*/ "^^ Randoms, ^^ ~V ^v^ ^ 1 Recollectionv^ g ■'t^^' ^'fe ' ^ LONG? LIFE 1806 -° 1876. Still o'er these scenes my memory wakes, And fondly broods with miser care, — Time but the impression deeper makes As streams their channels deeper wear." Burns "To Mary in Heaven. -^-'^-^ssf-^*-^- COLUMBIA, S. C. Charles A. Calvo, Jr., Printer. 1884. '■^ Page 36, line 14, for "from " read "for." Page 44, line 2cS, for "Thomas" read "Charles." Page 46, line 3, for " Harvey " read "Henry." Page 67, line 2, insert negro between "India" and "barber." Page 67, at the end of the Chapter add the following, which was accidentally omitted by the author : The Baptist Church was of brick, and fronted on Sumter street^ near its intersection with Plain. The Methodist Church, a long, low wooden building, stood at the corner of Washington and Bull streets, the site of the present church. It was succeeded by a brick structure, with galleries on the sides and rear, which was burnt by Sherman's vandals in 1865. On the removal of the County seat from Granby the old court house was bought by the Presbyterian congregation, who had it taken down, removed and rebuilt, and converted into a church, in which they wor- shiped till their present church was about to be erected, when it became the property of Major Niernsee, Avho altered it into the dwelling now owned by Mr. J. H. Kinard on Lady street, opposite to its former loca- tion. Thus, after serving for the administration of the law and the propagation of the Gospel, it was changed into a private residence. The Episcopal Church was at its present location, and the Catholics and Lutherans had no church in Columbia at that time. Page 110, between lines 13 and 14, insert : The chief income in this section was from lumber sawed at their mills and rafted down Edisto River to the coast. Page 17, line 15, for " 1815" read " 1816." Page 2()6, line 24, for "Isaac A." read "James A. Entered :»ccording to Act of Congress, in the year 1884, By Edwin J. Scott, In the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY. PAGE. Aim and Scope of the Work 3 CHAPTER II. HISTORICAL EVENTS ON THE CONTINENT OF EUROPE. Napoleon Bonaparte — Louis the Eighteenth — Charles the Tenth — Revolution of 1830— Louis Phillippe— Revolution and Republic in 1848 — Louis Napoleon — The German Empire— Its Conquest of Austria and France 4 CHAPTER III. GREAT BRITAIN. George The Third— Poets, Novelists, Essayists and Critics— George The Fourth— Trial of Queen Caroline— William The Fourth- Reform Bill — Queen Victoria 7 CHAPTER IV. SUMTER, 1806 TO 1811. Black River — Presbyterian Church — Indigo — Cotton — Specie Cur- rency — Wells— Manchester — Its School House — Ball Battery — Drinking and Gambling — African Negroes — Yankee Peddlers — Catawba Indians 9 U CONTENTS. CHAPTER V. CAMDEN, 1811 TO 1817. Rev. George Reid's Academy — War of 1812 — Colonel William McWillie and His Son — Chapman Levy — General Blair — Henry G. Nixon — Boys' Artillery Company — Insurrection of Negroes — Cruelty of Criminal Laws — Baron DeKalb — Church, Preachers and Leading Citizens 14 CHAPTER VI. COLUMBIA, 1817 TO 1822. Departure from Camden and Arrival in Columbia — Apprenticeship and Return to Camden — Emigration Westward — Importance of a Wafer — Trip to Augusta — John McLean — Race Between Argyle and Bascom — Robert Waddell and Colonel Preston — Hugh McLean, H. I. Caughman and Sid Johnston — Sojourn at Lexington — Henry Shultz — Toasts 19 CHAPTER VII. . COLUMBIA— CONTINUED. Introduction of Steam with Its Effects — Magnetic Telegraph — Ex- press Companies — Waterworks, Gas Works and Other Improve- ments and Inventions — Changes in Habits, Utensils, Diseases, &c. — Roads, Streets and Ferries — Drowning of Yoimg Blocker — Markets and Butchers 29 CHAPTER VIII. COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. Business Houses and Their Occupants— John D. Brown and Family— D. and J. J. Faust— Terence, James and John C. O'Hanlon— The Bryces — Daniel Morgan — Adam Edgar — Dr. F. W. Green — Dr. S. Percival — John Parr — The Purvises and Hunts — Major Benj, Hart — Old State House — Isaac Frazier and Isaac H. Coleman — Little Levy — R. E. Russell and His Garden , . . 34 CONTENTS. CHAPTER IX. COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. Main Street, East Side— Dr. Sam Green— Business Men and Their Houses— From Gervais to Lady Street— From Lady to Wasliing- ton — From Washington to Plain, Including the Court House — From Plain to Camden or Taylor — From Taylor to Blanding — From Blanding to Laurel 42 CHAPTER X. COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. West Side of Main Street — Ainsley Hall — From Laurel to Blanding Street — From Blanding to Taylor— From Taylor to Plain — An- drew Wallace — Columbia Insurance Company— From Plain Street to Barrett's Store — David Coulter and Family — Benjamin Rawls — McCord and Nott — Shipwrecks — William L. Lewis 50 CHAPTER XL COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. Private Dwellings and Their Occupants— The Beards, Taylors, Hamp- tons, Wades, DeSaussures, Notts, Starks, Guignards, Herbe- monts. Fishers, Chappells, McGowans and Others — First Theatri- cal Performance — C!ircus and Ball Room 59 CHAPTER XII. COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. Remarkable Negroes — Lawyers — James and Maxcy Gregg — Abram Blanding — Columbia Canal — State Road — Saluda Factory — Rail- road Bank — Water Works — Chapman Levy — Trial of William Taylor— Duel — Academies, Schools and Watering Places 67 CHAPTER XIIL DISTINGUISHED CLERGYMEN. William Capers, James O. Andrew, Samuel Dunwoody, Jonathan Maxcy and Basil Manly 73 IV , CONTENTS. CHAPTER XIV. DISTRICT AND TOWN OFFICERS. Sheriff, Clerk and Ordinary, Tax Collector, Crier of Court, Intend- ant, Chief of Police and Congressman — Flush Times — Prices of Produce — Tobacco Inspection— Credit Sj'stem — Boats — Goods and Their Prices 77 CHAPTER XV. Jacob and Judah Barrett — John G. Dunlap — Henry Hook — Murder of John Arthur — Henry Voss and John H. Eiflert 82 CHAPTER XVI. LEXINGTON, 1822 TO 1839. The Village — George Haltiwanger — A. H. Fort — Jacob Drafts — John Meetze — Mrs. Corley — The Well Curb — Ephraim Corlej^ — Adam Mayer, Mrs. Stewart and the Hendrixes 87 CHAPTER XVII. R. H. Goldthwaite and Allen C. Stillman — The Court House — Bush Arbor and St. Peter's Church — Jesse Drafts — The German Lutherans, Their Habits and Characteristics, Their Negroes, Their Clothing, Food and Furniture, Their Honesty, Fights and Weddings — Game — Superstition — Edgefield Ghost , 93 CHAPTER XVIIi. William Jones and John Caldwell — My Election as Tax Collector and Marriage — Stenography and Bookkeeping — Bishop Capers and Mr. Petigru— Revs. Thomas Rail, Godfrey, Dreher and Yost Metze — John Snyder 102 CHAPTER XIX. SOME LEADING MEN OF THE DISTRICT. West Caughman, John W. Lee, John Quattlebaum, Daniel Rambo, Tommy Williamson, Simon and Peter Redmund, John Hoover, Muller & Senn, John Threewitts — Old Granby and Its Inhab- itants—A Tale of a Shirt 108 CONTENTS. CHAPTER XX. THE DUTeil FORK. George Lorick's — " My Pally Hurts Me " — Spring Hill — Thomas Boyd, Senior— Lindler as a Bridegroom— Jacob Counts— Henry Smith and His Mudderwit — Shealy's — Tom Frick and His Faith — Fred Wise — Spinning Flax— Grace Before Meat 114 CHAPTER XXI. Amos Banks — Buckeye Bayles — Whitman, the Blacksmith — Paysin- ger and Bates — Deep Swimming — Dominick and His Gun — Drunken Men and Hogs — Nicknames — Verses 118 CHAPTER XXII. Queer Sayings and Doings — Lewis Stack as a Plough Horse — Luke Manning and His Duel — Lowry, the Surveyor — Daniel and Jeremy Wingard and Jesse Floyd 123 CHAPTER XXIII. Judges and Lawyers — Judge Gantt and Judge O'Neall — Tom Hen- drix and Isaac Vansant — Judge Butler and Barney Livingston — Old Grig Clark— Cases in Court— Joseph Kennerly's Widow- Dunning vs. Permenter, Breach of Marriage Contract— Meetze and Singletary— Arson and Forgery 130 CHAPTER XXIV. Lafayette's Visit to Columbia — Death of Jefferson and Adams — Nullification Convention — John Randolph, Henry Clay and Thomas Ritchie — Florida War — Klbler. Sims and Petigru — Lutheran Seminary — Rev. Dr. Hazelius 13?' CHAPTER XXV. r RETURN TO COLUMBIA. Officers and Directors of the Commercial Bank — The Branch Bank — New Merchants and Business Men — The Clergy — The College — The Academies — The Seminary — Receipts of Cotton — Election in 1840— Sidney Park 140 VI CONTENTS. CHAPTER XXVI. THE WAR WITH MEXICO. Colonel Butler, Lieutenant-Colonel Dlckerson and Major Gladden— My Assignment— Robert Latta, John A. Crawford, John Cald- well and Henry Lyons — The Freshet of 1852 — My Election as Cashier — The Bank Suspension of 185T — The College Riot 156 CHAPTER XXVn. THE CONFEDERATE WAR. The Central Relief Association — Joseph Daniel Pope — My Visit to the Army in Virginia — The Burning of Columbia 168 CHAPTER XXVin. My Trip Up the River — End of the War — Visit to Salt Works — Elec- tion to the Legislature — Copartnership with George W. Wil- liams—Bank Robbery— Connection with Southern, Baldwin and Shiver — Reconstruction and Radical Rule — Failure in Health and Business — Seven Spring Mass — Rhymes 195 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS LONG LIFE. " Old people tell of li'Jiat tliey have seen and done, children of 7vhat they are doing, anil fools of 7vhat thev intend to do^ CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY. Aim and Scope of the Work. However humble or obscure one's Hfe may be, be can hardly attain the age of eighty without witnessing and parti- cipating in some exciting and interesting scenes and becom- ing acquainted with many remarkable and distinguished persons. And when too old and infirm to serve his family or the community in any other way, he may, if blest with an ordinary memory, amuse or instruct them somewhat by re- calling and recording some of the circumstances and trans- actions that have occurred in his time, together with the changes made thereby. This I propose to do. And whereas any statement of facts may be strengthened and confirmed by a knowledge of the manner in which they became known, my own experience shall be given whenever requisite to verify or simplify the narrative about to be related. The present century has witnessed many startling and im- portant events, producing a greater revolution in all the phases RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. of human society than has occurred in the same length of time at any previous period of the world's history. Who can enumerate, for instance, the many improvements made in the arts and sciences, in government and education, in law and literature, in medicine and surgery, in agriculture and its im- plements, in mechanical inventions and chemical discoveries, all tending to promote the comforts and conveniences, sup- ply the needs, advance the interests, and contribute to the welfare of the race? Without attempting at present to par- ticularize or estimate the effects of these improvements on the character and condition of our people, which shall be done to some extent hereafter, a brief review of the most prominent public matters shall first be traced, and then a sketch of private affairs, with the great alterations in our business habits and domestic manners and customs, inter- spersed with local incidents and anecdotes, will form the subject of the following series. CHAPTER II. HISTORICAL EVENTS ON THE CONTINENT OF EUROPE. Napoleon Bonaparte — Louis the Eighteenth — Charees the Tenth — Revolution of 1830— Louis Philippe— Revolution and Republic IN 1848— Louis Napoleon— The German Empire— Its Conquest of Austria and France. We will first glance at the principal historical events, be- ginning with France. The wonderful career of Napoleon Bonaparte, perhaps, ex- ceeds in novelty and interest that recorded of any other character in history or fiction. His rise from a private station to supreme power without the aid of wealth or in- fluential fiimily connections; his creation (for it can be called RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. no less) of peace and order out of the chaos of conflicting and fermenting elements left by the great French Revolution ; his successive conquest of all the kingdoms of Continental Europe, until his fatal and insane invasion of Russia, with the horrors and sufferings of the retreat from Moscow; his waning fortunes at Dresden and Leipsic; his desperate but futile struggle to protect Paris; his defeat, abdication and exile to Elba; his sudden and unexpected return, causing the flight of Louis the Eighteenth; his busy and brilliant reign of the Hundred Days; his final overthrow at Waterloo; his vain attempt to escape to America; his banishment and death at St. Helena, wdie^nce after many years his remains were removed to Paris and received with great pomp by Louis Philippe, and where, in accordance with his last will and prayer, they '^repose on the banks of the Seine, among the people whom he had loved so well." Surely no more stir- ring and romantic life is found in the annals of our race. Such were his power and influence that his history was that of Europe for nearly twenty years ; and Allison, the historian, his bitter and prejudiced enemy, declared that all Europe would fly to arms at the display ^of his old grey coat. I distinctly recollect reading the account of the battle of Waterloo in the Camden newspaper at the time ; and if the old Cornwallis mansion still remained, in which I went to school, and which was burnt by Sherman's troops in 1865, I could go to within three feet of the spot where I read the paper — one whole broadside being filled with the list of killed and wounded general officers. After the fall of Napoleon, Louis the Eighteenth was re- stored to the kingdom by the Allied Powers, and was suc- ceeded at his death by the Comte D'Artois, under the title of Charles the Tenth. Him the people dethroned and drove out by the Revolution of 1830, under the lead of Guizot, Thiers and others. This was in the same week that witnessed RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. the commencement of a still greater revolution — though of a different kind — in the opening of the railroad between Liver- pool and Manchester, and the successful application of steam power to locomotion by land ; Mr, Huskisson, the great British statesman, being unfortunately run over and killed on the trial trip. Louis Philippe, then elected King of the French, was a son of the dissolute and unprincipled L'Egalite, Philip Duke of Orleans, who completed his infamy by voting in the National Convention for the conviction and execution of his kinsman, Louis the Sixteenth, and ended his life not long after under the guillotine, by authority of the Revolutionary Tribunal. By the Revolution of 1848, Louis Philippe, the citizen King, was forced to vacate the throne and flee to England for safety. Then followed the stormy and short-lived Repub- lic under Lamartine, Ledra Rollin and their associates ; the escape of Louis Napoleon from the fortress at Ham; his flight to England; his subsequent return and election to the Chamber of Deputies; his overthrow of the Republic and his assumption of the Empire with the title of Napoleon the Third. The Revolution of 1848 extended over the Continent, "with fear of change perplexing monarchs," who quieted their subjects for the time by promises of reform, which, however, were soon falsified. The subsequent course of events, resulting in the consolidation of the German Empire by annexing to the Kingdom of Prussia the petty principali- ties formerly represented in the Diet; by its conquest in suc- cession of Austria and France, with the defeat, capture and death of Louis Napoleon, are too well known to deserve further notice. Thus the French ship of state, resembling. " a stormy land, a stormy sea before her," was tossed and buffeted by the restless and tumultuous currents of foreign war and domestic factions. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. CHAPTER III. GREA T BRITAIN. George the Third — Poets, Novelists, Essayists and Critics — George the Fourth — Trial of Queen Caroline — William the Fourth— Reform Bill— Queen Victoria. Meantime England, having seen and paid dearly for the folly of intermeddling in the affairs of her neighbors, was steadily, if not rapidly, growing in wealth and power — undis- turbed, save by an occasional gust from the coast of Ireland, whose people she had shamefully misgoverned and oppressed — increasing her population and territory, extending her com- merce and manufactures, and utilizing and profiting by all the agencies and appliances that characterize and enrich an industrious and a prosperous community. My memory goes back to the close of the reign of George the Third, under the Prince Regent, an era distinguished by the remarkable and splendid galaxy of writers in poetry, fiction and criti- cism — Byron, Scott, Moore, Campbell, Rogers, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey, Shelley and Keats, Jeffrey, Brougham, Sydney Smith, Christopher I^orth, (John Wilson,) and Charles Lamb — who illuminated the whole horizon of polite literature, and, after the lapse of so many years, still shine with the brightness of morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and, in their influence on taste and sentiment, more powerful than an army with banners. They actually created new tastes and erected different standards of merit from those previously existing, while charming and surprising their own and succeeding generations by the beauty, variety and abun- dance of their productions. Many of these I devoured with avidity and delight at their first appearance, once sitting up a whole night with one of Scott's novels. To fully appreciate our indebtedness to them, we must re- member that from Burns to Scott and Byron — a period of RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. some twenty years — no poetry deserving the name had ap- peared, whilst the next twenty were enriched by the list of authors given above; that the fashionable novels were mostly a mere mass of indecency, stupidity and sickly sentiment- ality, until the publication of Scott's, which at once secured a popularity that has never ceased and scarcely diminished, notwithstanding the host of competitors that has since entered the lists; and that in criticism the staid and correct, but hard and dry, utterances of Blair and Lord Karnes were superseded by the wit and wisdom, the common sense and audacity, of Blackwood and the Edinburgh Review. At the death of George the Third, George the Fourth ascended the throne. He created intense excitement through- out the Kingdom by refusing to allow the coronation of his consort. Queen Caroline, and, as an excuse or justification for such refusal, by instigating her scandalous prosecution and public trial on a charge of adultery. Her counsel — Brougham and Denman — in a spirit of manliness and independence that was above all praise, in defiance of the monarch's per- sonal wishes, and of the influence of his power and patron- age, faithfully and successfully defended their client, whilst fearlessly exposing his conduct and character. After him came William the Fourth, and then Queen Victoria, whose reign continues to the present date. In the meantime the matters of most interest were the passage of the Reform Bill in 1832, regulating and extending the suf- frage; the repeal of the Corn Laws; the Irish agitation under Daniel O'Connell; the Crimean War; the Sepoy Rebellion, and others too recent and unimportant for further remark. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. CHAPTER IV. SUMTER, iSod TO iSii. Black Riveu Presbyterian Church — Indigo — Cotton — Specie Cur- rency— Wells— Manchester— Its School House— Ball Battery- Drinking and Gambling— African Negroes— Yankee Peddlers— Catawba Indians. At home, my first recollections found me at Sumterville, where my father kept a tavern in 1806, when I was about three years old. To get me out of the way at Court time, when the house was full of guests, I was sent to the home of my grandfather, VVm. Anderson, some ten miles East of the village, beyond Black River, between it and the Brick Church, (Presbyterian,) which then stood nearly, if not exactly, on the beautiful spot occupied by the present Salem Presbyterian Brick Church, Black River. The river swamp where we crossed it was half a mile wide, crowded with large trees, and had a high bridge over the main current of the stream, which was reached by a causewayed road through the black and sluggish water on either side, so narrow and crooked that a passenger could see but a few yards ahead; always looking gloomy and threatening, often hazardous and sometimes im- passable. Now it has a broad embankment, above the highest freshets, through which the river flows under three or four substantial bridges, with strong hand-rails that give a sense of perfect security to the traveler. This valuable improve- ment is due to the skill and energy of my deceased friend Matthew E. Muldrow, formerly Commissioner of Roads. Indigo was then raised in all that region for sale and for domestic use. It grew wild in the woods, attained the height of one and a half to two feet, and had bluish green leaves. At the proper season the plants were cut off near the ground and immersed in water to extract the coloring matter, which sank by its own weight to the bottom of the vat, when the 10 KAN DOM RECOLLECTIONS. water was drawn off, the sediment left to dry and harden, and then cut into squares, forming the finest blue dye known to the world. To make a first rate article the water was sometimes drawn from one vat to another, stirred and boiled. When broken, the cleavage in good indigo was smooth and showed a copper-colored tinge. A knowing old lady, in telling another how to judge its quality, said : "Take a clean new cedar or cypress piggin, fill it three-thirds full with clear spring water, put into it a lump of indigo as big as an egg, and, if good, it will either sink or SAvim, I have really for- gotten which." I have seen the vats or tanks when in use, and the remains of some of them still stand in the neighbor- hood. There being no cotton gins at the time, the cultivation of that staple was quite limited. Families in the country usually spent the long Winter evenings in social converse, while picking cotton from the seed with their fingers, and seated around a big log fire, in which a plenty of pindars and sweet potatoes were roasting. The growth of cane in all low places, together with other plants, afforded a capital range for stock, and planters raised large numbers of beeves and hogs for the Charleston market, whither they were driven every winter. They also sold their indigo in the city, bring- ing home the proceeds in Spanish silver coin, which com- posed almost the entire currency before the Bank of the State came into existence in December, 1812. This was a very clumsy and inconvenient medium of exchange, especially for large amounts and for merchants in North Carolina and other distant points who dealt in Charleston and were forced to carry their money in boxes fitting under the seats of the sul- keys in which they traveled, so as to be taken out at night and put back in the morning. Goods, except upon the rivers, were hauled by wagons, and freight on heavy articles like iron and salt was enormous! v hicdi. Mr. Robert Latta laid RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 11 the foundation of his immense fortune by wagoning goods from Philadelphia to Yorkville, where he did business during the war. Wagons, for safety and company, went together in large numbers, and it was not unusual to see a dozen or more in a gang, the jingling of the bells on their horses' heads making '* music in the sinners' ears." The wells in this section and most of the low country were quite a curiosity to strangers. The pond cypress, unlike that of the swamps, has the peculiarity of being hollow nearly its entire length, thus forming a tube, sometimes two or three feet in diameter, surrounded by a rim of wood two to four inches thick. These are cut into sections, cleaned, cleared out and converted into well curbs, bee gums, ash stands, &c. The knees — so called — when inverted and fitted with handles, make the best of buckets, which never leak nor shrink, and hardly ever decay or wear out; so that the boy was not far wrong who said that cypress timber lasted always, for his father had tried it twice. I know of one such curb that after being in daily use upwards of fifty years is as sound as it was at first. In that low, flat country, some of the wells during a wet season require banking around the curb to keep the water from flowing out on the surface, yet when freshly drawn it is cool, pleasant and healthful. I was too young to take much notice of fashions in dress, but young ladies at balls wore sharp-toed morocco slippers of all the colors of the rainbow, and gentlemen looked particu- larly neat and genteel in fair-topped boots, worn with knee breeches, and having a band of smooth yellow leather four or five inches wide at top. They also wore white powder in their hair on public occasions. From Sumter we removed to Manchester on the main road from Camden to Charleston. This village was settled, for the sake of health and society, by the Moores, Ramseys, Ballards and other rich planters who owned lands on the 12 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. Wateree River. Besides their residences, it had a tavern, kept by my father, a shoe shop, tailor shop, blacksmith shop, a school house and two or three stores — the principal one owned by Duke Goodman, who soon after went to Charleston, where he became a leading cotton factor and Methodist exhorter. He was said to have once confounded the two pro- fessions and shown which was uppermost in his mind, by giv- ing out a hymn as short staple, instead of short metre. But this might have been a mere piece of fun or slander; for slan- der and fun were as much relished then as now. The school house, built of logs, had a stand at the Eastern end, that served for a pulpit whenever a stray Methodist preacher happened to call and hold divine service, which was done by at least one of them in my time, who declared that he was not ashamed to be called "old bawling Jenkins." He was widely known as a zealous Christian, had been a faithful soldier in the Revolutionary War, and bore an excellent char- acter in every respect, which together caused him to be elected doorkeeper of the Senate in his extreme old age. In that building I first went to school, my teacher being a Mr. Rivers from the low country. Many years afterwards, when visiting my friends in Salem, I was delayed several hours at the Manchester station on the Wilmington Railroad, about a mile below the old village, and walked up to it, where I found but two houses remaining — that formerly occupied by my father, and the old school house, looking both inside and out exactly as I had left it half a century previously — the pulpit, seats and benches all in their places, and so it may be to this day. A short distance South of the village was a ball bat- tery and alley, where the young men played fives, sometimes at match games with those from other places, as is now prac- tised in base ball, with the addition of considerable sums being occasionally staked on the result. Stephen D. Miller, afterwards Governor, was one of the best players in the State. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 13 The battery was a smooth wooden wall, perhaps forty feet long by thirty in height, with the alley of corresponding length and breadth, carefully leveled, tightly packed, and swept clean. Some of the villagers and neighbors met every day at a store, where the card table was brought out into the piazza soon after breakfast, and gambling went on till night, winding up, now and then, with a supper and ball, to which the young ladies were invited, and that lasted to a late hour. This, with drinking freely, was their regular habit week after week, varied by quarter races, feats of strength and activity, and an occasional fist fight. The natural consequence fol- lowed: in a few years they were bankrupt in health, fortune and morals. The slave trade was then in operation and many Africans were brought into the District by the planters. I saw quite a number of them, bright-looking, smooth-faced, and slender in form, but clean-limbed and very active. So fond of whisky were they, that for a dram one would stand with his back against a post or wall and let a strong man strike him in the forehead with his fist. The occasional, and always welcome, advent of a Yankee peddler, driving a good horse in a covered wagon, supplied families with tin ware and other light goods. And a few Catawba Indians visited us every winter, with bows and arrows, moccasins, and earthenware pots and pans of their own manufacture, some very neatly made and prettily colored ; the women carrying infants wrapped in blankets on their backs, so that the little ones could peep out over their mothers' shoulders. To complete my reminiscences of Man- chester, it may be stated that we had a bright comet and several severe earthquakes; that shad were so abundant as to sell by the hundred at 12^ cents each; that for health's sake my brothers and myself were given a small quantity of whisky before breakfast every morning, and that I had learned U RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. to play cards before I could read. It would seem that noth- ing but a special providence or a lucky chance saved me from becoming both a drunkard and a gambler, for certainly no one ever had a fairer start in that direction. But my task is to relate facts, not to moralize on them. CHAPTER V. CAMDEN, 1811 TO 1817. Rev. George Reid's Academy— War of 1812— Colonel William Mg Willie and His Son — Chapman Levy — General Blair — Henry G. Nixon— Boys' Artillery Company— Insurrection or Negroes- Cruelty of Criminal Laws— Baron DeKalb— Churches, Preach- #ERS AND Leading Citizens. In iSir my father removed to Camden, where I was sent for six years to an Academy for girls and boys, kept by Rev. George Reid, a portly, pock-marked Presbyterian clergyman, of much experience and very superior attain- ments as a classical teacher, a rigid disciplinarian, who used the rod and the ruler unsparingly and impartially whenever he thought it necessary. His favorite method of inflicting punishment was to lay the delinquent across his lap, face downwards, and then paddle him with a broad, flat ruler, leaving marks, in some cases, that were visible for weeks. Public opinion, in these latter days, seems to condemn corporal punishment and the mingling of the sexes in our schools. But, while disclaiming any competency to decide on these questions, I confidently affirm that neither the spirit of the one sex nor the modesty and purity of the other was unfavorably affected by these practices as then enforced, and that, so far as my knowledge and belief extend, no undue familiarity between them ever was reported or suspected. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 15 Under Mr. Reid, I took his regular course in Latin, viz., Ruddiman's Grammar, Corderii, .^vsop's Fables, Erasmus, Cornelius Nepos, Caesar, Virgil and Horace, and was a year or so in the Creek, as my old friend, John Summer, said of his son Adam. He had, as assistant in the English depart- ment, C. J. Shannon, subsequently a leading merchant and father of the lamented William M. Shannon; and later, in the classics, William K. Clowney, of Union, who afterwards was a tutor in the South Carolina College and represented his District in Congress. My classmates were Isaac H. Smith, David Evander Reid, son of the teacher, William O. Nixon, Henry I. Abbott, William Trent, and part of the time Brevard and Adamson. I have not seen or heard of any of them for many years, and, as all were older than my- self, probably not one survives. During this period the war of 1812 was declared, and I well recollect the rejoicings, illuminations, torch-light pro- cessions and paradings around the liberty pole that stood on Main street, a little South of Havis's tavern, at the news of every victory over the British, and particularly at the procla- mation of peace. An affecting scene was presented at the separation from their families and friends of the volunteer regiment on its departure for the coast under command of old Colonel Wil- liam McWillie, of Lancaster, with his son William, my school- mate, as Adjutant. The latter, some years later, was Presi- dent of the Branch Bank of Camden, and after his removal to Mississippi became Governor of that State. He was said to have been the father of twenty children by one wife. Camden contributed two companies to this regiment — the Rifles, Captain Chapman Levy, and the Artillery, Captain James Blair — not the giant General and member of Congress, of the same name, who shot Tom Evans in a duel, nearly killed Duff Green with a cudgel, and finally blew out his own 16 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. brains at Washington. Evans's excuse for missing so fii'iv a mark was that the muzzle of Blair's pistol looked as big as a barrel. General Blair was the second of Hopkins in his duel with my former school-fellow, the eloquent and talented Henry G. Nixon, at Augusta, where the latter was shot through the heart at the first fire, his second being Governor John Lide Wilson, author of the " Code of Honor," who had him- self stood fire in a similar rencontre with a cigar in his mouth. At a brigade encampment, in Camden, Blair's enormous size attracted the rapt attention of all the idle boys, who watched his movements and hung upon his words with won- der and admiration. He showed forbearance and consider- ation on that occasion by declining to compete with a con- ceited and contentious young officer, whose vanity induced him to make an exhibition of his strength and endurance, on the ground that it might mortify the young man or lead to a quarrel. In a very different spirit he provoked a challenge from James H. Hammond, (afterwards Governor,) in a news- paper discussion. On the arrival of the principals and their seconds at the appointed place in North Carolina, Blair in- vited the other party to visit him at his lodgings on the morn- ing of the day when the fight was to come off, and when they came asked all to take a drink, which was done. In a few minutes he proposed to repeat the dose — in his words to "black the other eye," — but when Hammond rose to com- ply, his second, Colonel P. M. Butler, (also Governor after- wards,) vetoed the proposition, saying that they had come there to settle a serious difficulty; that his principal was un- accustomed to taking spirits before breakfast, and that he should drink no more till the affair was over. An amicable adjustment was made in the course of the day. My remem- brance of the big General closes with the statement that I saw liim, William Dravton and* Mitchell, members of RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 17 Congress, burnt in effigy by a mob in the Main street of Columbia, in the days of Nullification, Blair being repre- sented by a bale of hay, with head, legs and feet attached. He occupied so much space in the public view that a slighter notice of him would have been unbecoming and dispropor- tioned. The boys in our academy formed a uniformed artillery com- pany, with two pieces resembling cannon, turned out of wood, painted like brass, and mounted on wheels, having musket barrels in the center, and touch-holes corresponding with those in the guns, so that they fired very well, and we were highly complimented by the famous war Governor, David R. Williams, on our appearance in line at a regimental or brigade review in Camden. The whole community was greatly excited in July, 1815, by the discovery of an intended insurrection of the negroes, which was fixed for the Fourth. They were so confident of success that the ring-leader had selected and named the young lady who was to be his future wife. The jail was crowded with suspected participants and guarded by armed men day and night for some weeks. _ I saw four or five of them hanged at one time and another afterwards upon the same gallows. As showing the severity of our laws in those days, I will mention that I stood by while the Deputy Sheriff of Kershaw branded a man with a hot iron on both cheeks and in the forehead and then cut off his ears with a dull knife; and that some years later I saw a white man receive twenty-five stripes on his bare back, at the public whipping post, on three or four successive sale days, for horse stealing, that offense being at one time punishable by death on the gallows. And it was a strange fact that this crime was committed as often while threatened with capital punishment as before or after. 18 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. I played frequently on the grave of the Baron DeKalb, in the middle of a lonely old field at the Southwest part of the town. It was surmounted by a plain brick structure, three or four feet high, covered by a white stone slab, with an in- scription eulogizing his character and services. The corner- stone of a more suitable monument to the memory of this noble German, who, at the battle near Camden, sacrificed his life in our cause, was laid in a more central location by Lafayette, on his visit to the State in 1825, with imposing Masonic ceremonies, and his remains were afterwards re- moved and interred at the same spot. According to Weems's Life of Marion, he received eleven wounds. Of the clergy, I remember, besides Mr. Reid, my teacher. Revs. Isaac Smith, Bond English, a one-eyed man, Berry, and Mr. Mathis, Ordinary, who preached occasionally, all Methodists. The leading citizens were the Canteys, Ches- nuts, McRaes, Kershaws, Langs, Deases, Nixons, Abbotts, Douglasses, Dobys, Carters, Reynolds, Whitakers, Blandings, Boykins, Kenneciys, Warrens and others. Matt Wiggins was Sheriff part of the time; Mickle, Tax Collector; Carter, Congressman, and Phineas Thornton, Postmaster. Camden had three churches — Methodist, Presbyterian and Baptist. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 19 CHAPTER VI. COLUMBIA, 1S17 TO 1S22. My Departure from Camden and Arrival in Columbia — Apprentice- ship AND Return to Camden— Emigration Westward— Impor- tance OF A Wafer— Trip to Augusta— John McLean— Match Race Between Argyle and Bascom — Robert Waddell and Colonel Preston — Hugh McLean, H. I. Caughman and Sid, Johnson— Return to Lexington— Henry Shultz— Toasts. Nothing further of general interest occurred during my stay in Camden, and now I hope to be excused for giving a hasty sketch of my future movements as connected with and requisite to a proper understanding of what follows. My poor dear mother died in 1815, and after boarding in the family of James McKenzie, at McRae's Mill, about a mile from the town, I finally quit school in September, 1817, at the age of fourteen, and came to Columbia, where I was bound as an apprentice for six years to Jacob Barrett, a Jewish merchant, whose store stood on the site of that now occupied by the Stanleys. On the day appointed for my departure from McKenzie's, when the hour arrived for me to bid the family farewell, the old lady (his wife) began to lament at our separation and declared that she would as soon part from one of her own children. This so completely over- came me that the tears streamed from my eyes, and my heart swelled up into my throat till it seemed as if I must suffocate. It so happened that I was prevented from going on that day and returned to the house till the morrow. Then, at the appointed hour, to avoid a repetition of the distressing scene, I stole out unperceived at the back door and fled as if for my life. I never saw or heard from one of them again. With Barrett I remained upwards of four years, when, com- pletely tired out and disgusted by his continued ill-treatment, notwithstanding my faithful and unrequited service, and 20 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. being old enough to think and act for myself, I decided, once for all, to run away. This decision was carried into effect at midnight on the 20th of January, 1822, when, under a bright moon riding high in the heavens, and in a freezing atmos- phere, with a handkerchief in my hand containing all the clothing I possessed, except what was on me, I bade farewell to my feliow apprentice, John G. Dunlap, and took the road to Camden, where my father and one of my brothers still resided. Out at Taylor's (now Dent's) mill the water was above the foot-boards, and I was forced to wade, but its depth did not exceed eighteen inches. After getting out, however, it froze on me till I reached a camp of people moving to the West, where I sat down, dried, warmed and rested. The road from the Eastern border of this State and North Caro- lina was then daily thronged with a continual stream of vehi- cles of every conceivable class and description, laden with women, children and household stuff, and accompanied by their owners on horseback or afoot, with their negroes, dogs, and sometimes cattle, all bound for the new lands in Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi. The owner of the camp where I stopped kindly offered me a passage to Mississippi free of charge, but I was bent on continuing towards Camden, not without the secret hope of being overtaken by Charles Young's Theatrical Company, which, after performing all the winter in Barrett's back store, and thus making my acquaintance, was preparing to leave Columbia the next day. If they had gone to Camden my intention was, with the con- sent of the manager, to join them and become an actor, one whose profession, to my youth and inexperience, seemed par- ticularly attractive and enjoyable. They went some other way, and I kept the road before me, having to break the ice with my naked feet next morning in crossing a shallow but rather wide stream. Late in the day I arrived at Camden in wretched plight, my feet blistered, my joints sore and stiff- RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 21 ened, and my entire energies exhausted by fatigue and loss of sleep. From this condition, however, I soon recovered. Failing to find em-ployment in Camden, I obtained money enough from some of my relatives to pay my fare to Augusta in the stage, whither I set out about the middle of February, leaving behind me in the postofifice a letter offering me just such a situation as I desired above all others. It was from the firm of Andrews & Keenan — Warren Andrews and Ro- land Keenan — both of whom had been with me as clerks of Barrett; had been afterwards set up in business by him, and they now, with his approval, proposed employing me. Their letter I failed to receive because a boy in the postoffice had some weeks previously refused to give me a wafer, remark- ing at the time that he kept them for sale, whereupon I asked their price, and, being informed, bought a box, resolving, as a rebuke for his insolence, that I would not patronize his office, even so far as to ask for letters, and thereby inflicting on myself greater punishment than I had designed for him. And here, if I had time and inclination to moralize on the importance of trifles, what sage reflections might be uttered on the mysterious fact that a dispute be- tween a couple of silly boys about so insignificant a thing as a wafer should entirely change and control the destiny of myself and my descendants. And on the other hand " The best laid schemes o' mice and men Gang, aft, agley." On arriving in Columbia, instead of lying by privately or secretly and ascertaining whether Barrett had the power or the disposition to arrest and punish me as a runaway appren- tice, which was what I dreaded, I got out of the stage in the suburbs and went to the law office of Colonel James Gregg, about where Cap Carroll's barber shop is, to consult him as to my rights, but he was engaged and never could bear inter- 22 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. ruptions, so he gave me no satisfaction, and, without more ado, I walked down to the stage office, at Dr. Sam Green's hotel, opposite the State House, and took a passage for Augusta. The stage, carrying \.\\q fast mail, took two days and part of two nights between Camden and Augusta. The line was owned by John McLean of Fayetteville, N. C, who, from being a stage driver, became a contractor for carrying the mails, and at one time owned, I believe, the entire route from Washington to New Orleans. This required a large outlay and considerable financial capacity for its successful manage- ment. He was assisted by his brothers, Hugh, Daniel and Niel, with Gilbert Stalker, a steady old Scotchman, in the Columbia office, which became his headquarters and was at Adam Edgar's hotel, opposite Dr. McGregor's present drug store. McLean must have made large profits by his con- tracts. He was the sole owner of the street railroad, worked by horse power, from Cotton Town through the middle of Main and Bridge streets to the basin on the canal, where Alexander Herbemont kept a warehouse for storing goods and produce. But, like Judge Gantt's constable, he couldn't bear promotion, and began to play the gentleman, a charac- ter so happily drawn by Dr. Franklin, who probably had more worldly wisdom than any other man our country has produced. The Doctor said that soon after going to Eng- land he asked his negro servant what he thought of the country, and got this answer : " Massa, everybody work here ; man work, woman work, child work, horse work, cow work, all work but hog; hog walk about and do nothing, Just like a gentleman.''^ Carlyle called such a gentleman yrz/^^fi" con- sumere iiaii esquire. To maintain his character of gentleman, he kept race horses and made a match race of four mile heats for $5,000 or ^10,000 a side with Colonel Crowell, Indian Agent in Georgia, RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 23 to run his horse Duke of Argyle against John Bascom, at Augusta. So confident of winning was he, that he went to Augusta in a coach and four, taking along a number of car- rier pigeons to convey the news of the result to Columbia in the least possible time, and when some of his friends who had come all the way from Kentucky begged a share in the bet he refused. Never was disappointment greater than when the race came off, for Argyle was distanced in the first heat. His backers charged trickery on the other party, asserting that they had obtained access to Argyle's stable the night before and bled him nearly to death. However that might be, they lost their money and their horse never ran another race. McLean, in walking up town one morning, accosted Rob- ert Waddell at his store, where Agnew now keeps, with the question whether he had heard of the good fortune just ex- perienced by their mutual friend Colonel Preston, to which Waddell replied in the negative. McLean then stated that by the death of a relative Colonel Preston had fallen heir to a very large estate, and then continued on his way. Waddell went home immediately, put on his best suit and betook him- self to Colonel Preston's, whom he greeted with his heartiest congratulations. Preston asked what he meant, and, being told, said: "Mr. Waddell, has it not occurred to you that this is the first of April?" Thoroughly disgusted and dis- comfited, Waddell went home, resumed his work-day cloth- ing, and, returning to the store, armed himself with an axe- handle and awaited McLean's reappearance, who called out to him at a distance of twenty yards: " Well, Waddell, have you found out that this is the first of April?" Waddell replied, shaking the stick at him : " It's well for you that you got the first word, or I'd have given you a taste of this shil- lelah." Hugh McLean delighted in such jokes and in run- ning rigs upon his friends. The winter before the great race 24 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. at Augusta Colonels H. I. Caughman and J. A. Addison of Lexington went to the Camden races, where, according to Hugh's account, they lost all their money, and, whilst con- sulting in the street as to how they should get home, Caugh- man saw an Italian with his monkey and organ, who seemed to be doing a good business, and suggested to Addison that they should join the organ grinder and thus work their way back. Addison laughed at the joke, but Caughman took it seriously, and swore if Hugh McLean and Sid Johnston didn't quit talking about him, somebody would get a d — d whipping. When the result of the race at Augusta became known, Caughman took his revenge by writing to Hugh that, if neces'sary, he would send a negro with a mule and cart to bring him back to Columbia. As a specimen of Johnston's manner, the following is given : He and Caughman were addressing a Miss Kincaid in Fairfield, and they both happened to meet and spend a night at her house. A few days afterwards a female friend of her mother asked the old lady which of the two was the favorite. She said she believed Mary liked Mr. Johnston best, but for her part she preferred Colonel Caughman, be- cause after their departure she had gone* in to both of their rooms, and in Johnston's found everything topsy-turvy — a pillow in one place, a bolster in another, the bed clothes tumbled up, and all about the place in utter confusion. In Caughman's, on the contrary, everything was in place — the bed neatly made, the room swept and dusted, the water emptied, and all just as though nobody had been there, and hence she inferred that for a quiet life he was the man. This of course was purely an invention of Johnston's. In Augusta, I wandered about a couple of days, wheii, finding no encouragement, and being nearly out of money, I one evening resolved on returning to Columbia afoot and running the risk of Barrett's displeasure. The way was long RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 25 and weary, and the weather cold and inclement. The eve- ning before reaching Lexington, on the way back, snow com- menced falling and soon covered the ground, making travel very uncomfortable in my thin clothes and worn-out shoes. I recollect stopping and writing my name in the snow on the roadside, thinking that, like it, I would probably soon pass away unnoticed and unknown. But, thanks to the " Divinity that shapes our ends" and controls all the issues of life, it was ordered otherwise, and, after more than sixty years, I still survive, though why, or for what purpose, He only knows. The next morning, at Lexington, I was received hospitably by John Meetze, who never turned the needy away empty. We had long been acquainted at Barrett's, where, as a country merchant, he bought most of his goods. He employed me immediately as a clerk, at ^120 and my board for the first year, on the condition that my old master had no objection. This we soon found to be the case, and I was at last made easy on that score and on all others in the near future. It was full time, for my clothes were worn out and I had but a half dollar in my pocket, after declining a pressing invitation to eat at the house of Colonel Jones, in Edgefield, whose wife seemed to suspect the real cause, namely, my want of money and unwillingness to make that want known. My stay at Lexington was prolonged for seventeen years, until January, 1839, when I returned to Columbia and took the place of Teller in the Commercial Bank. But before giving my recollections of Columbia and Lex- ington, I must devote some time to that extraordinary me- chanical genius and practical engineer and financier, Henry Shultz, whose character and career were too strange and re- markable to be passed over without notice in a paper of this kind, although it may occupy considerable space. On returning from Augusta I passed through Hamburg, which Shultz had then just fairly started to build in the midst 26 KANDOM RECOI.LECTIONS. of a hideous swamp, which he had ditched and drained, o]:)posite to Augusta, with the view of rivaling that city, by intercepting the large quantity of cotton and other produce that went there every year from our side of the river. Originally from the ancient free city of Hamburg, on the Elbe, he had come to Augusta some ten years previously, with no capital but his head and his hands. Engaging as a day laborer on a pole boat, he soon began to build and run his own boats to" and from Savannah. Then he erected the Augusta Bridge, on a plan of his own, which stood for fifty years or more, uninjured by freshets that swept away others constructed by professional architects according to the most approved scientific principles. In connection with his part- ner, John McKinne, he established the Bridge Bank of Augusta, and issued bills that, by their prompt redemption, obtained a wide circulation in the Southern States and were preferred by many people to all others. His banking house stood at the Augusta end of the bridge, on the North side of the street leading from it to and across Broad street, and at one time he owned a number of other houses on the same range. But difficulties arose between him and some of the other Augusta banks, and, after a long struggle, in which each by turns had the advantage, they managed to present more of his bills than he could meet, had them protested, sued on, and by a summary process, which he tried to resist, levied on, sold and bought in the bridge and all his other property in Augusta. He struggled to the last, refusing to vacate the premises till dispossessed by main force, under an order of the Court, and then resorted to the expedient of erecting a toll gate at the other end of the bridge, where he exacted payment from all passengers, until prohibited by an injunction from the United States Court, after prolonged and expensive litigation, in which Judge Butler, of Edgefield, and Richard H. Wikle, of Augusta, were opposing counsel. In RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. a fit of desperation, on the day when this injunction was en- forced, he attempted to commit suicide by discharging a loaded pistol in his mouth, but it happened to range upwards and outwards, so that the load came out between his eyes, frightfully mutilating him for the time, and leaving indelible marks of the powder in his face, yet, strange to say, he re- covered, with his eyesight unimpaired. His Hamburg pro- ject proved measurably successful ; the town grew and pros- pered for several years, enjoying an extensive trade, to the serious detriment of Augusta. The Legislature incorporated the place, Shultz being Mayor, and chartered the Bank of Hamburg, of which Wyatt W. Starke (father of William Pinckney Starke, Esq.,) was first President, and Hiram Hutch- inson, Cashier. But a fatality, caused apparently by Shultz's violent temper, baffled all his efforts. A trunk was stolen from a wagon yard in the town, and he, as Mayor, had a young man from the country arrested on suspicion of having committed the theft. To make him confess, the Mayor or- dered him to be severely whipped, in consequence whereof he died, and Shultz was indicted for murder, imprisoned many months at Edgefield, and narrowly escaped ending his turbulent and eventful life on the gallows. I saw him fre- quently whilst autocrat of Hamburg, and long after when he haunted the halls of the Legislature vainly seeking redress or revenge for his losses in Augusta. A tall, erect old man, wearing a heavy Waterloo coat that reached his heels, and bearing, as it were, the brand of Cain in hi^ forehead. At Shultz's death he left a will bequeathing all his right, title and interest in the bridge to his friends Jones and Kennedy. They employed Carroll & Bacon of Edgefield to look into the matter and were advised by their counsel to invoke from the Legislature the right of eminent domain on the part of this State in one-half of the Savannah River, and to grant them the privilege of erecting a toll gate at the South Carolina 28 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. end of the bridge. This was done, and when the President of the bridge company in Augusta threatened to demolish the South Carolina toll gate by firing a cannon at it, Jones replied that two could play at that game, reminding him that Shultz had left a couple of old cannon on the hill in Hamburg, which was six hundred feet above Augusta, and that he would certainly return the fire. Finally the case was compromised by the Augusta owners paying ten thousand dollars to Shultz' s heirs under the will. His famous anti-climax toast, given when we were trying non-intercourse as a remedy for the tariff, was : '•' Freemen's rights and homespun.''