to the same.

The rebels of the South are leaning on the Northern
democracy for support, and it is unquestionably true
that unjustifiable opposition to the administration is
giving aid and comfort to the enemy.

While it is the duty of patriots to oppose usurpa-
tion of power, it is alike their duty to avoid captious
criticism that might create the very evils they attempt
to avoid. The name Democrat, associated with all
that is bright and glorious in the history of the past,
is being sullied and disgraced by demagogues who
are appealing to the lowest prejudices and passions
of our people. We have nothing to expect from the
South and nothing to hope without their conquest.

They are now using their money freely to subsidize
the press and politicians of the North, and with what
effect the tone of some of our journals and the
speeches of some of their leaders too plainly and
painfully testify.

We see with deep solicitude and regret that there
is an undercurrent in Indiana tending toward a coali-
tion of the northwest with the south against the east-
ern States. Be not deceived. Pause for the love you
bear to your country and reflect. This movement is
only a rebel scheme in disguise that would involve
you alike with themselves in the crime of rebellion
and bring to your own hearthstones the desolation of
a French Revolution. Separation on either side with
peace in the future is impossible, and we are com-
pelled by self-interest, by every principle of honor
and every impulse of manhood to bring the unholy
contest to a successful termination.

What! Admit that we are whipped? That twenty-
three millions of northern men are unequal to nine

37

millions of the south? Shame on the State that
would entertain so disgraceful a proposition.

Shame upon the Democrat who would submit to
it and raise his cowardly voice and claim that he was
an Indianian. He and such dastards and their off-
spring are fit "Mud-sills" upon which should be built
the lordly structure of their southern aristocracy!
And with whom would this unholy alliance be
formed? With men who have forgotten their fath-
ers, their oaths, their country, and their God; with
guerillas, cotton burners, with those who force every
male inhabitant of the South capable of bearing arms
into the field, though starving wives and babes are
left behind! Men who persecute and hang or drive
from their lines every man, woman, and child who
will not fall down and worship the Southern God.
And yet free born men of our own State will sympa-
thize with such tyrants and dare even to dream of
coalition! Indiana's proud and loyal legions number
at least seventy-five thousand effective men in the
field, and as with one great heart we know they
would repudiate all unholy combinations tending to
dismember our government.

In this dark hour of our country's trial there is but
one road to success and peace and that is to be as
firmly united for our government as rebels are
against it. Small differences of opinion amount to
nothing in this great struggle for a nation's existence.
Do not place even one straw in the way and remem-
ber that every word you speak to encourage the South
nerves the arm and strikes the blow which is aimed
at the hearts' blood of your kindred.

Signed: ALVIN P. HOVEY, Brigadier General.

WILLIAM T. SPICELY, Colonel 24th Ind.
WILLIAM E. McLEAN, Colonel 43d Ind.
GEORGE F. McGiNNis, Colonel llth Ind.
JAMES R. SLACK, Colonel 47th Ind.

38

This timely, vigorous and effective address
was published broadcast throughout the State,
and was credited to the gifted pen and intellect
of Colonel William E. McLean. Colonel James R.
Slack became brigadier general, was a conspicuous
Democrat after the war and was circuit judge for
many years. General Hovey, a Democrat before
the war, was elected governor on the Republican
ticket in 1888 and died in office. Colonel McGin-
nis was promoted to be brigadier general, served
with distinction throughout the war and was elected
as a Republican auditor of Marion County.
Colonel McLean was a member of the Military
Commission that tried Milligan and others for
treason.

It is a coincidence in the record of tragedies that
the surrender of Fort Sumter occurred on the
14th day of April, 1861, that on the evening of
that day President Lincoln wrote his proclamation,
dated on the loth, calling on the American peo-
ple to assist him in preserving public peace and
order and to aid him in maintaining the honor,
integrity and existence of the national union, and
calling the special session of congress that de-
clared war, and that on the night of the 14th day
of April, 1865, at about the same hour that he
signed his proclamation of four years before, he
was assassinated.

It is not the author's intention to attempt to
follow the progress of the war or give a description
of its many tragedies and events that have been

v CU

made the subjects of so many complete, accurate

39

and ably written histories, but he will refer here-
after to some of these events that have a connec-
tion with the reconstruction period that followed.
His next narrations will begin in the month of
April, 1865, as an event and experience in his own
life that then occurred made such impressions as
to cause him to become a close observer of the
conduct of public men who were actors in the pub-
lic events that followed.

Having the liberty of choosing his own course
in life and the kind of employment he preferred,
ihe left the little town of Galveston in Cass County,
Indiana, on the first day of April, 1865, to seek
employment more congenial to his inclinations than
working on a farm, with only funds sufficient to
pay his railroad fare to Chicago and for his board
at a cheap lodging house for a very few days. No
great philanthropist like the 'Honorable Hinky
Dink," later a local celebrity and municipal legis-
lator of that city, was then providing a lodging and
refreshing place for so-called "Hobos," and he had
to subsist on very scant meals for a number of
days, but the excitement of the times aided in keep-
ing him alive.

On the 9th day of April, 1865, four years after
the rebel march to Fort Sumter began, the news
came of the surrender of General Lee to General
Grant that ended the war. Those who witnessed
the scenes on the llth day of November, 1918,
when the news was confirmed about the ending of
the World War can imagine the excitement on
the 9th day of April, 1865.

40

The great rejoicing in the city of Chicago then
was mixed with bitter reproaches of those called
"Copperheads." Painted on the sidewalks and in
other public places in large black letters were
these words:

'Wanted- -The men who in the month of Au-
gust, 1864, in Convention Assembled in this City
declared the war a failure to now show themselves'3

The writer begs to digress here to say that the
indignation the publishers of these words then felt
was no deeper than that experienced by many
when a United States Senator from Oregon, in
1917, declared that the agencies of the administra-
tion and its military directors had "fallen down"

«/

in the prosecution of the World War, when in fact
oyer two million braye American soldiers had been
landed in France without the loss of a single life,
to end it.

The reference of the painted words, mentioned,
to the Democratic National Convention of 1864,
that had nominated General George B. McClellan
for president, proyoked feelings and demonstra-
tions of the most intense anger and many street
quarrels and discussions that were very exciting.

This bitterness was more intensified when on
the fourth anniversary of the surrender of Fort

Sumter the world was shocked and sorrowed by

•/

the news of the assassination of the president. This
tragic and historic event cast grief, gloom and de-
spondency everywhere, and in every doorway of
the city where he had been nominated for presi-

41

dent in 1860 appeared his picture, wreathed in the
badges and drapery of woe.

This gloom and the disappointments, distress
and fears experienced by a homeless and penniless
youth were not dispelled by the belief that "the
brighest lightning is kindled in the darkest clouds,"
and he determined to leave the city. It so happened
that there were then no gates to prevent entrance
to railroad coaches, one of which he boarded with
much less than half the return trip fare. It still
more fortunately happened that the conductor of
the train, named Workman, was the possessor of
such humane and charitable characteristics that he
did not impose the discomforts and humiliation of
expulsion upon the returning wanderer, but landed
him back to the place from which he started, where
he remained until an opportunity came to him that
enabled him to observe future events from a quieter
place than Chicago. It was not his intention to
ever again see that city, but by a concatenation
of fortuitous circumstances it became his residence
twenty-six years later, where he resided for twenty-
eight years without losing his affections for the
old Hoosier State.

THOMAS A. HENDRICKS

CHAPTER III

THE accession of Andrew Johnson to the pres-
idency that immediately followed the death of
President Lincoln caused that personage's actions
to be closely watched from the hour that he took
the oath of office and at once incited criticisms and
distrust. It was whispered by some and boldly
declared by others that he was intoxicated on that
occasion, his followers indignantly denying the
charge and some of them later convincing them-
selves that it must have been true.

What his policy would be in the work of recon-
struction was the uppermost subject of inquiry
in the public mind.

The course that the minority party in Congress
would take towards him was watched with quite
as much eagerness as was that of the majority
party that had nominated and elected him for vice-
president.

Thomas A. Hendricks of Indiana was then the
minority leader in the United States Senate. His
Republican constituents in Indiana were charging
that he had withheld his support from President
Lincoln, and demanding that it be given to the new
president. This demand was made before it was
known what Johnson's policies would be and so

43

acute was it that a public meeting was called at
Indianapolis to instruct him as to the wishes of
those who called it and to demand a public pledge
from him. His personal friends advised him that
to attend this meeting or to face the mob that it
would be composed of meant personal violence to
him, but nevertheless, he courageously faced it and
declared that he would cheerfully give his support
to the president if his policies were consistent with
his own views of constitutional construction, other-
wise he would not.

The charge previously made that Hendricks
had not possessed courage or qualities of leader-
ship was not thereafter repeated.

The few days that had intervened between the

«/

end of the war and the death of President Lincoln
were so given up to general rejoicing over its close
that no plans of reconstruction had then been pub-
licly stated by President Lincoln or proposed from
any source. The status of the States that had se-

«/

ceded in their then and future relations to the Fed-
eral Union presented puzzling questions that
neither jurists or statesmen had yet ventured posi-
tive opinions upon. The prevailing opinion soon
afterward was that they had forfeited and lost
their status as States of the Union by reason of
their attempts to secede from it, and that they
should be held as conquered provinces and sub-
jected to federal control by military agencies or
otherwise as congress might determine.

Johnson had been a loyal Union man before the
war, was a military governor of it wrhen nominated

44

and elected vice-president in 1864, and it was be-
lieved that he would concur in this prevailing
popular opinion, but those who so believed over-
looked the natural thirst and appetite for power
that seizes everyone who gets in position to exer-
cise it, and did not take into account the vanities
of mankind in their desires to become great lead-
ers in thought and action.

To concede such great powers to congress would
lessen his own and in effect abdicate them; con-
sequently he was not slow in declaring his own
policies that he proposed to enforce either with or
without the concurrence of congress.

He very soon indicated that it would be the
policy of his administration to withdraw any con-
trol over the seceding States by military governors
or other agencies of the Federal Government and
to restore to them all the rights of independent
state governments and all civil rights of their citi-
zens as fully as they had existed before their seces-
sion, and that test oath acts and other acts of
congress that had disfranchised their leaders and
participants in rebellion should be set aside. In
short, he seemingly proposed to fully reanimate the
old doctrine of " States rights," notwithstanding
that the war had been fought and won to establish
the supremacy of federal control and had prac-
tically, or at least theoretically, settled that they
had forfeited and lost all the rights reserved to
them when the Federal Union was formed. It is
probable that his policies would have been prem-
ature for many years at least, but for 'the fact

45

that the Southern States, already devastated by the
war, were being overrun by unscrupulous "Carpet
Baggers" and other adventurers from the north,
who were imposing unbearable burdens upon them,
and but for the fact that in dealing with the situa-
tion congress threatened Johnson's impeachment,
and by its acts showed a determination to keep
alive the partisan clamor that would long prevent
either reconciliation or reconstruction.

A clear statement of the issues and differences
between congress and the president appears in a
published address delivered by Honorable Hugh

McCulloch at his home at Fort Wayne, Indiana,
on the llth day of October, 1865, following one

along the same lines delivered at Richmond, In-
diana, by Governor Morton on the 29th day of
September, 1865, that is preserved in the state
library at Indianapolis, in which he took strong
grounds in opposition to negro suffrage at that
time, and strongly commended the reconstruction
policies of President Johnson, contending that
they were in harmony with the intended purposes
of President Lincoln. The facts that he stated
are convincing in support of his conclusion that
Johnson was "simply carrying out the policy left
to him by his lamented predecessor — a policy that
had been endorsed by the whole nation in the re-

a/

election of Mr. Lincoln and had been promulgated
to the whole world nearly one year before the time

•/ %.•

of his last election." Viewing this speech in itself
without challenging or commenting upon the con-
sistency of its author in changing his attitude to-

46

ward Johnson, and voting for his conviction on his
impeachment trial it must be said that it is perhaps
the ablest of all the great speeches ever delivered
by that intellectual giant, but yet none of his biog-
raphers have given it prominence or publicity.

It was not, as often contended by his political
opponents, an absolute and unqualified argument
against negro suffrage, but was an able argument
in support of his contention that there should be a
period of probation education and preparation be-
fore the negroes should be brought "to the exercise
of political power." In concluding his remarks on
this subject he said: "I submit then, however,
clearly and strongly we may admit the natural
rights of the negro--! submit to the intelligence
of the people- -that colored state governments are
not desirable; that they will bring about results
that are not to be hoped for; that finally they
would threaten to bring about, and I believe would
result in a war of races."

This statement about "colored state govern-
ments" had reference to what he contended was
inevitable in the Southern States.

The writer regrets that it is not convenient to
here reproduce at full length this great speech that
his biographers omitted to publish or comment
upon. No doubt the speeches of these great men,
one a member of the cabinet of both Lincoln and
Johnson, the other the great war governor of In-
diana had much effect in turning back the tide that
had set in against Johnson.

So much of the speech of McCullough as defined

47

the issues and stated his views is here reproduced,
reading as follows:

'Under his direction the great work of re-estab-
lishing civil government at the South under the
Federal Constitution is going rapidly forward —
too rapidly, it seems, according to the opinion of
many at the North, whose opinions are entitled to
great consideration. I know, sir, that many doubt
the wisdom of Mr. Johnson's policy; that many
are of the opinion that by their ordinance of seces-
sion the rebellious States had ceased to be States
under the Constitution, and that nothing should be
done by the executive in aid of the restoration of
their State governments until congress had deter-
mined on what terms they should be restored to
the Union which they had voluntarily abandoned
and attempted to destroy; that as the people of
these States had appealed to the sword and had
been subjugated by the sword, they should be gov-
erned by the sword until the law-making power
had disposed of the subject of reconstruction; that
no State that had passed ordinances of secession
and united with the so-called Confederate Govern-
ment should ever be admitted again into the Union
unless in its preliminary proceedings all men, ir-
respective of color, should be permitted to vote,
nor without provisions in its Constitution for the
absolute enfranchisement of the negro. Some go
even further than this and demand the confiscation
of the property of all rebels and the application
of the proceeds to the payment of the national
debt.

48

'These are not, I apprehend, the views of a
respectable minority. I know they are not the
views of a majority of the people of the North.
The better opinion is that the States which at-
tempted to secede never ceased to be States in the
Union; that all their acts of secession were of no
effect; that during the progress of the revolt the
exercise of the Federal authority wras merely sus-
pended, and that there never was a moment when
the allegiance of the people of the insurrectionary
States wras not due to the Government, and when
the Government wras not bound to maintain its au-
thority over them and extend protection to those
who required it. When the rebellion was over-
come, the so-called Confederate Government and
all the State governments which had been formed
in opposition to the Federal Government ceased
to have even a nominal existence, and the people
who had been subject to them were left for the
time being without any government whatever. The
term of office of the Federal officers had expired
or the offices had become vacant by the treason of
those who held them. There were no Federal
revenue officers, no competent Federal judges, and
no organized Federal courts. Nor were the peo-
ple any better off so far as State authority was
regarded. When the Confederacy collapsed all
the rebel State governments collapsed with it, so
that, with a few exceptions, there were no persons
holding" civil office at the South by the authority

O «•' V

of any legitimate government.

"Now, as government is at all times a necessity

49

among men, and as it was especially so at the
South, where violence and lawlessness had full
sway, the question to be decided by the president
was simply this: Shall the people of the recently
rebellious States be held under military rule until
congress shall act upon the question, or shall im-
mediate measures be taken by the executive to re-
store to them civil governments?

"After mature consideration the president con-
cluded it to be his duty to adopt the latter course,
and I am satisfied that in this conclusion he was
right. And here let me say that in doing so he was
carrying out the very policy which had been de-
termined upon by Mr. Lincoln and his Cabinet.

"Military rule will not be endured by the people
of the United States one moment longer than there
is an absolute necessity for it. Such an army as
would have been requisite for the government of
the people of the South, as a subjugated people,
until congress might prescribe the terms on which
they could be restored to the Union, would have
been too severe a strain upon our Republican in-
stitutions, and too expensive for the present con-
dition of the treasury. The president has, there-
fore, gone to work to restore the Union by the use,
from the necessity of the case, of a portion of those
who have been recently in arms to overthrow it.
The experiment may be regarded as a dangerous
one, but it will be proved, I apprehend, to have
been a judicious one. Never were a people so dis-
gusted writh the work of their own hands as were
the great mass of the people of the South (even

50

before the collapse of the rebellion) with the gov-
ernment which wras attempted to be set up by the
overthrow of the government of their forefathers;
never were a people so completely subjugated as
have been the people of the rebel States. I have
met a great many of those whom the president is
using in his restoration policy, and they have im-
pressed most favorably. I believe them to be hon-
est in taking the amnesty oath, and in their pledges
of fidelitv to the Constitution and the Union.

«/

Slavery has perished- -this all acknowledge — and
with it has gone down the doctrine of secession.
State sovereignty has been discussed in congress,
before courts, in the public journals, and among
the people, and at last, :'when madness ruled the
hour," this vexed question was submitted to the
final arbitrament of the sword. The question, as
all admit, has been fairly and definitely decided,
and from this decision of the sword there will be no
appeal. It is undoubtedly true that the men of
the South feel sore at the result, but they accept
the situation, and are preparing for the changes
which the war has produced in their domestic in-
stitutions with an alacrity and an exhibition of
good feeling which has, I confess, surprised, as it
has gratified me.

"In the work of restoration the President has

aimed to do only that which was necessary to be

«/ «/

done, exercising only that power which could be
properly exercised under the Constitution, which
guarantees to every State a republican form of
government. Regarding slavery as having perished

51

5

in the rebellious States, either by the proclamation
of his predecessor or by the result of the war, and
determining that no rebel who had not purged him-
self of his treason should have any part in the res-
toration of the civil governments which he is aiding
to establish, he has not considered it within the
scope of his authority to go further and enfran-
chise the negro. For this he is censured by many
true men at the Xorth and a few extreme men at
the South, but I have no doubt that he will be sus-
tained by the people, and that the result will vindi-
cate the wisdom of his course.'

52

CHAPTER IV

TJUGH McCULLOCH was a man of high
-*--*- scholastic attainments and eminent as a finan-
cier, was Secretary of the Treasury of the United
States from 1863 to 1869, and credited with the
inauguration of a business system that relieved the
National Treasury from the menaces of bankruptcy.

Thomas A. Hendricks, William H. English,
William E. Niblack, Joseph E. McDonald,
Michael C. Kerr, Daniel W. Voorhees, Generals
Mahlon D. Mauson, James R. Slack, and in fact
all Indiana Democrats and many conservative Re-
publicans supported President Johnson, and his
policies, and from motives of party expediency if
not from any higher motives his policies were
endorsed by the Democratic party in the Presiden-
tial contest that followed in 1868.

The first attempt to impeach him failed, but the
second attempt was made on the 5th day of March,
1868, under the leadership of Thaddeus Stephens,
a congressman from Pennsylvania.

The first instance in the world's history in which

»/

the impeachment of the head of a Nation was pro-
posed was expressed in a resolution that Stephens
then presented and had passed calling upon the
United States Senate to convene as a court of Im-

53

peachment, and the organization of that body into
a court was effected by calling upon Honorable
Salmon P. Chase, Chief Justice of the Supreme
Court of the United States to preside over its pro-
ceedings and deliberations.

Honorable Benjamin F. Wade, United States
Senator from Ohio, had previously been elected as
President of the Senate to preside in the absence
of the Vice-President and in the event of the con-
viction and removal of Johnson would become
President of the United States.

It was Senator Thomas A. Hendricks of
Indiana, as the first step in the proceedings, who
challenged the right of the Senator from Ohio to
sit in the court because of his interest in the result
of the trial. The question presented by the chal-
lenge was debated at length, its supporters con-
tending that the question was one for decision by
the chief justice, but he excused himself from
deciding it, because by a rule previously adopted
by a majority of the senate, the power to do so,
was denied to him and as a consequence the chal-
lenge was withdrawn and Wade was sworn in and
on the final vote on the question of the guilt or
innocence of the accused, unhesitatingly voted
guilty.

To prevent Johnson from removing government
officials from office, and to continue in his cabinet,
as one of his advisers, Edwin M. Stanton, who was
his political and possibly his personal enemy, con-
gress had passed what was called the Tenure of
Office Act.

54

The first of the articles of impeachment charged
that Johnson had violated that act by excluding
Stanton from the office of Secretary of War and
installing General Lorenzo Thomas.

Another of the articles, that in form corre-
sponded with indictments in courts of criminal
jurisdiction, as did the first, charged that he had
attempted to bring into disgrace, ridicule and con-
tempt the Congress of the United States in certain
public speeches he had made throughout the coun-
try.

Upon the presentation of these charges many
questions as to their sufficiency arose. Among
other objections urged by his counsel against the
count in regard to the speeches he had made, it was
argued that it was an attempt to make freedom of
speech a public offense. This objection was
answered by the impeachment managers by say-
ing that it was indecency of speech and not free-
dom of speech that wras condemned. The proceed-
ings in the impeachment court were very much the
same as in courts of criminal jurisdiction, but the
accused was not required to be present in court at
any stage of the proceedings, but probably would
have been allowed that privilege and the right to
testify in his own behalf had he so desired. A two-
thirds vote was required to convict.

There were only twelve Democrats in the senate ;
they were unanimous in their votes of not guilty
and were joined by seven Republicans, and his
acquittal followed, and four years later his policies
were supported by many senators who had urged

55

his conviction. Among these was United States
Senator Simmer of Massachusetts. The Republi-
can senators who voted for Johnson's acquittal were
Trumbull of Illinois, Doolittle of Wisconsin,
Grimes of Iowa, Henderson of Missouri, Fessen-
den of Maine, Norton of Nebraska, and Ross of
Kansas.

Among other journals that supported the poli-
cies of Johnson was the great New York Tribune,
founded and edited by Horace Greeley, the fore-
most American journalist, the most unique char-
acter of the Civil War period, and gifted with
gigantic intellect, but not free from foibles, ill
temper, and inconsistencies. He was the uncom-
promising foe of human slavery, and yet told the
Southern States who wanted to secede- -with their
slaves- -to "depart in peace with them," and a little
later complained of General McClellan because
he did not move faster with his army in destroying
the enemy, and almost immediately upon the col-
lapse of the rebellion startled the communities of
the North and surprised the leaders in secession
by signing the bail bond of Jeff Davis, when he
was held under an indictment for treason, and
urged the dismissal of his prosecution.

The Union League Club of New York was so
angered at him for this act that its governors cited
him to appear before them and show cause why he
should not be expelled from membership in it. In
answer to their citation he wrote them a letter
that deserves a place here because of the vigor of
its phraseology and of its reflections of the char-

56

acter of its author. Following is a copy of it as it
appears in his Tribune of May 23, 1867:

Gentlemen: I shall not attend your meeting this
evening. I have an engagement out of town and shall
keep it. I do not recognize you as capable of judging
or even fully apprehending me. You evidently regard
me as a weak sentimentalist, misled by a maudlin
philosophy. I arraign you as narrow-minded block-
heads, who would like to be useful to a great and
good cause, but don't know how. Your attempt to
base a great, enduring party on the hate and wrath
necessarily engendered by a bloody civil war, is as
though you should plant a colony on an iceberg
which had somehow drifted into a tropical ocean.
I tell you here, that out of a life earnestly devoted
to the good of human kind, your children will select
my going to Pxichmond and signing that bail bond
as the wisest act, and will feel that it did more for
freedom and humanity than all of you were com-
petent to do, though you had lived to the age of
Methuselah.

I ask nothing of you, then, but that you proceed to
your end by a direct, frank, manly way. Don't sidle
off into a mild resolution of censure, but move the
expulsion which you proposed, and which I de-
serve, if I deserve any reproach whatever.

All I care for is, that you make a square stand up
fight, and record your judgment by yeas and nays,
I care not how few vote with me, nor how many vote
against me; for I know that the latter will repent
it in dust and ashes before three years have passed.

Understand, once for all, that I dare you and defy
you, and that I propose to fight it out on the line
that I have held from the day of Lee's surrender. So
long as any man was seeking to overthrow our gov-
ernment, he was my enemy; from the hour in which

57

he laid down his arms he was my formerly erring
countrjanan. So long as any is at heart opposed to
national unity, the Federal authority, or to that as-
sertion of the equal rights of all men which has be-
come practically identified with loyalty and national-
ity, I shall do my best to deprive him of power; but
whenever he ceases to be thus, I demand his resto-
ration to all the privileges of American citizenship.
I give you fair notice that I shall urge the re-en-
franchisement of those now prescribed for participa-
tion in rebellion so soon as I shall feel confident that
this course is consistent with the freedom of the
blacks and the unity of the Republic, and that I shall
demand a recall of all now in exile only for partici-
pation in the rebellion, whenever the country shall
have been so throughly pacified that its safety will
not thereby be endangered. And so, gentlemen, hop-
ing that you will henceforth comprehend me some-
what better than you have done I remain yours.

HORACE GREELEY.

This pungent philippic was responded to by the
Union League Club by a resolution it passed stat-
ing that, "There had been nothing in the action of
Horace Greeley relative to the bailing of Jefferson
Davis calling for proceedings by this club."

While the controversy as to whether the course
should be pacific or punitive in dealing with the
erring people of the Southern States was going on,
there were many conservative and patriotic peo-
ple who believed that the logic of future events
would have more efficacy than the wisdom of polit-
ical sages in determining what the better course
should be, and they turned their attention from the
controversy to a contemplation of the glory and

58

grandeur of the country when a firmly cemented
Union would finally be assured. They looked for-
ward to the approaching one hundredth anniver-
sary of American Independence as the occasion
when all would be as firmly united in their loyalty
to the flag of their country as were their forefathers
a century before, and to one of Indiana's greatest
citizens and scholars must be given the credit for
being the first proponent of an appropriate cele-
bration of that anniversary at Philadelphia on
July 4, 1876.

Professor John L. Campbell, of Wabash College,
in 1864, delivered a lecture at the Smithsonian In-
stitute, in Washington, commemorative of the third
centennial anniversary of the birth of Galileo
and so firmly were his convictions upon the subject
of commemorating important centennial events
that as early as 1866 he began the agitation of the
subject of a proper celebration of the one hun-
dredth anniversary of American independence to
be held at Philadelphia, and to further the project,
addressed a letter to the then mayor of that city,
urging it. This letter was at once acted upon and
preparations for the celebration then began. On
the recommendation of Governor Baker, Campbell
was appointed by President Grant as the Indiana
commissioner of the exposition, and was chosen as
secretary of it and chairman of its committee on
foreign affairs. By means of his great energy
other nations of the earth were brought into activ-
ity as participants in the celebration, including the
great empire from which the United States gained

59

its independence, and through his great work, In-
diana was awarded the great honor of being first
in the United States in its educational progress, a
position that it has since so well maintained.

