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 THE UNION LEAGUE CLUB 
 
 NEW YORK. 
 
 i^ROCEEiJiisras 
 
 IN IIKFKliKNOK To I'lIK DKATll 
 
 OF 
 
 HON. EDWIN M. STANTON, 
 
 DECEMBEK 3()th, 1869. 
 
 CLUB HOUSE, MADISON AVENUE, 
 
 Cor. East Twenty-Sixth Street. 
 
 1870. 
 
/ 
 
 THE UNION LEAGUE CLUB 
 
 NEM^ YORK. 
 
 
 i>ROOEEDiisras 
 
 IN REFERENCE TO THE DEATH 
 
 OF 
 
 HOK EDWIN M. STANTOK 
 
 DECEMBEK 30th, 1869. 
 
 CLUB HOUSE, MADISON AVENUE, 
 Cor. East Twenty-Sixth Street. 
 
 1870. 
 

TRIBUTE 
 
 HON. EDWIN M. STANTON, 
 
 OF PENNSYLVANIA, 
 
 EX-SECKETAKY OF WAR, AKD ASSOCIATE JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME 
 COURT OF TUE UNITED STATES. 
 
 On the 24th day of December, 1869, the telegraph startled 
 the country with the sad news of the death of Hon. Edwin 
 M. Stanton, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of 
 the United States, and ex-Secretary of Y^ar. Immediately 
 upon the receipt of the intelligence, Mr. Charles Butler, 
 Senior Vice-President, issued the following call for a special 
 meeting of The Union League Club : 
 
 "The Union League Club, 
 
 " Friday, 2-itli Becember, 1869. 
 
 " A special meeting of the Club will be held on Satiirday 
 evening, 25th inst., at eight o'clock, to take proper action 
 in respect to the sudden death of that distinguished and 
 patriotic citizen, the Hon. Edwin M. Stanton, late Secre- 
 tary of War. 
 
 " Charles Butler, 
 
 " Vice-Pi'esidenf." 
 
 In accordance with this call a sad company assembled at 
 the Club House on Christmas eve'.iing, and, after organizing, 
 
unanimously adopted the following j^reamble, o£fered by 
 Dr. Francis Lieber, and resolutions, proposed by Mr. Wil- 
 liam Cullen Bryant : 
 
 " We, the members of the Union League Club of the city 
 of New York, having heard with profound grief the death 
 of Edwin M. Stanton, the greatest War Minister of modern 
 times, to w'hose energy and lofty patriotism the ultimate 
 success of the national cause is owing, as much as to any 
 other individual man ; who trusted in the people, and 
 called forth and organized victorious armies in an age 
 which, until then, was un-military ; the unsullied citizen, 
 through w^hose hands passed more millions than have passed 
 through those of any other man ; who entered his high office 
 not rich, and left it poor ; the true and sterling man, who 
 was sincerely averse to holding public office, however high, 
 but sacrificed his health, his property, his life, to it when 
 the salvation of his country was at stake ; Stanton, whom 
 it is feeble to call a Roman, but whom we call, with joy in oxir 
 sadness, a noble American : Therefore — 
 
 " Besolved, That the members of the Union League Club 
 cherish with the sincerest affection the memory of that great 
 man, who, by his lanparalleled services to the nation in the 
 days of her peril and distress, has earned the everlasting 
 gratitude of the jDeople of the United States. In his 
 place in the Cabinet in that fatal hour when the seat of gov- 
 ernment became on a sudden the centre of treason, he was 
 one of the few faithfid heroes and patriots who, by firmness, 
 energy, and wisdom, saved the fragments of the State from 
 the noxious plots of traitors, and the not less deadly imbe- 
 cility of the Executive. Called by providential wisdom to 
 the charge of the War Department in the darkest hour of 
 the rebelhon, his indomitable w411, his never-failing courage, 
 his far-reaching forethought, and matchless executive genius 
 organized the shattered forces of the Republic, and from de- 
 feat and despondency wrought out at last the triumph of our 
 arms and the salvation of the nation. No matter what 
 dangers threatened, the people relied with sublime confi- 
 dence on the patient wisdom of Lincoln, sustained by the 
 exhaustless energy of Stanton, to bear them safely through. 
 They were ever faithful to the trust, and both alike have 
 sacrificed their lives to its discharge. 
 
" Resolved, That in the career of Mr. Stanton as an advocate 
 of the first merit, of stern and incorrnptible integrity, of 
 learning, eloqnence, and power, who regarded his great pro- 
 fession always as a means of doing justice and not of per- 
 sonal aggrandizement, the people had abundant reason to 
 rejoice in his recent elevation to the Bench of the Supreme 
 Court, which, while it was a deserved tribute to his patriot- 
 ism, was at the same time a marked acquisition to justice 
 and to the dignity of that eminent tribunal. 
 
 "Rpsolved, That out of regard to his memory the portrait of 
 Mr. Stanton in the Club House be draped in mourning for 
 thirty days, and that a copy of these resolutions be sent by 
 the Secretary to his family." 
 
 Messrs. Alexander T. Stewart, William Cullen Bryant, Lo 
 Grand B. Cannon, Joseph H. Choate, and Jackson S. Schultz 
 were then ai^pointed a committee to arrange for an address 
 before the Club on the life, character, and services of the late 
 Secretary of War, and to report such other additional testi- 
 monial to Mr. Stanton as they might think proper 
 
 A committee of fifteen, Hon. Henry E. Davies, chairman, 
 was also appointed to attend the funeral of Mr. Stanton on 
 behalf of the Club ; and the Club then adjourned. 
 
 The committee having matured th( ir i^lans, a special 
 meeting of the Club was held on the 30th December, 1869, 
 pursuant to the following call : 
 
 IN M E M O K I A M . 
 
 The Union League Club, 
 26th Street, cor. Madison Avenue, 
 New York, Dec. 28, 1869. 
 
 SiE,— A special meeting of the Club will be held at the 
 Club House on Thursday evening next, 30th inst., at 8 
 o'clock, to listen to addresses on the life, character, and ser- 
 vices of the late Hon. Edwin M. St.^ktox, which are expected 
 from several gentlemen. 
 
 J. L.VNGDON V> \HD, 
 
 Secretary. 
 
Mr. Charles Bc'tlee presided. 
 
 Mr. A. T. Stewart, from the Committee on the Address on 
 the Life of Mr. Stanton, presented the following report, 
 which was read by the Secretary : 
 
 The Committee to whom it was referred to propose some 
 testimonial, in addition to that adopted by the Club, in 
 honor of the memory of the late Edwin M. Stanton, respect- 
 fully report : 
 
 That they recommend that a Committee of Seven be ap- 
 pointed and announced by the Chair, this evening, to co- 
 operate on the part of this Club with other committees or 
 citizens, or other associations in this city or elsewhere in the 
 Union, in obtaining subscriptions to a fund to be presented 
 to Mr. Stanton's family, as a testimonial of the public sense 
 of the invaluable services rendered by him to his country 
 as Secretary of War. 
 
 It should be enough to state that adequate means have not 
 been accumulated for their support, and that this measure is 
 required not only as an expression of gratitude, but also as 
 an example which will encourage a fearless, unselfish, honest, 
 and patriotic discharge of public duty. 
 
 All of which is respectfully submitted. 
 
 For the Committee. A. T. Stewart, Chairman. 
 
 The report was unanimously adopted, and the Chair an- 
 nounced, as the Committtee therein provided for, Messrs. 
 A. T. Stewart, Marshall O. Roberts, Moses H. Grinnell, 
 Le Grand B. Canxox, Jackson S. Schultz, George Cabot 
 Ward, and AVilliam T. Blodgett. 
 
 The Chair then introduced Mr. William Cullen Bryant, 
 who spoke as as follows : 
 
 ADDRESS OF MR. BRYANT. 
 