^ And this reminds me of some other toasts. Mr. Coe, a violent ''Union man" and member of the Richland Volunteer Rifle Company, at a Fourth of July celebration in 1832, gave expression to his sentiments by the words: '' Church, State and Nullification — three d'nd rascally principles." Where- upon the company immediately expelled him by an unanimous vote. He afterwards explained his reference to Church and State as meaning no objection to either separately, but intending to condemn their union. Our game-cock Gov- ernor, Stephen D. Miller's celebrated toast was: ''The three boxes preservative of liberty — the jury box, the ballot box and the cartridge box." He, by the bye, was inaugurated as Governor in a full suit of homespun, and when speaking earnestly made most awfully ugly faces, as if suffer- ing intense torture. Old Billy Jones, at Lexington, gave : "Our liberty pole is not straight, but it leans towards General Jackson," when old Hickory was a candidate for the Presi- dency. And when a great jollification took place in October, 1832, at Isaac Coleman's theatre and circus, on the corner where Mrs. Dial now lives, over the election of the candi- dates in favor of Nullification, General James H. Adams and Colonel William C. Preston being elected to the House of Representatives, the former gave: "The rights of freemen, RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. constitutional or not," and the latter, instantly after the firing of a rocket, "The State of South Carolina ; may she rise like that rocket, not to descend like it in silence and darkness, but to remain a fixed star in the firmament." From Coleman's the crowd marched with military music to greet some of the leading Nullifiers, calling first on Colonel James Gregg, who went with us to the College, where old Dr. Cooper made a short speech, and then to Colonel J. J. Chappell's, on the corner now occupied by the Presbyterian printing office. After hearing him, F. C. Barber exclaimed, "if the church isn't with us, the chapel is." Finally we adjourned to Charley Dukes's saloon, near where Palmer's tin shop now is; and at ii o'clock I left Barber and Colonel Preston engaged in an encounter of wits, while old Tom Baker was singing a smutty song to Colonel Gregg, probably the only one of the kind the Colonel ever heard. CHAPTER VII. COLUMBIA, 1811 TO 1S22. Introduction of Steam, with Its Effects — Magnetic Telegraph — Express Companies — Water Works, Gas Works and Other Im- provements AND Inventions — Changes in Habits, Utensils, Dis- eases, &c. — Roads, Streets and Ferries — Drowning of Young Blocker— Market and Butchers. When I came here in 181 7 the use of steam in moving railroad cars, steamboats and machinery for manufacturing purposes, with its incalculable effects on trade, travel and products, was utterly unknown. We had no telegraph to give us before breakfast yesterday's news from all parts of the civilized world. The reports of the Liverpool cotton mar- ket, for example, were brought by sailing vessels after a voy- age of three to six weeks. It was not till 1852 that steam- RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. ships began to make regular trips across the ocean, and in 1858 the first Atlantic cable was successfully laid and operated.''' Then no Express Company for a trifling compensation took the risk and labor and guaranteed the safe delivery, at our very doors, of all packages, regardless of their size, weight or value. No water works brought into every house that in- dispensable necessity of civilized life. A pump stood at the Court House corner on Main street to supply the population of the surrounding squares and to fill the firemen's buckets in time of a fire. No gas works, kerosene or matches. At night candles were kept burning, or flint and steel were used to strike a light in case of emergency. What an enormous aggregate of toil and capital are in- volved in these vast and varied operations, and what an im- mense number of people now depend upon them for support ! We were without a city clock to give the time by day or by night, but a policeman cried the hours at the street cor- ners, from bell ring (9 or 10) at night till daylight. No telephone enabled us to communicate with distant points by word of mouth ; no spectrum analysis told us that other planets were composed of like materials with our own; no heliograph conveyed messages hundreds of miles by the light reflected from a bit of looking glass; and no photographic apparatus recorded with unerring certainty the lineaments of our faces, our houses or the surrounding scenery. Surely the witness or cotemporary of these great and numerous novelties and mutations may claim that he has lived in an age of progress. But these were not all, and I will briefly mention promis- cuously such others as occur to me at the moment. In the four years of my stay with Barrett, I never saw a commercial drummer or book agent. India rubber was used *I have a New York newspaper dated January 4th, 1800, with the latest arrival from Europe, containing extracts from the London papers of the 20th October, the day of the vessel's departure. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 31 j-(?/:c., fiirnished by the people at home for their friends in the army. For this purpose they organized a bureau under the active, efficient and untiring supervision of Mr. Kerrison, who gave probably more in time, labor and money to the cause than any other individual in the State. He opened a storehouse for receiving, purchasing, keeping and forwarding everything intended for the troops. Rev. Mr. Martin and Mr. Leiding superintended the packing and shipping department. Asher Palmer, W. P. Price and O. A. Pickle were agents of transportation, with the assistance occasionally of John Beard, Daniel Crawford, Rev. Mr. Barnwell, until his lamented death, and others, taking charge of goods and going with trains to their respective destina- tions, where they were turned over to those properly author- 170 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. ized to receive and receipt for them. By these means the safe and rapid delivery of every package, great or small, was, as far as possible, secured and accounted for. An immense amount of labor was also required in corres- ponding with the Confederate and State officials, railroads, contractors and others, and in appointing and watching over agents, besides keeping an account of shipments and pur- chases, as well as of all receipts and expenditures. Mr. DeSaussure, as Chairman of a Committee, reported in January, 1865, that the amount disbursed during the past year amounted to ^1,192,588, to wit: Supplies bought and forwarded by the Association — cost price $561,055 Packages and boxes sent to us and forwarded to the army — estimated value 560,000 Salaries and expenses of the Bureau and transporta- tion 71.533 The Committee also reported the following resolution, which was adopted : "The laborious, efficient and indefatigable services ren- dered by Mr. Kerrison and Mr. Leiding to the cause of the army and the country, most generously without compensa- tion, except the satisfaction derived from the discharge of this important trust, does not require comment. They will have their reward in the earnest approval of a grateful coun- try." Mr. Leiding refused the salary that was offered him. Mr. Martin being without other means of support received a moderate compensation, and the rest of the Board got no pay. KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 171 Hon. Joseph Daniel Pope during the war was Chief Collec- tor of the Confederate taxes and head of the Bureau for the printing of the Confederate Treasury notes and bonds. Most of the men being in the war, the Government employed females for the preparation of the Confederate notes in Columbia, and a large number of most respectable ladies from Virginia to Texas, who had lost their fortunes by the war, made a decent support in this way. About a hundred of them, with fifty men, under his supervision, handled, counted, signed and put up in packages the entire issues of the Government, aggre- gating some thousand million of dollars in amount, three large printing establishments being employed in the depart- ments of printing, engraving, &c. This, of course, involved immense care, time and labor. But, to the honor of all con- cerned, not a dollar was lost, stolen or embezzled, and Mr. Pope turned over to W. Y. Leitch, Assistant Treasurer, the entire and exact sum that had been entrusted to him. In the collection of the Confederate taxes, he also appointed about an equal number of assistants or sub-collectors throughout the State, who received from the citizens their respective quotas in money and in kind. This, too, was accounted for to the last cent, and Mr. Pope's record as an able, honest, industrious and most efficient officer stands without a blot. At the death of Mr. Bronson in May, 1863, I was elected to his place in the Relief Association, and as its Secretary, and its minutes to the end of the war are in my possession. By request of the Board I visited our troops in Virginia in November, 1862, going by railroad to Richmond and Staunton, and thence to Winchester in the stage, having obtained in Richmond from Mr. Randolph, Secretary o War, a passport, with orders for transportation wherever I wanted to go. The fertile region of the Shenandoah Valley was then a scene of utter desolation for many miles, not a building, fence or even gate-post being left, except 172 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. a few stone barns, whose outside walls withstood all efforts for their destruction. General Longstreet's command marched through Winchester the morning of my arrival, returning from the Maryland campaign, after the battle of Sharpsburg, and I there met with Colonel Wm. Wal- lace, Colonel Joe Gist and other acquaintances from South Carolina. At the Ballard House, where I stopped in Rich- mond, General Bragg, just from a successful campaign in Tennessee, received great attention, and at another hotel I met General Loring, who had lost an arm in the Mexican war. After waiting a day or two at Winchester for transporta- tion to General Gregg's headquarters, near Berryville, I walked out one evening to the toll gate on the turnpike in that direc- tion and was taken up in his buggy by Judge Camden of Rockbridge County, who was going to see a son in the army. We traveled to a late hour, seeking lodgings, which were refused us, at several places, although we offered to pay our way, the occupants seeming afraid to entertain strangers, lest they might be considered as adhering to one side or the other, that region being then held alternately by the Federal and Confederate forces. I spent one day and night with General Gregg, seeing General A. P. Hill, the Haskells, Colonels McCorkle, Hamilton, Simpson and Perrin, Captain Hunt of Edwards's regiment, and other officers, and also many privates of my acquaintance from South Carolina, and dining with a Lexington company on a choice leg of mutton, nice biscuits and a cup of buttermilk. Next morning the owner of the land occupied by the camp reported to General Gregg that two of his best Merino sheep were missing, and I then suspected from what quarter my dinner of mutton had come, but said nothing. General Gregg told me that whilst he and General Hill were on their way from Harper's Ferry to Sharps- burg, while the battle was going on, they met and passed RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 173 enough stragglers from our army to have gained us the vic- tory if they had been in the fight. General Hill took their swords from several officers and broke them in their presence, whilst reprimanding them severely. They were seeking food and not exemption from danger. And thus for want of disci- pline and supplies we lost the chance of probably ending the war by a successful march on Philadelphia or Washington, as just then Louis Napoleon was urging on Great Britain the joint interference and mediation of France and England in behalf of peace and the recognition of our independence. On Sunday I met Stonewall Jackson returning from church at Berryville. Some cavalry passed through the village the night before, and that morning Ewell's Division went down the road towards Ashby's Gap, with their baggage train, in which I counted three hundred and fifty heavily loaded wagons and one hundred and five belonging to Stonewall Jackson's Brigade — many more than I had previously thought necessary. Returning from Winchester by way of Staunton, I arrived at Culpeper Court House in a furious snow storm. There General Kershaw, General Jenkins and General Anderson furnished me such information as I desired. A few miles below, at the camp of General Hood's command, I met Cap- tain Bachman with his artillery and. that of Captain Garden from Sumter. In Winchester and Richmond I wrote to the commanders of such corps as could not be reached, directing them how and where to apply for such supplies as they needed. THE BURNING OF COLUMBIA. The burning of Columbia on the night of Friday, February 17th, 1865, deserves particular notice, and I therefore quote from memory and from my diary the facts connected there- with as they came to my knowledge: 174 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. Sitnday. Februaj-y 12. — Fearing the city might fall into the enemy's hands, we this day sent a load of books and valua- bles belonging to the Commercial Bank by W. W. Renwick's wagon to his residence in Union District, between Enoree, Tyger and Broad Rivers, for safe-keeping. We were roused at an early hour by the firing of cannon on Arsenal Hill as a signal for the reserved and detailed force to assemble. My son Henry, Bookkeeper of the Bank, was to have gone with the wagon, but being one of the reserves he refused to leave town, his Captain (Robertson) having notified him to be ready at a moment's warning to go to the front. Mr. Craw- ford, President, therefore followed the wagon in his buggy. The weather was terribly cold. I went to the Methodist Church and sat for the first and last time in the pew I had selected the day before, hearing an excellent sermon from Rev. Mr. Conner, our stationed preacher for that year. Dar- ing the day Colonel J. P. Thomas's regiment of reserves paraded one or two hundred strong and were reviewed by Governor Magrath. S. W. Capers shut up the Express office and went into the ranks. Monday, ijth. — Mr. S. O. Talley, our Teller, being noti- fied by Captain Robertson of orders to march, left the bank, as did also my son Henry when so informed. I was alone in the bank, but heard that Mr. Crawford had got back after seeing the wagon beyond Spring Hill. Tuesday, 14th. — Busy all day with Mr. Crawford preparing to close the bank. Heavy firing heard in afternoon about Congaree Creek, with rumors that Orangeburg was taken. About dusk the alarm bell rang, and Mr. Crawford went home, leaving me to send books to his house and carry a few things home; packed them up hastily, and inquiring in the street what the alarm bell meant, heard that Saluda Factory was burnt, and could see fire in that direction. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 175 Wednesday, i^th. — Went to Charleston depot to get car to go to Manchester for corn from Governor Manning, but Bol- lin refused to furnish it and said the railroad bridge below was burnt. Ex-Governor John L. Manning had for several years generously supplied the officers of our bank with pro- visions at greatly reduced prices, and sometimes gratis. Hampton reported the Yankees within six miles last night. Fighting heard all day, and coming nearer, but it ceased about 5 o'clock P. M. General Beauregard arrived to-night and expects some of Hardee's army before day. Cheatham's, from Augusta, are reported coming; some say already here. Thursday, i6th. — Wheeler's men burnt Saluda Bridge last night; they have been robbing our stores to-day, and several were broken open by them last night. A number of troops arrived last night from Wilmington. The city has been shelled from across the river nearly all day and part of yes- terday. Mayor Goodwyn says Beauregard tells him he can hold the place but two or three days longer, as Hardee refuses to evacuate Charleston. The confusion and excitement of removing Government stores and treasure and private families is beyond parallel. Friday, lyth. — Woke by a terrific explosion, shaking the whole town as by an earthquake. The storehouse of the South Carolina Railroad was blown up, accidentally or other- wise. At daylight Henry tells me that Mayor Goodwyn informed him of his intention to surrender forthwith, having white flag ready. Going to bank, delivered some packages to their owners and put others in vault; then for the last time locked it up. Heard that the Mayor was gone to surrender, and while at Henry's, over the bank, Mrs. Rawls came in say- ing Yankees were at her house near the river. Rapid firing continued all the morning towards Broad River Bridge, the Columbia Bridge having been burnt last night. Early this morning General Hampton had threatened to shoot any one 1T6 EANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. who offered to raise the white flag, but about 9 o'clock he directed Mayor Goodwyn to surrender, and before 10 a com- pany of Wheeler's cavalry passed down Main street ordering all soldiers to leave it as the enemy were coming in. About that hour a carriage displaying the United States flag, with an officer or two and the Mayor, drove rapidly down to the Market, where I went and saw Colonel Stone, who had received the surrender, with Aldermen McKenzie, Bates and a few citizens. Mr. McKenzie informed me that the surrender was unconditional, and I then asked the Colonel: "Will private property be respected in the city?" He seemed indignant at the question, and replied: "Private property will be re- spected ; we are not savages. If you let us alone, we will let you alone." He was a handsome young officer, Avho looked and spoke like a gentleman, and I believed him. These assurances he repeated to others in my presence. I thanked him, and, returning to the bank, informed Henry's wife that I thought she could remain there in safety till evening, when I would take her to my house. As the carriage passed she became frantic with excitement, and declared her purpose to wave a Confederate banner from the window, which I pre- vented her from trying to do. On my way home I saw some of the first troops that marched in leave their ranks and break open Mordecai's and Heise's liquor shops with axes. While I was stopping at the engine house, next above the Market, one of them came across the street, followed by a negro, and demanded admittance into J. C. Walker's store, whereupon Walker handed him the key of the front door, and he and the negro went in. Just then some of them were trying to force the front door of James G. Gibbes's store, where McKenzie's confectionery now is, and in a minute or two the side door, next the Court House, was broken open and the negroes and soldiers streamed in and helped themselves. I then went home, seeing piles of cotton bales on fire in the RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 177 middle of Main street South of Washington street. Half an hour later I was told that a soldier was in my kitchen, in the basement of the dwelling, ransacking it. Going down to the door I demanded to know what he was doing there. He came up to me and replied that he