Yale University Library

39002004602273

YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

1912

CA8TNER HANWAY, ELUAH LEWIS. JOSEPH P. SCARLET.
TAKIN MOM AFTIR THI TFIAIM TIlML*.

THE CHRISTIANA RIOT

AND

THE TREASON TRIALS
OF 1851
AN HISTORICAL SKETCH
BT
W. U. HENSEL

With Some Account of the Commemokation or
these Events, September 9, 191 1

SECOND AND REVISED EDITION.

Vnm OF
Taa Miw Xm PiuHnim CoiirAiiT
LAKCAink, Pa.
lOIl

YALt

BrW, u.HKMaxi.

PREFACE.
The preparation of this sketch and contribution to onr
local history had been long contemplated by the Editor and
Compiler. Bom near the locality where the events occurred
which are its subject, he has been for more than half a cen
tury intimately related with their associations. He has re
gard for the integrity of motive which alike animated both
parties to the conflict. It was a miniature of the great
struggle of opposing ideas that culminated in the shock of
Civil War, and was only settled by that stem arbiter. He
rejoices that what seemed to be an irrepressible conflict be
tween Law and Liberty at last ended in Peace. To help to
perpetuate that condition between long«stranged neighbors
and kin, this offering is made to the work of the Lancaster
County Historical Society.
While it has been written and published for that Society,
no responsibility for anything it contains or for its promulga
tion attaches to any one except the author. Where opinions
are expressed — and they have been generally avoided as
far as possible in disputed matters — he alone is responsible.
Where facts are stated, except upon authority expressly
named, he acoepte the ride of refutation. In all cases he has
tried to ascertain and to teU the exact tenth. He worked in
no other spirit and for no other pnrpow; and wherein he has
failed hia ia all the blame.
W. U, H.
"BuuK Boua%"
Ancoit M, mi.

m

CONTENTS.

CHAPTEB I. iNnoDOCTonr.
Bibliographj of the Subject— A Stad^' of It from the Southern Stand
point—The Testimonjr of Surviving Witnesses— Basis for Bomantle
Literatnre, 1-4. CHAPTEB II. Tbx Law or tb* Land.
The Earlj Compromises of the Constitntion — PennsjrlTania's If ore
Toward Abolition — The Act of 1826 — The Prigg Case — Border
Troubles- The Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 — Wrong* of Escaped
Slaves and Bights of Their Owners, 5-12.
CHAPTEB m. CoNDinoRS Aiono thx Bobdib.
On the Different Sides of Mason and Dixon Line — Conflicts of Ideas
and of Citizenship — Lower Lancaster County a Gateway — Terror
of the "Gap Gang" — The Underground Bailwajr — Outrages hj
the Slave Catchers and Kidnappers, 13-19.
CHAPTEB IV. TBI Escape and PDBStnr of tec Suvn.
The Gorsnch Homestead and Its Proprietor — An Old and Prominent
Maryland Family — The Bunaways Absent for Nearly Two Tears
Before They were Pursued — The Warrants and Attempted Exe-
ention, 20-26. CHAPTEB V. Thb DnvHSc and DirEMDns.
^railam Parker and His Home — A Leader Tf His.Baee and ClaM —
The Hero of the Fugitive Slaves and the Champion of Their Beslit.
•n«a to Beeaptors— The Night Before the Eight, S7-M.
CHAPTEB VL Tn TIoht.
The Challenge to Surrender and the Deflanea — A Long Parl^ — Tha
Prompt Besponse to a Call for Aid — The Firing Beg^ — Flight of
Kline and his Depntiea — Oorsneh is Killed and Us Bob TarrlU/
Wonaded, SO-W.

?1 THZ OHBISTIAKA BIOT.
CHAPTEB Vn. Thb "Pdbboit" and Abbists.
Federal and State Authorities in Conflict — "Bough Biding" tba
Vall^ — Numerous and Indiscriminate Arrests — Hearings in Lan
caster and Committals to Philadelphia, 4(M5.
CHAPTEB VIIL Thb Politicai. ArrEBMATH.
Partisans Quick to Make Capital out of the Occurrence — The Demo
crats Aggressive — The "Silver Grays" Apologetic, and the "Woolly
Heads" on the Defensive — Effect of the Christiana Incident on the
October Elections^ 46-54.
CHAPTEB IX Betobb tbb Tbial.
Popular Discussion Precedes the Arraignment — Legal Questions Baised
by Eminent Lawyers — Judge Kane takqs High Ground Agidnst
Treason — The Selection of the Jury — A Eepresentative Panel, 65-60.
CHAPTEB X. "Thb Tkeason Teials."
Differences of Opinion Among Counsel for the Government — A Bril
liant Array of Lawyers — Selecting Twelve Men, "Good and True,"
from a Large Venire — The Prisoners Arraigned and Pleas Entered,
Trial and Acquittal, 61-91.
CHAPTEB XL The Later Tbiaus.
Legal Proceedings in Lancaster County — Prisoners Bemanded to Local
Jurisdiction — President Fillmore 's Message — Attorney General
Brent's Beport — Final Disposition of th? Cases in the Lancaster
Connty Court — "Sam" Williams Trind in Pliiladelphia and
Acquitted, 92-100. CHAPTEB XII. Pabkeb's Own Stobt.
The Leader of the Defenders Tells his Story of what Occurred at "the
Biot" — The Author Gives Beasons why He takes the Narrative with
Some Allowance — ^A Valuable Historical Contribution, 101-125.
CHAPTEB Xin. AiTZB THB Wab.
Peter Woods the Sole Survivor — Castner Hanway's Later Days — The
Descendants and Belatives of the Principal Actors in the Drama —
Concluding Beflections on the Affair, 126-134.
ADDENDA. SupplbmbntaIi Notes.
The Pennsylvania-German and the Negro — Parker's Military Becord —
The Venue in Treason, 135 — Speling of Names — Parker's Bevisit

OONTEITTB. vil
la 1878 — Lineola a Defender of the Fugitive Slave Law — Fatar
Smith's BecoUectlons, 136 — Francis licnnoz's Story— 'Dr. Mo-
Oowan '* BecoUectlons, 137 — Elizabeth Pownall Steele — Burleigh —
The Jurors' Weight — The Kennedy Case — Higginson '• Correction,
138 — Whittier's Poem to the Prisoners, 142 — "Sixty Tears After,"
F. layman Windolph, Mary N. Bobinson, 143.
POLITICAL COBBESPONDENCK
Aa Address to Gov. Johnston — His Beply — The Demoeratia Bejdader
— Governor Lowe to President HUmore, 145-15L
THE COMMEMOBA'nON.
The Exerdsea at Christiana Sixty Tears After — Addreasea hf Praml-
nent Pnblle Men — A Great Popolar Demonstration — Dedleatimi of
tha MoBmnant — rreaaatatlim of MadalS— Tha Conndtteaa^ 168-158.

THE CHRISTIANA RIOT.

CHAPTER I.
Intboductoet.

I propose to write the history of the so-called " Christiana
Riot" and "Treason Trials" of 1851, as they occurred —
without partiality, prejudice or apology, for or against any
of those who participated in them. As is inevitable in all
such collisions, there were, on either side of the border
troubles of that period, men of high principle and right
motive and also rowdies and adventurers, disposed to resort
to ruthless violence for purposes of sordid gain. There were
slave-masters who sincerely believed in the righteousness of
an institution of ancient origin, while even the more saga
cious of their class recognized it as at variance with the
divine law and the trend of Christian civilization, and in
evitably doomed to extinction. There were on this side of
the line many who, believing themselves humanitarians, were
mere mischievous agitators, lawless in deed and treasonable
in design, reckless of those rights of property which are as
sacred in regard of the law as the rights of man. There were,
too, in the North wicked slave catchers and kidnappers whose
bmtalities aroused the just resentment of the communities
in which they operated, even when they kept within the
limits of strict and technical legal rights.
It was of course impossible, as Mr. Lincoln pointed out,
for the republic to endnre forever half slave and half free
— to mn a geographical marker through a great and oompli-
cated moral, eoonomio and political issue — eapecially in
1 1

2 THE 0HBI8TIANA BIOT.
view of the far flung border line and the rapidly increasing
development of communication and transmission.
If, however, all the great statesmen, economists and
churchmen who had straggled with the slavery question
since the formation of the Union were unable to solve it,
without the awful carnage of a tremendous and long lasting
civil war, can it be the cause of special wonder that a hand
ful of Marylanders in lawful search of their escaped prop
erty, and a larger group of free and fugitive negroes, with
the "embattled farmers" who sympathized with them,
should have made the hills of this peaceful Chester Valley
echo with gun shots and stained its soil with blood, when
Man and Master met in final and fatal contest for what each
had been taught was his right?
Numerous attempts have been made to publish reports of
this incident which would serve the purposes of permanent
history ; and, while they have all been helpful, none has been
complete. On his return to Maryland after his failure to
convict Hanway and the others of treason, Attorney General
Robert J. Brent, of Maryland, made an elaborate official
report to Governor E. Louis Lowe, who in turn submitted
it, with extended comments of his own, to the General As
sembly of Maryland, January 7, 1852. From the stand
point of the lawyer and the chief executive of a slave state,
both are able deliverances. Aroused by their version of the
affair, and especially by their comments on the treason trial,
and impatient over the delay in publishing the official report
of it, W, Arthur Jackson, junior counsel for the defendant,
printed a pamphlet review of it, which shows much ability,
has great value and has become very rare. The official pho
nographic report of the trial, by James J. Robbins, of the
Philadelphia bar (King & Baird, 1862), is of course a
copious fountain of exact information — as well as an inter
esting exhibit of the " reportorial " efficiency of that day.
From all of these I have felt at liberty to draw largely.

INTBODVOTOBT.

"A Trae Story of the Christiana Riot," by David R.
Forbes, 1898, tinged with sectional prejudice, has much
matter that was well worthy of preservation, and the new
facts it contains^ if verified, I have freely used. All of the
general political histories of the period refer to the Christi
ana tragedy as having significance in the intense agitation
of the issue raised by the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. Fred.
Douglass' stories of his life and time; William Still's
"Underground Railroad," and Dr, R. C. Smedley's "His
tory of the Underground Railroad " have also been subjects
of my levy for aid- To them, however, have been added
the personal reminiscences of Dr. J. W. Houston, Thomas
Whitson, Esq., Ambrose Pownall, Charles Dingee, Gilbert
Bushong, Peter Woods, WilHam P. Brinton, Cyrus Brinton
and many other residents of the neighborhood in which the
riot occurred and from which the prisoners in the trials for
life were taken. Access has been had to the diaries and
family records of the Pownall, Hanway, Lewis and Gorsuch
families; and many other original sources of information,
including the local and metropolitan newspapers of that day,
whose enterprise and impartiality were somewhat variable.
Some of them published full reports of the trial.
For the first time, however, I think, the subject has been
studied with some care and consideration for the facts as
disclosed and from the point of view occupied at the home of
the Gorsuches. The family of Dr. F. G. Mitehell, whose
wife is a daughter of Dickinson Gorsuch, and who now owna
the property then of her grandfather, Edward Gk>r8uch,
from which the slaves fled, have been especially gracious and
helpful, withal fair and generous in their attitude toward an
event which brought bratal death to one ancestor and long
suffering to another.
J. Wesley Eni^t, long resident of the neighborhood of
Monkton and Glencoe, Maryland, and who was under the
roof of the Gorsnch homestead when the slavea escaped, has

4 THE OHBISTIANA BIOT.
given me much accurate information as to their previous
condition of servitude.
If their contribution to the history of the encounter and
the events preceding it presente the relation of the Southern
ers to it in a far more favorable light than has hitherto
attended its narration, no fair-minded student of history can
object to the whole truth, even at this late day. That the Gor
such runaways were not heroic and scarcely even pictur
esque characters; and that their owners were humane and
Christian people, and not the brutel slave traders and cmel
taskmasters who figured in much of the anti-slavery fiction,
can no longer be doubted. But if the Lancaster County
Historical Society exists for any purpose it is illustrated in
its apt motto: "History herself as seen in her own work
shop." Every such shop must show some chips and filings ;
and occasionally the more these abound the better wiU be
the craftsman's product. I cannot hope — and I certainly
do not desire — this should be the "last word" about the
"Christiana Riot"; but the occasion of its Sixtieth Anni
versary and the Commemoration seemed to call for a his
torical review up to date ; and the story of its few survivors
had to be caught before it was lost.
It may be confidently predicted that when our long-looked-
for local Stronghand in imaginative literature shall seek for
a theme near at home, he will find it in the dramatic story
of the "Christiana Riot"; or when some gifted Lancaster
County Son of Song shall arise and strike the trembling
harp strings, the scene of his epic will follow the winding
Octoraro and lie along the track of the Fugitive Slave.

CHAPTER n.
Tee Law of the Lard.
The Early Compromises of the Constitntion — Pennsylvania's Mov(
Toward Aliolition — The Act of 1826 — The Prigg Case — Bordei
Troubles — The Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 — Wrongs of Escapei
Slaves and Bights of Their Owners.
It is entirely unnecessary for the purposes of this par
ticular story to enlarge upon, or to review at length, the lonj
debate, the innumerable compromises, the many makeshifti
and the unending controversies which attended the discus
sion of the slavery question from the agitation and adoptioi
of the Federal Constitution to the enactment of the Fugitivi
Slave Law of 1850 — and which then left it utterly unsettled
It is, however, important that a few plain landmarks of th
law be kept in sight to guide one who would fitly study th(
general history of the times and fairly estimate the signifi
cance of the local events to be narrated.
The Union of the States was only effected by the adoptioi
of Art. rV ; the general purpose of which was to require ead
State to give full faith and credit to the public acts am
records of other States. The exact language of its third sec
tion was :
" No Person held to Service or Labour in one State, undo
the Laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in Consc
quence of any Law or Regulation therein, be discharged f roi
such Service or Labour, but shall be delivered up on Olaii
of the Party to whom such Service or Labour may be due.'
No union could have been effected without this agreemeni
Whether that federation was a contract from which an
party to it could retire, for a violation of it by other partie
thereto, need not be discussed here. The affirmative of tha
6

6 THE OHBISTIAlirA BIOT.
proposition was not the creed of any particular party or
section. It was originally maintained by New England
Federaliste; it was later defended by Southern Democrate;
it was at last decided adversely in battle and by the sword.
While there is now general acquiescence in the result, the
final decision was not the prevailing doctrine of the people
of the United States in 1851.
Under the Constitution the Right to Reclaim the fugitive
slave was no more unmistakable than the Duty to Return
him. The Law of the Land gave to each State the right to
regulate its own domestic institutions; and that right was
expressly recognized and guaranteed even by the Republican
party and by Abraham Lincoln long after the outbreak of
the Civil War. The slavery questions upon which political
parties differed up to 1851 were not disputes as to the rights
of slave owners and slaves in Slave States; nor as to the
rights of slave owners against their escaped slaves in Free
States, but as to the extension of slavery and the status of
the institution in the National territories.
The prevailing popular misapprehension on this subject
may be easily pardoned when it is observed that so eminent
an authority as Oswald Garrison Villard, in his recent excel
lent biography of John Brown, says the Fugitive Slave Law
of 1850 " made legal in the North the rendition of negroes
who had found their way to Free States." That proposition
was recognized by all political parties from 1793 to 1863.
The Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 was passed in strict con
formity with the Constitution of the United States ; and it
impressed upon the executive authorities of the several States
the duty of arrest, and upon their magistrates the obliga
tion to hear and commit the fugitives for return. That act
was generally recognized as just in its essence and object
As late as 1850 even the Free Soil party assented to the
legal principle it involved. In execution, however, ite pro
cesses were greatly abused; unlawful seizures, unwarranted

DICKIMSON QORSUOH.
OMongwiT mumMB ¦• thc mot

THE UlW of THE UUn). 7
reclamations and ruthless kidnappings were Qommon occur
rences in the lower parts of the Border States along the line
of Slavery and Freedom. Pennsylvania, after respectful
hearing of the Maryland Commissioners and due considera
tion for their suggestions, enacted the Act of 1826, which
made the. State Courts the arbiters of claims to fugitives;
forbade justices to exercise these powers ; and, in the line of
Pennsylvania's moyements since 1780 to extinguish slavery
and protect free persons, it made the free-bom children of
escaped slaves citizens of Pennsylvania and put them under
its protection.
This legislation accorded with judicial decisions of the
highest court in Pennsylvania. In Commonwealth v. Hallo-
way, 2 S. & R,, 305 (1816), Mary, a negro slave of James
Course of Maryland, absconded from her master and came
to Philadelphia, where, after she had resided for about two
years, her child Eliza was bora. It was held that under the
Act of March 1, 1780, which Pennsylvania passed "for the
gradual abolition of slavery," this child, bora as she was,
was entitled to freedom ; that the provision of the Federal
Constitution for the return of a slave from one state " escap
ing into another," did not apply to the free-bom child of a
fugitive, and that even under the Constitution of the United
States ihe child Eliza was bom free. Justice Gibson filed
a concurring opinion, at the conclusion of which he said:
"Whether this case is to be considered a hard one or not
will depend much upon the temper with which the mind
may contemplate the positive and artificial rights of the
master over the mother, on the one hand, or on the other the
natural righto of her child."
After the Act of 1826 the border troubles, especially be-
tweien York and Lancaster Counties, Pennsylvania, and
Cecil, Harford and Baltimore Counties, Maryland, were
much intensified. Mason and Dixon line was the imaginary
demarcation between two wholly antagoniBtio aocial and po-

THE OUBISTIAirA BIOT.

litical orders. The same person might be a Maryland eUve
under Maryland law and a Pennsylvania freeman under
Pennsylvania law. Owners and agente, armed with Mary
land authority to reclaim property, made theirs by Maryland
law, were felonious kidnappers in Pennsylvania. The anoma
lous condition of affairs and the legal difficulties arising
out of it are best illustrated by actual facte. A slave woman
escaped from her owner, James S. Mitchell, of Cecil County,
Maryland, in 1845. During her absence, as a fugitive from
his service, she had given birth in New Jersey to an illegiti
mate child. Through the instramentality of agents, residing
in Pennsylvania, Mitchell apprehended the woman, who
together with the child, had been delivered to him at
Elkton, in Cecil County. The woman was taken in Penn
sylvania by George F. Alberti and James Frisby. These
agents, themselves fearing to incur possible responsibilities,
had repeatedly refused to take the child with the mother;
until finally overcome by the entreaties of the mother her
self, they yielded to their feelings of benevolence, and as
sumed the risk. They were arrested for kidnapping; evi
dence to show their motives in including the child in the
return was excluded, and they were sentenced to long terms
in the penitentiary — for permitting it to accompany the
mother, whose own recapture and return by them were ad
mittedly lawful. The state of the record of the case was such
that it could not be appealed to the United States Supreme
Court. Mitchell himself, who had not even been in Pennsyl
vania, was indicted here for kidnapping the child and was
subject to seven years in the penitentiary. The Governor of
Pennsylvania issued, and the Governor of Maryland declined
to honor, a requisition for him. There were many other
cases of which this was a type.
On the other hand, there were unquestionably well-authen
ticated cases of slaves returned in violation of their legal
claims and of free negroes bratally kidnapped and remorse-

THE I.AW OF THE LAm>. 9
lessly sold to slavery without a fair hearing and adjudication
of their righto. The offenders were often protected by legal
technicalities, obstructions or difficulties, and by friendly
jurisdictions North or South.
A case pregnant with great legal and political conse
quences finally arose under the conflicting claims of Mary
land and Harford County on one side and Pennsylvania and
York County on the other. It reached the Supreme Court
of the United States and the contest was a momentous battle
in the campaign of pro- and anti-slavery agitation. Lawyers
will find it fully reported in 16 Peters, U. S., 539 (1842) :
Edward Prigg, a citizen of Harford County, Maryland,
together with Nathan S. Bemis, Jacob Forward and Stephen
Lewis, Jr., were indicted in York County, Pennsylvania,
O. and T., for kidnapping an alleged free child of Margaret
Morgan, in violation of the Pennsylvania law of 1826, wliich
made it a felony, punishable with from seven to twenty-
one years imprisonment at hard labor, to carry off, sell or
detain a free negro from Pennsylvania. Prigg was the
agent — and the others his assistants — <>f Margaret Ash-
more, owner of Margaret Morgan, who escaped from her
and fled to Pennsylvania in 1832. Her children, taken back
to Maryland by Prigg, were born in Pennsylvania — one of
them more than a year after she escaped. Under Pennsyl
vania law they were free; under Maryland law and the
common law principle that "the brood follows the dam"
they were slaves.* To avert the disastrous resulte that
always follow a conflict of laws between neighbors, Pennsyl
vania and Maryland agreed that the facto should be the
subject of % special verdict, so that after Prigg's conviction
and sentence his case might be heard and the issue it in
volved be determined by the highett Federal Court of final
jurisdiction and of last resort.
•Tha mla of tha dvil law partu* te^tmr tmtrm, formaify V^
vaUad ia ra domeatia alavaiy^— 1 DaU. 197,

10

THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.

The United States Supreme Court held that the Federal
Constitution self -executed ite provisions; that the owner of
a fugitive slave could retake him wherever found; and that
the National government — not the State govemmento —
must support and enforce this right ; that the Fugitive Slave
Law of 1793 recognized this and left nothing on the subject
to State regulation. But the Court doubted whether State
magistrates or officials were bound to perform any duty im
posed upon them in this respect by. a Federal law; and the
State statute under which Prigg was indicted was held to
be unconstitutional and void.
In the discussion Meredith and Hambley appeared for
Prigg, and virtually for Maryland. For the Conmionwealth
of Pennsylvania appeared Attorney General Ovid F. John
son (under Governor D. R. Porter) ; and he frankly stated
that the real and substantial parties to the controversy were
Maryland and Pennsylvania, whose officials came into that
high Court "to terminate disputes and contentions which
were arising and had for years arisen along the border line
between them on this subject of the escape and delivering
up of fugitive slaves. Neither party sought the defeat or
the humiliation of the other. It was for the triumph of
the law they presented themselves before the Court. They
were engaged under an imperative sense of duty in the
work of peace; and he hoped he would be pardoned if he
added of patriotism also."
Story, of Massachusetts, delivered the Court's opinion. He
had been appointed by Madison, served a long time on the
bench and was a jurist of high renown ; but Taney, C. J.,
while concurring in the judgment, expressly dissented from
the doctrine that the State authorities were " prohibited from
interfering for the purpose of protecting the rights of the
master and aiding him in the recovery of his property." He
thought the contrary to be not only the right, but the duty
of the State. The Federal Constitution meant this when

THE LAW OF THB . LAND. 11
it declared "the fugitive shall be given up." He predicted
that if the State officials under the State laws could not
arrest the fugitive, " the territory of the State must soon be
come an open pathway for the fugitives escaping from other
States." Justices Baldwin and Thompson concurred with
Taney; Wayne with Story, and also Daniel, filing opinions.
McLean held that Congress might prescribe the duty of
State officers. All seven Justices expressed separate opin
ions. Taney's forecast was right. Maryland and Pennsylvania
— especially the southeastern counties of this State — soon
became an open pathway for the fugitive slaves. Their
track was lighted from many a window in the households
of the Chester Valley; and two main lines of the Under
ground Railroad ran through Lancaster County, close to
where the two lines of the great steam railway which tra
verses it from east to west are now located.
Acquiescing in this decision Pennsylvania, in 1847, re
pealed the provisions of the Act of 1826 repugnant to the
Federal Constitution ; and remanded the whole subject to
Congress. Like legislation in other States left the slave
holders stripped of the remedies they claimed under the
Constitution. Hence the Fugitive Slave. Law of 1850, with
its more drastic processes, manifold deputies marshal, "posse
comitatus" of the bystanders, psnalties for obstruction of
processes and many other provisions — which if they had
been tolerable under the conditions prevailing long after
1793, had now become odious to the largely increased and
rapidly increasing number of persons who were opposed to
all forms of slavery, regardless of ito constitutional protec
tion or right at law.
For this class Lancastor County's then representative in
Congress, Thaddeus Stevens, was the boldest and most aggres
sive spokesman. When, in 1861, he denounced every form
of human slavery he was so far in advance of hia party (Whig

12 THE OHBISTIANA BIOT.
then and Republican ten years later) that in 1861 a Repub
lican Congress, Charles Francis Adams, of Massachusette, the
first Free Soil Candidate for Vice President, heading the
" Ayes," by an overwhelming vote declared that all attempts
of the States to override or obstruct the Fugitive Slave Law
were unconstitutional and "dangerous to the peace of the
Union " ; that all enactments to that end should be repealed
and there was no authority outside of a State wherein then
existed a right "to interfere with slaves or slavery in such
States, in disregard of the rights of their owners or the peace
of society."

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CHAPTER m.
Conditions Alono the Bo&deb.
On the Different Sides of Mason and Dixon Line — Conflicts of Ideas
and of Citizenship — Lower Lancaster County a Gateway — Terror
of the "Gap Gang" — The Underground Bailway — Outrages by
the Slave Catchers i^nd Kidnappers.
Formal legislation and statutory enactmente could not
repress the instincto of humanity. Involuntary bondage of
men, women and children was not consistent with either the
spirit of free institutions or the instincto of a progressive
citizenship. As it was impossible to prevent reckless and
degenerate men from abusing the processes of the law by
kidnapping and other forms of crime against the colored
race; and as it was impossible for the most humane and
philanthropic elements of slaveholding citizenship to pre
vent constantly recurring barbarities and horrors resulting
logically from the legal recognition of property and traffic
in human flesh and blood, so it was impossible to forbid
thousands of good men and women throughout the North —
in all other respects law-abiding people — to secretly aid
and even to publicly promote the escape of slaves fleeing
from slavery. Nor could those who thus kept their con
science while they broke the law discriminate between the
worthy and the unworthy in slave or master. There was no
time in the quick trips between the statidns of the Under
ground Railway to ascertain with precision whether the
passenger was fleeing from just or unjust treatment, whether
he had the character of a criminal escaping deserved punish
ment, or of a bondman aspiring to a, condition of freedom;
nor to judge and determine the individual merito and the
legal righto of the owner. Behind lay Slavery— beycmd
blazed the North Star of Freedom. 18

14 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
Lower Lancastor County was at the gateway of this path.
For a comparatively short distance — only about five miles
— the Mason and Dixon line forms ite Southern boundary.
Only two of its townships are in contact with Maryland, Ful
ton and Little Britain, and the last named barely touched
the edge of the Southland of Slavery. In its citizenship
Lancaster County represented all the principal elements
which enter into our composite commonwealth. The more
numerous and important strain of blood, occupying the wider
and richer upper domain, was composed very largely of the
so-called Pennsylvania German scot and church people, who
had little fellowship with the negro race, little interest in or
sympathy with its cause and very slight personal contact
with its members. In the lower townships the principal
elements were the so-called Scotch-Irish Presbyterian and the
Friends; between them there was considerable friction, if
not antagonism; they had for nearly a century represented
different views of society and government. Their variance
was very distinct in their respective early attitudes toward
" the Indian question."
It has been made the subject of forcible contrast that the
prevailing Quaker settlement of Fulton and Western Dm-
more townships took on the more placid aspect of the Cono-
wingo, whose smooth meadowb and fiowery banks character
ized these localities ; while the eastern end of Drumore, Cole-
rain and Little Britain had peculiarly the type illustrated by
the more turbulent fiow and ragged hillsides of the Octoraro.
Both streams find their outlet in the Susquehanna, and at
very nearly the same sea level. But in the days of the Fugi
tive Slave Law and of local defiance of it the North bound
bondsman generally made his way to the Chester Valley
by Pleasant Grove and Liberty Square, rather than by Kirk-
wood and Nine Points.
Of the two "schools" the Hicksite branch of Friends
was not only the more nnmerous in the Lower End, but ito

CONDITIONS ALONQ THE BOBDEB. 15
members were the more aggressive in their hostility to
slavery. The Presbyterian works out his humanitarianism
rather more directly through the law than around or under
it; and, while in many households of this faith, colored ser
vants and farm hands found trasted and long continued
employment, the general attitude of the Scotch-Irish to the
slavery question was different from that of the Quaker;
socially the blood of the negro was more offensive to the more
aggressive race.
There were, of course, far more than enough exceptions to
" prove the rale." Rev. Lindley C. Rutter, long the beloved
pastor of Chestnut Level Presbyterian Church, was one of
the most fearless and outepoken of the local Abolitionists.
Likewise " Father " William Easton, of the Octoraro United
Presbyterian Church. In the neighborhood of Quarryville,
where the German and Scoteh Irish elemente seemed to
meet, intermixture of colored and white blood was not in
frequent ; and, contrary to the general laws of miscegenation
and degeneration, many of the mulatto, quadroon and octo
roon people sprang from these racial intermarriages were
very respectable, honest and industrious citizens.
On the north side of the Mine Ridge, that range running
westward from Gap across Lancaster County, during the
"fifties" there was a considerable amount of outlawry on
the part of an organized "gang," whose depredations now
took on the form of kidnapping and again the less illegal,
but by no means more popular, practice of aiding the recap
ture and return — regularly or irregularly — of fugitive
slaves. If their raids and robberies were the terror of the
farmers, millers, butchers and storekeepers of the peaceful
Pequea Valley, on the south side of which their strongholds
then lay, their incursions into the homes and haunts of
colored laborers beyond the Octoruro hills were no less cause
for alarm among the free or fugitive colored people than
th^ were of intense resentment and indignation on the part

16 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
of the white friends, employers and protectors of the blacks.
While then one trail of the Underground Railroad ran by
Columbia and Bird-in-Hand, whereon friendly hands passed
the fugitive from Stephen Smith to Daniel GKbbons ; and a
branch led from Joseph Taylor's, at Ashville to Pennington-
ville and Christiana, another had a continuous line of sta
tions from the Gilberts and Bushongs aToimd May, in Bart,
or later Eden township, out "the valley" to and past the
scene of what was to be the deepest tragedy which ever
thrilled this little community.
Popular feeling was not wholly unprepared for it. The
confiagration was not a sudden outbreak. Combustibles had
been accumulating. Local incidents, such as escapes, man
hunts, kidnappings and other like events had occurred to an
extent sufficient to excite popular interest; and by rumor
they had been exaggerated enough to further inflame it;
numerous persons supposed or known to be ex-slaves resided
and worked in the neighborhood and were the subjects of a
qualified popular protection. There had been outrages on
one side and some reprisals on the other.
In 1850 it was alleged that an innocent and free colored
hired man named Henry Williams had been seized without
right or legal process and sold into perpetual slavery South.
William Dorsey had been taken from his wife and three
children and lodged in the jail at Lancaster. A gang of
three, who tried to take a maid servant from Moses Whit-
son's across the line in Chester County, were forcibly re
sisted by a lot of colored men under the lead of Ben. Whipper.
The girl was rescued and her captors terribly, if not fatally,
beaten on the Gap hill. A negro known as " Tom-up-in-the-
barn," living near Gap, was said to have been captured
one morning on his way to thresh at Caleb Brinton's, and
never got back. The barn of Lindley Coates, in Sadsbury
township, was burned in 1850 by miscreants angered at his
denunciation of slave catchers and kidnappers.

iW^i^

V ¦'- V-.,C'

.i

CONDmONB ALONO THE BOSDEB. 17
It was also related that an industrious negro fence-maker
had been violently carried off from his home on John Mc-
Gowen's place in the valley, near Mars HiU, between Chris
tiana and Quarryville. The narrator of this (Forbes' " Trae
Story ") does not tell whether the man was free or a fugitive
slave; and to his outraged neighbors this distinction made
little difference.
The incident of most note occurring in the immediate
neighborhood, the infiuence of which lasted longest, the feel
ing about which was most acute, and which figured largely
in the " Treason Trials" was what was stigmatized as " the
outrage at Chamberlain's." Its scene was on the "Buck hill,"
in the northwestern part of Sadsbury township, on what is
now known as the " Todd place," west of the back road from
Gap to Christiana and in what was a sort of middle ground
between the operations of the "Gap gang" and the refuge
territory of the fugitives. Here in March 1851 a posse,
claimed to be led by a rather notorious member of the "Gap
gang," entered the Chamberlain house, severely beat a col
ored man named J(^ Williams employed there, who made
desperate resistance, terrified the members of the family,
and carried off their bleeding victim in a wagon. It seems
he was an escaped slave; but his captors exhibited no offi
cial warrant of arrest nor made any claim of authority
except to declare they were acting for his master. It was
believed he died from their ill treatment of him.
And there were reprisals! William Parker — of whom
this narrative will have more to say— admitted years
afterwards that he had helped to beat, fatally he believed,
the captors of a colored girl; that he had tried to kill Allen
Williams on suspicion that he had betrayed Henry; that
he recaptured a kidnapped man on the West Chester road,
after shooting at his captors and being himself shot in the
ankle; and that he and his associates went to the home of
a decoy negro, burned it down and watched to shoot him
2

18 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
with smooth-bore rifies " heavily charged " if the flames drove
him into the open.
The leading people of this neighborhood were not only
anti-slavery in sentiment, but they resented what seemed to
be lawless invasion of their peaceful community; they were
not afforded means of verifying the authenticity of the claims
made for escaped slaves; the local people engaged in the
business of aiding in slave hunting and slave nabbing were
generally disreputable and sometimes themselves outlaws
and criminals; farmers and mechanics were disturbed in
their domestic service by the frequency with which attacks
were made upon their many and useful colored employees
and by the apprehensions to which they were all constantly
exposed. Withal a sense of protection was felt in the fact
that the most powerful leader of the bar of Lancaster County,
and its representative in Congress Thaddeus Stevens, was
outepoken in his denunciation of the Fugitive Slave Law.
Political discussion and sentiment in this immediate locality,
far more than in any other part of Lancaster County, was
focusing upon open defiance of and even physical resistance
to the enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Law. As early as
October 11, 1850, at a public meeting in Georgetown, Bart
Township, four miles from the later scene of the riot —
William L. Rakestraw presiding and Elwood Cooper Sec
retary — a committee consisting of Thomas Whitson, Elwood
Cooper, Cyras Manahan, Elwood Griest and Joseph Mc
Clelland, reported and published vigorous resolutions de
nouncing the fugitive slave bill, and declaring that they
would " harbor, clothe, feed and aid the escape of fugitive
slaves in opposition to the law."
This was the state of popular feeling and these were the
social and political conditions prevailing in lower Lancaster
County, when the Gorsuch party set out from Maryland to
retake their escaped slaves by due and orderly processes of
law — from which mission the elder Gorsuch returned a

8 ZaGC 9

CONDITIONS ALONO THB BOBDEB. 19'
mangled corpse and his son with a shot-riddled body; in the
attempt to execute which the officers of the law were put to
flight; out of which grew the arrest of two score men and
the indictment of more persods for treason than were ever
before or since tried for that crime in the United States;
the acrimonious relations of two neighboring common
wealths for years; the open exultation of many persons over
the killing and wounding of citieens engaged in a lawful
undertaking, and the chagrin of many other orderly and law-
abiding people that the law of the land had been violated
in bloodshed and ito officers Bucceflsfnlly resiated.