As a reward for his achievements in that respect
and as a deserved honor he was, in 1891, also ap-
pointed by Governor Alvin P. Hovey as a mem-
ber of the Board of Managers for Indiana at the
Columbian Exposition at Chicago and it was his
building plans that were adopted in the construc-
tion of the great structures that covered the expo-
sition grounds.

To him must also be given the credit for devis-
ing the original plans for the improvement of the
Kankakee River, that years afterwards resulted in
the reclamation of the great body of Kankakee

valley lands in Northern Indiana. Under a reso-

«/

lution of the General Assembly of the State
adopted in 1881 Governor Porter appointed him
to make a survey of this river and of the lands of

•/

its valleys as a step in their drainage. A further
mention of his work in that matter will be made in
connection with a history of Governor Porter's ad-
ministration that will hereafter follow.

Professor Campbell was a native of Indiana,
born at Salem, Washington County. He got his
early education at the celebrated Morrison School
of that county and later entered and graduated
from Wabash College in which he became a tutor.
Its records show his connection with that institu-
tion for four years as a student and fifty years as
an instructor.

60

CHAPTER V

T) Y reason of his prominence in the senate and
-*-J because of his general popularity, Hendricks
was prominently mentioned as the Democratic
nominee for president in 1868 and received the
next highest vote for the nomination, it going to
Horatio Seymour, of New York, who had been
governor of that State during the Civil War pe-
riod, elected in 1862. He was then urged to accept
the nomination for vice-president but refused it,
and General Francis P. Blair, of Missouri, who
had been a prominent Union general during the
war, and had kept his state from seceding, was
nominated. Hendricks had, before the national
convention was held, been nominated for governor
of Indiana, and Alfred P. Edgerton of Fort
Wayne, for lieutenant governor. General Grant
was the Republican nominee for president and
Schuyler Colfax, of Indiana, then speaker of the
national house of representatives, was the nominee
for vice-president.

The state elections in Indiana were then held in
October. The great popularity of Grant and
Colfax and the conditions that followed the Civil
War indicated a victory for the Republicans, and
that the presidential election in November would
go as it was believed it would in October. In-

61

diana's vote in October was looked upon as deter-
mining the presidential contest. Grant and Col-
fax carried it by nine thousand majority.

The Democrats had nominated as associates of
Hendricks and Edgerton candidates for other
state offices men who had given honorable service
to their country as Union soldiers, among them
General Reuben C. Kise, of Lebanon, for secre-
tary of state, and Colonel Joseph V. Bemusdaffer
for auditor of state.

The Republican nominee for governor was Col-
onel Conrad Baker, who was then acting as gov-
ernor, having been elected as lieutenant governor
with Morton, who had been elected to the senate.
His associates on the state ticket were also mostly
Union soldiers, among them Colonel Will Cum-
back for lieutenant governor, Major John D.
Evans, of Hamilton County, for auditor of state,
and Colonel James B. Black of Marion County,
for reporter of the Supreme court.

The Republican nominees were all elected, but
the vote for governor was so close that it was not
known for several days who had been elected, but
Baker was finally declared elected by about one
thousand majority, and it was claimed that this
majority had been produced by holding back and
doctoring the returns from Hamilton and other
strong Republican counties where Democrats were
not members of the election boards. The house
of Indiana representatives elected in 1868 wTas
Democratic by a small maiority. the senate was

«/ *J V *

Republican, and the Republicans had a majority

62

on joint ballot. Henry S. Cauthorne of Vin-
cennes, was the Democratic speaker of the house
and was again speaker of the house ten years later.

The defeat of Hendricks for governor did not
take him out of public life, as his term of senator
did not expire until 1869. Upon his retiring from
the senate he again became the head of the great
law firm of Hendricks, Hord & Hendricks at In-
dianapolis, composed of himself, Oscar B. Hord,
and Major Abram W. Hendricks. Hord was an
able and active lawyer. Major Abram W. Hen-
dricks was a cousin of Thomas A., and though the
junior member of the firm, was generally regarded
by lawyers as superior to his associates in legal
lore.

An event worthy of mention as showing the per-
sonal friendship and high regard of Hendricks and
Governor Baker for each other, was in their ex-
change of places in 1873, Hendricks was elected
governor in 1872 and Baker in his last message to
the legislature urged an increase of the salary of
governor, and it was increased, and Governor Ba-
ker went from the governor's office to the head of
the law firm from which Hendricks retired on be-
coming governor, and the law firm was thereafter,
Baker, Hord and Hendricks. Baker preferred
the position at the head of this firm above that of
any political office and declined to become a candi-
date for United States Senator, as it was thought
he would be, in accordance with the precedents of
his party in promoting its governors as it did when
Lane and Morton were elected to the senate.

63

Will Cumback, who had been elected lieutenant
governor when Baker was elected Governor, was
very ambitious for promotion to the office of gov-
ernor, or if he could not gain that honor, wanted
to be selected as senator, and was so determined
to bring an expression from Baker as to whether
or not he would be a candidate for senator, that he
addressed a letter to him soliciting his aid in mak-
ing him senator if he did not want the honor. This
letter became public later, and had the effect to
prevent Cumback from becoming either governor
or senator.

When the legislature convened in 1869 Baker
was governor by reason of his election in 1864 as
lieutenant governor, and was to be inaugurated as
governor because of his election in 1868. He made
it known that it was his purpose to serve out the
term of four years for which the people had elected
him as governor, and by that course eliminated
himself from consideration as the senator that was
to be elected. The letter that Cumback had writ-
ten to him was preserved among other documents,
in the files of the governor's office, as was a copy
of Baker's answer to it declaring that the proposi-
tion it contained was "corrupt and indecent," but
neither the letter or the answer to it had become
public until after the Republican caucus had nom-
inated Cumback for senator and a bolt had fol-
lowed. Judge James Hughes, a former member
of congress and judge of the Court of Claims at
Washington, and then a belligerent and able sen-
ator from Monroe County, led the bolters, while

64

Isaac P. Gray, who got into the Democratic party
three years later and went from one prominent po-
sition to another in that party with the swiftness of
the deer that clears the hedge, was the leader of
the Cumback forces. It being the right of the leg-
islature to call upon the executive to produce doc-
uments for legislative uses when their production
"would not be incompatible with public interests,"
Hughes availed himself of his privilege of intro-
ducing a resolution calling for the production of
this correspondence. Gray and other of Cumback's
supporters opposed its production upon the
grounds that the letter was a harmless private
communication of a confidential and personal char-
acter, while Hughes urged that it should be pro-
duced so as to vindicate Cumback if Baker had
placed a wrong construction on the letter that he
had written, and his motion finally prevailed and
tiie letter and the answer to it were produced, and
a sufficient number of Republican members con-
curred in Governor Baker's contention that the
proposition made to him was "corrupt and inde-
cent/' and Cumback was defeated and Daniel D.
Pratt, who had been elected to congress at the pre-
ceding election, was then elected senator. Pratt
was a powerful man mentally and physically, was
much over six feet in height, and carried a weight
of over three hundred pounds on a massive frame,
and had such a powerful voice that no request to
speak louder ever came from the audiences he ad-
dressed, was a pioneer lawyer of Logansport of
such great ability that it was a fortunate client who

65

could secure his services. He was courteous in
manner, kind in disposition, and highly honored
and revered bv all his fellow citizens. No one had

f

more legal contests with him than his highly re-
spected friend, Nathan O. Ross, whom he defeated
as the Democratic nominee for congress in 1868.
Pratt was succeeded in the senate by Joseph E.
McDonald, who was the Democratic caucus nomi-
nee elected by the legislature in 1875.

Pratt's election to the senate caused his resigna-
tion as a member of congress from what wras then
the 9th district, and a special election was called
to fill the vacancy. James N. Tyner, of Peru, wras
nominated by the Republicans. The Democrats
made no nomination, but a few friends of Samuel
A. Hall, editor of the Logansport Pharos, got to-
gether and agreed upon a plan to have him make
the race, and arranged that the Democrats of the
district should absent themselves from the polls

until the afternon of the day of election and then

*> »•

go and vote for him. In devising this scheme they
had overlooked the fact that the election officials
wrould nearly all be Republicans and would have
it in their power to keep the polls open until their
voters could be brought in after the discovery of
the scheme, and if need be, could count their can-
didate in if he failed to receive a sufficient number

of votes. Whether Tvner actually received a ma-

»/ «.'

jority did not become known, or a subject of in-
vestigation. He got the certificate of election and
filled out Pratt's unexpired term and was nomi-
nated for re-election at the regular election of

66

1870. His opponent was Judge Thomas C. White-
side, of Wabash County, who ran as an Indepen-
dent candidate and received most of the Demo-
cratic votes, but Tyner was elected and again
elected in 1872, and in the congress of 1873 voted
for what was knowrn as the salary grab bill referred
to elsewhere. He was popular with his party, and
his personal followers could control the district in
making nominations so well was his machine or-
ganized.

Theophilus C. Philips, editor of the Howard
Tribune, published at Kokomo, and Daniel R.
Bearss, a wealthy and influential citizen of Peru,
were his managers and as shrewd politicians and
observers of the drifts of public opinion, foresaw
his defeat for re-election in 1874, if he should again
be nominated, and decided to select as the candi-
date for that election some one who would give
way for Tyner again after the storm of indignation
about the salary grab had subsided, and they se-
lected James L. Evans, a miller and prominent
citizen, but not an office seeker, of Hamilton Coun-
ty, who was elected and at the end of his first term,
they reminded him of the deal that was made
whereby he was to retire and allow Tyner the race
in 1876, but "Uncle Jim," as he was called, disa-
vowed any such arrangement and was nominated
and elected for the second term and was considered
by his colleagues as a man of excellent judgment
and a good member. This ended Tyner's congres-
sional career, but he was taken care of by appoint-
ment to a Federal position in the postoffice depart-

67

6

merit at Washington, and was for a short time
postmaster general and for a long time assistant
attorney general for that department. Evans was
not a candidate for a third term and threw his sup-
port in the convention of 1878 to his friend, Colo-
nel Thomas H. Bringhurst, of Logansport.

CHAPTER VI

fifteenth amendment to the Federal Con-
-*- stitution, that logically followed the thirteenth,
and conferred upon negroes the right to vote was
proposed to the several states by congress on the
27th day of February, 1869, and came before the
Indiana legislature for adoption or rejection a few
days later. It was one of the peculiar incidents in
the vicissitudes of politics that Colonel Isaac P.
Gray, then a member of the state senate, who led
the forces of Cumback in his race for senator at
that session, and was afterwards elected, first as
lieutenant governor and next as governor, by the
Democrats, led the fight for the adoption of the
fifteenth amendment and locked the doors of the
state senate, and pocketed the key, to prevent the
breaking of a quorum by the Democrats who op-
posed it, and openly boasted of his act and
triumph. Another interesting fact and instance
of the failure of political designs was that instead
of its ratification increasing the number of Repub-
lican votes at the succeeding election of 1870 it
had the contrary effect, and because of its ratifi-

*

cation the Democrats carried the state. Colonel
Xorman Eddy, of South Bend, headed the ticket

v *

as candidate for secretary of state and was elected,

69

as were all other Democratic candidates, including
four supreme judges, and the legislature was also
democratic.

Prejudice against the negro race was so deep-
seated and long existing that both their freedom
and right to vote was long and vigorously opposed.
This prejudice was manifested in many ways, and
years, both before, during and after the war that
resulted in their freedom, it was reflected in party
platforms, in campaign speeches and on campaign
banners in 1868. Many ex-Union soldiers were
heard to declare that President Lincoln's emanci-
pation proclamation wrould have caused mutiny
in the army if he had issued it sooner than he did,
as many of his party friends, among them Gover-
nor Morton, urged him to do, and that they never
would have enlisted as soldiers to free the negro.
Companies of these ex-soldiers became members of
an organization calling themselves 'White Boys
in Blue" and marched in the campaign proces-
sions of 1868, and to offset the influence of this
organization and to belittle the army service of its
members the Republican campaign managers
found it necessary to organize companies called
"Fighting Boys in Blue," campaign badges bear-
ing the wrords "No Nigger in Mine," were con-
spicuous in that campaign, sometimes being
prominently worn by the fair sex.

The prejudice against the negro race was
grounded in the fear that the northern states would
be overrun by slaves if they should be freed, a

%•' •/

prediction generally made during the war, but not

70

afterwards verified, except that in the years 1917
and 1918 approximately one hundred thousand
colored people were brought to the city of Chicago
and residences for them found in the best residence
districts of the city by a method of depreciation of
the value of the elegant homes they desired to oc-
cupy, a thing easily brought about by finding one
house or apartment in a block and filling it with
colored occupants, which so alarmed property own-
ers of the neighborhood that they became so panic-
stricken that they offered their homes for sale for
almost nothing and abandoned them, and the col-
ored people thus were able to occupy palaces in-
stead of the "negro quarters" where they had
lived before. This condition prevailed to such an
extent that large sections of the best residential
parts of the city became and still are occupied al-
most exclusively by colored people, and their votes,
combined with others that the then and now mayor
of that city has been able to control, have kept
his political machine in such excellent order that
the great Chicago Tribune is now attempting to
dismantle it, and is bewailing and condemning what
it terms as the voting power of the "brunette dis-
tricts" as it calls them. The losses of homes of
values, running up into the millions, have as a con-
sequence of these negro colonizations been suffered
by their owners, as well as great mental anguish
and distress occasioned by their being compelled to
abandon their homes. The writer's lost residence
of the value of ten thousand dollars stands in the
center of one of these "brunette districts," bound-

71

ed on the south by Washington park and on the
east by Drexel boulevard, but he disclaims any
prejudice against the negro race or the fortunate
colored occupants of his old family home because
of this fact. The Republican party, when it was
organized, and in the years that followed, rapidly
gained accessions to its membership in Indiana
from the ranks of the Democratic party, because of
the domination of Southern Democrats and their
determination that slavery should be extended into

»/

new states and territories. As was truly said by

f »/

Jefferson, in his allusions to the Southerners, when
he deleted part of his indictment against the King
of Great Britain, :' their reflections were not yet
matured to a full abhorrence of the slave traffic,"
and its horrors were so slow in appreciation in the
Northern States that only the most radical faction
of the Republican party and none of the Demo-
crats moved to destroy it until its destruction came

•

about as an incident of the Civil War.

O. P. MORTON

CHAPTER VII

A MOXG the former prominent Democrats who
-^- joined the Republican party in Indiana were

Alvin P. Hovev, Oliver P. Morton and Albert G.

»/ '

Porter, each of whom became governor, and Mor-
ton also, became United States senator and a
great leader of the Republican party in that body.
Morton was serving as a circuit judge at the time
he renounced the Democratic party that had
elected him, and in 1856 was nominated as the Re-
publican candidate for governor, but was defeated
bv Governor Ashel P. Willard. On the ticket with

•

him was Conrad Baker, for lieutenant governor,
who had been selected by the Republican State
Central Committee to take the place of Xathan
Kimball, who had declined it. In 1860 Morton
was selected as lieutenant governor and elected as
already mentioned. It has not become a matter

•/

of public record that any very prominent Republi-
can became a Democratic governor unless Isaac
P. Gray may be given that distinction.

«/ •/ o

The writer well remembers the appearance of
Governor Morton in May, 1864, when at Camp
Morton, in Indianapolis, he addressed a regiment
of Union soldiers, to which the writer's only
brother belonged, on its departure for the front.

73

He was then indeed a commanding figure in every
sense, about five feet, ten inches in height, stoutly
built, but not obese, with heavy coal black hair
and chin whiskers, with determined jaws, slow but
impressive and convincing in his words that were
articulated distinctly and with a meaning that was
well expressed. He told them of the daring duties
they were going forward to perform and explained
the causes of the war for the Union and the neces-
sity for its vigorous prosecution, expressed his deep
regret that the emergency called for them to make
the sacrifices they were required to make and as-
sured them of the great honor and rewards that
would be bestowed upon them. Their faces ex-
pressed their admiration of him, and their cheers
their devotion to him.

He was justly called Indiana's great war gov-
ernor. He was surrounded with and overcame the
greatest difficulties in maintaining the loyalty of
the state in furnishing its quotas of Union soldiers
required. The growth of opposition to the war,
as already mentioned, had become so vigorous that
the general election of 1862 was a positive protest
against the policies of the Federal administration.
The Indiana legislature of 1863 refused to make
the appropriations of money to carry on the war
that Governor Morton asked for, but nevertheless
made what its members deemed sufficient appro-
priations for that purpose. The leaders in the
house of Indiana representatives in the state legis-
lature of that year were Jason B. Brown of Jack-

«,'

son County, and Marcus A. O. Packard, of Mar-

74

shall County, both men of positive characteristics,
and stood high as lawyers in their respective lo-
calities, and had no superiors in point of ability in
the legislative assembly. Their determined oppo-
sition to Morton's dictation was only intensified
by the Indianapolis Journal's attempt to hold
them up to public ridicule and in branding them
as disloyal, a charge that they vigorously resented.
The Act of Congress providing for the organiza-
tion of national banks, as a means of sustaining the
government, went into effect in 1864, and Packard
found it more agreeable to organize the First Na-
tional Bank of Plymouth and give his attention
to banking and his law practice than to continue
his activities in politics, and it is a curious fact that
Morton and Jason Brown became so warmly at-
tached to each other afterwards that Brown, though
elected to the state senate as a Democrat in 1866,
complimented Morton by voting for him for Uni-
ted States senator in 1867. And upon Morton's
recommendation he was appointed as secretary of
the Territory of Wyoming and served in that po-
sition for a short time.

He again became a state senator serving in the
sessions of 1881 and 1883, and later served three
terms in congress and died at Seymour in 1898.

O v

75

CHAPTER VIII

BECAUSE of the failure of the legislature of
1863 to give to Governor Morton's adminis-
tration the appropriations he regarded as vital to
an energetic prosecution of the war he found it
necessary to call on his close personal advisers to
aid him in obtaining the funds he desired for that
purpose. He had no hesitancy in calling on Dem-
ocrats to both fight the war and to finance it. Wil-
liam H. English wras a prominent war Democrat,
a name given to one class of Democrats to distin-
guish them from another calling themselves
"Peace" Democrats, the latter being called by
malicious Republicans as "rebels" or "copper-
heads." John C. New wras a Republican, and had
been chairman of the finance committee in the
state senate of 1863. English and New wrere as-
sociated as financiers. Morton called them into con-
ference with him, and it was through their influ-
ence and personal guaranties that the banking
house of Winslow Lanier and Company of New
York advanced all the funds that Morton re-
quired, except a fractional part, that was provided
by William Riley McKean, a banker of Terre
Haute, and the next legislature made provision
for the reimbursement or repayment to Winslow

76

Lanier & Co. and McKean of the sums they had
advanced that were treated as loans to the state.
Mr. Lanier was a native of Madison, Indiana.
More about William H. English and John C.
New will appear in future pages.

Various causes existed for the opposition to the
war. Prominent among these was the fact that in
the first battles the Confederates bv reason of bet-

•/

ter preparation were victorious. The discourage-
ments of loyal Northern people that followed, com-
bined with the attitude of Southern sympathizers,
created great doubts about the success of the
Northern army, and the rivalries and jealousies of
its commanders had a tendencv to encourage these

*>• f~j

doubts. The reasons for which the war had been
declared caused many disputes, many claiming
that the restoration of the Union was the pretext,
while the freedom of the slaves was the real cause.
Another cause of opposition grew out of the fact
that many soldiers were in their opinion harshly
treated by the officers over them, they not having
anticipated the rigors of military discipline nor
the hardships of soldier life when they enlisted,
and there were manv desertions. Another cause

»/

was that a class of politicians claimed that the war
was an exclusive partisan enterprise and were too
free in attributing disloyalty to members of the

o »/ ft/

opposite party. Still another cause was in the fact
that many prominent men of the State, who had
in the beginning been active in encouraging enlist-
ments and organizing regiments, expected to be-
come officers of them but were disappointed.

77

These various causes and others contributed to
the necessity for drafts to fill quotas in many coun-
ties. The draft law that had been passed by con-
gress had made provisions whereby the person
drafted could be excused from service by either
hiring a substitute or paying a sum of money that
would enable the payment of a bounty by the gov-
ernment to encourage an enlistment in place of
the man drafted. It was claimed that this had the
effect to compel the poor men of the country to
fight the battles and to allow the rich to escape
danger. It was also charged in some instances
that the drafting boards were partial in the mat-
ter of exemptions and some were accused of ac-
cepting bribes. There was so much opposition to
the draft that enrolling officers were menaced with
threats and shot at from ambush, and mobs were
organized in some parts of the country to so resist
that it seemed for a time as if the attempts to draft
would have to be abandoned. So difficult was it
to fill quotas by draft that many counties paid
large bounties out of their treasuries to induce en-
listments. This led to a system of "bounty jump-
ing." Men would enlist, get the bounty, and
then desert and repeat the performance in another
county.

So frequent were these acts and desertions that
the military authorities determined upon a public
example of the consequences of desertion by con-
vening a court martial for the trial and conviction
of deserters and fixed their punishment at death.

On one occasion five deserters were convicted at

78

the same time and sentenced to be publicly shot
to death on the parade grounds near Camp Mor-
ton. At the hour fixed when they were to be shot
by a firing squad of soldiers they were seated on
the pine coffins that they were to be buried in and
at the command their lives were terminated. It was
published that one of these composed and re-
quested the publication of the following lines that
were often heard gleefully sung afterwards:

"Farewell, my dear Mary Ann,
You must do the best you can;
I am going to the other shore
^Yhere I'll never jump the bounty anymore."

The several elements of opposition to the war
early in 1863 crystallized into the formation of
secret organizations to oppose it, called first, "Sons
of Liberty," and next, "Knights of the Golden
Circle," both of which were finally broken up by
military authorities or were abandoned. Readers

i/

of our Colonial history will recall that the name,
"Sons of Liberty." was adopted by Colonists, who
revolted against British rule. The appropriation
of this name by the organized opponents of the
Civil War in itself justified their being called
"rebels," because their ancestors in name were in
fact in rebellion against Great Britain. These In-
diana "rebels" came to know each other when they
met outside of their lodges by the tokens they wore
which were made by molding breast pins to the
large copper cents that were then in circulation.
On the crown of the heads that were engraved on

79

these copper coins was the word 'Liberty." The
observers of these tokens not knowing or caring
anything about the origin or significance of the
name "Sons of Liberty," preferred to look upon
the wearers as the companions of the copperhead
snake, hence the name, "Copperheads," was ap-
plied to them. Butternut breastpins were another
emblem of Southern admiration that were worn.
They were made by severing into two parts the
conically shaped nuts that grew on white walnut
trees in parts of Indiana, the interior cells of
which revealed a resemblance of two hearts sepa-
rated from each other and claimed to mean a
northern and southern Union. These were often
snatched from the wearers and caused manv fist

tt

fights.

The name "Knights of the Golden Circle," can
be traced to a pro-slavery organization that pro-
posed a slave-holding Confederacy about the time
that the war with Mexico was declared that would
be included in a circle containing all the slave
states, California, Cuba, Mexico and Texas. It
was this organization, and slave owners generally,
that began their advocacy of the right and their
purposes of seceding from the Union and kept it
up until they attempted to make their purposes
successful, by adopting ordinances of secession in
Southern states and firing on the American flag
at Fort Sumter.

These organizations in Indiana, as was disclosed
by members who had joined them, had secret lodges
with rites and ceremonies in the initiation of their

80

members that bound them together by oaths and
other obligations, and that required them as part
of their work in contemplation that of assisting
in the release of captured Confederate soldiers,
who were prisoners of wrar at Camp Morton in In-
dianapolis, and Camp Douglas in Illinois. To ef-
fect their purposes they had drilled their members
and educated them in the use of guns and other
weapons that they kept concealed in their lodges
and other places. The purposes and plans of
these oath-bound, treasonable organizations hav-
ing been confided to, or became known to, leading
democrats who had no sympathy with them, they
were exposed from that source.

There had been strong suspicions that some
Democratic leaders throughout the state were
identified with these organizations, and these sus-
picions were confirmed by declarations made by
Michael C. Kerr, of Xew Albany, who in the
spring of 1864 was a candidate for the nomina-
tion for congress on the Democratic ticket. On
the evening of the day preceding the assembling
of the convention that was to make the nomination,
he called his supporters together and announced to
them his intention of withdrawing from the race,
because he was in possession of knowledge that a
conspiracy existed against the government of the
state and that the conspirators were Democrats,
and that he felt it his duty to go to Indianapolis
and lay the facts before Governor Morton, which
he did, and Morton and the military agencies at
his command upon the basis of the information

81

that he furnished, were enabled to break up these
oath-bound, treasonable organizations. A condi-
tion bordering on anarchy was prevailing in parts
of the State and particularly in Southern Indiana,
when Kerr decided to contribute all of his power
to destroy its sources. The information he had
furnished led to the arrest of Lambdin P. Milli-
gan, of Huntington, on the 5th day of October,
1864, under the General Order No. 38, that Gen-
eral Burnside had previously issued.

After making this exposure by Kerr his friends
insisted upon his accepting their nomination for
congress, as a war Democrat, and he was elected
that year and for a number of succeeding terms.

Milligan was found guilty by the military com-
mission that tried him, of five charges: First,
conspiracy against the government of the United
States ; second, affording aid and comfort to rebels
against the authority of the United States; third,
inciting insurrection; fourth, disloyal practices;
fifth, violation of the laws of war, and he was sen-
tenced to death.

He applied to the United States District Court
at Indianapolis for a writ of habeas corpus, in his
petition setting forth that he was not in the mili-
tary service of the United States or subject to ar-
rest or trial by the military authorities, and that
the military commission wras without jurisdiction
to hear or determine as to his guilt or innocence
of the charges against him. The right to the writ
of habeas corpus had been suspended in districts
where a state of war existed. It was his conten-

82

tion, and that of his counsel, that this suspension
did not apply to the State of Indiana as a state of
war did not exist in it. The Federal Court, to
which he applied, certified to a division of opinion
by the judges that had the effect to transfer his
petition to the Supreme Court of the United
States, and to suspend the execution of the death
sentence, but he was remanded to the jail in which
he was confined to await the final decision by the

w

Supreme Court of the United States, and while
the case was pending, an application for his par-
don was made to President Johnson, who refused
to grant it, and in time the Supreme Court, in an
opinion written by Judge David Davis, who had
been appointed supreme judge by President Lin-
coln, decided that the military tribunal was with-
out jurisdiction and he was released.

Among other army men who composed the mil-
itary commission that tried him was General Mah-
lon D. Manson, a prominent Democrat, about
whom more will be written.

