resolutions galore

Posted on January 1, 2022 by SUMPTER

150 years ago today a Chicago editorial looked at the year just past and saw the terrible destruction of the Great Chicago Fire in October 1871 as a source of hope for the coming year – citizens had a great opportunity to apply their energy and industriousness to the work of rebuilding the city. The piece next offered a series of New Year’s resolutions for various city stakeholders, and then the Tribune resolved to continue it’s own work as an advocate for non-partisan “Truth, Justice, and Right.”

From the January 1, 1872 issue of The Chicago Tribune:

The Russian is coming

THE NEW YEAR.

The New Year has come with Alexis, bringing with it sundry provocations to make allusions to scythes, hour-glasses, biers, garlands, cherubs, and other properties which pertain to the last act of 1871 and the first act of 1872. The curtain goes down upon a reality of ruins, and rises again upon the future no man can draw, except with the inspiration of hope. We transfer from the books of 1871 to the new set, a clear balance of acres of broken brick, stone, and iron, and a dozen broken Aldermen, with a determination to remove the one entry and correct the other, as a basis for this year’s work. At the commencement of no previous year has Chicago had such a magnificent field for labor. There is work enough for every man, woman, and child, and plenty of money to pay for it; and, as work brings contentment and peace with it, our chances for a Happy New Year ought to he of the brightest description.

The Old Year left us a margin of time sufficient to clear away the wreck and now we have some three hundred and sixty-six days for good honest endeavor. The fire which burns over the prairie in the fall makes the young grass of the next spring always greener and stronger, and the soil richer and more productive. The same result will ensue in our own case, if we hasten to seize upon the advantages offered us. It would be quite superfluous for us to suggest what course should he adopted or what dangers avoided in shaping and making the New Chicago. Every jagged wall and heap of bricks is eloquent enough with these suggestions, and it is to be presumed that every owner of a pile of this sort has wisdom enough to heed these suggestions and act thereon.

Opportunity for the New Year

As all of us become violently virtuous on New Years Day and make sundry resolutions, it is probable that we shall do the same to-day. It will be in order, therefore, for city officials to resolve to be honest and spurn bribes and other moneyed considerations to do wrong; for property-owners to resolve to build no more shams, and for builders to observe honesty as a material part of their contracts; for the horse railroad companies to be compassionate toward their brute servants and not tax them beyond their strength; for the West Side Gas Company to furnish a better article for illumination; for grocers to put less sand in their sugar, and for all dealers to give better measure and weight; for young men to drink less whiskey, and for young women to wear less finery; for the unmarried to get married. and for the married to stay married; for the clergy to write better sermons, and for the laity to pay better attention to them; for the lawyers to be more scrupulous, and for the doctors no longer to consort with death; for the rich to be more charitable to the poor, and for the poor to be more tolerant of the rich; for insurance men to be repentant, for insurers to reduce per cents, and for Board of Trade men not to doctor grain; and for every man to forgive his enemy and not let the sun go down upon his wrath, this evening.

It were useless to speak of the New Year elsewhere, for we shall have all that we want to do here with it; and, in the great work of municipal reorganization to be done, the newspaper must of necessity take a prominent place. While wishing all its readers a Happy New Year, and thanking all its patrons for favors in the Old, THE TRIBUNE will henceforth, as always, labor for the best interests of the new city; will still continue to be the people’s Tribune, advocating the right without regard to men; and, in the administration of City, State, and National affairs, demand only the Truth, Justice, and Right, for these are higher than Party, Creed, and Sect.

Hospitality, American Style

Grand Duke reviews NY City Metropolitan Fire Brigade

Grand Duke tours Chicago’s burnt district

According to Wikipedia, Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich actually arrived in Chicago on December 30, 1871:
The city was recovering from the great fire. Joseph Medill, mayor of Chicago, had written to the Grand Duke:
“We have but little to exhibit but the ruins and débris of a great and beautiful city and an undaunted people struggling with adversity to relieve their overwhelming misfortunes.”
He visited the destroyed part of the city and was impressed by the rhythm of the reconstruction. He gave US$5,000 (equivalent to $250,000 today) in gold to the homeless people of Chicago. Alexei also visited the stockyards and a pork processing plant.
As the Tremont House Hotel had been burnt to the ground, he was accommodated in the New Tremont House which had opened on Michigan Avenue, where he was awarded the “Freedom of the City”. On New Year’s Day General Philip Sheridan initiated him into the American custom of making “New Year’s calls upon the ladies”.
Wikipedia goes on to say that later in January the Grand Duke participated in a buffalo hunt in Nebraska, apparently with Generals Sheridan and Edward Ord, Lt. Colonel George Custer, and “Buffalo Bill” Cody.

Custer and Grand Duke pose

You can never tell. The Chicago Tribune’s January 1, 1871 editorial seems kind of ironic after a year:
Our own city of Chicago is striding forward –
“To her throne amid the marts,”
with a rapidity unexampled in the history of cities. Republican palaces are rising around us on every street. Edifices, modelled after the residences of the crowned heads of Europe in their order of architecture, are rising on our central streets, and will be devoted to the purposes of commerce, or the wants of travel — thus reasserting, in stone and iron, the essential truth of the sovereignty of the people. Where the people resort, there are our palaces; and none in the world are vaster or more permanent. In all these exhibitions of progress there is not merely the toil of the effort, but the enjoyment of success. Side by side with the temples of trade, and not less costly, are those of art, of song, of worship, and of amusement. These are significant proofs that our enterprise is not sordid, but that our success is human, and that, hand-in-hand with it, go all the amenities, graces, and enjoyments of a true life. Trusting that all these may fall within the experience of our readers, one and all, we tender them gratefully and cordially the wish of the hour — a Happy New Year.
From the Library of Congress: Chicago ruins, looking northwest from Michigan Ave. hotel; Grand Duke’s drive through the burnt district, from Frank Leslie’s illustrated newspaper, vol. 35, no. 899 (1872 Dec. 21), p. 301; the photo of Custer and Alexiei; Currier & Ives 1876 wish.
Harper’s Weekly provided a lot of coverage of the Archduke’s American visit from the middle of October through at least the end of 1871. The portrait, cartoon, and review of the fire brigade come from that publication. You can see almost all of Harper’s Weekly for 1871 at HathiTrust.
Happy new year (New York : Published by Currier & Ives, c1876.; LOC: https://www.loc.gov/item/2002695831/)

hope it is a good one

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Charleston and Chicago on Christmas

Posted on December 25, 2021 by SUMPTER

halt, please

150 years ago a couple editorials, North and South, seemed to share some similarities.

From the December 25, 1871 issue of The Charleston Daily News (image 2):

Christmas.

May we not hope that this day of days, the festival of Universal Christendom, will cheer the hearts which, through persecution and pestilence, are heavy-laden with care? For these few hours may not all this people put carking grief aside, and find, in the blessedness of giving, a tranquil joy which they shall never know who cannot, at this auspicious season, become as the little children whose gala time it is? One day in the year devoted to compassing the happiness of others! This is the secret of the jocund face, the dimpled cheek and the kindly-beaming eye, which make beautiful our streets and give to sturdy grandsire and stately matron, to graceful girl and stripping gallant, to the familiar forms at the fireside, and to the stranger within the gates, their part in the joyousness of the merry Christmas morn.