was foraging. I asked for his authority, and another who was with him presented his musket, saying that was his authority. I then told them that Colonel Stone had assured me private property would be pro- tected, and that they were acting contrary to the orders of their officers, and one of them replied that they didn't care a d'n for the officers but would have what they wanted. They then said if I would go up stairs they would stay below. I did so, and, telling my wife and daughter what they said, I went to Main street for a guard. On the way, Dr. Boatwright told me that Colonel Nichols, at the Market, had given him a guard, and when I applied to that officer; apprising him of what was going on at my house, he called a soldier named Ruble and bid him go with me and turn the fellows out at the point of the bayonet. Returning with Ruble I was told one of them had been up stairs, searching all the rooms, and had taken my gun. I then went down where they were with the guard, and found they had been in the store room and taken meat and flour which was loaded on one of my ponies. They refused to leave the place, and as they were two to the guard's one and as well armed as he was, he was powerless. Seeing that they were drinking and becoming more violent, I went back to the street for another guard, and with great difficulty, after applying to several officers, found one at Janney's corner, who sent a young man with me named Turner. Turner declared that the other guard knew not his duty or he would have driven the ruffians out. When we returned they were gone with the ponies, meat, flour and some articles of little value from up stairs. While going down Main street to Janney's, towards 12 o'clock. General Sher- 178 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. man and bis staff rode up. The soldiers were then breaking open and robbing the stores within his sight and hearing. After dinner I went back to the bank with a negro to bring some of Henry's things to my house. Large bodies of troops were marching down Main street, and a soldier with several negroes was in Henry's rooms. Left them to get a guard for the place, and, meeting Mr. Dovilliers, heard that Major Jenkins, at Nickerson's Hotel, was Provost Marshal for plac- ing guards. The street and pavements were crowded with drunken soldiers, rioting, plundering, throwing out goods from the stores, scrambling for them and making a perfect Pandemonium. They were as closely packed as beeves in a pen, and to reach Nickerson's we had to take a cross street and go round the square. The bar room of the hotel was filled with anxious crowds praying for guards, among whom I recollect seeing old Mr. Alfred Huger and Mrs. Dr. John Fisher. After waiting till near night I got speech of Major Jenkins and stated the condition of things at the bank — females occupying the rooms over- head and vaults filled from floor to ceiling with valuable property of private citizens — begging him to send guards for their protection. He replied: "I cannot under- take to protect private property." In the course of the afternoon I had met Colonel Stone and asked for a guard, but he turned off, saying he had no time to attend to me, though he was standing idle in the Market place. Returned to bank and took Henry's wife to my house. Ordered an early supper; and told all to go to bed. Then went down stairs to see Turner, the guard, and found two white men with him, who he said were officers that had just been released from impris- onment here. Begged him to turn them out, shut the doors and go to sleep, for I feared the house would be burnt before morning, as the streets were so full of drunken, disorderly negroes and soldiers, breaking open stores and committing RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 179 Other outrages that I could hardly get back to the bank. Up stairs sat half an hour with the other guard and saw the light of a fire in the direction of Charleston depot, on Bridge street. Hampton's house, on Camden road, and Arthur's, in the suburbs, were burnt before night. Just after dark Puryear's, at race track, and Dr. John Wallace's were on fire. Charlotte Railroad track, in sight from my back door, was also burning. Went to bed with clothes on, and about lo o'clock heard fowls in the yard squalling and men catching them. The light of the fire grew brighter towards Main street, and after getting up two or three times to look at it had gone to sleep, when at 2 o'clock my old negro. Quash, woke me at the back door, saying Mrs. Zimmerman, next door, was moving out her furniture and I must get up, as the orders were to burn every house. All rose, and, by my direc- tions, put on all the clothes they could and made bundles of what they could carry. A drunken officer with two soldiers, his sword and spurs clanking at every step, soon after came in at front gate and demanded to know what was in the house. I told him the usual furniture. He wished to see and stamped through the passage in the dark to the head of the inside steps, where, when I opened the door, he stumbled from top to bottom and I saw him no more. One of his pri- vates said they were ordered to remove all combustibles that would blow up the house and I gave him what powder I had. The fire by this time was raging and roaring furiously, extend- ing gradually further up Main street, the wind veering from Southwest to Northwest and blowing a perfect gale. On Wash- ington street all the buildings on both sides had been consumed except the Female College, as far as the West side of Bull street, where Mrs. Thompson's and Mrs. Kelly's were then burning, and the squares in front of me were threatened. The wind at length became so high and the fires in front and on our right hand so near and so threatening that we all con- 180 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. eluded our dwelling must go, and, gathering what we could carry, left it in a body, intending to try and get to L. F. Hopson's, East end of Camden street. My wife was quite sick and weak, but we reached Mr. Hopson's all tired out and were readily allowed house room. By his advice I went over to Mrs. English's, where he said a Major had promised safety to its inmates. Found there Joseph Cooper, Mrs. Kennerly and some others, but could not see the Major. Returned to Hopson's, and, leaving my family, went back home, where my faithful guard still stood at the front door, as I had requested him to do. The streets, lit up as bright as day, were occupied by men, women and children, standing or sitting by such household goods, furniture, clothing and bedding, as they had saved from their burning houses. The \vind showed no sign of abating, but it gradually changed and came from the Northeast, blow- ing back upon the fire and saving my premises. Went to Mr. Dovilliers' and helped his wife put two or three big pictures in frames on her head, which she carried over to my house, and thence beyond the Female College, where her husband and his mother were in the street. Whilst there Pelham's house, just opposite, took fire, and with Dr. Wm. Reynolds, Jr., I carried water from Dovilliers' well to put it out. Mike Brennan, in Pelham's door, called on three or four soldiers in the street to assist in saving the building, but one of them said, ''d — n the house, let it burn!" and they did nothing. It burnt, and Sam Muldrow's next door. There the fire stopped in our street. On the way to Dovilliers' I met a Yankee soldier, who accosted me with the question, " Well, old man, what do you think of the Yankees now?" I replied, "I think they have done their work pretty thoroughly this time," and he rejoined, with an oath, "Yes, if you want a job well done put a Yankee at it!" Going back to Hop- son's, about daylight, I took my wife and daughter to the RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 181 front gate of R. M. Johnson's^ house, where we met Caleb BoLiknight, who then occupied the place — at present the Benedict Institute. Leaving them with him, I came back home. Thus passed a night of horrors such as this genera- tion has not witnessed. Our streets and vacant lots were full of homeless families, with a few articles saved from the flames, many having nothing but the clothes they wore, for when bringing bedding, provisions or raiment out of their dwell- ings they were plundered or destroyed by the brutal soldiers, who jeered and exulted in their fiendish work. The Metho- dist Church, on Washington street, was set on fire three times before its destruction was completed, Mr. Conner, the clergyman in charge, who lived in the parsonage adjoining, having twice put out the fire. When they burnt the parson- age he brought out a sick child wrapped in a blanket, and on one of the soldiers seizing the blanket he begged that it might be spared because of the child's sickness. The brute tore it off and threw it into the flames, saying, " D — n you, if you say a word I'll throw the child after it !" The fruits of more than a half century's cares and labors were thus destroyed in a single night, and where at sunset on the 17th stood one of the fairest cities on the continent, by daylight the next morning nothing remained but heaps of smoking ruins, with here and there a solitary chimney to mark where the houses had been. Every building but one — and that a little one — on both sides of Main street for a mile in length above the State House was reduced to ashes, and a great number on other streets, especially on the East side, for three or more squares, were in the same condition. The Phoenix soon after the fire contained a publication by Wm. Gilmore Simms, in which he estimated the aggregate losses as covering 84 out of 124 squares, including the old State House, 6 churches, 11 banking establishments, besides railroad depots, schools, shops and stores, with the names of 182 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 445 merchants and tradesmen burned out on Main street and 1,200 watches taken from private individuals. Saturday, i8th. — Early this morning, my family having returned, Wm. Harth and his wife, with two children, a niece and a couple of negroes, walked in and helped for three weeks to consume the scanty supply of eatables that I had saved. They had spent a part of the night in an open lot, after the burning of M. A. Shelton's house, where they had taken refuge with two wagon loads of provisions and their carriage and horses, coming from lower Lexington to Colum- bia for safety. Nearly all they brought is burnt. Great alarm prevails lest the remainder of the city shall be consumed to-night, as the soldiers threaten will be done. As some of them marched up Pickens street this morning, they cried out in front of my door, "This house shall go to-night." At 2 o'clock I called at General Wood's headquarters in William. A. Harris's house on Gervais street for a guard, and was told that one would be placed at every door within two hours, but that time expired and no guard came. Near night, Henry's wife and Miss Gardner went to the General and he promised to send us sufficient protection in an hour, but it was not done. William Harth's guard, a Mr. Burgess, and another came, however, and stayed with my faithful watch. Ruble. I lay on a sofa in the front room with a pistol in my pocket that night, and several subsequently, but all was as quiet as the grave. Sunday, February igth — This morning, as Mayor Good- wyn was passing my gate, I met him, and proposed that we, with a few other citizens, should apply to General Wood or Howard for the means of feeding and protecting our people till supplies could be received from abroad. He agreed, and on the way we gathered Revs. Nicholas Talley, Thomas Raysor and Mr. Conner, also Dr. C. H. Miot and Messrs. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 183 J. J. McCarter, the bookseller, and W. M. Martin, of Charles- ton, the broker. Dr. Goodwyn, the Mayor, proposed that he should act as our spokesman, as his office and his acquaint- ance with the officers would add weight to our petition, and we made no objection. General Wood, after hearing the Mayor, refused his request, saying it was unreasonable and unprecedented, but he referred us to General Howard, who he said was officer of the day. Him we found encamped in rear of the College, near W. H. Gibbes's present residence. He also objected to the application, but proposed going with us to General Sherman, and we all proceeded to Blanton Duncan's house, on Gervais street, where the Commander-in- Chief was quartered. He received us very courteously in- deed, seeming to be on particularly good terms with himself, showing by the way he pulled down his vest and looked at himself, and by every other indication of manner and tone, his supreme pride and gratification at his success. No pea- cock ever manifested more vanity and delight than he did, when, addressing us, he said : ''Gentlemen, what can I do for you ? You ought to be at church ; I myself thought of going to hear Mr. Shand." «Mr. Talley replied: ''Ah, General, our church is burnt." He then invited us all to take seats, and Mayor Goodwyn stated our condition, with twenty thou- sand old men, women and children, having no provisions or •means of defense against the disorderly soldiers and negroes, and requested a supply of arms and ammunition, with food enough to keep us alive till we could communicate with the country. General Sherman replied in a long lecture or harangue on our folly in beginning the war, the subject of slavery, the mismanagement of Beauregard, the condition of Georgia, &c., &c. The fire, he admitted, was caused by his troops, saying: "It is true our men have burnt Columbia, but it was your fault." And when Dr. Goodwyn inquired, " How so, 184 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. General?" he replied that our people had made his soldiers drunk, citing an instance of a druggist who he was told brought out a pail of whisky to them. Dr. Miot here inter- rupted him to remark that he was a druggist, but he had heard of no such case. Mr. McCarter also stated that a soldier had demanded his watch, while pointing a pistol at his head, but the General only laughed and told him that he ought to have resisted. He concluded by consenting to leave us 500 head of beef cattle, 100 muskets and ammuni- tion, all the salt at the Charleston Railroad depot, and wire enough to work a flat across the river. He also promised that his Surgeon General should turn over to us some medi- cine for the use of the sick in our midst. This, he said, was contrary to usage, but I thought his treatment of Columbia liable to the s-ame remark. Some of us went to the depot, where we found 60 or 80 tierces of salt, which General Howard agreed to haul to the new State House for us. While on the way we saw the gas works on fire. General Sherman, in his discourse to us, never named nor alluded to General Hampton or the burning of the cotton as causing the fire. Yet in his official report, which was prob- ably made the same day, he charged it to Hampton, acknowledging, as it seems to me, that he knew the charge to be false at the time. I quote his own words : "In my official report of this conflagration I distinctly charged it to General Wade Hampton, and confess I did so pointedly to shake the faith of his people in him, for he was in my opinion a braggart and professed to be the special champion of South Carolina." [See Sherman's Memoirs, Vol. H, page 287.] Surely any comment on this precious confession would be superfluous, since it discloses, in a single sentence, the char- acter of its author and the length to which he will go in deal- ing with an opponent. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 185 In his Memoirs he says further: ''Many of the people thought the fire was deliberately planned and executed. This is not true. It was accidental, and, in my judgment, began with the cotton which General Hampton's men had set fire to on leaving the city." Thus it appears that he gave three different versions of the origin of the fire, each one varying from and inconsistent with the other two, to wit: First, that it was caused by his men; second, by General Hampton; and third, by accident. Which, if either, is to be believed? I have no hesitation in saying the first, for the following, among other reasons : 1. Because he knew, and he said so voluntarily on the second day after it occurred, while it was fresh in his mind, in the presence of our citizens named above and a half dozen or so of his own officers of the highest rank, who knew the facts, and who by their silence acquiesced in and endorsed its correct^iess, since they would hardly have allowed so grave a charge against their men to pass without a contradiction if they had known it to be untrue. 2. On page 288 of xhis Memoirs occurs this passage: "Having utterly ruined Columbia, the right wing took up its march Northward," &c. 3. General Howard, while in Columbia in 1867, called on Governor Orr at his office, above stairs in the Branch Bank building, my bank and broker's office being on the first floor. There he met, besides Governor Orr, General Hampton, General John S. Preston, James G. Gibbes and F. G. de Fon- taine. General Hampton came down from the Executive office to mine and said to me: "I have just left General Howard up stairs, and was greatly pleased to hear him say, in conversing upon the burning of this place: 'It is useless to deny that our troops burnt Columbia, for I saw them in the act.' " I understand General Howard made a similar state- ment to Colonel L. D. Chi Ids the same day. 186 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. James G. Gibbes says: ''I was present in the office of Governor Orr some time in 1867, when General Howard, then visiting Columbia, was there. When General Hampton entered. Governor Orr introduced him to General Howard. The first thing General Hampton said was, ' General Howard, who burned Columbia?' General Howard laughed and said, 'Why, General, of course we did.' But afterward qualified it by saying, ' Do not understand me to say that it was done by orders.' " Rev. Peter J. Shand reports that General Howard told him in Charleston, in November, 1865: " Though General Sherman did not order the burning of the town, yet some- how or other the men had taken up the idea that if they de- stroyed the capital of South Carolina it would be peculiarly gratifying to General Sherman." General Howard is said to have denied all this on oath in some trial at Washington, probably before the Mixed Com- mission on British Cotton Claims. But General Sherman was there at the time, and that fact, with the difference in latitude, may account for his making one statement in Columbia and another entirely different at Washington, forgetting at one place what he remembered at another. 