After his release Milligan brought a civil suit
against the individual members of the commission
for false imprisonment, claiming damages in a
large sum and a petit jury awarded him one cent.
Whether he was guilty of the acts with which he
was charged, may have been a question of some
doubt, but the public generally accepted the de-
cision of the military commission as conclusive and
believed him guilty. This was not, however, the
opinion of all his fellow citizens of Huntington,
who gave him a great ovation on his return home

83

and he seemingly had their confidence and high
respect generally. He resumed his law practice
and continued it for many years afterwards.

It was in the wildernesses and about the foot-
hills of the counties of Orange, Washington and
Jackson, that the principal place of rendezvous of
the Knights of the Golden Circle was found to
be and because of that fact the people of these
counties were often unjustly accused of disloyalty,
when in fact the best of soldiers of the Union army

•/

went forth and served their country from these
counties. Among those remembered were Colonels
Cyrus L. Dunham and Frank Emerson, and Cap-
tains John F. Scott and John N. McCormick of
Jackson County; Captain John C. Lawler and
Samuel B. Vo}des of Washington, and Thomas B.
Buskirk of Orange. Colonel Emerson was circuit
judge for many years. John C. Lawler was a
member of the legislature and the leader of the
Washington County bar. Samuel B. Voyles was
a state senator and circuit judge, as was Thomas
B. Buskirk.

Robust and powerful as Governor Morton was,
the great strain on him mentally and physically
during the war had the effect to break his health,
so that his limbs became partially paralyzed about
the time that the war ended, and during the bal-
ance of his life he had to support himself by
crutches and canes, and remain seated on occasions
when he addressed public meetings, but he still
held his great power in his party and was elected
United States senator in 1867, and re-elected in

84

1873; and was a candidate for the nomination for
president in 1876, but defeated by General Ruther-
ford B. Hayes. As senator he became one of the
members of the electoral commission that decided
the disputed question as to who had been elected
president in 1876. He was also one of the senators
who voted for the conviction of Andrew Johnson
on his impeachment trial.

Morton and Hendricks differed from each other
in every way. Among the memorial addresses in
congress on the occasion of the death of Hendricks,
was one by William D. Owen, an eloquent clergy-
man of the Christian Church, who then represented
the Logansport district in congress as a Republi-
can, in which an apt comparison or contrast of the
characters of these two great men appears in his
declaration that: 'Two more diverse spirits never
battled in government before; Morton and Hend-
ricks--Sir Richard and Sir Launcelot, the lion-
hearted, and the fair knight. The one spoke to
men with the majesty of an autocrat; the other
talked with men as a man with his fellows. The
one always commanded; the other always pleaded.
The one brooked no dissent in his following; the
other left his train camp far apart. The one
like Caesar would burn eight hundred cities, bathe
his sword in a million lives, and wade through
blood to preserve the cause he championed; the
other, Coriolanus like, seeing the carnage, the de-
solation, the anguish, would sheath his sword and
turn away."

The attitude of Hendricks towards the war was

85

severely criticised by his political opponents. He
was charged with being a Southern sympathizer and
with disk>3ralty, without having the courage to
openly manifest his real convictions. In support
of their denunciations they cited among other
things an address that he delivered on the assem-
bling of the Democratic convention, over which he
presided on the 8th day of January, 1862, in which
he said: "With secession upon one hand and sec-
tional interference with Southern rights upon the
other we hold no sympathy."

The platform of his party that followed his ad-
dress was claimed to reflect his real views in its
vigorous denunciations of the conduct of the war,
and in the declaration that: ;'it resulted from the
long continued, unwise and fanatical agitation in
the North of the question of domestic slavery, and
we are opposed to a war for the emancipation of
the negroes or the subjugation of the Southern
States."

It was the adoption of this platform that
caused the division of the Democratic party into
two distinct classes, one called the 'War Demo-
crats." It was openly repudiated by such Demo-
crats as Governor Joseph A. Wright, Wm. H.
English, Cyrus L. Dunham, James Hughes, Gen.
Lew Wallace, Gen. Alvon P. Hovey, Gen. Ebene-
zer Dumon; Colonel Norman, Eddy, and hun-
dreds of others.

Hendricks preferred to remain with the faction
that opposed subjugation of the forces that were
in rebellion and stood for peace at any price, and

86

became the beneficiary of the power it possessed in
making him its representative in the United States
senate.

It is not believable that the great political up-
heaval that brought the Democratic party into
power in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania,
Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and even in Iowa, in 1862,
could have been foreseen by him when in January
of that year he took his stand with the opponents
of the war and that he took it merely to be on the
winning side, a want of sincerity was never charged
against him, and it must be assumed that his choice
was made in accordance with his convictions. A
consideration of the then existing conditions and
the implications that his views were reflected in the
platform that he supported indicate that his critics
were not wholly without justification in their
charges; but his course and votes in the senate
showed no affection for or sympathy with the
southerners, nor any opposition to the war. Pie
voted for all appropriation measures that were pro-
posed to carry it on, among these the largest ap-
propriation bill that had ever been passed, also
offered and voted for measures to increase the pay
of the Union soldiers in proportion to the then de-
preciated condition of the currency, and in his
campaign for governor and vice-president after
the war was always supported by a large number
of former Union soldiers.

CHAPTER IX

TV7ILLIAM H. ENGLISH has been the sub-
ject of so many historic sketches that only
a brief addition to them will be here attempted.
His life is part of the life of the State itself, so
closely was he identified with it in its development.
He was born at Lexington in Scott County, and
in his early years received a college education. Was
a member and secretary of the constitutional con-
vention of 1851, that still exists as the organic law
of the State. He became a member of the first
legislature that assembled under this constitution
and was its speaker. In 1852 he was elected to
congress and served in that bodv for four consecu-

•/

tive terms, becoming on his entrance in congress
a member of the committee on territories, then the
most important committee of that body, as it had
to deal with the all absorbing question of slavery.

The territory of Kansas was created in 1854,
and aspired to statehood. Whether it should come
in as a free or slave State made it a scene of bitter
partisan conflict. A territorial legislature that
assembled at Lecompton in 1857 adopted a pro-
slavery constitution.

Mr. English dissented from his Democratic as-
sociates upon the question of its admission and

88

\VM. H. ENGLISH

opposed its becoming a State, and in the commit-
tee on conference reported what was known as the
English bill that required the ratification or re-
jection of the Lecompton constitution by a vote
of the people of the State. The people rejected
the Lecompton constitution and a new one was
adopted in 1858 at Topeka that made it a free
territory, and it was admitted as a free State in

v •

1861. To William H. English the credit must
therefore be given for the first practical step in re-
pelling the encroaches of slavery. This act in
antagonizing the dominant forces of the party to
which he belonged required the kind of independ-
ence and courage that always aligned him with
the best leaders in thought and action in the pub-
lic interest. This course in respect to the admis-
sion of Kansas caused the first open threats of
secession from the Union to be made, and Mr.
English warned his fellow Democrats of the South-

o

ern States that the people of the North would de-
feat any such attempt on their part, and consistent
with that warning he became an active war Demo-
crat in his State, and, as mentioned elsewhere,
aided Governor Morton in providing the neces-
sarv "sinews of war." He was a staunch Demo-

•

crat of the Jefferson school, and while maintaining
his identity as such at all times he made it a point
to always use his influence at the right time to see
that his party was not too far led astray by the
many new theories and plans of temporary polit-
ical expediency that were proposed, and accord-
ingly it was in the Tilden and Hayes campaign of

89

1876 that he came forward to lead his party in sup-
port of the resumption of specie payment of the
government's obligations, and thus aided in the
overthrow of the so-called greenback party and in
the triumph of democracy at that election.

John C. New was made quartermaster gen-
eral bv Governor Morton, and as before mentioned
«/

was on the legislative committee on finance in the
legislature of 1863, and rendered the great aid to
the State and to Governor Morton in obtaining
the funds to carry on the war.

He was clerk of the Marion County circuit court
from 1857 to 1861; was treasurer of the United
States during part of the administration of Pres-
ident Grant, 1875-76, and assistant secretary of
the treasury in 1882, under President Arthur. He
was an active promoter of the candidacy of Gen-
eral Benjamin Harrison for president, and cred-
ited with bringing about his nomination and elec-
tion, and was appointed consul general at London,
England, by President Harrison. He was for more
than half a century identified with financial and

•>

business enterprises of Indianapolis and always
stood in the front ranks of its best citizens. He
was born at Vernon in Jennings County in 1831,
and knew what it was to endure the privations of
pioneer life. His father was one of the early set-
tlers of that county who had served as a soldier
in the war of 1812.

A part only of the public record of General
Mahlon D. Manson, who was for so many vears

*/ V

in public life, will be given in this chapter. He was

90

elected auditor of state in 1878. Long and event-
ful as was his life he related an incident in that
year that set forth much of his career that will be
recited here. It was part of his official duties as
auditor of state on the convening of the state legis-
lature to take part in its organization, by making
up a roll of its members to be called and sworn
in.

On the day preceding the meeting of the assem-
bly of 1879, the members came into his office to
present their credentials so that he might enroll
their names.

On going to the old Grand Hotel at Indiana-
polis on the evening of that day, he met a group
of young men who always sought association with
him and greatly admired him, when he said: "Boys,
you are all aspiring to fame and I want to tell
you what fame is. As the members of the legisla-
ture came into mv office today and were intro-

%/ •/

duced or introduced themselves, there wras one
who did not know my name and asked to have it
repeated, I said, sir, my name is Manson. He
said Manson, Manson, what countv are you from

v •/

Mr. Manson? I said, I am from Manson Countv.

mt

He said, Oh, yes, I think I have liearn of you]
before. Just think of it, boys! In my youthful
davs in the vear 1846 I enlisted as a soldier and

*/ «.'

went to the war with Mexico, I fought at the battle
of Buena Vista and was at the storming of Cha-
pultepec, I revelled in the Halls of the Montezu-
mas, and returned to my home at the beautiful city
where Wabash College is located and engaged in

91

mercantile business until the Civil War begun. On
the first call for troops I hung a sign on my store
door saying, 'this store will be open when the war
is over/ and locked it and again enlisted as a sol-
dier. I became colonel of the 10th Indiana Regi-
ment and led it in the first battles in the State of
Kentucky, where I was severely wounded and was
promoted to be a brigadier soldier for bravery in
action and served until the war ended. My party
nominated me for secretary of state while I was
in the field and I was defeated. On mv return

c/

home I was nominated for congress and defeated
the author of the Fair God and was nominated
for re-election and defeated bv Godlove S. Orth.

mJ

I have presided at Democratic state conventions
and made political speeches in every county in the
State and was elected auditor of state in 1878,
and here comes a man to make laws that are to
be rules of action for the people of this great State
who believes there is a county in it named Manson
and thinks he has hearn of me before; such is
fame/'

CHAPTER X

;HE Republican candidates for State offices
•*• who had been elected in 1868 were again nom-
inated in 1870, as were the four judges of the
Supreme Court of the State who had been elected
in 1864.

These judges were Jehu T. Elliott of Xew
Castle, James S. Frasier of Warsaw, Robert C.
Gregory of LaFayette, and Charles A. Ray of
Indianapolis.

The Democratic convention nominated to head
its ticket Colonel Xorman Eddy of South Bend,
who had been elected to congress in 1852 and in
whose honor a post of the Grand Army of the Re-
public of that city was named and still exists. In
1861 he organized and was appointed Colonel of
the 48th Indiana Regiment and fought in the bat-
tles of Corinth, Grand Gulf and luka, where he
was severely wounded, but remained with his regi-
ment in the seige of Vicksburg and served until
the war ended. He led his party to victory in the
State in 1870, and died while holding the office of
secretary of state.

m

The Democratic candidates for judges of the
Supreme Court were James L. Worden of Fort
Wayne, Alexander C. Downey of Rising Sun,
Samuel H. Buskirk of Bloomington, and John

93

Pettit of LaFayette, who were elected and their
judicial opinions ranked as high as had those of
their predecessors, and they were all renominated
in 1876, but all with the exception of Judge Wor-
den lost their places as candidates by reason of
circumstances hereafter related.

The Democrats also carried the legislature and
at its meeting in January, 1871, William Mack
of Terre Haute was elected speaker of the house.
The Democrats had elected as one of their mem-
bers a gentleman from a southern Indiana county,
who was reported to have operated a gambling de-
vice called a "Faro Bank." Mack found it difficult
to select his chairman of the standing committee on
banks and called in Colonel James H. Rice to assist
him. Rice, like Mack, w^as not lacking in humorous
qualities and proposed that the member from
southern Indiana be selected, as he wras the only

*/

Democratic banker in the house, and Mack yielded
to the suggestion. There were a number of Re-
publican bankers in the house with whom he served
and associated, and it was said that the committee
on banks and banking met oftener than any other

C_7 •/

during that session, and that the chairman pocketed
all the bills that were referred to it.

There wfas no very important legislation en-
acted at that session. Such a publication as a non-
partisan newspaper was not in general circulation
in Indiana at that time. The now great and in-
fluential Indianapolis News that was founded by
John H. Holiday as an independent newspaper in
1869, was then struggling to maintain an existence.

94

The dissemination of public intelligence and
partisan doctrines was the work of the old reliable
Indianapolis Journal and the Indianapolis Sen-
tinel. By custom the party that succeeded at the
election bestowed upon the publisher of its State
organ the office of state printer, which however,
was not an office created by either the State con-
stitution or any legislative enactment, but by usage
and precedent was called an office. From that of-
fice the books and stationery of every description
required by the State and its several departments
were furnished at prices that the state printer
fixed, no competition was permitted, nor was there
any limit to the quantities of supplies that might
be furnished.

Alexander Hamilton Conner then the owner of
the Indianapolis Journal had been the State
printer for six years prior to 1870. The election
of that year displaced him and the publisher of
the Sentinel succeeded him.

The old reliable Journal changed its ownership
soon afterwards and its new editor, from motives of
jealousy or for some other cause, and unmindful
of the amenities and harmony that ought to exist
between the proprietors of two great party organs,
charged in a leading editorial that the state printer
had prevailed upon a complaisant state auditor
to give him a warrant on the State treasurv for

O v

the value of a large quantity of stationery without
observing the formality of furnishing it. This
charge led to further investigations by someone
of mousing propensities who discovered that the

95

basements and all other storing places for such
supplies were so crowded that there was no room
for any more.

About the same time that these disclosures were
made it was suggested from many sources that
there were other irregularities and customs of long
standing in regard to the State's finances that
should be reformed. And there was a loud clamor
for the state printer to take some notice of the
charges against him, that was not confined to Re-
publicans alone, but Democrats who had a fond
admiration for their State paper also demanded a
defense from him. To this he responded in an
editorial with headlines reading:

'When you get a good thing save it, save it."
When you get a black cat skin it to the tail," and
justified his act by citing Republican precedents.

Another instance of a want of discipline of
temper, and an absence of refinement on the part
of a later owner of the Sentinel was on an occa-
sion when the Supreme Court of the State had
decided a case contrary to his wishes and he
headed an editorial saying, "Damn Their Cowardly
Souls"

Such performances and examples were more
reprehensible than those of rival editors of country
newspapers in giving weekly entertainments to
their readers by publishing columns of personal
abuse of each other, their quarrels generally orig-
inating over contests for the county printing of
delinquent tax lists.

This condition of affairs had gone to such an

96

JOHN B. STOLL

extent that the power and influence of the Demo-
cratic partisan press of Indiana had almost ceased
to exist when it occurred to the now veteran editor,
John B. Stoll, that a Democratic editorial asso-
ciation would be an appropriate instrumentality
in reviving the influence and usefulness of the press,
and be the means of denning, co-ordinating and
harmonizing Democratic doctrines and disseminat-
ing them in the education of voters to an under-
standing of the principles of democracy. To him
is the credit due for the origin and influence of
that association that he was the first president of.
A like association was later organized bv He-

C5 •/

publican editors and they have both perpetuated
their powers. It was not alone in this association
that S toll's great work and influence was recog-
nized. For a half century his advice and influence
has been sought by the political leaders of the
party with which he has been identified, his popu-
lar name has also been frequently used by his
selection as a presidential elector, and he has been
deserving of much hgher honors. The purity, vigor
and independence of the editorials in his own news-
papers and his contributions to others attest his
culture, and his continuous labors as a journalist
place him at the head of that profession in the
State. He has at all times stood as a prominent
protagonist for high ideals and basic principles of
right in matters both secular and sacred, and has
never been known to yield his sound convictions
to the temptations of questionable political expe-
dients. At the time this is written, in the year

97

1920, the author of this production has found two
articles from his gifted pen that have an appro-
priate application to existing conditions and to
illuminate its pages they are here reproduced from
the Kendallville, Indiana, News-Sun:

"MAN'S INDISPUTABLE PREROGA-
TIVE

'The basic principle upon which the American
republic was founded assures its inhabitants of the
God-given right of 'life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness.' Experience teaches that work is an
essential part of organized society. Common sense
teaches that human existence is dependent on pro-
ductive work. The avenues to production must
therefore be open to all capable of some sort of
productive activity. But along comes the profes-
sional labor leader or agitator with the specious
plea that in all essential productive institutions
only such persons may work who hold membership
in an oath bound organization commonly called
'union.' By establishing what is called the 'closed
shop' all persons disinclined to subordinate per-
sonal prerogative to union dictatorship are ex-
cluded from such institution, no matter how much
such laborer may wish to find employment therein
or howr greatly the owner or owners of such insti-
tution might desire to secure such service. As has
been stated over and over, the establishment of
labor unions is not objected to so long as the para-
mount object is mutual benefit, proper working
conditions, and just remuneration for service ren-

98

dered. The more amicable the relations between
laborers and employers the better for the commu-
nity and for society. Professional agitators and
walking delegates are justly looked upon as leeches
sucking the lifeblood of labor. To brand a non-
union laborer 'a scab' is an outrage to which no
wage worker should ever be subjected. To attempt
to deprive him of the privilege and opportunity to
work wherever his services mav be desired is a

V

flagrant violation of human right and an indefen-
sible disregard of individual prerogative.

"No non-union worker has ever been known to
refuse work side by side with a member of any
labor organization. The right of workingmen to
organize and maintain labor organizations is not
disputed. But the right of such organization ar-
bitrarily to control or regulate the management of
any employing institution is emphatically denied.
The demand for wrhat is known as the 'closed shop'
is unreasonable, unwarranted and intolerable. This
demand is as unreasonable as would be a rule that
only members of certain fraternal organizations
may obtain employment in this or that establish-
ment. Unions for the betterment of conditions in
any branch of industry are commendable and
worthy of encouragement. Unions for raising hell
in a community may justly be designated as pub-
lic nuisances — a detriment to wage workers and an
evil to society. These self-evident but dogmatic-
ally suppressed truths should be conspicuously
brought to public attention and to popular under-
standing."

99

8

•73505k

"NO SAFETY WITHOUT RELIGION

'Time and again the declaration has been made
through the medium of this department that no
republic can long endure without the observance
of religious tenets. High authority for this con-
tention has been cited. No one has ventured to
pronounce this assertion to be either unsound or
fallacious. The declaration stands as an unshaken
and uncontradictable truth.

'Persistently maintaining this attitude, it is
highly gratifying to be splendidly reinforced by
what I consider the most perfect daily newspaper
in the United States- -the Kansas City Star,
founded many years ago by an Indiana product,
Col. William R. Nelson, born and reared at Ft.
Wayne by a profoundly religious family, headed
by I. D. G. Nelson, a man of high standing in
city, county and state.

"In a recent Sunday issue of that admirable pub-
lication appeared an editorial headed 'A Sermon.'
The text of the sermon reads : 'And Abraham was
rich in cattle, in silver and in gold.' After com-
prehensively detailing the doings and experiences
of Abraham, the Star sermon runs thus:

'The text finds Abraham on his way back to
Canaan. In Egypt he had lost his power, his in-
fluence and even his self-respect. He had only his
riches left. But it was not through riches that the
world was to be blessed through Abraham. God
had something better in store for the world than
cattle and silver and gold.

100

"And when Abraham was taken back to Canaan
he was taken, also, back to Bethel, back to 'where
he was in the beginning,' and there, it is recorded,
he did something that he did not do in the land
of Egypt: 'There he called upon the name of the
Lord/

"And from Bethel, in Canaan, a nation of God-
fearing men was established. Through that na-
tion came to the world the Ten Commandments,
the Law of Moses, and, finally, the Man of Gali-
lee. Every fundamental law of civilization and
every inspiration of mankind that has made life
worth while, individually or nationally, came from
the nation that Abraham was called into Canaan
to build.

'There is a lesson, brethren beloved (for this is
a sermon), in the experience of Abraham. A les-
son for the good old LTnited States of America.
Something wrong with us. Things are out of joint.
Read the newspapers and note the stories in al-
most every column of the news pages almost every
day in the week — murders, riots, thefts, oppres-
sions, discontent, unrest, disorder. Statesmen re-
alize it. Serious men acknowledge it. The wise
hearted no longer hide their eyes from it. They
face the storm that is shaking us and seek a path
back to industrial, social and political peace. The
country is rich, but we seem to be suffering from
poverty in the thing that makes for happiness and
contentment.

"It requires no preacher to tell us what we
need. It is spiritual peace, for the spirits of men

101

run wild and are at war. Reason has no place
among us. We are living in the midst of alarms.
We seek what riches cannot buy, but without
which wealth lacks riches for us. And that applies
to the nation as it applies to the individual. A
contented nation cannot come from a discontented
people.

'The path we seek leads back to first principles;
back to where we were in the beginning. Back to
the fundamentals of old-fashioned religion; back
to the house of God. Back to the faith 'once de-
livered to the saints.' And that path leads Amer-
ica back to the place of blessing for itself and to
the place where it can be a blessing to the world.
If world blessing is what we desire as a nation we
are sure to find it in the place of blessing for our-
selves.

Tis the good old path that our fathers trod;
Tis the good old way, and it leadeth up to God."

The Star sermon ought to be printed in the form
of a brochure and be given a place in every Amer-
ican household. The truths contained therein ought
to help wonderfully to arouse the well meaning
people of this country to a sense of duty.

It would require thousands of pages to give an
account of Stoll's accomplishments as a journalist
and historian and to sketch his personal and polit-
ical career. He was engaged to write a "History
of the Indiana Democracy, from 1816 to 1916," by
a publishing company that embarked in that enter-
prise. A volume of 1,090 pages, of 600 words

102

on each page, was the result of his three years'
labor in that undertaking. While the work, in
accordance with the designs of its promoters, sets
forth the virtues and activities of nearly all Demo-
cratic partisans of the State during that long
period, and the doctrines and platforms of that
party, it at the same time deals fairly with its
opponents and in many instances shows the distinct
dissent of its author from the views and positions
of his party on public questions. Aside from the
partisan features of the work, it reveals such a
marvelous and stupendous compilation of historic
matter as shows a full and accurate account of
the constitutional, legislative and judicial history
of the State from 1816 to 1916, and brings to light
many historic acts that have not been so clearly
exposed in any other history of the State.

Another of the State's historians was William
Wesley Wollen, the author of "Biographical and
Historical Sketches of Early Indiana." His char-

mf

acter sketches are only equaled by the elegance of
his diction and phrases, and the wisdom of his
words. In one of its parts he pay this tribute to
pioneers of whom he wrote, "Men who found em-
pires should not be forgotten. They plant the tree
of civil liberty and water its roots, while those who
come after them but trim its branches to preserve
its symmetry. If they plant carelessly and in
poor soil, the tree will have but a sickly growth.
That the men who planted Indiana in the wilder-
ness planted wisely and well is evidenced by its

wonderful growth.

55

103

For many years, both the Journal and Sentinel
were ably edited, the former by Judge E. B. Mar-
tindale, B. R. Sulgrove, John D. Nicholas, Elijah
W. Halford, and others; the latter by Joseph J.
Bingham, Rufus Magee, Robert L. Matthews,
Joseph B. Maynard, Samuel E. Morss, and other
able writers. It went out of existence soon after
its editorial about the Supreme Court, and a few
years later the Journal was merged into the In-
dianapolis Star.

Colonel William R. Holloway of Indianapolis,
was at different times the owner of the Journal.
It was under his management that its influence in
the guidance and education of Republican voters
was the most powerful, and that it succeeded also
as a business enterprise and wras for years the lead-
ing paper of the State. It was the gospel herald
of the Republican party. Its Republican readers
looked upon it as their Bible, and so revered its
name that they disapproved of the change of it
to the Star.

Colonel Hollowav was the military secretary of

&/ m/ v

Governor Morton during the civil war and was his
brother-in-law. His father, David P. Holloway,
wras for many years the owner and editor of the
Richmond Palladium, probably the oldest and best
known of the early newspapers in Indiana, and
was also a member of congress and a commissioner
of patents.

Colonel Hollowav was also identified with other

V

newspapers of Indianapolis and was the founder
of the Indianapolis Times. He held the office of

104

postmaster at Indianapolis for a number of years,
was first appointed to that position by President
Grant. His son, Edward Morton Hollo way, is
the very efficient clerk of the United States Cir-

t/

cuit Court of Appeals at Chicago.

Many men who became prominent as journalists
began their newspaper work as reporters on the
old Indianapolis Journal. Among these reporters
well remembered were: George C. Harding,
Charles Dennis, Gideon B. Thompson, William
H. Blodgett, and Harry S. Xew, now United
States Senator, who became a member of the re-
portorial staff in 1878, and continued in that cap-
acity for twentv-five years, and has had an active

«. mJ •!

career in Republican politics. He served a four-
years term in the Indiana State Senate, from 1896
to 1900, and was the author of the county and

A

township reform bills that were passed at the ses-
sion of 1897. His personal popularity and loyalty
to the Republican party in times of disaster as
well as success enabled him to defeat James E.
Watson by a large popular majority in the pri-
mary race for United States senator, and he was

•

elected as senator in 1896, and soon after enter-
ing the senate was chosen as a member of the com-
mittee on military affairs, and has rendered con-
spicuous service in behalf of measures for the pro-
secution of the World War, and is now a member
of the committee on foreign relations, and is also
chairman of the committee on territories and in-
sular possessions.

105

CHAPTER XI

THE events in the congress of the United States
that followed the election of General Grant
as president in 1868, had such a connection with
and bearing upon political events in Indiana that
it is proper to mention some of them.

The contests for power between the executive
and legislative departments of the Federal govern-
ments have been bitter in nearly all administra-
tions since their creation.

The requirements of the "advice and consent"
of the senate to nominations by the president for
the higher grade of officials and the passing of
judgment by that body on all treaties proposed
with foreign powers have led to these conflicts.