There is trouble enough behind. The brave boy whom war had spared, the proud young mother, whose little ones sadly lisp her name, a host of the tender and the true, who, twelve months ago, sang on earth the Christmas canticle, are numbered with the saints who keep eternal Yule before the Jasper Throne. And who shall say what new desolation the future has in store? But until the rising of the morrow’s sun, all who will may know the great joy which is born of forgetfulness or self.

Harper’s Weekly December 30, 1871

The burdened thousands who thronged the thoroughfares on Saturday had said a short good-bye to business anxiety and domestic sorrow. They were willing laborers for sweetheart, for kinsman or for friend. Who shall tell the sweet story of the whispered debates which went before the modest outlay which shall bring exquisite content to loving hearts this day? The pondering of tastes; the weighing of the claims of utile and dulce; the hiding of the gift until the reindeers halt at the expectant threshold; the shy wonder whether the child of larger growth will be gladdened by the Christmas offering. These may be small things, but they are the happiness of peoples. They make this a day of good deeds, when many a sullied page shall be washed into whiteness in the chancery of heaven.

Very soon the hard battle of life must begin anew, but the Yule sunshine will linger on silvered beads as well as childish faces. We have Yule with us as long as thought and act are pure. And the best wish we can offer, to friend and foe alike, on this blessed morn, is that they may have Christmas in their hearts every day of the year.

“on the plains of Bethlehem”

From the December 25, 1861 issue of The Chicago Tribune (image 4):

CHRISTMAS.

“Christmas comes but once a year,” says the old proverb; and it might have added, [“brightest ]and best when it comes.” It takes its place in these dying days of 1871, the merriest, the stateliest, the most sacred of all, crowned with holly and ivy, merry with carol and good cheer, musical with chimes of happy bells ringing peace and good will, whose tones reach every blazing fireside, and whose memories reach every wanderer on seas or lands, be they never so distant.

There is never any ill-omen in a Christmas fire, and the Yule-logs of future Christmases will burn all the brighter for tho remembrance of this birthday of our blessed Lord, in this memorable year now closing. Since last Christmas a cruel fire has swept over our city, destroying millions of dollars in property, well nigh blotting out our grand material interests, and laying in ashes thousands of homes; and yet, this Christmas, our misfortune has been made beautiful by the tender sympathy and human brotherhood, by virtue of which we no longer sit in its shadow. We as a city have been the recipients of the grandest gift ever vouchsafed to men since the unspeakably blessed gift Heaven made to earth on that first Christmas morning, on the plains of Bethlehem. Nothing has more grandly attested the song of the angel messengers to the shepherds than this great Christmas gift of charity, which the nations of the earth have sent to us for the healing of our wounds; nothing has more nobly evidenced the feeling of universal brotherhood, which links man to man, in the presence of an overwhelming desolation. The broad, rich stream of charity has not yet ceased to flow, and, this Christmas day, its largess comes to beautify and bless, making glad the homes of the poor and hiding our ashes from sight. We are richer than we know. Rich in material resources, rich in the means of utilizing them, and, leaning upon the strong arm of all the world, rich in the energy and determination to recover what we have lost, and by another Christmas see our streets throbbing again with the busy life of commerce, each in his old place working with his old might.

The first duty of this day is charity. It is sacred to the poor, in memory of Him who had not where to lay His head, and sacred to the children, for of such is His kingdom. And, according to the measure of that charity which has been meted out to us, let us remember the poor on this day, more than on all other days, in memory of the firesides which are in ashes. The cheery little old man from the cold latitude will miss many of the old familiar chimneys on his route, and there will be fewer Christmas trees this day in Chicago than usual. More than ever, therefore, it belongs to us to remember the poor, and make this Christmas a merry one for them, and to recognize them as brothers with us, in token of Him, the son of a peasant woman and carpenter, whose natal day we celebrate.

pretty tall orders

This, too, is the children’s day, and let them be bountifully remembered, that they may not lose faith in Santa Claus. One of the best of Nast’s cartoons is in the current number of Harper’s Weekly. It represents Santa Claus sitting at his desk, opening his mail. At his right hand is a huge pile of letters, reaching to the ceiling, labelled, “Letters from Naughty Children’s Parents,” and at his left, a very small pile, labelled, “Letters from Good Children’s Parents.” The little old man holds an open letter in his hand, and, as he puffs the smoke from his mouth, looks slyly at the correspondence touching the bad children. His own opinion is quite clearly expressed in two pictures on the wall. One represents two lusty, chubby youngsters,with faces full of mischief, and forms full of wildlife, romping at play. These are the had children. The other represents two miserable little wretches, sitting on a bench, with folded hands and upturned eyes, not daring to say their souls are their own, for fear of reproof. These are the good children. By this fine touch of satire the artist means to have us infer that the sympathies of Santa Claus are with the bad children. We bespeak his good offices for both, and especially for the children of the poor, not forgetting Ginx’s Baby, that it may grow up into a better life than its father, and not curse the day on which it was born.

And throughout our city, so sadly changed since last Christmas, our wish is for a merry Christmas; and that every home may be full of all gladness, as befits the day; of all love, and gentleness, and innocent mirth, as befits the day; of all gratitude for the mercies of the past and of all faith in the results of the future, as befits the day; and of all solemn joy, as befits the birthday of Christ. On this day, more than all others, there should be a forgetting of all enmities and a forgiving of all enemies; and so, a merry Christmas to all, saints and sinners; a merry Christmas to Dives and Lazarus; a merry Christmas to all kind souls and poor outcasts; a merry Christmas to those at home and to the absent ones; and God bless us all.

Bethlehem bell

ruined church in Charleston, April 1865

Chicago’s Pacific Hotel after the great fire

I am thankful that I discovered the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir this year on Youtube. I became familiar with the choir fairly early in the year, and then later on, a couple of their songs really helped me out when I was going through a bit of a rough patch. And I’ve kept right on listening. They have many good songs, and all their lead singers are excellent. I am picking this example from their Youtube repertoire because the singer reminds me of church bells – loud and clear, strong and true. Relating this somehow to the American Civil War, we know during a personally painful time in 1863 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote “Christmas Bells,” a poem which later became the Christmas song “I heard the Bells on Christmas Day.” You can read the words to the original poem here

drawing a crowd

My mistakes seem to be mounting. All year long I’ve been saying you can read all of Harper’s Weekly for 1871 at HathiTrust. That is almost true, but I found out that the page with the Thomas Nast cartoon of Santa and his received missives and the next page are missing. Thankfully the image of Santa blowing smoke comes from the Internet Archive. It is on page 1217 in the December 30, 1871 issue of Harper’s Weekly.
From the Library of Congress: Currier & Ives 1876 greeting; Bethlehem bell between 1898 and 1946 (another link at the Libray suggests that the bell is “The Bethlehem Christmas bell in belfry of Church of St. Katherine”); the ruined Cathedral of St. John and St. Finbar in Charleston April 1865; Chicago’ post-fire Pacific Hotel; Xmas Charity, from other pictures it seems the Santa helper is ringing a little bell to possible solicit donation.
The image of Santa Claus and his team at what seems to quite a northerly latitude is from The Christmas Reindeer by Thornton W. Burgess at Project Gutenberg. The image of the 1577 painting of the nativity by Maerten de Vos comes via Wikipedia.
Merry Christmas (New York : Published by Currier & Ives, 125 Nassau St., [1876])

to you and yours

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not half bad

Posted on November 30, 2021 by SUMPTER

one of the calamities

Another year, another Thanksgiving. Here’s President Grant’s 1871 Proclamation:

THANKSGIVING DAY 1871
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA – A PROCLAMATION

The process of the seasons has again enabled the husbandman to garner the fruits of successful toil. Industry has been generally well rewarded. We are at peace with all nations, and tranquillity, with few exceptions, prevails at home. Within the past year we have in the main been free from ills which elsewhere have afflicted our kind. If some of us have had calamities, these should be an occasion for sympathy with the sufferers, of resignation on their part to the will of the Most High, and of rejoicing to the many who have been more favored.

I therefore recommend that on Thursday, the 30th day of November next, the people meet in their respective places of worship and there make the usual annual acknowledgments to Almighty God for the blessings He has conferred upon them, for their merciful exemption from evils, and invoke His protection and kindness for their less fortunate brethren, whom in His wisdom He has deemed it best to chastise.

In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this 28th day of October, A.D. 1871, and of the Independence of the United States of America the ninety-sixth.
U.S. GRANT

One of the calamities President Grant probably had in mind was the Great Chicago Fire that ravaged the city in early October. According to Wikipedia many people sympathized with the sufferers and sent practical help:

“In the days and weeks following the fire, monetary donations flowed into Chicago from around the country and abroad, along with donations of food, clothing, and other goods. These donations came from individuals, corporations, and cities. New York City gave $450,000 along with clothing and provisions, St. Louis gave $300,000, and the Common Council of London gave 1,000 guineas, as well as £7,000 from private donations. In Greenock, Scotland (pop. 40,000) a town meeting raised £518 on the spot. Cincinnati, Cleveland, and Buffalo, all commercial rivals, donated hundreds and thousands of dollars. Milwaukee, along with other nearby cities, helped by sending fire-fighting equipment. Food, clothing and books were brought by train from all over the continent. Mayor Mason placed the Chicago Relief and Aid Society in charge of the city’s relief efforts.”

Chicago in flames

refugees in the street

Chicago in ruins

Although Mrs. O’Leary’s cow has been exonerated as cause of the fire, some people in Chicago apparently did keep cows for the supply of fresh milk. I don’t know if anyone in New York City kept a cow in a barn out back, but I don’t think many people raised turkeys in the city, especially not enough to satisfy Gotham’s appetite, especially not at Thanksgiving. 150 years ago Connecticut was a major turkey producer. A New York City newspaper reported on the turkey operation of a Mr. Peck from the Newtown area.

From the December 2, 1871 issue of Harper’s Weekly:

OUR THANKSGIVING BIRD.

THE immediate vicinity of Newtown, Fairfield County, Connecticut is chiefly peopled by persons interested in the turkey crop. The choicest birds sent to the New York markets are from this point.

Broadway Bound?

The turkey is not successfully reared in great numbers. A small flock well fed, and permitted to rove among hill and forest, will bring to its owner more profit than a large flock confined and fed upon corn and kitchen refuse. The largest dealers do not raise large flocks themselves. They make it a point to produce fine birds rather than great numbers. Each dealer has suitable houses for picking, and ice-houses for keeping or shipping the poultry, which is collected from the small farmers of the neighborhood. Our sketches are of Mr. E. M. PECK’s poultry house, and give an excellent idea of the modus operandi in any of the establishments. Mr. PECK scours the country, buying only the choice turkeys, paying (live weight) from twelve to fifteen cents per pound. The turkeys are carried to his farm in a wagon, fed for a few days, and then driven to the pen which adjoins the picking-house. Here they are fed a light provender of corn meal, to reduce the “crop,” and make the bird shapely for market. The turkey butcher takes the birds from this pen, three at a time, places his foot upon their legs, and makes a small cut in the large vein of the neck. This produces almost instant death; at the same time it permits the bird to bleed freely, which poultrymen say is necessary to secure fine meat. The birds are then taken into the house, when the feathers are picked from the legs (as the skin of the “drumstick” is too tender to be “scald picked”). The next move is to immerse the bird in water kept nearly at the boiling-point, after which it is passed to a table, where, for a cent and a half per bird, women remove the feathers. A skillful picker will dispose of seventy-five turkeys per day. The poultry is next arranged upon shelves to cool slowly, then packed in large boxes (with ice, if the weather is too warm), and shipped to New York. A single shipment of fifteen tons has been made at once, and, during a single week, Mr. E. M. PECK has slaughtered thirteen hundred birds, averaging fourteen pounds in weight each, making nearly a ton of turkey meat.

Connecticut is par excellence the turkey State of the Union; Rhode Island follows, and next comes New York. Some of the finest turkeys sent to this market are the frozen turkeys from Vermont. These do not come in until spring, and command a high price, on account of their fine quality. The extent of the poultry trade in New York is but little known. One of our leading houses, that of E. & A. ROBBINS, disposes of upward of 50,000 turkeys during the season, and others sell from 18,000 to 20,000 each, making an aggregate of nearly 2,000,000 pounds of turkey gobbled by Gothamites every season.

“The beggar boy’s Thanksgiving”

from Harper’s Weekly December 9, 1871

From the Library of Congress: The beggar boy’s Thanksgiving c1871. I got the Grant Administration’s 1871 Thanksgiving Proclamation at the Pilgrim Hall Museum. All of Harper’s Weekly 1871 is available at HathiTrust.

house of feasting not bad either

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Dutch treat

Posted on November 25, 2021 by SUMPTER

patriotic globalist, with a soft spot for Leyden

Given the fact that David McCullough’s Pulitzer Prize winning John Adams was apparently published in 2001, I have to say I’m thankful that I finally got around to reading it within the last year or so. It is a very good book. Mr. Adams served as an emissary to Holland for the fledgling United States from mid-1780 to October 1782. One of his goals was to secure a loan from the Dutch. That was tough work, but eventually in June 1782 he negotiated a loan with some Dutch banks. Also, during his time in Holland the Dutch recognized the United States and signed a treaty with Mr. Adams. For a time John Adams resided at “the first American embassy anywhere in the world.” (page 271).