 Mr. President and Gentlemen, — Among the many vir- 
 tues which adorned the character of him in honor of 
 whose memory we are assembled this evening, the most 
 remarkable and eminent, perhaps, was his disinterested- 
 
ness. He never thought of gaining anything by an office 
 which he held for himself ; neither popular favor, nor 
 fame, nor fortune. He thoiaght only of serving his coun- 
 try. In the age in which we live, a mercenai-y, venal, 
 self-seeking age, when public men seek to win popular 
 favor by the lowest arts, and enrich themselvess by the 
 basest means, this is a shining example. Disinterested- 
 ness — self-sacrifice for the good of others — is the basis 
 of all true nobility and grandeur of character. I do 
 not believe that Mr. Stanton ever thouglit of the con- 
 sequences to himself, in any of those multitudinous and 
 important transactions of the War Office in which he 
 was engaged. Enemies he made, and many bitter ones, 
 and was perfectly wiDing to make them if he could not 
 otherwise serve his country. He was perfectly indifferent 
 to censure incurred by any course in which he was 
 certain he was right. He loved not office, and gladly 
 retired from the post he held the moment he thought 
 his services were not needed. In the many rapid de- 
 cisions which the exigencies of the times compelled him 
 to make, there is no doubt that he occasionally commit- 
 ted injustice. These errors of his have been collected 
 by his enemies with a malignant diligence, and have 
 been dwelt upon with an artful rhetoric ; and a sedulous 
 attempt has been made to show that Mr. Stanton is un- 
 worthy of the sorrow with which he is mourned through- 
 out the land. 
 
 Mr. President and Gentlemen, the Divine Government 
 has so ordered the constitution of the world that there 
 are few of the great blessings of life which have not 
 their attendant evils. This fair earth which feeds us with 
 its harvests, and on which we plant our habitations, is 
 shaken, and yawns with earthquakes that overturn cities 
 and bury their inhabitants. The air we breathe, and 
 without which we shouM expire, often carries on its 
 
8 
 
 gentlest breezes the contagion of disease from place to 
 place, or it gathers itself into whirlwinds, uproots forests, 
 lifts our dwellings from the ground, and scatters the 
 timbers like chaif. The sun, himself, the source of 
 light and warmth, strikes down men in its midsummer 
 heats, and parches the land with fearful droughts. What 
 a case might be made against the sun if all the in- 
 stances of death by sunstroke were collected together, 
 and all the cases of withering drought and consequent 
 famine, and noxious exhalations drawn up from the 
 gi'ound, to say nothing of the venomous reptiles and in- 
 sects drawn to life by its beams, and the fierce and 
 formidable beasts of prey which haunt the regions where 
 he sheds his most direct rays. Yet, Mr. President and 
 Gentlemen, we every morning rejoice in the retui-n of the 
 sun. We bless God for the beautiful earth which he has 
 made our dwelling-place. We breathe with delight the 
 air in which he has wrapped the globe. In like manner we 
 glorify the Providence which watches over the destiny of na- 
 tions for having raised up in the time of our country's great- 
 est peril, and placed in that department of the Government 
 which was then the most important, such a man as Stanton 
 — of a quick sagacity, a I'esolute will, and utter indifference 
 to personal interest ; an untamable courage, and a fiery 
 energy, to carry forward the great canse in which we were 
 engaged — the great cause of the country and of liberty — 
 to a glorious and successful termination. "\^'e thank the 
 Lord of Hosts for raising up such a man, whose veiy 
 faults were but the wild outgrowth of a noble and generous 
 nature ; weeds in a fertile garden, a thistle or two among 
 wholesome herbs and nutritious roots which were nourished 
 in a generous soil. And now, gentlemen, bj'- the courtesy of 
 my excellent fi'iend who presides at this meeting, I am per- 
 mitted to call up a gentleman, who, during the time that Mr. 
 Stanton held the War Oftice, had the opportunity of observ- 
 
9 
 
 ing him closely, and who will be able to analyze the web of his 
 character thread by thread ; and if he finds in it, as he per- 
 haps may tell you that he did, some traces of a coarser 
 and harsher yarn, mingled with the nobler material, he is yet 
 too just and too generous to disparage, for that reason, the 
 fabric as a magnificent whole. I will call up a gentleman 
 Avho himself took a large share in the mission of mitigating 
 the miseries of our late war, who stood at the head of one of 
 the noblest institutions of this or any other age of mankind, 
 the Sanitary Commission, and whose arduous labors in that 
 great w^ork of humanity have carried his name to the utmost 
 bounds of the civihzed world. I call on the Kev. Dr. Henry 
 ^\. Bellows. 
 
 ADDEESS OF REV. DE. BELLOWS. 
 
 Mr. President and Gentlemen, — Nothing but m}'- respect 
 for the urgent wishes of the Union League Club com- 
 municated to me by the committee who waited on me 
 with the request, would induce me to appear as one of 
 those who, to-night, are to give voice to the reverence 
 and gratitude of this patriotic body for the great and 
 glorious services, the pure and exalted j)atriotism, the 
 tempted and tried, yet spotless, character of Edwin M. 
 Stanton ! Not only have I no claim, from long jyev- 
 son:il intimacy or special acquaintance, to speak of 
 him, but I might be pronounced by Mr. Stanton him- 
 self, were his shade permitted to w^aive a forbiddance, 
 disqualified for the friendly office. For, although favored 
 with his afi'ectionate and confidential acquaintance for 
 a short period after he came into office, I had the mis- 
 fortune to fall into a serious misundc^rstanding with, him 
 at a very early period of his official career, which em- 
 barrased and complicated my duties as the head of 
 the U. S. Sanitaiy Commission, and closed my per- 
 sonal relations with the Secretary for the residue of 
 
10 
 
 the war, and, indeed, of liis life. My favorable testi- 
 mony, therefore, is at least that of an unimpeachable 
 witness, and as I am not a volunteer on this platform, 
 I trust that those who enjoyed his permanent confi- 
 dence and friendship will think it some compensation 
 for the loss of eulogies of love, that they hear the 
 cooler jiraises of justice — the expression of that com- 
 pulsory gratitude which even personal grievances could 
 neither extinguish nor dim. 
 
 And yet, perhaps, it may be an offset to the only 
 sort of unfavorable criticism which Mr. Stanton's memory is 
 Hkely to encounter in respectable quarters — namely, that of 
 having had brusque and violent manners, and strong and 
 rancorous prejudices— to say that no man ever had gi'eater 
 excuses for them, or, on the whole, turned them to a better 
 account. At the time he took the War Office the chief peril 
 of the country lay in the gentle and complying temper of 
 great officials ; the corrupting influences brought to bear 
 upon their personal sensibilities ; the concessions made to 
 private claims and impulses at a moment when the opportu- 
 nities of office and the optional reading of its rules by offi- 
 cials involved the making and losing of vast fortunes for 
 others; when banks, railroad companies, cor jjorations of all 
 kinds, and factories and industrial interests of all sorts were, 
 by their agents, besieging every department of the Govern- 
 ment, and using every kind of personal wheedling, and strain- 
 ing every partisan and political nerve, to save themselves 
 from ruin, or to avail themselves of some connection with 
 the vast expenditures of the Government to make their for- 
 tunes. At such a time, we wanted not courtiers and dilet- 
 tanti in modes and manners in the chief seats of power 
 and patronage ; but rather prompt, severe, stern, and deci- 
 ded men, who forgot friendship, set aside personal feelings, 
 acknowledged no private claims, ignored their own personal 
 yearnings, and administered then- overwhelming duties and 
 
13 
 
 the flag kept uutarnishe'l. Bat no habits of the civilian 
 alone could have equipped Mr. Stanton for the all-important 
 service ! His preparation was in his nature and tempera- 
 ment. 
 
 " He was uot of that strain of counsellors 
 
 That, like a tuft of rushes in a brook, 
 Bends every way the current turns itself. " 
 
 Of Vii'ginian parentage, he had enough of her hot blood in 
 his veins to understand that the quarrel with the South was 
 "to the death," and enough of her fierce and self-devoted 
 spirit to meet her advances with a sword as sharp and , 
 thrusting as her own. He loved his country with the ardor 
 of a bridegroom, and hated her enemies with the godly jeal- 
 ousy of a husband for the rival in a wife's affections ! It was 
 no cold, calculating patriotism that could consider the 
 advantages and disadvantages of disunion or of compromise, 
 that was wanted in the Government or in the country then, 
 but a passionate devotion, a hot, fierce, one-sided, terrible 
 earnestness, such as would bum through opposition, fire the 
 lukewarm, consume the doubts and fears of the wavering, 
 and melt into a lava-stream of volcanic fury the party ele- 
 ments, the business hesitations, the personal waverings, the 
 philosophic misgivings, the "can'ts" and "won'ts" of the 
 moderate and the mild, the s(4f-styled waiters on Providence, 
 and the logic of events. y.There are times when passion — 
 noble, god-like, infinite passion, that lets the force of the 
 universe into the channels of human affairs, and multiplies, 
 by an infinite factor, the fractional and limited powers of 
 calculation and reason — can alone work the saving miracles 
 by which the souls of nations and the lives of States are saved. 
 Who could look on the pale, scholarly visage rising above 
 the broad shoulders of that great Secretary, and not per- 
 ceive that the white heat of a devouring passion for his 
 country and her cause was giving vent to the national vol- 
 cano thi'ough his Titanic soul, and that the crushing, rushing 
 
u 
 
 fury of the national devotion and self-abandonment was 
 finding its first full outlet and expression in his character 
 and his jjolicy ? And oh ! how rare is that divine anger, 
 that impersonal fary, that becomes the greatest causes, and 
 leads to the results of such lives as Luther's and Crom- 
 well's. 
 