The Senatus Comultum of the Roman Repub-
lic, composed of Patricians, was never more dictato-
rial than have been its imitators in the senate of
the United States. In the case of President John-
son, they hastily and willingly converted the senate
into a court of impeachment, and but for the fact
that a two-third vote is required to convict the
executive, probably attempted impeachment in
other instances wrould have occurred.

Charles Sumner of Massachusetts, one of the
most learned and conspicuous of United States

106

senators, was one of its members most determined
to convict Johnson, and four years later became
a supporter of his policies of reconciliation that
were the basis for his attempted impeachment.

Less than two years after Grant's inauguration
as president, he recalled the historian, John Lath-
rop Motley, as minister to England in defiance of
the wishes of Senator Sumner. This so enraged
Sumner that he took advantage of his position as
chairman of the committee on foreign relations to
make a desperate effort to have a treaty that Grant
had proposed with San Domingo rejected by the
senate, and in referring to the president in his
speech, opposing ratification opened it by quoting
the words:

"Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed
that he hath grown so great," and affixed the
word "ism" to Grant's name, as another senator
from the same State, and also chairman of the
foreign relations committee, did to the name of
President Wilson forty-eight years later.

President Garfield nominated as collector of
the Port of New York a man named Robertson,
who had been a delegate to the Republican con-
vention who cast the first vote for his nomination
for president.

Roscoe Conkling, the leading senator from Xew
York, became so angered at Garfield for this act
that he resigned from the senate, as did Senator
Thomas C. Platt, who followed him and got the
name "me too Platt," but they both failed to get
the vindication from the people of the State that

107

they sought, and so disrupted their party in the
State that James G. Elaine, who was Garfield's
secretary of state and the nominee for president
in 1884, lost the State's electoral vote.

These are only mentioned as prominent instances
of the consequences of senatorial dictation.

Grant survived the malignities of Sumner and
was re-elected in 1872 bv an almost unanimous elec-

mt

toral vote. Both he and his successor of after
years have records among the greatest in the
world's achievements that personal malevolence,
though clothed in senatorial vesture, have not
diminished in their splendor.

The speech that Sumner made in denunciation
of Grant was answered bv Senator Howe, who

•>

said he had "plunged a dagger into the Republican
party." Carl Schurz, United States senator from
Missouri, joined Sumner in his denunciation of
Grant and endorsed his utterances saying, it was
not into the Republican party, but into Ceesarism
that Sumner had plunged the dagger, and that
:<we cannot forget that the world has agreed to
pronounce Brutus the noblest Roman of them all."
These speeches of the followers of Brutus were
given great circulation in the presidential cam-
paign of 1872, and Sumner and Schurz tried the
experiment of forming what was called a "Liberal

Republican Partv." Thev called their followers to

«/ •/

meet them in national convention at Cincinnati,
Schurz presided at the convention and Horace
Greeley was nominated for president, and Sehurz's
senatorial colleague from Missouri, Benjamin

108

Gratz Brown, was nominated for vice-president.
Brown was charged in the campaign that followed,
among other things, with being in such a condition
at a public banquet held in his honor that he spread
butter on his watermelon, and Greeley was bitterly
denounced because he had clamored for amnesty
for the rebels and had signed the bail bond of the
traitor, Jeff Davis, to get him out of prison at
Fortress Monroe.

At that time the Democratic party in Indiana
wras greatly in need of some new lifeblood, because
of the odium that had attached to it as the product
of some of its leaders during the war, and because
of the persistent repetition of the charge of dis-
lovaltv that was made against it during the war.

«,• mr C? C-5

The prejudice against it in many localities was
felt by the Democratic merchant who suffered pro-
scriptions and boycotting in his business, by the
Democratic lawyer in his profession because of its
reflections in the verdicts of juries, and even
judges in their decisions on questions of law and
fact were intimidated by it, while the young man,
who dared to identifv himself as a Democrat did

mf

so at the risk of social ostracism. It was the pre-
vailing opinion among Democrats that their party
would be nourished into new life by going into
repose, and that the bolting Republican leaders
were more fitted for leadership than their own, and
that the desertions from Grant would be numerous
enough to defeat him, and therefore it was decided
to adopt what was called :'the passive policy."
Joseph E. McDonald and Daniel W. Yoorhees,

109

of the Democratic leaders, did not at first concur
in this course, and possibly the farseeing Joseph
E. McDonald had visions of the ambitious states-
man, Isaac P. Gray, coming into the party with
his followers of liberal Republicans to wrest the
honors of leadership from him, and if he did it was
a dream that came true.

Notwithstanding McDonald's opposition to the
endorsement of Greeley, when a resolution of en-
dorsement was offered in the Democratic State
convention, he came forward and gaining recogni-
tion by the chairman, said he recognized the logic
of events and seconded the motion for its adoption.

The same convention forced the nomination for
governor on Thomas A. Hendricks.

Washington C. DePauw of New Albany, was
nominated for lieutenant governor. He was a
man of supposed great wealth that he had gained
in the manufacture of plate glass. While he was
identified in name as a Democrat, his interests were
with the Republican party as a beneficiary of its
protective tariff policies, consequently and consis-
tently he declined the nomination, and Colonel
John R. Cravens of Madison, Indiana, was placed
on the ticket in his stead bv the Democratic State

ft>

committee and he was defeated at the election by
Leonidas Sexton, of Rushville.

DePauw's beneficence was later bestowed on
what was then Asburv University, that in conside-

•/ mr *

ration of the donations it received or had the prom-
ise of, changed its name by legislative consent to
DePauw University, but this consent was not given

110

without some comments about the sacred name of
Bishop Asbury being bartered away for DePauw's
gold that it was afterwards said greatly depre-
ciated in amount.

Asbury University, named in honor of Bishop
Francis Asbury, the first Bishop of the Methodist
Episcopal Church in the United States, who was
sent to America as a missionary to its colonies in
1771, was organized under a charter granted to its
trustees in 1836.

It required the active voices of Hendricks, Mc-
Donald, Voorhees and other leaders to arouse the
Democratic voters to a full appreciation of this
'passive policy," and Republican newspapers and
speakers were not slow in reminding them of the
many disrespectful things that the New York Tri-
bune, founded by Horace Greeley, had said about
them when it said that "all Democrats are not horse
thieves but all horse thieves are Democrats," and
"all Democrats are not rebels but all rebels are
Democrats." So confident of success were the In-
diana Republicans that year that there was a spir-
ited contest for governor between Gen. Thomas
M. Browne of Winchester, who was then United
States district attorney, Godlove S. Orth of La

•/ *

Fayette, and General Benjamin Harrison of In-
dianapolis. General Browne won the nomination
mainly because of the numerical support given him
by what was then called the "old burnt district,"
composed of the strong Republican counties of
Wayne, Randolph, Jay, Henry and Delaware. To
get the unanimous support of his district, however,

111

he was humiliated by a demand from the radical
temperance delegates that he make a public pledge
in the convention that he would forever thereafter
abstain from the use of liquor, although he had not
been generally known to have any convivial habits.
General James R. Slack and the writer were visi-
tors at this convention, sitting by each other when
Browne came forward to accept the nomination.
In the course of his eloquent speech of acceptance
he said: "If in the past, by eating meat, I have
offended my brother, then I will eat no more meat
while I live." General Slack turning to the writer
said, "that speech advertising himself as a drunk-
ard will defeat him," and it did. He was charac-
terized in the campaign as 'Thomas Meateater
Browne." Hendricks in referring to him would

humorously say, "mv convivial friend, General

•/ ./ • */

Browne," and Hendricks got nearly all the radical
temperance votes and wras elected, while all the
other candidates on the ticket with him were de-
feated with the exception of Milton B. Hop-
kins, a prominent preacher of the Christian Church
who was elected state superintendent of public in-
struction. Grant and Colfax carried the state in
November by twenty thousand majority.

In the years following, General Browne repre-
sented his district in congress for many terms, and
until his death.

112

GEORGE \V. JULIAN

CHAPTER XII

origin of the name, "Burnt District," was
-*- by some traced to a great conflagration that

»

overspread it in an early day, while others say it
was so named because of the attitude of George
W. Julian and his followers on the slavery ques-
tion, who were called abolitionists and 'black re-
publicans." He was an avowed abolitionist when
that was a term of derision, was at one time nomi-
nated for vice-president on the "free soil" ticket.
He was a great leader, was far in advance of the
majority in the Republican party in the advocacy
of the freedom of slaves. He and Oliver P. Mor-
ton, both of Wavne Count v, were likened unto

» » -

"two great lions that could not live in the same
forest." Their opinions of each other were recip-
rocal. Morton became his rival in party leader-
ship. Julian was not only a leader in the crusade
against human slavery, but was far ahead of the
times on other public questions. It was he who in-
troduced in the Forty-first congress the proposed
amendment to the Federal Constitution, confer-
ring the right of woman suffrage, that finally be-
came the 19th amendment.

During the Civil War the opponents of the ad-
ministration adopted the shibboleth, 'The Consti-

113

tution as it is and the Union as it was." In 1868
Mr. Julian supported Grant for president. In a
speech that he delivered that year at Kokomo, In-
diana, to which the writer was a listener, he took up
that watchword for analysis, claiming that it was a
disloyal expression. His analysis was so clear as
to be convincing to many that it was of that char-
acter; he said :'the constitution as it is" means
that it shall not be so amended as to abolish slav-
ery, and :'the Union as it was," was a Union with
slavery, and it was against the perpetuation of
such a Union that the war had been fought and
won.

On that occasion he also shamed his Democratic
hearers for their subserviency to Southern domi-

•/

nation, by telling them that it was this Southern
domination by "Christless whelps" that had forced
their great apostle, Thomas Jefferson, into an
abandonment of his convictions on the subject of
slavery, by modifying his draft of the Declaration
of independence and his arraignment of the King-
dom of Great Britain, so that the institution could
be maintained. Bancroft's History of the United
States, Volume V, page 324, contains a reproduc-
tion of the draft of the Declaration of Independence
and of the indictment that Jefferson submitted
with it, and the historian says that the offensive ex-
pressions were deleted at the request of the South-
erners for the reason, as Jefferson wrote, for the
guidance of history, "that these gentlemen's reflec-
tions were not yet matured to the full abhorrence
of the slave traffic."

114

This Kokomo speech of Mr. Julian was no more
pleasing to his Republican hearers than was one
to Democratic hearers four years later that he
made at the old Academy of Music in Indianapo-
lis, in support of Horace Greeley for president,
when Oliver P. Morton became the subject of his
invectives. He held up Morton as having been edu-
cated in the same school with the same "Christless
whelps," with whom he broke because of the al-
lurements of the public office that he got as his re-
ward when he became governor, and enumerated
some of his inconsistencies and sudden changes of
views on public questions, bringing to the recollec-
tion of his hearers, that on the 29th of September,
1865, Morton had delivered a great speech to his
old friends at Richmond, denouncing negro suf-
frage and upholding President Johnson's policy
of reconciliation, and that he experienced such a
change of heart as to soon after clamor for John-
son's impeachment because of these same policies.

In manner and actions, Julian was not en-
tirely different from other public men of Indiana,
but his stvle of oratory was peculiarly his own.

•/ */ *••

There was nothing of a bombastic character in it,
but it was rather colloqual and yet emphatic and
convincing, and his words were seemingly carefully
selected and so articulated as to give them the
greatest force. His severities of expression that
sometimes seemed malicious, were more properly
chargeable to the deep sincerity of his sentiments
in the causes he advocated.

115

CHAPTER XIII

HHHE legislature of Indiana, in 1873, was Re-
-•- publican, and re-elected Morton to the senate.
Hendricks was inaugurated as governor. The old
Court of Common Pleas was abolished by an act
of that assembly and a number of new circuit court

•/ t

districts were created, and in accordance with a
provision of the State Constitution a new district
of the Supreme Court wras created, so that it would
thereafter be composed of five judges.

The vacancies created by this court legislation,
gave Hendricks the power to appoint a number of
judges of the circuit courts and prosecuting attor-
neys, also the new judge of the Supreme Court. In
making his selections he did not confine them to
his own party, but choose those he regarded as
most fitting from both political parties. He ap-
pointed Andrew L. Osborn of La Porte, a Re-
publican, as the new judge of the fifth supreme
court district.

An important legislative enactment passed at
this session was what was known as the Baxter
liquor law. Its author was Honorable William
Baxter, of Wayne County, a prominent member of
the Quaker Church, who represented that county
in the state senate. He was able, conscientious,
and highly respected by his legislative colleagues,

116

and its passage was more due to their wishes to
please him, than to their approval of the measure.
It imposed so many restrictions on the liquor traf-
fic, and such severe penalties for their violation,
that many members of both political parties urged
Hendricks to veto it, but as it contained no uncon-
stitutional provisions, Hendricks showed his high
regard for legislative wisdom, and his gratitude for
the many temperance votes he had received at the
preceding election, by signing it and it became a
law.

In 1873, David Turpie became a resident of In-
dianapolis, and in 1874 was elected as a member of
the state legislature from that county, and at the
session of 187o was elected speaker of the house.
His many contests with Schuyler Coif ax form
part of his history.

Colfax served in congress for eight terms, was
three times speaker of the national house of rep-
resentatives, and vice-president from 1869 to 1873.
His unsuccessful opponent in nearly all his con-
tests for congress was Turpie, who was one of the
most scholarly men in public life in Indiana. While
Turpie was unsuccessful in his contests for con-
gress he was more fortunate in receiving honors
from the Indiana legislature. In 1863 he was
elected to serve in the United States senate for a
short time to fill out the unexpired term of Jesse
D. Bright, who had been expelled on charges of
complicity with leaders of secession to overthrow
the government, was later elected by the legislature
for a full term of six years, 1893 to 1899.

117

In a number of his contests with Colfax, a series
of joint debates was held between them. He usu-
ally was the victor in arguments, but Colfax was
more pleasing in his address and as a "mixer "
with the people, and was called 'the smiler." At
the close of their meetings Turpie usually went to
his hotel, while Colfax remained to shake hands
and flatter the people; he also had the advantage
in the fact that his district was normally Republi-
can. In his early days Colfax edited a newspaper
at South Bend, and took a leading part in the en-
terprise of that city. One of its principal avenues
was named in his honor. In the late years of his
life he and his family had the misfortune to meet
a great financial loss occasioned by over confidence
in an old-time friend, who failed in the banking
business. The nomination of Turpie for lieutenant
governor in 1860 made it necessary that another
should be selected to contest unsuccessfully with
Colfax for congressional honors and Charles W.
Cathcart was the Democratic nominee that year.
He was a native of the Island of Madeira, who
had settled in La Porte County in 1831, near what
is now the town of Westville, and followed farm-
ing and stock raising, was a state senator in 1835,
a member of congress in 1845 and 1847, and
United States senator, by appointment, in 1852
and 1853.

118

CHAPTER XIV

OLLOWIXG the close of the Civil War, the
waste, extravagance, and profiteering, that
originated during that period, was kept alive
through the instrumentality of an inflated cur-

•/

rency, inflated credits, wild speculations, and great
railroad building schemes that were projected by
means of great land grants and government aid,
until the fall of the year 1873, when the greatest
financial panic of the country's history occurred,
as a consequence of the abrupt plans of financiers
to change economic and financial conditions.

In 1857 a Democratic congress, dominated by
the slave-holding interests of the country, under

o »/ -

the plausible policy of establishing commercial
connections of the cotton growing states of the
South with the corn producing states of the North,
and to afford postal facilities to the government
in the transmission of the United States mails,
granted to the Illinois Central Railroad Company
a strip of land, twelve miles in width across the
entire State of Illinois, approximating about one
hundred million acres. The road was constructed
as a result of this grant. When the Civil Wai-
was raging and wasting the resources of the coun-
try, a Republican congress, following this Demo-

119

cratic precedent in land grants, greatly expanded
the government's policy in granting government
aid by donating to the projected transcontinental
railroads to the Pacific Ocean one hundred and
two million acres of the public domain, forty-seven
million to the Northern Pacific Railroad Com-
pany, forty-two million acres to the Atlantic and
Pacific Company, and thirteen million acres to the
Union Pacific Company, and later forty million
acres were granted to aid other railroad projec-
tors.

And by an Act of Congress, passed in 1862, there
were also issues of government bonds, provided for
by which each of these Pacific Railroad companies
were to receive from the government at the rates
of $16,000, $22,000 and $48,000 per mile, in gov-
ernment bonds, according to the cost and difficulty
of construction, for constructing the roads, the
bonds providing for their payment thirty years
after their issuance, at six per cent semi-annual in-
terest in the gold coin of the United States.

The promoters of these railroad enterprises in
furtherance of their plans for the construction of
the roads were alert to the great profits in con-
struction that could be availed of by creating con-
struction companies with which construction con-
tracts might be made, and to which the govern-
ment aid, the stocks of the railroad companies, and
the bonds they might issue, secured by their prop-
erty, including the lands granted to them, might
be transferred in payment for construction wrork.
With these valuable assets as security, that also

* *

120

carried with the security the power to control the
railroads and their operation upon completion, the
construction companies wrere in a position to in-
duce banks and other financial institutions to fur-
nish the funds required. One of these construction
instrumentalities was a chartered corporation
called the "Credit Mobilier of America," that had
unlimited powers in the issuance and sales of its
own stock that was supposed to have great value,
by reason of its holding the vast securities derived
from the railroad companies. It was the pledge of
this stock as collateral that procured excessive
loans to this Credit Mobilier Company by Xew
York banks, and when the great financiers of the
country decided upon the policy of restricting
credits and a general policy of deflating the cur-
rency these banks were so overloaded with this
collateral, and their reserves had been so lessened,
that they could not pay their depositors and they
were forced to suspend, and the suspension of the
construction work on the railroads followed as a
consequence.

This Credit Mobilier Company had been char-
tered by the State of Pennsylvania in the year
1859, named the same as a gigantic scheme pro-
mulgated by the French government in 1852, to
take in hand and originate trading enterprises of
all kinds, and to conduct the business of banking
and the construction of public works.

The stock of this company was issued in large
amounts and distributed liberallv, and in some in-

«

stances gratuitously, to members of congress who

were assured of large dividends, and it was
charged, in the public press, had induced many
votes in granting congressional aid to railroads.
When the crash came there followed congressional
investigations to discover the identity of these
stockholders. Oakes Ames, a member of congress
from Massachusetts, and James Brooks, a member
from Xew York, were found to have been stock
distributors, and confessed to having delivered
both stock and dividends to many of their congres-
sional associates and others in public life, among
these were some prominent men in Indiana.

122

CHAPTER XV

HEX the policy of retrenchment and restric-
tion of credits began in 1873 the farmers of
the country were the first to suffer from the slump
in prices of farm products, from three dollars a
bushel for wheat to fif'tv cents, and they were

«. «

ready to espouse any cause and to invoke any
remedy that promised them relief. The trouble
then, as now. was in locating the trouble and find-
ing a remedy that would give them relief. They
organized, fretted and fussed around for a long
time before they discovered that the reduction of

i

railroad tariffs, that would enable them to mar-
ket their products might help them some, even
though the middle man who passed them on to the
consumer, came in for his share in the benefits of
a reduction. They were not content with a regu-
lation of the rates unless they could be the resru-

•

lators. They wanted reduction not mere regula-
tion. How were they to force the reduction was

i

the puzzling question they must deal with. They
could see no way except to elect men to represent
them in the state legislatures. They would not
trust the salary-grabbing, back-pay congressmen

» C^ -L •

in far distant Washington, who would attach too
much importance to the power they had under the

123

constitution to regulate commerce. The experi-
ment of state legislation was given its first trial
in the states of Illinois, Kansas and Iowa, and
was watched with great interest by Indiana farm-
ers. The legislatures of these states passed what
was known as the granger railroad acts, that gave
the exclusive power of regulation of freight rates
into the hands of state agencies that the grangers
could control. The railroad companies contested
their constitutionality in suits that were carried
to the Supreme Court of the United States, upon
the ground that the power to regulate commerce
was vested in the congress of the United States,
and could not be exercised bv the states. The old

mf

doctrine of states rights was thus again brought
forward as having great efficacy in the decision
that was to be made. The grangers got a tempo-
rary comfort from the decision. It upheld the
legislative power of the states, because congress
had not acted, holding that until congress acted in
the matter the states could legislate upon the sub-
ject. This clearly foreshadowed a contest in con-
gress. The farmers had by this time been con-
vinced that they might have enough power to have
an interstate commerce commission created by con-
gress that would deal fairly with them, and accord-
ingly John H. Reagan, a member of congress
from the State of Texas, introduced the measure
that suited the grangers, but it didn't suit the rail-
road companies. It passed the house, elected in
1874, but lodged in the senate in the hands of Sen-
ator Cullom of Illinois, and after a contest

121

lasting for nearly ten years, came out as a meas-

<— j •/ «,

ure entirely satisfactory to the railroad companies,
but it is only fair to say that the powerful gov-
ernmental agency that it created- -the Interstate
Commerce Commission- -has not been under the
control or influence of railroad companies, and the
enlarged powers that have been conferred upon it,
from time to time, have aimed at justice and fa
dealing between transportation and shipping inte
ests, and the high character of the men who have
been chosen as its members, from time to time, has
been attested in the work they have done and in

m>

the decisions they have made.

»/

This reference to the acts farmers have ac-
complished by their organization is pertinent in a
work of reminiscences and is brought into it in
part to exhibit this class of public men and to show
their great power, and how they influenced, both
nominations, and the result of the state elections in
Indiana in 1874 and 1876.

In 1876, the Greenback party placed a full state
ticket in the field, headed by Anson Wolcott, a
farmer of White County, for governor. A few
days before the election, he published a card with-
drawing from the race and urged the election of
General Harrison. His withdrawal created a great
storm of indignation and harmed Harrison more
than it helped him. Henry W. Harrington, a
leader in the Greenback party, was substituted in
place of Wolcott, and the Greenback party polled
a heavy vote.

*

Franklin Landers, a farmer and man of affairs

125

in commercial and business life, was nominated in
1874 for congress in the Indianapolis district by
the Democrats, in reliance on the farmer vote to
defeat General John Coburn, who had served in
congress for many terms, and had a splendid
record, both as a soldier and congressman, and
the backing of a large Republican majority. The
farmer votes elected Landers.

James D. Williams, known as "Blue Jeans Wil-
liams," because of the home spun suit of blue
jeans clothes that he wore on all occasions, had
long served his farmer neighbors as a state sena-
tor, was also a prominent member of the State
Board of Agriculture, and was a member of con-
gress, serving out an unexpired term of another
farmer, when the Democratic State Convention of
1876 met. Michael C. Kerr, who was then speaker
of the national house of representatives had ap-
pointed Williams chairman of the congressional
committee on accounts of expenditures by con-
gressmen, and he had made some exposures of
their extravagance in having excessive items for
stationery, mileage, etc., charged against the gov-
ernment. The farmers in attendance at the con-
vention from his home county and district, though
having but a few votes in the convention, proposed
his name for governor and he was nominated as a
"dark horse," defeating William S. Hohman and
Franklin Landers, because of the close contest be-
tween them for the nomination. His nomination
was at first ridiculed by that class of society peo-
ple who only look forward to the gayeties at the

126

governor's inaugural ball, and by the snobs who
are ever readv to sneer at the rude farmer. Unfor-

m

tuiiately for General Harrison, who was the Re-
publican nominee, these society classes were en-
tirely too conspicuous among his supporters about
the city of Indianapolis, and their sneering re-
marks and sayings were repeated too much in the
rural districts, with the result that many Republi-
can farmers left their party to resent the insults
bv their votes for old "Blue Jeans Williams. v and

•

he was elected by nearly six thousand plurality.
Some of the good farmer women of Southern In-
diana prevailed upon the newly-elected governor
to allow them to line his blue jeans garments with
silk to be worn on the occasion of his inauguration,
and at a proposed inaugural ball. This social af-
fair was staged and managed under the direction

o o

of the handsome and highly accomplished cheva-
lier of Xew Albany, Colonel Charles L. Jewett,
assisted by many of the most polished members
of Indianapolis society, and was attended by ladies
and gentlemen of the highest social ranks from all
parts of the state. In the campaign of 1876. George
TV. Russ. an ex-Union soldier, organized a reori-

o o

ment of ex-soldiers to march in procession, carry-
ing 'blue jeans" banners and "Blue Jeans'' re-
warded him by making him his adjutant general
of the state.

127

CHAPTER XVI

"\Y7HEX the legislature of 18T7 convened, Wil-
liams was inaugurated as governor. In his
message on that occasion he urged economy in
public expenditures, and that appropriations be
made only for such public purposes as were abso-
lutely necessary, and suggested that in considering
what was absolutely necessary, that the assembly
might properly consider the subject of the con-
struction of a new capitol building, that had long
been agitated, but should place proper safeguards
against extravagance, if it should be decided to
enter upon that work. A bill providing for its
construction was passed that created a commission
to have charge of all matters pertaining to it, and
making the governor, ex-officio, the president of
that commission. It was provided that as far as
possible, it should be constructed of material pro-
duced in the State. The several plans that were
prepared, by many architects, all provided for
Bedford stone as the material to be used in the
structure, and the one selected by the commission,
from the number offered in competition, it was be-
lieved, provided ample room for all the officials and
archives of the State for at least a hundred vears.

V

It was not at that time supposed that there would

128

be any boards or commissions to fill its rooms except
the boards of the penal and benevolent institutions
of the State, but so many boards and com-
missions have since been created by legislative en-
actments that it is now overcrowded from basement
to dome. The work of its construction had not been
completed during the "Blue Jeans' administra-
tion, and it was completed under the direction of
Governor Porter, and was perhaps the only pub-
lic building that was ever constructed within the
original appropriation for it. To the credit of
these two governors, it was not only completed,
but was furnished within the appropriation, and
a surplus paid into the State treasury.

129

CHAPTER XVII

TAT the year 1873, the tornado of startling events,
•*• that swept over the country so disturbed its equi-
librium as to turn a period of seeming prosperity
quickly into one of depression and stagnation in
every branch of industry, and business and was

•/ •/ -

most harmful to the Republican party. Before and
after this crash occurred, there were great com-
plaints about the high cost of living. Members of
congress complained about it, contending that their
salaries wrere insufficient to meet their living ex-
penses, and they proceeded to avail themselves of a
remedy, not available to their constituents, by vot-
ing themselves a fifty per cent increase of salary,
also back pay to cover the time they had served in
the preceding sessions. This produced such a shock
of public indignation that their constituents de-
manded that they repeal the act and resign. Some
of the members paid the salaries they had re-
ceived, under the act, back into the treasury, but
they fared little better with their constituents than
those who received them, and a great majority of
them were defeated for renomination, or at the next
election, a number of them fearing their defeat, did
not stand for re-nomination or re-election.