David McCullough wrote about the importance of Holland’s religious tolerance. “To New Englanders it was very nearly sacred ground, as the place where the English separatists known as the Pilgrims had found refuge in the seventeenth century, settling at Leyden for twelve years before embarking for Massachusetts.” (page 245). During his sojourn in the Dutch Republic, John Adams actually spent some time in Leyden, residing with two of his sons who were studying at the university there. Their apartment was near the “Pieterskerk, the city’s famous cathedral … It was the old quarter where the Pilgrims had lived during their years at Leyden, a connection felt deeply by Adams. A deacon at the cathedral would later relate,’Mr. Adams could not refrain from tears in contemplating this great structure.’ (page 253)”

Leiden’s Pieterskerk

For the preceding quote Mr. McCullough cites Elkanah Watson’s A Tour in Holland: In MDCCLXXXIV (pages 103-104):

I FELL in fortunately with the deacon of the presbyterian church, who spoke French perfectly: The moment he found I was an American, the muscles of his face and the expression of his eye plainly declared his partiality for my country; he left his affairs, and I found him very intelligent; to his information, with what I collected from Mons. Luzac, I am principally indebted for the account I have already given of Leyden.

I FORGOT to mention that this church is the identical one, where the original Brownists worshipped, previously to forming their first establishment in Plymouth, Newengland, in 1620. The building is very old and inelegant; but I viewed it with more abstracted satisfaction than a palace. The deacon assured me that Mr. A— could not refrain from tears, in contemplating this ancient structure; a veneration and homage due to the virtuous founders of Newengland, and worthy of this great man.

I never knew about the Brownists, but maybe I should have: “The Brownists were a group of English Dissenters or early Separatists from the Church of England. They were named after Robert Browne, who was born at Tolethorpe Hall in Rutland, England, in the 1550s. A majority of the Separatists aboard the Mayflower in 1620 were Brownists, and indeed the Pilgrims were known into the 20th century as the Brownist Emigration.”

According to Wikipedia, President John F. Kennedy urged a compromise over who had the official first Thanksgiving feast in colonial America: “He issued Proclamation 3560 on November 5, 1963, saying: “Over three centuries ago, our forefathers in Virginia and in Massachusetts, far from home in a lonely wilderness, set aside a time of thanksgiving. On the appointed day, they gave reverent thanks for their safety, for the health of their children, for the fertility of their fields, for the love which bound them together and for the faith which united them with their God.”

I was pretty young when President Kennedy issued his decree. It has always seemed like Thanksgiving has been associated with the Brownists at Plymouth. Those who survived the first difficult year since landing in November 1620 definitely would have had reason to be thankful. One of the colonists wrote a letter describing about a week long thanksgiving feast, which for a few days included some of the indigenous inhabitants. From Caleb Johnson’s MayflowerHistory.com

Letter of Edward Winslow, 11 December 1621

Edward Winslow

Loving, and old Friend; although I received no letter from you by this ship, yet forasmuch as I know you expect the performance of my promise, which was, to write unto you truly and faithfully of all things. I have therefore at this time sent unto you accordingly. Referring you for further satisfaction to our more large relations. You shall understand, that in this little time, that a few of us have been here, we have built seven dwelling-houses, and four for the use of the plantation, and have made preparation for divers others. We set the last spring some twenty acres of Indian corn, and sowed some six acres of barley and peas, and according to the manner of the Indians, we manured our ground with herrings or rather shads, which we have in great abundance, and take with great ease at our doors. Our corn did prove well, and God be praised, we had a good increase of Indian corn, and our barley indifferent good, but our peas not worth the gathering, for we feared they were too late sown, they came up very well, and blossomed, but the sun parched them in the blossom; our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a more special manner rejoice together, after we had gathered the fruit of our labors; they four in one day killed as much fowl, as with a little help beside, served the company almost a week, at which time amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest King Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain, and others. And although it be not always so plentiful, as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want, that we often wish you partakers of our plenty. We have found the Indians very faithful in their covenant of peace with us; very loving and ready to pleasure us: we often go to them, and they come to us; some of us have been fifty miles by land in the country with them; the occasions and relations whereof you shall understand by our general and more full declaration of such things as are worth the noting, yea, it hath pleased God so to possess the Indians with a fear of us, and love unto us, that not only the greatest king amongst them called Massasoit, but also all the princes and peoples round about us, have either made suit unto us, or been glad of any occasion to make peace with us, so that seven of them at once have sent their messengers to us to that end, yea, an Fle at sea, which we never saw hath also together with the former yielded willingly to be under the protection, and subjects to our sovereign Lord King James, so that there is now great peace amongst the Indians themselves, which was not formerly, neither would have been but for us; and we for our parts walk as peaceably and safely in the wood, as in the highways in England, we entertain them familiarly in our houses, and they as friendly bestowing their venison on us. They are a people without any religion, or knowledge of any God, yet very trusty, quick of apprehension, ripe-witted, just, the men and women go naked, only a skin about their middles; for the temper of the air, here it agreeth well with that in England, and if there be any difference at all, this is somewhat hotter in summer, some think it to be colder in winter, but I cannot out of experience so say; the air is very clear and not foggy, as hath been reported. I never in my life remember a more seasonable year, than we have here enjoyed: and if we have once but kine, horses, and sheep, I make no question, but men might live as contented here as in any part of the world. For fish and fowl, we have great abundance, fresh cod in the summer is but coarse meat with us, our bay is full of lobsters all the summer, and affordeth variety of other fish; in September we can take a hogshead of eels in a night, with small labor, and can dig them out of their beds, all the winter we have mussels and othus at our doors: oysters we have none near, but we can have them brought by the Indians when we will; all the springtime the earth sendeth forth naturally very good sallet herbs: here are grapes, white and red, and very sweet and strong also. Strawberries, gooseberries, raspas, etc. Plums of three sorts, with black and red, being almost as good as a damson: abundance of roses, white, red, and damask: single, but very sweet indeed; the country wanteth only industrious men to employ, for it would grieve your hearts (if as I) you had seen so many miles together by goodly rivers uninhabited, and withal to consider those parts of the world wherein you live, to be even greatly burdened with abundance of people. These things I thought good to let you understand, being the truth of things as near as I could experimentally take knowledge of, and that you might on our behalf give God thanks who hath dealt so favorably with us.