 What is it the American people lack so much as reasons 
 for a faith in the deep, self-forgetting earnestness and conse- 
 cration of their public men ? Make them absolutely sui'e 
 that their statesmen and rulers love their counti-y, their 
 God, their duty, better than themselves, and they will for- 
 sake all — party, self interest, pride, and policy — yes, forsake 
 all, and follow them ! But, do we remember what this ear- 
 nestness and passion implied in Mr. Stanton ? It was 
 marked with two qualities, which, in my own brief intimacy 
 with him, stood out in most vivid and affecting relief, and 
 they were, perhaps, the last traits you would expect to find 
 iu such a man, although I believe they are nearly universal 
 in the highest natures — tenderness and sadness. Beneath 
 Mr. Stanton's robust and stern bosom dwelt a softness and 
 gentleness of heart which made him the idol of his home and 
 the object of a passionate devotion from his personal friends. 
 I shall never forget the way he took me in his embrace, 
 almost the first time we met, as if, in his own home, and 
 before ati unworldly profession, his official reserves were all 
 gladly and irresistibly dropped, and he could indulge the 
 luxury of love ! His external manners were the rough rind 
 of his tender heart. Rather than against others, he pro-_ 
 tected himself against himself — the relentings of his gentle 
 spirit, the j)erilous softenings of his soul — by the iron mail 
 of a brusque and cold carriage. The betrayer he most 
 feared was in his own heart, and that made his eye and his 
 brow discharge their amenity, to hide from the world the 
 place where he alone was vulnerable Mr. Lincoln — let his 
 name never be publich' pronounced without honor and rev- 
 
15 
 
 erence — had not a gentler heart than Mr. Stanton, and it 
 was their common tenderness that melted them together and 
 made them one through the war. I should not have been 
 surprised at any time to have found them locked in each 
 other's arms, and kissing like girls, after a day's struggle to 
 be stern and cold in their great and never-ceasing conflict 
 with the enfeebling seductions of a betraying pubhc. 
 
 But Mr. Stanton had a higher mark of greatness, because 
 of a diviner type — sadness — the sadness of souls that feel all 
 the lonehness of their unshared responsibihty; the greatness 
 of their ideal shaming theii- best accomplishments ; their 
 yearning for sympathy, backened by the necessary, uncon- 
 querable superiority and elevation of their views, so that 
 they are dwarfed by the distance in which they leave others 
 behind them, and made solitary and lonely by the heights 
 they attain. There was an almost tragic sadness on Mr. 
 
 Stanton's face. 
 
 " With grave 
 Aspect he rose, and iu his rising seem'd 
 A pillar of State ; deep ou his front engraven 
 Deliberation sat and public care." 
 
 It was not like the sadness on Mr. Lincoln's countenance, 
 which resembled that on His face that was " more marred 
 than any man." The President was plowed and furrowed 
 with sorrow, till his face looked like the sea after a storm, 
 when the winds are hushed, but the waves still roll, and the 
 gi'ay clouds make them leaden and drear. But Mr. Stanton's 
 sadness was rather that of the midnight embers, which show 
 fire slumbering beneath the ashes— ashes which disappoint- 
 ments, griefs, misunderstandings, abuse, delays, have heaped 
 up, but which, dun and silent, hide unconquerable flames in 
 their bosom ! I must leave others to speak of the other 
 point, in Avhich we lacked most and were supplied by 
 him — administrative skill and energy, the largeness and 
 promptness and many-sided activity exhibited in the great 
 
16 
 
 War Secretary's administration. I will not say he bi'oug-lit 
 the native American genius for administration into the War 
 Office, because, great as Americans show themselves in the 
 management of their private concerns, they are yet to prove 
 their superior talent for public administration — execiitive 
 genius being yet rare. But Mr. Stanton had it, and he 
 showed on a public scale just the qualities which our greatest 
 merchants and movers of corporations exhibit in their pri- 
 vate business. He was as clear, and prompt, as all-knowing, 
 and omnipresent in the Department as Mr. Stewart is in his 
 mercantile establishment. But all his patience of details, 
 his untiring energy, and ceaseless labors would have been of 
 little avail without the personal character he brought to the 
 work. Of great solidity and compactness of frame, thought, 
 care and sorrow had refined his face, and softened his flowing 
 beard, and purified his complexion, till he looked the image 
 of a scholar pale from serious or sacred studies. Temperate 
 in the extreme, he seemed to live from meat and drink un- 
 Hke that of other men, and to keep his body under with 
 almost saintly rigor. When I first knew him he was already 
 an invalid, and an object of solicitude to his family and his 
 physician — although he repelled sympathy, and even seemed 
 annoyed at inquiries about his health — a pretty sure sign of 
 a consciousness that all is not right. He worked when he 
 could not eat, and his invalid hours seemed equal to other 
 men's best ; for he lived from his soul, and not fi-om his 
 body. It was the " aliqidd immensum, injinitumque" in him 
 which supplied all that physical strength, or exhausted 
 nerves, or a weary brain denied. Just so long as the 
 coiTntry and the caiise required him, he was equal to any- 
 thing and everything, and postponed sickness, weariness, 
 and almost self-consideration of any kind, to the hour when 
 he would not be missed. To his pure hands, up to the arm- 
 pits in the national wealth, there did not stick one traitorous 
 piece of silver. Nobody not too black to receive a new 
 
17 
 
 stain has dared to hint a suspicion of his integrity. Oh, 
 how great, how fortunate the lot which that noble patriot 
 has enjoyed and supported ! While mere military glory may 
 dechne or suffer deductions from the sober estimates of his- 
 tory, who does not know and feel that Mr. Stanton's fame 
 has only begun to glow, and that those rays, beautiful and 
 warm as they are, which, within one week, have been shining 
 in concentrated splendor about his bier and on his hardly - 
 closed grave, will gather in history into a sun that will fill 
 distant ages and climes with the perfume and the glory of 
 his deeds and his name ? If, like another Elijah, he had 
 ascended in a chariot of flame, it would have fitly symbolized 
 his career, for he guided the burning axles of the national 
 wrath, organized its fury, inspired its course, witnessed its 
 victory, declined its rewards, and almost shrunk from its 
 honors ; and because we could not pay him for all this, God 
 took him to his own keeping, and may be tx'usted to requite 
 our hopeless debt. Of Mr. Lincoln and his great counsellor 
 and close companion in the war that made the nation great 
 in itself, and in their pure and precious characters, may we 
 not say as Sir Walter Scott said of Fox and Pitt : 
 
 " Speak not for those a separate doom 
 Whom faith made brothers in the tomb, 
 But, search the land of living men. 
 Where wilt thou find their like again ?" 
 
 ADDRESS OF REV. DR. THOMPSON. 
 