CHAPTER rV.
The Escape and Pobbuit of the Slaves.
The Gorsnch Homestead and Its Proprietor — An Old and Prominent
Maryland Family — The Bunaways Absent for Nearly Two Tears
Before They were Pursued— The Warrants and Attempted Exe
cution.
In Baltimore County, Maryland, on the west side of the
York and Baltimore turnpike, south of Monkton, and north
of Glencoe, stations of the North Central Railroad, stand
today the farm buildings of the Gorsuch homestead, where
and as they stood in 1849 and for a long time before.
Their earlier owner, John Gorsuch, devised this estate to
his nephew, Edward, with several hundred acres of land
and a number of slaves. It was a provision of his will that
certain of them should be free when they reached a fixed
age. In 1849 one of them at least attained this condition.
Jarret Wallace had during the period of his bondage so
served his master and was so appreciated by him that after
he became free Mr. Gorsuch retained him in his employ as
his "market man" to sell his products in Baltimore. In
November, 1849, he was building Wallace a tenant house,
and John Wesley Knight (who now lives in York, aged 83)
and Joshua Pitt, carpenters, were working for him at the
time. He had also millwrights, boarding and sleeping there
and then they were building him a saw mill on Piney Creek,
which ran through his extensive farm. Four of his slaves
were Noah Buley and Joshua Hammond — whose time was
nearly up — and two younger, about twenty-one years old,
named Nelson Ford and George Hammond who had six or
seven years to serve. The man Ford was a rather delicate
young fellow, and Mr. Gorsuch spared him heavy work.
20

the ESCAPE AND PDBBUIT OF IHE SLAVES. 21
He was the teamster of the place, but was always accom
panied by help when he needed it. Buley is described as a
copper colored mulatto and of treacherous disposition.
Mr. Gorsuch was a man of much prominence. He was a
Whig in politics, a class leader in the Methodist church, a
dignified and courtly gentleman in his manners, a just and
accurate man in his business dealings, a kind hearted master
and employer and a man of forceful and determined tempera
ment. He was born April 17, 1795, and was, therefore,
in his fifty-fifth year when his slaves escaped and in his
fifty-seventh when he was killed. He was living with his
second wife, and had five children of his first wife, two
daughters and three sons, of whom the eldest, John S., was a
Methodist clergyman, then residing in Washington, D. C.
There is no portrait extant of the elder Gorsuch, but his son
Dickinson resembled him.
In the fall of 1849 Mr. Gorsuch had his wheat stored in
the corn house, a building which stood between the house
and barn. ' The main barn fronts and adjoins the turapike ;
the mansion house is some distance back of the road, reached
by a shady lane and surrounded by lawn, orchards and out
buildings. In accordance with his habit Mr. Gorsuch kept
careful account of his wheat in store and of the quantities
withdrawn from time to time, as he made his grain all into
flour at his own mill and retailed it in Baltimore. Having
missed considerable of his stock, he made inquiry of a
neighbor miller, Elias Matthews, who reported a lot of wheat
sold to him by one Abe Johnson, a ne'er-do-well free negro
living two miles north of Gorsuch's, who had no land to
raise wheat nor credit to buy it Gorsuch got out a warrant
for his arrest, and it was put .into the hands of Constable
Bond for execution. He was laggard and "Bill" Foster
who waa something of a local terror to wrongdoers, was
entrusted with the job. But Johnson got over into Pennsyl
vania, and Governor Johnston aubeequently refused to honor
a requisition for his extradition.

22 THB OHBISTIANA BIOT.
While the carpenters were building the tenant house and
the millwrighte were putting up the saw mill, in November,
1849, the negroes were cutting and topping the corn, haul
ing in the unshucked ears with ox-carte to the bam floor
where, by aid of lanterns, the whole household, mechanics
and slaves engaged nightly in husking bee merriment. Mean
time news of Bill Foster's search for Abe Johnson were rife ;
likewise suspicious that the colored ".boys " had helped him
to raid the cornhouse and shared his spoils. One day they
exhibited unwonted unrest and clustered into whispering
groups; one expressed to the white workmen special anxiety
to know "if the Boss is going to husk com tonight," and
another declared his purpose to set a rabbit trap, for it was
" going to be a very dark night."
It was. There was no corn husking; and Knight, the car
penter, was aroused early by the call of Dickinson Gorsuch
from down stairs that " the boys are all gone," They escaped
through a skylight in the back building and made their way
down a ladder and up the York turnpike. When the Gor
suches next saw any of them it was in the flash and fire of
the Christiana Riot, in the early dawn of September 11,
1851, at Parker's cabin.
During the interval, however, reports reached the Gor
suches from time to time of their whereaboute; messages
came from the runaways soliciting food supplies and other
aid, which were sent upon assurances of their return. Mr,
Gorsuch had such confidence in his benevolence as their
master that he always believed if he could meet or communi
cate directly with them he could get them back. They soon
found their way into the vicinity of Christiana where they
" worked around " and were known by various aliases ; after
nearly two years sojourn thereabouts their ownership became
known to those who made gain of such information.
The personal narrative of Peter Woods, survivor, leaves
little room for doubt as to their identity and their residence

THE ESCAPE AND PUE8UIT OF THE SLAVES. 23
around Christiana. He says : " They lived here among us
adjoining me. One lived with Joseph Pownall. His name
was John Beard. He was a little brown-skinned fellow — a
pleasant chap. The other three were known to us as Thomas
Wilson, Alexander Scott and Edward Thompson; Scott
was a tall yellow-colored fellow, with straight hair. The
colored fellows met at Parker's nearly every Sunday, A good
many got their washing done there. He had an apple-butter
party about the time of the riot. We knew that these new
colored fellows were escaped slaves. They were about the
Riot House and in our neighborhood a couple of years before
the riot. We colored fellows were all sWorn in to keep secret
what we knew and when these fellows came there they were
sworn in too. Scott told how they four happened to run
away. He said he brought them with him in a big wagon
to Baltimore, or he said he had come with a big load of grain
for his master. He put them on the cars at Baltimore, then
sent his master's team back and took the next train too, and
that way they come up among the Quakers in this country
which they knew was a good point on the underground rail
way. The people who owmed these slaves or some of them
sent men up into this country some time before. One man
came to me one day while I was cradling wheat and said,
•^You are a little man to cradle wheat, I am trying to find
three or four big colored men to cut wheat for me. Can you
tell me if there are any here that I can get?' I knew what
he was after, that he was looking for escaped negroes, and I
did not give him mu«A satisfaction." The "John Beard"
whom Woods knew was Gorsuch's boy Nelson Ford-^w) he
told Cyras Brinton.
From Penningtonville (now Atglen, near Christiana),
August 29, 1851, there was mailed to "Mr. Edward Goi^
such, Hereford P. O., Bait. Co., M. D.," a letter which waa
found upon and taken from hia body after he waa kiUed ; the
following is a copy:

5 24 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
LaUoastib, Co. 28 Angnit 1861.
Beepected friend, I have the required
Information of four men tliat is within
Two miles of each other, now the best
Way is for you to come as A hunter
Disguised about two days ahead of your son and let him eome
By way of Philadelphia and get the deputy marshal John
Nagle I think is his name, tell him the situation
And he can get force of the right kind it vrill take
About twelve so that they can divide and take them
All within half an hour, now if yon can come on the 2d or 8d
of September come on & I will
Meet you at the gap when you get their
Inquire for Benjamin Clay's tavern let
Your son and the marshal get out
Kinyer's* hotel now if you cannot come
At the time spoken of write very soon
And let me know when you can
I wish you to come as soon as you possibly can
Veiy respectfully thy friend
WnxiAM M. P.
(In pencil) Wu M PADonr.
•Kinzer's.
About the same time there had come into Gorsuch's locality
a man (whose name is not known), purporting to be from
lower Lancaster County, who claimed to be able to locate
a number of slaves escaped from Baltimore County, among
them one of Dr. Pearce, who had escaped the same night as
Ctersuch's, Dr. Pearce was a son of the elder Gorsuch's mar
ried sister Belinda.
Acting upon these reports and under the authority of the
new Fugitive Slave Law of 1850, Edward Gorsuch, his son
Dickinson, his nephew Joshua Gorsuch, Dr, Thomas Pearce,
Nicholas Hutchings and Nathan Nelson, neighbors and
friends, came to Pennsylvania to recover the slaves. Under
date of September 9, 1851, the owner procured from Edward
D, Ingraham, United States Commissioner at Philadelphia,
four warrants directed to Henry H, Kline, Deputy United
States Marshal, to apprehend the fugitives. About the at-

THB ESCAPE AND PUESUIT OF THE SLAVES. 26
tempt and failure to execute those warrants, or any of them,
circle the Christiana Riot and the Treason Trials of 1851,
According to Dickinson Gorsuch's diary his father left
for Philadelphia "on the express train," Monday, Septem
ber 8, 1851, and the others followed next day. The war
ranto had meantime issued and the Maryland party met at
Parkesburg on Wednesday, September 10. By arrangement
Constables John Agan and "Sheriff's Officer" Thompson
Tully of Philadelphia had come on to Parkesburg; Deputy
Marshal Kline went separately by rail to West Chester, took
a vehicle to Gallagherville, and started thence for Penning
tonville [now Atglen], His wagon broke down; he and his
man Gallagher hired another vehicle and reached Pennington
ville about midnight; his delay caused the party to discon
nect, Agan and Tully and the Gorsuches stayed at Parkes
burg, Meantime a light young colored man, named Samuel
Williams, of Seventh Street, below Lombard, Philadelphia,
recognized Kline at Penningtonville; he likely scented his
real errand, and when Kline represented that he was after
two horse thieves, Williams told him they had left. When
Kline started for Gap he was followed by some one whom he
suspected to be Williams, and Williams no doubt sounded
a general alarm as to Kline's errand, . He had been dis-
patehed for that purpose from Philadelphia, where a Vigilant ,
Committee was on the lookout to protect fugitives. It was
also told by John Criley on information from Henry Murr,
blacksmith, that Joseph Scarlet, from a business trip to
Philadelphia early in the week, had brought like tidings
into the neighborhood,
Kline and his associate slept at Houston's hotel. Gap, on
Wednesday night and returned early next morning to Parkes
burg, whei« they found Agan and Tully; the Gorsuch people
had gone over to Sadsbury on the old Philadelphia turn
pike and Kline rejoined them; Gorsuch went to Parkes
burg to detain the Philadelphia t^oers, and Kline went to

26 THI OHBUTLUrA BIOT.
Downingtown and thence to Gallagherville, where the entire
searching party met, except TuUy and Agan, who returned
finally to Philadelphia. About eleven o'clock at night the
party went from Gallagherville to Downingtown, took the
cars there after midnight, came through to Gap, where they
got off the train and went down the railroad track. About
2 A,M, they met Padgett (his name was not mentioned at
the trial). Presumably they joined him and left the rail
road at the grade crossing of a public road to Smyrna,
formerly known as the " Brown House," which stood at the
northeast coraer of the intersection, Padgett was a farm
hand at Murray's, the stone house at the top of the hill,
between Gap and Christiana on the Brown farm. The Mur-
rays had lived in Baltimore County, Md. There their local
guide led thorn, likely by or at least toward Smyrna and
through coraficlds to the Valley Road, where the " long lane "
led southward through Levi Pownall's farm to the Noble
Road, across the Valley and near to Pownall's tenant house
on the southern slope, where WiUiam Parker and his brother^
in-law Pinckney lived.

CHAPTER V.
The Defense and Defendebs,
WiUiam Parker and His Home — A Leader of His Baee and Class —
The Hero of the Fugitive Slaves and the Champion of Their Besist-
ance to Becapture — The Night Before the Fight
To those who sympathized with resistance to the execu
tion of the warrants, and rejoiced in the results of the battle
to the death made by the refugees, the hero of the event
was William Parker, His home was "where the battle
was fought," and he was then and had been long before a
leader of his race and the most resolute defender of the
runaway slaves in that section. He was a man of force and
had strong though untutored intellectual qualities. After
the war for the Union, in which he served, he inspired some
articles for the Atlantic Monthly, in 1866, from which this
story will later be amplified, and upon the occasion of a re
visit nearly forty years ago to Christiana he gave some
account of himself to old friends thereabouts.
He was bora opposite Queen Anne, in Anne Arundel
County, Maryland. His mother was Louisa Simms, who died
when he was young, and his only parental care was from his
grandmother. ' His mother was one of the seventy field hands
of Major William Brogdon, of "Rodown" plantation; and
six years after the old master died, when his sons David
and William divided his plantation and slaves, William
Parker fell to David and to his estate " Nearo," There he
had kind treatment, until slave traders came and a slave
sale occurred, followed by others with their crael and
pathetic separation of families. Then he realized the bitter
ness of slavery and the blessings of freedom. He set out for
the North by Baltimore, with hia brother as a oompanion.
27

28 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
They reached York and Wrightsville, croesed the river to
Colombia in a boat and he settled down to farm work near
Lancastor at $3 per month; while his brother moved on to
the eastern part of the County. Later William got employ
ment with Dr. Obadiah Dingee, a warm sympathizer, who
lived near Smyrna and was the father of the venerable
Charles Dingee, of West Grove nursery and rose culture
fame. While there Parker had access to anti-slavery periodi
cals and he heard William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick
Douglass speak ; he caught inspiration from them to organize
his fellows, fugitive and free, in that community to resist
recapture and repel assaults upon their race.
It has been already told, upon his own testimony, how they
operated. Parker was involved in many other affrays. In
a rescue riot on the streets of Lancaster on one occasion he
proved himself a man of great strength and valor; he was
recognized by whites and blacks as a towering figure. Daniel
Gibbons sent Eliza Ann Howard, another refugee, to Dr.
Dingee's and she became Parker's wife; her sister followed
and married his associate Alex. Pinckney, They all lived
together, and at the time the Gorsuch party came for their
slaves Parker and Pinckney were running a horse-power
threshing machine for Joseph Scarlet and George Whiteon.
Their families lived together in the tenant house, just to
the east of the "long lane" on the Levi Pownall farm, later
owned by Marion Griest, and now by Mrs. Agnes Lantz. It
was a place for frequent foregatherings of the colored people
in that day. No trace of the little old stone house is left,
but skeftches of it were made before the obliteration. The
news spread by Sam Williams of Kline's visit reached Par^
ker's house the evening before the officers. Besides Pinckney,
Josh Kite, Samuel Thompson and Abraham Johnson were
there. Sam Hopkins, who died recently, always related that
there was an applebutter boiling at Parker's that night, and
the merrymakers danced around the kettle and fire singing
a song the refrain of which was

TBS DEFEN8B AND DEFENDEBB. 29
"Take me back to Canada,
Where de' cuUud people's free."
The men named and the Parker and Pinckney sisters were
there all night at least. That the negroes were armed not
only appears from subsequent evente, but it might be in
ferred from Parker's own account of his habit. He was
long reticent as to the details of the final encounter; but
there is ample proof that of the Gorsuch slaves Noah Buley
was there very early on the day of the affray, and at least
two others of the Gorsuch slaves were on the ground soon
after. The names taken by fugitives were so uncertain
that the "Abraham Johnson" of this occasion may or may
not have been the Baltimore County freeman of that name
who fied from Gorsuch's warrant in 1849. Some of the
Gorsuch party so identified him. It is beyond doubt that the
concourse of colored men already gathered at Parker's house
when the Kline-Gorsuch squad arrived were assembled by
design, upon some call or signal ; that their leaders knew the
objective point was the arrest then and there of the Balti
more County runaways; and they soon had added force large
enough and brave enough to resist, defeat and either kill,
wound or drive off the offioers and owners.

CHAPTEB VL
The FiOHT.
The Challenge to Surrender and the Deflanee — A Long Parlqr — Tba
Prompt Besponse to a Call for Aid — The Firing Begins — Flight of
Kline and his Deputies — Gorsuch is Ellled and his Son Terribly
Wounded.
Padgett, guide and informer, led the Southern and Federal
forces to within about a quarter mile of the Parker house,
where they stopped at a little stream crossing the long lane,
ate some crackers and cheese and " fixed their ammunition,"
It was then just about daybreak; it was a heavy, foggy
morning; and Padgett found it was his time to withdraw.
As the party drew near to the short lane which led into the
house and little garden-orchard around it they were seen by
Nelson Ford and Joshua Hammond, two of the Gorsuch slaves
who had evidently been picketed. They retreated to the
house ; Gorsuch and Kline followed and the Marshal officially
announced their errand. Some inmate of the house answered
that the men called for were not there ; and when Kline, as
he testified, started to go up the stairs, followed by the elder
Gorsuch, a five-pronged fish " gig " was thrown at him ; next
came a flying axe. Neither missile hit him; he and Mr.
Gorsuch withdrew, and he says a shot was fired at them from
the house and he returned the fire. Then Kline made a feint
of sending off for a hundred men "to scare the negroes."
His bluff had that temporary effect and a parley ensued.
During this it was made manifest that a considerable number
of armed men were in Parker's house.
Meantime, on their way, the officers had heard a bugle
blown ; conjectures differed whether it was a signal from the
Parker house or a summons for the laborers on the railroad
30

THE FIOHT. 31
to go to work. The evidence on this point was not positive,
but the besieged soon sounded their horn from the upper
story. Parker is quoted as saying that Kline threatened to
bum the house, and he defied him to do it ; that Mrs. Par
ker sounded a horn which brought their allies ; and the depu
ties fired at her as she sounded it, without causing her to
desist ; that Pinckney counselled surrender, but Parker was
for fight. Parker's own accounte show no lack of self-asser
tion nor absence of self-confidence. That may or may not
enhance their credibility.
Some early summons called a mixed mob together, for
while the brief events already described were occurring,
Castner Hanway, who lived a full mUe away, rode up on a
bald-faced sorrel horse; Elijah Lewis came on foot in his
shirt sleeves and a straw hat; Zeke Thompson, the Indian
negro, arrived with a scythe in one hand and a revolver in
the other; Noah Buley rode in on a handsome gray horse and
carrying a gun ; Harvey Scott was there, weaponless ; and a
half score of others armed with guns, scythes and clubs, were
assembled — far more than the upstairs of that little cabin
could have held, even without the women. Other white
men came trooping along, who in Parker's imagination were
Gap gangsters enrolled by Kline as "special constables";
but there is no satisfactory proof that these were anybody
but residente of the vicinage attracted to the place by the
commotion. The excitement and confusion that subsequently ensued,
the quick succession of tragic events, the prompt retreat of
the officers and the almost inunediate flight from the vicinity
of their guiltiest assailante, and the fact that none of them
remained or ever returned to toll the whole story, combine to
make it difficult even now to aver with certainty what next
actually happened. It is, however, reasonably sure that
Hanway and Lewis were called upon to intorfere and aid in
executing the warranto and they declined to do so; but they

32

THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.

neither advised nor inspired any violence; nor does it appear
that they arrived on the scene by any pre-arrangement or
otherwise than from hearing that an attempt was being
made by some one to take negroes from the Parker house.
Parker says Dickinson Gorsuch opened the next stage of
the battle by firing at him in resentment of a supposed insult
to his father, and that he knocked the pistol out of Young
Gorsuch's hand before " fighting commenced in earnest," and
the outside negroes then shot both Gorsuches. Deputy Kline,
who made himself somewhat ridiculous on the witness stand,
remembered most vividly how he himself went "over the
fence and out " through the cornfield and did not very clearly
account for the fatal renewal of hostilities. Joshua Gorsuch
testified that as Edward Gorsuch started to the house in
answer to Kline's call to him to come on and get his prop
erty, his uncle was murderously assaulted with clubs and he
fired a revolver to save his kinsman, but his cap burst and
the weapon did not go off ; he was severely beaten and ran for
his life, the infuriated crowd pursuing him ; a thick felt hat
saved his life and he rode off the battlefield behind some
one on a horse, supposing Edward and Dickinson Gorsuch
were already killed; his retreat ended only at York; but it
was months before he recovered from his wounds.
Whoever else ran or stayed, the Gorsuches, father and son,
stood their ground and took the enemy's fire. Dickinson
warned the elder that they would be overpowered ; but when
the parent declined to retreat the son stayed by him until he
was himself clubbed and shot down, as he went to the rescue
of his assaulted father. Eighty shot penetrated Dickinson's
arms, thigh and body — and many of them stayed there; so
that when he died in 1882 — thirty-one years after he was
shot — his body prepared for burial was "pitted like a
sponge" with the marks of the "Christiana Riot." When
he was supposed to be dying Dickinson Gorsuch was taken
into the shade of a big oak tree, about fifty yards from where
the small lane then entered the " long lane."

THE OLO RIOT HOUSE. WTILUAM PARKER'S HOME.
THC riACC WHCK THC Wmi *M nuOHT.

THB FIOHT. 33.
Dr. Pearce was hit with a missile from an upper window;
Nathan Nelson knew and recognized Buley, one of the ran-
aways, and while, at the outset, only fifteen or twenty negroes
were lined in the lane with guns, scythes, clubs and corn
cutters, Nelson saw from seventy-five to a hundred before the
smoke of battle had entirely cleared. Sam Hopkins and his
historic corn cutter were among the later arrivals.
One of the dramatic features of the engagement was the
appearance on the field of old Isaiah Clarkson. He sum
moned fifteen or twenty infuriated and raging negroes into
the corafield and "called them to order" three times before
he could quiet them, and withhold them from violence.
Meantime old Clarkson had. seen the body of Edward Gor
such lying alone where he fell dead, clubbed, cut and pierced
with gun 'shots, his son desperately wounded; his kinsmen
beaten and driven off ; the United States deputies marshal
in full retreat — infuriated women, forgetful of all humane
instincts, revenging on a humane Christian gentleman's life
less body the wrongs their race had suffered from masters
of altogether different mould, rushed from the house and
with corn cutters and scythe blades hacked the bleeding and
lifeless body as it lay in the garden walk. At the first hear
ing Scott, the witness who afterwards swore differently on
the trial, testified that he lived with John Kerr and had
stayed at Parker's out of doors in the road sill that night,
having been persuaded to go there by John Morgan and
Henry Sims, who were armed; that he saw them both
shoot and Henry Sims shot Gh>rduch; that John Morgan
cut him in the head with a corn cutter after he fell. Dr,
Pearce stated under oath that he saw Noah Buhly ranning
past Gk>rsuch, but he could not say that Buhly did the shoot
ing. At the time Edward Gorsuch was shot he was standing
still calling his nephew Joshua and had no weapon in hia
hand. It will never he known whose shot or how many killed
3

34 THB OHBIBTIAirA BIOT.
Edward Gorsnch. More than one weapon was directed at
him and doubtless several were guilty of hia blood. It waa
not long until a consciousness of this fell upon the mob and
they scattered as rapidly as they had assembled. If the
Federal deputies had dispersed in fear and fiight and the
local authorities were slow to move, neither were the
guilty laggard in flight. By nightfall every man inmato of
Parker's house and every ranaway from Baltimore County
were on their way to Canada. Hay mows and straw stacks
weltered above the throbbing presence of trembling fugitives ;
and all the local agencies of rapid news and transportation
which were at command of the anti-slavery people were set
in motion to get and keep the accused in advance of the war
rants. Somebody tarried long enough on the Parker premises
to despoil Gorsuch's body of $300 or $400 in money, which
was on his person when he fell and which was missing at the
coroner's inquest. According to Tamsy Brown it was taken
from his body by a black man, who divided it among tiie
colored women and Abe Johnson. On a blank leaf of the
Padgett letter, heretofore printed, were found some memo
randa made by Mr. Gorsuch himself of the railroad sched
ules and names of persons in the neighborhood of the scene
of the affray, with whom it was supposed colored men resided,
together with the following :
Bobert M. Lee
John Agen Heniy H. Cline
Depatised
Marshal Kline
Lawyer Lee
and Benit
Commissioner Ingraliam
O. Biley's Telegraph
avoid Halzel
Councelman Cpt. Shntt
J. B. Henson.

THB FIOHT. 36
The significance of these entries will be recognized. No
weapons were found on the body. This of course does not
prove that Mr. Gorsuch was unarmed, as he easily might
have lost or have been despoiled of his arms, Fred Douglass
boasted that Gorsuch's pistol had been presented to him. His
family believe, and from his habite of life and temperament
it may be presumed, the elder Gorsuch was unarmed. He
depended mainly on the force of the law's warrant and, per
haps too confidently, on the nerve of the Federal deputies
marshal, Dickinson Gorsuch was soon removed to friendly shelter
and tender ministrations under the hospitable roof of Levi
Pownall's homestead. There ho learned to know that the
Quaker families of the valley, while they were considerate
of the slave, could bo no less kind to the master in distress.
Thc daily entries of his diary attest his gratitude and appre
ciation, and these he substantially manifested throughout
his lifetime. His contemporaneous portrait herein pub
lished was taken from a daguerreotype sent to the Pownall
family, Dr, Ashmer Pusey Patterson, who attended him,
was then practicing at Smyrna. He was of the Lower End
families whose names he bore. Dr. John L, Atlee, Sr,, of
Lancaster, and Dr, John Martin, of Bart, were called into
consultation. During Dickinson Gorsuch's stay in the Pownall house
hold he was visited in his convalescence by many of his Balti
more County friends and relatives. Among them were his
brother Jolm S,; his uncle Talbott Gorsuch; his sister
Mary (afterwards Mrs. Morrison) ; his cousin George and
others. It was ten days before he could eat and nearly three
weeks before he could sit up. By October 1 he could take a
short drive and was entortained next day at Ambrose Pow
nall's. When he returned home in charge of some of his
family on October 4, Dr. Patterson accompanied them as far
08 Columbia. During hia recovery he had no more popular

36 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
visitor than his friend Alex. Morrison, who subsequently
married his sister, Morrison is described by the older inhabi-
tante as one who "made friends everywhere." He kept up
his acquaintance with people about Christiana until his death
and visited there as late as 1903, He rejoiced in the establish
ment of good relations between those who had been on opposite
sides of the conflict of 1851, Dickinson Gorsuch was 56 years
old when he died, August 2, 1882.
Exactly when and how Parker, Pinckney and the fugitive
slaves got away from the neighborhood is difficult to tell with
absolute certainty ; but a surviving neighbor throws light on
their movements immediately after the affray. George
Steele, now living in Chester County (who subsequently
married Elizabeth, daughter of Levi W. Pownall), was mak
ing charcoal iron at the Sadsbury forges in 1851. He lived
near by the Parker place and recalls the evente with great
distinctness. He met some negroes coming from the scene
exultant over its results and he warned them of their serious
danger. He says Parker first came to Pownall's to arrange
for Dickinson Gorsuch's removal there, but another neighbor
was already on the way with the wounded man. Both Parker
and Pinckney remained hidden all day; the news of young
Gorsuch's serious condition brought many visitors to the
Pownall house; later in the evening Parker and Pinckney
themselves called and for the first time seemed to realize their
position. Some of the women members of the household
warned them; and, while Mrs. Povimall was nursing the
wounded man to life, she was sparing of her pantry supplies
to fill a " pillow case " with food for the fugitives ; and her
husband, under whose roof Gorsuch was receiving every kind
attention, loaned of his clothing to their disguise — all being
carried to them by George Pownall, then a boy, who was
directed to find them at a certain apple tree on the farther
side of the orchard.
At the "Riot House" the Pownalls found both Pinckney's

one AUKAIIOCR MumMIN,

A SOUTHERN VISITOR.
PMCHD AND KINSWAH OT THC OOfMUCHCa,
RCLATIOM WrTH THE KWHAU PAMItV.