In the same year the scandals growing out of

130

the operation of the great Credit Mobilier of
America began to circulate and in the autumn,
when the leaves of the forest began to fall, occurred
this great financial and industrial crash. The
direct cause of its occurrence, as already men-
tioned, was the failure of New York banking
houses, that had undertaken the financing of the
agencies that were engaged in the construction
of the Pacific railroads. This financial disaster was
not only fatal to many political ambitions but
crushed out fortunes in its course. Values of prop-
erty of every description that had been maintained
at high points during and following the war sud-
denly fell to almost nothing, banks suspended and
failed, the construction of transcontinental rail-
roads that was then well under way giving employ-
ment to hundreds of thousands of laborers sud-
denly stopped, factories of all kinds shut down,
leaving workmen employed in them to stand
around and look in vain to see the smoke from
their chimneys as a signal for them to return to
work, commercial transactions almost ceased, and
depressions of every kind appeared everywhere.
To stay the hunger that existed there were then not
even soup houses, as in the time of the so-called
panic of twentv years later. The National Bank-

X v «/

ruptcy Act of 1867 was availed of in all the Fed-
eral courts of the country, during the following
five years that it continued in force, by broken mer-
chants and others to discharge their debt obliga-
tions incurred during this period, to such an extent,
as to swamp the courts with bankruptcy cases.
10 13.1

All of these things happened during a Republi-
can administration, and as is always the case, the
party out of power had many nostrums in prepa-
ration to restore healthy and prosperous conditions,
and only needed to get in to administer them, and
it was given its opportunity at the next genera'
election when a new congress was elected; and Ben
Butler was elected governor of Massachusetts on a
fiat money platform of the so-called Greenback
party, that also sprang up in all other states, and
with its aid the Democratic party was successful
in nearly all of them and had a large majority in
congress, and Michael C. Kerr, of Indiana, was
elected as its speaker. At the short session of the
expiring congress in January, 1875, is passed what
was known as the Specie Resumption Act that pro-
vided that on the first day of January, 1879, the
government should begin the payment of its out-
standing obligations in coin. This brought into
prominent discussion the question whether coin
meant gold only or both gold and silver. An act
passed in 1873 had taken away the privilege of
paying debts in silver, but subsequent acts restored
the legal tender qualities of the old silver dol-
lar, and in a measure settled, so far as congres-
sional expressions could settle the question, that
coin meant both gold and silver; nevertheless fi-
nanciers of the country insisted that gold was the
standard, and that the government's outstanding
obligations, consisting in great part of its treasury
notes called greenbacks, because of the color of the
paper on which they were printed, should be paid

132

in gold. This contention and the scarcity of gold
kept gold at a high premium during the greater
part of the times that the treasury notes were
greatest in their circulation as money, and it is a
curious fact, to one not familiar with financial
philosophy, that on the first day of January, 1879,
the date fixed for the government to begin pay-
ment of its obligations in coin, less than one per
cent of them were presented on that day to the
treasurer of the United States for payment; and
at the same time the premium on gold disappeared
and the government's paper currency continued
to circulate as money as it had before.

Opposition to the Specie Resumption Act, the
clamor for its repeal, and a demand for an increase
in the issues of paper currency of the government,
sufficient in volume to meet the necessities of trade
and commerce, were the demands of the platforms
of both the Democratic and Greenback parties in
1874, but the Democratic congress that was elect-
ed that year, so far as its record of acts passed dis-
closed, enacted no legislation to further such ends.

133

CHAPTER XVIII

THE Indiana Republican state convention that
was held in 1874, had no Morton there to
sound its keynotes. It passed its usual eulogistic
resolutions pointing with pride to its past record,
but had no plank of promises to restore prosperous
conditions that had disappeared when the financial
panic of 1873 came.

It nominated, for secretary of state, William W.
Curry, an eloquent preacher of the Universalist
Church, to give assurances of universal salvation,
but even his doctrines could not save the grand
old party from defeat that year.

Many young men of both Republican and Dem-
ocratic parentage, were college attendants when
the Civil War came, who left their studies to join
the Union army ; one of these was John Enos Xeff,
of Winchester, whose father was also a Union
Civil War captain. Enos, as he was familiarly
called, had made a brilliant campaign against Gen-
eral John Peter Claver Shands, of Jay County,
for congress in 1872, coming within a few votes
of defeating him. He was nominated by acclama-
tion to make the race for secretary of state against
Curry, and in his speech accepting the nomination,
put his opponent and his party on the defensive,

134

and he challenged him to a joint debate a few days
later. Some Democrats had their misgivings about
Neff's ability to contend with the skilled disputant,
who had vanquished preachers of other denomina-
tions in theological discussions in many of which
he had engaged, but their fears were dispelled at
the first debate by Neff again putting his adver-
sary on the defensive and maintaining his argu-
ments with both plausibility and elegance of dic-
tion. The friends of Curry said they were evenly
matched, while the admirers of the youthful Neff,
declared him a dashing cavalier, who had com-
pletely vanquished his adversary. Neff and all
Democratic state candidates were successful. Ebe-
nezer Henderson, a farmer of Morgan County,
was elected auditor of state, Colonel Benjamin C.
Shaw, of Indianapolis, treasurer of state, Clarence
A. Buskirk, of Gibson County, attorney general,
and Professor James H. Smart, of Allen County,
state superintendent of public instruction. They
were all re-elected in 1876, and Professor Smart
was elected again in 1878, and afterwards was, for
a number of years, president of Purdue University,
and ranked among the ablest educators of the
State. At this same election, of 1874, Judge Hor-
ace P. Biddle of Logansport, was elected judge of
the Supreme Court, from the new fifth judicial dis-
trict, that had been created by the legislature of
1873. Previous to this time the Supreme Court
was composed of four judges. The constitution
of the State had limited the number to five. The
cases in the court had so increased that this addi-

135

tional member was much needed and was so pro-
vided.

Judge Horace P. Biddle was a member of the
constitutional convention of 1851, had served
many years as a nisi prius judge, was a Republi-
can in politics, but in 1874 was first nominated as
the fifth judge by a convention of the new Green-
back party, composed mainly of farmers, and the
Democrats deemed it expedient to also give him
their nomination. At the election his majority over
his Republican opponent was thirty-three thou-
sand, and sixteen thousand greater than that of
his associate Democrats.

This vote of sixteen thousand represented the
voting strength of the new Greenback party, and
was the prize which both the Republican and Dem-
ocratic parties sought to win in the next election,
but both were disappointed because the Green-
backers generally spurned affiliation with either
of them, and maintained their own organization in-
tact for many years, and gained strength particu-
larly among the farmers, and brought a number
of them into the class of public men of Indiana.

Colonel Isaac P. Gray was the Democratic nom-
inee for lieutenant governor and was elected in
1876. "Blue Jeans" Williams served as governor
until his death occurred in 1879, when Gray, as
lieutenant governor, succeeded him. It was the
great political privilege and pleasure of Governor
Williams to commission his warm friend, Daniel
W. Voorhees, as United States senator to serve
out the unexpired term of Governor Morton,

136

whose death occurred on the first day of November,
1877. The nomination of "Blue Jeans" caused
great curiosity to see him in all parts of the State,
and the Democratic State Committee decided upon
a plan of exhibiting him by announcing him and
the great "Sycamore of the Wabash," Daniel W.
Voorhees, as speakers at the places appointed.
Great crowds came to see "Blue Jeans" and re-
mained to hear Voorhees. Upon the unveiling of
a monument erected to the memory of Governor
Williams at Wheatland, in Knox County, on July
4, 1883, Senator Voorhees delivered an oration
that is here reproduced as a sample of his elo-
quence, and to also present a conception of the
chief characteristics of the plain farmer-governor,
Voorhees said:

"In looking at the career of Governor Wil-
liams, and in studying the influences under which
his character was developed, a long and most
striking retrospective view is presented to the
mind. Born in 1808, he came to Knox County in
1818. Here, at the age of ten years, he began his
life work on the farm, and here, at the close of
more than three-score vears and ten, he rests in the

c'

soil and in the midst of the people he loved so well.
He lived in Indiana and in this county sixty-two
years, beholding with intelligent observation the
growth and development, step by step, of his own
State, and all of the Northwestern States, until
from a nominal beginning he witnessed the glory
of their civilization and power fill the whole earth.
His life embraced almost three-quarters of the

137

present marvelous century, and covered such a
period of human progress as the eye of man had
not rested on until then in all the wide and varied
annals of human effort.

His first reading was on grave and serious mat-
ters. His youthful mind knew nothing of fiction.

«. o

His life and thoughts were real. He read mes-
sages of the early governors, Jennings. Hendricks,
and others, in which there glowed a fervent love of
country, and a firm faith in the people.

The glorious traditions and the high American
flavor of the Revolution were also fresh, and every-
where prevalent, and as a boy, Governor Williams
often listened in silent wonder to men not much
past middle life, who had been under fire with
Washington, and in council with Jefferson, Madi-
son and Monroe. It has been said that from lack
of education and travel he had a certain narrow-
ness of view in public affairs. On the contrary,
Governor Williams was developed and instructed
from vouth to robust manhood in a school of

•

thought and action which never yet failed to make
broader, stronger, and more useful men than the
Greek lexicon or tourists' guide book. He formed
his first ideas of government and of public duty
from the purest and best sources, and there was
not a prescriptive, intolerant, or narrow sentiment
in his nature. His love of countrv was of the old-

«.

fashioned kind, inspired by the spirit of 1776, and
it was broad enough to embrace every star of the

•

flag, and every foot of American soil beneath its

•

folds. But there was still another powerful reason

138

why Governor Williams carried into the discharge
of his duties a sound judgment and a staunch heart.
He lived and died a practical farmer. He knew
the laboring people better than any public man
Indiana ever produced. He was born in their
ranks and remained there to the end. He was at
home in the broad and wholesome field, and he was
familiar with the wants and ways, the hardships
and the hopes of those who eat their bread in the
sweat of their faces.

From the days of Cincinnatus, to the present
time, men seeking popular favor have been pa-
raded and eulogized as farmers, who could not tell
a field of wheat from a field of oats, but the farmer
in whose memory we are here today, drove his team

ft ft

and held the plow: planted the corn, attended its
growth and gathered it in; sowed his small grain
and reaped his harvests; raised horses, sheep, cat-
tle and hogs, and fed them with his own hands. He
made more than two blades of grass to grow where
none had grown before. In the pursuit of these
labors, he became deeply imbued with sympathy
for the agricultural classes, and with an earnest de-
sire for their improvement. At an early period of
his life he became actively identified with agricul-
tural associations and for more than thirty years,

«, »

was a controlling member of the Indiana State
Fair organization. This tribute so long continued
and coming as it did. from the tillers of the soil was
peculiarly grateful, and I doubt if any political
honor was ever as pleasant to him, or as highly
prized as his prominent connection with the county

139

and State fairs of Indiana. He delighted to inter-
view a herd of blooded cattle as keenly as a reporter
delights to interview a string of candidates for
the presidency. His enjoyment over a bunch of
fine sheep or a lot of cultivated hogs, looking com-
fortable from high living, and handsome from fine
breeding, was very great and very genuine. In his
admiration of the horses he had, without reading
Bacon, adopted the Baconian philosophy. He
looked to utility rather than to style and speed.
His pride was in the farmer's horse rather than in
the flying courser of the race track. Growing gol-
den grain, the tall, dark corn, the rich golden
wheat, the clover fields and broad meadow lands,
were to him a source of unfailing interest and con-
tinuous comment.

While traversing every part of the State a few
years ago, and as the bright and beautiful farms
seemed to glide by like a painted panorama on ex-
hibition, how often have I heard his exclamation
of delight, and listened to his comments on the
more than magical changes he had witnessed. He
had, indeed, in his own day and generation, seen
the wilderness put off its savage garb, and array
its waste places in the richest robes of progress,
culture and refinement.

I have heard him recall the fact that within his
recollection not a tree of the primeval forest had
been disturbed by the white man's ax, where now
stands the splendid capitol of our State.
It is not any wonder, therefore, that he looked
with peculiar emotions on the present condition of

140

Indiana, the happy home of two million healthy,
prosperous people, her fields yielding more agri-
cultural wealth in proportion to area, than any
other State in the Union; her coal, timber, stone
and fine clays giving employment to a hundred
thousand laborers.

He also saw the cause of education move for-
ward with a force and rapidity unknown in any
other commonwealth; he saw the whole face of the
State adorned and lit up with commodious free
schools, with colleges, seminaries, high schools and
universities ; he exulted in the fact that rising gen-
erations had access to pathways of learning and
science, and that there were so few left in Indiana,
who were unable to read and write their mother-
tongue. In all these stupendous developments Gov-
ernor Williams, whether in private or public life,
always bore an active and honorable part. In 1843,
then being thirty-five years of age, he was first

O J J c5

elected to the Indiana legislature as a member of
the house, and from that time to the day of his
death he was rarely, if ever, out of public employ-
ment.

During a period of thirty years he was almost
continuously elected and re-elected to the legisla-
ture, either as a member of the house or the senate.
Such long and unbroken confidence, on the part of
those who knew him best, is a far more eloquent
eulogy than can be uttered over his grave on this
occasion.

The administration of Governor Williams as
chief magistrate of Indiana is too recent and

fresh in the public mind to call for discussion or
extended notice. It is an honorable part of the
history of a magnificent State; a State whose
career in all the elements of greatness has been
with the speed and strength of the eagle's wing
in his flight toward the sun.

Governor Williams loved Indiana and has left
no blot on her name. He was her thirteenth exec-
utive, elected by the people, and in the noble fra-
ternity of his predecessors in that high office he
stands a peer. Others more learned in books, but
none wiser in the principles of self-government,
nor purer in administering them for the welfare
of the laboring, producing, business interests of
the State. * * *

But two of those who preceded him in the exec-
utive chair are amongst the living, one of whom
is here to join in honor to the dead. Long, long,
may their useful and honorable lives be spared,
and at last when the final hour of rest shall come
to them, as it will to all of us, may the memories
which cluster around their names in the hearts of
all their countrymen, without respect to creed or
party, be as kind, as free from reproach, and as
gentle in their judgment as those which now gather
around the name of James D. Williams and hal-
low the spot where he sleeps."

Among the distinguished persons in attendance
at the unveiling were, Governor Conrad Baker,
and Senator Benjamin Harrison.

142

CHAPTER XIX

Tj1 YEXTS of the campaign of 1876 show how
-^ troublesome the liquor dealers were to the
Democratic party and how the temperance people
disconcerted the Republicans.

A Democratic platform that did not declare in
favor of the largest liberty to liquor dealers and
against sumptuary laws was a defective structure.
And a Republican platform that did not inveigh
against the evils of intemperance, and give some
promises of local option or prohibition, failed to
satisfy the strong temperance Republicans, who
were insistent not only on having the platform to
suit them, but also that only total abstinence can-

mt

didates should be nominated.

As already mentioned, the temperance voters in
the Republican party had exacted a public pledge
from General Browne that defeated him for gov-
ernor in 1872. Godlove S. Orth, who was nom-
inated in 1876, of German descent and known
to occasionally refresh himself with a glass of beer,
was so unsatisfactory to this same element of

V

voters that many of them openly declared their
intention to vote against him. He had served
many terms in congress, was a man of great ability,
and had been United States Minister to Venezuela.

143

In addition to the charges of temperance people
against him, the Democrats were giving out hints
about a scandal that attached to him growing out
of his having had some connection with a bond
issue by the Venezuelan government that had
caused some financial losses to American inves-
tors. Fearing that these attacks upon him might
defeat him, the Republican State Central Com-
mittee gave him a hint that his withdrawal from
the race would not be objected to, and he tendered
his resignation as a candidate and it was accepted,
and General Harrison was substituted.

The Baxter liquor law that Governor Hendricks
had found no constitutional objections to and re-
fused to veto, was amended in some of its provi-
sions in 1875, but as amended was in force and
some of its provisions were being contested in the
Supreme Court, and the liquor dealers were look-
ing to that tribunal for a decision against its va-
lidity, and were also clamoring for its repeal if it
was held valid. They were very much afraid that
the Supreme Court would decide against them and
particularly afraid of Judge Alexander C. Dow-
ney, who was a member of the Methodist Church,
and one of the trustees of Asbury University, and
known to be a man of strictly temperate habits,
and pronounced temperance sentiments. It so
happened that a disappointed applicant for the
position of librarian of the Supreme Court was
willing to aid these liquor interest, by making
charges against all the four Democratic judges
who had been renominated, to the effect that they

144

had made some court allowances against the State
for some small items of stationery and office sup-
plies that should have been charged to their per-
sonal accounts. These charges were so magnified
and repeated in the public press, and elsewhere,
that the Democratic State Central Committee took
notice of them and did not intend that the Repub-
lican State Committee should outdo their committee
in applying purifying processes to their State
ticket, and called meetings of the same delegates
who had attended the State convention from the
respective districts of the four judges to determine
whether they should be removed, and if removed,
to nominate judicial candidates in their places.
These conventions were held. The friends of
Judge Worden of the Fort Wayne district, under
the leadership of Honorable Robert C. Bell, ral-
lied to his support and adjourned the convention,
leaving him on the ticket. The candidates in the
other three districts withdrew and William E.
Niblack was nominated in place of Samuel H.
Buskirk. George V. Howk was nominated in
place of Judge Downey, and Samuel E. Perkins
in place of John Petit. They were all elected.
Judge Worden's plurality being greater than the
others, and the court so constituted upheld the
validity of the Baxter law in the cases involving
it, but the law was repealed at the session of 1877.
The retirement of Orth from the State ticket did
not retire him from public life. He was again
elected to serve three terms in congress, but de-
feated in his last race in 1882 bv his fellow towns-

•/

145

man, Judge Thomas B. Ward, the Democratic
nominee. Judge Ward was again elected in 1884
over Major Charles T. Dovey of Anderson.

William S. Holman of Dearborn County, served
many terms in congress. Was a member during
all of the Civil War period and for a number of
years afterwards, and gained the name of the
"Watch Dog of the Treasury'1 by his persistent
objections to land grants and congressional appro-
priations. His ability in defeating them was only
equalled by his success in getting votes by his pecu-
liar methods of electioneering. He made it a point
to always put himself on familiar terms with the
people of his district by calling them by their first
names and asking every man he met for a chew of
his tobacco. In 1863, the Confederate General
John H. Morgan, with his army of about four thou-
sand rebel cavahy soldiers, crossed from Kentucky
into Indiana and made a raid through Holman's
district, where he received many assurances of sym-
pathy for the Southern cause from the Hoosiers
he met, the sincerity of which he insisted should be

*/

evidenced by their turning over to him their horses,
cattle, and other property that his struggling army
was so much in need of, and of course they readily
complied with this request. The many owners of
this confiscated property placed their claims for
payment against the Federal government in the
hands of Holman and became staunch supporters
of his in all of his after races for congress. On
one occasion when he was interposing an objection
to an appropriation, one of his colleagues hap-

146

pened to remember about these Morgan raid claims

and said he had always observed that "Watch

j

dogs never barked when there was any of the fam-
ily about." Holman was still in congress when
Cleveland became president and still a member of
the appropriations committee. When a new crowd
of beneficiaries of appropriations belonging to his
own party would be affected by his objections, it
was deemed expedient to have him transferred from
the appropriations committee to another, where
his objections would not be so harmful to the of-
fice holding patriots who always stand for the old
flag and an appropriation. His willingness to be
so transferred was made the basis of a challenge
of his right to the name of a "Watch Dog" by his
Republican opponents in the races he afterwards
made. He met his first defeat after the war by
James E. Watson, who because of his triumph be-
came and continued a conspicuous figure in Repub-
lican politics in the State.

The Democratic State convention of 1876, pres-
ented the name of Hendricks to the country for

•

the nomination for president. Its instructed dele-
gates and all the members of his party in the State
were his enthusiastic supporters at the national
convention that was that year held at St. Louis.

•

He received the votes of delegates from nearly all
the Northern States, but Xew York had formed
a combination with the solid South that forced the
nomination of Samuel J. Tilden, and Hendricks
was unanimously nominated for vice-president.

Indiana Democrats were greatly disappointed in

11 147

not seeing the name of Hendricks at the head and
were slow in working up their enthusiasm for the
ticket. A ratification meeting was held in the State
House yard, at which Honorable William H. Eng-
lish presided, and in an able speech he made a
clear statement of the issues that must be decided
by the people. Contrary to the position that the
party had adhered to in the campaign of 1874 in
the endorsement of the financial policies of the
Greenback party, and in opposition to the re-
sumption of specie payment of the governments
obligations, the St. Louis platform contained a
strong arraignment of the Republican party be-
cause it had made no progress toward the resump-
tion of specie payment. The speech of English on
that occasion, and others in line with it, had the
effect to bring the party back to its original beliefs
as a sound money party.

148

CHAPTER XX

GENERAL RUTHERFORD B. HAYES
of Ohio, was the Republican nominee for
president in 1876, defeating James G. Blaine, Ben-
jamin H. Bristow, and Oliver P. Morton.

Hayes was a practicing lawyer of Cincinnati
when the Civil War began, and by honorable ser-
vice in the Union army became a major general,
and was elected to congress in 1864 while serving
in the field. James G. Blaine, his rival for the
Republican nomination for the presidency in 1876,
had hired a substitute to perform his part in the
suppression of the rebellion, he was one of the
most vociferous actors in keeping alive the animos-
ities of the war by waving the banner of the
"Bloody Shirt."

*/

Haves had been a successful contender with

ft/

Allen G. Thurman for governor of Ohio in 3869
and in 1875, wrhen the questions of retiring the in-
flated currency of the country and the resumption

•/ f

of specie payment of the government obligations
were live political questions, and his stand for
sound money endeared him to the financiers of the

m

country, whose influence secured him the presi-
dential nomination in the face of the great wave
of enthusiasm for Blaine that rolled over the con-

149

vention in response to the great nominating speech
of Robert G. Ingersoll, a copy of which is here
reproduced as a sample of political rhetoric, and
because it has some bearing upon the same indus-
trial and financial conditions then prevailing that
exist now when this is written.

Benjamin H. Bristow of Kentucky had been
placed in nomination by a delegate from Massa-
chusetts, when the cheers that greeted Ingersoll
as he came on the stage subsided, he said:

"Massachusetts may be satisfied with the loyalty
of Benjamin H. Bristow; so am I; but if any man
nominated by this convention cannot carry the
State of Massachusetts, I am not satisfied with the
loyalty of that State. If the nominee of this con-
vention cannot carry the grand old commonwealth
of Massachusetts by 75,000 majority, I would ad-
vise them to sell out Faneuil Hall as a Demo-
cratic headquarters. I would advise them to take
from Bunker Hill that old monument of glory.

The Republicans of the United States demand
as their leader in the great contest of 1876 a man
of intelligence, a man of integrity, a man of well
known and approved political opinions. They de-
mand a statesman; they demand a reformer after

•/

as well as before the election. They demand a poli-
tician in the highest, broadest and best sense, a
man of superb moral courage. They demand a
man acquainted with public affairs, with the wants
of the people, with not only the requirements of
the hour, but with the demands of the future. They
demand a man broad enough to comprehend the

150

relations of this government to the other nations
of the earth. They demand a man well versed in
the powers, duties and prerogatives of each and
every department of the government. They de-
mand a man who will sacredly preserve the finan-
cial honor of the United States; one who knows
enough to know that the national debt must be
paid through the prosperity of the people ; one who
knows enough to know that all the money must
be made not by law, but by labor; one who knows
enough to know that the people of the United
States have the industry to make the money and
the honor to pay it over just as fast as they make
it. The Republicans of the United States demand
a man who knows that prosperity and resumption
when they come must come together, that when
they come they will come hand in hand through
the golden harvest fields, hand in hand by the
wheeling spindles and turning wheels; hand in
hand past the open furnace doors; hand in hand
by the flaming forges; hand in hand by the chim-
neys filled with eager fire, greeted and grasped by
the countless sons of toil. This money has to be
dug out of the earth. You cannot make it by pass-
ing resolutions in a political convention.

The Republicans of the United States want a
man who knows that this government should pro-
tect every citizen at home and abroad, who knows
that any government that will not defend its de-
fenders and protect its protectors is a disgrace to
the map of the world.

They demand a man who believes in the eternal

151

separation and divorcement of church and State.
They demand a man whose political reputation is
spotless as a star; but they do not demand that
their candidate shall have a certificate of moral
character signed bv a Confederate congress. The

O v ilJ

man who has in full heaped and rounded the meas-
ures, all these splendid qualifications is the pres-
ent grand and gallant leader of the Republican
party — James G. Elaine.

Our country, crowned with the vast and marvel-
ous achievements of its first century, asks for a

t/ •

man worthy of the past and prophetic of her
future; asks for a man who has the audacity of
genuis; asks for a man who is the grandest com-
bination of heart, conscience and brain beneath her
flag. Such a man is James G. Elaine. For the
Republican hosts, led by this intrepid man, there
can be no defeat.

This is a grand year, a year filled with recollec-
tions of the Revolution, filled with proud and ten-
der memories of the past, with the sacred legends of
liberty; a year in which the sons of freedom will
drink from the fountains of enthusiasm; a year
in which the people call for a man who has pre-
served in congress what our soldiers won upon the
battlefields; a year in which we call for the man
who has torn from the throat of treason the tongue
of slander, for the man who has snatched the mask
of democracy from the hidden face of rebellion, for
the man who like an intellectual athlete has stood
in the arena of debate and challenged all comers
and goers, and who up to this present moment is

a total stranger to defeat. Like an armed warrior,
like a plumed knight, James G. Elaine marched
down the halls of the American congress and threw
his shining lance full fair against the brazen fore-
head of the defamed defamers of his country and
the maligners of his honor. For the Republicans
to desert this gallant leader now is as though an
army should desert their general upon the field of
battle.

James G. Elaine is now and has been for years

V

the bearer of the sacred standard of the Repub-
lican party. I call it sacred because no human being
can stand beneath its fold without becoming and
remaining free.

Gentlemen of the convention, in the name of the
great Republic, the only Republic that ever existed
upon the earth; in the name of all her defenders
and of all her supporters; in the name of all her
soldiers living, in the name of all her soldiers dead
upon the field of battle; and in the name of those
who perished in the skeleton clutch of famine at
Andersonville and Libby, whose sufferings he so
vividly remembers- -Illinois, Illinois, nominates
for the next president of this country that prince
of parliamentarians, that leader of leaders, James
G. Elaine."