Massasoit statue in Plymouth Mass

Our supply of men from you came the ninth of November 1621, putting in at Cape Cod, some eight or ten leagues from us, the Indians that dwell thereabout were they who were owners of the corn which we found in caves, for which we have given them full content, and are in great league with them, they sent us word there was a ship near unto them, but thought it to be a Frenchman, and indeed for ourselves, we expected not a friend so soon. But when we perceived that she made for our bay, the governor commanded a great piece to be shot off, to call home such as were abroad at work; whereupon every man, yea, boy that could handle a gun were ready, with full resolution, that if she were an enemy, we would stand in our just defense, not fearing them, but God provided better for us than we supposed; these came all in health unto us, not any being sick by the way (otherwise than seasickness) and so continue at this time, by the blessing of God, the goodwife Ford was delivered of a son the first night she landed, and both of them are very well. When it pleaseth God, we are settled and fitted for the fishing business, and other trading, I doubt not but by the blessing of God, the gain will give content to all; in the mean time, that we have gotten we have sent by this ship, and though it be not much, yet it will witness for us, that we have not been idle, considering the smallness of our number all this summer. We hope the merchants will accept of it, and be encouraged to furnish us with things needful for further employment, which will also encourage us to put forth ourselves to the uttermost. Now because I expect your coming unto us with other of our friends, whose company we much desire, I thought good to advertise you of a few things needful; be careful to have a very good bread-room to put your biscuits in, let your cask for beer and water be iron-bound for the first tire if not more; let not your meat be dry-salted, none can better do it than the sailors; let your meal be so hard trod in your cask that you shall need an adz or hatchet to work it out with: trust not too much on us for corn at this time, for by reason of this last company that came, depending wholly upon us, we shall have little enough till harvest; be careful to come by some of your meal to spend by the way, it will much refresh you, build your cabins as open as you can, and bring good store of clothes, and bedding with you; bring every man a musket or fowling-piece, let your piece be long in the barrel, and fear not the weight of it, for most of our shooting is from stands; bring juice of lemons, and take it fasting, it is of good use; for hot waters, aniseed water is the best, but use it sparingly: if you bring anything for comfort in the country, butter or sallet oil, or both is very good; our Indian corn even the coarsest, maketh as pleasant meat as rice, therefore spare that unless to spend by the way; bring paper, and linseed oil for your windows, with cotton yarn for your lamps; let your shot be most for big fowls, and bring store of powder and shot: I forbear further to write for the present, hoping to see you by the next return, so I take my leave, commending you to the Lord for a safe conduct unto us. Resting in Him

Plymouth in New England
this 11 of December.
1621.

Your loving Friend
E. W.

“The First Thanksgiving at Plymouth” (1914) By Jennie A. Brownscombe

Wikipedia points out that since President Lincoln’s call for a day of Thanksgiving on the last Thursday of November 1863, there has always been a national Thanksgiving Day. Secretary of State William Seward apparently wrote the words for the proclamation
From the Library of Congress: Massasoit statue in Plymouth, Massachusetts; John Adams as Vice-President of the USA – the image is said to be after a painting by John Singleton Copley (1738-1815), according to David McCullough John Adams wrote in a letter to Charles Dana that “America … has been too long silent in Europe … Her cause is that of all nations and all men, and it needs nothing but to be explained to be approved.” (page 253);

I got the picture of Leiden’s Pieterskerk at Wikipedia, along with Jennie A. Brownscombe’s painting of the first official Thanksgiving feast at Plymouth, Mass. The greeting image comes from University of Michigan and/or Google Books)

yes, indeed

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street murder

Posted on November 11, 2021 by SUMPTER

150 years ago last month a white man shot and killed a black man in public on Election Day in Philadelphia. In it’s October 28th Harper’s Weekly summarized the murder. In an editorial a week later the paper seemed to blame the Democratic Party.

From the October 28, 1871 issue of Harper’s Weekly:

Octavius V. Catto

OCTAVIUS V CATTO.

WE give on this page the portrait of Mr. OCTAVIUS V. CATTO, a worthy colored citizen of Philadelphia, who was shot by a ruffian on the night of the late election in that city. He was master of the Institute for Colored Youth, and was highly esteemed by all who knew him. Shortly after three o’clock on election day, having closed his school, he was quietly proceeding homeward, when he was rudely accosted by a white man, who leveled a pistol at his head. Mr. CATTO endeavored to pass on, taking advantage of the shelter afforded by a passing street-car,but was again accosted by the same ruffian,who then fired at him three times. One ball took effect in his left breast, passing through the heart; another struck him in the left shoulder. He fell immediately. Several citizens carried him into a station-house, where he died a few minutes afterward. Mr. CATTO was a quiet, well-educated man, and the murder was entirely unprovoked.

From the November 4, 1871 issue of Harper’s Weekly:

THE MURDER OF CATTO.

THE murder of Mr. CATTO, a colored teacher in Philadelphia, whose portrait appeared in this paper last week, the meeting of honorable Philadelphians to express sympathy and indignation, and the sneering comments and misrepresentation both of the murder and the meeting which have appeared in the Democratic papers, are striking illustration of what can only be called the essential meanness of that party. Here was a man sprung of a race which had been held in the worst slavery, and whose very color was a badge of social ‘egradation [sic] in a country which professes to honor men simply as men—and a white man knows how hard is the struggle of life when, as in his case, there are no factitious disadvantages; but a man who, like CATTO, quietly braving all the cruel obstructions which contempt, ignorance, prejudice, and hatred throw in his way, devotes himself to the elevation and instruction of his younger brethren in misfortune, and who by his superior intelligence, industry, and stainless character wins the respect and confidence of the best men around him, is worthy of an admiration which is seldom due to a white man under the same circumstances.

Pennsylvania Peace Society deplored the assassination

Such a man, closing his school in the afternoon upon election day, and quietly walking homeward, is accosted by a white bully, who insults him, levels a pistol, and shoots him on the spot. It would seem as if there could be but one feeling of shame and indignation among all decent men; but the assassin was, of course, a Democrat, his victim was a Republican, and the Democratic papers teem with ribaldry at the fuss made over a dead negro, when scores of white men are murdered without public excitement. It is, we repeat, another illustration of the unspeakable meanness of the Democratic party toward the colored race. That party struggled to hold the race in the most loathsome slavery, and to secure that end it sought the destruction of the government. Baffled in every foul design against them, it can now only encourage the Ku-Klux which harries the colored people in the Southern States, and jeer and insult them even in their bloody graves when murdered by drunken or merely devilish Democrats in the North.

This is the party some of whose Northern leaders affect to acquiesce in the settlement of the war, and which promises to maintain and defend the rights of all citizens more surely than the Republicans! It proved its sincerity by its bitter hostility to emancipation and the civil and political equality bills, by the slaughters at Memphis and New Orleans, by its incessant gibes at the most unfortunate class in the country honorably striving to rise, and now shows it by its sneers over the grave of this honorable and modest citizen of Philadelphia, whose offense in Democratic eyes is that his skin was not white. By their works ye shall know them.

You can read more about Octavius V. Catto and his murder at The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia. For more information about the Institute for Colored Youth check out Villanova University’s Falvey Memorial Library – Mr. Catto is one of the Institute’s featured graduates.
All of Harper’s Weekly 1871 is available at HathiTrust. The clipping about the Peace Society meeting was published in the October 26, 1871 issue of The New National Era, available at the Library of Congress. The speakers at the meeting alluded to the two national parties but didn’t mention them by name. Frederick Douglass edited the paper from 1870-1872. The left-hand column in the clipping detailed one of the Grant Administration’s efforts to curtail the Ku Klux Klan. President Grant signed the Third Ku Klux Klan Act in April 1871. Pursuant to this act, on October 17th he signed the order suspending Habeas Corpus in several counties in South Carolina.

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“Chicago will not succumb”

Posted on October 11, 2021 by SUMPTER

displaced Chicagoans

I never knew much about the devastating 19th century Chicago fire, except that it seemed to have something to do with a Mrs. O’Leary and her cow. As I realized the fire was getting nearer, at least in sesquicentennial time, I naturally looked it up in Wikipedia. I found out that the Great Chicago Fire burned from the evening of October 8, 1871 until October 10th. I decided to go to the Library of Congress and check out a Chicago newspaper published on October 8th. I was looking for a little calm before the fire irony, some innocent ignorance just before the imminent calamity.