WHO KfPT ur nRcnoir

THE FIOHT. 37
and Parker's loaded guns ; and they pradently buraed a lot of
letters found there, which would have incriminated some of
their neighbors in violation of the Fugitive Slave Law,
The Pownalls later received anonymous information that
Parker had reached Canada. Gorsuch himself is said to have
expressed kindly feeling for Parker, which bears out the
theory that Parker tried to stem the riot after it attained a
deadly stage.
Even they who were guiltless of their neighbor's blood were
not unmindful of the responsibility imposed upon their com
munity by the violent killing of Gorsuch and the escape of
his slayers. His dead body was taken to Christiana and lay
at Fred Zercher's hotel, where Harrar's store now is and
nearly opposite the Commemoration Monument. There a
coroner's inquest was held before noon. The main facts of
the riot were related by Kline, "Harvey" Scott (who later
recanted), and others, John Bodley and Jake Woods testi
fied that Elijah Lewis passed them in the early morning,
when they were working at James Cooper's, and that Lewis
said " William Parker's house was surrounded by kidnappers
and it was no time to take out potatoes."
The coroner's jury, summoned by Joseph D, Pownall,
Esq., consisted of George Whitson, John Rowland, E. Oa-
borne Dare, Hiram Kinnard, Samuel Miller, Lewis Cooper,
George Firth,' William Knott, John Hillis, WiUiam H.
Millhouse, Joseph Richwine and Miller Knott. Their find
ing was :
" That on the moraing of the 11th inst., the neighborhood
was thrown into an excitement by the above deceased, and
some five or rix persons in company with him, making an
attack upon a family of colored persons, living in said Town
ship, near the Brick Mill, about 4 o'clock in the moraing,
for the purpose of arresting some fugitive slaves as they
alleged, many of the colored people of the neighborhood col
lected, and there was considerable firing of gnna and other

38 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
fire-arms by both parties, upon the arrival of some of the
neighbors at the place, after the riot had subsided, found the
above deceased, lying upon his back or right side dead. Upon
a post mortem examination upon the body of the said de
ceased, made by Drs. Patterson and Martin, in our presence,
we believe he came to his death by gun shot wounds that he
received in the above mentioned riot, caused by some person
or persons to us unknown."
Dr. John Martin and Dr. A. P. Patterson reported offi
cially that Gorsuch came to his death by a gunshot wound
made by slug or heavy shot, occupying the upper part of the
right breast, and that there was an incision found near the
frontal bone, produced by a light sharp instrument, and a
fracture of the left humerus by some blunt weapon.
It must be conceded, even at this distance in time, the
jury's thermometer of popular indignation at the crime
scarcely registered above the mark of " cold neutrality,"
Scharf's history of Baltimore County states that on Sep
tember 13th and 16th meetings of citizens of Baltimore
County were held to take action in the premises, Wm, H.
Freeman, John Wethered, Samuel Worthington, Wm, Mat
thews, Wm. Taggart, John B. Pearce, Samuel H. Taggart,
Wm. Fell Johnson, Wm. H. Hoffman, Edward S. Myers,
John Merryman, and Henry Carroll were appointed a com
mittee to collect all the facts in the case and transmit them to
Governor Lowe, in order that he might lay them before the
President of the United States, Another committee, con
sisting of John B, Holmes, Levi K, Bowen, Dr, Nicholas
Hutchins, J. M. McComas, and E. Parsons, was appointed to
confer with the gentlemen who had accompanied Mr. Gor
such into Pennsylvania. A meeting at Slader's tavera, on
September 15th, passed resolutions calling upon the people
of each district of the county to elect delegates to meet at
Oockeysvillo on October 4th for the purpose of forming a
county association, and recommending the formation of di»-

THE FIOHT, 39
trict associations "for the protection of the people in their
slave and other property." An indignation meeting of six
thousand persons was held at Monument Square, Baltimore
City, on September 15th, at which Hon, John H, T. Jerome
presided, and addresses were made by Z, Collins Lee, Cole
man Yellott, Francis Gallagher, Samuel H. Taggart, and
Col, George W, Hughes,
While some of the conservative newspapers North pro
foundly deprecated the tragedy they advised a subsidence of
excitement and agitation ; but in Baltimore and further South
the pro-slavery journals displayed intense feeling. The
Washington "Republic" especially foreshadowed prosecu
tions for treason, and, a few days after the riot, said :
" One would suppose from the advice of forcible resistance,
as familiarly given by the Abolitionist, that they are quite
unaware that there is any such crime as treason recognized
by the Constitution, or punished with death by the laws of
the United States, We would remind them that not only is
there such a crime, but that there is a solemn decision of the
Supreme Court, that all who are conceraed in a conspiracy
which ripens into treason, whether present or absent from
the scene of actual violence, are involved in the same liabili
ties as the immediate actors. If they engage in the conspir
acy and stimulate the treason, they may keep their bodies
from the affray without saving their necks from the halter.
" It would be very much to the advantage of society, if an
example could be made of some of these pestilent agitators,
who excite the ignorant and reckless to treasonable violence,
from which they themselves shrink, but who are not only in
morals but in law, equally guilty and equally amenable to
punishmmt with the victims of their inflammatory oonnseL"

CHAPTER VIL
The " PoEBurr " and Abbebts.
Federal and Stete Authorities in ConiUct — "]b>ngh Biding" the
Valley — Numerous and Indiscriminate Arrests — Hearings in Ian-
caster and Committals to Philadelplda.
Whatever anybody was doing in th© way of vindicating
whatever law or laws had been violated, the perpetrators of
the killing were being allowed to escape. There were no
daily newspapers in Lancaster then and the Philadelphia
jouraals of Friday, September 12th, had very meagre ac
counte of the affair. But meantime the Federal officials in
Philadelphia and the Commonwealth authorities in Lancaster
County "got busy," Constable William Proudfoot, of Sads
bury, acted under the direction of 'Squire Pownall and Dis
trict Attorney John L. Thompson. In Philadelphia John
M. Ashmead was United States Attorney, and Anthony E.
Roberts was Marshal. When District Attoraey Thompson
made his second visit to the scene on Saturday following the
riot, accompanied by a "strong party of armed men," he
found there the United States Marshal, District Attoraey and
Commissioner " with a strong force of U. S. Marines and a
detachment of the Philadelphia police." A controversy arose
between the local District Attoraey Thompson and the United
States Attoraey Ashmead as to whether the prisoners should
be held for murder in Lancaster County, or for treason
against the United States. Commissioner Ingraham sus
tained the latter charge. The difficulty was adjusted by an
agreement that each party should make its own arrests.
Some forty-five United States Marines who went to Chris
tiana wore in command of Lieutenants Watson and Jones.
United States Marshal A, E. Roberto had a civil posse of
40

CASTNER HANWAV.
truio m» Ti«A«» un «ca«TTir.

THE " PUR8DIT " ARD ABEESTS. 41
fifty, There were county constables and deputies sheriff on
the scene. With those three detachments landed in a Httle
country village and scouring the surrounding farms, of whose
inhabitants half the many blacks had fled the State and the
other half were in hiding, and the whites mostly suspected of
sympathy with the fugitives, a local reign of terror ensued;
" the valley " was in a state worse than subjection to martial
law. The tendency of a "little brief authority" is toward
abuse of it; and the class of persons easily secured for the
service then required of temporary officers of the law was
not such as to insure delicacy of treatment or tender con
sideration for the objects against whom their summary proc
esses were directed. Whites and blacks, bond and free, were
rather roughly handled ; few households in the region searched
were safe from rude intrusion; many suffered terrifying
scenes and sounds.
Peter Woods, sole surviving sufferer and prisoner of the
occasion, was working for Joseph Scarlet when he and his
employer were arrested. He tells his story thus to the author
of this history:
"The day the fight happened I was up very early. We
were to have ' a kissing party ' that night for Henry Roberts ;
and as I wanted to get off early I asked my boss, Joe Scarlet,
if he would plough if I got up ahead and spread the manure,
I started at it at two o'clock. The moraing was foggy and dull.
About daylight Elijah Lewis's son came running to me while
I was getting my work done, and said the kidnappers were
here. They came to Ellis Irvin's. farm, and then to Milt
Cooper's which is known as the Leaman farm. The mora
ing of the riot I got there about seven or eight o'clock. I
met some of them coining out of the lane, and others were on
a run from the house, I met Hanway on a bald-faced sorrel
horse coming down the long lane, and his party with him.
The other party, the marshal and his people, took to the
spronta, licking out for all they could, and then took the

42 THE GHBUTIANA BIOT.
Noble road. There were about sixty of our fellows chasing
them. The strange party got away, I got hurt by being
kicked by a blind colt on the hip. The shooting was all
over, Gorsuch had been killed before I got there. The
Gk>rsuch party was riding away as fast as they could. I
guess I am the last man living of our party.
" When Scarlet was arrested they were rough in arresting
him. They took him by the throat, and pointed bayonete
at him all around him, I said to myself if you arrest a white
man like that, I wonder what you will do to a black boy?
The arreste were made a day or two after the riot, I was
plowing or working the ground, and when I saw the officers
come to make the arrests, I quickly got unhitched and went
towards Bushong's, and soon there was six of us together
and we went to Dr. Dingee's graveyard and hid. We heard a
racket of horses coming and then we jumped into the grave
yard. This was two days after the riot. We hung around
Wm. Rakestraw's too; and he said we could have something
to eat, but we couldn't stay around there. Then they got us.
They asked George Boone and James Noble who we are.
The man with the mace, the marshal I guess, said *I got a
warrant for Peter Woods.' They pointed me out and then
he strack me and then they tried to throw me. They ar
rested me and took me up a fiight of stairs, and then they tied
me. Then they started away with me and tried to get me
over a fence. They had me tied around my legs and around
my breast, and they put me in a buggy and took me to
Christiana. From there they took me to Lancaster, and put
me first in the old jail and then in the new prison."
The accuracy of Woods' narrative is attested by the his
torical record that at that very time the new Lancaster County
prison was just ready for occupancy. The first prisoners
were transferred to it on the day immediately following the
riot — September 12, 1851.
Woods' further story of what occurred at Christiana has

THE " PUEBUIT " AND ABBEBTS. 43
all the marks of verity: " There at Christiana was [David]
Paul Brown and Thad. Stevens and Mr. Black. They had
quarters in ' Old Harrar's ' store. We did not know who they
were counsel for, and we thought they were threatening us,
and trying to make us give away ourselves, Thad, Stevens
or some one said to me: 'Who do you live with?' They
had just brought me down from the Harrar garret, and'Frfed
Zercher was there. Mr. Brown then asked me again how I
got up there into that garret, who put me there? I made
up my mind not to talk, and Brown said, * If you don't tell
we will send you to jail.' Then a mutiny broke out there.
George Boone and Proudfoot and others got in it. George
commenced striking and I got knocked over. Boone was
taking my part,"
Arreste were numerous and somewhat indiscriminate and
the charges varied, some relating to State and others to
Federal laws, and many of them involving capital crimes and
death penalties. All of them called for appearances and
preliminary hearings before J. Franklin Reigart, Esq,, an
alderman of Lancaster City, He was a cousin of the late
Emanuel C, Reigart, Esq., and mingled the pursuits of let
ters and law. His handsome picture in lithograph is the
frontispiece of his somewhat bizarre biography of Robert
Fulton, now something of a curio, once the oraament of
many centre tables in Lancaster County.
Alderman Reigart was kept busy for some time issuing
warrante and having hearings that attracted great attention,
numerous and distinguished lawyers and ever increasing
popular interest Among those taken into custody were
Elijah Lewis, storekeeper at Cooperville; Joseph Scarlet,
farmer and dealer; Castner Hanway, miller at the "Red
Mill"; Janqes Jackson, farmer; Samuel Kendig, all whito;
and a large nuniber of colored men and women, among them,
William Brown and William Brown, 2d, Ezekiel Thompson,
Daniel Canlsberro, Emanuel Smith, John Dobbins, Lewis

44 THB OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
Jamea Christman, Elijah Clark, Benjamin Pendegresa,
Jonathan Black, Samuel Hanson, Mifflin Flanders, Wilson
Jones, Francis Hawkins, Benjamin Thompson, John Halli-
day, Elizabeth Mosey, John Morgan, boy, Joseph Benn,
John Norton, Lewis Smith, George Washington, Harvey
Scott, Susan Clark, Tamsy Brown, Eliza Parker, Hannah
Pinckney, Robert Johnston, Miller Thompson, Isaiah Clark
son and Jonathan Black, The officers claimed to have cap
tured on the persons or premises of some of them heavily
charged guns, dirks and clubs.
The examination of the persons charged before Alderman
Reigart for complicity in the affair began in the old Lancas
ter County Court House, in Centre Square, on Tuesday, Sep
tember 23, at 11 o'clock A.M. The appearances at this hear
ing for the prosecution were Attorney General R. T. Brent, of
Maryland, John M. Ashmead, United States Attorney, Dis
trict Attoraey John L. Thompson, Colonel William B. Ford-
ney and Attorney General Thomas E. Franklin. For the de
fense, Thaddeus Stevens, George Ford, O. J. Dickey and
George M. Kline appeared.
The testimony of Dr. Pearce, Miller Knott and Deputy
Marshal Kline was relied upon to m^e out a prima facie
case. It was at this hearing George Washington Harvey
Scott, a colored man (who subsequently changed his testi
mony in Philadelphia, and swore he was not even at Par
ker's), testified that he saw Henry Sims shoot Edward Qor-
such, and that John Morgan afterwards cut him on the head
with a com cutter. Lewis Cooper testified that John Long,
colored, was on his premises the evening before the occur
rence "giving notice." He was with Henry Reynolds.
Long was described as a dark mulatto, five and one-half feet
high, and of slender make. The District Attorney argUed that
the offense was treason, and asked that the persons be com
mitted to answer at the Circuit Court of the United States.
Mr. Stevens made the opening speech before the Alderman,

THB PUBSUIT " AND AEEESTS. 46
claiming that the defendant prisoners, especially Lewis and
Hanway, had not been identified as criminals or offenders;
he dwelt upon the local kidnappings that had occurred in the
night time, and charged William Bear and Perry Marsh
with participation in these offenses ; he produced many wit
nesses to the affair and to prove an alibi for some of the
colored men, especially John Morgan, and nothing worse
than inaction by Hanway and Lewis.
The women were all discharged; and some of the men.
The names of those who were remanded to Philadelphia to
await trial in the Federal Conrte for treason, together with
some others subsequently held, and some indicted in their
absence and never apprehended, will be found in the report
of the trial later in this history. James Jackson, father of
William Jackson, now of Christiana was so well known to
Marshal Roberts that he waa released "on parole," though
subsequently indicted for treason. Mrs, Parker and Mrs.
Pinckney left the vioinity and made their way to their hu»-
bands in Canada.

CHAPTER VnL
Thb Politioal Aftebmath.
Partisans Qniek to Make Capital out of the Oecurreneo — The Demo
crats Aggressive — The "SUver Grays'? Apologetic, and the "Wool^
Heads" on the Defensive — EiTeet of the Christiana Incident on tha
October Elections.
Thaddeus Stevens in September, 1851, was serving his
second term as Representative of the Lancaster County dis
trict As an anatgonist of Southern ideas relating to
slavery, he " strode dovra the aisles " of the House with a good
deal more erectness of bearing than Ingersoll in his famous
nominating speech ascribed to the "Plumed Knight" from
Maine; and he struck the shield of his adversaries with a
much louder ring than was given out at the impact of Mr,
Blaine's lance. To his individual and official view — law or
no law, constitution or no constitution — slavery was "a
violation of the rights of man as a man" — freedom was the
law of nature. Like Mirabeau, " he swallowed all formulas."
But he was a lawyer, as well as a politician and moralist, and
while he announced his "unchangeable hostility to slavery
in every form in every place," he also avowed his "deter^
mination to stand by all the compromises of the constitution
and carry them into faithful effect" — much as he disliked
some of them, they were not "now open for consideration,"
nor would he disturb them. This again was practically an
admission of the abstract legal right of the master to re
claim the fugitive,
Mr, Stevens was first elected to Congress in 1848, when
Gen, Zachariah Taylor was elected President, and when he
died (July 9, 1850), and Fillmore, Vice President and a
Northera Whig, succeeded him, Stevens had been elected to
a second term, which lasted until March 4, 1863,
46

the POLITICAL AFTERMATH. 47
In those " good old days" a Congressman had some in
fluence in the matter of Federal appointments. The United
States Marshal, who executed warrants and picked jurors in
Eastern Pennsylvania, was Stevens' personal and political
friend, Anthony E. Roberts. Mr, Roberts, who was a native
of Chester County, was then 48 years of age and long a promi
nent citizen of New Holland. He had been sheriff of Lan
caster County elected in 1839 as an avowed anti-Masonic
candidate, favored by Stevens, He was with him an active
anti-Mason and was a candidate for Congress in 1843, but
was beaten by Jeremiah Brown, President Taylor ap
pointed him Marshal in 1849, and he filled the office until
the incoming of Pierce's administration.
The Intelligencer and Journal, then edited by George
Sanderson, was the regular organ of the Democratic party
in Lancaster County. It was a wfiekly publication, and at
that time a vigorous and exciting campaign for the State
election in October was in progress. Col, William Bigler of
Clearfield County was the Democratic nominee for Goveraor ;
General Seth Clover of Clarion County for Canal Commis
sioner, and for Judges of the Supreme Court the first ticket
presented by the Democratic party under the new elective sys
tem bore the illustrious names of Jeremiah S, Black, Somer
set; James Campbell, Philadelphia; Ellis Lewis, Lancaster;
John B, Gibson, Cumberland, and Walter H Lowrie,
Allegheny. The Whig County organ was the Lancaster Examiner and
Herald, published and edited by Edward 0. Darlington, who
was a conspicioua leader of what was then known as the
"Silver Gray" faction of his party — being opposed by the
more aggressive anti-slavery men, of whom Thaddeus Stevens
was the leader, and whose followers were derisively styled
"Woolly Heads." The candidates of the Whig party on
the State ticket were: for Governor, William F. Johnston,
Armstrong Connty (a candidate for rfr«Ieotion) ; for Canal

48 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
Commissioner, John Strohm, of Lancaster County, and for
Judges of the Supreme Court, Richard Coulter, Westmore
land; Joshua W, Comly, Montour; George Chambers,
Franklin; William M, Meredith, Philadelphia, and William
Jessup, Susquehanna.
The fact that the entire Supreme Court membership, then
numbering five, was to be elected, greatly increased populw
interest in the result Pennsylvania was an October State.
The Darlington faction of the Whig party was in the ascend
ancy and Darlington himself was on the ticket for Senator.
Moses Pownall, of Sadsbury Township, was one of the Whig
candidates for the Assembly. The regular Democratic Coun
ty ticket had not yet been nominated, but the opponents of
Mr. Buchanan, who were stigmatized as disorganizers and
" Frazer Ponies," had named a County ticket.
The first local publications of the tragic occurrences in the
Chester Valley appeared respectively in the Intelligencer of
September 16 and the Examiner of September 17, and their
local reports of the affair are illustrative not only of the lag
gard journalistic enterprise of that day, but of the intense
partisanship which characterized newspaper management,
colored the reports of news occurrences and generally per
vaded all journalistic work. The Intelligencer's account of
the affair was printed under a Columbia correspondent's
" Particulars of the Horrible Negro Riot and Murder," and
the editoral additions to this report commented on the dis
graceful conduct of the "Abolition Whig Governor, absent
ing himself from the seat of goverament " on an electioneer
ing tour, while riots and bloodshed prevailed throughout the
Commonwealth, and citizens of an adjoining State were
"murdered in our midst." All these outrages, it charged,
could be traced to the Executive of the Commonwealth —
Governor Johnston was then serving his first regular term —
"roaming about in quest of votes, instead of being at his
post to enforce the utmost rigor of the law against the whito
and black murderers."

"AFTER THE WAR "
lAMtT NClLV* WITH THC VDVMQUT 4M.AT OIUHDCHIIjD OT COWARD OOMUOH.

THB POLITICAL AFTEBMATH, 49
Further down the same column the editor rejoiced that
Hanway and Lewis and nine negro accessories had been ar
rested and were in prison awaiting trial for murder. Dis
trict Attorney John L. Thompson and Alderman J. Frank
lin Reigart were warmly praised for "ferreting out and
arresting the guilty ones," while the deposition of Deputy
Marshal H. H. Kline was presented as a most satisfactory
accoimt of the "whole transaction."
The Examiner promptly declared it to be a "dreadful
tragedy " and " one of the most horrid murders ever perpe
trated in this County or State." Manifestly with one eye
upon the political consequences to the State and local Whig
ticket, and the other toward the Abolition faction of the
Whig party, to which Editor Darlington was opposed, his
newspaper frankly admitted that an awful responsibility
rested somewhere, and the Examiner believed it to be "our
duty to speak loudly and distinctly to those individuals who
evidently have urged the blacks to this horrid measure." It
deprecated aU attempts " to make political capital out of the
Sadsbury treason and murder by connecting Governor Johns
ton's name with that melancholy affair. Intelligent readers
will regard such efforts with feelings of disgust and contempt"
But for the whito persons imder arrest and charged with
murder and treason, it had no condonation. " Their passions
had been infiamed by Abolition harangues and incendiary
speeches franked by members of Congress until they had
come to look upon treason to the laws of their country as a
moral duty, and upon murder as not a crime." It declared
that this was especially perceptible and prevailing in Sads
bury and the eastern end of Bart; it recalled with special
disapprobation the public meeting held at Georgetown, when
the Griest resolutions were passed.
Much indignation was expressed hj his political opponento
that Goveraor Johnston, passing through Christiana on hia
4

50 THE OHBUTIANA BIOT.
way from Harrisburg to Philadelphia, on a campaign tour,
the morning of the affair, did not get off hia train at Christi
ana where lay the dead body of the Marylander, slain on
Pennsylvania soil ; though many other passengers did so and
the train stopped almost at the place where the inquest was
to be held.
Democratic campaign meetings held throughout the County
were quick to turn their sails to catch the currento of popu
lar opinion and at an assemblage in Columbia, on September
13th, N, B. Wolfe, M.D., later a famous citizen of Cincin
nati, Ohio, principal speaker, denounced " the horrid murder
of Gorsuch" "by a band of desperate negroes excited and
influenced by murderous Abolitionists whose reeking hands
are still smoking with the warm life's blood of a fellow
citizen." A committee of conspicuous Democrats in Philadelphia,
including Hon. John Cadwalader, James Page, John W,
Forney, A. L. Roumfort, Charles Ingersoll, Joseph Swift
and others, in an "open letter," loudly demanded of the
Governor that he act for the vindication of the Common
wealth and called a public indignation meeting of citizens
in Independence Square. The Goveraor responded with a
rather tart letter and offered $1,000 reward for the arrest of
the murderers. (See Addenda.)
The Intelligencer continued to comment on the tragedy
as " the legitimate f rait of the policies pursued by Goveraor
Johnston and Thaddeus Stevens." In criticized Johnston
very severely for having passed Christiana without institut
ing any " measures to bring the murderers to justice " before
proceeding on his way; for making political speeches "in
stead of seeing that the perpetrators of treason against the
government and the most bloody murder ever committed in
this State were brought to justice." Governor Johnston was
at Ephrata and New Holland on the following Saturday,
he came to Lancaster on Saturday night, left at midnight

THB POtlTIOAIi AFTEBMATH. 51
for Philadelphia, and arrived there about five o'clock A, M,
Meantime Rev. J. S. Gorsuch, son of Edward Gorsuch and
brother of Dickinson, wrote to the Baltimore Sun an account
of the tragedy, which was copied into the Intelligencer and
other Northera papers as an accurate statement.
Subsequently he published an open letter to Goveraor
Johnston, arraigning him for a lack of official promptness
which resulted in the slaves and murderers of his father
escaping. He recalled that Johnston had refused to honor
a requisition from the Goveraor of Maryland for the free
negro, Abe Johnson, who had received the stolen wheat, and
he declares that that same Johnson whose return was refused
by the Governor, was present aJ; the riot. He proceeded to
contrast Johnston's tardiness with " the decision, energy and
promptness of the Lancaster County officers," who, he said,
" had to collect a posse of men from iron works and diggings
on the railroad " to enforce the processes of the law.
The newspapers report that Alderman Reigart was "re
ceiving much commendation in the Southern press for the
ability and firmness with which he discharged his duties as
the committing magistrate." In the Baltimore Sun of Oc
tober 8, Rev, J, S, Gorsuch had another open letter, this time
to Attoraey General Thomas E. Franklin. Gorsuch had un
dertaken to criticise Goveraor Johnston without in any way
condemning his Attoraey General. Mr. Franklin had vin
dicated his chief, by declaring that he had done his full
duty, and as his legal adviser the Attoraey General accepted
all the responsibility for the Governor's conduct
The general tondency of the agitation undoubtedly was to
depress the campaign proepecto of the Whigs. Even Phila
delphia was extremely conservative and desperately anxious
to not lose the trade of the SoutL Bigler carried the State,
receiving 186,499 votes to 178,034 for Johnston, More than
that slender majority could he accounted for by the Christi
ana riot In Lancaster Connty the vote on Goveraor was:

52 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
Democrat, 6,226, Whig, 11,064, What might have happened
had Mr, Stovens been a candidato for Congresa cannot now be
calculated. He had been re-elected in 1850, receiving 9,665
votes, to 6,464 for Shaeffer, In 1852 he was not a candidate.
The late Hon, Isaac E, Hiester was nominated by the " Silver
Gray Whigs," and received 8,840 votes, to 6,466 for Sample,
the candidate of the Democratic opposition. In 1854 Stevens
was not a candidate, but revenged himself on Hiester by
running Anthony E. Roberts, the same who had been U. S,
marshal during the Christiana riots. There was a three-
cornered fight during that year. Pollock, Whig candidate
for Governor, had the support of the Know Nothings, and
defeated Bigler by 37,007 majority. Lefevre was the third
candidate for Congress in Lancaster County, and divided
both the Roberta and Hiester vote, with the result that
Roberts received 6,561, Hiester 5,371 and Lefevre 4,266.
By this time the new Republican party was organized; the
Silver (Jray Whigs went out of the fight; Roberts, Whig, and
Hiester, Opposition, were again the candidates, and, although
Buchanan carried Lancaster County by a plurality of 2,123
above Fremont and 4,139 above Fillmore, Roberts was elected
to Congress, receiving 10,001 votes to Holster's 8,320. In
1858 Stevens again became a candidate for the 36th Congress,
and was elected over James M. Hopkins, by the foUowing
vote : Stevens, 9,513 ; Hopkins, 6,341. The latter had been
one oi the jury in " the treason trial " and had some support
from Stevens' Whig opponents. Stevens, however, got some
Democratic aid. Thenceforth the power of Darlington and
"the Silver Grays" was broken; Republicanism was in the
local ascendancy with Stevens as its leader ; he never lost his
control until his death — ^hia last nomination being conferred
upon him by popular vote when his body was encoffined, the
ballots having been printed before he died.
If the effect of the agitation elected Bigler, it strengthened
the Buchanan wing of the Democratic party, whose choice

THE POLITICAL AFTEBMATH. 53
the Governor-elect was. If it was not able to control the
National convention of 1852, it succeeded in defeating Cass,
who was Buchanan's chief rival, and thus was helped the
nomination of the Lancaster County candidate for Presi
dency in 1856. Though Bigbr was defeated for a second
Gubernatorial term, he was elected United States Senator in
1855. The election of four Democratic Supreme Court
Judges in Pennsylvania in 1851 was one of the results of the
Christiana riot, James Campbell, alone of the Democratic
nominees was defeated. He was a Catholic and the Know
Nothing opposition to him centred upon Coulter, and electod
him; he had been on the bench 1846-7; Campbell became
Postmaster General under Pierce,
Meantime the dead body of Edward (Jorsuch was taken by
rail to Columbia, and via York on the Northera Central
Railroad, to Monkton, where a throng of mourning neigh
bors met it and great local excitement prevailed. There being
no convenient hearse and the distance too long for pall
bearers, it was carried by the four-horse team of Eliphalet
Parsons to Mr. Gorsuch's home. There, after a brief service
by Rev. Vinton, it was committed to a family burying ground,
where the body has rested undisturbed for sixty years. This
private graveyard on the Gorsuch farm is located on an
eminence in the midst of a fine orchard of apple trees, and
overlooking the wide expanse of country to the southwest
and traversed by Piney Run, a tributary to the Gunpowder,
The graveyard is about twenty-five by thirty-five feet, sur
rounded by a massive stone wall, without any gate or en
trance. The former opening to it was walled. up by direc
tion of and with a legacy left for that purpose by a son
Thomas. There remain three low gravestones, of uniform
pattern, the central one of which has the initials "£. G."
The occupanto of the other two graves are unknown, and
there is nothing to indicato who they were. Rev. John S.
Gorsnch, aon of Edward and who was very oonspicnons in

54 THB . OHBISTIANA BIOT.
the agitation over his killing, was formerly buried in this
graveyard, but his remains have been removed therefrom.
He died at 32 of typhoid fever the Mareh after his father, and
while attending a M,E. conference. The little graveyard
is overgrown with myrtle. Human hands have not desecrated
it in any way, but there is evidence that the gnawing teeth of
rodent vandals have been at work on the graves.

'W^

iniHMi*^"*"*

¦ li.'/

f. '<

Xo

CHAPTER IX.
Before the Tbial.
Popular Discussion Precedes the Arraignment — Legal Questions Baised
by Eminent Lawyers — Jndge Kane takes High Ground Against
Treason — The Selection of the Jury — A Bepresentative PaneL
Pending the arraignment of the prisoners in the United
States Court for treason, the affair was made the subject of
extended popular discussion. Fiery Southern journals and
orators reflected the views that had been early expressed by
Goveraor Lowe to President Fillmore, for his own State of
Maryland, that if slave owners could not without incurring
the risk of death pursue their property North and reclaim it.
Secession and Disunion were inevitable. Quite as fierce and
fiery champions of Abolitionism retorted with equal, fervor
and contempt for a league with iniquity and a covenant with
slavery, and for a "flaunting lie" that flung the banner of
freedom over a human race in chains. The large mass of
conservative citizens stood for both law and liberty; and
heard with sympathetic ears Webster's great and eloquent
pleas for "Liberty and Union — one and inseparable,"
Joshua R, Giddings, in a speech at Worcestor, in the early
part of November, before the trial, publicly rejoiced in the
killing of XJorsuch and that the fugitives " stood up manfully
in defense of their Gh>d-given righto and shot down the
miscreante, who had come with the desperato purpose of
taking them again to the land of slavery."
It ia a notable coincidence that just at this tinie the
National Era, an Abolition paper in Washington, D. C,
editod by Gamaliel Bailey, waa beginning to publish as a
weekly serial the first and copyrighted edition of "Unde
Tom's Cabin." Neither the authoress nor the general reading
65

56 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
public then appreciated the power and interest of the work,
nor until it appeared later in book form.
The rashness of the Gorsuches in incurring danger and
inviting death by venturing into an unfriendly country for
an unpopular cause, was cited in mitigation of the indict
ment against a whole community for lawlessness. The
blunders of the Deputy Marshal in giving his official errand
the aspect of a warlike incursion was urged as a reasonable
explanation for what was charged as popular indifference in
the locality toward a dark crime.
Withal lawyers and laymen found subject for protracted
discussion in the vexed question as to whether it was " trea
son " ; and what degree of opposition or what extent of resist
ance to law constituted this high crime of such infrequent
occurrence. The cases of the Whiskey Insurrectionists in Western Penn
sylvania, and Aaron Burr's trial at Richmond, Virginia, had
almost faded from popular memory. But there were those
in Eastern Pennsylvania who recalled some of the echoes of
the Fries treason case ; and its analogies with the impending
trial of nearly forty Lancaster County people were curiously
scanned by legal pundits on the Court House benches and by
local sages on the countiy store boxes.
The case of United States vs. John Fries arose out of the
opposition of the Pennsylvania Germans in Bucks, North
ampton and Berks Counties to the collection of a direct
Federal tax known as " The House Tax." Assessors had to
measure houses to levy the tax. Hostile public meetings were
held at which John Fries threatened and encouraged armed
resistance to the tax. Armed and with martial music he and
his followers paraded the public highways, intimidating
tax officials, denouncing Congress and the government as
"damned rogues," etc. Fries had two trials, in both of
which he was found guilty of treason and sentenced to be
hanged. He was subsequently pardoned by President John

HON. JOHN K. KANE.
DTATI* OWTWCT iUDOl AT THff TWI OV THC T1IIA0OR T*AU.

BEFOBE THE TBIAL. 67
Adams. He was originally tried and convicted before Judges
Iredell and Peters, in 1799; and his case is reported in 3
Dallas (Fed. Court Rep.), 515.
As early as November 18, 1850, Hon. John K. Kane,
United States District Judge at Philadelphia, had charged
the Grand Jury at some length — and not without consider
able personal feeling in relation to the State of Pennsylvania
statutes — on the subject of the Fugitive Slave Law. Judge
Kane had been District Attoraey and he was Attorney Gen
eral of Pennsylvania under Goveraor Shunk from Jan. 21,
1845, to June 23, 1846. His appointment as Attorney Gen
eral was offensive to Mr. Buchanan.
Notwithstanding the Supreme Court of the United States
in the Prigg case had intimated that legislation of this char
acter was for the Federal Government and not for the State,
Judge Kane severely reprehended the Pennsylvania Act of
1847, which repealed the acts of 1826 and 1827, delegating
to State authorities the right to issue warrants for fugitives ;
he declared the new Fugitive Slave Law of Congress to be
little different from the Pennsylvania statute of 1826, and
he depicted the results of the Pennsylvania law in these
rather lurid terms: "Fanatics of civil discord have, mean
while, exulted in the fresh powers of harm with which this
state of things invested them; and the country has been
convulsed in ite length and breadth, as if about to be rent
asunder, and tossed in fragmente, by the outbursting of a
volcano." He went on to say that the new Federal law must be
obeyed, and the penalties for violating it were to be enforced
without fear, favor or affection. He referred to his district
aa a community which had suffered in reputation and repose
"from crimes of excitement, turbulence and force," and in
veighed against disobedience to a statnto, obstracting officers
of the law and deeds of violent resistance against them.
The language of this charge, and his well-known viewi on

58 THB OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
the legal and political aspecte of the question, did not afford a
very encouraging outlook for those who were to be tried be
fore him or in his court. These very natural apprehenaiouB
were increased, when his charge to the grand jury followed on
September 29, 1851. He briefly reviewed the reportod facte
of the Christiana affair, and though he avowed entire free
dom from any impressions of the guilt or innocence of the
accused, he pointed to the charges made against them as suffi
cient to establish the crime of treason if they were duly
proved. He also pointed out that as the offence of treason
was not triable in his Court, and though the grand jury then
empanelled could not take cognizance of the indictments,
his learaed brother of the Supreme Court, the Hon. Robert
C. Grier, who presided in this circuit, would sit on the trial
of the cause. Justice Grier* was a Pennsylvanian, appointed
by President Tyler in 1844, to succeed Henry R, Baldwin,
deceased. The result of the submission to the Grand Inquest for
the United States inquiring for the Eastern District of Penn
sylvania to the August Term, 1851, was that they found trae
bills for treason against the following persons, which indict
ments were, on October 6, 1851, remitted from the District
Court to the Circuit Court :
1. Castner Hanway, 20, Collister Wilson,
2. Joseph Scarlet. 21. John Jackson,
3. Elijah Lewis. 22. William Brown.
4, James Jackson. 23. Isaiah Clarkson.
5. George Williams. 24. Henry Sims.
6. Jacob Moore. 25, Charles Hunter,
'It may not be rememlwred generally tliat Mr. Justice Qrier resigned
from the XJ. 8. Supreme Court, to take effect February 1, 1870. On
December 20, 1869, President Orant sent to the Senate the appointment
of Ex-Secretary Edwin M. Stanton to succeed him. On a vote to confirm
Stanton there were 46 yeas and 11 nays. He was commissioned the
same day, to take effect February 7, 1870. He died betoie that time
and Hon. WiUiam Strong, of Pennsylvania, was appointed.