This great speech was not responded to by the
nomination of the candidate in whose behalf it was
made, nor did the country realize the grandeur of
the vear "filled with the recollections of the Revo-

t-

lution," when the first act in the performance of
reversing the result of the election of 1876 was put

153

on the stage. The "fountains of joy and enthusi-
asm" that gushed forth when the first returns came
in suddenly, turned into a raging torrent of indigna-
tion when Zach Chandler, the chairman of the Re-
publican National Committee, a United States sen-
ator from Michigan announced, without giving any
particulars or reasons for the declaration that
Hayes had received 185 votes and was elected.
This astounding declaration was based on what
turned out to have been the successful workings
of the returning boards in the State of South Caro-
lina, Florida, and Louisiana, in certifying that
Hayes electors had been chosen in these States.
The elections in these States were held at polling
places, surrounded by United States soldiers, under
laws that had been passed by the "carpet bag"
governments that in substance gave the power to
election officials to add to the votes that had been
actually cast such a number as they chose to say
would have been cast if the voters had not been
intimidated. These election officers were Republi-
cans, who estimated that such a number of negro
voters had been intimidated as would have given
the Hayes electors a majority, notwithstanding the
fact that the army prevented their intimidation.
At the same time they certified that the Democra-

•/

tic candidates for governors in these States had
been elected by large majorities. It soon developed
that on the night of the election and before Chand-
ler had made his infamous declaration that a num-
ber of "visiting statesmen" had been hurried to
these Southern States while the returning boards

154

were still in session and subsequent events gave
color to the suspicion that these "visiting states-
men" had made a tentative deal with the Southern
Democratic leaders that their State governments
would be bestowed to them and that carpet baggers
would be relieved of their powers if there was an
acquiescence in the verity and legality of the re-
turns of the election officers by ''Southern chiv-
alry," and as a consequence the question arose as
to whether congress in declaring the result of the
election could go behind the returns or must only
count the votes as they had been certified.

The exciting time that followed from November
until congress met in March of 1877 were much
greater than during the Civil War. There was an
evident determination on the part of the Repub-
lican leaders to not surrender the power they had
so long held, and an equally determined purpose
on the part of the Democrats of the Northern
States, particularly to gather at any hazard the
benefits of the victory which they asserted had been
fairly won. The United States army was called
from posts in the Southern States, where it had
been concentrated when the election boards were
in session, and stationed near Washington city.

The house of representatives was Democratic,
the senate was Republican. The puzzling question
for them to decide was whether both houses of con-
gress must participate in counting the electoral
votes of a State, or whether the president of the
senate by virtue of his office had the exclusive right
to count them and whether he had the discretionary

155

power to decide to whom they should be credited.
Unless one or the other of the parties surrendered
the claim to victory, another civil war was threat-
ened that would bring neighbor against neighbor
in conflict.

The more conservative people hoped there might
be an adjustment of the controversy as they were
already war worn by the terrible war between the
two sections of the coutnry. Both Tilden and
Hayes preserved a dignified silence while the con-
troversies were going on. What would be their
ultimate respective attitudes was a matter of wild
speculation among their respective supporters at
the polls.

Would Tilden, regardless of the formalities re-
quired in declaring his election, take the oath of
office and assert the right to command the armed
forces of the government in the protection of his
right to it? Would Hayes accept the office with
such a clouded title to it as it would be tainted
with? — were the questions most frequently asked.
Would they each give as due consideration to the
vast financial and other interests of the country
that were jeopardized by the controversy as to
their own personal ambitions, was also a question.

Tilden was a possessor of great wealth and
closely identified with the great financial interests
and enterprises of New York, and the holder of
many bonds and obligations of the Federal govern-
ment. The creation of a commission bv both

mi

houses of congress a a tribunal for the settlement
of the controversy was first suggested by his friend,

156

Abraham S. Hewett, a prominent representative
of New York in congress, and was thought to have
had its origin in Tilden's desires to save his per-
sonal fortune as well as to patriotically preserve
the prosperity and peace of the country.

How this commission was to be created and its
powers defined was for solution by the statesmen
in congress. Oliver P. Morton, the great senator
from Indiana, was one of these who was destined
to perform a part in the work that was to deter-
mine the fate of his political rival Hendricks.

Proctor Knott, a leading member of the house
of representatives from Kentucky, who afterwards
became governor of that State, concurring with
Hewitt, proposed a committee of five members,
whose duty it should be, acting in conjunction wTith
a similar committee on the part of the senate, to
consider the w^hole question of the disputed elec-
toral votes and to recommend to congress a course
to be pursued in counting them. The resolution
he then offered was adopted almost with unanim-
ity. Morton was selected as a member of the
senatorial committee. It became evident as soon
as this joint committee got down to work that the
two parties represented in it wrould not agree on
the questions regarding the extent of the powers
and duties of the president of the senate in the
matter of counting the disputed electoral votes.
His powers and duties as well as those of the com-
mission that was to direct him all depended upon
and related back to the question of going behind
the returns of the election boards. The Democratic

contention was that fraud and corruption vitiated
the certificates of the election boards, while the
Republicans contended that they were beyond dis-
pute in their legality.

This joint committee like the hung jury finally
agreed to disagree as to how this electoral com-
mission should be composed, and then it was pro-
posed to create an independent tribunal composed
of five members of the Supreme Court of the United
States to be selected in the order of their seniority
of commission, five senators and five represent-
atives in congress. This plan would place five
Republican senators and five Democratic members
on the commission, and who were to be the five
members of the Supreme Court that would make
the final decision was the all absorbing question.
Their selection in the order of their seniority was
not entirely satisfactory to either party, but it
was, over the protest of Morton, finally agreed that
they be so chosen. These five judges were, justices
Clifford, Swayne, Davis, Miller and Field. Two
of these were known as Democrats, two as Repub-
licans, with Justice David Davis' political affinity
in doubt. Although he had been appointed by Pres-
ident Lincoln, his republicanism was challenged
because he had at one time allowed himself to be
nominated by a labor organization for president,
had decided against the military commission in the
Milligan case and shown himself to be independent
of political control, and he was also known to have
become tired of his judicial duties and was ambi-
tious for either senatorial or presidential honors.

158

The Democrats were exultant over the fact that he
was to be the fifth member, and the Republicans
were correspondingly despondent. Whether these
judges could consent to serve had not been ascer-
tained, and before their final selection a political
episode occurred that eliminated Davis and brought
Justice Bradley in as the fifth member. With his
coming in was a revival of Republican hopes and
the despair of Democrats began. To bring about
this change in the situation, the Republicans had
shrewdly planed to have Davis elected as a United
States senator from Illinois. They had sent

•/

some of their well chosen ''visiting statemen" to
Springfield, where the balloting for senator was
going on. Two or three independent members of
the legislature had prevented an election by voting
for Davis. They were encouraged to keep on so
voting to defeat General John A. Logan, who
was the Republican nominee. The Democratic
members of the Illinois legislature composed in
large part of slum statesmen from Chicago, with
their characteristic fatuity, and inability to see any-

•S ' •/ V

thing beyond their nasal organs except a Chicago
saloon bar, wheeled into line and voted for Davis
for senator, and presumably got gloriously drunk
over their happy association with the Republicans
who sacrificed General Logan to get a vote that
was to save the presidency.

"Upon what slender threads hang everlasting

things."

The vote of this great tribunal stood eight to
seven in favor of receiving and counting the fraud-

159

ulent certificates, and Hayes was installed as pres-
ident.

In 1872 Horace Greeley had urged the Northern
people to forgive the Southerners, to shake hands
over the ''bloody chasm" and discard the 'bloody
shirt" as a campaign emblem, but they were not
yet ready to follow his advice. The installation of
Hayes was followed by a general clamor for re-
conciliation with the South and the selection of his
cabinet gave the first tangible evidence of a con-
firmation of the suspected deal that had been made
to dislodge the "carpet bag" governments, and of
a reconciliation with the Southern States. An ex-
Confederate General was appointed postmaster
general and about his first official act was to direct
the clothing of United States mail carriers in gray

o d} «/

uniforms, corresponding with those that rebel sol-
diers wore in the rebellion, an act that provoked
the wrath of nearly every soldier who had worn the
blue. While the Hayes administration was in the
main satisfactory to the best interests of the coun-
try, there was a noticeable want of that high re-
spect and confidence that a president usually
commands that could onlv be attributed to the fact

•/

that he held the office by a fraudulent and clouded
title.

The centennial year, so eloquently depicted with
grandeur by Ingersoll, will be well remembered by
many yet living as the one that commemorates the
events that preceded, a decision by a high judicial
tribunal created bv act of congress that confirmed

v CJ

fraud in election returns and awarded the presi-

160

dency of the United States to a man who had not
received a majority of either the popular or elec-
toral votes of the United States.

Tilden received a popular majority of three
hundred thousand votes over Hayes, but by the
false and fabricated returns of election certificates,
this popular verdict was overthrown. The great
leader in this conspiracy to overthrow popular gov-
ernment was Zach Chandler, a United States sena-
tor from the sovereign State of Michigan, and his
followers were again conspicuous in the campaign
that followed for the nomination of the Republi-
can candidate for the presidency in 1880, and
again showed their adroitness in dealing writh
Southern delegates of the same class as those who
had composed the Southern returning boards.

The candidates for the Republican nomination
in 1880 were: General Grant, John Sherman of
Ohio, and General Russell A. Alger of Michigan.
Grant had three hundred and six loyal followers,
who voted to the last for his nomination, but finally

m

had to yield to the objection to a third presi-
dential term. Until the convention met, it was
generally believed that Sherman would receive
practically the solid support of the delegates from
the Southern States, but it suddenly developed
that they had been captured and their affections
transferred from Sherman to Alger.

General Alger was a man of great wealth, and
had made extensive investments in industrial cor-
porations that had a monopoly of the coal, iron and
railroad business in Tennessee and Alabama, and

161

while both he and Sherman had met defeat in the
convention, the latter did not forget about his loss
of Southern delegates, and at the next session of
congress introduced and later had passed the so-
called Sherman anti-trust act that had a direct
application to Alger's Southern monopoly.

Events of recent years show that Michigan poli-
ticians of the Chandler school are not vet an ex-

*,

tinct species in that State. It is to the credit of
the State of Indiana that it has at no time given
preference to its men of wealth for United States
senators, or foreign ambassadors, as have other
States. With one exception its senators have been
comparatively poor men, and no charge of bribery
of either legislatures or individual voters has ever
been made against them. The votes of Indiana
delegates to the Republican national convention of
1880 were cast in the beginning for General Har-
rison, but with little hopes of his nomination, and
the delegates soon left him and became divided in
their support between General Grant and Sher-
man.

General Garfield made the nominating speech,
placing the name of Sherman before the conven-
tion in a glowing tribute to his record as a states-
man, and at the same time exhibited his own great
abilities that clearly foreshadowed his own nomina-

V

tion when the deadlock that ensued should be
broken.

The event of the convention that created the
greatest enthusiasm was when Roscoe Conkling
placed General Grant in nomination. His first

162

sentence was, 'When asked from whence our can-
didate comes, we say from Appomatox, and the
famous apple tree." The applause and wild cheer-
ing that followed was kept up for half an hour,
before he could proceed further. The balloting
that followed showed Grant in the lead with 306
votes, but he gained none as it preceded, and Gar-
field was finally nominated through the influence

•i

of the admirers of Elaine, and because of his own
great ability, but Conkling forced them to accept
his friend. General Chester A. Arthur, as their
candidate for vice-president.

The campaign in Indiana that followed was
vigorous as usual in that then close State, and both
parties in their selections of both State and legis-
lative candidates put forward their best men.

The State senate elected that year was conspic-
uous for the unusually strong men that composed
it, among these were, Robert C. Bell, Robert Gra-
ham, Jason B. Brown, Eugene Bundv. Frederick

t_j «

W. Viehe. Gustave V. Menzies, General George
H. Chapman, Samuel B. Voyles. and Rufus Ma-
gee, all lawyers of high standing and well fitted
for the legislative work that came before that ses-
sion, the most important of which was in dealing
with the report of a commission that had been
created pursuant to an act passed at the preceding
session to compile, classify and codify the laws of
the State. That commission was composed of
James S. Frazier, former judge of the Supreme
Court; David Turpie, and John H. Stotsenburg.
As a means of simplifying legal procedure and
12 163

making clear many of the provisions of previous
laws and correcting their phraseology, many bills
were presented by the commission that had to be
well considered and were nearly all enacted into
laws that made the officially revised statutes of
1881 into one volume of great and long use.

164

CHAPTER XXI

NO very important issues were submitted to the
voters of Indiana for decision in 1878. The
Democrats elected their State candidates, a ma-
jority of the members of congress and the State
legislature that would elect a United States sen-
ator.

John Gilson Shanklin of Evansville, was elected
secretary of state; General Mahlon D. Manson,
auditor of state; Thomas W. Woollen, attorney
general, and John J. Cooper, treasurer of state.
Daniel W. Yoorhees was a candidate for United
States senator to succeed himself, he having been
appointed by Governor Williams to fill the vacancy
caused by the death of Senator Morton. The
legislative districts were so formed that it was
necessarv the Democrats should carry at least one

•/ •/

that usually gave Republican majorities. The
counties of Marion and Shelby formed one of these,
and it was necessary for the Democrats to find
a candidate who could command not only the full

V

Democratic vote, but could draw largely from the
Republicans. William E. English was selected
and elected. He and Charles A. Cole of Peru
were the Democratic leaders in the house. Cole
was an able young lawyer, the son of Alphonso

165

A. Cole, who was a prominent lawyer of Peru, and
the grandson of Albert Cole, an early associate
judge of Miami County. Charles A. was for many
years a leader of the Peru bar, and became circuit
court judge for the six years immediately preced-
ing his death in 1921. This is an appropriate place
to give William E. English the prominence he
deserves in these reminiscences of the Public Men
of Indiana.

William E. English is the only son of Wil-
liam H. English, was born at Lexington in Scott
County, the birthplace of his father, has a hered-
itary taste for public service of a legislative char-
acter, and has been conspicuous in the maintenance
of the legislative accomplishments of his father,
and in supplementing them with further useful
legislation called for by new conditions. His first
experience was in the legislature of 1879, and he
was the youngest member of that body, and gave
special attention to the enactment of measures,
limiting the amounts of indebtedness that munic-
ipalities may incur, and that would reduce the
then excessive compensation of public officials. In
1882, he was elected to congress from the Indian-
apolis district and was the youngest member of
that body also, and looked closely after the per-
sonal wants of his constituents, regardless of their
political status, and was at the same time always
attentive to his other duties, and as active in oppos-
ing measures he disapproved as in furthering those
he favored.

He was unusually well equipped for legislative

166

WM. E. ENGLISH

work by reason of his having given the subject spe-
cial study, and from having had the best points of
observation in the course that his father had suc-
cessfully followed. He also had the advantage of
education in the law, having graduated from the
law department of the Northwestern Christian
University.

t/

Differing from most sons of wealthy parents,
he has made his life one of usefulness and industry,
and has never manifested any disposition to join
any of the aristocratic classes of wealth. While he
has always been generous in his charities, he has
never shown any ostentation in bestowing them.

Regardless of his present political alignment, he
is a Democrat bv nature in the highest and broad-

v CJ

est sense of that term, and drew his earlv inspira-

V -L.

tion from Jeffersonian doctrines, and was an active
worker in the ranks of the Democratic party from

his boyhood until the year 1896, when like thou-

./ «/

sands of others, he declined to give his activities
to the support of William Jennings Bryan, or the
financial fallacies he proposed, and supported
MeKinley for president.

At the outbreak of the Spanish-American war
in 1898, he was commissioned as a captain of vol-
unteers and served continuously from his enlist-

«/

ment until the capture of Santiago, and in the
battle of that place was severely injured by the
explosion of a shell. At the end of the war, he
returned home and his fellow citizens insisted upon
his again giving the benefits of his legislative expe-
rience to them in the State senate. In the sessions

167

of that body he has been an active supporter of
the most beneficial measures, and was the pro-
ponent of amendments to the old and admirable
constitution of the State that his father helped to
form, that have become necessary only because of
the changes in conditions brought about by time
and circumstances. He is a past Commander of
the Spanish American War veterans, refused any
salary for his services as a soldier, and serves with-
out pay on the many boards and commissions he is
a member of. He is a past Grand Master of Indi-
ana Masons and a 32nd degree Knight Templar.

168

CHAPTER XXII

AS the presidential campaign of 1880 ap-
proached, there was much interest in the at-
titudes of Tildeii and Hendricks, growing out of
the fact that they had been deprived of the offices
to which they had been elected. Neither of them
gave any public expression of a desire to again
become candidates, and while the Northern Demo-
crats generally favored their selection, there was
a disposition on the part of their Southern breth-
ren to try the experiment of presenting the mailed
hand of a soldier to the country. General Winfield
S. Hancock, while commanding a Southern mili-
tary district in reconstruction days, had endeared
himself to them by his subordinating his military
powers to the local civil authorities that had been
restored to power under the conciliating policies
of President Hayes. The years of 1879 and 1880,
were years of prosperity that gave the Republicans
the advantage in urging that there be no changes
in administration to interrupt it and the result was
the election of Garfield and Arthur, over Hancock
and William H. English.

The inevitable and ever appearing clash between
senatorial dictation and executive prerogative fol-
lowed in 1881, that had its effect in the destruc-

169

tion of the previous cordial relations that seem-
ingly had existed between senators Conkling and
Garfield, when Garfield appointed as collector of
the Port of New York a man Conkling did not
want. The assassination of President Garfield
wras, of course, not either a direct or remote con-
sequence of this break, though many people argued
that the anger of Conkling that caused him to re-
sign, because he could not give offices to his friends,
had set a vicious example to office seekers, such as
Guiteau, the assassin.

The defeat of Charles J. Folger for governor of
New York, in 1882, by Grover Cleveland, then
mayor of Buffalo, by one hundred and ninety-two
thousand votes, wras such a stunning blow to the
Republican party of New York that it could not
hope to succeed at the election of 1884, wrhen Cleve-
land was elected president.

The elections for State officers in Indiana were
still held in October in 1880. Albert G. Porter
wras the Republican nominee for governor that
year, and Thomas Hanna of Green Castle, was the
nominee for lieutenant governor. Isaac P. Gray
sought the nomination for governor that year, but
was defeated by Franklin Landers, and was then
nominated for lieutenant governor. Landers chal-
lenged Porter for a joint debate of the issues and
a number of appointments for them were arranged,
but Landers disappeared from them before they
were all filled, and Porter was elected by a sub-
stantial majority, that insured the State to Gar-
field in November.

170

A. G. PORTER

Governor Porter was for many years in public
life before his election as governor.

He first held the position of reporter of the deci-
sions of the Supreme Court of the State, to which
he was appointed by the great jurist, Isaac Black-
ford, and his judicial associates. He was next
nominated by the Democratic party for congress
and elected in 1856, and in 1858 was nominated
by the Republicans and elected, and re-elected in
1860, serving wrhile in congress on the judiciary
committee. For the next fourteen years, he de-
voted his time to the law practice at Indianapolis,
at the head of the firm of Porter, Harrison and
Hines.

In 1877, Governor Porter was appointed by
President Hayes as first comptroller of the treasury,
and while holding that position he was nominated
for governor. In all the stations Governor Porter
filled, he looked upon his duties as requiring more
than ordinary consideration and attention, whether
they were administrative, judicial or executive in
character. They were performed with the view of
making their purposes the most effectual, and he
was well equipped to that end by reason both of
his natural talent and the splendid education that
he had acquired in his youth. He wras the graduate
of a classical course at Asburv Universitv and had

•-• t.

a full law schooling as a partner of Philip Spooner,
a pioneer lawyer of Lawrenceburg. As governor,
he was enthusiastic over and contributed much to
the development of the natural resources of the
State, as well as gave attention to the legislative

171

requirements for that purpose that he urged the
general assembly to provide. It was upon his recom-
mendations and executive activities that the
growth of the extreme Northern Indiana counties
began its most vigorous development.

The counties bordering the Kankakee River, that
now contain more than one-eighth part of the
population and wealth of the entire State, had
then but a small rural population on a vast acre-
age of territory, much of it covered by water. It
was one of the great acts of his administration that
devised a plan to bring nearly a million acres of
land, lying in these counties, then deemed worth-
less, into use by draining them. He was granted
authority, upon his calling for it in a message to
the legislature, to appoint a commission to make
a survey of the river and the lands in its vicinity,

«.• «/ ^

and to report as to the practicability of their rec-
lamation, and if deemed practicable to report a
plan for the work to be done and its cost. He
appointed Professor John L. Campbell of Wabash
College to head the commission. Professor Camp-
bell was a skilful engineer and in the years 1881
and 1882, made the surveys and estimates of cost
provided for. The amount required to straighten
the channels of the river that was about the only
thing necessary to be done to afford an outlet for
the drainage of the lands was comparatively small,
and on the meeting of the general assembly of
1883 Governor Porter urged that an appropria-
tion be made by the State to accomplish the work,
but the political fears of the consequences to the

172

party in power at the next ensuing election caused
the postponement of action by the legislature, and
as might be expected, the succeeding administra-
tion would not approve any measure, however
meritorious, that its predecessor had proposed, and
it was left to individual enterprise and sacrifice to
do what the State in its sovereign capacity should
have done, and which it had obligated itself to do
when it accepted the grant of swamp lands that
was made to it in 1850.

The administration of Governor Isaac P. Gray
that followed entirely avoided any action in this

•/ «/

important matter.

The result of the election of 1886 clearly fore-

i/

shadowed the victory of the Republicans in 1888,
when General Benjamin Harrison was nominated
for president.

General Alvin P. Hovey was elected governor,
and Ira J. Chase, a former chaplain in the army,
and a prominent minister of the Christian Church,
was elected as lieutenant governor. General Ho-
vey died while governor, and Chase succeeded him
to the office of governor.

One of the Democratic nominees for a State
office in 1886 was Martin T. Kreuger, of Michigan
City, for clerk of the Supreme Court, who made a
thorough canvass of the State, speaking in both
the English and German languages, of both of
which he is a master. At the close of his campaign,
he reported to James Murdock, the chairman of
the Democratic State Committee that he had found
that there had been an average of five applicants

173

for each fourth class postoffice, and that by mul-
tiplying this number of disappointed applicants by
five and then adding the number of Cleveland's
vetos of pension bills, he could ascertain what the
Republican majority in the State would be. His
estimate proved correct, and he has not since been
an aspirant for a state office, but has been mayor
of Michigan City almost continuously since.

O •/ v

174

CHARLES L. JEWETT

CHAPTER XXIII

State election in 1882 resulted in victory
for the Democrats. William D. Bynum, who
had been formerly in the law practice at Washing-
ton in Daviess County, soon after becoming a resi-
dent of Indianapolis was elected a member of the
legislature in 1882, and was speaker of the house
in 1883. In 1884 was elected to congress. Charles
L. Jewett, one of the best known and ablest law-
yers of the State, was chairman of the judiciary
committee of the house when Bynum was speaker,
and at the regular and special sessions of 1885, and
again became a member in 1887, and was the au-
thor of the law passed at that session, requiring
the payment of wages in money every two weeks.
He was appointed by President McKinley as
colonel in the Spanish- American war, and became
judge advocate general of the military forces in
the Philippines. He was favored by nature with
the qualities that make the best of lawyers and
combines them with his high scholastic attainments
and the advantages that come from the active par-
ticipation in trials. He has great powers of con-
centration that he resorts to in the preparation and
trial of his cases, and is not unfamiliar with a vocab-
ulary that contains both adjectives and explosives,

175

and besides is a man of most imposing appearance
and pleasing address. The hundreds of instances
in which his name appears in the Supreme Court
reports as counsel, for either appellant or appellee
are some indication of his extensive law practice in
Indiana. The State would gain in prestige if he
were either governor or United States senator, and
he is still eligible.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE presidential campaign in 1884, was so
vigilant on both sides that but few Indiana
voters refrained from activities in it.

The campaign proceeded in a fairly orderly way
until the Cincinnati Enquirer, that had an exten-
sive circulation in Indiana, startled Cleveland's
followers by publishing an article charging that he
had been guilty of many youthful indiscretions,
and specifically charging that, though a bachelor,
he had a living son, whose mother's name was
Maria Halpin.

This charge was at first denounced by his fol-
lowers as a campaign lie, but some of his Mug-
wump followers called on him to take some notice
of it and requested that he indicate what answer
they should make to it. He answered them, ad-
mitting the charge and said, "Tell the truth"
about it. This amazing admission greatly dimin-
ished the enthusiasm of his followers, but at the
same time set them to the work of investigating
the private life of Elaine, that resulted in the
Indianapolis Sentinel making a countercharge
against him to the effect that he had attempted
to conceal his own wrongful conduct by a hasty
marriage.

177

Elaine's Indiana supporters, like the followers
of Cleveland, called on him to take notice of the
Sentinel's charges, which he did, and sent a tele-
gram to them saying that the charge was false in
everything that it stated or implied, and directed
General Harrison, as his attorney, to at once bring
a libel suit against the Sentinel, and the suit was
brought in the United States circuit court at
Indianapolis. The Sentinel company answered the
complaint, justifying the charge on the ground
that it had only published the truth, and to sus-
tain its answer, depositions were taken in the
State of Maine, to prove the date of Elaine's mar-
riage and the inscriptions on tombstones, showing
the dates of the birth of his offspring.

The campaign literature, bearing upon these
illegitimate issues, was much more abundant than
that dealing with political issues, and the campaign
degraded into the filthiest affair that was ever
carried on.

After the election the Sentinel company in-
sisted on a trial of the libel case, and forced Elaine
to either dismiss it or to come forward with his
proof of libel, and, finding it necessary to do one
or the other, he sent a letter to his counsel,
stating that he was convinced that he could not
have a fair trial in Indiana. This letter, his counsel
offered for filing in the court as his authority for
dismissing the case. The presiding judge refused
to allow it to be filed, but permitted a dismissal to
be entered.

Many young men of both political parties, who

178

THOMAS TAGGART

had not theretofore taken a leading part in cam-
paigns, came forward that year as leaders in local
political organizations. Prominent among these in
the Democratic party was Thomas Taggart, of
Indianapolis, whose subsequent career, in both po-
litical and business affairs, could only be briefly
set forth in a large volume, but some of the events
with which he has been identified will here follow.
He found it necessary in early life to lay aside his
desires for a higher education than that obtained
in the common school that he left to go to work,
but industry, integrity, and energy were the forces
in his character that made up for all educational
deficiencies.