Page one of the October 8, 1871 issue of The Chicago Tribune headlined “Episcopalianism” and reported on a convention in Baltimore. So far, so good. But as I scrolled to the right I noticed an ad headlined “Great Fire, Fire” – a government surplus store was selling “slightly damaged” products. A fire sale before the great fire? How could that be? I turned to page two. There was another fire-related ad. This time an insurance company mentioned a “disastrous conflagration in the west division last night.” Last night? Now I was really suspicious. Were we somehow being hoaxed? I googled Chicago fire October 7, 1871 and sure enough, according to the Chicago History Museum, the Saturday Night Fire on October 7th appeared to be the climax of week of small fires. The October 7th fire caused an estimated one million dollars damage. “The fire will not be put out until the following afternoon, leaving firemen exhausted and their equipment in need of repair.” Page three of the October 8th Tribune reported on the “fire fiend.” The newspaper didn’t publish on October 9th and 10th.

Chicago Tribune
Oct 8, 1871 pg 1

Chicago Tribune
Oct 8, 1871 pg 2

Chicago Tribune
Oct 8, 1871 pg 3

______________________________

down but not out

The first report in the October 11th issue of the Tribune stated that the fire apparently started in a “cow-barn,” but didn’t single out Mrs. O’Leary and/or her cow. The paper began with an overview of the catastrophe and a vow that the city wasn’t going to fold.

From The Chicago Tribune October 11, 1871:

During Sunday night, Monday,and Tuesday, this city has been swept by a conflagration which hat no parallel in the annals of history, for the quantity of property destroyed, and the utter and almost irremediable ruin which it wrought. A fire in a barn on the West Side was the insignificant cause of a conflagration which has swept out of existence hundreds of millions of property, has reduced to poverty thousands who, the day before, were in a state of opulence, has covered the prairies, now swept by the cold southwest wind, with thousands of homeless unfortunates, which has stripped 3,600 acres of buildings, which has destroyed public improvements that it has taken years of patient labor to build up, and which has set back for years the progress of the city, diminished her population, and crushed her resources. But to a blow, no matter how terrible, Chicago will not succumb. Late as it is in the season, general as the ruin is, the spirit of her citizens has not given way, and before the smoke has cleared away, and the ruins are cold, they are beginning to plan for the future. Though so many have been deprived of home and sustenance, aid in money and provisions is flowing in from all quarters, and much of the present distress will be alleviated before another day has gone by.

even Tribune paused two days

It is at this moment impossible to give a full account of losses by the fire, or to state the number of fatal accidents which have occurred. So much confusion prevails, and people are so widely scattered, that we are unable for a day to give absolutely accurate information concerning them. We have, however, given a full account of the fire, from the time of its beginning, reserving for a future day a detailed statement of losses. We would be exceedingly obliged if all persons having any knowledge of accidents, or the names of persons who died during the fire, would report them at this office. We also hope that all will leave with, or at No. 15 South Canal street, a memorandum of their losses and their insurance, giving the names of the companies.

THE WEST SIDE.

At 9:30 a small cow-barn attached to a house on the corner of DeKoven and Jefferson streets, one block north of Twelfth Street, emitted a bright light, followed by a blaze, and in a moment the building was hopelessly on fire. Before any aid could be extended the fire had communicated to a number of adjoining sheds, barns and dwellings, and was rapidly carried north and east, despite the efforts of the firemen. The fire seemed to leap over the engines, and commenced far beyond them and, working to the east and west, either surrounded the apparatus or compelled it to move away. In less than ten minutes the fire embraced the area between Jefferson and Clinton for two blocks north, and rapidly pushed eastward to Canal street.

When the fire first eugulphed the two blocks, and the efforts of the undaunted engineers became palpably abortive to quench a single building, an effort was made to head it off from the north, but so great was the area that it already covered at 10:30 o’clock, and so rapidly did it march forward, that by the time the engines were at work the flames were ahead of them, and again they moved on north. …

headed toward Lincoln Park

According to the Wikipedia article, General Philip Sheridan was put in charge of maintaining law and order from October 11th through the 24th. Wikipedia also mentioned that there has been a lot of controversy about what exactly caused the fire: it is was legend that Mrs. O’Leary’s cow kicked over a lantern – in 1893 a Tribune reporter admitted he made that part up. But the legend remained.

labor protest?

O’Leary home spared

And people seemed to know it was a legend right away. The picture above of the rambunctious cow is from 1872’s Mrs. Leary’s Cow, A Legend of Chicago at Project Gutenberg. C. C. Hine’s work was sponsored by an insurance a bit north of my neck of the woods and began with this account of the Chicago fire: “Mrs. Leary got her living by selling milk; she had five cows, and kept them in her barn on De Koven street, on the west side of the river. A neighbor woman called on her for a pint of milk at nine o’clock Sunday night, October 8th, and Mrs. Leary, having sold all she had, went to the barn with her lamp to make a further draft on her best cow. The cow, as seen by the picture, being a spirited animal, became indignant at the attempt, kicked over the lamp, setting the barn on fire, and thus inaugurated the greatest fire the world has ever seen.”
A websiteby Richard F. Bales takes a more nuanced view of the fire’s origin. One of the link’s discusses the exoneration of Mrs. O’Leary and points out that it is unlikely that if she was in the barn when the fire broke out she would have just ignored the fire and gone back to bed. The website also states that the fire spared the O’Leary’s home, which supports the photo above.
From the Library of Congress: view from West Side; damaged Tribune building and O’Leary home (the Library notes for these two photos”This record contains unverified, old data from caption card.”) – according to Richard F. Bales, “There were actually two small cottages on the O’Leary property. The house fronting DeKoven Street was rented to the McLaughlin family. The O’Learys lived in the rear building.” apparently the home on the right was the O’Leary’s; panoramic view of the ruins.
The image of the Chicagoans fleeing toward Lincoln Park was published in the November 4, 1871 issue of Harper’s Weekly, which provided extensive coverage of the conflagration. You can review all of 1871 at HathiTrust.

ruins but not ruined

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upriver

Posted on September 15, 2021 by SUMPTER

According to documentation at the Library of Congress, an expedition of exploration set out from a camp in Arizona territory 150 years ago today:

heading out

up the river

In its May 6, 1871 issue Harper’s Weekly provided more information about the expedition:

SCIENTIFIC INTELLIGENCE.