BEFOBE THE TBIAL. 59
7. George Reed. 26. Lewis Gates,
8. Benjamin Johnson. 27. Peter Woods,
9. Daniel Caulsberry. 28. Lewis Clarkson,
10, Alson Pernsley. 29. Nelson Carter,
11. William Brown, 2nd. 30, William Parker,
12. Henry Green. 31, John Berry,
13. Elijah Clark, 82, William Berry.
14.. John HoUiday, 33, Samuel Williams.
16, WilHam Williams, 34, Josh Hammond.
16, Benjamin Pindergast 35, Henry Curtis.
17. John Morgan, 36, Washington Williams.
18. Ezekiel Thompson. 37, William Thomas,
19, Thomas Butler. 38, Nelson Ford,
The District Attorney then moved for a venire to issue
to the marshal, who was commanded to return 108 jurors, of
whom at least 12 were to be summoned and returned from Lan
caster County, where the offenses charged were perpetrated.
The selection of jurors for this trial, under all the condi
tions we have tried to sketch impartially, was a delicate and
difficult task for Marshal Roberts — in view of his well-
known political opinions and of his personal and partisan
affiliations with Thaddeus Stevens, chief counsel for the de
fense from start to finish. The character and associations of
the members of the panel may be gathered to some extent
even now from the attitude assumed toward them by counsel
on either side. In a subsequent chapter will be briefiy epito
mized the disposition made of those whose names were called.
Keeping it in mind, the author, from a large historical ac
quaintance with the leading men of that period in the coun
ties of the Stato from which this panel waa chosen, does not
hesitato to say that it was high above the average in intolli-
gence and all other requisitos for important jury service;
that it was eminently representative and an altogether fit and
fair enrollment This opinion is not only now justified, bnt
it i> fairly demanded hj reason of the oriticism Attorney

60 THB OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
General Brent made in his report to Maryland's Governor
upon the disadvantage to which the prosecution was sub
jected in the personnel of the venire.
During their stay in Moyamensing the prisoners suffered
for a time from lack of heat and ventilation until conditions
were remedied. Some of them were confined in the Debtors'
Apartments, Witnesses deemed necessary to be held were
detained by the Government under pay of $1.25 per day to
them. Petor Woods relates that Ezekiel Thompson and
Henry Sims engaged so frequently in loud prayer that out
siders were attracted to the prison walls to listen to them
from the adjoining sidewalks. By November 15th it tran
spired that two witnesses, Peter Washington and John Clark,
detained in the Debtors' Apartments, had escaped. David
Paul Brown said one of them was important for his client
Joseph Scarlet, while the United States was insistent that it
needed them also. Mr. Brent finds cause for suspicion and
complaint in the allegation that they got out without breaking
a lock through inside treachery, of which he "cheerfully"
acquite Marshal Roberts; but neither throughout nor after
the trial does Mr. Brent present himself as an altogether
cheerful person.

"zeke" THOMPSON,
KnOWN AC **THC IMNAH MIOBO" W Tl-C CMWmAM MOT

CHAPTER X.
"The Teeason Teialb,"
Differences of Opinion Among Counsel for the Oovemment — A Bril
liant Array of Lawyers — Selecting Twelve Men, "Good and True,"
from a Large Venire — The Prisoners Arraigned and Pleas Entered.
In the so-called official report of the Castner Hanway
trial, which involved the final disposition of all the treason
cases, it is fitly stated by the author and editor that "the
ability which marked the trial throughout, the patient atten
tion of the judges, the eloquence and learning of the Counsel,
and the full examination of every matter of fact and law in
any manner involved, gave to the trial a deep and abiding
importance, such as will make its perusal interesting to the
general reader, and of indispensable use to the Legal Pro
fession," It is not to be expected, however, that a detailed
report of these proceedings or a presentation of their technical
aspect falls within the scope or prescribed limits of this
sketeh. Those desirous of perusing them can get access to
Mr, Robbins' report in many libraries ; lawyers will find the
case reported for their special benefit in Vol, II of Wallace's
Report of Circuit Court Cases for the Third District, pp.
134r-208, The report of Attoraey General Brent and the
message of Goveraor Lowe, in the Maryland Stato Docu-
mente, 1852, constituto an interesting history of the facts
and valuable discussion of the law; and Mr, Jackson's reply
undoubtedly correcto and modifies some of the impressions
that the complainto of the Marylanders would tend to creato.
Even onteide of these quasi-official documento there remain
signs that there was some division of counsel, if not conflict
of opinion, among those engaged in the prosecution as to the
most expedient course to take and the more effective remedy
61

62 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
to apply to the broken law. Whatever the private opinion of
U, S, District Attoraey Ashmead may have been, his presen
tation of the case and his entire part in the trial evinced no
lack of preparation or ability and no want of sincerity in the
Government's cause. He shrank from no responsibility that
his position imposed. He was, moreover, the direct represen
tative of the Law Department of the FiUmore administra
tion. His chief was Attorney General John J. Crittenden
and Daniel Webster was the premier of that Cabinet There
was at that time no " Department of Justice " as now organ
ized; there was simply the office of the Attorney General,
and an investigation of the archives of the Department fails
to disclose anything whatever with respect to the affray or
the trials. There is, however, authority for the statement
that the final determination to prosecute for treason was made
by Webster and Crittenden, who concluded and advised " that
even if a conviction were not obtained, the effect of the trial
would be salutary in checking Northern opposition to the
enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act."
Some question of professional etiquette arose between
counsel who appeared for the State of Maryland and those
who represented the United States by direct employment for
the Government. Mr. Brent reports that this was " satis
factorily adjusted in a personal interview" with Mr. Ash
mead. He further says:
"This gentleman, in the presence of the Hon. James
Cooper, tendered to me the position of leading counsel in
these trials, which I promptly declined, on the ground that I
never had claimed such precedence for myself, as well as on
grounds of policy and expediency for the prosecution.
" It was then agreed that the Hon. James Cooper, of Penn
sylvania (the distinguished colleague associated with me for
the State of Maryland), should occupy the position of leading
counsel, which he did with fidelity and signal ability. I
will here take occasion to remark that, however unfortunato

^/

MHN W. A8HMIAD.
¦U. : ATTOSMT «•« OOMUOTtS Tw »«tttoimo«.

"the TEEASON TBIALB," 63
the preliminary difficulty between Mr, Ashmead and myself,
and however prejudicial it may have been to the development
of the evidence, by preventing that early interchange of views
and information, which was necessary to a thorough prepa
ration of these important cases, yet I received during the
trial every social and professional courtesy at the hands of
that gentleman, and he was at all times prompt to act upon
any suggestion which might be made by either Mr, Cooper
or myself."
Whatever may have been the nature of their difficulties
or the character of their settlement, there was a good deal of
"girding" during the trial from the defense at the relations
of the various opposing counsel ; and there was some recrimi
nation after the Government's defeat over the responsibility
for what ite representatives thought was a miscarriage of
justice. When the lawyers were finally lined up the record
showed these appearances: U. S. Atty. J. W. Ashmead,
G, L. Ashmead and J, R. Ludlow represented the Unitod
States: R J, Brent, Attorney (Jkneral of Maryland, James
Cooper, a Senator of the United States for Pennsylvania,
and R. M. Lee, of Philadelphia, appeared as special counsel;
Mr, Brent by order of the Goveraor of Maryland, of which
State Mr. Gorsuch was a citizen; Mr. Cooper and Lee also
private counsel of Mr, Gorsuch's relatives: For the prisoner,
J. J. Lewis, of West Chester, Th. Stevens, of Lancaster, John
M. Read, T. A. Cuylcr and W. A. Jackson, of Philadelphia.
David Paul Brown also sat at the prisoners' counsel table;
he appeared for Joseph Scarlet, whose case, with that of
others, depended on the result of Hanway's trial.
Most of these names will be remembered by the general
reader as already eminent or soon to so become. The Ash-
meads were notably able lawyers; Mr. Brent had high pro
fessional position ; James Cooper was then United States Sen
ator, from Pennsylvania ; Ludlow lator became a member of
the Philadelphia jndieiary; Lewis of West Chester and Ste-

64 THE OHBISTIANA BIOT.
vens of Lancastor were leaders of their respective connty
bars, John M, Read was lator to be a member of the Su
preme Court of Pennsylvania, Theo, A. Cnyler was long
one of the foremost of Philadelphia's lawyers. Mr. Jackson,
junior counsel and historian of the defense, died Jan. 10,
1857, aged 29, and after less than six years his pronusing
career ended.
The trial was held in the second story room of old Inde
pendence Hall and sentimental iste speculated as to whether
the cause of Law or of Liberty would prevail in a historic
building consecrated to both these vital principles of organ
ized society. It had been refitted for the occasion with new
gas fixtures and special ventilating devices. The opening day
did not attract the concourse that thronged the chamber
and corridors as the trial progressed, but the seating capacity
of the room was fully occupied.
Court opened at 11 A.M. Monday, November 24, 1851.
Seventy-eight jurors answered; and Judge Grier ordered a
call of the defaulters under promise of a $100 fine to those
who were in default until next morning. Jurors called and
some missing then began with one accord to make excuse.
Before the session adjourned eighty-one answered and it ap
peared that nineteen had been previously excused. Arrange
ments were made for reporting the proceedings; there was
some discussion over the impanelling of the jurors, but
nobody was disposed to quash or continue ; the prisoner, Cast
ner Hanway, was arraigned and pleaded. The questions
to jurors were framed upon the replies to which challenges
were to be based; and the first juror, David George, was
called on the second day of the trial.
Thence the selection of jurors proceeded imtil twelve men
were secured satisfactory to both sides. This occupied the
Court until Wednesday evening. Next day being Thanks
giving the trial was adjourned until Friday morning, the
jury selected being accommodated and lodged at the Ameri
can Hotel, opposite the old State House.

"the tbeason tbiau," 66
An essential part of this narrative, in ito political and
popular interest, is the personnel of the entire panel of
jurors, which contained eight names more than the venire
called for. It is here given with brief memoranda abstracted
from the official report, indicating what disposition was
made of each person called. Where there are no commente
the juror was not called; and the twelve finally swora are
each marked with a * :
1. Adams, Peter, Farmer, Mohnsville P. O., Berks County.
2. Baldwin, Matthias W,, Machinist, 335 Sprace St,
Philadelphia. Founder of Baldwin's Locomotive Works,
Stood aside,
3. Barclay, Andrew C, Gentleman, 147 Areh St, Phila
delphia. Challenged by defendant; had an opinion.
4. Bazley, John T,, Gentleman, Doylestown, Bucks
County, Challenged by prisoner.
5, Beck, John, Professor, Lititz, Lancaster Co, Principal
of famous Boys' School; Excused at Mr, Stevens' instance
because "the school could not get on without him;" grand
father of Hon, Jas. M, Beck,
6, Bell, Samuel, Gentleman, Reading, Berks County.
Associate (Lay) judge and excused. Father of Sam'l. Bell,
late Clerk U. S. Court, Philadelphia,
7. Brady, Patrick, Merchant, 397 Areh St, Philadelphia.
Challenged by prisoner for opinion. Prominent citizen;
founder of conspicuous family,
8. Breck, Samuel, Gentleman, Areh St, west of Broad,
Philadelphia. Prominent citizen; aged 81 and deaf; Ex
cused, 9, Brinton, Ferree, Merehant, Belmont P. O., Lancastor
Co, Later associate judge ; father-in-law of Jndge Wiltbank,
of Philadelphia. Stood aside.
10. Broadhead, Albert G., Farmer, Delaware P. O., Pike
Co. Deficient hearing and frequent headaches; Excused.
11, Brown, John A., Merchant, S.E. Cor. 12th and Ohest-
5

66 thb OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
nut Sto,, Phila,, one of the founders of great Brown Bros.
banking house. Challenged by prisoner.
12. Brown, Joseph D,, Gentleman, 167 Arch St, Phila-
delphia^ 13, Brush, Cteorge G., Merchant, Washington, Lancaster
Co. A prominent citizen and Democrat. ChaUenged by
prisoner, 14. Butier, Robert, Clerk, Mauch Chunk, Carbon Co.
15. Cadwalader, George. General in Mexican War. Gen
tleman, 299 Chestnut St, Philadelphia, Excused tempo
rarily. Prominent Philadelphia Democrat Subsequently
called and challenged by prisoner,
16, Cameron, Simon, Gentleman, Middletown, Dauphin
Co, Ex U. S. Senator. UnweU and temporarily excused.
17. Campbell, Hugh, Merchant, 33 Girard Street, Phila
delphia. 18. Clendenin, John, Gentleman, Hoagstown, Cumberland
Co. Challenged by defendant
19. Cockley, David, Machinist, Lancaster City, Chal
lenged by U, S. for opinion.
20. Cook, Jonathan, Gentleman, Allentown, Lehigh Co.
Challenged for opinion by defendant.
21. Coolbaugh, Moses W., Farmer, Coolbaugh P, O., Mon
roe County, Prominent Democrat, Challenged by prisoner.
22. *Connelly, Thomas, Carpenter, Beaver Meadow, Cai>
bon Co. Accepted and sworn (3).
23. Cope, Caleb, Merchant, Walnut & Quince Ste,, Phila
delphia, Applied for excuse; refused as he waa "not over
60," Recalled and not answering, fined. Subsequently re
mitted on account of iU health.
24. *Cowden, James, Merchant, Columbia, Lancaster Co.
Stood aside at first, finally accepted (12). He waa largely
engaged in transportation, having a line of boate on the
Pennsylvania canal and cars on the railroad. He had been
a Whig member of the Legislature in 1850. Father-in-law
of J. Al. Meyers, president of Columbia National Bank.

"the TBEABON TBIALB," 67
25, Culbertson, Joseph, GJentieman, Chambersburg, Frank
lin Co, " Excused for age, hardness of hearing and vertigo,"
26, Darby, John, Gentleman, FayetteviUe, Franklin Co,
Enfeebled ; deaf ; excused.
27, Davies, Edward, Gentleman, Churchtown, . Lancaster
Co, Stood aside,
28, Deshong, John O,, Gentieman, Chester, Delaware Co.
Stood aside. Distinguished banker and citizen,
29. DiUer, Solomon, Farmer, New HoUand, Lancaster
Co. Stood aside.
30. Elder, Joshua, Farmer, Harrisburg, Dauphin Co,
Stood aside.
31. DiUinger, Jacob, Gentieman, AUentown, Lehigh Co,
Excused because of "kidney trouble." Conspicuous Demo
crat, 32, *Elliot, Robert, Farmer, Ickesburg, Perry Co, Ac^
cepted and sworn (2),
33, Ewing, Robert, Merchant, 446 Walnut St, Philadel
phia, ChaUenged by defendant,
34. *Fenton, Ephraim, Farmer, Upper Dublin P. O.,
Montgomery Co, Stood aside. Subsequently recaUed and
accepted (11).
35, Fraley, Frederick, Gentieman, 365 Race St, PhUa-
delphia. President of SchuylkiU Navigation Company; Ex
cused temporarily. Conspicuous citizen. Treasurer Cen
tennial Commission in 1876.
36, George, David, Gentieman, BlocUey, West PhUa. P.
O,, PhUadelphia Co, Stood aside, RecaUed and chaUenged
by U, S.
37. Gowen, James, Gkntieman, Germantown, PhUadel
phia Co. Father of P. & ^ President F. B. Gowen and of
James E, Gowen, distinguished lawyer. ChaUenged by pris
oner. Democrat
38. Grosh,. Jacob, Gentleman, Marietta, Lancaater Co.

68 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
Political friend of Stevens, Associate (lay) jndge, 1842-47.
Stood aside.
39, Hammer, Jacob, Merchant, Orwigsburg, SchuylkiU
Co, Associate (lay) Judge; excused on account of his wife's
iUness, 40, Harper, James, Gentieman, Walnut & SchuyUtill
Fifth Sts., Phila, Leading manufacturer of bricks; built
house now occupied by Rittenhouse Club, 1811 Walnut Street,
Challenged by prisoner.
41. Hazard, Erskine, Gentleman, Ninth & Chestnut Sts.,
PhUadelphia. Father-in-law of Samuel Dickson, later one
of the leaders of the PhUadelphia bar. Challenged by the
prisoner. Whig. One of the founders of Lehigh Coal and
Navigation Co. and of Crane Iron Co.
42. Hippie, Frederick, Farmer, Bainbridge, Lancaster
Co. Stood aside.
43. Hitner, Daniel O., Farmer, Whitemarsh, Montgomery
Co. Challenged by prisoner.
44. *Hopkiiis, James M., Farmer, Buck P. O., Drumore
Twp., Lancaster Co. Ironmaster, Conowingo furnace.
Fusion Candidate for Congress against Stevens in 1858.
Accepted (7).
45. Horn, John, Gentleman, 16 Broad St., Philadelphia.
Biased in favor of defendant and chaUenged for cause by
U.S, 46. Hummel, Valentine, Merehant, Harrisburg, Dauphin
Co. 47. Jenks, Michael H., Gentleman, Newton, Bucks Co.
48. *Junkin, John, Farmer, Landisburg, Perry Co, Ac
cepted (8).
49. Keim, WiUiam H., Merchant, Reading, Berks Co,
Stood aside.
50. Keyser, EUianan W., Merchant, 144 North Ninth St,
Philadelphia. 51. Kichline, Jacob, Farmer, Lower Saucon P, O., North
ampton Co. ChaUenged by prisoner.

"the TBEABON TBIALB," 69
52. Kinnard, John H,, Farmer, West Whiteland P. 0.,
Chester Co, Stood aside.
53, Krause, John, Clerk, Lebanon, Lebanon Co, Stood
aside ; had conscientious scraples against death penalty.
64. Kuhn, Hartman, Gentieman, 314 Chestnut St, PhUa
delphia. Conspicuous citizen; descendant of old Lancaster
family ; ChaUenged by U. S. for opinion.
55. Ladley, George, Farmer, Oxford P. O., Chester Co,
Stood aside.
56. Leiper, George G., Farmer, LeipervUle, Delaware Co.
Associate (lay) judge; excused. Prominent Democrat and
intimate friend of James Buchanan, to his latest day.
57. Lewis, Lawrence, Gentleman, 345 Chestnut St., Phila
delphia. President Mutual Insurance Company; very busy.
Excused for a fortnight.
58, Luther, Diller, Gentleman, Reading, Berks Co. Chal
lenged by prisoner,
59. Lyons, David, Farmer, Haverford P. 0., Delaware Co.
ChaUenged by prisoner,
60. McConkey, James, Merchant, Peachbottom P. O,,
York Co. Deaf and deputy postmaster; excused. Of old
Democratic family,
61. McHvaine, Abraham R,, Farmer, WaUace P. O.,
Chester County.
62, McKean, Thomas, Gentleman, 356 Sprace St, PhUa
delphia, Excused on account of illness. Leading citizen
and member of distinguished family.
63. Madeira, George A., Gentleman, Chambersburg,
Franklin Co. Stood, aside.
64. Mark, George, Gentieman, Lebanon, Lebanon Go.
Stood aside.
66, "Martin, Peter, Surveyor, Ephrata P. 0., Lancaster
Co. Anti-Buchanan Democrat; later associate judge and
prothonotary; "was under the impression offense might be
treason." Accepted (4).

70 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
66. Massey, Charles, Merchant, 170 Arch St Philadel
phia. Excused on account of iU healtL
67. Mather, Isaac, Farmer, JenMntown, Montgomery Co.
Stood aside.
68. Merkle, Levi, Farmer, Shiremanstown, Cumberland
Co, Stood aside,
69, Michler, Peter S,, Merchant, Easton, Northampton
Co, Prominent in social and business circles.
70, MUler, John, Gentleman, Reading, Berks Co. Chal
lenged by the prisoner. Excused,
71. Moore, Marmaduke, Merchant, 153 North Thirteenth
St., Philadelphia. A prominent Democrat ChaUenged by
prisoner. 72. Morton, Sketehley, Farmer, Gibbon's Tavern P. O.,
Delaware Co, Stood aside.
73. Myers, Isaac, Merchant, Port Carbon, SchuylkiU Co.
74. Neff, John R., Merchant, 124 Sprace St, Philadel
phia. Excused for absence from the State.
75, Newcomer, Martin, Innkeeper, Chambersburg, Frank
lin Co. Challenged by U, S. for opinion.
76, *Newman, Solomon, Snuth, Milford, Pike Co, First
juror drawn. Stood aside. Subsequently accepted (9).
77. Palmer, Strange N., Editor, PottsvUle, SchuylkUl Co.
Stood aside.
78. Patterson, Robert, Merchant, S. W. cor. Thirteenth
and Locust Sts. General in Mexican and Civil wars. Had
decided opinions. Challenged by prisoner.
79. Penny, James, Farmer, Liberty Square P. 0., Dra-
more Twp., Lancaster County. Stood aside. Neighbor to
Quaker Abolitionists.
80, Piatt, WiUiam, Merchant, 343 Chestnut St PhUa
delphia. Excused because of ill health,
81. Preston, Paul S., Merchant, Stockport, Wayne Co.
Stood aside.
82. Reynolds, John, Gentleman, Lancaster City, Father

"the tbeason TBIALB," 71
of Gen. John F. Reynolds and Admiral Wm, Reynolds and
former proprietor of a Democratic newspaper in Lancaster.
Examined at length ; showed disfavor to defendants and was
challenged peremptorily by Stevens,
83. Rich, Josiah, Farmer, Danboro P, 0,, Bucks Co.
Stood aside,
84, Richards, Matthias, Gentieman, Reading, Berks Co.
Challenged by prisoner,
85, Richardson, John, Gbntleman, Sprace St, west of
Broad, Philadelphia, President of Bank of North America.
Excused temporarily for bronchial affection.
86. Rogers, Evan, Gentleman, Locust St and Washington
Square. Man of large wealth ; father of Fairman Rogers and
father-in-law of Dr, Horace Howard Furacss, Shakespearean
scholar. Challenged for cause by defendant
87, Ross, Hugh, Farmer, Lower Chanceford Co,, York
Co, Challenged for cause by defendant Scotch Irish,
Presbyterian, Democrat,
88, Rupp, John, Farmer, Mechanicsburg P, O., Hamp
den Twp., Cumberland Co. Associate jndge; excused tem
porarily. Recalled and chaUenged by U. S, because he was
opposed to death penalty,
89, Rutherford, John B., Farmer, HBrrisburg, Dauphin
Co,, of distinguished family. Stood aside,
90, *Saddler, WiUiam R,, York Sulphur Springs P. 0.,
Adams Co, Accepted (6).
91, Saylor, Charles, Merchant, Saylorsbnrg, Monroe Co.
Postmaster. Excused.
92. Schroeder, John S., Clerk, Reading, Berks Co.
ChaUenged by prisoner.
93. SmaU, Samuel, Merchant, York, York Co. Prominent
citizen and representative of notable f amUy. Stood aside.
94. Smith, George, Fanner, Upper Darby P. C, DeU-
ware Co. Stood aside.
96. Smith, John, Smith, Jeokintown, Mootgomeiy Oon

72 THX OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
ChaUenged by defendant; extended discussion; challenge
sustained. 96. *Smith, Robert, Gentieman, Gettysburg, Adams Co.
Accepted (6).
97. Smyser, PhUip, Gentieman, York, York Co. Chal
lenged for cause.
98, Starbird, Franklin, Farmer, Stroudsburg, Monroe
Co, Stood aside.
99, Stavely, WiUiam, Farmer, Lahaska P. O,, Bucks Co,
ChaUenged by prisoner,
100. Stevens, WiUiam, Merchant, WhitehaUviUe, Bucks
Co. Challenged by prisoner,
101, Stokes, Samuel E., Merchant, 39 Arch St, Phila
delphia. 102, Taylor, Caleb N., Farmer, Newportville, Bucks Co,
Suffering from what Judge Grier called " Epidemic of deaf
ness," Excused,
103. Toland, George W., Gentieman, 178 Arch St.,
Philadelphia, of notable family of bankers.
104. Trexler, Lesher, Gentleman, Allentown, Lehigh Co.
Stood aside.
105, Wainwright, Jonathan, Merchant, Beach, below
Hanover St, Philadelphia, Stood aside. Subsequently re
called and accepted (10),
106. Walsh, Robert F., Merchant, 5 Girard St, PhUa
delphia, " Thought the offense treason," ChaUenged by the
Court, 107, Watmough, John G., Gentleman, Germantown,
Philadelphia County. "Strongly against the whole busi
ness." ChaUenged by U. S.
108. Watson, WiUiam, Farmer, MechanicsvUle, Bucks Co.
Stood aside.
109. West, David, Farmer, Kimberton, Chestor Co,
Stood aside,
110, White, Thomas, H, Gentleman, N, W, Cor, Ninth &
Spruce Sts., Philadelphia, ChaUenged for opinion by U, S.

"thb tbeason TBIALB." 73
111, WhitehiU, James, Gentleman, Lancaster City. Chal
lenged by prisoner.
112, Witman, Andrew K,, Farmer, Center VaUey P. 0,,
Lehigh Co, From neighborhood of Fries rebellion. Chal
lenged by U. S. for opinion, after long discussion,
113, WiUiamson, WiUiam, Gentleman, West Chester,
Chester Co, Challenged by prisoner,
114, *Wilson, James, Gentleman, Fairfield P. 0,, Adams
Co, Accepted and swora (8). From neighborhood of
Stevens' iron works. Had been in 18th, 19th and 20th Con
gresses. 116. Vanzant, Franklin, Farmer, Attleboro P. 0., Bucks
Co, Two children sick. Excused temporarily.
116, Yohe, Samuel, Gentleman, Easton, Northampton Co,
Stood aside.
As finally selectod the trial jury consisted of the foUow
ing persons :
1, RoBEBT Elliott, farmer, Ickesburg, Perry Cotmty,
aged 69 ; weight 190 pounds.
2. James Wilson, gentleman, Fairfield postoffice, Adams
County, aged 73 ; weight 186 pounds.
3, Thomas Connelly, carpentor, Beaver Meadow, Car
bon County, aged 64 ; weight 140 pounds.
4. Peteb Mabtin, surveyor, Ephrata postoffice, Lancaster
County, aged 46 ; weight 260 pounds.
6. RoBEBT Smith, gentleman, Gettysburg, Adams County,
aged 67 ; weight 183 pounds.
6. William R, Sadoleb, farmer, York Sulphur Springs
postoffice, Adams County, aged 41 ; weight 148 pounds,
7. James M. Hopkins, farmer. Buck postoffice, Dramore
Township, Lancaster County, aged 60; weight 191 poiinds.
8. John' Junkin, farmer, Landisburg, Perry County,
aged 66 ; weight 161 pounds.
9. Solomon Newman, smith, Milford, Pike Connty,
aged 48 ; weight 166 ponnds.

74 the OHBISTIANA BIOT.
10. Jonathan Wainwbioht, Merchant Philadelphia,
aged 66 ; weight 200 pounds.
11. Ephbaim Fenton, farmer. Upper Dublin postoffice,
Montgomery County, aged 52 ; weight 200 pounds,
12. James Cowoen, merchant, Columbia, Lancastor
County, aged 36 ; weight 135 pounds.
Average age of jurors: 53. Average weight: 178 pounds.
In opening for the prosecution District Attorney Ashmead
defined the act of treason, as it had been laid down in pre
vious judicial deliverances, and he relied on the proof that
there had been an armed and organized resistance to the exe
cution of the laws of Congress, in which the prisoner not
only participated, but of which he was a leader. After he
had concluded, Z. CoUins Lee, of Baltimore, United States
District Attorney, appeared also for the prosecution. Wit
nesses were excluded while other witnesses were testifying,
Mr. G. L. Ashmead, who was a cousin of the United States
Attoraey, conducted the examination of the witnesses. The
scene was located; Deputy Kline told his story in detaU,
substantially as the incident has been related; he insisted
that he asked Hanway and Lewis to aid him in enforcing
his writs and they refused ; Hanway sat on his horse during
the affray and Joshua Gorsuch, pretty badly hurt, got be
hind the horse for protection. Kline was the special target
of severe and sarcastic cross-examination by Mr. Stevens, as
he was the Atlas of the Government's case. To break him
down on the identity of those who were present at the riot,
Mr. Stevens insisted on the Court aUowing the presence in
Court of. all the prisoners; and when he accompUshed this
dramatic purpose he turned Kline over to Mr. Lewis for
further and protracted cross-examination on the skirmishing
movemente of the arresting party before the riot. Mr, Read
also took a hand in his cross-examination, which was not
concluded until the Saturday of the first week. His last
answer at this session was to the effect that he did not see
Joseph Scarlet at the " action."

"the TBEABON TBIALS." 75
Dr, Pearce testified at some length corroborating Kline;
and averring very distinctiy that he saw a shot fired from
the window of the house at (Jorsuch, the elder. He was
severely cross-examined by Mr. Stevens, who intimated
repeatedly that the witness had charged Kline with cowardice,
Dickinson Gorsuch foUowed him and testified to the main
facte. Neither he nor his cousin, Joshua, was subjected to
any cross-examination; and both of them were less direct
in their accusations against Hanway and Lewis than Kline,
at the most declaring that Hanway's arrival seemed to give
the colored men inspiration and encouragement The son es
tablished his father's determination not to be driven or in
timidated from the premises, and described the kUling of
him and the wounding of himself. These circumstances,
creditable to the valor of the Gorsuches, did not materiaUy
prejudice the case of the defendant on the trial, Dickinson
recognized Scarlet as one who at first refused to help him, but
subsequently got him water, Nicholas Hutchins was also
examined as to the affray and corroborated the other wit
nesses ; likewise Nathan Nelson, the other of the Maryland
party. These witnesses were positive in their recognition of
Noah Buley and Joshua Hammond, the elder two of the
runaways. The first week of the trial closed with MiUer Knott on the
stand. He was a citizen of the neighborhood, who was not
charged with any compUcity, but who had given aid to the
wounded. He had seen a man on horseback, in his shirt
sleeves ^-presumably Hanway — riding northward, with a
band of negroes foUowing him ; and a half score or more at
tacking Dickinson Gorsuch, while others foUowed Isaiah
Clarkson into the corn field. He saw Gorsuch the father
lying alone not yet dead ; and Joseph Scarlet, on horseback, at
"the mouth of the long lane"; he subsequentiy returned with
the colored men toward Parker's house. From this witness
it appeared that it was a mile from Hanway's miU to Pari[er's

76 THB OHBISTIANA BIOT.
house, that Joseph Scarlet would have to travel two mUes
and his horse was "sweaty," that Elijah Lewis Uved from
a mile and a half to two mUea away. Mr. Knott was not
subjectod to cross-examination. His son, John, had preceded
him to Parker's by ten minutes and saw the riot from a point
about thirty yards from the junction of the long lane and the
house lane. He saw from fifty to sixty negroes come out from
the house, shouting and shooting, disperse up the little lane
and run toward the creek. He saw horses hitched on the fence
in the long lane ; he saw Dickinson Gorsuch bleeding and gave
him water. Again the defense desisted from cross-examina
tion of either of the Knotts. Alderman Reigart testified to
an exciting conversation between Kline and Hanway and
Lewis at Christiana, after their arrest, when Kline had
denounced them savagely and they disclaimed having incited
the negroes. It was manifest the defendants would centre
their attack upon EHine and Mr. Read brought out the fact
that while he wore formidable whiskers and mustaches at the
time of the affray, he had since shaved them off. It was
shown that though he publicly denounced the prisoners
as "white livered scoundrels" who had ordered the blacks
to fire, his statements under oath were very much milder.
A long discussion ensued over the admission of Charles
Smith's evidence, but he was finaUy permitted to testify
that Samuel WiUiams — the colored man from Philadelphia
who had trailed Kline — had brought and circulated news
of the intended raid for the arrest of the Gorsuch runaways.
It was disclosed by Dr. Cain's testimony that Washington
and Clark, colored witnesses who had escaped from Moyamen
sing, had been circulating a paper on September 10th, which
had the character of a warning to the Maryland refugees.
Shortiy after the affray Dr. Cain, at his own tenant house,
treated two colored men, Henry C. Hopkins and John Long,
who had been shot, one in the arm and one in the thigh.