 Mr. President and Gentlemen,- W^hen the one man who 
 could have secured to France the benefits of her revolution 
 while averting its excesses, thus conserving liberty with 
 order — Count Mirabeau — had ceased to breathe, the intelh- 
 gence was communicated to the Assembly in this brief and 
 emphatic sentence: "He is dead!" And when the few 
 journals of that day communicated to Paris and to France 
 the great catastrophe, so momentous for the future destiny 
 
 2 
 
18 
 
 of the nation, they opened the obituary with the same brief 
 and pregnant words — " II est mart !" No name was needed 
 to interpret them. Evex'ybody knew who was dead. The 
 man who had said of himself, " In anarchy, a despot may 
 even seem a savior ;" the man of whom others had said he 
 could not have a party, for his only party w^as his head ; the 
 man who, amid the stormy scenes of debate and the bloody 
 tumults of the populace, had established order and unity by 
 the magnetism of his presence, by the force of his will ; that 
 mighty ruling and taming spirit, whose very violence within 
 itself commanded calmness in others, had ceased to be ; he 
 was dead. So when, last Friday, the telegraph flashed to all 
 parts of this country the intelligence of the death of Mr. 
 Stanton, everybody — man, woman, and child — knew who was 
 dead. It was not that a party in the country had lost its 
 leader, for he, too, could have no "party" whose only 
 party was " his head". It was the nation that now felt the 
 loss of one who, with all the virtues of Mirabeau and more, 
 and with none of his vices, had dared to seein a despot that 
 he might be a savior. The army of the North knew that he 
 had gone, who, through all the war, had fed, clothed, equip- 
 ped, housed, and organized them for victory. The scatter- 
 ed, broken army of the South knew that that mighty spirit 
 had passed away, which, behind the array of artillery and 
 the strategy of generals in the field, had moved on with un- 
 relenting vigor, with steady, ever-growing pressure, until the 
 rebellion was crushed, because he would hear no terms but 
 absolute submission. The civilized world knew that that 
 great Minister of War had j^assed away, who, from the peace- 
 ful industries of the i^eople, had raised and equipped an 
 army of 1,500,000 men, and when their work was done had 
 remanded that army in two days to the quiet walks of indus- 
 trious peace. The nation saw the patriot and statesman 
 whom she was just beginning to appreciate, and to whom 
 she had awarded such honor as office and eulogy could be- 
 
19 
 
 stow, rising above the honors thus laid at his feet, to aceept 
 the crown of immortahty. There is hardly another man in 
 the nation whose death could create in every household, for 
 various causes, so profound an impression ; and how few 
 names are there among those that are gone that will stand, 
 as the speaker before me has intimated, so great, so growing 
 in the coming history of this country. 
 
 After your committee had tendered me the most unex- 
 pected comphment of an invitation to particijiate in these 
 services, on re-entering my library, my eye fell upon a pic- 
 ture of those twin Colossi that stand in solitary grandeur 
 upon the plain of Thebes, representing the monarch returned 
 from successful wars — the whole country subdued to his do- 
 minion and peace established without — sitting down here in 
 absolute rest, looking forth into unfathomable dej)ths, as if 
 commanding the empire of the world and of time. They 
 stand as the sublimest impersonation of Majesty in repose. 
 The Nile rolls the waves of its inundations around their 
 pedestals ; all about them are the ruins of temples, and sta- 
 tues of forgotten men and gods, but there they stand immov- 
 able to-day as when erected more than three thousand years 
 ago ! Not altogether mute, for one of them is the fabled 
 Memnon that greets each morning sun with its note of wel- 
 come. 
 
 So it has seemed to me that a thousand years hence, the 
 historian tracing the events of these times, and coming upon 
 that flood of war that rolled over the land and threatened to 
 merge all in ruin and desolation, will see rising above it two 
 majestic forms, twin figures in virtue and in honor, twin 
 saviors of their country, twin also in the enjoyment of the 
 crown that History has conferred, — side by side, sitting with 
 undisturbed repose, iinwasted by all the changes of the ages 
 since, unforgotten amid the dim memories of the past ; not 
 silent either, but speaking wherever thought is honored, 
 wherever virtue is revered, wherever patriotism is respected, 
 
20 
 
 whei-ever history is known, speaking of the grandeur of de- 
 votion to country and to truth ; two xinrivalled figures, Lin- 
 coln and Stanton, side by side, in the foreground of a heroic 
 past. 
 
 Mr. President and Gentlemen, the key-note of power in 
 this world is Personality. Not thought alone, not eloquence, 
 not position, not circumstances give influence, but a living 
 personality, that can impress itself upon men and the times 
 by the force of a human soul putting itself into the souls of 
 others, into the spirit of the nation. This nation had need 
 of such. Go back ten years, to the time Avhen this great free 
 people were still cowed and bullied by slavery, when this 
 vast nation of intelligent men was ruled by imbecility ! What 
 need we had to rouse ovir souls, to lead us on to the grand 
 possibilities of the future, saving us from the impotency and 
 destruction that threatened us ! — what need of an example 
 of self-sacrifice, of supreme devotion to country, of loyalty 
 to truth and justice! What need we had, within the walls 
 of the Constitution our fathers had built, of such a zeal for 
 the house as would drive out with the scourge the profaners 
 of the temple, and overturn the tables of the money-changers ! 
 And these examples were given. Personality, on the one 
 side by the gentle magnetism of love, in Lincoln ; on the 
 other by the force of indomitable will and courage, in 
 Stanton. We needed the last as well as the first. It came 
 to us in the rough, it remained in the rough ; the tires of 
 the war tempered and annealed it, but never enamelled it. 
 There it stood, a pillar unpolished, but strong and true, 
 that the nation might lean upon it. 
 
 It is now nearly forty years since Mr. Stanton left a book 
 store in Columbus, Ohio, where he had held a clerkship for 
 a time — having been di'iven to his own support by the death 
 of his father — to resume his studies, intending at that time 
 to devote himself to the church. By the persuasion of friends 
 he was induced to enter the profession of the law. A gentle- 
 
21 
 
 man who is with lis to night was at that time a companion 
 of his, a clerk in an adjacent store ; they were together clay- 
 by day, in conversation and in recreation, and his playfellow 
 said to him as they parted, "You be a lawyer; you are made 
 for that, and I shall see you one day Attorney-General of 
 the United States." When Mr. Buchanan, in his vacilla- 
 tion — for I think we must do him the credit of exempting 
 him fi-oni really treasonable designs — when Mr. Buchanan, 
 in his vacillation, saw whither things were tending, and 
 called Mr. Stanton to the post of Attorney-General, this old 
 friend went to see him and congratula«ted him on the fulfil- 
 ment of his prophecy. 
 
 Where did Stanton have his first hearing in his new office ? 
 Where did he plead his first cause for the Constitution and 
 the laws of his country ? Before its Executive Head, and in 
 words which I will give you as they came from his own lips, 
 and were taken down by vhis friend, who has put them into my 
 hand's. When the news came that Anderson had evacuated 
 Fort Moultrie and occupied Sumter, Mr. Buchanan called 
 his cabinet together in haste. AVhen Stanton came in, the 
 President sat trembling and pale, while the Southern mem- 
 bers were loudly demanding an order from him compelling 
 Anderson to return to Fort Moultrie. Stanton, hardly wait- 
 ing to hear them through, said : " Mr. President, you dare 
 not give this oi'der ; it is treason ; it would be a repetition of 
 the crime that Arnold committed, and for which Andre died ! " 
 In the same conversation Mr. Stanton went on to say : " Mr. 
 Buchanan didn't give the order to evacuate Sumter, and 
 through all the weary time they were planting their guns 
 around it I prayed that they might be mad enough to open 
 their fire, for I knew the thunder of their cannon was needed 
 to wake up the nation." 
 
 I differ slightly in my recollections — perhaps from coming 
 in contact with a different circle of friends at the time — from 
 Dr. Bellows, with regard to the position which Stanton had 
 
22 
 
 already won in the confidence of the country when Mr. Lin- 
 coln came into office. It seems to me there was a wide-spread 
 expectation that Mr. Lincoln would call him to his cabinet ; 
 that he had shown such force of character, such capacity for 
 administration, such loyalty to the country, such knowledge 
 of executive affairs, as made him a man to be trusted. This, 
 however, may be a recollection which has dawned upon me 
 through the events of after years. Be that as it may, every 
 one was gratified when he was fairly installed by Mr. Lincoln 
 in the War Office ; and he brought to the work ability, prompt- 
 ness, and energy of application, before unknown. He put 
 his whole life and soul into his Avork. He was a man of 
 " one idea " in the sense in which Paul, for instance, was a 
 man of one idea. There is nothing disparaging in being a 
 man of one idea, provided only the idea be great enough to 
 possess the soul, and to fire it with devotion for man and 
 God. Stanton went into the service with but one idea — to 
 serve his country and to save it ; and here he exhibited that 
 marvellous power of organization, that promptness in de- 
 tails, that energy of will, that at once brought the War De- 
 partment up to the highest state of efficiency. A friend said 
 to him, near the close of the war: " How was it that you suc- 
 ceeded in supplying this vast army throughout this great 
 extent of country, whether in the camp or in the field, with 
 all that they needed for comfort and support? " " Sir," said 
 Stanton, " I will tell you how I managed in one instance, and 
 you can infer the rest ; a day or two after I was installed in 
 this office, a telegram came from Harper's Ferry urging that 
 several large guns should be sent there that day. I at once 
 sent an order to the Arsenal for the guns. Being busied in 
 my office all day, I went after office hours to the Arsenal to 
 see Avhether the order had been fulfilled. I found the 
 Arsenal closed and nobody in attendance. Looking up a 
 subordinate 1 learned that no guns had been sent. After 
 having tried, in vain, to find the keys, I had the door broken 
 
23 
 
 open ; helped drag the guns out, accompanied them to the 
 railway, saw them put on the train, had an engine fired up, 
 and those guns were ofi" that night for the Ferry." The next 
 morning the incumbent, not knowing of this action, came 
 into the War OiSce and said : " It was not convenient, Mr. 
 Secretary, to despatch those guns yesterda}-, but if you think 
 it is at all urgent I will attend to it at once this morning." 
 Said Stanton : " The guns are now at Harper's Ferry, and 
 you, sir, are no longer in the service of the United States 
 Government." I see you understand, gentlemen, the ques- 
 tion is answered. 
 