An intimate association with and employer of
laboring people made him their favorite, and at the
same time gave him great advantages in dealing
with the various traits in human character. It was
his knowledge of the wants and wavs of common

O •/

people, and his ever readiness to serve them that
always brought them to his support in his political
undertakings without its being necessary for him
to organize anv labor unions to further his ambi-

o »

tions. His popularity with them was first mani-
fested in 1886, when as the Democratic nominee for
auditor of Marion County he overcame a large
normal Republican majority as well as the drift in
politics that gave the State to the Republicans
that year. His election prompted him to give his
first attention to the duties of that important office
in which great care and skill were required in
the management of the county's finances, to the

o *

179

13

end that its credit might not be impaired by either
the confusion or diversion of its funds. To assist
him in his new work he engaged as his chief dep-
uty, Eudorus M. Johnson, a graduate of Earl-
ham College, gifted with the mathematical order
of mind, and one of the most skillful accountants
of the State, who, like Taggart, was also pos-
sessed of a charming personality. So well were
the duties of the office performed that Taggart
was made the unanimous nominee of his party, and
elected for a second term. Near the end of his
second term his party insisted on his accepting the
nomination for mayor of Indianapolis, and he was
elected over a popular Republican nominee, and
again elected for a second and third term, and
again selected as his city comptroller, his tried and
true friend, "Dora" Johnson, as he was familiarly
called. As mayor of Indianapolis he made a splen-
did record in the history of the city by his enforce-
ment of law and order, and in the inauguration and
carrying into effect of a vigorous policy in public
improvements, without any increases of taxation,
or the necessity of resorting to temporary loans
to the city, as had been a previous custom. To his
administration should be credited the beautiful
boulevards and parks that adorn that city.

It has been said that "the tree that bears the best
fruit always has the most clubs in it," and Tag-
gart, like all successful politicians, has not escaped
some clubbing. The Republican press and politi-
cians of Indiana viewred his remarkable successes
as an organizer with much concern, as he was con-

180

tinually making inroads on Republican majorities
both in Marion County and in the State, while
serving as chairman of the County and Democratic
State Central committees, but the press assaults
on him only served to aid in popularizing him with
his party and gave to him undisputed leadership
of it in the State, and as a member and Chairman
of the National Democratic Committee. Republi-
cans viewed his acts "with alarm," while Democrats
pointed to them "with pride."

His activities in party management have been
signally free from self-serving purposes. He has
derived no personal benefits from his party work,
but has given his valuable time and talent to the
promotion of the political ambitions of others, with-
out any reward "or the hope or promise thereof,"
in a personal sense, or to gain office for himself.
He has continued in his party service for so many
years because the voters of his party have been en-
tirely satisfied with his activities and accomplish-
ments and have been unwilling to dispense with his
assistance as their adviser and leader. His success
as a political manager are largely due to the fact
that so much confidence is reposed in him, and to
the further fact that he has always applied business
principles to all his undertakings. He is a business
man, and not a selfish politician. It is not to the
discredit of business men in a government of po-
litical parties that they become active participants
in public affairs, nor is it just to them that they
should so often be stigmatized as "bosses" or "ma-
chine politicians," and this is especially true as to

181

Taggart, who has never been instrumental in plac-
ing undeserving men in positions where they can
plunder the public.

Besides being successful in his business under-
takings of every kind he is the possessor of other
commendable qualities that exhibit him as a man of
refinement, as well as one proud of his State and
interested in the devlopment of its material wealth.

It was something more than the mind of the mere
politician that conceived and carried into effect the
many business enterprises with which he has been
identified, and that combined esthetic tastes with
usefulness in appropriating the great French Lick
Springs to their proper purposes, and that
prompted the preservation of the natural attrac-
tions of the place of their location in its scenic beau-
ties, and at the same time embellished and made
most picturesque its rocks, ravines, and terraced ap-
proaches to the hill tops that overlook the ever gush-
ing springs that put forth their medicinal liquids
from the mythical Pluto regions, to invigorate
those who visit them from all parts of the world,
where they find rest and comfort in one of the great-
est hotels in the world, and receive the pleasant
greetings of the man who possessed both the fore-
sight and the courage to bring his visions of the
beautiful and useful into actual realization. In this
connection a little of the history of these wonderful

«/

springs and of their location is not out of place.

Doctor William A. Bowles held the title to the
large body of lands on which they are located from
1832 until his death in 1873. He was the Colonel

182

of the Second Indiana Regiment in the war with
Mexico that he commanded in its retreat at the
battle of Buena Vista. That retreat has been de-
scribed as having no comparison with his quiet re-
treat in Orange County where these springs are
located, but probably bore some comparison with
it in wildness, when he found it, and where for so
many years he made his home. He was charged
with being one of the conspirators with Harri-
son H. Dodd, Lambdin P. Milligan, Stephen
Horsey, Andrew Humphries and Horace Heffren
to overthrow the government during the Civil War.
He was tried as were the others by a military com-
mission that found them guilty. Dr. Gatling, the
inventor of the great Gatling gun, was also impli-
cated as a participant with them but was not put
on trial. It was testified by witnesses, who were
government detectives, among other things, that
Bowles was the inventor of a mechanical device for
setting boats and government buildings on fire, and
had been seen experimenting with his machine, in
which Greek fire was used as a liquid to produce
its explosions; also that he was a major general in
the military organization that operated as part of
the processes of the Sons of Liberty that were first
called as the order of American Knights.

The French Lick Springs and the country about
them, first known as the Lost River country, were
the undisputed happy hunting grounds of the
American Indians up to the time of the French
settlement there about two hundred years ao^o.

J c>

This early settlement was in huts and tents and

183

was followed a few years later by the erection of
a few cabins and by the construction in 1840 of a
hewed log house, called a hotel, that Doctor Bowles
built and where he lived and made his home until
1846, when he leased the place to a Doctor Lane
and went to the Mexican War. A few years after
his return he resumed possession himself, and con-
tinuously held the title to the Springs and the ex-
tensive body of adjoining timbered lands from
1832 until his death in 1873. Shortly before, or in
the first years of the Civil War, he constructed a
frame hotel that he occupied at the time of his
arrest in 1864. A picture of it as it appeared in
1867 is here presented.

These buildings were added to and others con-
structed during the twenty years that followed and
the adjoining grounds were also much beautified.
The place became famous as a health resort under
a management that preceded that of Taggart and
his associates, but they, as the French Lick Springs
Hotel Company, a corporation, made still greater
improvements upon becoming the owners in 1891,
by the construction of the magnificent fire-proof
brick hotel with its Bedford stone front steps and
marble stairways, shown with the lands that sur-
round it, and the herds of beef and dairy cattle
that roam over their hills, and feed on their green
fields, in the pictures that follow.

During the same period in which Taggart came
into public notice as a Democrat, Daniel M. Rans-
dell forged to the head in public popularity as a
republican. He was among the first to enlist as a

184

o
r

n

ffi

ffi

G
H

OC

CM

W
H

ffi

C5
i— I

Q

O

HH
.J

a

private soldier in General Harrison's Seventieth
Indiana Regiment, in which he served until the
end of the war and was seriously wounded in one
of the many battles in which that regiment fought.
He was a great admirer of and was greatly ad-
mired by General Harrison, and was much de-
pended upon in the promotion of Harrison's polit-
ical campaigns. He had such a popular following
that he was elected clerk of the circuit and supe-
rior court of Marion County in 1878.

Soon after Harrison's election as senator he was
elected sergeant-at-arms of the United States sen-
ate and held that position for many years, and had
the highest respect of all senators, as well as that
of his many other acquaintances. He had been pre-
ceded in that honorable position by Richard J.
Bright, whose election had been brought about by
Joseph E. McDonald and Daniel W. Voorhees.

Jackson County claims Joseph Hooker Shea, by
adoption, as one of its prominent citizens. He is
a native of Scott County where he attended the
public schools, graduating from the Lexington
high school and then taking a full college course
at the Indiana State University, from which he
graduated in the year 1889, receiving the degree of
A. B. In January of that year he was admitted
to the bar at Scott sburg where he began the active
practice of his profession. In 1891 he was elected
prosecuting attorney, and in 1896 was elected State
senator from the counties of Scott, Clarke, and
Jennings, and in the deliberations of the assembly
of 1897 was an active participant and was re-

185

elected to the next assembly where he held a posi-
tion of influence and prominence. In 1899 he be-
came a resident of Seymour and there engaged
actively in the law practice and was an associate
of the writer for a number of years in the legal
department of the Southern Indiana Hailway Com-
pany, where he rendered most efficient service until
his election in the year 1906 as Judge of the 40th
Judicial Circuit, and six years later was elected a
judge of the Appellate Court of the State and
rendered the most capable judicial service in that
tribunal until he wras called in 1915 to still higher
honors by appointment as United States ambas-
sador to Chile and had charge of the embassy dur-
ing the period of the World War, when many deli-
cate and important duties in international affairs
required and had his careful attention, among these
the duty and honor of acting as the personal repre-
sentative of the president of the United States on
the occasion of the unveiling of the Magellan monu-
ment at Punta Arenas and at the installation of
President Allesandro of that Republic.

186

JOSEPH H. SHEA

CHAPTER XXV

^ HE prestige that Grover Cleveland got, by his
-•• election as governor in 1882, brought him into
immediate prominence as the Democratic candidate
for president in 1884. Joseph E. McDonald de-
sired the nomination, and the Indiana delegates to
the national convention were instructed for him. It
was said the delegation had ;cthe hand of Esau but
the voice of Jacob, 5: that it reallv wanted Hen-

•.•

dricks, but Hendricks headed the delegates and
loyally supported McDonald, and when it was pro-
posed to substitute his name after it became appar-
ent that McDonald could not be nominated, he
frowned on the proposition and would not permit
it. Cleveland was nominated and Hendricks was
immediately nominated by Cleveland's followers by
acclamation for vice-president, and it was his great
power and influence over the Democratic voters
that defeated Elaine, the Republican nominee.
Elaine made a whirlwind tour of the State. Hen-
dricks followed him in every county in which he

.-' i

had appeared and the plumed knight's "shining
lance" drew no blood.

Isaac P. Gray had to be provided for again in
1884, and was nominated for governor over Gen-
eral Manson. The grizzly old hero's war record

d? *•

counted for nothing against that of Gray, who had

187

held a commission as colonel of the Fourth Indiana
cavalry for four months, but Manson was nomi-
nated for lieutenant governor and elected. Gray
defeated William H. Calkins, the Republican
nominee, and when Cleveland was again elected
in 1892 he was awarded the honor of an appoint-
ment as ambassador to Mexico, where he could
"revel in the Halls of the Montezumas" as did
Manson in 1846, and he died while holding that
office.

Major William H. Calkins, of LaPorte, had
served a number of terms in congress, was a mem-
ber when nominated for governor in 1884, and re-
signed to make the race. His resignation required
a special election to fill the vacancy. Benjamin
F. Shivery, of South Bend, was nominated by the
Democrats as their candidate and was elected and
was again elected for the full term, and also suc-
cessful in the elections of 1888 and 1890.

During his three terms in the house of represent-
atives he became prominent as a leader and was
so greatly admired by the people of his congres-
sional district that he overcame large Republican
majorities. He was unanimously nominated as the
Democratic candidate for goveror in 1896 and de-
feated at the election. In 1908 the Democrats car-
ried the state legislature, and at its session in 1909
he was elected United States senator by the legis-
lature, and again elected by popular vote in 1914,
and died while serving his second term and Thomas
Taggart was appointed by Governor Ralston to fill
the vacancy until the next election.

188

During his term of seven years in the senate
Shively played a prominent part in national states-
manship as a member on the committee on foreign
relations. He was a native of St. Joseph County,
and in his youth entered the Indiana Normal school
at Valparaiso, from which he graduated and for a
time followed the profession of a teacher, also en-
gaged in journalism as the editor and publisher of a
newspaper called the Xew Era. At the expiration
of his first term in congress he determined to gain
a better education and entered the law department
of the University of Michigan, from which he
graduated. He took a deep interest in higher and
better education and became a member of the
board of trustees of the Indiana State University.
In his life and character it was truly said by his
associates, "there was a beautiful combination of
modesty, courage, and sparkling genius, which was
greatly appreciated by his best friends, so that
none knew him but to love him."

189

CHAPTER XXVI

IN his first message to Congress President Cleve-
land pledged his administration to an observance
of civil service rules in appointments to office,
much to the disappointment of party workers in
Indiana, who in the campaign carried banners dis-
playing the words, "Tell the Truth" and "Turn
the Rascals Out." It soon became apparent after
the election that no rascals or other Democrats
would be "turned in." The civil service rules did
not apply to the "higher ups," however, but in only
one instance that is remembered did any head of a

«,'

department get an appointment and that ap-
pointee was Ebenezer Henderson, a practical poli-
tician, who had been auditor of state from 1874 to
1878, and was chairman of the Democratic State
Committee in 1884. He had composed the words
below to be sung by jubilant Democrats on th;
night of the election, referring to the before men-
tioned campaign scandal:

"Hurrah for Maria,

Hurrah for the Kid,

Voted for Cleveland and d--d glad I did."
Whether these chaste and thrilling words in-
duced the appointment that was given to their au-
thor is not known, but he received the appointment
as a first assistant in the revenue department.

190

Joseph E. McDonald was the United States
senator and was looked to for appointments by the
faithful. He had been a candidate against Cleve-
land for the nomination and, seemingly, did not
stand in high favor by his successful rival, but was
popular with his colleagues. By the combined
pressure that he could bring to bear he was able to
secure the appointment of his good friend, Rufus
Magee, of Logansport, as minister plenipotentiary
and envoy extraordinary to Sweden and Norway.
Magee had been a law student in McDonald's of-
fice, was for a time an editorial writer on the old
Indianapolis Sentinel and for many years promi-
nent in the journalistic field; was a member of
the state senate at the sessions of 1883 and 1885,
and on his return from his residence at the em-
bassy in Stockholm was in 1890 again elected as
state senator, serving in the sessions of 1891 and
1893. He practiced law successfully for many
years. At this writing he is still living at Logans-
port in the enjoyment of ease, and comforted by
the recollection of an active and useful life, and en-
joys the high esteem of all his fellow citizens, as
well as that of those who knew him throughout the
State.

Colonel Charles Denby, of Evansville, was also
appointed to a foreign mission; in 1885, by Cleve-
land. He was a native of Virginia, educated at
Georgetown University; practiced law at Evans-
ville, after serving as colonel in the Civil War; was
appointed minister to China, where he remained,
serving in the same capacity under the administra-

191

tions of Presidents Benjamin Harrison, the second
term of Cleveland, McKinley, Roosevelt and Taft.
In 1898 was made a member of the commission to
investigate the conduct of the war with Spain, and
in 1899 a member of the Philippine Commission.
During the war between China and Japan the
Japanese government placed its interests in China
in his care. As mentioned elsewhere he was the
father of Edwin Denby, secretary of the navy in
the cabinet of President Harding.

192

CHAPTER XXVII

CLEVELAND seemingly harbored a grudge
against ex-Union soldiers and vetoed many
pension bills, especially private pension acts that
had been passed by congress. The message that
defeated him in his second race, as it was claimed,
was the one urging a reduction of the tariff be-
cause, of the accumulated and excessive revenues
that the existing law had brought into the federal
treasury, but it is very doubtful whether that mes-

*> ' V

sage contributed as much to his defeat as did his
vetoes of pension legislation.

It is not the purpose in this volume to enumerate
the events of his second administration. His elec-
tion over General Harrison for the second term
was largely due to a split in the Republican ranks
that followed a breach between Harrison and
Elaine.

Colonel Courtland C. Matson was the Demo-
cratic nominee for governor in 1888, and Captain
William R. Myers, who later served three terms

«/

as secretary of state and previously one in con-
gress, was the nominee for lieutenant governor.
Both having been gallant Union soldiers were
greatly embarrassed and handicapped in their
campaigns by Cleveland's vetoes of pension legisla-

193

tion, and met their defeat as a consequence. Colo-
nel Matsoii graduated from Asbury University in
1858, and began the law practice at Greencastle,
that he left in 1861 to enlist as a soldier in the 16th
Indiana Regiment, and became captain of one of
its companies and at its term of service ending
again enlisted for three years, and became colonel
and served until the war closed. He served in
congress from 1882 until 1888. While a member
of congress was chairman of the house committee
on invalid pensions and the author of the widows'
pension bill, and had secured the passage of the
many pension measures that Cleveland vetoed.
Captain William R. Myers served as a Union sol-
dier for three years, and identified himself with
the Democratic party in 1872; was a great orator
and good lawyer, practicing his profession at An-
derson when nominated for congress to make what
seemed to be a hopeless race against General Wil-
liam Grose, of Xew Castle, whom he met in joint
debates and defeated. His army comrade, Daniel
J. Mustard, and his associate, John L. Forkner,
persuaded him against his inclinations to engage
in a joint discussion with General Grose. Grose
pretended that he had been nominated over his pro-
test and against the wishes of his family and did
not want to go to congress, except to please his
friends. The powers of ridicule came to the relief
of Myers, in their first joint discussion, when he so
humorously commented on the pretenses of Grose
as to make him the laughing stock of the people,

whose votes he wanted, and Myers had an easy

•i j

194

victory, but was defeated for re-election by his fel-
low townsman, Colonel Milton S. Hobinson.

John L. Forkner, or "Jack," as he has so long
been called, held county offices and was mayor of
Anderson for many years, and is still living and
honored as one of the oldest and best citizens of
that thriving city, as is Dan Mustard, who has for
more than half a century been a banker and leader
in the civic affairs of Anderson, and both have been
leaders of the Democratic party of the county.

195

14

G

CHAPTER XXVIII

OVERXOR Morton disliked General Walter
Q. Gresham, but had no admiration for Gen-
eral Benjamin Harrison, each of whom had a group
of followers in the Republican party who stood
ready to champion their respective ambitions for
leadership, when it became manifest that Morton
would soon pass away. He was so indifferent as be-
tween them that he was not known to have ever
given a hint as to which of them he would prefer to
follow him as the leader of his party. General
Gresham was appointed United States district
judge for the district of Indiana without the con-
sent of Senator Morton and it was said over his
protest.

His position as judge gave him much influence
in the Department of Justice at Washington, if he
chose to use it by making recommendations for ap-
pointments of United States district attorneys and
marshals in his district. Colonel William W.
Dudley, of Wayne County, had lost a limb in the
army service, was elected clerk of the Wayne
circuit court, and was desirous of becoming United
States marshal to succeed General Ben Spooner,
who died while holding that office. His appoint-
ment as marshal was credited to Gresham. He

196

was a practical politician, and became notorious as
the organizer of the floating voters into "blocks of
five" to carry the election of 1880, and having ac-
complished that result, and with it secured a Re-
publican legislature that would elect a United
States senator, his influence was much desired by
aspirants for the senate, an honor sought by both
Gresham and Harrison, but not openly by Gresh-
am. Harrison got the Republican caucus nomina-
tion and was elected, supposedly through the
manipulations of Dudley, and a great breach be-
tween Gresham and Dudley followed.

V

The prestige and influence that Harrison gained
by being senator was not, however, greater than
Gresham had held, and continued to hold at Wash-
ington during the terms of Grant, Hayes and
Arthur. Arthur, when nominated as vice-president
with Garfield, was known to belong to what was
called the Stalwart wing of the Republican party
of New York, led by Senator Roscoe Conkling,
while Garfield was identified with the Elaine wing.
The assassination of Garfield made Arthur presi-
dent, and Gresham became a member of his cabinet
as postmaster general and secretary of the treasury.
Soon after his retirement from the cabinet Arthur
appointed him as judge of the United States cir-
cuit court for the district of Indiana and Illinois,
and he soon thereafter moved to Chicago, but con-
tinued to have a large number of followers in the
Republican party of Indiana, who urged his can-
didacy for the nomination for president before the
Republican national convention of 1888, but Har-

197

rison's forces secured all but two of the delegates
from that state while Gresham got the votes of
Illinois and Missouri, and some from other states,
leading Harrison until the Elaine forces finally
swung to Harrison and nominated him.

Gresham's judicial record fully vindicated
Grant's wisdom in giving him his first opportunity
in civil life to show his worthiness. While serving
as district judge he also heard most of the cases
that came within the jurisdiction of the United
States circuit court, and his able and fearless deci-
sions won the highest respect for him by all the able
lawvers of the countrv.

t. »

Cleveland's election in 1892 was favored bv

•

Gresham and he received his reward by being
appointed as secretary of state in Cleveland's
cabinet. His death occurred while serving as such,
and he was laid awav in Oakwood's cemetery at

4. ft.

Chicago on Decoration dav. 189.5. President Cleve-

*,

land and other members of his cabinet attended
the funeral, a mark of respect that Cleveland
did not show to the memory of Thomas A. Hen-

•

dricks. who had made him president, and died
while serving as vice-president on the 28th day of
Xovember, 1885.

198

JUDGE J. A. S. MITCHELL

CHAPTER XXIX

THE opinions of the Supreme Court of Indiana,
at this writing, consist of 18 j volumes in addi-
tion to the eight volumes of Blackford's Reports.
They have at all times ranked high as authorities
in other jurisdictions, and particularly in the days
of Blackford and his associate judges were cited
oftener and quoted from more by law writers and
judges in other jurisdictions than those of any
other state, except possibly Massachusetts and
New York, and this prominence has been fairly
well maintained ever since. With few exceptions,
the judges who have composed the court, have
been among the ablest lawyers of the State, in-

m

eluding a number who rendered service to
their country during the Civil War. Among
these soldiers were Colonel Edwin P. Hammond,
who served throughout the war and marched with
Sherman to the sea; Captain Joseph A. S. Mitch-
ell, who commanded a cavalry company from the
beginning to the close of the war; Timothy E.
Howard, who served as a private soldier; also
Judge Walter Olds. The city of Goshen, Elkhart
County, has been a liberal contributor to both the
state and federal judiciary. Judge William A.
Woods and Captain Joseph A. S. Mitchell, of that

199

city, were nominees of their respective parties for
supreme judge at the election of 1880. Woods
was successful and two years later was appointed
United States district judge for the district of In-
diana. Governor Porter filled the vacancy occa-
sioned in the Supreme Court by appointing Colonel
Hammond, who was nominated to succeed himself
at the election of 1884, but was defeated by Cap-
tain Mitchell, who was elected again in 7890, and
died while in office. John H. Baker, of Goshen,
served in congress from March, 1875, to March,
1881, and was appointed United States district
judge for the district of Indiana in 1892, to suc-
ceed Judge Woods, who had been promoted to the
circuit court. His son, Francis E. Baker, was
elected and served as supreme judge of Indiana
for three years, when he resigned and was appoint-
ed in 1902 to succeed Judge Woods as circuit
judge, and became one of the judges of the United
States Circuit Court of Appeals for the seventh
circuit, where he has served continuously, and is

*/ 7

now the presiding judge of that court. He gradu-
ated from the University of Michigan, getting the
degrees, B. A. and LL. D. and from the University
of California with the degree of LL. D. and Phi
Beta Kappa college honors.

Charles Miller, who, like Francis E. Baker, re-
ceived his legal education in the law office of Ba-
ker and Mitchell, composed of John H. Baker
and Captain Mitchell, became United States dis-
trict attorney for the district of Indiana.

Captain Mitchell was an ideal judge, a man of

200

most pleasing personality, a trustee of Asbury Uni-
versity, and a polished scholar, who stood for high
ideals in citizenship as well, as in political matters,
and contributed great prestige to his party in the
State, as well as great learning to the judicial office
he held.

It is no disparagement to others to point to the
opinions written by him as ranking with those of
Isaac Blackford, Jehu T. Elliott, James L. Wor-
den, Alexander C. Downey and Byron K. Elliott.
For clearness of statement, profound reasoning,
and literary expression, they were faultless and like
those of Byron K. Elliott always gave great prom-
inence to underlying elementary principles and
were of a most instructive character.

Byron K. Elliott, after long service on the su-
preme bench, wrote, in association with his son,
Wm. F. Elliott, a number of law books, one on the
lawr of evidence, and others pertaining to practice
and procedure, of great value to the legal profes-
sion.

It fell to the lot of Judge William A. Woods,
as a federal judge, to decide many cases of pub-
lic importance and political in character, in which
great jurisdictional questions were involved. The
jurisdiction of the Federal court to try and de-
termine the question of guilt of election officials
for tampering with tally sheets at State elections
and perpetrating election frauds came before him,
and he held that the court had jurisdiction, because
at the same election a member of congress was
voted for, which gave it the character of a national

&•

201

election within the provisions of acts of congress,
and a number of parties were convicted of the of-
fenses with which they were charged. Following
another general election an attempt was made to
invoke the jurisdiction of the Federal court in the
prosecution of parties who were alleged to have
conspired to commit frauds at the presidential elec-
tion of that year, but he held the indictments faulty
and dismissed the accused. For this decision he
was much criticised and accused of partisanship
and inconsistency in convicting the accused in one
instance and allowing them to escape in the other,
but in the belief of many able lawyers of both po-
litical parties this criticism was unfair, as there was
a clear distinction between the charges in the in-
dictments in the respective cases.

The great case, in re Debs and others, who were
convicted of nuisance in disturbing and injuring
the public in their acts of calling and maintaining
a railroad strike at Chicago in 1893, and in con-
structively violating an injunction that had been
granted to prevent the destruction of railroad
property, came before him and the imprisonment
of Debs and others followed as a result of his
decision. His opinion, found in both the federal
reports and in the reports of the decisions of the
Supreme Court of the United States, is well worth
reading and stands out in great prominence in its
definitions of nuisance and purpresture, and in its
reasoning. These were only a few of the many
cases of far reaching interest and public impor-
tance in which decisions were fearlessly made.

202

He was a powerful man, both physically and men-
tallv, and a most active and industrious worker

•/ 7

during his long term of judicial service and com-
manded the highest respect of his judicial associ-
ates, as well as that of the many lawyers, who had
cases in his courts.

It has sometimes been a matter of cynical com-

V

ment that so many judges of the Supreme Court of
Indiana became the general counsel of railroad
companies, some of them resigning to accept such
employments.

Judge William Z. Stuart resigned from the
Supreme Court to accept employment as general
counsel of the Wabash Railroad Company, and
held the position the balance of his life, when it
descended to his sons.

Judge Walter Olds resigned from the supreme
bench and several years later became general attor-
ney for the Xickel Plate Railroad Company.

Judge Allen Zollars, of Fort Wayne, became
general attorney for the Fort Wayne division of

^^ »/ */

the Pennsylvania Company soon after his term as
supreme judge expired.

Judge Leonard J. Hackney became general so-
licitor of the Big Four Company upon his retire-
ment from the supreme bench.

It is only fair and just to say that there was
nothing in any of the decisions or opinions of these
men while occupying the beiu-h that justified the
innuendoes implied in these cynical comments. But
it has been a fact of common observation that rail-
road companies, operating in Indiana, because of a

203

supposed but an overestimated prejudice against
them, have at all times been alert to the impor-
tance of preventing the nominations by either
party of men to the supreme bench who might be
unjust to them in their decisions, and their repre-
sentatives have always been attendants at conven-

«/

tions and vigilant in urging the defeat of candi-
dates of the respective parties that they deemed
undesirable.