THE TBEASON TBIALB.
Hopkins was the doctor's tenant. John Roberts, a cole
witness, who had, been detained as such, for more than
weeks, in Moyamensing, proved that Joseph Scarlet 1
him " about sun up " that kidnappers were at Parker's,
witness got a loaded gun from Jacob Townsend and m
to the scene. Other witnesses of the same kind, and detai
the same way, elicited little material matter, as they arri
on the scene after the battle. In support of the (Jovemme
theory of a treasonable conspiracy, some evidence was in
duced of meetings at West Chester in opposition to the F
tive Slave Law, but the participation of the accused was
shown. The scenes attending the trial are described by the m
papers of the day as highly interesting and sometimes se
tional. Popular interest grew as it progressed and
centered upon the prisoner, who was a stranger in Phila
phia. One newspaper account describes Hanway as
playing the greatest self-possession during the selection
jurors. "He is apparently about 35 years of age, taU
spare in form, and inclined to stoop a little. There i
becoming seriousness in his countenance, but nothing
alarm or trepidation is visible. When caUed upon to 1
at the juror summoned to try him, he does so with a i
and inquiring look, but never detormines upon his admisi
or rejection until he has consulted his counsel, Thadc
Stevens, who site immediately by his side."
Before the defense was formaUy opened ito course
character had been anticipated by the cross-examinatioi
Mr. Stevens; in this quality of a trial lawyer he was
acknowledged master. The opening speech of Mr. Cu;
referred to the division among the counsel for the prosi
tion; it praised the fairaess of Mr. Ashmead, who, it
dared, had been remanded to the background, because Mi
land distrusted the justice of Pennsylvania. This waa
effective appeal to the Stato pride of the jwy. He vigoroi

78 THB OHBISTIANA BIOT.
assaUed Kline, who had been the Government's most zealous
witness. He traced the course of Pennsylvania's legisla
tion on slavery and insisted that this Commonwealth was
"ever trae to her pUghted constitutional good faith"; he
extoUed Hanway's civic virtues, and dwelt with emphasis
upon the local agitation over the "lawless and diabolical
outrages " of the kidnappers ; and finaUy ridiculed the idea
of treason in the allegation that " three harmless, non-resist
ing Quakers, and eight-and-thirty wretched, miserable, pen
niless negroes, armed with corn-cutters, clubs, and a few
muskete, and headed by a miller, in a felt hat, without a
coat, without arms, and mounted on a sorrel nag, levied
war against the United States."
When Mr. Stevens began the production of testimony for
the defense with offers to prove the recent kidnapping out
rages in the neighborhood of Gap, the legal storm center of
the trial was at hand. The prosecution saw and feared the
influence of this line of evidence as keenly as the defense
recognized its force and value. Judges Grier and Kane both
discerned the vital issue at once and long before the argument
concluded, pointed out that as the accusation was treason—^
a position founded upon some previous conspiracy — the de
fense must be aUowed the same latitude to disprove intent
as had been aUowed to the prosecution to establish it. This
opened the way for Thomas Pennington to tell the story
of what had occurred at the home of his son-in-law, WiUiam
Marsh Chamberlain, the preceding January — it was the
same night, by the way, that " James Ray fell dead as he en
tered the door of his own house." As has been heretofore re
lated, in the absence at Ray's of the head of the Chamberlain
household, the black man in its employ was beaten and dragged
out and carried off by intruders without legal process and
led by local abettors of the capture.
The fact that it was not shown the man taken was a free
man, or that he may have been reclaimed by the authority of

"the TBEABON TBIALS," 79
his owner, made little difference, in the popular feeling about
the affair or in the effectiveness of the incident for trial
purposes. If such ruthlessness might be technically legal
it made the slave law none the less odious I
Henry Ray went further than Pennington and identi
fied both Perry Marsh and William Bear as associates of
the band who carried off Chamberlain's man ; and Mrs. Cham
berlain — who saw the incident through a pipe hole from
upstairs, where the affrighted family had retreated — and
her brother, Miller Pennington, described it in a manner
that heightened its effect. With this recital the defense made
a distinct adyance.
When the next witness, Elijah Lewis, was caUed, a ques
tion was raised as to his competency. Although not himself
on trial, he was under indictment for the same offense as
the prisoner. Mr, Brent cited "5th Espinasse," but the
Goverament's objection was not urged with much confidence
and was not sustained by the Court, Interest centered in
the witness as he was probably the most conspicuous of all
the defendante and a recognized leader of local sentiment.
He supported the case of the defendante as their counsel had
outlined it; and his intelligence, direct manner and forceful
expression gave added weight to his testimony. Isaiah
Clarkson had summoned him to the scene by the report that
Parker's house was surrounded and had been broken into
by kidnappers; he started on foot and called Hanway, who
was not very weU and got his horse; Kline showed them a
paper which he assumed was a warrant ; the negroes were, ex
cited and Hanway begged them not to shoot; witness had
turned south toward the wood, Kline foUowing and Hanway
to the north when the shooting began. He contradicted Kline's
story of him or Hanway expressing defiance of the law
and declared Kline was "in the woods" when the firing
began; he and Hanway were not arrested; they gave them
selves np. Oroas-ezamination strengthened his statement

80 THX OHBISTIANA BIOT.
Other witnesses testified to Kline's dedarations after the
event to the effect that he had wantod to withdraw, bnt was
overruled; that Dr. Pearce admitted the Gorsuches were
rash and Kline timid, and that he himself owed his life to
Hanway's protection.
The defense then opened ite batteries against Kline's repu
tation. Hon. WiUiam D, KeUy — later a Common Pleas
Judge and long time a leading member of Cdngress from
Philadelphia — headed a long list of vritnesses who testified
that Seine's reputation was bad and that he was unworthy
of belief. There were nearly a score in aU and many of
them were most emphatic; it was also shown that in some
accounts of the affray Kline had denounced "the damned
Quaker abolitionists."
To open the way for the recanting witness, Harvey Scott,
to recaU his former stories and repudiate their statements,
witnesses were caUed to testify that he was not at the riot at
aU, but was " buttoned up " in John Carr's garret untU day
light and from that time on was at the place, blowing and
striking in his employer's blacksmith shop; that when he
heard of the affair he congratulated himself with the remark,
" I'm a nigger out of that scrape."
Lewis Cooper, who was a son-in-law of Elijah Lewis, had,
with Joseph Scarlet's assistance, taken Dickinson Gorsuch
to the PownaU house; he had heard Dr. Pearce teU of his
uncle's rashness and that one of his own slaves, " a bright
yellow negro," shot him ; and also that he had been saved by
holding on to Hanway's saddle skirt
Many witnesses were called to prove Hanway's character
"as a peaceable, good, loyal and orderly citizen." It was
brought out that Hanway, contrary to the general popular
impression, was not a member of the Society of Friends.
Having been born in Delaware and lived in Chester as weU
as Lancaster County, and having been at one time absent
from the State, the witnesses in his behalf represented dif
ferent sections of the country.

81
The rebuttal on the part of the prosecution consisted largely
of an attempt to rehabilitate Kline's reputation; a great
number of respectable citizens of Philadelphia, who had
known him from his youth up, were called to testify that
his character was good and that he was entitled to belief.
The opening in rebuttal also covered proposed proof of al
leged outrages and reprisals by the sympathizers with fugi
tive slaves, in that armed and organized bands of negroes
paraded the streets of Lancaster " on the hunt for slave hun
ters and avowing the determination, if they caught them,
they would kill them " ; that in April, 1861, Samuel Worth
ington, of Maryland, went into the neighborhood of Chris
tiana to reclaim his fugitive slave and was resisted by armed
force; that bells were rang and boras blown to arouse the
neighborhood and the master was obliged to fiee for his life.
It was also promised that Harvey Scott would corroborate his
former statement and disprove the alibi that had been made
out for him. In the number of witnesses who were caUed to
prove the general character of Kline for truth and veracity,
the Government far exceeded his assailants. The proposed
testimony as to previous occurrences in the neighborhood,
showing popular feeling against the resistance to the reclaim
ing of fugitive slaves, was raled out by the Court; the trial
judges concurred that if it was any part of the Govern
ment's case it should have been offered originally, and Judge
Grier jocularly observed, "We may draw a figure from the
game of whist ^- it would be renigging and keeping your
tramp back to the last trick,"
When the recanting witness, Harvey Scott, was called
by the Goverament to prove that the alibi made for him was
not correct, and Mr. Ashmead confidently offered him to
prove that he was at the riot, Scott startled the prosecution
and satisfied the defense by testifying as foUows: "I gave
my evidence that I was there once. I was frightened at
the time I was taken up, and I said I was there, bnt I was
6

82 THX OHBISTIANA BIOT.
not; I was proved to be there, bnt I waa not there; they
took me to Christiana, and I was frightened, and I didn't
know what to say, and I said what they told me." He re
peated this, whereupon Mr. Ashmead declared that he had
been entrapped and asked that Scott might be committed to
take his trial for perjury, when the foUowing coUoquy oc
curred :
" Judge Gbieb, Poor devil, it is not worth while for the
United States to do it. Let him go, and if you owe him
any thing, pay him, that he may not be tempted to steal.
" Mb, Stevens. The trath is, that he is not right in his
mind. " Me. j. W. Ashmead. With that explanation I am per
fectly willing he should depart,"
At the resumption of the trial on the next day. there was a
good deal of discussion as to what should be done about the
variation in the testimony of the witness Scott, The Gov
ernment had manifestly suffered from his wobbling, and
intimated that he had been tampered with; all of which
was resented by the defense, who declared that he was only
a "poor miserable negro," shallow-minded and uncertain,
and that the United States having fed and ctothed him for
the purpose of the trial, no one representing the defense had
had any access to him and the whole effect of his testimony
was a matter for the jury. After again calling Dickinson
Gorsuch to prove that two of his father's slaves — Noah
Buley and Joshua Hammond — wore present at the shoot
ing, the testimony closed, and it was agreed there should be
not more than three speeches on either side.
The summing up began on Friday, December 6, Mr. Lud
low opening for the prosecution and discussing at length and
elaborately the law of the case, and then proceeding to con
sider the strength of the Government's testimony and the
improbabilities of what had been proved on the part of the
defense. Being himself a member of the Philadelphia bar.

THE TBEABON TRIALS," 83
he undertook the defense of Kline, and declared that no
man of bad character could have produced in his behalf the
array of witnesses whom the Goverament had called to sus
tain ite deputy marshal. On Saturday moraing, December
6, Mr, Lewis, of West Chester, commenced to sum up for
the defense. He made an exceptionally able argument both
on the facts and the law of the case and reviewed the history
of the two leading cases of treason which had occurred in
Pennsylvania arising out of the so-called Whiskey Insur
rection and the Fries rebellion. He was foUowed by Attorney
General Brent, for the prosecution, and his speech was not
concluded when Court adjourned on Saturday afteraoon to
meet the following Monday. It was at this session of the
Court the colored prisoners were brought in clad in the uni
form dress which had been furaished them by sympathizing
friends, and the scene that was presented is thus described
by a contemporary newspaper reporter:
*.' On Saturday morning, December 6, when Mr. Lewis was
to speak first for the prisoners and was to be followed, by, the.
Attorney General of Maryland there was a great throng pres
ent at the trial. The room was overcrowded with women, and
Marshal Roberts was greatly embarrassed at his inability
to find or to make a place for them. The special attention
of the specators was attracted to a row of colored men, seated
on the north side of the room. They were cleanly in their
appearance, and their heads and faces presented strong pre
sumptive evidence that they had just escaped from the hands
of the barber. These were the colored prisoners aUeged to
have been engaged in the treason at Christiana, and numbered
twenty-four. They were aU simUarly attired wearing around
their necks ' red, whito and blue scarfs.' Lucretia Mott* was
'Mrs. Lucretia Mott, native of Nantucket, Mass. — ^wliere Iier portrait
is proudly exhibited — and long resident of Philadelphia, was one of the
very remarkable women of her period. Mrs. Bebeeca Harding Davis,
herself tha irife of the late L. Clarke Davis and mother of Biehard
Harding Davis, was a Southern woman with pro-davery ^ympsthiei. Ib

84 TUX OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
at their head. This, we believe, ia her first appearance in
court since the trials have commenced. Her dignified and
benevolent coimtenance ever atiracto attention. Under that
calm exterior there glows a fire, kindled by charity, which
is as universal as it is ardent and enduring. She sat knitting
during the entire session of the court, apparentiy unconscious
of what was going on around her, except when some point
in the testimony seemed to bear strongly against the prisoner.
Then her eyes were lifted from her work, and sparkled for
a moment with admiration; but speedily relapsed into their
intelligent; yet quiet and peaceful aspect One of the colored
persons, whose name is Collister Wilson, was too unweU to
be brought from prison on Saturday morning. It is but just
to say, that these colored men, taken together, will compare
in personal appearance with an equal number of the same
her "Bits of Gossip" (1904), she made a pen picture of Mrs. Mott,
whom she descrilws as a rare combination of intellectual gifts and
domestic accomplishments. She says: "No man in the Abolition party
had a more vigorous brain or ready eloquence than this famous Quaker
preacher, but much of her power came from the fact that she was one
of the moat womanly of women. She had pity and tenderness enough
in her heart for the mother of mankind, and that keen sense of humor
without which the tenderest of women is but u dull clod. Even in ex
treme old age she was one of the most beautiful women I ever have
Kon. She was a little, vivid, doUoato orouturo, alive with magnolia
power, It is many years since that charming face with its wonderful
luminous eyes waa given back to the earth, but it is as real to me this
moment as ever." She "looked like a saint," but "until the day of
her death kept up the homely domestic habits of her youth. She might
face B mob at night that threatened her life, or lecture to thousanda of
applauding disciples, but she never forgot in the morning to shell the
poBS for dinner. Ilor flngors never woro quiet. She knitted wonderful
bedspreads and made goy rag-carpets as wedding gifts for all of ber
granddaughtora. She had, oddly enough, the porionul eharm, the tem
perament, the hospitable soul of a Southern woman. I used wickedly to
wish that she bad been born on the other side. How she would have
glorlflod her duty as a slaveholder and magnlflod her office I And how
they would have appreciated her beauty and charm down there I ' '
Manifestly Lucretia Mott was not to be fairly classed with Justice
Grier 's "female vagrant lecturers," "whose moral atmosphere had been
tainted and poisoned."

"the TBEABON TBIALB." 85
race taken indiscriminately from any part of the world.
The two white men, Lewis and Scarlet, were also brought
from prison, but occupied the rear or east end of the court
room. These two appeared to be between thirty and forty
years of age, and judging from their garb, do not belong to the
Society of Friends, as has been generally supposed. On in
quiring how it happened that the colored prisoners were aU
dressed alike, we were informed that they had been clothed
by a committee of ladies belonging to .the Abolition Society,
who have been very attentive to them since they have been
in prison."
Subsequent reports of the trial indicate increased atten
dance, especiaUy of " ladies dressed in Quaker garb."
Continuing his speech on the foUowing Monday the
Attorney General waxed eloquent over the glories of the
Union and the perUs to national peace that lay in resistance
to law and in the refusal of any one section to accord to an
other its legal rights. He read from Webster's speeches and
Washington's • farewell address and from Judge Iredell's
charge on the trial of the Fries cases. He referred to the
presence in Court by Hanway's side of his devoted and af
fectionate wife, who it seems liad sat with him during the
trial. WhUe the gaUantry of the Maryland lawyer constrained
him to express his admiration and respect for "the a£3icted
lady of this prisoner," he warned the jury against being con-
troUed by " the speU of that female influence which, is more
potent than the eloquence of counsel," and contrasted the
situation of Mrs. Hanway with that of Gorsuch's wife "who,
as a widow, is now mourning the loss and lover of her youth
and the prop of her dedining years," He played upon the
color of Scarlet's name; he denounced the coroner's inquest,
lauded the chivalrous courage of Edward Gorsuch, pictured
with skillful hands the combat at the Parker house and the
"diabolical malice" of those who mangled the victim of
that occasion after they had kiUed hinu He insisted that

86

THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT,

both Lewis and Hanway had been gnUty of treason and that
they had incited the blacks to make armed resistance to the
law of the land.
To Mr, Read was assigned the responsible duty of reply
ing immediately to Brent, which he did in a speech occupying
nearly three days in the delivery and, as the reporter ob
serves, "marked throughout by eloquence and profound
learning, being a thorough and complete dissertation on the
law of treason, and which riveted the attention not only of
the Court and jury, but of a crowded auditory,"
It Was expected that Thaddeus Stevens would follow him,
and the public interest which attached to his speaking was
probably greater than that attending any of the other counsel ;
but for some reason he declined speaking in the cause, and
Mr, Read was foUowed by Senator Cooper, who represented
not only the State of Maryland, but the Gorsuch family. He
expounded with the ability of a profound lawyer the constitu
tional definition of treason and applied it to the facts of the
case, which he insisted fuUy, amply and distinctly proved the
overt act of treason. In the cases of contradiction between
Lewis and Kline he declared that Kline was supported by
the testimony of aU the Maryland party, while Lewis stood
alone, and Lewis was an interested and therefore discredited
witness. His peroration was an earnest plea for the Union
and against anything that would affect its stability or en
danger its peace. In Websterian strain he closed as foUows :
" The eyes of the world are upon the constellation in its ban
ner. Ite stars are the beacons of liberty. Let us then, for
our sakes, and for the sake of liberty in other lands, guard
it as the Ark of the Covenant was guarded of old. Let no
hand deface it. Let the day never come when it shaU be
rent in twain ; when one cluster of its stars, separated from
the other and beaming in different banners, shall be borne
over adverse and conflicting hosts ; but let it remain as it now
is, 'the Flag of the Union,' stiU waving over the heads of

THADDEUS STEVENS.
m TMI MVt Of HW OOMRCWKHUl lIADf MHtP.

"the teeason te:!ai,b." 87
united freemen, obedient to the same laws— laws supported
by all, sustained by all, vindicated by all, in every section of
the country."
The argument of the case closed with Senator Cooper's
speech and he was immediately foUow^d by Justice Grier's
charge to the jury. After the judge had made a general ex
position of the law, he paid a high tribute to the maimer in
which the case had been conducted on both sides by counsel.
He framed the issues to be determined by the jury as two
fold, involving first the question as to whether Hanway par
ticipated in the offenses proved to have been committed, and,.
secondly, if he did so, was his offence treason? In under
taking to vindicate the reputation of the people of Pennsyl
vania he left no doubt as to his own individual views upon
the subject of the anti-slavery agitation then prevaUing, and
the following cxtracto from his charge, which were savagely
resented at the time of their utterance even by those who
were satisfied with his legal conclusion, are reportod to have
been uttered in a shrill and piping voice, which added to the
intensity- of their expression:
"With the exception of a few individuals of perverted in
tellect, some small districts or neighborhoods whose moral
atmosphere has been tainted and poisoned, by male and fe
male vagrant lecturers and conventions, no party in politics,
no sect of religion, nor any respectable numbers or character
can be found within our borders who have viewed with ap
probation or looked with any other than feelings of abhorrence
upon this disgraceful tragedy.
" It is not in this Hall of Independence, that meetings of
infuriated fanatics and unprincipled demagogues have been
held to counsel a bloody resistance to the laws of the land.
It is not in this city that conventions are held denouncing
the Constitution, the laws, and the Bible. It is not here
that the pulpit has been desecrated by seditions exhortations,
toaching that theft is meritorious, murder excusable and
treason a virtue.

88 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
"The guUt of this foul murder resto not alone <hi the
deluded individuals who were ite immediate perpetrators, but
the blood taints with even deeper dye the skirte of those who
promulgated doctrines subversive of aU morality and aU
government" He practicaUy disposed, however, of the whole case and
took its further consideration from the jury by his announced
legal conclusion that the offense did not arise to that of
treason. His summing up on this branch of the subject prac
ticaUy concluded aU of the cases. It was as foUows:
" Without desiring to invade the prerogatives of the jury
in judging the facte of this case, the Court feel bound to say,
that they do not think the transaction with which the prisoner
is charged with being connected, rises to the dignity of
treason or levying war. Not because the numbers or force
was insufficient. But 1st, For want of any proof of previous
conspiracy to make a general and public resistance to any
law of the United States. 2ndly, Because there is no evi
dence that any person concerned in the transaction knew there
were such acts of Congress', as those with which they were
charged with conspiring to resist by force and arms, or had
any other intention than to protect one another from what
they termed kidnappers (by which slang term they probably
included not only actual kidnappers, but all masters and
owners seeking to recapture their slaves, and the officers and
agents assisting therein),
" The testimony of the prosecution shows that notice had
been given that certain fugitives were pursued; the riot,
insurrection, tumult, or whatever you may call it, was but a
sudden ' conclamatio ' or ranning together, to prevent thc
capture of certain of their friends or companions, or to res
cue them if arrested. Previous to this transaction, so far
as we are informed, no attempt had been made to arrest
fugitives in the neighborhood under the new act of Congress
by a public officer. Heretofore arreste had been made by

"the, TBEABON TBIALB." 89
the owner in person, or his agent properly authorized, or by
an officer of the law. Individuals without any authority, but
incited by cupidity, and the hope of obtaining the reward
offered for the retura of a fugitive, had heretofore under^
taken to seize them by force and violence, to invade the
sanctity of private dwellings at night, and insult the feelings
and prejudices of the people. It is not to be wondered at
that a people subject to such inroads, should consider odious
the perpetrators of such deeds and denominato them kid
nappers — and that the subjects of this treatment should
have been encouraged in resisting such aggressions, where
the rightful claimant could not be distinguished from the
odious kidnapper, or the fact be ascertained whether the
person seized, deported or stolen in this manner, was a free
man or a slave. But the existence of such feelings is no
evidence of a determination or conspiracy by the people to
publicly resist any legislation of Congress, or levy war
against the United States. That in consequence of such
excitement, such an outrage should have been committod, is
deeply to be deplored. That the persons engaged in it are
guilty of aggravated riot and murder cannot be denied. But
riot and murder are offences against the Stato Government
It would be a dangerous precedent for the Court and jury
in this case to extend the crime of treason by construction to
doubtful cases."
Having thus practicaUy disposed of the case Mr. Justice
Grier praised the U. S, Attorney and the counsd for
Maryland for their zeal and abUity, and intimated that the
duty of punishing " the perpetrators of this outrage " might
be transferred to the courte of Lancaster County, where the
activity and zeal of ite law officers gave assurance that their
duty would be performed with aU fideUty.
After the Judge'a charge the jury retired to ddiberato at
the American House where they were lodged. They re-

90 THE OHBmTIANA BIOT.
turned in fifteen minutes and rendered a verdict of "Not
Guilty," which announcement was received by the large
audience present " in a becoming manner " ; the propriety of
their conduct is ascribed to the fact that the Judge's charge
forecast the verdict.
John M. Read afterwards said some of the jurymen in
formed him they were ready to acquit before the defense
opened. On motion of District Attoraey Ashmead, and in con
sideration of the ordeal through which Castner Hanway had
just passed, four other bills against him for misdemeanor were
non prossed and he was discharged from custody and from all
further prosecution in the Federal Courts, The charge of
treason against Elijah Lewis was withdrawn, and he and
Samuel Williams were admitted to bail in $2,000 on four
other indictmente pending against them. Hanway and Lewis
were brought to Lancaster on Friday afternoon, December
12th, and held by Associate Judge Vondersmith in $1,000
bail each, "to answer any charge that might be brought
against them."
There was a later proceeding in which all the other bills
for treason were non prossed; and the proposed transfer of
the prisoners to Lancaster County was announced by the
District Attorney. Mr, Read brought to the attention of
the Court the subject of the United States paying the ex
penses of the Hanway witnesses ; for which there was a prece
dent in Aaron Burr's case. The subject was fuUy argued
December 19th; and Judge Kane filed an opinion refusing
to tax these costs against the Government and dismissing
Hanway's petition.
Subsoquontly a petition to Oongrosi, of which the following
li a copy, was circulated and signed by the defendants, but it
avaUed nothing:

THE TBEASON TBIALS, 91
"TO THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF BEPEESENTATIVES OF
THE UNITED STATES:
"The Petition of
Citizens of the State of Penna., respectfully repre
sents; That Whereas in the month of Septeml)er 1S51 a Biot occurred in
the vicinity of the residence of your petitioners, generally known as the
'Christiana Biot,' and your petitioners repairing to the scene of dis
turbance without any evil intentions, but to prevent violence, were
arrested by persona acting for the United Statea, and charged with the
liigheat crimes known to our Laws, and thrown into prison, where they
were detained many months and subjected to great expense in making
preparations to meet those charges, wherel^ their estates were wasted,
their minds haraaaed to the verge of insanity, and their health impaired,
till preniature decrepitude is the consequence, after which they were
discharged without a hearing, thereby tacitly admitting the charges were
groundless, having incurred an expense of nuiny thousand dollars.
"Tour petitioners therefore pray yon the honorable representativea
of the most magnanimous nation of the eartli, to grant as soma relief
from onr embarrassments, and we will ever pray, ete."
Thus ended the Treason Trials of 1861.

CHAPTER XI,
The Lateb Tbials.
Legal Proceedings in Lancaster Connty — Prisonms Bemanded to Local
Jurisdiction — President Fillmore's Message — Attorney General
Brent's Beport — final Disposition of the Cases in the Lancaster
County Court — "Sam" WiUiams Tried in Philadelphia and
Acquitted.
There was, however, very considerable political and legal
aftermath to the proceedings in Philadelphia. The intima
tion of so eminent an authority as a justice of the Supreme
Court of the United States to the effect that some official duty
devolved upon the Lancaster County authorities could not be
ignored. Accordingly District Attorney John L. Thompson,
who was in his day one of the leaders of the Lancaster County
Bar, framed bills of indictment to the January Sessions 1852
against many of those who had been arraigned for treason in
Philadelphia. On Wednesday, December 3 1, Marshal Roberts
brought to the Lancaster County prison from Philadelphia
the following persons: Alson Perasley, Lewis Gales, Lewis
Clarkson, Charles Hunter, Nelson Carter, Thomas Butler,
Henry Green, Collister Wilson and George WiUiams, — all
these were on the same evening discharged by the District
Attorney, as he deemed the evidence insufficient to warrant
their detention.
On the same evening George Williams was arrested as a
fugitive slave and taken to PenningtonvUle, where he took
advantage of the sleepiness of his captors and walked off, and
" straight was seen no more," to the great chagrin of Henry
H. Kline, the officer who made the arrest, and of the owner
of the slave, who was asleep on the floor.
Saturday, January 3, 1852, Marshal Roberts brought to
92

THB LATEB TBIALS, 93
Lancaster as prisoners John Morgan, Jacob Moore, Ezekid
Thompson, Isaiah Clarkson, John WiUiams, John Jackson,
Benjamin Johnson, George Read, Daniel Causeberry, Ben
jamin Pendergrass, William WiUiams, John HoUiday, WU
liam Brown, Elijah Clark, WiUiam Brown, Jr., and Henry
Sims, as prisoners, and five colored persons as witnesses. The
witnesses were discharged on their recognizance to appear at
Court to testify.
Public and political interest in the Riot and the Trials
was not allowed to flag from inattention to the issues they
involved by those high in authority. From "the seats of
the mighty" deliverances were heard against what was in
terpreted in some quarters as successful offensive resistance
to law, in his message to Congress early in December, 1851,
President Fillmore had these paragraphs, relating to the
evente at Christiana.
"It is deeply to be regretted that in several instances
officers of the Government, in attempting to execute the law
for the return of fugitives from labor, have been openly re
sisted and their efforts frastrated and defeated by lawless and
violent mobs ; that in one case such resistance resulted in the
death of an estimable citizen, and in others serious injury
ensued to those officers and to individuals who were using
their endeavors to sustain the laws. Prosecutions have been
instituted against the alleged offenders so far as they could
be identified, and are stiU pending. I have regarded it as my
duty in these cases to give aU aid legaUy in my power to the
enforcement of the laws, and I shaU continue to do so wher
ever and whenever their CKCution may be resisted."
"Some objections have been urged against the details of
the act for the return of fugitives from labor, but it is worthy
of remark that the main opposition is aimed against the
Constitution itodf, and proceeds from persons and dasses of
persons many of whom declare their wish to see that Consti
tution overturned. They avow their hostiUty to any law

94 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
which shaU give fuU and practical effect to this requirement
of the Constitntion. Fortunately the number of these per
sons is comparatively smaU, and is heUeved to be daUy dimin
ishing; but the issue which they present is one which
involves the supremacy and even the existonce of the
Constitution." At an anti-slaveiy meeting, in PhUadelphia, held on De
cember 18, 1851, Joshua R. GKddings and Lucretia Mott were
speakers. The large audience grew tumultuously enthusi
astic over the presentation on the platform of Castner Han
way and Elijah Lewis.
After the trial William H. Seward sent the foUowing
Christmas greeting to District Attorney Ashmead, whose
son, Henry G. Ashmead, historian of Delaware County and
resident of Chester, cherishes the manuscript; Mr. Seward
was then in his first term as United States Senator, but had
already distinguished himself as an anti-slavery leader:
Washinqton December 25, 1857
My Dear Sir,
I thank you for the kind remembrance manifested by you sending me
a copy of your opening Argument on the late Trial for Treason. WhUe
I cannot but rejoice in the result of that trial as a new assurance of the
security of Popular Liberty, I am not unable to appreciate the ability
with which you have maintained the untenable position which the Govern
ment waa made to assume. The argument is highly logical and eloquent,
and I cannot better manifest my good wishes for you and for the Country
than by expressing a hope that it may be the good fortune of the cause
of truth and justice hereafter to enlist you on their side.
I am, my dear Sir,
Very respectfully & truly
Your friend,
WnxuM H. Sewasd.
John W. Ashmead, Esq.,
District Attorney of the United States
Philadelphia.
In his message to the Generd Assembly of Maryland at the
fdlowing January Session, Governor Lowe referred at lengtii

1

'A

t

i %4s

. 1 ^ 1^
^ • 1 ^ ^ i

•d 1

THE I.ATEB TEIAI,S, 95
to the Gorsuch tragedy. Despite the assurances of the Federd
administration through Secretary of State Daniel Webster,
that aU the energies of the law would be exerted to bring
the offenders to justice, Maryland had felt constrained to
actively participate in the prosecution, "The blood of a
Marylander," he declared, "cried out from the earth; whUst
the Genius of the Union called aloud for a vindication of
outraged laws." Otherwise " the flame of excitement would
spread from the hills of Maryland to the savannahs of the
extreme South, until every Southern State would unite in
one common feeling of horror and indignation." Senator
Cooper had been retained by him ; and despite the high ability
and signd service of both him and Maryland's Attorney Gen
eral, there had been a gross miscarriage of justice. With a
fervor of rhetoric that was more common then in State papers
than it is now, he declared : " Shall domestic feuds destroy
our power, when the eyes of all nations are turned to the
star of our empire, as the harbinger of their deliverance!
ShaU Kossuth blast Hungary with the breath of our discord ?
ShaU O'Brien, in his lonely exile, see the hope of Ireland
pass down the horizon, with the western sun? May so in
calculable a calamity be spared to the nations of the eartL
And yet, when American blood is made to flow upon
American soil, as a grateful libation to American fanaticism;
when whole communities stand listlessly by, and a prosti
tuted press and vend politicians are found, in the open day,
to glory in the human sacrifice; when the Law proclaims
ite own weakness from the Bench, and Treason stalks un
punished, through the haUs of justice; the Naticms can judge
of the probable, remoteness of that cdamity,"
The officid report of his Attorney Generd justified the
Governor in becoming somewhat heated over the outcome at
Philadelphia. Mr. Brent had suffered not only some per-
sond irritation over his position there, but a keen profes-
siond disappointment in his faUuro to convict The blame

96 THE 0HBIBTIAri.& lUUT.
for this he distributed very generaUy among the people of the
North who sympathized with resistance to the Fugitive Slave
Law; the partisan character of the jury panel; the partiality
of the ddly press reports; the sympathy of the spectators;
the treachery of the prison officids ; the bribery of Scott, the
government's witnesses; and egregious errors of law com
mitted by Judge Grier. Even the amiable Marshd did not
escape criticism, as evinced by this paragraph :
"I brought to the attention of the court, the fact stated
in the 'Pennsylvania Freeman,' that the Marshal (Mr,
Roberto) had actuaUy dined with the prisoners, or some of
them, during the trid, on Thanksgiving day, and when I was
about to read the article from the paper I was stopped by his
Honor, Judge Grier, who in behalf of the Marshal, denied the
truth of the statement that he had so dined ; but unfortunately
for the Judge's interposition, the Marshal immediately after
wards made his own explanation, and admitted that he had
not only assisted at the dinner, ' but had set down and par
taken sparingly ' of the Thanksgiving dinner, with the white
prisoners. I cannot but consider such conduct as highly un
becoming that officer from whom, next to the Judge, we had
a right to expect impartiality and a due regard for decorum."
It is only fair to all concerned to say that the Attorney
General's indignation was not taken very seriously. Attorney
Jackson's history of the case corrects some of his exaggera
tions, and especially points out that aU of Mr. Brent's col
leagues exculpated Marshal Roberts from any misconduct.
Judge Kane's own son, was known to have extended various
kindnesses and courtesies to the prisoners.
Mr. Brent's complaint on this score seems almost ridiculous
when one reads the full particulars of the affdr, as published
in the PhUadelphia Freeman of December 4, 1851. That
newspaper says :
" It affords us great pleasure to state, that the Christiana
prisoners were not whoUy forgotten on Thursday last in the

THE LATEB TBIALS. 97
distribution of the good things pertaining to Thanksgiving.
Thomas L. Kane, Esq. (son of the Judge), sent to the prison
for their use six superior turkeys, two of them extra size,
together with a pound cake, weighing 16 pounds. The tur
keys were cooked with appropriate fixings, by order of Mr.
Freed, the Superintendent, in the prison kitehen, by a female
prisoner detached for the purpose. The dinner for the white
prisoners, Messrs. Hanway, Lewis and Scarlet, was served in
appropriate style in the room of Mr. Morrison, one of the
keepers. The U. S. Marshal, A. E. Roberto, Esq., severd of
the keepers and Mr. Hawes, one of the prison officers, dined
with the prisoners- as their guests. Mayor Gilpin coming in,.
accepted an invitation to test the quality of the pound cake,
Mrs. Martha Hanway who has the honor to be the wife of the
'traitor' of that name, and who has spent most of her time
with her husband since his incarceration, served each of the
27 colored * traitors ' with a plate of turkey, potatoes, pound
cake, &c., and the supply not being exhausted, aU the prisoners
on the same corridor were similarly supplied.
" Who wiU stand best with posterity— the father who prosti
tutes his powers as a judge to procure the conviction of peace
able citizens as traitors for refusing to aid in the capture of
fugitive slaves, or the son who ministered to the wante of those
citizens while incarcerated in a loathsome prison ! Need we
answer the question ? "
The Maryland witnesses do not appear to have had as
cheery a Thanksgiving as the prisoners, Dickinson Gorsuch's
diary had this entry:
"TmiBSDAT, Nov. 27. "Thanksgiving Day. This has been a great
holiday here; there was no court today. We went to Mr. Ashmead 'i
office and stayed awhile. John Bacon went home after tha clothes I wore
when I was shot"
During their imprisonment the colored people and their
families were largely supported by outs[ide friends and
sympathizers ; and many an itom such as this, recorded in the
7

98

THE OHBmTIANA BIOT.

cash book of Thos. Wood (father of Mrs. David W. Jackson),
is set down to the credit of sympathetic friends:
lOth mo. 8, 18S1. Dr. I pair of pants and 1 shirt given to Elijah Clark
in Moyamensing; also sent his wife qr. middlings.
In another respect the official complaints of Maryland's
Governor and Attorney Generd against Pennsylvania justice
caU for correction at even this late day. Both aver that " the
murder" of Kennedy, a slave owner, at Carlisle, kUled in
resistance of the fugitive slave law, went utterly unpunished :
The facts are that in that offense the rioters and rescuers
were led by John Clellans and he and thirty-six others were
indicted. Besides CleUans twelve of the accused were con
victed of riot and of riotously rescuing fugitive slaves from
the lawful custody of their owners. Judge Hepburn sen
tenced them to solitary confinement at labor in the Eastern
Penitentiary for three years. Charles Gibbons represented
them on an apped to the Supreme Court; and Deputy At
toraey General (District Attorney) Bonham for the Com
monwealth, argued before that tribunal that Pennsylvania
followed the law of England, which upon conviction for riot
authorized fine, imprisonment and the pillory, and therefore
sentence to the penitentiary was lawful. Justice Burnside
delivering the opinion of the Supreme Court, declared " it
was an aggravated case of riot " ; but that as Pennsylvania
had adopted the English common law, the imprisonment must
be in the county jail, and the final judgment of the court was
that as the prisoners had been confined in the- Eastern Peni
tentiary about three-fourths of a year, "we deem this as
severe a pimishment as if they had been confined in the county
jail, where they legitimately should have been sent, for two
years," (CleUans vs. Com. 8 Barr. 223.)
Meantime the friends of Hanway, Lewis and others, in
censed at the continued prosecutions in Lancaster county,
assumed the aggressive.