 But let me tell you another instance. You will recollect, 
 from having read the history afterwards, though the painful 
 facts at the time were largely concealed from the public — 
 you will remember what a stress of anxiety there was when 
 our army was penned up at Chattanooga — its supplies cut 
 off, and itself almost threatened with famine. Great fears 
 were entertained at Washington of some catastrophe there. 
 Stanton resolved that that army should be reinforced. Ho 
 met the President and the Cabinet, and urged upon them 
 his views. He took pains to ascertain from railway men how 
 long a time would be required to transport an army corps 
 from the Potomac to the Tennessee, and, with his facts all 
 jjrepared, he forced his way through the objections of the 
 Cabinet and the Generals, and succeeded in obtaining from 
 the President the order that the thing should be done. 
 Within twelve hours from the issuing of that order, an army 
 corps was on its way to the Tennessee, detached from the 
 Potomac army, where at that time it was not needed. Stan- 
 ton himself was on his way, riding day and night, to meet 
 General Grant, for conference. On the ninth day (he had 
 promised within ten) that army relieved Chattanooga ; the 
 enemy was held in check, and presently came that magnifi- 
 cent series of victories, in which the names of Hooker, of 
 Thomas, of Sherman, have become immortal. 
 
24 
 
 With this energy and determination in carrying out to 
 the full all the responsibilities and details of his office, he 
 had sometimes a boldness in taking the responsibility, that 
 nothing but the extraordinary emergency could have justi- 
 fied, and that nothing bvit the marvellous patience, wisdom, 
 and good-nature of Mr. Lincoln would have tolerated ; and 
 yet Mr. Lincoln was led time and again to concede that, in 
 such matters, the Secretary was wiser than he. For in- 
 stance, when the good-nature of Mr. Lincoln was beset with 
 entreaties to commission this man and that to this office 
 and that in the army, he sent in at one time to the office of 
 the Secretary of War a large batch of newly made commis- 
 sions to be countersigned. When the messenger returned, 
 the President inquired, " Is that business all done ? " 
 "With one excejition," said the messenger. "What was 
 that?" "It was the commission of a Major-General." 
 " What did the Secretary say about that ? " " He didn't 
 say anything ; he tore it up and threw it into the waste 
 basket." "Indeed," said Mr. Lincoln, "he must have 
 had some very good reason." You all remember how 
 the country was astounded just after the capitulation of 
 Lee's army, by the announcement from the officer then 
 in command at Richmond, that the Rebel Legislature 
 would convene (to consider upon what terms the State 
 would re enter the Union) by authority of the President of 
 the United States — Mr. Lincoln then being in Richmond, 
 Mr. Lincoln returned to Washington a day or two after. 
 His Secretary of War waited upon him, and handed him an 
 order which he said he had issued during his absence, which 
 was an order displacing the General in command, substitu- 
 tuting another, and revoking his convocation of the Legisla- 
 ture. " Well," said the President, " What does this mean ?" 
 "I saw," said Mr. Stanton, "that he was throwing away all 
 that we had fought for these four years." " But, did you 
 not see that that was done by my authority ? " " Yes, Mr. 
 
25 
 
 President, I saw that it was by your authority, and I re- 
 solved to save the country while I could, and hand you my 
 resignation." The President did not accept that resigna- 
 tion. The matter, as the story goes on good authority, was 
 discussed in Cabinet, the Cabinet to a unit sustaining Mr. 
 Stanton. That night the ball of the iissassin verified his 
 judgment. 
 
 Mr. Stanton had largely the element of hope. We are 
 saved by hope ; and underneath that tone of sadness of 
 which Dr. Bellows has spoken, was an unfaltering confidence 
 in the success of the cause, an undying trust that the Union 
 would be saved. He, perhaps, was the only man who never 
 faltered or wavered ; for even Mr. Lincoln at times — his 
 great heart so pained and grieved with the losses and dis- 
 asters of the war, with the anguish of the nation that he 
 bore upon himself, and made a part of himself — would verge 
 toward despondency. Such an hour was that — and this I 
 give as coming from the hps of Mr. Stanton himself to a 
 friend, though he had no thought at the time that it would 
 reach the public ear — such an hour was that when a series 
 of disasters was crowned with the defeat of Chancel lorsville. 
 The Secretary of War, in such times, never left the office 
 day or night ; did not sleep there, for he did not sleep at all, 
 but stayed there on his couch, with his ear ever on the alert 
 for any telegraphic despatch. On that night, Mr. Lincoln, 
 who had been there through weary hours — ^through sleepless 
 days and nights, was now in a perfect torture, bordering 
 on despair ; and, as the news came in worse and worse, 
 Mr. Lincoln arose from the couch on which he had been 
 lying, and said : " Ah, Stanton, I can't bear this ! I should 
 be happier to-night if I could walk into the Potomac, and 
 sink !" "No," said Stanton ; "you and I are set hereby the 
 country to see this thing through, and we can't sink. Come, 
 we will go to the Potomac." In an hour after midnight he 
 had a tug ready, and they two steamed off to the nearest 
 
26 
 
 point of access to tlie army. The next day they saw the 
 Generals, saw the army, rank and file ; saw that though this 
 army was beaten, it was not annihilated — it had fight in it 
 yet, and the President came back revived, full of new cour- 
 age and hope. 
 
 Courage Stanton had, which, had he been called upon 
 to exhibit it in the field, would there have made him re- 
 nowned in deeds of valor. But he had that higher moral 
 courage which faces obloquy and opposition, and dares 
 to do right against even the misconstruction of friends. 
 I think he manifested the highest type of courage in the 
 closing act of his public life, when he who, as all now know, 
 desired no office, but longed to have his hands free from all 
 public responsibilities and return again to his profession 
 and to the walks of private life, yet consented to submit to 
 the misconstruction of being tenacious of office, and full of 
 egqtism, and all such like aspersions, because he saw that to 
 go out of that office, though he knew the man in power be- 
 hind him would gladly kick him out if he could, was to put 
 in jeopardy the great interests of the country, not yet fully 
 saved. Courage to do an unwelcome duty without explain- 
 ing himself to friends, without defending himself from ene- 
 mies; the grand self-sacrifice that led him there at the first, 
 kept him there to the end. 
 
 And now, when we know, as an intimate friend of his who 
 had knowledge of his accounts has told me this ver}- day, 
 that this man, who, when he accepted office, was in the 
 receipt of perhaps twenty-five thousand dollars a year from 
 his profession, just beginning to win its honox's and emolu- 
 ments, relinquished this for a salary of one-third that 
 amount, a sum utterly inadequate for the support of his 
 family, and came out of that office not only unsullied but 
 having actually spent thirty-one thousand dollars of his lim- 
 ited private property, for the support of his family, we 
 shall look, I fear, almost in vain for another such example in 
 the history of our counti-y. 
 