This vigilance on their part is not to be won-
dered at when it is remembered that so many laws
requiring construction and enforcement against
them have been enacted in the State, among them
the employers' liability acts, and the laws relating
to taxation of railroad property.

One of the acts passed in 1869 was the act pro-
viding for the granting of aid by counties to con-
struct railroads, and many roads were projected
with a view of getting this aid. The Constitution of
the State had prohibited counties from lending
their credit to corporations, and the validity of this
act was contested upon the ground that the consti-
tutional prohibition was violated by it. The Su-
preme Court upheld the act by applying a strict
and literal rule of construction to the constitutional
inhibition holding that giving aid in cash was not
giving credit. This was a victory for the promot-
ers of railroad enterprises. The operators of rail-
roads were not as successful in their opposition to
legislative acts, as were promoters in support of
the aid law.

The employers' liability act that in effect abol-

204

ished the old rule of law that enabled railroad
companies to avoid liability for deaths and per-
sonal injuries by invoking what was known as the
fellow servant rule and the doctrine of assumed
risks, was the most important of any other act in
its consequences to railroad companies, and to the
credit of the Supreme Court it must be said that the
most the companies could do in resisting its pro-
visions was but to delay its enforcement in the

»t

many cases that were appealed.

They were equally unsuccessful in their efforts
to defeat the laws relating to taxation. They vig-
orously contested, as unconstitutional, the acts pro-
viding for assessments upon their roads upon the
ground, as they contended, that they imposed bur-
dens upon them that other classes of property
were exempted from. The Supreme Court of the
State upheld the acts and the Supreme Court of the
United States affirmed its decision. William A.
Ketcham was the attorney general of the state in
this litigation and followed it at every step in all
the courts. To his skill, industry and determina-

•

tion in upholding these laws the people of the State
owe much. Before becoming attorney general he
was known as a fighting lawyer, who never yielded
his contentions or compromised the rights of his
clients, and could not be intimidated by threats or
cajoled by promises. He got his fighting qualities
in the army in which he enlisted in the war for the

•

Union, and from the station of a private soldier
gained the rank of captain, and became the com-
mander of the Grand Army of the Republic. He

205

began the law practice as a member of the firm
of Ketcham and Mitchell, composed of his father,
John M. Ketcham and Major James L. Mitchell.
Upon the death of his father and the election of
Major Mitchell as mayor of Indianapolis, he
formed a co-partnership with Judges Horatio C.
Newcomb and Solomon Claypool, under the name,
Claypool, Newcomb and Ketcham. This firm was
for many years one of the leading law firms of In-
dianapolis.

Major Mitchell was the first Democratic mayor
of Indianapolis elected after the Civil War. Gen-
eral Daniel McCauley was his predecessor in that
office. Judo^e Claypool had been for manv vears

V J. J t/

judge of the Putnam circuit court, and Judge New-
comb was one of the judges of the superior court
of Marion County, and a Republican nominee in
1876 for judge of the Supreme Court. John Caven
succeeded Mitchell as mayor.

206

CHAPTER XXX

H HE last governor to serve out his full term

•*• before 1890 was Isaac P. Grav, who was elect-

«/ '

ed as a Democrat over Major William H. Calkins,
the Republican nominee in 1884.

The Greeley campaign of 1872 brought a num-
ber of former Republicans into the Democratic
party, among these General William Harrow, of
Mount Yernon, Indiana, who had won distinction
as a brigadier general in the Union army during
the Civil War, and lost his life in a railroad acci-
dent while making a speaking tour in support of
Greeley.

mr

Other ex-Union soldiers who became Democrats
and leaders of the party were Captains William R.
Mvrs of Anderson, John C. Nelson and Maurice

•>

Winfield of Logansport. Myers, as already men-
tioned, was afterwards elected to congress and
served three terms as secretary of state, while both
Nelson and Winfield were honored bv election as

V

judges and rendered faithful judicial service.

Isaac P. Gray, who identified himself as a Dem-
ocrat at that time, has been mentioned in previous
pages and a partial estimate of his greatness has
been indicated without taking into account his
achievements in mobilizing a small but powerful

207

army of practical politicians of the State, as his
friends, who early recognized him as their cham-
pion, and proved themselves of great service to him
in promoting his political ambitions. The fee sys-
tem of compensating county officers for official ser-
vices afforded so many methods of imposing bur-
dens on litigants and taxpayers that there was for
a number of years a popular demand that it be
abolished, and that specific salaries as a means of
compensating them be substituted in its place.
This popular demand was quietly but determi-
nately opposed by the beneficiaries of the system
who formed associations to resist it in legislative
lobbies and political conventions, where their mem-
bers were always conspicuous. To this organization
combined with his own great powers and intellec-
tual capacity, Gray owed much for his political
successes that are set forth in 1500 eulogistic words
found in Volume 2 of an Encyclopedia of Indi-
ana Biography, in which the statement is made that
during his term as governor, "he rendered excel-
lent service to his State and inaugurated and car-
ried to success many reforms," but as no bill of
particulars showing what these "reforms" consisted
of appears in this biographical sketch, they cannot
be here set forth.

208

CHAPTER XXXI

TV/I" ANY men, other than those mentioned in pre-
•L*-*- ceding pages, have been contributors to the
educational, industrial and political affairs of their
respective localities and in many instances served
the State in the maintenance of its position as one
of the loyal States of the Union. They were men
who did not consider themselves as entitled to the
halo that their heroism and good work deserved,
but were satisfied with a self-consciousness of duty
well performed, without advertising their accom-
plishments. Their lives were those of inward
experience rather than outward show. While they
have not been given the historic records that should
have been preserved their fellow citizens were
nevertheless not wanting in a manifestation of
appreciation of their worth. This was shown par-
ticularly in respect to the men who aided in pre-
venting the dismemberment of the Union. The
people of the State did not forget the promises
they made to those who went forth to fight their
battles. In a great majority of the counties a
majority of the county offices were filled by men
who had served in the Union Army, and the judi-
cial standards of the State were ablv maintained

•/

in most of the judicial districts by able nisi prius

209

judges who had rendered good military service to
their country.

V

111 glancing over the alphabetical list of the
counties of the State there is brought to the mind
of the writer men in nearly all of them with whom
he was personally acquainted and about whom
much should be written that must be preserved for
use in the volume that is designed to follow this.
He deems it a fitting close of this one to record
something about the people of the one county in
the State that was long his residence and where he
became bound by the sacred marriage relation that
brought a happy companionship from the year
1869 until the year 1919, to be then broken by
death, as the golden anniversary approached, and
he would be unmindful of the wishes of the one
who ever cherished a loving and loval devotion to

c? «/

her birthplace did he not select it above all others
for some mention of life-long acquaintances.

This County of Hamilton affords such a rich
and tempting field for his reminiscences that his
fears of unfair selections of his subjects forbid his
doing more than to briefly record some of the facts
about those with whom he was most intimately

wt

acquainted or professionally associated. It was at
Xoblesville in that county that, through the kind-
ness of an uncle whose name is engraved on the sol-
diers' monument that stands in beautiful Crown-
land cemetery and was dedicated in 1868, that in
the month of August, 1865, he was brought in asso-
ciation with lawyers and judges by being appointed
deputy clerk of the Hamilton Circuit Court and for

210

the first time saw a presiding judge, who was
Judge Joseph S. Buckles of Muncie, Indiana.
Other ex- judges and prominent lawyers of that
day, who attended at sessions of the court, were
Judge Stephen Major, mentioned in the first chap-
ter, Judge William Z. Stuart of Logansport, John
Davis of Anderson, Walter March of Muncie,
Nathan R. Overman and John Green of Tipton,
and Nathaniel R. Lindsay of Kokomo. The great
abilities of these men so impressed him that he
determined to try to become a lawyer himself, and
three years later he entered the law office of Gen-
eral David Moss of Noblesville to begin his studies.
Judge Earl S. Stone, the Nestor of the Hamilton
County bar was in early days a circuit judge. As a
lawyer he was noted for the neatness and accuracy
of the legal documents he prepared and for the very
moderate charges he made for his legal service. He
took a great interest in agricultural development
and spent much time at work on his fine farm on
the west side of White River that overlooked the
town of Noblesville.

General Moss had been a general of the State
militia in earlier days and was conceded the leader-
ship of the bar in that county, and had an extensive
practice in others. At the beginning of the Civil
War he became active as a War Democrat and
recruited many soldiers for the 75th and 101st
Indiana Regiments, expecting to become colonel
of the latter, but through the partiality of Gover-
nor Morton for Breckinridge Democrats, William
Garver was appointed its colonel and resigned

211

15

after a few months' service to accept the office of
judge of the Court of Common Pleas, and held it
until that office was abolished; meanwhile he also
became a candidate for circuit judge but was
defeated by Judge John Davis of Anderson, who
presided for a few months and then became so dis-
abled physically that he could not hold the courts
and a special act of the legislature was passed per-
mitting the governor under such circumstances to
appoint a judge in his stead, and James O'Brien,
a lawyer of Noblesville, was appointed by Gover-
nor Baker and later, while holding the office, moved
to Kokomo, Howard County then being in the cir-
cuit, and became prominent in the affairs of that
county and represented it in the State Senate a
few years afterwards. His brother, Colonel Wil-
liam O'Brien, was lieutenant-colonel of the 75th
Indiana Regiment, was severely wounded at the
battle of Peach Tree Creek in Georgia, losing part
of his right hand, but remained with his regiment
until the war closed and then engaged with his
brother, James, in the law practice and was soon
elected prosecuting attorney of the circuit and was
also chosen as State Senator. It was on his motion
that the writer was admitted to practice law. Colo-
nel O'Brien was fast gaining popular prominence
in the State when his health gave wray and in 1874
he went to California in search of health but died
at Santa Barbara. His widow, a daughter of the
venerable and highly respected John Pontious, a
woman of excellent education, returned to Nobles-
ville with her two sons and was for more than hr

212

a century a teacher in its public schools. Among
Colonel O'Brien's army comrades who were promi-
nent and worthy citizens of the county were Major
Cyrus J. McCole, Captain Mahlon H. Floyd and
Henry M. Caylor, who is at this writing still in
active life. Following the close of his four years
of army service he engaged in business and indus-
trial pursuits, was in his youthful days a cooper by
trade and followed from that occupation to that
of a lumber manufacturer and dealer and con-
structed many residences and business houses in
his home town, and served his county as a member
of the Indiana Legislature, was State Department
Commander of the Grand Army of the Republic
when it contained 16,000 men.

William Conner was among the first of the early
settlers of that county and owned large bodies of
land, on part of which the City of Noblesville now
stands. A short time before his death he disposed
of his land by conveyances to his widow and chil-
dren, giving part of it to his children 'by an
Indian woman of the Delaware tribe," as appears
by an ancient deed in the county recorder's office.
His nephew, William W. Conner, was one of the
organizers of the Republican party and a dele-
gate to the Chicago Convention that nominated
Abraham Lincoln for President in 1860 and was
credited with being the first of Indiana's delegates
going to his support. He wTas a prominent leader
of that party for many years and wras elected clerk
of the Circuit Court, his term expiring in 1863,
wrhen he was succeeded in office by the writer's

213

uncle, John Trissal, who was elected while serving
in the 7<5th Indiana Regiment. Conner engaged
in the milling business for a number of years and
while so engaged was in 1871 elected to the legis-
lature as an Independent and became a supporter
of Horace Greeley for President and Thomas A.
Hendricks for governor in 1872 and was appointed
Adjutant General of the State by Governor Hen-
dricks. In 1876 he became prominent among the
leaders of the "Greenback" party, but in after
years returned to the Republican fold. His son,
John C. Conner, was captain of a company of the
63d Indiana Regiment and at the close of the war,
upon the accession of Andrew Johnson to the pres-
idency, became one of his supporters, making
many public speeches to popularize his policies, and
while so engaged received a commission as an offi-
cer in the regular army and was assigned to duty
in a military district in which the State of Texas
and the cities of Sherman and Dallas are located.
In these reconstruction days the leaders and par-
ticipants in rebellion had not yet received amnesty
and were ineligible to seats in congress and Cap-
tain Conner seeing a possible opportunity of
becoming a congressman planned a campaign to
that end by so vehemently denouncing acts of
congress and the course of some of his superior
officers that he was courtmartialed and as a conse-
quence was nominated and elected to congress by
the few old Texans who were allowed to vote. His
election took place while he was in military con-
finement and he got the distinction of being the

214

only Democratic "Carpetbagger" who was elected
to congress. His admission to his seat was opposed
bv General Ben Butler and others of the radical

«/

faction in congress, but he was finally admitted,
and upon being admitted under a claim of high
privilege was recognized by the speaker and
allowed ten minutes in which to defend his right to
his seat, and greatly surprised the members by his
deliberate and vigorous denunciation of Butler,
whom he characterized as being better suited for an
end man in a burlesque show than a seat in con-
gress, when Butler in his characteristic manner, in
the slang of the day, said ffShoo fly, don't dodder
me" and they later became close friends. He
served two terms and died soon after the close of
his second term. One of his strong supporters was
Colonel Silas Hare, a native of Xoblesville, who
had gone to Texas in an early day and served four
years as colonel of a Confederate regiment. Cap-
tain Conner as congressman secured the appoint-
ment of his son, Luther Hare as a cadet to West
Point, from whence he graduated and became an
officer of high rank in the regular army, while his
father, Colonel Silas Hare, succeeded Conner in
congress and was long a prominent member of that
body.

«,

Jonathan W. Evans or "Will" Evans, as he was
usually called, a graduate of Bethany College, was
an able lawyer of the Hamilton County bar who

•/

excelled all others in oratorical advocacy.

c

Thomas J. Kane, an able lawyer, held the record
as the one of the longest and most conspicuous in

215

continuous practice of all its members, with the
possible exception of Joel Stafford, who had began
the practice in 1859 and left it to join the army
where he served two years, and then resumed the
practice and continued actively in it for more than
sixty years, and meanwhile was prosecuting attor-
ney and a number of times performed legislative
duties.

Senator Ralph K. Kane was associated with his
father, Thomas J. Kane, in the later years of the
latter's life, succeeding Theodore P. Davis, who
was for many years his father's associate in the
practice. The firm of Kane & Davis was exten-
sively known as composed of able lawyers and had
an extensive practice. Davis was a native of the
county, got a start in his legal education in the law
office of Moss and Trissal. He was elected judge
of the Appellate Court of the State as a Democrat
in 1892, was an able and industrious member of it
and became prominent also as a member of the
Indianapolis bar after his term as appellate judge
expired. Paul Gray Davis, prominent in Demo-
cratic politics in Indianapolis, is his son.

Richard Ross Stephenson, of the Hamilton
County bar, was one of the best educated and ablest

ml

of its members, was a graduate of Ann Arbor Law
School and at the end of a term of service in the
Union army became a student in the law office of
General Moss and for a time was his partner and
then became associated as a partner of Jonathan
W. Evans, the firm having an extensive practice.
In 1868 he was elected a member of the Indiana

216

legislature and among other events at the session
of 1869 got a short leave of absence to get married
to Lucy Shaw, a graduate of Oxford College, a
woman of high literary and other accomplishments,
a sister of Dr. Albert Shaw, editor of the Review
of Reviews. He introduced at that session and
urged the passage of a measure placing county offi-
cers on specific salaries in place of compensating
them by the much abused fee system. The meas-
ure met with such opposition by the county offi-
cials that it was defeated at that session, but later
a similar measure became a law. The officials of
his county attempted to defeat him for re-election
because of this salary bill, but he accepted the issue
and at the Republican primary election got almost
the unanimous vote of his party and was elected
without opposition and served in the session of
1871, and on returning founded the Ledger news-
paper, first called the Commercial, that is still one
of the enterprises of the county. He continued in
the law practice while editing it and was later nomi-
nated and elected circuit judge and so ably did he
perform his judicial duties that he was often called
to other circuits to preside as special judge in
important cases. The contest over the will of
United States Senator Joseph E. McDonald was
one of the great cases tried in his court in which he
was called upon to decide many intricate questions,
particularly questions relating to the admissibility
of evidence bearing upon the subject of the testa-
tor's intention, and his decisions were all affirmed
by the Supreme Court as they were in most other
cases where appeals were taken.

217

Associated with him in the law practice after his
term as judge expired wras Walter R. Fertig, who
like him was a native of the county, and is now

»> '

probably the oldest living resident member of the
bar continuing in active practice. Mr. Fertig had
the advantages of a complete college course at
Butler University before its name was changed

*/ £j

from that of the Xorth Western Christian Uni-
versity and after traveling abroad and getting the
benefits of observations in other parts of the world,
settled down to his life work in the county of his

•/

birth, where he enjoys the highest esteem of his fel-
low citizens as wrell as that of the many lawyers and
judges of the State who know him.

Robert Graham, a native of Butler County,
Pennsylvania, a brother of Dr. William B. Gra-
ham, a prominent surgeon of the Civil War, resid-
ing at Noblesville, studied and began the law
practice in the office of James and William O'Brien
and became a member of that firm and followed it
in practice for a number of years; was elected State
Senator in 1880 and served in the sessions of 1881
and 1883 that were noted for the great number of
able senators they composed. He was in line for
higher political honors that he justly deserved when
he decided to change his residence to Cripple Creek,
Colorado. He was a great admirer of and was
greatly admired by Governor Albert G. Porter,
Walter Q. Gresham, Thomas A. Hendricks and
other of the great men whose names adorn the
annals of the State.

Joseph R. Gray was prominent in the leadership

218

of the Republican party of Hamilton County for
many years and was held in high esteem by all of
its citizens. He held the offices of County Audi-
tor and Clerk of the Circuit Court and was de-
feated by only one vote in a race for the Republi-
can nomination for congress by Godlove S. Orth,
who was defeated at the election by Judge Thomas
B. Ward, the Democratic nominee.

Augustus F. Shirts of that county commenced
the law practice several years after arriving at the
age of maturity and was noted for his industry and
energy in the practice that he kept up continuously
during his long life. His son, George Shirts, was
favored with the higher educational advantages
not available to his father and wras an able and
active practitioner for many years. He was a
member of a legislative commission that codified
and classified the corporation laws of the State and
the author of a text book on the law of negligence.

Francis M. Housholder, a native of Darke
County, Ohio, became a resident of Noblesville in
1870. He had served a term of enlistment as a
Union soldier and took up the law as a profession
after a course of reading in the office of Thomas J.
Kane. He was elected as prosecuting attorney
for the counties of Hamilton and Madison on the
Democratic ticket and served as postmaster of
Noblesville during the first term of President
Cleveland.

Walter N. Evans was clerk of the Circuit Court
from 1883 to 1887 and had the honor of being the
only Democrat who ever held that office.

219

Major William A. Wainwright was a soldier
and citizen of the county whose name and memory
deserve the highest tribute. On the first call for
troops in 18G1 he was the first to enlist in the three
months' service in the 6th Indiana Regiment and
participated in the first battles of the war, and at
the end of his three months' service immediately
again enlisted and served until the war closed, be-
coming major of his regiment. At the close of
hostilities he was assigned to a special military ser-
vice in Texas. Upon the expiration of that term of
service he returned to Noblesville and was for
many years engaged in mercantile business and
then compiled and completed a full abstract of
titles to the lands of that county. This abstract
enterprise became the foundation for the Wain-
wright Trust Company, a strong financial institu-
tion of the county. He also equipped his fine farm
that borders the east side of White River and over-
looks the City of Noblesville with modern farm
conveniences and magnificent farm buildings, the
pride of the county as it was of its owner, where
he and his excellent wife, the sister of Mrs. Colonel
William O'Brien, for the many years of his life hos-
pitably entertained their legions of friends.
Their son, Lucius M. Wainwright, was the first boy
graduate of the Noblesville High School and has
been prominent as a business man of Indianapolis
for many years, and is the father of Colonel Guy
Wainwright of the celebrated Rainbow Division,
that went overseas and gained militant fame in the

World War, who in soldierly bearing and manners

«

220

is a facsimile of his illustrious grandfather, Wil-
liam A. Wain wright.

John D. Evans served as major of the 39th
Indiana Regiment from the beginning until the
end of the war and was elected Auditor of State in
1868. James L. Evans, as previously mentioned,
served two terms in congress.

The long and useful career of General David
Moss wras rounded out bv his election as circuit

t

judge in 1884 and he died soon after his judicial
term closed.

Hiram Hines, who grew up in frontier sur-
roundings and lived the life of a pioneer with the
hardships incident thereto, was twenty-one years
of age when he enlisted in 1861 as a private sol-
dier of the 57th Indiana Regiment, having as his
comrades many farmer boys of Jackson Township
in Hamilton County. This regiment saw active

«/

service from the time it crossed the Ohio River in
1861 until it was mustered out in 1865, and was in
many battles in all of which Hiram participated.
He kept a diary of every day's events and recorded
the location of his regiment and what it did from its
organization until it was discharged from the ser-
vice.

At the close of his armv service he resumed work

«.

as a farmer and followed that occupation until his
election as County Auditor in 1880 and at the end

•/

of his official service again took his position in in-
dustrial pursuits in which he continued until his
death in the year 1913. He took an active interest

t/

in the growth and beauty of Xoblesville, and the

221

beautiful park that environs its southeastern boun-
dary was acquired by him and preserved as an
intended donation to that city. He took great
interest in the cause of education and was gratified
and rewarded for his zeal in that cause by observ-
ing the educational progress of his sons. His son,
Linneas became one of the State's most prominent
educators, twice elected on the Republican ticket
as State Superintendent of Public Instruction, and
at this writing is President of the Indiana State
Normal School. Fred E. is now judge of the
Hamilton Circuit Court.

John S. Corner was long a prominent and high-
ly respected citizen of Hamilton County, a Civil
War soldier and graduate of DePauw University,
having high attainments as an engineer and sur-
veyor and was county surveyor.

» •/ »

William Neal, of Cicero, in Hamilton County,
commanded a company of the 39th Indiana Regi-
ment in the Civil War; at its close he took up the
study of law and was for many years an honored
member of the bar of the county. His son, John

*/

F. Neal, was first prosecuting attorney and then
became circuit judge.

Earl S. Stone, Jr., began his law studies in the
office of his father, was a great student and reader
of ancient history, was engaged in school teaching
when the Civil War began, and enlisted as a pri-
vate soldier in the 75th Indiana Regiment and was
with it at the battle of Kenesaw Mountain, where
he received an injury from a shell bursting over

his head but remained with his regiment until the

~

222

war ended. The injury he received from the burst-
ing shell later resulted in such a severe mental
affliction that his mind only retained a recollection
of events of the ancient history he had read and he
lingered for many years under the delusion that
he was the commander of a battalion of Roman
soldiers.

John S. Conklin, a prominent pioneer resident of
Westfield, was the father of three sons, who served
in the Civil War. Joseph, the elder, fell in battle ;
Anthony M., at its close, was for many years edi-
tor of the Hamilton County Register, the Republi-
can organ of the county, but later identified him-
self with the Democratic party and was for a time
on the reportorial staff of the Indianapolis Senti-
nel. William H. also identified himself with the
Democratic party in 1876 and was long credited
with casting- the only Democratic ballot that was

CD «/

counted at Westfield.

The Republicans of that precinct later became
divided on the temperance question; this division
resulted in the Prohibitionists being allowed to sit
on election boards and the consequent counting of
all ballots as thev had been cast. No voter of that

•/

precinct would admit that he was a Democrat but
when the presidential election of 1884 was held
fifty ballots were found to have been cast for
Democratic candidates and about forty of the num-
ber casting them came forward, each claiming to
have cast the one Democratic vote at preceding
elections and a number of them were applicants
for the Westfield postoffice, but the office was

223

given to Colonel William H. Conklin, who was not
an applicant for it. He wras for many years en-
gaged in mercantile business at Westfield and
highly respected by all of his fellow citizens.

The western part of Hamilton County was pop-
ulated by many Quakers from North Carolina.

Westfield was known for many years as a station
on what was termed the underground road that
fugitive slaves from Southern States traveled on
their way to Canada, and as a place where they
would be protected, and many white men who were
not slaves left North Carolina to escape persecu-
tions because of their opposition to slavery and set-
tled in that vicinity. Among these was George W.
Vestal, who became a resident at the beginning of
the Civil War and maintained his status as a good
Republican until the nomination of Horace Gree-
ley for President, and being a great admirer of that
great character, became one of his supporters. As
a consequence of that act he was upbraided by
his former political associates and suffered almost
as many indignities and insults as had been heaped
upon him in North Carolina by slave-owners, but
this mistreatment only confirmed him in his politi-
cal views and he became a pronounced Democrat
and his sons were educated in that political school.

His son, Meade, named in honor of the distin-
guished Union general, w^as elected as judge of the
Hamilton Circuit Court, the only Democrat who
ever held that office, and he also became an officer
in the World War. Of his services as a soldier and
his high character as a citizen many pages could be

224

written in praise, but as he belongs to a younger
generation than those selected for this volume his
record is reserved for use in a second volume as is
that of William Edward Longley and a number of
other high class citizens of both political parties.

Aaron Cox, whose early political status may be
inferred from the fact that he named one of his
sons Millard F., in honor of Millard Fillmore, the
last Whig President, was long a resident of Ham-
ilton County residing in the western part of the
county. He became a supporter of the policies of
Andrew Johnson and was appointed postmaster
at Noblesville in 1867. Political intolerance pre-
vailed to an unreasonable degree during that
period and one who would hold an office under An-
drew Johnson was suspected of being an enemy of
his country. Capturing Rebel flags as trophies of
war was much talked about by returning soldiers,
and some patriots who had remained at home and
did not know what such a flag looked like suspected
that every Democrat had one concealed somewhere

»/

about his premises. In 1868 an American flag on
which was printed the names, Seymour and Blair,
was being waived by a nine-year-old boy in front
of the postoffice. One of the home patriots to qual-
ify himself to become a candidate for sheriff at the
next ensuing primary election courageously wrest-
ed the flag from the nine-year-old boy and declared
it was a "Rebel flag" that he had captured. The
incident created a riot for a few minutes. Whether
the captor got the nomination for sheriff is not re-
membered but the nine-year-old boy, Charles E.

225

Cox, later became an able judge of the Supreme
Court of the State. His elder brother, Jabez T.
Cox, was a Union soldier and was for twelve years
judge of the Miami circuit, and Millard Fill-
more Cox was for four years judge of the Marion
County Criminal Court, and was for a time chief
editorial writer on the Indianapolis Sentinel and
was the author of "The Legionaires," a romance
of Morgan's Civil War raid in Indiana.

With sincere reverence to the memories and
virtues of the departed and greetings to the living
who have been written about in this volume, it is
closed in the hope of a blessed immortality of all.

226

THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
REFERENCE DEPARTMENT

W

This book is under no circumstances to be
taken from the Building

furw 41*