4. I have mingled with the people of Columbia ever since the fire, except when occasionally absent for a short time, and have conversed on the subject with all classes, old and young, rich and poor, male and female, white and colored, and among them all have never heard it attributed to any other cause, many giving instances of the troops carrying from house to house balls of rags or cotton saturated with spirits of turpentine, and calling on the inmates to come out, when they set fire to the buildings and robbed them of their con- tents. 5. Because these same troops burnt Orangeburg, Blackville, Lexington, Winnsboro, Camden and Cheraw, besides hun- RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 187 dreds of private residences in the country. Colonel Stone, who received the surrender of Columbia, published a state- ment, some years ago, describing the destruction of dwellings and desolation of the country wherever their army marched throughout the State. And there is no pretense that any of these were accidental or caused by burning cotton. Then, as to Hampton's causing the fire, Sherman's own confession puts the innocence of the former beyond doubt. In f:ivor of the accidental burning, he dismisses the subject by saying in his Memoirs, page 287 : ''This whole subject has since been thoroughly and judicially investigated, in some cotton cases, by the Mixed Commission of American and British Claims, under the treaty of Washington, which Com- mission failed to find a verdict in favor of the English claim- ants, and thereby settled the fact that the destruction of prop- erty in Columbia, during that night, did not result from the acts of the General Government of the United States — that is to say, from my army." Unfortunately for General Sherman, that verdict settled nothing but the British claims in the cotton cases then tried, and, as I hope to show, dt was founded on defective and in- correct testimony. The higher claims of truth, justice and humanity were neither considered nor settled by it. These concerned the citizens of Columbia and involved interests infinitely superior, in character and extent, to the value of all the cotton. They could not be settled by a mere inference or implication on a side issue in a case between entirely dif- ferent parties, tried by a tribunal created for a different and distinct purpose. I understand the issue before the Commis- sion was whether the Government had taken cotton belong- ing to British claimants, and was decided in the negative, because the cotton was burnt and therefore could not have been taken. Who burnt the town was another question, into which the Commission had no right to inquire and did not 388 EANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. enter. To pass upon it a Court or Commission should have met in Cohnnbia, where the transaction occurred and the facts were best known, instead of at Washington, five hun- dred miles distant, under the influence of the United States Government and of General Sherman. To give some idea of the evidence that would have been submitted in that case, and how it was procured, I will state that when Sherman's charge against Hampton became known in Columbia, a pub- lic meeting was held to provide for collecting the testimony in relation to the destruction of the city, and that Chancellor J. P. Carroll, lately deceased, as Chairman of a Committee appointed for that purpose, received more than sixty deposi- tions and statements in writing from as many individuals. I quote from his report an outline of its contents. This report, I understand, is to be published in full by Chancellor Car- roll's family: "The array of witnesses is impressive, not merely because of their number, but for the high tone and elevated character of some, the unpretending and sterling probity of others, and the general intelligence and worth of all. The plain and unvarnished narrative subjoined is taken from the testimony referred to, solely and exclusively, except so much as refers to certain declarations of General Sherman and the forces under his command, t- ^ ^^ xhe soldiers were universal in their threats; they seemed to gloat over the distress that would accrue from their march in the State. General Sher- man himself said to a lady of his acquaintance : ' Go off the line of the railroad. I will not answer for the consequences where the army passes.' ''Extracts from his address at Salem, Illinois, in July, 1865 : ' I resolved in a moment to give up the game of guarding their cities and to destroy their cities.' For eighty miles along the route of his army, then the most highly improved and cultivated region of the State, the habitations of but two RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 189 white persons remain, and if a single town or village or hamlet within the line of march escaped altogether the torch of the invaders the Committee have not been informed of the exception. * * >i^ Before the surrender of the town, the soldiers of General Sherman, officers and privates, declared that it was to be destroyed. At Lexington, on the 1 6th February, General Kilpatricksaid in reference to Colum- bia: 'Sherman will lay it in ashes for them.' A Federal Lieutenant on the 17th wrote to Mrs. McCord: 'My heart bleeds to think of what is threatening; leave the town, go anywhere to be safer than here.' To W. H. Orchard the leader of a squad said : ' If you have anything you wish to save, take care of it at once, for before morning this d'nd town will be in ashes. If you watch, you will see three rockets go up soon. If you don't take my advice, you will see hell.' Within an hour afterwards three rockets were seen to ascend, and but a few minutes elapsed before fires in quick succession broke out at intervals so distant that they could not have been communicated from one to the other. At various parts of the town the soldiers of General Sherman at the appear- ance of the rockets declared that they were the appointed signals for a general conflagration. * * The soldiers with bayonets and axes pierced and cut the hose, disabled the engines and prevented the citizens from extinguishing the flames. * * By 3 o'clock A. M. on the night of 17th February, 1865, more than two- thirds of the town lay in ashes, comprising the most highly improved and the entire business part of it. * * That Columbia was burned by the soldiers of General Sherman, that the vast majority of the in- cendiaries were sober, that for hours they were seen with com- bustibles firing house after house, without any affectation of con- cealment and without the slightest check from their officers, is established by proof full to repletion, and wearisome from its very superfluity. After the destruction of the town, his ofifi- 190 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. cers and men openly approved of its burning and exulted in it. It was said by numbers of the soldiers that the order had been given to burn down the city. There is strong evidence that such an order was actually issued in relation to the house of General John S. Preston. The proof comes from the Mother Superior of the Ursuline Convent, which was de- stroyed by the fire. She says General Sherman offered her next morning any house she might select for the use of her Convent and directed Colonel Ewing to carry out the offer. When she told Colonel Ewing that she chose General Pres- ton's house, he replied, 'That is where General Logan holds his headquarters, and orders have already been given to burn it to-morrow morning, but if you say you will take it I will > speak-to the General.' On the following morning we learned from the officer in charge, (General Perry, I think,) that orders were to fire it unless a detachment of the Sisters were in actual possession. ''As to the cotton, Generals Beauregard and Hampton ordered it not to be burned. These orders were issued by Captain Rawlins Lowndes, then acting as Hampton's Adju- tant, and General M. C. Butler, who was with the rear squadron of the Confederate cavalry, deposes that Hampton directed him that the cotton was not to be burnt; that this direction was communicated to the entire division and was strictly observed. Rev. A. Toomer Porter was told by General Hampton: 'The cotton is not to be burnt; the wind is too high ; it might catch something and give Sherman an excuse for burning the town.' Mayor Goodwyn deposes that Hampton said the same to him. "^ * The wind blew from the West, but the fires at night broke out West of Main and Sumter streets, where the cotton bales were, and instead of burning the houses was probably burnt by them." Moreover, James G. Gibbes says in his communication of September, 1880, to the Weekly Times, Philadelphia: "The RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 191 fire continued throughout the night, the streets being crowded all the time with soldiers, but no officers were to be seen. I did see General Sherman riding leisurely through the streets, smoking a cigar, but he gave no orders and seemed to take little interest in what was going on. No one could witness the scene without the firm conviction that the soldiers were given to understand that they had free license to do as they pleased, and that there would be no restraint over them. I spent almost the entire night in the streets and witnessed many houses fired by the soldiers, and I never saw (nor did I ever see any one who did) a single instance in which any assistance was rendered by the soldiers to save property from the flames. =h * i am satisfied that, looking from the upper part of my house, I saw not less than eight hundred to a thousand men engaged in probing the ground with their bayo- nets or iron ramrods, searching for buried treasures. The storm of fire raged with unabated fury until daylight or a little later, when my attention was drawn to a number of cavalry, in squads of three or four, galloping through the streets, sounding their bugles and calling on the soldiers to fall into ranks. This was the first sign of any attempt at dis- cipline or the issuing of any orders to the rank and file. I understood immediately that the worst was over, and so it was. * * The track of fire was just in the rear of my own dwelling and approaching it so rapidly that all who were with me had abandoned it, and I had prepared to leave also, when I noticed the orders for falling into ranks. In less than thirty minutes after the orders were given every straggler was in ranks and the destruction virtually over. Nowhere was the discipline of Sherman's army more conspicuous than in the quick, prompt and immediate recognition of their orders to stop from any further destruction of the city. It seemed like magic. All was quiet and orderly as if the men were on dress parade, when but a moment before it seemed as if to ruin and destroy was the only thing thought of." RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. Now, if all this testimony had been submitted to the Mixed Commission, or to any other fair tribunal sitting in Columbia, and if General Howard had testified to what he told General Hampton, Colonel Childs, James G. Gibbes and Rev. Mr. Shand and others, I risk nothing in saying what their verdict would and ought to have been. But why multiply words in so plain a case? General Sherman was in command; he knew the feelings of his men towards the people of Colum- bia; he admitted that he had the power to control them when he said to Mayor Goodwyn : *'Go home and rest assured that your city will be as safe in my hands as if you had controlled it ;" and he turned his trooj^s loose in the place without any restraint whatever, until they had destroyed enough of it to satisfy his vanity and malice ; then he ordered the work to stop, and it did stop. Whether they were drunk or sober is immaterial. He did exactly what one would have done who wanted the town destroyed, and he alone is respon- sible for the consequences, and doubly responsible, because he voluntarily promised protection and purposely failed to take any step towards even trying to fulfill his promise. If a transaction witnessed by forty or fifty thousand people can be successfully falsified, of what value is human testi- mony, or how can we rely upon any fact stated in history? Sunday, igth. — After the interview with General Sherman, I summoned James G. and Dr. R. W. Gibbes, Jr., Clark Waring, D. P. McDonald, Dr. Wm. Reynolds and others, about a dozen in number, to meet at my house to-night and arrange for receiving the guns and cattle to-morrow. General Howard having notified Mayor Goodwyn that they would be turned over to us at 6 o'clock A. M. They met and Dr. Goodwyn was present. James G. Gibbes, Mr. Dovil- liers and others agreed to get the guns, which were at the Asylum, while another party was to gviafd the cattle then in the College Campus. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 193 Monday, 20th. — The citizens were notified to meet at 9 o'clock in Mrs. Lyons's yard and arrange for the protection of the place ; but very few appeared. The guns turned over to us by General Sherman were found to be plugged with sand, either designedly or from disuse, and gunsmiths were employed to remove the sand before they could be used. By 12 o'clock about a hundred had assembled and Captain Stan- ley was appointed to command the guard. Whilst a commit- tee, with Mayor Goodwyn, were arranging for detail of guards, Rev. Mr. Toomer Porter announced an order from General Howard for us to take charge of the city above Cam- den street at 2 o'clock, as his forces in that quarter were marching out, and Captain Stanley ordered ten or a dozen for that purpose. Sherman's army were departing all day, and he directed us to put to death all stragglers found in our streets. Tuesday, 21st. — I met City Council at J. M. Blakely's house, where the Aldermen made their first report to the Mayor since the arrival of Sherman's army. Decided to send Mr. Blakely to Pacolet for provisions belonging to Supply Association managed by M. C. Mordecai. At 12 o'clock a public meeting was held in State House yard, where we agreed to enroll all needing food and to call on those having any to spare to give it for others. T. J. Robertson offered money and provisions. David Jacobs, A. L. Solomons and Mr. Edgerton each ^5,000 in currency, and the latter ^50 in gold. I consented to serve on the Committee of enrollment with A. G. Baskin, and we took seats in Plain street, at Rhett's mill, where we registered many names. Mr. Brooks offered to build a flat for crossing Broad River. At night, with Clark Waring, young Cohen, Rev. T. Raysor and D. P. McDonald, patrolled around our square till after 12 o'clock, but found all very quiet. On Wednesday, and for a week or more afterwards, pursued same course. li)i RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. This week Waring and Brooks made a flat, but in trying to cross the river the wire broke. My son Henry had left us on the morning of the 17th to join Hampton's retreating troops, and we got quite uneasy at hearing nothing from or of him till March 12th, when C. J. BoUin told me he and J. B. Glass had spent a night with Mark Brown, at Winnsboro, on their return from Charlotte, and had gone to Cokesbury for pro- visions. March i^th. — The continued rains and the bungling of those in charge of the ferries have prevented our receipts of food and communication with the country, except occasion- ally. Augusta sent us eighteen wagon loads, but they were left over the river and mostly stolen. The first arrival of provisions was brought in two wagons by Wm. J. Anderson and Rev. J. Leighton Wilson, from Sumter, the loads made up by themselves, Captain Wm. Harris and others. I had written there and up the country, informing my friends of our condition, and this cargo was in response to my appeal. About the same time Morris Strauss, at Cokesbury, sent us a wagon load or two, which were unfortunately stopped at New- berry. James G. Gibbes has acted as Mayor in place of Dr. Goodwyn, who became completely worn out from fatigue and anxiety when Sherman left us. . Gibbes, by common consent, was the only man here with energy and capacity for the occa- sion. He seemed to never tire or relax his efforts, going everywhere, listening to all complaints, attending all calls, talking, eating and drinking as he went, and his services to the city were beyond all computation or compensation, yet he never charged or received a single cent, and seemed glad for once in his life to have on hand as much as he could do. I have served daily in distributing tickets for food; have met a Committee with Dr. Gibbes, Dr. John Fisher, Messrs. Edgerton, J. K. Crawford and D. P. McDonald for the trial of disorderly negroes, who need checking these lawless times, KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 195 and have attended meetings of a Committee of City Coimcil with Mr. Kerrison and Colonel Heyward, deputed by the Governor to collect and distribute supplies. The five hun- dred beeves left us by General Sherman proved to be the starving cattle that his foragers had collected on their march, and were miserably poor, yet they served to keep our people alive for some weeks, a ration of a pound of this wretched beef and a quart of meal per day being issued to the number of 7,000 applicants whom we had enrolled. The supply of medicine for our 20,000 population, received by Dr. Gibbes from the Federal Surgeon General, was in a box that would have held one or two hundred cigars, with a pint bottle of castor oil. CHAPTER XXVIII. My Trip Up the Rivek — End of the War — Visit to Salt Works — Election to the Legislature — Copartnership with George W. Williams— Bank Robbery— Connection with Southern, Baldwin AND Shiver — Reconstruction — Failure in Health and Business — Seven Springs Mass — Rhymes. On the 15th I consented, by request of Council, to go up Broad River by boat, to hire, purchase or have built other boats for bringing down provisions, since, from scarcity of horses and wagons, they cannot reach us by land. Sunday, igth. — Took passage in Captain Hughes's boat at Geiger's Mill, with Colonel Wm. Shiver, Dr. Honour, Dr. Muckenfuss, Mr. Burdell of Bank of State, Mr. Brown of Union and others — some going in another boat. The river was high and rain fell nearly all the time. We slept of nights in a wet camp on the river bank. 19(5 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. Wednesday, 22d. — A batteau took me from the boat across the river to Henderson's Island, which is two and a half miles long by three-quarters wide at the broadest point. Walked across the island to Mrs. Henderson's, on the West side, and thence was directed and helped by way of Reuben Lyles's and Wm. E. Hardy's to W. W. Renwick's, who went with me to George B. Tucker's, on Enoree, in search for boats, but the latter was not at home. From there we proceeded to Wm. Glenn's, an old boatman, who gave me the desired information as to the cost and building of such boats as we needed. At Robert Beaty's and ex-Governor Gist's I had a kind and welcome reception, with conveyance to Union, where Dr. Herndon took me in charge, and I enjoyed the hospitality of his house till I met with R. V. Gist, manager of the Iron Works, on Broad River, and he agreed to build two boats and send them to