27 
 
 There he stood through all that storm of war, a rock so 
 high that no waves of rebellion or opposition could dash over 
 it — a rock so firm that no tides of corruption could under- 
 mine it. You have heard more than I could tell from any 
 personal knowledge, of another trait of his character that yet 
 deserves to be distinctly recalled in connection with its 
 rougher and grander elements — ^I mean the tenderness of his 
 nature. Two instances will suffice to paint this upon the 
 picture, just here. When he would spend whole nights for 
 weeks together, in the AVar Office, feeling that that was the 
 post of his duty, never living at home, he yet made it a j^oint 
 with the break of day to go out into the market and provide 
 for his family, and was accustomed to say to his friends who 
 wondered that he did not take those hours for rest : " This is 
 the only green spot that I have in my life — to go and see in 
 the market place a little of the freshness of nature, the fresh 
 gTeen products, the fresh, sweet-scented flowers, and to do 
 this service for my family." Look at him again as he stands 
 in that house opposite the theatre where the life of Abraham 
 Lincoln is ebbing away ! See how the tears course down his 
 manly cheeks ; see with what tenderness and reverence he 
 recognizes the presence of God, and requests a clergyman to 
 lead in prayer, setting the example of kneeling by the bed- 
 side ; see how, with more than a brother's love, he watches 
 over that dear form until there is life in it no more ! then 
 rises as if himself baptized with the blood of the martyr, 
 again to summon the country to fidelity and to victory ! 
 
 There is a moral sublimity worthy of such a life and his- 
 tory, in the manner of his dying. Just as he who had led us 
 to the triumphant close of so great and terrible a war, was 
 invited to sit on the tribunal of justice to administer the 
 affairs of peace, he heard the voice of Him who is the Prince 
 of Peace, saying, "To him that overcometh will I grant to 
 sit with me on my throne." 
 
28 
 
 ADDRESS OF GEN. THOMAS B. VAN BUREN. 
 
 It is with the greatest rehictance, Mr. President and gen- 
 tlemen, that I attenqit to put into language my estimate of 
 the character and services of the sleeping hero whom we 
 mourn. 
 
 When I remember the wonderful events that crowded the 
 later years of his life; when I reflect upon his patrioti^in, his 
 exhaustless energy, his indomitable will, his utter forget/ulness of 
 self, his devotion to his country, and his sacrifice in her liehalf ; 
 when I see on all sides the abundant fruits of his unceasing 
 vigilance, his unwearied care, his unselfish labors, it seems to 
 me as if golden silence alone could render a fitting tribute to 
 his memory. 
 
 But if speech were needed, certainly the choice words 
 which have fallen from the lips of the eloquent gentiemen 
 who have preceded me must fill u]) the measure of your 
 desires. 
 
 Can I say anything they have not said ? Ah, the theme is 
 a wide one, I grant you. Eulogy may here exhaust itself and 
 not degenerate into bombast. Coming generations will rec- 
 ognize, as true to nature and to history, the most striking 
 colors in which the deeds of this great man may be depicted. 
 Neither shall time fade these tints away ; but, mellowing as 
 they go down into the future, his grand and noble character 
 shall be esteemed by after ages as one of the gi-eat gifts of 
 God to his country and the world. 
 
 Sir, this Club remembers — every patriot in the land will 
 recall the dark days of our terrible struggle, when some 
 haitle had been lost, some new and dangeroxis treason discovered, 
 some dial)olical plot unearthed ; when at emry bulletin board 
 loom and anxious faces read loith dixmay the dread intelligence ; 
 wh:.n every true heart beat with an.riety, and the nation itxelf 
 seemed stricken with paralysis; how, standing firml}' at his post. 
 
29 
 
 working with teeming brain, with sivelling heart, with untiring 
 hands, knowing no rest, dismayed by no terrors, thinhing only of 
 his country, Edwin M. Stanton electrified the nation anew with 
 his own energy and determination, and patriots ivhis-pei~ed to each 
 other "All is well while Stanton is Secretary of War." 
 
 The rebellion, Mr. President, although plotting and matu- 
 ring for half a century, burst upon us with the suddenness of 
 a tropical tempest. 
 
 The trumpet blast that called the nation to arms was 
 sounded when our whole Northern country was given up to 
 the peaceful pursuits of industry ; when our little navy had 
 been scattered upon every sea, oar army dwindled into insig- 
 nificance, our arsenals emptied, our treasury plundered, and 
 the minds of our people whirling on a chaos of conflicting 
 sentiments. 
 
 What wonder, then, that immediate success did not wait 
 upon our cause ? What wonder that the great heart and 
 brain of Lincoln, the experience and earnestness of Cameron, 
 the energy and devotion of Stanton, and the uprising enthu- 
 siasm of the people did not vanquish at once otu' long-pre- 
 jjared and bitter foe ? 
 
 Those qualities which make up the impulsive and daring 
 soldier we all admire, but we rely most upon those stern vii*- 
 tues which learn "to labor and to wait." In these was Mr. 
 Stanton pre-eminent ; and with a determination that knew no 
 lessening, and a confidence of final victory that no defeat 
 could shake, he began and carried forward those great pur- 
 poses which will forever make his name famous. We do not 
 yet fully appreciate his untiring labors and their vast results. 
 Foreign nations looking upon our condition believed in the 
 speedy triumph of our enemies ; England, longing for our 
 downfall, sneeringly predicted we could not safely venture 
 thirty miles from our base. Our Southern ports and strong- 
 holds were in the possession of our foes ; our frontier of 
 thousands of miles was exposed and defenceless ; soldiers 
 
30 
 
 educated by the Government had betrayed their country 
 and given their skill and experience to her enemies ; and it 
 seemed for a while as if the task of subduing the gigantic 
 rebellion was impossible ; but our great Minister never 
 wavered in his work and his hope. Armies were organized 
 until they embraced a million and a half of men, and this 
 vast host was armed and equipped and marched hundreds of 
 miles into the enemy's country, suffering defeats and gaining 
 victories, until, hardened and disciplined, it conquered the 
 rebellion by its invincible strength. During all this time, to 
 the amazement of the world, this great army was provisioned 
 and cared for, as, I venture to say, no other army ever has 
 been of which history gives any record. 
 
 Carnot, the great Minister of War and of the Interior upon 
 whom Napoleon relied throughout his career, had no task 
 like this. Speaking of him, the Emperor afterwards said : 
 '• Carnot I knew well ; this stern old republican had refused 
 me the Empire in 1815 ; his mind was stamped with a pro- 
 bity that no circumstances could change, but to this honest 
 and energetic will there was added a love of opposition and 
 of Utopian theories." Ah ! this American republican of ours 
 had no Utopian theories. A certain love of opposition he 
 may have cherished, but / for one shall not impute it to him 
 as a crime. The commissariat of the French army, warlike 
 nation as it was, never compared with ours during the late 
 war, nor did its forces number half of those which conquered 
 the vast territory of the rebellion. When concentrating his 
 forces of 340,000 men at the crossing of the Neimen, Napo- 
 leon proudly exclaimed : " To form such an assemblage in the 
 forests of Neimen required not a little care and foresight in 
 directing the march of the columns, and in arranging sup- 
 plies for an army whose horses alone numbered 200,000, and 
 whose carriages were not less than 20,000. We might here 
 without exaggeration (he says), use the hyperbole employed 
 to describe the army of Xerxe-s : 'A/tar its pa^isage the tj en- 
 deavored to find the countries which it had passed over.' " 
 
31 
 
 Is it asking too much to say that could that renowned 
 warrior have looked npon our gigantic struggle, and have 
 seen so great an army marching such distances and through 
 such a country, provisioned so bountifully and accomplishing 
 such results, he would have deemed no language too strong 
 to express his admiration of the controlling mind that worked 
 with such resistless energy as Minister of War ? 
 
 With the life and fame of William Pitt, the hei^^d of the 
 English Grovernment during her wars with the French Re- 
 public and the Empire, you are all familiar ; a man of splen- 
 did abilities, of jDrofound information, of rare experience, he 
 united in himself the qualities of a great statesman and noble 
 citizen who devoted himself to the interest and glory of his 
 country. The facts warrant me, however, in saying that 
 during the time Mr. Stanton was Secretary of War of this 
 Republic, he accomplished a greater work than ever fell to 
 the lot of Pitt or any other War Minister of the world. 
 