WE have heretofore referred to an expedition under Lieutenant G.M. WHEELER, U.S.A., as among those now fitting out for service in the field; and we now learn that the work is to be prosecuted with the thoroughness that characterizes all the undertakings of the Engineer Department. As already stated, the field in question embraces a large area, and that of a comparatively little known country, south of the Central Pacific Railroad, including portions of southern and southwestern Nevada, southeastern California, southwestern Utah, some of the lower cañons of the Colorado, and extending into eastern and northeastern Arizona, with perhaps some points in New Mexico, and covering an aggregate of about sixty thousand square miles. The primary object of the expedition is, of course, the acquisition of a correct topographical knowledge of the country, and the means of preparing accurate maps, by which military movements can be arranged, and the best positions for settlement determined. The proper sites for military posts will be looked after, and a careful inquiry prosecuted into the character, disposition, and statistics of the Indians inhabiting the country. Of the more purely scientific work of the survey the practical geological and mining resources of the region will receive special attention. The expedition will be accompanied by gentlemen competent to settle these points, and much care will be directed also toward procuring a complete series of the animals and plants; so that, by a combination with the results of the expeditions of Mr. CLARENCE KING, of Captain SITGREAVES, of Lieutenant IVES, of General PARKE, and of the Geological Survey of California, together with the more private explorations of Dr. COUES, U.S.A., Dr. PALMER, and others, a satisfactory knowledge of the whole country can be established. Great attention will be given to the astronomical determinations, and a competent photographer will accompany the expedition. This will probably be divided into two parties-one under the direction of Lieutenant WHEELER himself, and the other under that of Lieutenant D.W. LOCKWOOD. We shall await with great interest the result of the operations of this exploration, which, it is thought, may occupy several years for its completion, but which can not fail, year by year, to bring to light much information concerning this interesting but little known portion of our country. …

View of Grand Cañon walls, near mouth of Diamond River.

Timothy O’Sullivan – out west

Black Cañon, Colorado River, looking above from Camp 7 / T.H. O’Sullivan, Phot.

_________________________________________

Harper’s was looking at a big picture with kind of a long exposure. The Lorenzo Sitgreaves led a southwest expedition in 1851. During the Civil War he was assigned to several non-fighting jobs. At the end of the war, “He conducted the inspection of the temporary defenses in Kansas and Nebraska from October 25, 1864, to July 1865.”

According to Wikipedia, the Wheeler Survey included a series of expeditions from 1869 until 1879 that explored territory west of the 100th meridian. In 1879 the Wheeler Survey and others became part of the new Geological Survey, later the United States Geological Survey.

One of the competent photographers along on the 1871 expedition was Timothy H. O’Sullivan, who also took photographs of the American Civil War.

expedition leader, later in life

From Wikimedia: Alice Pike Barney’s portrait of circa 1910 of George Montague Wheeler. From Library of Congress: Timothy O’Sullivan’s photo of Grand Cañon walls, near mouth of Diamond River; his photograph of the Colorado running through Black Canyon; one of Timothy O’Sullivan’s pictures from the Civil War – one of the guns at Fort Fisher in January 1865 – broken after the bombardment

Fort Fisher, N.C. Interior view, with heavy gun broken by the bombardment

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prison break

Posted on August 31, 2021 by SUMPTER

From the August 18, 1871 edition of The New-York Times:

SING SING AGAIN.
__________

Daring Escape of Twelve Convicts from the Prison.

__________

They are Carried off in a Tug, by Preconcerted
Arrangement — The Engineer Suspected — One Arrrest Made and
More to Follow.

__________

prison portrayed – 1855 engraving

No incident in connection with the prison history of Sing Sing since its establishment has created such an extraordinary commotion, not alone among the officials of the institution, but among the general community, from the perfection of its plan and the boldness of its execution, as the escape of a dozen convicts from the prison yesterday, in the middle of the noon-day, and in the face of the authorities themselves. It appears that about 11 3/4 [?] o’clock the steam-tug Dean Richmond, Capt. VAN ORDEN, with a canal-boat attached, was seen approaching the Prison dock, and making preparations for landing. There is a regulation of the institution forbidding vessels from coming within a certain distance of the prison grounds, but custom has for years ignored its existence, and boats of all descriptions land at the prison docks. The officer in charge sang out to the Captain of the Dean Richmond to “stand aloof,” but for some purpose, which is not yet distinctly ascertained, the order was disregarded, and the tug was immediately moored to the shore. Ere the officer could attempt to remonstrate, a dozen convicts, who were employed in the dock, rushed into the tug, seized the Captain, and with a purpose, as he states, only too evident, compelled him to run on shore to avoid personal injury. The other hands on the boat, the engineer and a boy, his nephew, instantly detached the moorings from the steamtug, the canal-boat was sent adrift, and swiftly and steadily the vessel steamed from the dock down the river, steering for the opposite shore.

All witnesses to the transaction concur in the statement that the proceedings occupied only a few seconds of time, and ere the astonished official realized the possibility of the fact, his charge had escaped. Hastily discharging his revolver at the retreating vessel, he gave the alarm, and about twenty officers of the prison, with an equal number of citizens, jumped into the boats lying along the piers and started in pursuit.

Dean Richmond at Kingston Point

The tug, however, got far beyond the reach of the officers, and ran on a sand-bar between Nyack and Rockland Lake. Several boats occupied by boys, the sons of fishermen, who at that time were fishing near at hand, were obtained to transport them to the shore, and dividing themselves into three different parties, they plunged into the fastnesses of the surrounding wood. As soon as the full circumstances regarding the affair, were developed at Sing Sing, dispatches were transmitted by telegraph to all the stations at each side of the river, and a number of boats started to intercept the fugitives. The tug was seen lying on the shore and was taken possession of.

THE CONDUCT OP THE ENGINEER.
THOMAS FARRELL, the engineer who aided their escape, was arrested and brought back to Sing Sing. He stated he was utterly bewildered in consequence of the action of the convicts, and that he was compelled to steer out into the river through dread of violence, but this explanation is hardly consistent with his conduct, which appeared entirely voluntary. While the prisoners ran into the cabin in the first instance to avoid the shots of the guard, be remained on deck, directing the engine, and placed his nephew, a mere boy, between himself and the fire, knowing it would make him assist. An examination of the boat revealed a number of facts illustrative of the care and precaution used for the accomplishment of the design. An Immense assortment of citizens’ attire, false whiskers, &c, had been provided, and, in case of resistance, it was determined to resort to the use of firearms. Several revolvers were found in the vessel, and these are now in the hands of the Police authorities at Sing Sing. A determined pursuit was made through the afternoon of yesterday for the capture of the fugitives, but without success, and last evening at 9 1/2 o’clock the officers returned discouraged, but not despairing. …

When I was searching for more information about Sing Sing, I found out that the Senate side of the U.S. Capitol was bombed back in 1915:

anything for peace

Frank Holt, aka Eric Muenter, never made it to Sing Sing. He comited suicide in police custody.
I got the image of the prison at Wikimedia and the image of the Dean Richmond at the Library of Congress. It seems several boats have been named Dean Richmond, but this picture might be the one in the story because of the date and the body of water is supposed to be the Hudson River.
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another glorious day

Posted on July 4, 2021 by SUMPTER

From the July 8, 1871 issue of Harper’s Weekly:

ninety-five years and counting

An editorial commented on the picture – the Fourth of a July was customarily a noisy, boisterous, and often dangerous holiday:

____________________________

A week later the editors still found the Fourth glorious because the war and the overall defeat of the Democratic party had changed the nation “from a nominal to an actual republic” and the national flag had become “a symbol of freedom”:

_________________________________

In Charleston, South Carolina the day wasn’t quite as glorious, at least not for the editors of the Daily News:

According to Wikipedia, Gilbert Pillsbury was a Yankee abolitionist who headed south during the war as an agent of the Freedmen’s Bureau. He served as mayor of Charleston from 1869-1871. He was defeated for reelection by German immigrant Johann Andreas Wagener, who served in the Confederate army during the Civil War. Mr. Pillsbury lived in Massachusetts from 1872 to his death in 1893.