THB LATEB TEIALB. 99
They procured the indictment to the January Sessions,
1852, No. 38, in Lancaster County, of Deputy Marshal
Henry H. Kline, for perjury. It was laid in this indictment
that he had sworn falsely at the hearing before Alderman
Reigart, wherein he averred that he had shown his warrant
to Hanway, asked him and Lewis to spare his men, that they
defied the warrant and encouraged the rioters and in various
other particulars. Upon this biU of indictment appeared the
names of a large number of witnesses, and Kline was held
in $1,000 baU before Charles G. Freeman, alderman of PhUa
delphia, to answer at the Lancaster Court.
It appears from the subsequent history of the case that aU
parties involved were by this time wiUing to have " somebody
help them to let go"; and accordingly at the January Ses
sions, Joseph McClure, of Bart township, being foreman of
the jury, this biU against Kline for perjury, being No. 38,
was ignored, and also the following, indictments all to the
same sessions and for Riot: No. 57, WiUiam Brown; No. 58,
Wm. Williams; No. 59, Henry Green; No. 60, WiUiam
Brown, Jr.; No. 61, Benjamin Johnson; No. 63, Daniel
Caulsberry; No. 64, George WeUs; No. 65,. George WiUiams ;
No. 66, Alson Perasley; No. 67, Lewis Gales; No. 68,
Lewis Clarkson; No. 69, Chas. Hunter; No. 70, Nelson
Carter ; No. 71, Jacob Woods, a brother of Peter Woods ; No.
72, Peter Woods; No. 73, Israel Clarkson; No. 74, John
Williams; No. 76, John Jackson; No, 76, Castner Hanway;
No, 77, Elijah Lewis; No. 78, John Morgan; No, 81, Ben
jamin Pendergrass; No. 82, John HaUiday; No. 83, Thomas
Butler; No, 84, Elijah Clark; No, 85, CoUister WUson.
With this termination of the cases in the locd courte aU
prosecutions were finaUy ended except that of Samuel WU
liams, in the United States District Court at PhUadelphia.
He was there charged with intorfering with the execution of
warranto for the arrest of Noah Buley and Joshua Ham
mond, runaway slaves. His case was first caUed for trid on

100 THE OHBISTIANA BIOT,
January 5, and continued untfl January 12. Mr. Ashmead
and Messrs, Ludlow appeared for the prosecution, and R. P.
Kane, W. S, Pierce and David Paul Brown for the defense.
The foUowing jury was empaneUed to try his case; the last
name on the list wiU be recognized as that of an estimable
citizen of Lancaster County:
Pratt Roberts, Chester County; Thomas Vaughan, PhUa
delphia; Henry McMahen, PhUadelphia; Patrick McBride,
Philadelphia ; Michael Keenan, Philadelphia ; Fredk. Boley,
Sr., Philadelphia; Joseph Dowden, Chester County; Samuel
Culp, Germantown; MinshaU Painter, Delaware County;
Joseph Thornton, Philadelphia; Francis Parker, Chester
County ; Peter McConomy, Lancaster.
Kline was the principal witness on this trial, and his testi
mony was practically a repetition of what he had sworn to in
the Hanway case. The trial judge fell iU during the progress
of the case and it was continued the third time and resumed
on February 2, argued to the jury on February 3, and, on
February 4, a verdict of " not guilty " was rendered.
This closes the record of all judicial proceedings arising
out of the Christiana Riot.

CHAPTER XIL
Pabkeb's Own Stobt,
The Leader of the Defenders Tells his Story of what Occurred at "the
Biot" — The Author Gives Beasons why He takes the Narrative with
Some Allowance — A Valuable Historical Contribution.
I deem it entirely fair and proper at this stage of the
narrative to republish entire William Parker's own account
of what took place at his house during. "the Riot" It is
reproduced in the assurance that each reader may — as he,
and especiaUy she, wiU — give it such credibility as the
circumstances may command for it. It is fit that it be pre
sented with certain qualifications to the general reader and to
the increasing number who may peruse this history in the
spirit in which it is written, viz., one of purely historic
inquiry. The Atlantic Monthly (Boston), for Febraary, 1866,
published the first part of what is entitled " The Freedman's
Story," introduced by one who signed himself " E. K,," and
said he was asked to revise it for publication "or weave ite
facts into a story which would show the fitness of the
Southern black for the right of suffrage." The editor evades
the natural inquiry whether the text is wholly Parker's or
partially his own; but it is printed as that of a freedman
or ex-slave and as evidence " of the manhood of his race to
that impartial grand-jury, the American people,"
Of course it cannot be unreservedly accepted for the pur
pose for which it was offered, that is : to prove the fitaess of
the Southern freedman for suffrage ; for it is not the narra
tive of a man who was suddenly freed and enfranchised by
the circumstances of war, but of one who became a fugitive
slave many years earlier and had the advantage of Northern
life and Canadian experience in the intervening period.
101

102

THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.

But it is of very decided vdue to this attempted impartid
and impersond history, because it purporte to teU the story
of the Riot as the man most responsible for it and most con
spicuous in it saw and heard ito incidente; and, because he
never had an opportunity to tell it under the restrainto of a
judicial examination or the obUgations of an oath. It must
be taken as his voluntary testimony, when he had no hopes
of reward or fear of punishment to incite or restrain him.
The earlier part of his life's story has been already ab
stracted, so far as it has any importance to this history. It
leaves no room for doubt that he was a heroic and a desperate
man ; that he was instigated by ideas of personal liberty for
himself and others, without regard to law; and that both
offensively and defensively he was "enlisted for the war"
to the death against all and every attempt to execute the
Fugitive Slave Law.
Whether he is accurate in his statement of what occurred
on the day of "the Riot," each reader must determine for
himself or herself. For myself, individually, I doubt the
literal truth of parts of his narration, while I concede that
in the main it is true and it certainly throws more illumina
tion on the actual occurrences than the testimony of any
other single witness.
I detect a note of braggadocio through aU Parker's nar^
rative, which slightly discounts its truthfulness. His defi
ance of " aU United States " ; his admitted attempts to de
ceive Gorsuch as to the presence of his slaves on the premises;
and his avowed purpose to shoot Gorsuch infiuence my judg
ment. Such considerations might not have weight with those
who believe a man may be a good citizen who violates and
defies a bad law. The literary style of "The Freedman's
Story" leaves littie room for doubt that his manuscript was
edited by some one with a purpose other than strictly
historical. On the other hand, no other person was in so favorable a

pabkeb's own btobt. 103
position as Parker to teU the actual story of the Riot, if he
saw fit to do so, and when this version was published Parker
had nothing to gain or Idse from telling the trath, but the
zeal of his editor to exalt " the freedman " may have tinc
tured the story. That he could remember its detaUs so ex
actly as to verbally reproduce the many conversations in the
Atlantic fifteen years later, is more than doubtful — it is
impossible; and his pretense to do so discounts the attompt
In many respects the narration accords with the testimony
of other eye-witnesses and it is not out of harmony in the
main with the evidence produced on the' trial, WhUe it
ascribes language to Mr. Gorsuch that likely he did not use,
and may put into his hands weapons that he did not carry,
Parker's story certainly gives the Gorsuches, father and son,
due credit for valor ; and it makes some of their allies scarcely
more timid than the trial disclosed them to have been.
Howbeit, the story told by Parker is an essential part of
the history of the case and it is here reprinted out of fair
ness to all parties so far as it relates to the Riot and events
immediately pjreceding it
William Pabkeb's Stobt,
The Atlantic Monthly article. Part II, March, 1866, to
which attention has been given, presupposes a previous ac
count of Parker's early Ufe, the escape of the Gorsuch slaves,
the warrants for their re-capture, the departure of Deputy
Marshal Kline to execute them and "Sam WiUiams's" mis
sion to Lancaster County to wara them and their friends of
the impending raid upon them, substantiaUy as they have
been told already, Parker then proceeds:
The information brought by Mr, WUUams spread through
the vicinity like a fire in the prairies; and when I went
home from my work in the evening, I found Pinckney (whom
I should have said before was my brothei^in-law), Abra
ham Johnson, Samuel Thompson and Joshua Kito at my

104 THB OHBISTIANA BIOT.
house, aU of them exdted about the ramor. I laughed at
them, and said it was aU talk. This was the 10th of Sep
tember, 1851. They stopped for the night with us, and we
went to bed as usuaL Before daylight, Joshua Kito rose,
and started for his home. Directly, he ran back to the
house, burst open the door, crying, "0 WiUiam! kidnap
pers t kidnappers I"
He said that, when he was just beyond the yard, two men
crossed before him, as if to stop him, and others came up on
either side. As he said this, they had reached the door,
Joshua ran up stairs (we slept up stairs), and they fol
lowed him ; but I met them at the landing, and asked, " Who
are you?"
The leader, Kline, replied, "I am the United States
Marshd." I then told him to take another step and I would break his
neck. He again said, " I am the United States Marshal."
I told him I did not care for him nor the United States.
At that he turned and went down stairs.
Pinckney said, as he turned to go down, — "Where is the
use in fighting ? They wiU take us."
Kline heard him, and said, " Yes, give up, for we can and
will take you anyhow."
I told them all not to be afraid, nor to give up to any
slaveholder, but to fight until death,
" Yes," said Kline, " I have heard many a negro talk as
big as you, and then have taken him ; and I'U take you."
"You have not taken me yet," I replied; "and if you
undertake it you will have your name recorded in history for
this day's work."
Mr, Gorsuch then spoke, and said, — "Come, Mr. Kline,
let's go up stairs and take them. We can take them. Come,
foUow me. I'U go up and get my property. What's in the

pabkeb's own stobt. 105
wayf The law is in my favor, and the people are in my
favor," At that he began to ascend the stair; but I said to him, —
" See here, old man, you can come up, but you can't go down
again. Once up here, you are mine,"
Kline then said — "Stop, Mr, Gorsuch. I wiU read the
warrant, and then, I think, they wiU give np,"
He then read the warrant, and said, — "Now, you see, we
are commanded to take you, dead or aUve; so you may as
well give up at once."
"Go up, Mr. Kline," then said Gorsuch, "you are the
Marshd." Kline started, and when a little way up said, "I am
coming." I said, " Well, come on."
But he was too cowardly to show his face. He went down
again and said, — " You had better give up without any more
fuss, for we are bound to take you anyhow. I told you before
that I was the United States Marshal, yet you wiU not give
up, I'U not trouble the slaves. I wiU teke you and make you
pay for aU."
"WeU," I answered, "take me and make me pay for aU,
I'U pay for aU."
Mr, Gorsuch then said,. " You have my property."
To which I replied,-^ "Go in the room down there, and
see if there ia anyJiing there belonging to yon. There are
beds and a bureau, chairs, and other things. Then go out to
the barn; there you wiU find a cow and some hogs. See if
any of them are yours,"
He said, — "They are not mine; I want my men. They
are here, and I am bound to have them."
Thus we parleyed for a time, aU because of the pusiUa-
nimity of the Marshd, when he, at last, sdd,"— "I am tired
waiting on you ; I see yon are not going to give np. Go to the

106 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
barn and feteh some straw," said he to one of his men. " I
wiU set the house on fire, and burn them up."
" Burn us up and welcome," said I, " None but a coward
would say the like. You can burn us, but you can't take us ;
before I give up, you wiU see my ashes scattored on the earth,"
By this time day had begun to dawn; and then my wife
came to me and asked if she should blow the horn, to bring
friends to our assistance, I assented, and she went to the
garret for the purpose. When the hora sounded from the
garret window, one of the rafflans asked the others what it
meant ; and Kline said to me, " What do you mean by blow
ing that horn ? "
I did not answer, It was a custom with ui, when b hora
wai blown at an unusual hour, to proceed to the spot promptly
to SCO what was the matter. Kline ordered hia men to shoot
any one they saw blowing the horn. There was a peach-tree
at that end of the house. Up it two of the men climbed ; and
when my wife went a second time to the window, they fired
as soon as they heard the blast, but missed their aim. My
wife then went down on her knees, and, drawing her head and
body below the range of the window, the horn resting on the
siU, blew blast after blast, while the shote poured thick and
fast around her. They must have fired ten or twelve times.
The house was of stone, and the windows were deep, which
alone preserved her life.
They were evidentiy disconcerted by the blowing of the
horn. Gorsuch said again, " I want my property, and I wiU
have it,"
"Old man," said I, "you look as if you belonged to some
persuasion." "Never mind," he answered, "what persuasion I belong
to; I want my property."
While I was leaning out of the window, Kline fired a pistol
at me, but the shot went too high; the ball broke the glass
just above my head. I was talking to Gorsuch at the time.

pabkeb's own btobt. 107
I seized a gun and dmed it at Gorsuch's breast, for he evi
dently had instigated Kline to fire; but Pinckney caught my
arm and said, " Don't shoot." The gun went off, just grazing
Gorsuch's shoulder. Another conversation then ensued be
tween Gorsuch, KUne, and myself, when another one of the
party fired at me but missed, Dickinson Gorsuch, I then
saw, was preparing to shoot ; and I told him if he missed, I
would show him where shooting first came frouL
I asked them to consider what they would have done, had
they been in our position, " I know you want to kiU us," I
said, " for you have shot at us time and again. We have only
fired twice, although we have guns and ammunition, and
could kill you aU if we would, but we dp not want to shed
blood," " If you do not shoot any more," then said Kline, " I wiU
stop my men from firing."
They then ceased for a time, Thia was about sunrise.
Mr, Gorsuch now said, — "GHve up and let me have my
property. Hear what the Marshd says ; the Marshal is your
friend. He advises you to give up without more fuss, for my
property I will have."
I denied that I had his property when he replied, "Ton
have my men,"
"Am I your man?" I asked.
"No."
I then called Pinckney forward.
" Is that your man ? "
"No."
Abraham Johnson I caUed next, but Gorsnch said he was
not his man.
The only plan left was to caU both Pinckney and Johnson
again ; for had I caUed the others, he would have recognized
them, for they were his slaves.
Abraham Johnson said, "Does such a shriveUed np old

108 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
slaveholder as you own such a nice, genteel young man as
I am!" At this Gorsuch took offence, and charged me with dictatr
ing his language, I then told him there were but five of ns,
which he denied, and stiU insisted that I had his property.
One ef the party then attacked the Abolitioniste, affirming
that, although they declared there could not be property in
man, the Bible was conclusive authority in favor of property
in human fiesh,
" Yes," said Gorsuch, " does not the Bible say, ' Servants,
obey your masters ' ? "
I said that it did, but the same Bible said, "Give unto
your servante that which is just and equal."
At this stage of the proceedings, we went into a mutud
Scripture inquiry, and bandied views in the manner of gar
rulous old wives.
When I spoke of duty to servants, Gorsuch said, " Do you
know that ? "
" Where," I asked, " do you see it in Scripture that a man
should traffic in his brother's blood?"
"Do you cdl a nigger my brother?" said Gorsnch.
"Yes," saidL
" William," said Samuel Thompson, " he has been a class-
leader." When Gorsuch heard that, he hung his head, but said noth
ing. We then aU joined in singing, —
"Leader, what do you say
About the judgment dayt
I will die on the field of battle,
Die on the field of battle.
With glory in my aoul. "
Then we aU began to shout, singing meantime, and
shouted for a long while. Gorsuch, who was standing head
bowed, said " What are you doing now ?"
Samuel Thompson replied, " Preaching a sinner's funeral

pabkeb's own BTOBT. 109
"You had better give up, and come down,"
I then said to Gorsuch, — " ' If a brother see a sword com
ing, and he wara not his brother, then the brother's blood
is required at his hands; but if the brother see the sword
coming, and wara his brother, and his brother fiee not, then
his brother's blood is required at his own hand.' I see the
sword coming, and, old man, I wara you to fiee ; if you fiee
not, your blood be upon your own hand,"
It was now about seven o'clock,
"You had better give up," said old Mr, Gorsuch, aftor
another while, " and come down, for I have come a long way
this moraing, and want my breakfast ; for my property I wiU
have, or I'll breakfast in hell, I wiU go up and get it,"
He then started up stairs, and came far enough to see
us all plainly. We were just about to fire upon him, when
Dickinson Gorsuch, who was standing on the old oven, before
the door, and could see into the up-stairs room through the
window, jumped down and caught his father, saying, — "0
father, do come down! do come down I They have guns,
swords, and aU kinds of weapons I The/U kiU youl Do
come down I "
The old man turaed and left When down with him,
young Gorsuch could scarce draw breath, and the father
looked more like a dead than a living man, so frightened
were they at their supposed danger. The old man stood some
time without saying anything; at last he said, as if solUo-
quizing, "I want my property, and I wiU have it"
Kline broke forth, " If you don't give up by fair means,
yon wiU have to by foul."
I told him we would not surrender on any conditions.
Young Gorsuch then said, — "Don't ask them to pve np,
— make them do it We have money, and can caU men to
teke them. What is it that money won't buy ? "
Then said Kline, — "I am getting tired waiting- on you;
I see you are not going to give np."

110 THB OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
He then wroto a noto and handed it to Joshua Gorsuch,
saying at the same time, — "Take it, and bring a hundred
men from Lancaster."
As he started, I sdd, — "See here I When you go to
Lancastor, don't bring a hundred men, — bring five hundred.
It wiU take aU the men in Lancastor to change our purpose or
take us aUve."
He stopped to confer with Kline, when Pinckney said,
"We had better give up,"
" You are getting afraid," said I.
"Yes," said Kline, "give up like men. The rest would
give up if it were not for you,"
"I am not afraid," said Pinckney; "but where is the
sense in fighting against so many men, and only five of us ? "
The whites, at this time, were, coming from aU quarters,
and Eline was enroUing them as fast as they came. Their
numbers alarmed Pinckney, and I told him to go and sit
down ; but he said, " No, I wiU go down stairs."
I told him, if he attempted it, I should be compeUed to
blow out his brains. " Don't believe that any living man can
take you," I said. " Don't give up to any slaveholder."
To Abraham Johnson, who was near me, I then turned.
He declared he was not afraid. "I -wiU fight tiU I die," he
said. At this time, Hannah, Pinckney's wife, had become im
patient of our persistent course ; and my wife, who brought
me her message urging us to surrender, seized a corn-cutter,
and declared she would cut off the head of the first one who
should attempt to give up.
Another one of Gorsuch's slaves was coming along the high
road at this time, and I beckoned, to him to go around. Pinck
ney saw him, and soon became more inspired. Elijah Lewis
a Quaker, also came along about this time : I beckoned to him,
likewise ; but he came straight on, and was met by Kline, who
ordered him to assist him. Lewis asked for his authority.

pabkeb's own STOBT. Ill
and Kline handed him the warrant. WhUe Lewis was read
ing, Castner Hanway came up, and Lewis handed the warrant
to him. Lewis asked Kline what Parker said.
Kline replied, " He won't give up,"
Then Lewis and Hanway both said to the Marshal, — "If
Parker says they wiU not give up, you had better let them
alone, for he wiU kiU some of you. We are not going to risk
our lives " — and they turned to go away.
While they were talking, I came down and stood in the
doorway, my men following behind.
Old Mr. Gorsuch said, when I appeared, ''TheyTl come
out, and get away 1 " and he came back to the gate.
I then said to him, -^ " You said you could and wodd take
us. Now you have the chance."
They were a cowardly-looking set of men,
Mr, Gorsuch said, " You can't come out here,"
" Why ? " said I. " This is my place. I pay rent for it.
I'll let you see if I can't come out,"
" I don't care if you do pay rent for it," said he. " If you
come out, I wiU give you the contonts of these" — ^present
ing, at the same time, two revolvers, one in each hand.
I said, " Old man, if you don't go away, I wUl break your
neck," I then walked up to where he stood his arms resting on the
gate, trembling as if afflicted with palsy, and laid my hand
on his shoulder, saying, "I have seen pistols before to-day."
Kline now came running up, and entreated Gorsuch to come
away, " No," said the latter, " I wiU have my property, or go to
heU." " What do you intend to do f " add Kline to me.
"I intend to fight," said L "I intend to try your
strengtL" " If you wUl withdraw your men," he replied, " I wiU with
draw mine."

112 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
I told him it was too late. "Yon would not withdraw
when you had the chance, — you shaU not now."
Kline then went back to Hanway and Lewis. Gorsuch
made a signal to his men, and they all feU into line. I fol
lowed his example as weU as I could; but as we were not more
than ten paces apart, it was difficult to do so. At this time
we numbered but ten, whUe there were between thirty and
forty of the white men.
While I was talking to Gorsuch, his son said, "Father,
will you take all this from a nigger ? "
I answered him by saying that I respected old age; but
that, if he would repeat that, I should knock his teeth down
his throat. At this he fired upon me, and I ran up to him
and knocked the pistol out of his hand, when he let the other
one fall and ran in the field.
My brother-in-law, who was standing near, then said, " I
can stop him" — and with his double-barrel gun he fired.
Young Gorsuch fell, but rose and ran on again, Pinckney
fired a second time and again Gorsuch fell, but was soon up
again and, ranning into the cornfield, lay down in the
fence corner,
I returned to my men, and found Samuel Thompson talk
ing to old Mr, Gorsuch, his master. They were both angry,
" Old man, you had better go home to Maryland," said
Samuel. " You had better give up, and come home with me," sdd
the old man.
Thompson took Pinckney's gun from him, strack Qor-
such, and brought him to his knees. Gorsuch rose and sig-
ndled to his men. Thompson then knocked him down agdn,
and he again rose. At this time all the white men opened
fire, and we rashed upon them; when they turaed, threw
down their guns and ran away. We, being dosely engaged,
dubbed our rifles. We were too dosely pressed to fire, but
we found a good deal could be done with empty guns.

pabkeb's own STOBT. 113
Old Mr. Gorsuch was the bravest of his party; he held on
to his pistols until the last, while aU the others threw away
their weapons. I saw as many as three at a time fighting -with
him. Sometimes he was on his knees, then on his back, and
again his feet would be where his head should be. He was a
fine soldier and a brave man. Whenever he saw the least
opportunity, he would take aim, WhUe in close quarters
with the whites, we could load and fire but two or three
times. Our guns got bent and out of order. So damaged did
they become, that we could shoot with but two or three of
them. Samuel Thompson bent his gun on old Mr, Gorsuch so
badly, that it was of no use to us.
When the white men ran, they scattered. I ran after
Nathan Nelson, but could not catch him. I never saw a man
run faster. Returning, I saw Joshua Gorsuch coming, and
Pinckney behind him. I reminded him that he wodd like
"to take hold of a nigger." told him that now was his
"chance," and strack him a blow on the side of the head,
which stopped him. Pinckney came up behind, and gave
him a blow which brought him to the ground; as the others
passed, they gave him a kick or jumped upon him, untU
the blood oozed out at his ears.
Nicholas Hutchings and Nathan Nelson of Baltimore
C!ounty, Maryland, codd outran any men I ever saw. They
and Kline were not brave, like the Gorsuches. Codd our
men have got them, they would have been satisfied.
One of our men ran after Dr. Pierce, as he richly deserved
attention ; but Pierce caught up with Castner Hanway, who
rode between the fugitive and the Doctor, to shield him
and some others. Hanway was told to get out of the way,
or he would forfeit his life ; he went aside quickly, and the
man fired at the Marylander, but missed him, — he was too
far off. I do not know whether he was wounded or not; but
I do know that, if it had not been for Hanway, he would
have been kiUed.
8

114 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
Having driven the slavoorats off in every direction, onr
party now turaed towards their several homes. Some of us,
however, went back to my house, where we found severd
of the neighbors.
The scene at the house beggars description. Old Mr, Gor
such was lying in the yard in a pool of blood, and confusion
reigned both inside and outside of the house,
Levi Pownall sdd to me, " The weather is so hot and the
files are so bad, will you give me a sheet to put over the
corpse ? "
In reply, I gave him permission to get anything he
needed from the house.
"Dickinson Gorsuch is lying in the fence-corner, and I
believe he is dying. Give me something for him to drink,"
said Powndl, who seemed to be acting the part of the Good
Samaritan. When he returned from ministering to Dickinson, he told
me he could not live.
The riot, so called, was now entirely ended. The elder
Gorsuch was dead; his son and nephew were both wounded,
and I have reason to believe others were, — how many, it
would be difficult to say. Of our party, only two were wounded.
One received a ball in his hand, near the wrist; but it only
entered the skin, and ho pushed it out with his thumb. An
other received a ball in the fleshy port of his thigh, which
had to bo oxtructed ; but neither of thorn were sick or crip-
plod by the wounds. Whon young Gorsuch fired at mo In the
early port of the battio, both balls posBod through my hat,
cutting off my hoir doso to the skin, but they drew no blood.
The marks woro not more than on inch apart.
A story was afterwards circulated that Mr. Gorsuch shot
his own slave, and in retaliation his slave shot him ; but it
was without foundation. His slave strack him the first and
second blows; then three or four sprang upon him, and, when
he became hdpless, left him to pursue others. The women

PABKEEB own STOBT, 116
put an end to him. His slaves, so far from meeting death
at his hands, are all still living.
After the fight, my wife was obliged to secrete herself,
leaving the children in care of her mother, and to the chari
ties of our neighbors. I was questioned by my friends as
to what I should do, as they were looking for officers to arrest
me. I determined not to be taken alive, and told them so;
but, thinking advice as to our future course necessary, went
to see some old friends and consult about it Their advice
was to leave, as, were we captured and imprisoned, they
could not foresee the result. Acting upon this hint, we set out
for home, when we met some female friends, who told us
that forty or fifty armed men were at my house, looking for
me, and that we had better stay away from the place, if
we did not want to be taken. Abraham Johnson and Pinck
ney hereupon halted, to agree upon the best course, while I
turaed around and went another way.
Before setting out on my long journey northward, I de
termined to have an interview with my family, if possible,
and to that end changed my course. As we went along the
road to where I found them, we met men in companies of
three and four, who had been drawn together by the excite
ment. On one occasion, we met ten or twelve together. They
dl left the road, and climbed over the fences into the fields to
let us pass; and then after we had passed, turned, and
looked after us as far as they could see. Had we been
carrying destruction to aU human kind, they could not
have acted more absurdly. We went to a friend's house
and stayed for the rest of the day, and until nine o'clock that
night when we set out for Canada.
The great trial now was to leave my wife and family. Un
certain as to the resdt of the jouraey, I felt I wodd rather
die than he separated from them. It had to be done, how^
ever; and we went forth with heavy hearts, outcasts for
the sake of liberty. When we had wdked as far as Ohristi-

116 THB OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
ana, we saw a large crowd, lato as it was, to some of whom,
at least, I must have been known, as we heard distinctiy,
"A'n't that Parker?"
"Yes," was answered, "that's Parker."
Kline was caUed for, and he, with some nine or ton more,
foUowed after. We stopped, and then they stopped. One
said to his comrades, "Go on, — that's him." And another
replied, " You go." So they contended for a time who should
come to us. At last they went back. I was sorry to see
them go back, for I wanted to meet Kline and end the day's
transactions. We went on unmolested to PenningtonviUe ; and, in conse
quence of the excitement, thought best to continue on to
Parkesburg, Nothing worth mention occurred for a time.
We proceeded to Downingtown, and thence six mUes be
yond, to the house of a friend. We stopped with him on
Saturday night, and on the evening of the 14th went fifteen
mUes farther. Here I learned from a preacher, directly
from the city, that the excitement in Philadelphia was too
great for us to risk our safety by going there. Another man
present advised us to go to Norristown,
At Norristown we rested a day. The friends gave us ten
dollars, and sent us in a vehicle to Quakertown, Our driver,
being partly intoxicated, set us down at the wrong place,
which obliged ns to stay out aU night. At eleven o'clock the
next day we got to Quakertown. We had gone about six
miles out of the way, and had to go directly across the
country. We rested the 16th, and set out in the evening
for FriendsviUe.
A friend piloted us some distance, and we traveUed Until
we became very tired, when we went to bed under a haystack.
On the l7th, we took breakfast at an inn. We passed a smaU
viUage, and asked a man whom we met with a dearborn, what
would be his charge to Windgap. "One doUar and fifty