 An English historian thus speaks of Pitt after the war with 
 the Republic of France : 
 
 " Great as Pitt's abilities were, his military administration 
 was that of a driveller. He was at the head of a nation 
 eminently distinguished by all the physical and all the moral 
 qualities which make excellent soldiers. The resources at 
 his command were unlimited. The Parliament was even 
 more ready to grant him men and money than he was to ask 
 them. In such an emergency and with such means, such a 
 statesman as Richelieu, as Louvois, as Chatham, as Welles- 
 ley, would have created, in a few months, one of the finest 
 armies in the world, and would soon have brought forward 
 generals worthy to command such an army. Germany might 
 have been saved by another Blenheim ; Flanders recovered 
 by another Ramalies ; another Poitiers might have delivered 
 the Royalist and Catholic provinces of France from a yoke 
 which they abhorred, and might have spread terror even to 
 the barriers of Paris. But the fact is, that after an expendi- 
 
32 
 
 ture of wealth far exceeding the expenditure of the American 
 War, of the Seven Years War, of the Wars of the Austrian 
 Succession and of the Spanish Succession, united, the Eng- 
 lish army under Pitt was the laughing-stock of all Europe. 
 It could not boast of a single brilliant exploit. It had never 
 shown itself on the Continent, but to be beaten, chased, 
 forced to re-embark or compelled to capitulate. To take 
 some sugar island in the West Indies, to scatter some mob 
 of half-naked Irish peasants — such were the most splendid 
 victories won by the British troops under Pitt's auspices. 
 History will vindicate the real man from calumny disguised 
 under the semblance of adulation, and will exhibit him as 
 what he was, a Minister of great abilities, honest intentions, 
 and liberal oj^inions, pre-eminently qualified intellectually 
 and morally for the part of a Parliamentary leader, and cap- 
 able of administering with prudence and moderation the 
 government of a prosperous and tranquil country, but un- 
 equal to surprising and terrible emergencies, and liable in 
 such emergencies to err grievously, both on the side of weak- 
 ness and on the side of violence." 
 
 My friends, there were giants and critics in those days as 
 well as these, but I think you will agree with me that the 
 latter have much degenerated. 
 
 Pitt, you perceive, was criticised because he was not suc- 
 cessful, but he is given credit for great and admirable quali- 
 ties. Ah! this writer would not do for some Democratic 
 newspapers of to-day. 
 
 An unrepentant rebel, a disappointed traitor, a meddUng 
 babbler dismissed from the Department with scant courtesy, 
 a political ghoul, lost to all sense of decency, who will prey 
 with relish vipon those dead most honoi'ed and most loved — 
 of such we may judge some modern critics are made, and 
 to these what a feast is offered in the life and services of Ed- 
 win M. Stanton. 
 
 He not only supported Mr. Lincoln, but impatiently urged 
 
33 
 
 the issuance of that renowned order which made a people 
 free. He not only pushed forward with all his vigor the war 
 against armed treason in the field, but he laid his strong 
 arm on dastard traitors at home. He had no mercy for spies 
 and informers, for assassins and incendiaries, and when the 
 war had been brought to a triumphant conclusion, when the 
 sweet angel of peace had spread her white wings over the 
 Republic, and the name of Stanton was in every loyal mouth, 
 those were the men he had offended. 
 
 He had plundered no man to enrich himself. Those harp- 
 ies who fattened on the robbery of their country found no 
 friend in him. Receiving a salary scarcely fitted for a clerk 
 in his Department, he yet kept his hands clean from all un- 
 holy gains, and left his office a poor, but honest man. 
 
 Stern, determined, violent sometimes, against every form 
 of wrong, he ever yielded quickly to applications for redress, 
 and heard with the tenderness of a woman the tales of the 
 sorrowing and distressed. Incidents without number might 
 be repeated, in which, after listening with gentle patience to 
 some simple story of wrong endured, or suffering borne, he 
 has righted the one and relieved the other with his charac- 
 teristic promptness and energy. 
 
 When proud officials sometimes were heard with impatience 
 and dismissed with short and sharp reiDhes, the wounded 
 soldier or the weeping mother was listened to with kind atten- 
 tion and answered with careful courtesy. None so humble 
 as to be denied admittance. And indeed there was a certain 
 hour, I believe, each day when his doors were flung wide open 
 to the wounded and the sick, when all could come without 
 ceremon}'' or delay. 
 
 With a trust in the wise Providence of Him "who doeth 
 all tRings well," he never wavered in his confidence of tri- 
 umph ; and many, whose duties called them to the War 
 Department, will bear me witness, that frequently during the 
 darkest days of the war, Mr, Lincoln recuperated his almost 
 
 3 
 
desperate hopes from the unflinching courage and magnetic 
 will of Stanton. 
 
 Often the great-hearted President might have been seen 
 with bowed head, with stooping shoulders, and sad, sad eyes, 
 entering the War Oflfice, bearing in his person the sorrows 
 and fears of all the people, and looking as if the burden 
 was crushing him to the earth ; but, after a half hour, com- 
 ing from the interview with his Secretary a changed man, 
 his face beaming with new hopes, and his step elastic with a 
 new strength. 
 
 Said Napoleon, after his final defeat at Waterloo : 
 
 " Carnot, the old I'epublican leader, best understood the 
 nature of the crisis and the means necessary for a desperate 
 national defence. In his opinion, the French soil was, at any 
 price, to be freed from foreign invaders, and the best means 
 of accomplishing this object was to constitute a dictatorial 
 power, with all the energies of the Committee of Public 
 Safety in 1793. If Carnot was no great statesman, he at 
 least possessed the energy of a real old Roman, and let it 
 ever be remembered in his praise, that in the darkest hour 
 of French history he shook off the shackles of party preju- 
 dice, and thought only of his country's honor and glory." 
 
 What, then, shall we say of Stanton ? Coming to the end of 
 a victorious war, he asked for no Dictator — nay, when 
 anxious to retire from office to recruit his shattered health 
 and fortune, he was still more regardful of the loved country 
 he had saved, and remained at his post to counteract the evil 
 designs of one who in his own person made treason odious. 
 
 Coming from the people, without experience in war, he 
 applied to the task he had undertaken, that energy and skill 
 which so distinguishes our people. With his strong sense 
 and vigorous wiU, he cut through the slow and formal pro- 
 cesses of official procedure, and applied to his work those 
 principles of labor and business which marked their success 
 in the business community. 
 
And thus, with a patriotism, and energy, and zeal, and in- 
 telHg-euce, seldom equalled and never surpassed, this great 
 and good man devoted himself to his counti'y until she 
 triumj^hed over her foes, until the army was disbanded 
 again to the pursuits of peaceful industry, until the Govern- 
 ment was secured against every treasonable attempt. When, 
 returning to private life, he resumed his profession until the 
 summons came to take his place on the bench of the Supreme 
 Court, and that swift following and more imperative com- 
 mand to '' come up higher," into that presence where are 
 assembled the great and the small of all nations, and kindreds, 
 and tongues. 
 
 " We say a star has gone out ; 
 But iu the eternal system 
 No plauet is destroyed, though veiled 
 From human sight." 
 
 My countrymen, his memory remains to us — his great 
 deeds are part of our history ; and throughout the unknown 
 future of this land his name shall ever be quoted as the 
 synonym of bravery and patriotism — of truth, and honor, 
 and worth. 
 
 At the regular monthly meeting of the Club, held on 
 Thursday, May 12th, 1870, Mr. A. T. Stewart presented the 
 foDowing report, which was accepted, the resolutions therein 
 embodied adopted, and the Committee discharged : 
 
 The Committee appointed to raise funds in honor of the 
 late Edwin M. Stanton in acknowledgment of his unselfish, 
 patriotic, and invaluable services as Secretary of "War — such 
 funds to be applied to the benefit of his family — ^respectfully 
 report : 
 
 That the subscriptions paid to the Hon. Moses H. Grinnell, 
 
16 
 
 who was not only a member of this Committee but of another 
 
 like organization, amount to $26,500 00 
 
 That the subscriptions paid to Mr. A. 
 T. Stewart, Treasurer of this Com- 
 mittee, amount to $26,550 00 
 
 Which earned interest to the date of 
 
 the Trust, May 7th, 1870 416 44 
 
 $26,966 44 
 
 That it was deemed expedient to unite 
 
 both sums, amounting to $53,466 44 
 
 and deposit the same with the New York Life Insurance and 
 Trust Company, to be invested in the public debt of the 
 United States and held in trast, the interest to be paid to 
 the widow of Mr. Stanton during her life and afterwards to 
 her minor children, the principal to be divided among them 
 as they respectively become of age. 
 
 The Declaration of Trust was executed in triplicate, one 
 of which is hereto annexed, to which the Committee refer for 
 the names of the subscribers, its terms, and the commission to 
 be received by the Company. The son of the deceased by a 
 former marriage does not wish to participate ; he would do 
 so in the event of the death of all the beneficiaries in advance 
 of a division of the principal. 
 