The Declaration of Independence mentions Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. I think freedom is a part of liberty. You can listen to a “Hymn to Freedom” from 1964 at Youtube. You can hear a different version of the same Hymn (with words) at Barbershop Harmony Society’s 2019 International Convention. It was said that Oscar Peterson wrote the original instrumental in the 1960s.

You can find all of Harper’s Weekly for 1871 at HathiTrust. From the Library of Congress: the July 4, 1871 issue of The Charleston Daily News; the 34-star national flag from 1862.

Old Glory

Posted in 150 Years Ago This Week, Aftermath, Postbellum Politics, Postbellum Society, Reconstruction, Southern Society | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

redecoration

Posted on May 30, 2021 by SUMPTER

From the June 10, 1871 issue of Harper’s Weekly:

From the The New York Herald May 31, 1871:

THE NATION’S DEAD. …

The muffled drum’s sad roll has beat
The Soldier’s last tattoo,
No more on life’e parade shall meet
The brave and gallant few;
On Fame’s eternal camping ground
Their silent tents are spread,
And glory guards with solemn round
The bivouac of the dead.

The above exquisite lines were written by a priest of the Catholic Church, who was also an enthusiastic admirer of the lost cause, but they apply as well to the great army of American soldiers who knew no North, no South, now vanquished by death, whose graves fill the fields of the dark and bloody ground south of the Potomac. The dead had their prejudices buried with them; the passions that desolated the plains on which they fought are dead as they; the corn waves in the fields as rich and golden as ever, and over the resting place of Union and Confederate the same green grass grows luxuriantly. It is not, then, with any feeling of bitterness, hatred or revenge that the friends and relatives of those who fell in the desperate struggle for the maintenance of the integrity of the American republic annually assemble to deck the graves of the fallen brave with garlands of flowers and branches of laurel. Had we cemeteries of Southern dead within reach the same feeling of compassion and tenderness and wealth of affection would be evinced by us in whitest immortelles and greenest laurel lovingly strewn upon the green mounds under which their bodies were interred.

A glorious day shone out of the morning; the sky was clear; the wind blew in gentlest zephyrs yesterday. The streets of New York and Brooklyn were alive with people, and the citizens generally seemed conscious or the importance of the occasion which has added one more to the too few public days. It was a day of thankfulness – a day of poetic feeling – a day of sweet and tender recollection. …

At Woodlawn cemetery Admiral Farragut’s grave was honored. It close to violence in Boston when White and black soldiers returning from Mount Auburn had a disagreement about who could ride on the horse cars engaged by white troops. It was alleged that white troops made matters worse by insulting the blacks.

busy day in the Northeast corridor

And, with President Grant and Cabinet members in attendance, Frederick Douglass spoke at the Tomb of the Unknown at Arlington National Cemetery. This is his speech according to What So Proudly We Hail:

Friends and Fellow Citizens:

Tarry here for a moment. My words shall be few and simple. The solemn rites of this hour and place call for no lengthened speech. There is, in the very air of this resting-ground of the unknown dead a silent, subtle, and an all-pervading eloquence, far more touching, impressive, and thrilling than living lips have ever uttered. Into the measureless depths of every loyal soul it is now whispering lessons of all that is precious, priceless, holiest, and most enduring in human existence.

Dark and sad will be the hour to this nation when it forgets to pay grateful homage to its greatest benefactors. The offering we bring to-day is due alike to the patriot soldiers dead and their noble comrades who still live; for, whether living or dead, whether in time or eternity, the loyal soldiers who imperiled all for country and freedom are one and inseparable.

Those unknown heroes whose whitened bones have been piously gathered here, and whose green graves we now strew with sweet and beautiful flowers, choice emblems alike of pure hearts and brave spirits, reached, in their glorious career that last highest point of nobleness beyond which human power cannot go. They died for their country.

No loftier tribute can be paid to the most illustrious of all the benefactors of mankind than we pay to these unrecognized soldiers when we write above their graves this shining epitaph.

When the dark and vengeful spirit of slavery, always ambitious, preferring to rule in hell than to serve in heaven, fired the Southern heart and stirred all the malign elements of discord, when our great Republic, the hope of freedom and self-government throughout the world, had reached the point of supreme peril, when the Union of these states was torn and rent asunder at the center, and the armies of a gigantic rebellion came forth with broad blades and bloody hands to destroy the very foundations of American society, the unknown braves who flung themselves into the yawning chasm, where cannon roared and bullets whistled, fought and fell. They died for their country.

We are sometimes asked, in the name of patriotism, to forget the merits of this fearful struggle, and to remember with equal admiration those who struck at the nation’s life and those who struck to save it, those who fought for slavery and those who fought for liberty and justice.

I am no minister of malice. I would not strike the fallen. I would not repel the repentant; but may my “right hand forget her cunning and my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth,” if I forget the difference between the parties to that terrible, protracted, and bloody conflict.

If we ought to forget a war which has filled our land with widows and orphans; which has made stumps of men of the very flower of our youth; which has sent them on the journey of life armless, legless, maimed, and mutilated; which has piled up a debt heavier than a mountain of gold, swept uncounted thousands of men into bloody graves and planted agony at a million hearthstones—I say, if this war is to be forgotten, I ask, in the name of all things sacred, what shall men remember?

The essence and significance of our devotions here to-day are not to be found in the fact that the men whose remains fill these graves were brave in battle. If we met simply to show our sense of bravery, we should find enough to kindle admiration on both sides. In the raging storm of fire and blood, in the fierce torrent of shot and shell, of sword and bayonet, whether on foot or on horse, unflinching courage marked the rebel not less than the loyal soldier.

But we are not here to applaud manly courage, save as it has been displayed in a noble cause. We must never forget that victory to the rebellion meant death to the republic. We must never forget that the loyal soldiers who rest beneath this sod flung themselves between the nation and the nation’s destroyers. If to-day we have a country not boiling in an agony of blood, like France, if now we have a united country, no longer cursed by the hell-black system of human bondage, if the American name is no longer a by-word and a hissing to a mocking earth, if the star-spangled banner floats only over free American citizens in every quarter of the land, and our country has before it a long and glorious career of justice, liberty, and civilization, we are indebted to the unselfish devotion of the noble army who rest in these honored graves all around us.

I made changes on May 31, 2021.
From the Library of Congress: the May 31, 1871 issue of The New York Herald (image 3); at Arlington
You can find all of Harper’s Weekly for 1871 at HathiTrust. It looks like Thomas Nast signed the picture here from page 524.
Yale University Library provides a typescript version of the Frederick Douglass speech.
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