Columbia as soon as possible. After staying a couple of days at Gist's, (where I found Mr. John C. Cochran, Cashier of the Southwestern Railroad Bank, with Mr. Henry Gourdin and Mr. Hendricks in charge of the bank's effects,) I returned to Pacolet and by railroad to Santuc, whence I went on foot to Gordon's Mills, on Tyger River, where, with several returning soldiers, each was charged fifty cents for crossing in a batteau and the same for riding in a wagon three miles to Wm. E. Hardy's. Mr. Hardy sent a boy and horse with me to Mr. Renwick's, and he conveyed me back to Mrs. Henderson's, on the island. From there Dr. Hancock brought me to the head of the canal, about 8 o'clock at night, on Sunday, April 9th, and I walked to town on the railroad track in the dark, amidst a shower of rain, arriving at home after 9, thoroughly fatigued. Robert Beaty gave me half a dozen fine hams and made a present of the same number to Messrs. R. O'Neale and John A. Crawford. The abundance of provisions in that fertile region, which the Yankees failed to reach, was in striking RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 197 contrast with our utterly destitute condition in and around Columbia, and the kindness and liberality of the people, except at Gordon's Mills, was unbounded. The light from the burning of our city had been seen eighty miles distant and our calamity excited their sincerest commiseration and sympathy. Whilst away exciting and conflicting rumors from the army were afloat. On Friday, the yth, I first heard of the fall of Richmond, but did not believe it. After that the news had been confirmed, though we could get no particulars. On looking back to that gloomy period I miss many elderly citizens who had previously been hale and vigorous, but who gradually declined and died, I have no doubt, from trouble and despair at the loss of their property and the apparently hopeless condition of the country. Consequently, I think, we have fewer old men in Columbia than in former times. Some who had always borne the character of honest men, under the strong temptations of want and evil examples, and in the absence of all legal restraint, proved otherwise and took all they could lay their hands on. A few Gov- ernment stores that remained were robbed at night, while bonds, mules and wagons were appropriated to their own use by the officials to whom they had been en- trusted. The spirit of patriotism that seemed to pervade all classes at the beginning of the war had measurably died out, and in its place was the selfish greed of speculation and ex- tortion, especially on the necessaries of life. Able-bodied young men, who ought to have been in the army, sought and obtained exemption for the purpose of making money. Some gained immense fortunes in a short time, which, by the col- lapse of the Confederacy, were as suddenly dissipated. It was indeed a "time that tried men's souls." I can recall no single instance of one who thus "rose upon his country's ruin" that retained his ill-gotten gains. A few days before the surrender of Columbia a poor woman from the country 198 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. Spent a day in our streets trying to get a peck of salt, but none could be found for sale, yet after the fire hundreds of sacks lay open to the view in cellars and back stores^ where they had been concealed waiting for higher prices. A mer- chant reported to have made three hundred thousand dollars in two or three years and who hoped that salt would go to a hundred dollars a bushel lost his all in one night. Another, in a country village, who had all that heart could wish, told me afterwards the Yankees left him and his family without even a cup from which to take a drink of water. The down- fall of our cause was owing in a great measure to the preva- lence of this desire for wealth. This summer, for the first time since 1822, have had nothing to do but keep charge of the books and assets of the bank, at a nominal salary of ^400. In June went to the salt works in Southwest Virginia to collect a debt of ^100,000 due General John S. Preston as part purchase money for the works, but effected nothing beyond seeing that rich and beautiful region. These works, when in full operation, could turn out thirteen thousand bushels of salt per day. They consisted of two wells or springs, from which the water flowed in tubes or pipes, and were not more than ten feet apart, but located in different Counties, whose dividing line ran between them in a beautiful valley about half a mile wide, shut in by two ranges of high mountains. Near by was a long row of boilers cov- ered by a shed. The water was so strongly impregnated with saline matter that, when boiled down, a bushel of it made a gallon of pure fine salt as white as the driven snow. It was so valuable that the whole neighboring region had been tried by boring, but without success, no other place being found where it would pay to erect works. Found the whole country, from Chester, S. C, to Richmond, and thence to and beyond Lynchburg, full of Yankee soldiers, and our poor fellows returning home, worn out, sick and destitute. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 199 After thinking over many projects for employment, I became a candidate for the Legislature, in October, with the intention of trying to get the office of Comptroller General if it should be vacant, of which there was some doubt. Although my candidacy was announced but three days before the election, the good people of Richland gave me a seat in the House of Representatives. There I felt more out of place than in any other position I have ever occupied, and became satisfied that making laws was not in my line. Moreover the Legislature decided that the Comptroller's office was not vacant, but belonged rightfully to Mr. Hood. I then applied to General Preston and to John Caldwell for capital to start a banking and brokerage business on joint account in Colum- bia, but they both declined, thinking unfavorably of the pro- ject, to their great regret, as frequently expressed afterwards. On making a like proposition to Mr. George W. Williams of Charleston, accompanied by letters from some mutual friends, he consented to give me a credit of ten thousand dollars at the outset, and in January, 1866, when I first made his acquaint- ance, we entered into a copartnership for two years, he furnishing the capital and I managing the business — the profits to be equally divided between us. It proved far more successful than either of us had expected, and we divided nineteen thousand dollars in May, 1868. A contract for its continuance with my son Henry as a partner was then made for the ensuing two years. A few days before the expiration of that term, when we had cleared upwards of thirty thou- sand dollars, our bank was broken open and robbed of its contents, including a large amount belonging to special depositors. Thus nearly all that I had made up to that time was lost. But I had long seen the folly of trying to accumu- late more of this world's goods than one needs, and felt con- fident that with -life and health I could recover the loss, so it gave me very little trouble. In fact I neither eat nor slept 200 KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. any the less on its account. It did annoy me, however, as it defeated a trip to Europe, which I had intended making during the summer, and from which I anticipated a great deal of pleasure. Hitherto I never could spare time and money for the purpose. The very day before the robbery occurred at night, I had written to JMr. Williams on the sub- ject, and that was as near as I ever came to crossing the Atlantic. But I consoled myself with the reflection that I had passed many pleasant summers on this side and could do so again. Some curious facts connected with the robbery will now be mentioned, although they will take considerable time and space. It occurred on the night of Saturday, April i6, 1870. When informed of it on Sunday morning, I went to the bank and found the vault door and the burglar-proof iron safe torn to pieces, our customers' trunks and boxes broken open, the money, bonds and other valuables missing and the floor covered with the wrappers and paper that had covered the packages. The rogues left also a box with a complete set of burglars' tools and implements which they had used and a sledge-hammer stolen from Brennan & Carroll's blacksmith shop, thus furnishing me with the means of going into their business if so disposed. As the news spread it excited great commotion, and quite a crowd assembled to gaze on the scene. Our police was altogether inefficient and unprepared to act in such a case, but they set to work and did their best. We offered a reward of ^6,000 for information sufficient to convict the robbers and a percentage upon the amount that might be recovered. Besides, some of our friends volun- teered to go on the different railroads and watch at certain points. Two or three days later a carpet-bag was found be- tween Logan & Graham's cotton gin and the South Carolina Railroad, containing various articles of clothing and some tools that matched like articles found on the floor of the RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 201 bank. Further inquiry showed that three or four strangers had been camping some time the week before in the woods beyond the railroad, between the town and the river. A party went there on Tuesday or Wednesday morning, and where the camp had been one of them picked up a roll of paper about the size of a pipe stem, which had been torn in pieces and. wrapped tightly together. On unfolding the pieces and putting them together, they read as follows : ''Albany, N. Y., April , 1870. J. A. Asdell, Columbia, S. C: Have sold my farm; will be in Augusta Thursday. (Signed J J. Tierney." Following this clue, we discovered that on the Thursday preceding the robbery the name of J. A. Asdell, New Orleans, appeared on the register of the Columbia Hotel among the arrivals that evening, and that he left the house next morning, but attracted no notice. At the telegraph office a stranger called about dusk on Saturday, and, inquir- ing if they had anything for J. A. Asdell, 'received the dis- patch copied above. Hence we inferred that he was the burglar. He was a thick-set man of dark complexion, dressed like a mechanic, and we could trace him no further. Pinkerton's detectives in New York were employed and they reported Jack Tierney of Albany as a fast man who had been concerned in negotiating some bonds stolen from a New York bank. He left Albany on Monday after the rob- bery, arrived in New York that evening, then went to Brook- lyn or Jersey City, where he had relatives, and thenceforth disappeared. I had reason to suspect certain persons in Columbia, belonging to the Radical party, who were then engaged in plundering our State, of either committing or employing others to commit the robbery, but in the absence of proof it would have been useless to prosecute them. 203 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. Soon after the robbery occurred, Mr. Sample, a banker in Nashville, Tennessee, called on me in Columbia, heard an account of the affair and received a copy of our circular offering a reward and containing a list of some of the lost money and securities. In February, 1872, I received a dispatch from him stating that he was offered a large amount in bills of the Exchange Bank of Columbia which had been taken from our vault, and that if I would come to Nashville we might catch the thief. I immediately took the train for that city, and on arriving was informed of the following facts by Sample : That in October, 1871, a young man who called his name Smith had sold him several thousand dollars in bills of the Bank of the State of South Carolina, for which he paid by a check on New York to Smith's order; that he meantime had lost sight of and forgotten my circular show- ing a large amount in bills of that bank as stolen when we were robbed ; that later in the same day Smith called again just before the departure of the train for Louisville, seeming much hurried and excited, and offered to sell him several thousand dollars more in bills of the same bank ; that Smith's manner led him to suspect something wrong, and he proposed taking the bills at the same rate, on the condition that if he made a large profit on them Smith should be allowed a share of the gain on his leaving his address in New York, where he professed his home was; that Smith left his name and address on a slip of paper which lay upon his desk several months ; that he requested his correspondent in New York to be particular in noticing who presented the check for pay- ment, and telegraphed to Blythe, a noted detective in Louis- ville, to watch Smith's movements whilst there, who did so and reported nothing suspicious; that his check in Smith's favor was not presented for payment till six months after its issue, and then was in the hands of a little old German Jew. Sample then showed me a dispatch that he had received from RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 203 Smith in New York a few days before, inquiring what he would give for ^13,000 in bills of the Exchange Bank of Columbia. This he said caused him to remember the rob- bery of my bank, and he replied making a fair offer for the bills. Smith had accepted the offer and forwarded the bills by Express, requesting the return of a check for the amount, and they were then in the Express office adjoining the Max- well House, where I had stopped. Before leaving home I ascertained that Mr. C. H. Baldwin, Receiver for the Ex- change Bank, had redeemed all of its issues but three or four thousand dollars in 1870 and deposited the redeemed bills in our vault for safe keeping. And as the package then in the Express office contained more than all the unredeemed bills of the bank, its contents, or a portion of them, must have been taken when we were robbed. When Sample received the package we counted the bills and found the amount as stated by Smith. After consulting Judge Whit- worth, an old Nashville Bank President, Sample set out immediately for New York to identify Smith and have him arrested and taken to Columbia on a requisition from the Governor of South Carolina, for which I by telegraph directed my son in Columbia to apply with the necessary affidavit. The requisition was obtained and entrusted to R. C. Shiver, who was about departing for New York, and was instructed to communicate with Sample on his arrival. To throw Smith off his guard till Sample could reach New York, we got a daily Nashville paper to strike off a few copies of its issue with a card announcing the death of Sample's mother- in-law in a neighboring town and that he had gone there to attend her funeral. This card was mailed to Smith in the name of Sample's clerk, with the promise that a check for the bills should be remitted on Sample's return. Pinkerton's Detective Agency was employed meantime to watch the office at Smith's hotel and arrest the person who might claim the 204 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. letter addressed to him. One of the detectives saw the letter delivered to a boy, who claimed it, and followed him to a low groggery on a side street, where he handed it to a man evidently waiting for it. This man rose from his seat, passed his hand across his face and walked out, accompanied by a couple of companions. Instead of arresting him at once, the detective, according to his own account, dogged the party to another drinking house, into which they entered and passed through the back door, where they disappeared and could not be found. This occurred previous to the arrival of Sample and Shiver in New York. The requisition on the Governor of New York had to be presented to him at Albany for approval and certification. Then when it came back to New York, Sample, Shiver and Pinkerton's men searched for Smith and captured him at the hotel. He protested his inno- cence, claimed an alibi, and appealed to Shiver for an investi- gation. Fearing a suit for damages if they had arrested the wrong man. Shiver allowed an inquiry to be made before a New York Justice or Police Court, and was left at liberty to convey Smith to South Carolina if he chose to take the responsibility. In view of the testimony, he doubted whether the person arrested was Smith, and suspected that the detect- ives had, for a consideration, allowed the real offender to escape to Canada, whilst they persuaded Sample to arrest the wrong man. And thus ended all our efforts to arrest the robbers. The war was followed by the years of so-called reconstruc- tion under Radical misrule, when rogues and rascals held high carnival in the State and city governments, and vied with each other in showing the depths of infamy and corruption to which human nature can descend when unrestrained by law, con- science or public opinion. They congregated in Columbia — the seat of government — where jobbery and robbery were openly practiced and boasted of. The State debt was doubled. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 205 the annual expenses of the Legislature were trebled and some- times quadrupled. New bonds authorized to be exchanged for old, were issued without such exchange and their proceeds pocketed by the officers who issued them. Coupons redeemed by the Treasurer, instead of being canceled, were put upon the market and sold for his private emolument. Judge Mel- ton, as Attorney General, afterwards sued him and got a ver- dict of ^75,000 in favor of the State. An appropriation bill in the Legislature, after enumerating all the extravagant items that could be invented, was passed with an additional false aggregate of, I believe, ^150,000 to its real amount. This was discovered by Governor Scott, and was so barefaced and inexcusable that he refused to give it his official signa- ture and approval. Joe Crews actually complained to me of the Governor's veto on this occasion as an outrageous desertion of his party. In the city government it was no better, as the following instances will show: I was a member of the Council for a part of the war time, and, as Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, had become familiar with its financial condition. On declining to serve, after a re-election, I publicly expressed the opinion that by proper management, with increased but not immod- erate taxation for three or four years, and the sale of the city's ^150,000 in stock of the Greenville and the Charlotte Rail- roads, the entire bonded debt of ^320,000 might be paid off and the citizens freed from future taxation, except for current expenses. The overthrow of the Confederacy and the de- struction of the place by Sherman, of course, prevented any attempt at proving the correctness of my opinion. But the Radical party then took charge of the municipality, and in the face of the facts that the city had been desolated, as already described, and that its people were just crawling out of the ashes, as if determined to defeat our exertions for returning prosperity, they engaged in the wildest schemes of 206 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. useless extravagance and waste. After selling and devouring the proceeds of our railroad stock, and when unable to meet the interest on their bonds as it fell due, they blindly and recklessly adopted the following measures : They sold the water works to a private individual, contracting to pay him for extending the pipes and supplying the place with water at an annual sum far exceeding what it had previously cost, under the pretense that the supply was insufficient, although it had sufficed during the war, when we had twice the popula- tion that has been within our bounds at any time since. They bargained for and commenced the building of a new market house, on Assembly street, in front of Gus Cooper's store, for his benefit, but in the course of its erection, Provi- dence seemed to interfere and a storm blew down the frame work, when it was abandoned after a considerable outlay. Then they started a scheme for erecting an Opera House and City Hal!, as if it was the duty of the Council to provide a place for theatrical and other performances. In their pub- lished proceedings they declared that the cost would not exceed ^75,000 and that they had the means of paying for it without any increase of taxation. This declaration was followed by an application to the Legislature for leave to issue ^250,000 in bonds in order to meet the expense. Mean- time they entered into a contract to pay Isaac A, Allen $142,000 for doing the work, he being, by the merest trickery and subterfuge, the lowest bidder at that price. The princi- pal taxpayers opposed the petition for power to issue new bonds, and applied to the Courts to set aside the contract with Allen, as fraudulent in character and excessive in amount. Judge Melton, after hearing the case, declared the contract null and void, and one of the previous bidders at about $140,000 took the job for $90,000. The Council in the meantime had borrowed $75,000 from Dr. Neagle to carry on the work, and had given him as security for the loan, a lot of RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 207 bonds which the Legislature some years previously had author- ized to be issued in aid of the railroad to Augusta, but which, not being required or used for that purpose, had been left in the City Clerk's office. Neagle became dissatisfied with this security and demanded something else in its place. Now, although these facts were admitted, and could not be denied, the Legislature took up the matter as a party question, and, backed by the recommendation of the Committee of Ways and Means, with Whipper as Chairman, passed an Act author- izing the new issue, but guarded it by a provision that the entire indebtedness of the corporation should never in any event exceed ^600,000. Some of us did all we could to defeat the bill, or to reduce the maximum amount to $500,000. Tim Hurley, a member of the Committee and one of the most candid and impudent of the party, who said on all occasions that they would steal, told me privately that it would not cost much to defeat the bill, but my friends and I refused to take the hint and allowed it to pass. In spite of the express limitation of the city debt to $600,000, the scamps made it one or two hundred thousand more before we could stop them, and on that .increased basis it was finally com- promised after infinite disputation and litigation. Our copartnership with Mr. Williams expired in May, 1870, soon after the robbery, and he signified his desire to quit the concern, giving me time to make other arrangements. Accord- ingly we brought it to a close on the ist of August, without having had the slightest disagreement or complaint on either side during its continuance. He complied strictly and promptly with his part of the contract in furnishing funds when called for, and never interfered with my management by advice or otherwise. I then made a connection with Messrs. J. P. Southern, C. H. Baldwin and R. C. Shiver for the ensuing two years, they putting in $75,000 in cash, and I and my son, with assistants, attending to the business. At 208 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. the end of that time we divided between twenty-five and thirty thousand dollars of profits. Thus, in the first six years after the war I made ^75,000 for my partners and myself, without dealing harshly or illiberally with any customer. Then Mr. Southern and Mr. Shiver, with some others, bought the charter of the old Union Savings Bank and urged me to merge my business with theirs and take the place of President with my son as Cashier, offering me ^5,000 for the good will of my concern, and ^30,000 — a profit of ^5,000 — on the cost of my banking house, with its fixtures, and the adjoining store. But we disagreed as to the salaries that I demanded for myself and my son, and they rented another place and opened the Savings Bank, while we continued on alone. This was in August, 1872. My business had grown up gradually under my management and control, and I had every reason to believe that it would continue to increase, whilst I feared disagreement with some of their directors and doubted the success of their scheme. Next year came the panic of 1873, ^^^ suspension of nearly all banks throughout the country, and great shrinkage of values in real estate and other property, with the insolvency of many parties hitherto regarded as abundantly good. I managed to meet all demands, while the National Banks in Columbia suspended payment for sums exceeding ^100, and the Citizens' Savings Bank went into bankruptcy. The uni- versal depression continued a number of years, with no pros- pect of improvement or relief Besides, in 1876, while I was absent, my son was taken dangerously ill and died early in August, four days after my return. This was a very severe blow to me, for he was the active out-door man in our bank. But, in addition, just then occurred the violent political agitation and elections throughout the State, for relief from Radical rule, absorbing the time and attention of our people and nearly stopping all business. And finally, in November, RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 209 I was struck down with a chronic disease of the kidneys that had troubled me many years, which prevented my proper and necessary attention to the office and endangered my life for eighteen months. During this time I had dropsy, a complete derangement of the digestive organs, was threatened with hernia and confined to my bed room eight or ten months, with occasional attacks of nervousness, when I expected to survive but a few hours. Under these circumstances, which I could not possibly have foreseen or avoided, I made an assignment in June, 1877, and, owing to the depreciation in the prices of property and failure of debtors to meet their engagements, it resulted in heavy losses to my depositors, among whom were my only child, a daughter, and my daughter-in-law, who were not preferred nor cautioned to withdraw their money, but shared the fate of all the rest. From this dangerous condition, when the end was evidently approaching, and I had lain nearly unconscious several days, relief came almost miraculously. Dr. Talley, whose faithful and skillful attention had, with the blessing of Heaven, prolonged my life, told me one day of a remedy that had been produced in this way: A man near Abingdon, in Virginia, had drawn from a spring in his neighborhood a barrel of water and placed it over a slow fire until it was reduced to a pint. He then went to six other springs and drew from each a like quantity, which was treated in the same manner. These seven pints of water he mixed together, and by evaporation produced a mass, in color and consistency resembling putty, which he declared would cure the dropsy. It was called The Seven Spring Mass, and, to the surprise of every one, on trial it proved to be a specific for the disease, as was certified to by such men as Bishop Pierce of Georgia. The Doctor, with my consent, ordered some of the singular medicine. The dropsy in my lower limbs had then been growing and increasing, though very 210 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. slowly, for about a year, while my arms showed nothing but skin and bone, and all my senses were seriously affected. Yet a small dose of the mass, in a single night, carried off all the accumulated water, leaving the skin that had been so long distended, all loose and shrivelled. A repetition of the dose a week or two afterwards relieved me entirely from the dropsy; the other symptoms of disease abated, and in the course of a month I crawled out to the front door. Some time in April my strength bore me to Main street, though still very weak. I feared the first person I met would take me by the throat with the demand : '' Pay what thou owest." But all seemed glad to see me; expressed their sympathy for my misfortunes, and one good lady, whose kindness I shall never forget, crossed the street to meet me, turned back in her way, and walked upwards of two squares to chat with me. From that time my health gradually improved and has since been as good as that of any one at my time of life. The effects of this medicine were so happy and wonderful in my case that I record them here for the benefit of others who may be similarly afflicted. I had always before regarded the dropsy as incurable, having never known a patient to recover from it. KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 211 ^I|l ^k^mmA Shakspeare says: "All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players ; They have their exits and their entrances, And one man in his time plays many parts." Among the parts that I have played was, in my youthful days, that of a rhymer for very young ladies, who generally pronounced my productions be-e-aiitiful ; and now, to fill up some space for the printers, such as I have not forgotten will be coi)ied, and my long and tedious task brought to an end. I never kept duplicates of them, but have now and then rewritten one from memory for the amusement of a friend, and only one or two have ever been published. Those of my readers who have no taste for such trifles can pass them by without notice, as they are merely thrown in for good measure, and because without them my recollections would be incomplete. H BIRTHDM SONG, 'Tis the maiden's birthday ; the sky is bright. The roses are blooming around ; There's beauty in all that meets the sight. And music in every sound. The cooing dove on the lonely hill, The martin high up in the air. And the flattering mocking bird, loud and shrill, Hail the birth of the young and the fair. 212 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. The butterfly, decked in vermillion and gold, Calls to visit the beautiful miss ; And the saucy mosquito, mischievous and bold. Makes her blush with the warmth of his kiss. At midnight the whippoorwill's ceaseless cry Fills the woods with a serenade. While the firefly waves his torch on high As a silent huzza for the maid. Sweet maid of sixteen, may no sorrow or blight Ever furrow your cheek or your brow. But may time in his flight find your eye still as bright. And your slumbers as peaceful as now. WOMSN'S INFLUENCE, In days of yore the gallant knight Went forth to many a field of fight. Encountered peril, pain and toil — His sole reward, sweet woman's smile ; But days of knighthood now are o'er. Their gleaming spears are seen no more. Unheard their trumpets' martial strains. Yet woman's influence still remains. At her command grave, steady men, Unused to wield the poet's pen, Laying ambition, strife and pride. And cares and business all aside. And summoning from mem'ry's throng Thoughts that to other days belong, Essay to fill a vacant page With fancies bright or counsels sage. To cull a chaplet fair and sweet, And lay it humbly at her feet. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 218 TWILIGHT MUSINGS R FRAGMENT. Maiden of the raven hair, kind heart and merry eyes. Alone I often think of you as fade the evening skies ; Robed in crimson drapery, when the sun retires to rest. Your breath is on the balmy breeze, your blush is in the West. 'Mid gathering shades yon silver cloud reflects the absent sun, E'en so in mem'ry bring me back, when I from earth am gone. The brightest sky is farthest off, the darkest overhead. So shone the joys of long ago, so present sorrows spread. MY DREAM, I had a dream,* a glorious dream, of Eden's blissful bowers, When all was peace and happiness within this world of ours, And there I saw an earthly maid, most beautiful and bright, Who seemed to be at home amid that world of pure delight. A sound like that of lofty pines when swept by winter's blast, And a troop of white-robed angels came sailing slowly past ; On glittering wings, with golden harps, they hovered o'er the place. While the light reflected from their forms lit up the maiden's face. Celestial flowers in rosy wreaths around her brow they hung. And the air was full of melody as thus the angels sung : " We come to you, sweet earthly maid, our nature to impart. That you may be an angel in appearance and in heart ; Your eye shall have a brighter glance, your voice a sweeter tone. Your cheek a richer, deeper blush than any but your own : We'll guard and guide your daily walk, till daily walks shall cease — Your ways shall all be pleasantness, your paths shall all be peace ; And we'll take you up to dwell with us, if cares and troubles come. For you're fit for brighter regions, this dark earth is not your home.' 214 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. They waved arewell and soared on high — my glorious dream was past ; Like all my dreams of happiness, too bright, too sweet to last. But still a rosy glow was shed on all surrounding things — The poplar leaves still quivered with the waving of their wings ; Faint echoes of their music from a distant cloud I heard, And a trembling flash disclosed the track by which they disappeared. I turned to gaze around me, too full of thought for speech. When lo ! that maiden's album lay just within my reach, Enriched with friendship's precious fruits, adorned with fancy's flowers. As full of pure and peaceful thoughts as Eden's blissful bowers ; And I this tribute added, to her beauty and her worth. She is fit for better regions, her true home is not on earth. IMPROMPTU. In reply to a bantering anonymous letter received by a friend. Dear miss, your epistle has just come to hand, And I would, most willingly, grant your demand And fly to your arms without any delay, But for one or two obstacles still in the way. In the first place, your name is a secret to me — It's not in your letter so far as I see. Then, your description has nothing peculiar to you, For other young ladies have eyes that are blue, With hair that is auburn, and they too are tall, And I have looked wistful and sighed to them all ; I cannot but sigh when I witness the grace. The beauty and sweetness of form and of face. Like stars in the darkness of midnight that shine To light my lone pathway, but cannot be mine. But then you may ask, " Can't I tell by your ' leer? ' " No, all ladies sometimes look cross my sweet dear. So you see I'm afraid I may make a mistake. And some other tall, blue-eyed girl chance to take. Besides, let me tell you, and this is no joke. My horse is quite lame and my sociable broke. Moreover, dear Miss, I would have you to know I'm not without some other strings to my bow ; Every mail brings me ofl'ers from North, East and West, The girls of the village allow me no rest. The widows look willing, and some of the wives Are praying their husbands would shorten their lives. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 215 So, dearest, allow me to just recommend That you should come over along with a friend, And we will be married on Saturday next. For I am so pestered, fatigued and perplexed By the banters I daily, nay, hourly, receive, That I'm losing my senses and strength I believe. Now be sure to come shortly or I will be lost. And your hopes, like your eyes, most confoundedly crost. They were afterwards married. THE STREIMLET. In the depth of the forest a streamlet I've seen, Spreading fragrance and verdure around ; The solitude smiled and the desert was green Where its waters had moistened the ground. Bright beams and soft breezes would linger and play O'er the ripples that dimpled its face ; It cooled the soft breezes and brightened the ray That rested within its embrace. In its covert the wild birds sang happy and free. As though earth had no shadow of care ; They had music and merriment, gossip and glee. And bridals and honeymoons there. As a shelter the willow his arms overspread — The jessamine clambered above. While, blushing and trembling, each flower hung its head Like a maid at the first kiss of love. That streamlet resembles the maid I address. To whose smile such a magic belongs ; Whom the beams and the breezes delight to caress. And the birds to salute with their songs. Her face, like the streamlet that flows in the wood. Is radiant with light from above ; It speaks of a heart where no shadows intrude. Filled with gayety, kindness and love. Her form is as graceful, her footstep as light. As the willow that dips in the tide; And her lips and her cheeks are as fresh and as bright As the flowers that spring by its side. 216 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. The glance of her eye is like starlight at eve Reflected from billows at rest, And neither the stars nor the billows that heave Are more peaceful or pure than her breast. May friends cluster round her like leaves ever green ; May love join life's stream as it flows, Growing broader and deeper, more clear and serene. And joyous and bright to the close. TO THE QUEEN OF MM. 1. Hail, gentle Queen ! thy reign extends O'er happy subjects, fair and free ; Thy court is thronged with loyal friends. Who own allegiance, all, to thee. 2. No flatterer's falsehood cheats thine ear, No envious rival hates thy sway. But friendship kind and love sincere Unite to crown thee Queen of May. 3. No trembling vassal fears thy frown. Thy wants no ravaged realms supply ; Thine are the pleasures of a crown. Without its crimes or miserj'. 4. For thee we've roamed the woods and fields, And sought the brightest, sweetest flowers ^ The richest prize the garden yields Is found among these gifts of ours. 5. Crown other queens with sordid gold. The fruit of toilsome pain and care ; Their hearts, like it, are hard and cold. Nor can their crowns with thine compare. 6. For as these fragrant flowers entwined Shield and adorn thy regal brow. So in one band our hearts we bind To shelter and protect thee now. 7. These flowers will fade, but mem'ry still Shall long retain this pleasing scene. And oft, when May decks grove and hill. We'll think of thee, our gentle Queen. THE END. %, ^^ • ,^\^^^ .^-'-. iV- "> "^y. v^^ LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 014 498 140 6