 The Company have invested the respective sums in 5.20 
 Registered Bonds of 1862, as follows : 
 
 The sum paid in by Mr Grinnell in bonds, amount- 
 ing to $23,900 
 
 The sum paid in by Mr. Stewart 24,300 
 
 $48,200 
 The Committee submit the following resolutions : 
 
 llcKoI ved , That the Club approves of the Trust made with 
 the New York Life Insurance and Trust Company, and that 
 
37 
 
 the Treasurer of the Club be requested to keep tne above 
 triplicate on file. 
 
 Resolved, That the Chairman of the Committee be re- 
 quested to send one of the triphcates to Mrs. Stanton. 
 
 Resolved, That this report be printed, with the whole of 
 the Trust, as the Committee having ehax'ge of the printing of 
 the addresses made at the Club at the meeting called to pay 
 honor to his memory may elect, and circulated therewith. 
 
 All of which is respectfully submitted. 
 
 Alexander T. Stewart, 
 
 Chairman. 
 New Yoke, May 12th, 1870. 
 
 To ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME : 
 
 Whereas, The New York Life Insurance and Trust Com- 
 pany have received by the hands of Alexander T. Stewart, 
 Treasiu'er, appointed for the purpose by a Committee of the 
 Union League Club of the city of New York, twenty-six thou- 
 sand five hundred and fifty dollars of principal, and interest 
 thereon amounting to SUG/^Aj, together $2G,966yVo, "\vhich 
 first mentioned sum is the result of the following subscrip- 
 tions : 
 
 Alexander T. Stewart, $5,000 ; Peter Cooper, $1,000 ; John 
 David Woife, $1,000 ; Wilham H. Aspinwall, $1,000 ; J. & 
 W. Seligman, $1,000 ; Paran Stevens, $1,000 ; J. B. & W. A. 
 Cornell, $1,000 ; William R. Stewart, $1,000 ; Henry Clews, 
 $1,000 ; Cash, J. Q. J., $1,000 ; James Brown, $500 ; R. L. «& 
 A. Stuart, $500 ; William H. Vanderbilt, $500 ; David Dows, 
 $500; D. Willis James, $500; William T. Blodgett, $500; Jona- 
 than Sturges, $500; Cash, S. P., $500; William H. Fogg, $500; 
 Tifi'any & Co., $500 ; Joseph Gaillard, $500 ; Benjamin B. 
 Sherman, $500 ; James C. Hoe & Co., $500 ; C. H. Rogers, 
 
38 
 
 $350 ; B. Hinckley, $300 ; Le Grand B. Cannon, $250 ; 
 Jackson S. Sclmltz, $250 ; Charles Butler, $250 ; George 
 Cabot Ward, $250 ; P. McMartin, $250 ; John H. Hall, $250; 
 Otis D. Swan, $250 ; Ackiau Iselin, $250 ; Robert Hoe & Co., 
 $250 ; J. M. Fisk & Co., $250 ; John E. Williams, $250 ; 
 Henry L. Pierson, $250 ; John & Hugh Auchincloss, $250 ; 
 J. H. Sherwood, $250 ; E. W. Stoughton, $250 ; Howard 
 Sanger & Co , $250 ; S. H. Wales, $200 ; Armstrong & Son, 
 $200 ; WilHam F. Cary, $100 ; Benjamin H. Field, $100 ; 
 Gustave Schwab, $100 ; J. S. Rockwell, $100 ; Charles H. 
 Isham, $100 ; John C. Southwick, 100 ; Charles G. Havens, 
 $100 ; Hoyt Brothers, $100 ; Wilham C. Bryant, $50 ; Joseph 
 Allen & Co., $50 ; Cash, H. W. S & Co., $50 ; Maltby J. Lane, 
 $50. 
 
 And Whereas the said Company have received by the hands 
 of Moses H. Grixnell, Treasurer, twenty-six thousand five 
 hundred dollars, the result of the following subscriptions : 
 
 Moses Taylor, $1,000 ; WiUiam E. Dodge, $1,000 ; Morton, 
 Bliss & Co., $1,000 ; W. R. Vermilye, $1,000 ; Charles H. 
 Russel, $1,000 •. Marshall O. Roberts, $1,000 ; M. H. Grinnell, 
 $1,000 ; Edward Minturn, $1,000 ; John Steward, $1,000 ; 
 John C. Green, $1,000 ; Amos R. Eno, $1,000 ; E. D. Morgan 
 &Co., $1,000; Edwards Pierrepont, $1,000; William B. Astor, 
 $1,000 ; Joseph Sampson, $1,000 ; John J. Astor, $1,000 ; 
 James H. Bancker, $1,000 ; William Walter Phelps, $1,000 ; 
 Adams Express Co., $1,000 ; C. S. Sandford, $1,000 ; James 
 Lenox, $1,000 ; Isaac Bell, $1,000 ; Jay Cooke & Co., $1,000 ; 
 George F. Tallman, $500 ; A. C. Kingsland, $500 ; P. Hayden, 
 $500 ; S. B. Chittenden, $500 ; H. B. Claflin, $500 ; John 
 Ponder, $500 ; Isaac Sherman, $250 ; and Peter Townsend, 
 $250 (which sums of princijial and interest amount together 
 to fifty-three thousand four hundred and sixty-six dollars 
 and forty-four cents); which moneys were contributed and 
 paid by the subscribers aforesaid on the understanding that 
 
39 
 
 the same were to be applied to the use of the widow of the 
 late Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton, and of the children 
 of the said Edwin M. Stanton and Ellen H. his wife. 
 
 Now therefore knoio ye that the said The New York Life 
 Insurance and Trust Company do hereby certify and declare 
 that they take and hold said moneys in trust to invest the 
 same and keep the same invested in the public debt of the 
 United States of America, and to receive the interest, income, 
 and profits thereof, and the same to apply to the sole use of 
 Ellen H. Stanton, the widow of the said Edwin M. Stanton — 
 to be paid into her own hands or to her order from time to 
 time as the same shall accrue, and not by way of anticipation, 
 and to be wholly free from the control debts or obligations 
 of any future husband or any person whomsoever. And on 
 the death of the said Ellen H. Stanton in trust to divide the 
 trust estate into as many shares or portions as there 
 shall be children or issue of deceased children, if any, of the 
 said Edwin M. Stanton and Ellen H. Stanton, his wife, then 
 living — such issue to take the share to which the parent, if 
 living, would have been entitled — and to j^ay over and trans- 
 fer to each of such children who shall then have attained 
 the age of twenty-one years, and also to such issue of any 
 then deceased child, the share or portion of such children, 
 and of the parent of such issue, and to apply the income, 
 interest, and profits of the share or shares of any child who 
 shall be under the age of twenty-one years at the time of the 
 death of the said Ellen H. Stanton, to the use of such child 
 until he or she shall attain the age of twenty-one years, 
 and thereupon to pay him or her his or her share of said 
 trust estate ; and if any child shall die before attaining such 
 age, then to pay over the share of the child so dying to his 
 or her issue, if any, and if he or she leave no issue, then to 
 the brothei's and sisters and i.ssue of any deceased child 
 equally, the issue of any deceased child to take the j^arent's 
 shai-e : and if there shall be no child of the said Edwin M. 
 
40 
 
 Stanton and Ellen H. his wife, and no issue of any deceased 
 child, living at the time of the death of the said Ellen H. 
 Stanton, and entitled to receive the said trust estate, then in 
 trust to pay over and distribute the said trust estate to and 
 among the next of kin of the said Edwin M. Stanton in such 
 shares as they would take by the laws of this State if he had 
 died possessed thereof and intestate. 
 
 And it is hereby mutually agreed by and between the said 
 Company and the contributors to said trust estate by Messrs. 
 Stewart and Grinnell, that the said Company shall be allowed 
 to charge and receive for their compensation for execiiting 
 the trust hereby created, a commission of two and a half per 
 cent on the income of said estate, and shall also be allowed 
 for any necessary expenses and charges to which they may 
 be subjected in the premises, but they hereby relinquish all 
 commissions to which they might otherwise be entitled on 
 receiving and paying over the principal of said trust estate. 
 
 In witness Avhereof the said The New York Life Insurance 
 and Trust Company have caused theu* corporate seal to be 
 hereunto affixed and the same to be attested by the President; 
 and the said Alexander T. Stewart and Moses H. Grinnell, 
 representing the contributors above named, have hereunto 
 set their hands and seals this seventh day of May, in the year 
 1870. 
 
 D. Thompson, 
 
 President. 
 
 Alexr. T. Stewakt. 
 
 M. K. Geinnell. 
 Sealed and delivered in triplicate ) 
 in presence of j 
 
 Geo. 13. Butlek.