PABKEEB OWN BTOBT. 117
cents," was the ready answer. So in we got, and rode to that
place. As we wanted to make some inquiries when we struck the
north and south road, I went into the postoffice, and asked for
a letter for John Thomas, which of course I did not get The
postmaster scratinized us closely, — more so, indeed, than
any one had done on the Blue Mountains, — but informed us
that FriendsviUe was between forty and fifty miles away.
Aftor going about nine miles, wo stopped in the evening of the
18th at an inn, got supper, were politely served, and had an
excellent night's rest. On the next day we set out for Tan-
norsville, hiring a conveyance for twenty-two miles of the
way. We had no further difficulty on the entire road to
Rochester, — more than five hundred miles by the route we
travelled. Some amusing incidents occurred, however, which it may
be well to relate in this connection. The next moraing, after
stopping at the tavern, we took the cars and rode to Homer-
ville, where, after waiting an hour, as our landlord of the
night previous had directed us, we took stage. Being the first
applicants for tickete, we secured inside seats, and, from the
number of us, we took up all of tHe places inside ; but, another
traveller coming, I tendered him mine, and rode with the
driver. The passenger thanked me; but the driver, a churl,
and the most prejudiced person I ever came in contact with,
would never wait aftor a stop until I could get on, but wodd
drive away, and leave me to swing, climb, or cling on to the
stage as best I codd. Onr traveller, at last noticing his be
havior, told him promptly not to be so fast, but let aU pas
sengers get on, which had the effect to restrain him a littie.
At Big Eddy we took the cars. Directly opposito me sat a
gentleman, who, on leaning that I was for Roohestor, said he
was going there too, and afterwards proved an agreeable trav
eUing companion.
A newsboy came in with papers, some of which the pas-

118 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
sengers bought. Upon opening them, they read of the fight at
Christiana. "O, see herel" said my neighbor; "great excitement at
Christiana ; a — a statesman kiUed, and his son and nephew
badly wounded."
After reading, the passengers began to exchange opinions
on the case. Some said they would Uke to catch Parker, and
get the thousand dollars reward offered by the State ; but the
man opposite to me said, " Parker must be a powerfd man."
I thought to myself, " If you codd teU what I can, you
could judge about that."
Pinckney and Johnson became alarmed, and wanted to
leave the cars at the next stopping-place ; but I told them there
was no danger. I then asked particdarly about Christiana,
where it was, on what railroad, and other questions, to aU of
which I received correct replies. One of the men became so
much attached to me, that, when we would go to an eating-
saloon, he would pay for both. At Jefferson we thought of
leaving the cars, and taking the boat ; but they told us to keep
on the cars, and we would get to Rochester by nine o'clock the
next night.
We left Jefferson about four o'clock in the morning, and
arrived at Rochester at mne the same morning. Just before
reaching Rochester, when in conversation with my traveUing
friend, I ventured to ask what would be done with Parker,
should he be taken.
" I do not know," he replied ; " but the laws of Pennsyl
vania would not hang him, — they might imprison him. But
it would be different, very different, should they get him into
Maryland. The people in aU the Slave States are so pre
judiced against colored people, that they never give them jus
tice. But I don't believe they wiU get Parker. I think he is
in Canada by this time; at least, I hope so, — for I believe
he did right and, had I been in his place, I would have done
as he did. Any good citizen wiU say the same. I beHeve

pabkeb's own STOBT. 119
Parker to be a brave man ; and all you colored people should
look at it as we white people look at our brave men, and do
as we do. You see Parker was not fighting for a country, nor
for praise. He was fighting for freedom : he only wanted
liberty, as other men do. You colored people shodd protect
him, and remember him as long as you Uve, We are coming
near our parting-place, and I do not know if we shaU ever
meet again. I shaU be in Rochester some two or three days
before I return home ; and I would like to have your company
back" I told him it wodd be some time before we returned.
The cars then stopped, when he bade me good by. As
strange as it may appear, he did not ask me my name; and
I was afraid to inquire his, from fear he would.
On leaving the cars, after walking two or three squares,
we overtook a colored man, who conducted us to the house
of a friend of mine. He welcomed me at once, as we were
acquainted before, took me up stairs to wash and comb, and
prepare, as he said, for company.
As I was combing, a lady came up and said, "Which of
you is Mr. Parker ? "
"I am," said I, — "what there is left of me."
She gave me her hand, and said, "And this is WiUiam
Parker I"
She appeared to be so excited that she could not say what
she wished to. We were told we would not get much rest,
and we did not; for visitors were constantly coming. One
gentieman was surprised that we got away from the cars, as
spies were aU about, and there were two thousand doUars re
ward for the party.
We left at eight o'clock that evening, in a carriage, fw
the boat, bound for Kingston in Canada, As we went on
board, the beU was ringing. After waUdng about a littie, a
friend pointed out to me the o&cen on the "hunt" for us;
and just as the boat pushed off from the wharf, some of onr

120 THE OHBIBTIANA BlOt.
friends on shore caUed me by name. Our pursuers looked
very much like fools, as they were, I told one of the gentie-
men on shore to write to Kline that I was in Canada. Ten
doUars were generously contributed by the Roohestor friends
for our expenses; and dtogether their kindness was heartfelt,
and was most gratefuUy appreciated by us.
Once on the boat, and fairly out at sea towards the land of
liberty, my mind became calm, and my spirito very much
depressed at thought of my wife and children. Before, I had
little time to think much about them, my mind being on my
journey. Now I became silent and abstracted. Although
fond of company, no one was company for me now.
We landed at Kingston on the 21st of September, at six
o'clock in the morning, and walked around for a long time,
without meeting any one we had ever known. At last, how
ever, I saw a colored man I knew in Maryland. He at first
pretended to have no knowledge of me, but finaUy recognized
me. I made known our distressed condition when he said he
was not going home then, but, if we wodd have breakfast, he
would pay for it. How different the treatment received from
this man — himself an exile for the sake of liberty, and in its
fdl enjoyment on free soil — and the self-sacrificing spirit of
our Rochester colored brother, who made haste to welcome us
to his ample home, — the well-earned reward of his faithfd
labors I
On Monday evening, the 23d, we started for Toronto,
where we arrived safely the next day. Directly after landing,
we heard that Governor Johnston, of Pennsylvania, had
made a demand on the Governor of Canada for me, under the
Extradition Treaty. Pinckney and Johnson advised me to
go to the country, and remain where I should not be known ;
but I refused. I intended to see what they wodd do with
me. Going at once to the Government House, I entered the
first office I came to. The official requested me to be seated.
The following is the substance of the conversation between us.

pabkeb's own btobt. 121
as near as I can remember. I told him I had heard that
Governor Johnston, of Pennsylvania, had requested his gov
ernment to send me back. At this he came forward, held
forth his hand, and said, "Is this WUilam Parker?"
I took his hand, and assured him I was the man. When he
started to come, I thought he was intending to seize me, and
I prepared myself to knock him down. His genial sympa
thetic manner it was that convinced me he meant well.
He made me sit down, and said — "Yes, they want yon
back again. WiU you go?"
"I wUl not be taken back alive," said I. "I ran away
from my master to be free, — I have run from the United
States to be free. I am now going to stop running."
" Are you a fugitive from labor ? " he asked,
I told him I was,
"Why," he answered, "they say you are a fugitive from
justice." He then asked me where my mastor lived.
I told him, " In Anne Arundel County, Maryland,"
" Is there such a county in Maryland ? " he asked.
" There is," I answered.
He took down a map, examined it, and said, "You are
right," I then told him the name of the farm, and my master's
name. Further questions bearing upon the country towns
near, the nearest river, eto., foUowed, aU of which I an
swered to his satisfaction,
"How does it happen," he then asked, "that yon lived
in Pennsylvania so long, and no person knew you were a
fugitive from labor?"
"I do not get other people to keep my secrete, sir," I
replied, "My brother and famUy ody knew that I had
been a slave,"
He then assured me that I would not, in his opinion, have
to go back. Many coming in at tiiis time on business, I was
told to caU again at three o'clock, which I did. The person

122 THX OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
in the office, a derk, told me to take no further trouble
about it, until that day four weeks. " But yon are as free a
man as I am," said he. When I told the news to Pinckney
and Johnson, they were greatiy reUeved in mind,
I ate breakfast with the greatost relish, got a lettor writton
to a friend in Chester County for my wife, and set about
arrangements to settle at or near Toronto.
We tried hard to get work, but the task was difficdt I
think three weeks elapsed before we got work that could be
caUed work. Sometimes we would secure a smaU job, worth
two or three shillings, and sometimes a smaUer one, worth
not more than one shilling; and these not oftener than once
or twice in a week. We became greatly discouraged; and,
to add to my misery, I was constantly hearing some alarm
ing report about my wife and children. Sometimes they
had carried her back into slavery, — sometimes the children,
and sometimes the entire party. Then there would come a
contradiction. I was soon so completely worn down by my
fears for them, that I thought my heart would break. To
add to my disquietude, no answer came to my letters, although
I went to the office regularly every day. At last I got a letter
with the glad news that my wife and children were safe, and
wodd be sent to Canada. I told the person reading for me
to stop, and tell them to send hier "right now," — I could
not wait to hear the rest of the letter.
Two months from the day I landed in Toronto, my wife
arrived, but without the children. She had had a very bad
time. Twice they had her in custody; and, a third time,
her young master came after her, which obliged her to fiee
before day, so that the children had to remain behind for the
time. I was so glad to see her that I forgot about the
children. The day my wife came, I had nothing but the clothes on
my back, and was in debt for my board, without any work
to depend upon. My situation was traly distressing. I took

123
the resolution, and went to a store where I made known my
circumstances to the proprietor, offering to work for him to
pay for some necessaries. He readily consentod, and I sup
plied myself with bedding, meal and flour. As I had selected
a place before, we went that evening, about two miles into the
country, and settled ourselves for the winter.
When in Kingston, I had heard of the Buxton settlement,
and of the Revds. Dr. Willis and Mr. King, the agents. My
informant, after stating all the particdars, induced me to
think it was a desirable place ; and having quite a little sum
of money due to me in the States, I wrote for it, and waited
until May, It not being sent, I called upon Dr, WiUis,
who treated me kindly, ' I proposed to settle in El^n, if he
would loan means for the first instalment He said he
would see about it, and I should call again. On my second
visit, he agreed to assist me, and proposed that I should get
another man to go on a lot with me.
Abraham Johnson and I arranged to settle together, and,
with Dr, WUlis's letter to Mr, King on our behalf, I em
barked with my family on a schooner for the West After
five days' sailing, we reached Windsor, Not having the
means to take us to Chatham, I called upon Henry Bibb, and
laid my case before him. He took us in, treated us with
great politeness, and afterwards took me with him to Detroit,
where, after an introduction to some friends, a purse of five
dollars was made up, I divided the money among my com
panions, and started them for Chatham, but was obliged to
stay at Windsor and Detroit two days longer.
WhUe stopping at Windsor, I went again to Detroit, with
two or three friends, when, at one of the steamboato just
landed, some officers arrested three fugitives, on pretence of
being horse thieves. I was satisfied they were slaves, and
said so, when Henry Bibb went to the telegraph office and
learned through a message that they were. In the crowd
and excitement, the sheriff threatoned to imprison me for

124 TBS OHBUTXANA BIOT.
my intorferenoe. I felt indignant, and told him to do so,
whereupon he opened the door. About this time there was
more excitement, and then a man slipped into the jail, unseen
by the officers, opened the gate, and the three prisoners went
out, and made their escape to Windsor, I stopped through
that night in Detroit, and started the next day for Chatham,
where I found my family snUgly provided for at a boarding-
house kept by Mr, Younge.
Chatham was a thriving town at that time, and the genuine
liberty onjoyod by its numoroui colored roiidcnts pleased mo
greatly; but our destination woi Buxton, and thither we
wont on the following day. We arrived thoro in the evening,
and I called immediately upon Mr. King, and prcsontod Dr,
Willis's letter. He received mo very politely, and said that,
aftor I should feel rested, I could go out and select a lot. He
also kindly offered to give mo meal and pork for my family,
until I could get work.
In due time, Johnson and I each chose a fifty-acre lot for
although when in Toronto we agreed with Dr. Willis to take
one lot between us, when we saw the land we thought we
could pay for two lots. I got the money in a Uttle time,
end paid the Doctor back, I built a house, and we moved
into it that samo fall, and in it I live yet, (1860.)
Whon I first lettlod in Buxton, the white lottieri In the
vioinity woro much oppoicd to colored people. Their preju
dices were very strong; but the spread of intelligence and
religion in tho community has wrought a great change in
them. Prejudice is fast being uprooted ; indeed, they do not
appear like the same people that they were. In a short time
I hope the foul spirit will depart entirely,
I have now to bring my narrative to a dose; and in so
doing I would retura thanks to Almighty Glod for the many
mercies and favors ho has bestowed upon me, and especially
for ddivcring me out of the hands of davehdders, and plac
ing mo in a land of liberty, where I can worship God under

pabkeb's own btobt. 126
my own vine and fig-tree, with none to molest or make me
afraid. I am also particularly thankful to my old friends and
neighbors in Lancastor County, Pennsylvania, — to the
friends in Norristown, Quakertown, Bochestor, and Detroit,
and to Dr. WiUis of Toronto, for their disinterested benevo
lence and kindness to me and my family. When hunted,
they sheltored me; when hungry and naked, they dothed
and fed me; and when a stranger in a strange land, they
aided and encouraged me. May the Lord in his great
men^ remember and bless them, u they remembered and
blessed me.

CHAPTER Zin.
Avtbb TBI Wab.
Ptter Woods tht Bolt Survivor — Otttner Hanway 'i Lattr Dayt— Tht
Deteendaati and Belatives of the Principal Aeton In tht Drama —
Concluding Befleetlons on tht Affair.
The sole survivor of those who were directly involved in
the events that have been narrated is Peter Woods, a very
respectable colored man, who does not know his own age, but
who likely is an octogenarian and was twenty years old when
the riot occurred. He lives on his little farm of fifty-eight
acres, in Colerain Township, just south of Bartville, with his
good wife, and the youngest of his thirteen living children,
tho family being much cstcomcd by those who know its mem
bers. He was a soldier in tho Unioi. Army, having served
nearly three years in the Third Regiment, Colored U, S.
Infantry, During the war ho met Alex, Pinckney, at
Charleston, S, C, who was also a soldier in one of the North
ern regiments. Recently his pension was increased through
the influence of Congressman W. W. Griest, of the Lancaster
district — who is a son of Major Ellwood Griest, author of
the vigorous Bart resolutions of 1850. In the absence of
precise proof that Peter Woods was above seventy-five years
of age, the United States Government assumed that it would
not have indicted a boy of fifteen for treason.
The descendants of Edward Gorsuch maintain the high
social station of their family in Maryland. They were
Methodists in religion and Whigs in politics, and are now
Republicans; during the civU war they zealously supported
the Union cause.
Edward Gorsuch's immediate descendants are.:
126

AFTEB THE WAB. 127
(1) Mrs. W. W. CampbeU and chUdren, of Owing's
Mills, Md,
(2) Mrs. T. B. Todd (who is a daughter of Mary Sellers
and Alexander M. Morrison) and her children, of Fort
Huvord, Md.
(3) Mrs. E. M. Duncan and children, of Govaus, Md. ;
Mrs. Fannie Thomas and children, of Baltimore, Md. ; Mrs,
Wilmer Black and children, of Roland Park, Md, ; Miss
Annie Black, of Baltimore, Md. (the last four being children
of Belinda Gorsuch, intermarried with Robert Black).
(4) Mrs. R. F. MitcheU, wife of Dr, F. G, MiteheU, of
Glencoe, Md., and her son, F. Dorsey, and daughters, Mary
B. and Rebecca F., the elder of whom appears as an infant
in the arms of Mammy Kelly, one of the iUustrations of this
volume. Joseph PownaU Scarlet died July 8, 1882 ; his descendants
are as follows :
I. Children — Joseph Scarlett, 5313 Master Street, PhUa
delphia; Annie V. Scariett, Mary E. Scarlett, 1413 Peach
Street, Philadelphia; WUliam Scarlett, 6444 Girard Avenue,
Philaddphia; Mrs. Ella A. Jadrson, 304 North Franklin
Street, West Chester, Pa,; Edwin Way Scarlett, Sr., de
ceased ; Sophie Scarlett Morell, deceased,
II, Grandchildren — J. Ralph Scarlett, • Inda Scarlett
Conrow, Elsie J, Scarlett, Edwin W, Scarlett, Anne Scarlett
Custer, Dr, Charles J. MoreU, Florence M, Christ, T, Harold
Jackson, WiUiam Scarlett, Leslie Scarlett, Richard Scarlett
in. G^reat•grandchildren — Lavinia Scarlett, Helen Scar
lett, John S, Custer, Charles J. MoreU, Jr.
Elijah Lewis died Oct 18, 1884, aged 86; his descend
ants are as foUows :
I, ChUdren— Mrs. Martha A. Cooper, Palmyra, N. J.
n. GrandchUdren — Samuel Brinton, fanner. West Ches
ter, Pa., R. F. D. ; Henry Brinton, 2408 Bryn Mawr Avenue,
West Philadelphia; Edwin Brinton, 6684 Hunter Avenue,

128 THB OHBISTIANA BIOT,
West PhUadelphia; Mrs, Emma B. Made, R. F. D., Coch-
ranviUe, Pa.; Alfred Brinton, Christiana, Pa,; Mrs. Clara
B. Made, Gum Tree, Chester County, Pa. ; Harry P. Cooper,
14 Ruby Street, Lancaster, Pa. ; Mrs. D, W. MiUer, Linfield,
Montgomery County, Pa.; Mrs. Anna Cooper, Santa Bar
bara, California; Mrs, George PaschaU, Jr., Port Kennedy,
Pa., and Miss Mary Cooper, 2408 Bryn Mawr Avenue, West
PhUadelphia, Pa. (W, L, Cooper, superintendent of the
Bedford division P, R R., who recentiy met tra^c death by
drowning in the Susquehanna river, was a grandson.)
in. Great Grandchildren — Roy Cooper, Fairmount, W,
Va. ; Herbert Cooper, Parkesburg, Pa. ; Helen Cooper, Santa
Barbara, Cal. ; Clement S. Brinton, 213 Euclid Avenue, Had-
donfield, N. J.; Francis D. Brinton, West Chester, Pa.;
WUlard C. Brinton, 70 West 46th Street, New York; EUen
S. Brinton, R. F. D., West Chester, Pa. ; Robert F. Brinton,
R. F. D., West Chester, Pa. ; Wilfred Cooper, Bedford, Pa. ;
C. Burleigh Cooper, Christiana, Pa. ; Harry Brinton, 2408
Bryn Mawr Avenue, Philadelphia, Pa.; Lewis Brinton,
Octoraro, Lancaster Co., Pa.; Rev. Thomas Brinton, Octo
raro, Pa. ; Mrs. Jesse Webster, Mrs. John Dochter, Christiana,
Pa., and Evan J. Lewis, George School, Bucks Co., Pa.
Castner Hanway suffered most in expense and anxiety
from the trial. He resided for years after it ended in Chester
and Lancaster Counties, but in 1878 removed to Wilber,
Nebraska. His 'first wife, Martha, daughter of Jesse and
Letitia Lamborn, who was with him during his trial, died
August 20, 1855. Later he married Hannah, daughter of
Moses and Mary Pennock, who died January 1, 1864. Later
he married a Miss Johnston, a relative of Governor Johnston,
who was the Chief Executive of Pennsylvania in 1851, She
is stiU living in Milesburg, Pa. Hanway died May 26,
1893 ; his remains were brought East and buried in the ceme
tery at the famous Longwood meeting house of the Pro
gressive Friends, in Chester County, made memorable by

AFTER THE WAB, 129
anti-slavery meetings addressed by Whittier, Lucretia Mott
and others eminent in literature; in that quiet graveyard
are dso the chaste tombs of Bayard Taylor, poet, novelist,
traveler, jouraalist and diplomat, and of his brother. Colonel
Fred. Taylor, one of the heroes and martyrs of Gettysburg.
The Longwood Yearly Meeting soon after Hanway's death
adopted a memorial prepared by Patience W. Kent, which
said of him :
" One week ago the earthly form of Castner Hanway was
laid in yonder cemetery, A quiet, unobtrusive man, he gave
no token that his name was one to conjure newspaper noto
riety, or stir the wrathfd vengeance of the baffled slave power,
as it did at one time. Yet in him, was the stuff of which
heroes are made. ' He stood by his colors ' when that was aU
he codd do." During the ninety-seven days that he was in
prison he never once complained. He wrote to his wife from
there, 'I do not regret my course; I have simply done my
duty.' With a nature capable of asserting such a beautifd
sentiment in the face of so great mental and financial agony,
surely the reward in the Eternd Kingdom wodd be : ' WeU
done, thou good and faithfd servant; thou hast been faithfd
over a few things, I wiU make thee rder over many things ;
enter thou into the joys of thy Lord.' "
Hanway left no descendants. His coUaterd relatives, so
far as known, were :
Samuel Jackson Hanway, deo^ased, a brother, whose chU
dren are : Ida Hanway Whiteside, Christiana, Pa, ; EUa Cast
ner Hanway Skelton, 1725 Lindenwood Street, PhUadelphia;
Wilmer Everett Hanway, 1716 North 55th Street, PhUadel
phia ; (Anna H. Palmer Newlin and Enuna H. Diffenbaugh,
both deceased).
John Hanway, deceased, a brother, leaving a son, Joseph
M. Hanway, Hamorton, Chester County, Pa. ; two daughters,
Mrs. Keziah H Newlin, <rf Newark, Delaware, and Mrs.
9

130 THE OHBmTIANA BIOT.
PhUena H. Telo, 906 West 7tii Street, WUmington, Dda-
ware; (and four deceased chUdren, Mrs. Annie H. Martin,
John Hanway, David Hanway and Clark Hanway).
EUis Hanway, deceased, a brother, whose children are:
Mrs. Louise H. Booth, Gap, Lancaster County, Pa. ; WiUiam
Hanway, 1038 LoweU Street, New York City, N. Y. ; Mary
Hanway, and Mrs, Jdie H. Powers ; (and deceased chUdren,
Samuel and Sarah Hanway).
Washington Hanway, deceased, a brother, leaving one child,
Mrs. Clara Hanway Pierce, 317 South Queen Street, York, Pa.
Phoebe H. Gray, deceased, a sister, whose children are:
Washington Gray and Mrs. Elizabeth Frame, deceased, and
Albert Gray.
Hannah EUis H. Fdrlamb, deceased, a sister, who left
chUdren: Mrs. Elizabeth Barnes, West Chester, Pa., and
Robert Fairlamb, CoatesviUe, Pa.
Rebecca H. McDade, deceased, a sister, late of Norristown,
Pa., whose children are: Phebe H., Mary EUen, Elizabeth,
Sarah, James, WiUiam, Daniel, Samuel, Ferdinand, Wash
ington and John McDade.

"After Life's fitfd fever" they who fought and suffered
and died aU " sleep weU." " There is no Work, nor device, nor
knowledge, nor wisdom in the grave." WhUe governmente
shall endure and organized society of human order shaU con
tinue, the ceaseless contest wiU go on between Law and Lib
erty. As the temperaments of men vary they wUl differ
as to which side of that straggle they should or wiU espouse ;
and Human Wisdom wiU forever be insufficient to avert
occasiond conflict From it, however, wiU emerge Peace;
and as the parties to the straggle and their chUdren's chUdren
look back upon the contention that once raged, they wfll come
more and more clearly to see that it was inevitable; and they

AFTEB THE WAB, 131
wiU look with kindlier judgment upon the motives which in
spired antagomstic forces. They wUl also see in the outeome
and settlement a Final Cause, shaping evente and determin
ing resulte, one that codd not be recognized in the smoke and
dust of the immediate battie ; but which the clear, cold light of
History makes visible to all who would see the TrutL In
his matchless lyric of the Civil War, the most sublime noto
that has been sounded from aU the literature inspired hy that
great National Crisis, WiU M. Thompson, in his "High Tide
at Gettysburg," attains this lofty strain :
But who ahall break the guards that wait
Before the awful face of fatet
The tattered standards of the South
Were shriveled at the cannon's mouth.
And all her hopes were desolate.
In vain the Tennessean set
His breast against the bayonet^
In vain Virginia charged and raged,
A tigress in her wrath uncaged.
Till all the hill was red and wet I
Above the bayonets mixed and crossed
Men saw a gray, gigantic ghost
Beceding through the battle cloud.
And heard acrosa the tempest loud
The death cry of a nation lost I
The brave went down I Without disgrace
They leaped to ruin's red embrace;
They only heard fame's thunder wake.
And saw the dazzling sunburst break
In smiles on Glory's bloody face I
They feU who lifted np a liandl
And bade the sun in heaven to stand;
They smote and feU who set the ban
Against the progress of the stars.
And stayed the march of Motherland!
Th^ stood who saw the future eome
On through the fight's delirium;
They smote and stood who held tin hope
Of nations on that slippery slope.
Amid the cheers of Christendom!

132 THB OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
God Uvea! He forged the iron will.
That dntched and held tliat trembling hiU!
God lives and reigns! He built and lent
The heights for Freedom's battlement.
Where floats her flag in triumph still!
Fold up the banners! Smelt the guns!
Love rules; Her gentler purpose runs,
A mighty mother turns in tears
The pages of her battle years.
Lamenting all her fallen sons!

PREFACE TO REVISED EDITION.
The successful popular and historical celebration at Chris
tiana, on September 9, 1911, of the events narrated in this
sketch, gave its author an opportunity to correct, revise and
enlarge the foregoing text — ^which had to be put to press hur
riedly in its origind form. Every amendment responsibly
suggested has been made. Many other new facts elicited
are included in these "Addenda"; and likewise numerous
timely recoUections that the casud student of history might
miss. Some account of the Commemoration exercises seemed to
be dtogether fit for preservation in permanent form. I
have, therefore, appended this.
WhUe the entire volume may not have enough contem
porary interest to justify this amplification of ito origind
pubUcation, I am hopeful that the future historian of Lan
castor County wiU find this contribution not whoUy without
helpful vdue in his work.
W.U.H.
October 7, 101L

188

ADDENDA.
NOTT A.
On page U It it stated that there was little fellowship between the
negro and the PenneylvaniaGerman elements of our local citizenship.
I believe this is a continuing condition. It is not inconsistent with the
historical fact that the Mennonites of Germantown were the first
American Abolitionists; and that their deliverance of February 18,
1688, antedated like action by the Friends. Professor Wilkinson in his
so-called "Vindication of Daniel Webster," recently published, li
authority for the statement that Charles Sumner's social aversion to
the colored race was as pronounced as his political sympathy with it.
Nora B.
On page 27 it is said upon information that William Parker was a
soldier in the war for the Union. I have not been able to absolutely
verify this statement. It is therefore qualified.
NOTI 0.
On page 59 it is noticed that the venire issued to the marshal com
manding him to return 108 Jurors for the term of the treason trial
included a provision that at least twelve were to be summoned and re
turned from Lancaster County. This was in conformity with the Act of
September 24, 1789, known as the Federal Judicial Procedure Act, to the
effect that "in cases punishable with death, the trial shall be had in
the county where the offense was committed, or where that cannot be
done without great inconvenience, twelve petit jurors at least shall be
summoned from thence." Why 116 were summoned and returned, when
the venire called for 108, does not appear.
In a recent notable address before the American Bar Association at
Boston on August 30, 1911, Ex-Justice of the United States Supreme
Court Henry B. Brown called attention to the fact that the provision of
this act which required the trial for a capital offense to be held in the
county where it occurred had never been observed. It seems to have
escaped his notice that the statutory direction at to the venue wtt not
unqualifiedly Imperative and that this act had been the tnbjtct of
rtpeated Judicial eonstmetion, e. ff,, in the following eases:
"The Circuit Court* are bound to try all erimet committed within the
district, bnt not to try them in the Connty where committed; that it a
matter of which they mutt Jndge in the exercise of their diteretion.."
U. 8. «. Wilton, Bald. 117; U. 8. «. Oomen 8 Matoa 9S-8; V, B, v.
136

136 THE OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
Insurgents (Fries), 3 DaU. (Pa.) 613. In U. a «. Cornell the Court
holds that the third Section of the Act of March, 1793, Chapter 22,
operates as a material modification of the Act of 1789 and leaves the
place of the trial in the district to the sound discretion of the judge.
The Act of 1793, Chapter 22, directs that special sessions for the trial
of criminal cases shall be held at any convenient place witliin the
district nearer to the place where the offenses may be said to be com
mitted, tlian the place appointed by the law for ordinary sessions.
NOTK D.
I have adopted the spelling of Sims's and Scarlet's name with a
single terminal letter instead of the local and family usage — Simms and
Scarlett — ^because they were thus formally indicted.
Note E.
The lieat information I have as to the date of WiUiam Parker's revisit
to Christiana is that it was during the presidential campaign of 1872.
Peter Woods says he took back with him to Canada the widow of Henry
Sims — one of the defendants in the treason case; presumably he waa
then a widower and Mrs. Sims became his second wife.
Nora F.
On pages 6 and 12 I have recalled the indisputable fact that Abraham
Lincoln and his party distinctly recognized the legal obligation of the
Fugitive Slave liaw even after the war had begun. Striking confirmation
of what heedless readers may lie disposed to doubt is found in General
William T. Sherman's "Causes of the War," cited in the Ailantie
Monthly, for September, 1911, where Sherman says: "Mr. Lincoln after
election and installation, asserted repeatedly that slavery was safe in
his bands, that he was sworn to enforce even the Fugitive Slave Law
and soon Congresa declared it had no intention to interfere with slavery
in the States." NOTK G.
Peter Smith, a stalwart and sturdy man of 82, now resident of Terre
Hill, Lancaster County, who came from County Mayo, Ireland, when he
was a lad of ten, tells me he was bar-keeper at Fred Zercher's tavern,
in Christiana (now Harrar's store), when Edward Gorsuch's mangled
body was brought there (see p. 37) and the inquest was held. The rail
road track then ran in there, east of where the monument has been erected,
and the "bend" toward Philadelphia was extremely sharp. Mr. Smith
also recalls tliat the railroad work on which the Irish laborers were then
engaged (p. 31) was the radical re-location of the line, close to the mill-
pond and around the sharp turn known as "North Bend." It is a
notable coincidence tliat at the time of the Commemoration, sixty years

AUDENDA. 137
later, the great railroad improvement of the Subway construction was
nearing completion in Christiana.
The same informant tells me that nearly aU of the forty Irish workmen
were deputized as Unitod States marshals to hunt scattering negroes of
the neighborhood; one of them, being handed a horse pistol, declared
that he would shoot "the first black thing" he saw, even if it was a cow.
Nora H.
Francis M. Lennox, one of the oldest citizens of Bart township, and
long-time a schoolmaster in that neighborhood, was boarding at Mifflin
Parker's near the scene of the riot. He says that he was an eye-witness
to its events, and his account of the same was published in the Lancaster
" Examiner " of September 8; 1911. It follows very closely the narra
tive of Parker and, in some features, is almost a literal transcript of the
same. This may be accounted for by the fact that Parker's story was
published in 1866; or that Mr. Lennox says he was in "hiding" during
the battle ; and of course he himself did not hear the dialogue he relates
between Parker and Gorsuch. He says: " Caleb Hood's two colored
men came past where I was hiding; one had » gun, the other a com
cutter; then Joseph Scarlet came after them on horseback; half a dozen
".ame on foot; each carried something. I knew the most of them, as I
had Uved in the valley nearly two years at that time." . . . ''As the'
writer of this artide was going to his school the morning of the fight
he met a hatless man near the mill who inquired the way to 'Christeen'
(Christiana he meant). I directed him. I learned afterward it was
Kline. On the evening of the next day I was at the Bed Lion Hotel;
there were a number of United States marines; I asked one wliat they
were doing here; he s^id, 'We are going to arrest every nigger and
d  d abolitionist.' A man across the way said 'here is a man that
knows all about it. ' I walked away. Sure enough they scoured the
countiy for mUes around, arresting every colored man, boy and girl that
they could find." Nora L
Dr. H. McGowan, of Harrisburg, was a lad at the time of the riot,
living on the next farm west of Pownall's, and from his father's home
the movements of the combatants were discernible. He says Hanway
was so persistent in his attempts to check the negroes and protect the
Gorsuches tliat the colored men aasailed and even shot at him. Dr.
McGowan was not a witness at the trial, nor wat any tneh evidence
offered. I think he hat confuted the attack apon Dr. Petree, who waa
theltering himself behind Hanway 't horte, with hit own venion of the
affair. The fagittvet were not bottUe to Hanway; thsy at lettt reeog-
niied Um at a friend.

138 THB OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
Note J.
Mra. Elizabeth Pownall Steele, wife of George Steele, whoae own recol
lections are cited on page 86, died in December, 1907, aged 88. Her
remlnlsotnces of tht tvtnt wert vsry clear and aooordtd with htr hut-
band 'a She raltttd that Parker and Flnokney wert vary rtluotant to
leavt for Canada and could scarcely be made to reallte their danger.
When they left they were disguised in top hats and other dress which
might cause them to be mistaken for eaUers at the Pownall household.
Dickinson Gorsuch at that time was supposed to be dying and the Pow
nall premises were occupied by a horde of deputies on the lookout for
all suspects. Extended memoranda in pencil preserved in the Pownall
family Indicate thitt tome niombor of it was aotivo In preparing the evl-
donoe for the defense at tho trials, Besides other Interesting details
thli brief ihowi many wltnossot ezamlnod to prove different phases of
the ease, such at alibis for some prisoners, the neighborhood kidnap
pings, the movements of Parker, Pinckney and Johnson (who all lived
together in the PownaU tenant house), the good character of some of
the accused and the identity of "John Beard" with Nelson Ford, one
of the Gorsnch runaways.
From tllis same memorandum it appears that the night Henry Williams
was kidnapped he was knocked down, tied with a bed cord, carried off
in a dearborn belonging to BiU Baer, drawn by a gray and sorrel horse,
and the route taken by his captors was via Nickel Mines and the Green
Tree. NOTB K.
The Philadelphia Ledger says that [Charles] Burleigh, the AboUtion
lecturer, appeared at Christiana about the time the first prisoners were
brought in, but he soon left. I find no other mention of this personal
incident; nor does any surviving witness recaU it.
NoTB L.
It may seem peculiar that on p. 73 in giving the personal character
istics of the jury their individual and average weight should be noticed.
It appears, however, from a letter of James Cowden, the youngest of
them, to his wife that they found some diversion in these statistics.
Moreover it is not unlikely that, in the discriminating selection of the
panel to try, shrewd counsel for the prisoners kept in mind the classic
aphorism in favor of "men that are fat, that sleep o' nighta"
Note M.
I. On page 97 reference is made to the kUling of Kennedy in Carlisle
by a "fugitive slave" mob. That event happened before the passage
of the Act of 1850. In June, 1847, James Kennedy, of Hagerstown,
Md., went to CarUsle to recover runaway slaves. They Were arrested

AODENBA. 139
and the Court remanded the fugitives to Mr. Kennedy. Immediately
upon this decision being made a riot ensued in the courtroom for the
rescue of the prisoners. The judge seized a club and attempted to defend
Mr. Kennedy, but the latter was mortally wounded. This riot was almost
exclusively among the negroea. Of the white people who gathered few
took part. After Kennedy's death there was a pubUc meeting in Car
lisle in which the action of the mob was denounced as a disgrace and
Mr. Kennedy was extoUed as a citizen "whose whole life was an orna
ment and whose character was a valuable example of a good man."
II. In 1855 there was a suit in the Superior Court of Baltimore against
the Northern Central Bailway for aiding in the escape of two fugitive
slaves. One of them belonged to Abraham Getzendanner and the other
to George M. Potts, both of Frederick, Md. They made their way to
York, Pa., and there boarded a train on the Northern Central road.
The conductor was warned that they were fugitive slaves, but he per
mitted them to remain on the train, and they were carried beyond the
reach of recovery. Getzendanner got a judgment for $123 and Potts
one for $813.40.
III. An interesting case in the early fifties dragged at considerable
length through the local and Supreme Courts of Pennsylvania, and finaUy
reached the U, S. District Court at PhUadelphia, involving a simUar
question. About a acore of alavea belonging to a widow in Maryland
found refuge on the property of a man named Kauffman, in Cumberland
County, Pa., who reUeved their hunger and destitution with food sup-
pUes, after which they disappeared from the neighborhood. Their owner
sued Kauffman for some $20,000 damages for facUitating their escape.
There was a recovery in the State Courts for less than a tenth of the
claim, but the Supreme Court held that the case waa one for Federal
jurisdiction. On the firat trial in the District Court of the United
States, at PhUadelphia, the jury disagreed. On the second trial ex-Vice-
President George M. Dallas and David Paul Brown were of counsel for
the respective parties. On the first vote the jury divided according to
their partisan feelings — five Democrats were for aUowing the whole
claim, four Wliigs were for allowing notliing, three Free SoU Democrats
were for a compromise verdict for about the same amonnt that had been
recovered in the State Court. After a delay of three weeks in reaching
a verdict the jury finaUy compromised by accepting the proposition of
its Whig members to give the plaintiff a very moderate . verdict. The
expenses of the Utigation, however, practically absorbed aU that wat
awarded to the plaintiff; and, inconsiderable as the verdict ma, the
Utigation weU-nigh mined Kanffman; he iraa repreaeqted also by Thad-
deni Stevens in tome ptaget of it. NoraN.
With the! eharaeteritUe Uterary i^d Uttorical thrift of his part of the
eoontry that moat aeenrata, geid^ and liberal of New En^and writer^

140

THE OHBmTIANA BIOT.

the accomplished Colonel Tliomaa Wentworth Higginson, lately deceased,
in his "Cheerful Yesterdays," published in The Atla»tie Monthly (and
wisely republished in permanent book form, 1899), feU into the easy
error of recording that the death of a United States marshal's deputy,
named Batchelder, in one of the FanenU HaU anti-slaveiy riots in 1854
was the "first drop of blood actuaUy shed" in resistance to or enforce
ment of the Fugitive Slave Law. Unwilling to have the liistory of Penn
sylvania forever written — or unwritten — ^by New Englanders, I chaUenged
the distinguished historian's accuracy and caUed his attention to the
" Christiana riot." In reply I had the foUowing letter:
Gliupsewood, Dublin, N. H., Sept. 3, 1899.
Dear Sir:
Thank you for your note, caUing attention to an undoubted error in
my "Cheerful Yesterdays." What I must have meant to say was that
the kiUing of Batchelder was the first shedding of official blood so to
speak, i, e., that of a United States officer. As I rememl>er, the persons
kiUed at Christiana were the slaveholder himself & his son, which put
the matter more on the basis of self-defense as between claimant & slave;
whereas the death of Batchelder was that of an United States officer.
I liave not access to books here, but on my return to Cambridge, will
make the needed correction in the plates of "Cheerful Yesterdays."
Very truly yours, T, W. HlOCIIKSON,
To W. U. Hensel, Esq, Note O,
Columbia, Lancaster County, has for a century had a larger proportion
of colored population than any other aection of the County. This originated
in the settlement there in 1816 of some three score slaves manumitted by the
wUl of Israel Bacon, of Henrico County, Virginia, They started by wagon
for Canada, but stranded at Columbia, where sections of land were given
them to buUd their cabins, some of which stiU remain. Their settlement
was greatly augmented in 1«18, when another hundred freed slaves
from Hanover County, Maryland, joined them. The cheap labor thus
attracted was welcomed by the lumber and other industrial interests
then flourishing at this point. Fugitive slaves later quite naturaUy
drifted hither; and Samuel Evans, historian, has grouped in his history
of slavery in Lancaster County (Evarts & Peck, 1883) many romantic
incidents of flight, pursuit, resistance, capture and escape. The most
notable of these occurred soon after the "Treason Trials." WiUiam
Smith, an escaped slave of George W. HaU, of Harford Connty, Mary
land, found refuge in Columbia and work in a lumber yard there. His
master deputized Albert G. Bidgely to arrest him, accompanied by a
one-armed Federal marshal named Snyder, from Baltimore. In an
encounter that ensued April 30, 1852, Bidgely shot Smith dead, fled

ADDENOA. 141
across the Susquehanna bridge to WrightsviUe and escaped to Maryland,
without arrest. Governor Lowe, of Maryland, appointed Otho Scott and
James M, Buchanan commissioners to inquire into the facts. They took
testimony privately at Parson's "Sorrel Horse" hotel; after their report
Bigler, now become Governor of Pennsylvania, by the election of 1851,
refused to grant a requisition for Bidgely 't extradition to Lancaster
County, and he was never tried for killing Smith.
NoraP,
In the hot political discussions that were eontinnonsly waged over
tlavery between contending partisans in lower Lancaster Connty, It mt
a common taant of the Sootoh-Irtih Demoeratt that the AboUtion
Quakera harbored the fugitive negroet for galnfnl pvrpotet; and that
after they had profited from their cheap labor In the busy tommer and
f aU dayt of farm work, and when the doU and trotty montht drew nigh,
the thrifty Friendt would get lid of profltltit boarden by raiting a hoe
ud ery "the Udm^pen an eomiagt"

IN PEISON FOR TREASON,
[One of tha finest ttanzat in American poetry wat inapired by the
imprisonment of Hanway and othera for treason. While they were in
Moyamensing, Jolm O. Whittier wrote and published hit "Linea" to
them. Horace E. Sendder, in his exceUent and eompleto "Cambridge
edition" of WMttier, classea the foUowing with tliree other poems,
"eaUed out by the popular movement of Free State men to occupy the
territory of Kansas." In this he is mistaken. This poem, now entitled
"For Bighteousness' Sake," was originaUy "inscribed to Friends under
arrest for tresson against the slave power," and was directed especiaUy
to Hanway, Lewis and Scarlet. The concluding stanza is deeply imbedded
in popular appreciation of the best in our national Uterature,]
The age is duU and mean. Men creep.
Not walk; with blood too pale and tame
To pay the debt they owe to shame;
Buy cheap, sell dear; eat, drink, and sleep
Down-piUowed, deaf to moaning want;
Pay tithes for soul-insurance; keep
Six days to Mammon, one to Cant,
In such a time, give thanks to God,
That somewhat of the holy rage
With which the prophets in their age
On aU its decent seemings trod.
Has set your feet upon the Ue,
That man and ox and soul and clod
Are market stock to seU and buy!
The hot words from your Ups, my own.
To caution trained, might not repeat;
But if some tares among the wheat
Of generous thought and deed were sown.
No common wrong provoked your zeal:
The sUken gauntlet that is thrown
In such a quarrel rings like steeL
The brave old strife the fathers saw
For Freedom caUs for men again
Like those who battled not in vain
For England's Charter, Alfred's law;
142

ABTEB SIXTY TXABB 143
An4 right of speech and trial Jntt
Wage in your name their ancient war
With venal courts and perjured tnitt

Ood'i way teem dark, hut torn or lat»,
They toueh the thining hUU of day/
The evil cannot brook delay,
The good can weU afford to wait.
CHve ermined knavet their hour of ertrn*;
Ye have the future grand and great.
The tafe appeal of Truth to Timet

SIXTY YEARS AFTER
"THE OHBISTIANA BIOT."
186L IML
Out of the strident clash of hopes and fears
The times have buUded music; where of late
Passion strode fierce, and wrath and white-Upped hate
Met bitterly in agony and tears.
Meet we in kindness. CanceUed are arrean
Of debt and credit. It were iU to prate
Of right and wrongs; may we commemorate
More than the feuds of the forgotten years.
Great God I which one of ns thaU cast a ttone
At bygone riott Have we, too, not tet
Onr hands against thy lawtf It nought onr own
That eriet for pardon t Are no tear dropt wetf
Jndge of the Nations grant oa to atone —
And of Thy mercy teach nt to forget. — F, JjjvuB Wladolph.
t, Ft., Sept. 9, 191L

"THB OHBISTIANA BIOT."
Twat here that first wat heard the thrilling ery
Which pealed the kneU of bondage thro' the land;
Twat here that flnt our people took the ttand
Which eleanted nt from the gnUt of tlaveijr—
Te eaU H BiotI Loi it made men free!

144 THB OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
It ma a trumpet call, dear, lend and grand,
And in good time, obeying its command.
We heard our Union speak for Liberty.
Here shtveiy first died. The blood shed here
Destroyed the chains of every trembling slave;
It bound the Nation with a link more dear
And took from us a stigma dark and grave.
So thus we mark this fair September mom.
Where bondage perished, and free men were bom!
— ^Mary N. BoWntim.
Laneatter, Pa., 1911,

POLITICAL CORRESPONDENCE.
The Letteeb which Passed between Leading Dbmo-
0BAT8 of Philadelphia and Govebnob Johnston.
Reference is made on page 50 to the issue injected into
the politicd campaign of 1851 by the Christiana occurrence.
The rather sensationd character of this episode and its resdte
justify the preservation here in permanent and accessible
form of the correspondence. The informd caU for a popu
lar meeting in Independence Square, Philadelphia, declared
the purpose " of taking high and effectud action to prevent
the recurrence of so terrible a scene upon the soU of Penn
sylvania, to ferret out and punish the murderers thus guilty
of the double crime of assadting the Constitution, and of
taking the lives of men in pursuit of their recognized and
rightful property, as well as to take preparatory steps for the
protection of our own rights and the rights of our children,
under the Federd Constitution, ddly imperiUed and as
sailed by a race, who can never be our socid or politicd
equals, and the prevention of whose future emigration within
our borders is the ody guarantee we have to render power
less the efforte of the vigUant enemies of the Republic"
An Addbess to the Qoveenoe.
The foUowing "open letter "was addressed by many promi
nent PhUadelphia Democrate of that day, John CadwaUader,
John Swift, John W. Forney, R. Simpson, Charles Inger-
soU, James Page, A, L. Roumfort, and others:
To the Oovemor of Fentuylvania:
The undersigned eitizent of Pennsylvania reepectfnUy represent:
That citizens of a neighboring State have been emeUy atraarivated by
a band of armed outlam at a place not more than three honn Jonmey
distaiit from the teat of government and from the Commereial metropoUt
of the State,
10 146

146 THE OHBISTIANA BIOT.
That this insurrectionary movement in one of the most popolont parta
of the State has been so far successful as to overawe the local ministers
of justice and paralyze the power of the law.
That your memorialista are not aware that any miUtary force has l>een
sent to the scene of the insurrection, or that the eivU authority has been
strengthened by the adoption of any measures suited to the momentous
crisis. They, therefore, respectf uUy request the Executive Magistrate of Penn
sylvania to take into consideration the necessity of vindicating the out
raged dignity of the Commonwealth on tiiis important and melancholy
occasion. GovEKNOE Johnston's Reply to the "Appeal,"
Governor Johnston replied in the foUowing manner:
Gentlemen: Your letter, without data, was this afternoon put in my
hands by one of the servants of the hotel. The anxiety which you
manifest to maintain the laws of the land, and the public peace, is fuUy
appreciated, and I have great pleasure to inform you that, more than
two hours before the receipt of your letter, the parties implicated have
Iieen, through the vigilance and decision of the local authorities, ar
rested, and are now in prison, awaiting an inquiry into their reported
guUt. The District Attorney and Sheriff of Lancaster County, acting in
consort with the Attorney General of the State, deserve especial thanks
for their prompt and energetic conduct. This was aU done early on
Saturday morning, and duly reported to me by the local officers.
The testimony taken by the United States Commissioner, who arrived
at a later period on the grounds, a printed copy of which has accidentally
reached me this afternoon, confirms me in the beUef that the State
authorities had vindicated the law, and in a large extent arrested the
perpetrators of the crime.
The cruel murder of a citizen of a neighboring State, accompanied by
a gross outrage on the laws of the United States, in the resistance of ita
process, has tieen committed, and you may be assured that, as the giulty
parties are ascertained, they vrill be punished in the severest penalty by
the law of Pennsylvania. I am very proud that the first steps to detect
and arrest these offenders have been taken by Pennsylvania officers.
Permit me, gentlemen, having thus removed aU just cause of anxiety
from your minds, respectfully to suggest that the idea of rebeUion or
insurrectionary movement in the county of Lancaster or anywhere else
in this Commonwealth, has no real foundation, and it is an offensive
imputation on a large body of our feUow citizens. There is no insur
rectionary movement in Lancaster County, and there would be no occa
sion to march a miUtary force there, aa you seem to desire, and inflame
the pubUc mind by any such strange exaggeration. I do not wish our

political ooebespondenoe. 147
breathren of the Union to think that in any part of this State resistance
to the law goes undetected or unpunished, or that there exists such a
sentiment as treason to the Union and the Constitution. The alleged
murderers of Mr. Gorsuch, whose crime is deep enough without exagger
ating it, have been arrested and wiU be tried, and they and their abettors
be made to answer for what they have done in contravention of law.
But, in the meantime, let me invite your co-operation, as citizens of
Pennsylvania, not only to see that the law ia enforced, but to add to the
confidence which we aU feel in the judicial tribunals of the land, by
abstaining from undue violence of language, and letting the law take its
course. Depend upon it, gentlemen, there is in Lancaster County a sense
of duty to the laws of the land, manifested in the early and prompt
arrest of those offenders, which wUl on aU occasions show itself in prac
tical obedience.
The people of that county are men of peace and good order, and are
not easUy led aside from the path of duty wMch the Constitution pre
scribes. They and every Pennsylvanian love the Constitution and the
Union, They wiU detect, as they liave done in this case, and airreat and
punish aU who violate the laws of the land. ' There is no warrant, depend
upon it, for representing the men of Lancaster County as traitors, and
participanto in an insurrectionary movement. You do them, uninten
tionally I hope, no doubt, great injustice,
I am deeply indebted to you for affording me the opportunity of
expressing my views. But for your communication, I might not have
been able to do so. You, and my feUow-citizens at large, may be
assured of my firm determination, at all hazards and under aU circum
stances, to maintain the supremacy of the Constitution and enforce obe
dience to the laws, alike of the United States and of this Commonwealtli.
In order that I may be sure that my answer may reach ita destination
(your letter having but accidentaUy come to my hands) I have requested
Mr, White to put it in the hands of Mr, John CadwaUader, whose signa
ture, I observe, is first,
1 am, with great respect, your obedient servant,
WnjjAM F. Johnston.
Pboolamation.
In and by the anthority of the Commonwealth of Penn^'lvania, X,
WiUiam F. Johnston, Govemor of the taid Commonwealth, do henby
issue thia proclamation :
Whibias, it hat been represented to me that a flagrant violation of
the pnbUe peace has oeearred in Laneatter County, involving the mtirder
of Edward Qortnch, and terionely endangering the Uvet of other penone;
and, whereat. It hat alto been represented to me that tome of the partid-
panti in thit outrage are yet at large; now, therefore, by vlrtne of the
anthority in me vetted by the Constitntion and lam, I, ^Diam F. John-

148 THX OHBmTIANA BIOT.
tton. Governor of Peniuylvania, do hereby offer a reward of One Thou
sand DoUars for the arrest and conviction of the person or persona gnUty
of the murder and violation of tlie peace aforesaid.
In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and alBzed the
great seal of the Stato, this fifteenth day of September, in the year of
Our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-one. YfoAAAM F, Johnston, Oovemor.
Attest: A. L. BnssELL,
Secretary of the CommonwealtK
Second Letteb to Govebnoe Johnston,
The foUowing was the rejoinder of Messrs. CadwaUader
and others to Govemor Johnston's answer to them :
FHn.Ai>ELFBiA, 15th September, 1861.
To the Govemor of Penniylvania:
Sir: We have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your lettor of
yesterday, which came to hand this morning, after its pubUcation in one
or more newspapers. The informality which you mentioned, of the deUv-
ery of our communication, to which it is a reply, through the servant of
the hotel, is perhaps, of little significance. It may be . explained and
excused by stating that we had understood that the paper could not reach
you if addressed to the aeat of government. We were told that you liad,
on the day after the occurrence, to which we respectfoUy soUcited your
attention, left Harrisburg, and had passed the scene of those occurrences
without tarrying there, and that yon had subsequently been at this place,
and afterwards at Beading, The messenger entrusted with our commu
nication was, therefore, left to his own course to deUver it.
We are thankful for the promptness of your reply, but regret that
you had not been able to obtain more accurate information on the sub
ject of your letter. The mistakes in the general statement which it con
tains, that the parties implicated in the late horrible outrage liad been
arrested and were in confinement ia partly corrected in a subsequent
paragraph, and has since been more f uUy corrected in your proclamation
of the morning t The more important errors of your letter wUI, we trust,
be as publicly corrected when you shall have learned that treason against
the United Statea waa perpetrated successfuUy within the territory of
Pennsylvania on Thursday last. You wiU then, we presume, no longer
treat the offense of the insurgents aa though the homicide, which aU
deplore, had been committed by them, in an ordinary tumult, as contra
distinguished from an armed rebellion against the law. When you shaU
have learned that the latter was the true character of the offense com
mitted, you wiU probably cease to cenaure our true and simple definition

POLITICAL COEEESPONDENOE. 149
of the crime "as offensive imputation" and "a strange exaggeration."
The purpose of our communication has been entirely misconceived by
you. The crime which has been perpetrated in our immediate neighbor
hood was Treason, in preventing, by an armed resistance, the enforce
ment of a law of the United States, Our purpose was to request your
attention to this fact, and not to censure the local police of a county, as
you suppose. There had been no local police strong enough to resist an
organized band of armed outlaws, who were in open insurrection againat
the Government of the United States, The local authorities were over
awed, and, had they resisted or interfered, would have been overpowered.
Forty-eight hours elapsed before they were so reinforced as to be able to
visit the seat of the disturbances. The insurgents were then dispersed,
as their evU design had been fataUy accomplished. When we took leave
to address you on the subject we exercised the undoubted right of every
citizen on such an occasion. The disposable miUtary force of the United
States, at this post, had then been sent to the spot where the unfortunate
event had occurred. Citizens of Pennsylvania and Maryland were in
arms, to assist in the lawful enforcement of the authority of the General
Government. But nothing had been done by the Governor of Pennsyl
vania to vindicate the outraged honor of the Commonwealth, The first
act of State, of her Executive, is a proclamation issued four days after
the opponento of the law had openly accomplished their designs. Your
recapitulation of the few tardy acts of previous intervention, including
arrests by individual officere, shows that even this proclamation would
probably not Iiave been issued if the public feeUng of indignation on the
subject had not been manifested. At the crisis at which our communi
cation to yon was written, there were peculiar reasons for public notoriety,
which it is unnecessary here to specify, that the insurgenU should be
deprived of the pretext of an excuse or paUiation of their guUt, in the
supposed sympathy or indifference of the Chief Magistrate of the Com
monwealth. As you have seen proper to answer this communication, we
are justified in observing that it afforded you an ample opportunity for
the removal of aU doubts upon this material point. This might have
been done in words, though the timely adoption of the proper active
measures had been neglected. Under these circumstances that any citi
zens, however humble, should have been unadvisedly reprimanded by the
officen of the Commonwealth, and particularly by her Chief Magistrate,
for ezenising their righto to address him respectfully, it a matter of
tnbordinato importance, which we do not pause to consider.
It it of more importance that yonr answer hat been published by your
self. Ito tone and q>irit — and that of the Proclamation which hat fol
lowed it— whether responsive to, or evasive of, the pobUo feeUng— are
a proper tnbjeet of consideration by the citizens of the State. We
beUeve that those enemies of the United States, whose aete yon chari
tably deny to be treasonable or intnrrectionary, threaten and intend to

150 THB OHBIBTIANA BIOT.
re-enact them if a like occasion should arrive. We believe. that yonr
letter wiU afford them encouragement in tlieir lawless designs. We
understand it is a declaration of your opinion that there should be no
change In tht courte of the State Goverament, and that no public meat-
uret of Btatt an required in order to prevent the recurrence of tht lata
bloody outrage.
At we do not feel ourselves at Uberty to extend this discussion beyond
the immediate subject - of correspondence, we have concluded with the
expression of the great, respect with wliich we remain
Your most obedient servanta, John Cadwalladib,
James Paqk,
S. Lkach, Jb.,
BiCBABD Simpson,
Samuil Hats,
S. B, Cabnahan,
W, Dual,
John W, Fobnst,
for themaelvee and othert.
Mabtland's Govebnob Alabmed.
From the letter of GJovemor Lowe of Maryland to Presi
dent FiUmore, September 18, 1851.
' ' From the very beginning Maiyland has, with one voice, sustained the
compromise measures. No man has dared to raise the flag of disunion
within her border. AU parties have united in defense of the Constitntion.
AU classes of cur citizens have renewed their vows of fealty to the insti
tutions of their fathers. Maryland has, therefore, a moral weight with
the South, which armies and navies cannot give. It would be terrible,
indeed, if she should, under any combination of circumstances, be drawn
to place herself at the head of a column of secession. Her declaration
of disunion would be fatal. Where would Virginia bet Where, in fact,
eveiy Southern Statet The result is too terrible for contemplation.
And yet, Sir, we must look the contingency right in the face. Do not
understand me as intimating tliat such disaster is upon us. Far from it.
Heaven forefend it.
"But it is necessi.ry that I should tell you that our people are deeply
and justly exasperated. It is proper that you should be frankly assured
that nothing can, or will, or ought to, satisfy chem but the most prompt,
thorough, and severe retribution upon the perpetrators of the murderous
treason recently committed in Pennsylvania. I am rejoiced to be in
formed that those worthy and patriotic Judges, Grier and Kane, have
expressed the opinion that the crime amounU to treason against the
Federal Government, cognizable, therefore, by the Federal Courts and

POLITICAL OOEKESPONDENOE. 161
punishable under the Federal laws. This gives me confidence that justice
wUl be done, speedUy and fully. Our people wiU wait with aU reasonable
patience and confidence to see the issue. This faith in the power of the
Federal Oovemment, as weU as in its good intentions, wiU necessarUy
be governed by results.
"Nor is that all: If passion and prejudice should control the verdicts
of Pennsylvania juries, in the trial of this issue, I tremble for the Union.
One thing is very clear, and it is this, that Maryland would not remain
one day in the Confederacy, if finally assured either that the powers of
the Federal Government were inadequate, or that the public opinion of
the non-slave holding States was adverse to the protection of the righto,
Uberties and Uvea of our citizena If the Union is to be merely a union
of minority slaves to majority tyranta, then, indeed, our government has
failed in the end of its creation, and the sooner it is dissolved the better.
This, I assure you, Sir, is the sentiment of the patriotie South, the Con-
tervative South, the Vnion-loving South. I am not obtmding upon your
Excellency my views and opinions. I am plainly unfolding the viewt
and sentiments of a people with whom I am well acquainted. It it
important that I should do so— it is necessary that I should do so. I
fear tho latent causes of dissolution more than those which have hereto
fore agitated the surface of the waters. I fear that the North does not
believe in the possibility of disunion. Fatal increduUty. If they could
be made to believe it possible it would then, indeed, be impossible. But
their, disbelief renders it ever probable. BeUeving it to be afar off, and
ever receeding, they act in a manner which wUl precipitate the crisis, at
surely, as it wiU be, to them nnexpected. I do not know of a single
incident that has occurred since the passage of the Compromise measures,
which tends more to weaken the bonds of union, and arouse dark thonghtt
in the minds of men, than thit late tragedy. Nor wiU itt Influence and
effecto be limited within the narrow borden of onr Stato. They wiU
penetrato the tool of the South. They wUI tilenee the confident prom-
itet of the Union men and give force to the appealt of Secestionittt.
They wUI entor into the agitationt of the next Congrttt, and weaken the
pnbUe hope everywhere. For tU theit evUt, then it bnt a tingle eor-
reetive, and that it, tbt mott eompleto TlndleatioB of the laws and the
fnllett retrtbntleB npon the eriminalt."

COMMEMORATION OF THE CHRISTIANA RIOT
AND THE TREASON TRIALS OF 1851.
Under the auspices of the Lancaster County B[istoricd
Society in Christiana, Pa., on Saturday, September 9, 1911,
there was held a Commemoration of the events narrated in
this history. Despite a heavy downpour of rain there was
an unprecedented ccmcourse of people assembled in the town
at an early hour and they continued to participate in the
exercises until they concluded. Through some mishap of
transportation the monument to have been dedicated did not
arrive in time to be erected and formally unveiled, but the
base having been completed, the ceremonies took place thereon
and around it; and the massive shaft was put in place on
the foUowing Monday, the exact anniversary day. By rea
son of the weather conditions the parade dso had to be
abandoned, and the literary exercises were held in the M. E.
Church, the fo" owing programme being carried out:
L
Invocation  Bev, B, F, Wbight, of Zion A. M,
E, Church.
Music, "America"  Chbistiana Cornet Band,
Presentation  B. C, Atlez, Esq,
Music, " Star Spangled Banner". . Chbistiana Cobnit Bans,
Acknowledgment  Chasles S, Slokom, Burgess of
Cliristiana,
Music, "Dixie"  Chbistiana Cobnet Band.
Doxology, "Old Hundred."
Benediction  Eev, A, T, Stewabt, of Christiana
Presbyterian Church.
n.
11 A.M, AutomobUe trip to the "Biot House"; by Bridge Street to
Noble Boad; thence to Second Cross Boads, turning to right at road
to Brinton's MiU, down hiU to comer of New Valley Boad; south of
bridge tum to right and by John H, Bench's «nd B. F, Leaman 't (on
which farm Hanway 't "red mlU" stood— note Hanway's house, now
152

OOMMEMOBATION OF THB BIOT, 163
vacant, on right), Samnel Sheaffer's, Agnet Lanta't (noto streamer at
site of old Biot Honte), Levi PownaU 's hein (house on right when
Dickinson Gorsuch was nursed), Edward Johnson 's and Joseph S. Davit's^
to NoUe Boad; np road through P. B. B. arch to Bridge Street and
Christiana. IIL
11.30 A.M. to 1.30 P.M. Luncheon. Served in the basement of M. E.
Chureh, by ladies of the Church. IV.
Ajtebnoon Pboobammi.
Opening Prayer  Bev. T. S. Minkib, of Chrittiana
M. E. Church.
Music, "My Old Kentucky Home,"
accompanied by Bnrger't Fourth
Begiment Band  VooAL Chobus.
Address of Welcome  Thomas WmTSON, Esq.
Music, "Columbia, the Gem of the
Ocean"  Buboeb's Foubth Beoiment Band.
Introduction  Chairman of the Committee of Ar
rangements.
Commemoration Address  Bev, Db, Henbt J, Codden, Chap
lain of the House of Bepreeenta-
tives of the United Statot.
Presentation of Memorial Medalt. . H. Fbank Eshleman, Esq.
To Mrs. F. O. MiteheU, foUowed by Band selection, "Mary
land, My Maryland."
To Petor Woods, foUowed by "Old Black Joe."
Music, "Star Spangled Banner" ,,BmiaEB'B Foobth Beoiment Band.
Short Addreatet  Govebnob John K. Teneb; Hon.
M. E. OufSTKAD, Congressman;
Hon. F. B. McClain, Mayor of
Lancaster; Hon. W. C. Spsoul,
of Chester, Stato Senator; Fbanoib
Fishes Kane, Esq., of Philadel
phia.
Vocal Chomt, "Snanee Biver"  Buboeb's Foobth Bboimint Band.
Benediction  Bev. Cldton Habiis, of the Atglen
Baptist Cmch.
The Meuobial Medals.
The memorid medals which were the snhjecto of the pres
entation were esp^xnaUy designed by the engravers of the

154 THB OHBISTIAXA BIOT.
United States Mint, at PhUadelphia. Both are masdve dr^
cdar pieces of sUver, three inches in diameter and one fourth
of an inch thickness of rim.
The one presented to Mrs. MitcheU, granddaughter of
Edward Gorsuch, represents the "Law" side of the senti
ments involved in the celebration. It bears the profile bust
of MiUard Fillmore, under whose administration as Presi
dent the Fugitive Slave Law was passed, and by the direc
tion of whose Cabinet treason trids Were instituted and con
ducted. On the reverse side is engrossed :
In memory of Edward Gorsuch, Commemoration of Christiana Biot
and Treason Triab, 1851— September 11—1911.
The one presented to Peter Woods represents the idea of
" Liberty," and bears a magnificent relief head of Abraham
Lincoln, and on the other side the inscription :
Peter Woods. Freeman, Soldier, Citizen. Sole survivor of the Chris
tiana Biot and Treaaon Triala, 1851— Septem1}er 11 — 1911.
SlONIFIOANOE OF THE MeDALS.
In making presentation of the memorial medals Mr, Eshle
man spoke as foUows :
Descendants of Edward Oorsuch and Ladies and Oentle-
men: The good citizen not ody obeys and upholds the law,
but also accepts its guarantees and entrusts himself to its
protection. Trust and confidence in the law and the free use
of its benefits are as patriotic an attitude toward a govern
ment and as true a mark of dlegiance as support of an obedi
ence to the law. Faith and trust in law — confident reliance
upon the law — are vastly greater security to a nation than
mere cold obedience of law. Faith is primary; obedience
secondary. Faith, causal ; obedience, consequent So long
as there be faith and trust in law, there can be no violation —
no mob. Faith sweetens obedience. Though law be short,
ineffectual, slow of remedy, faith in it, as it stands, ia the
citizen's immediate duty; patience and amendment, his line
of action — ^not terrorism, violence and mob rule.

AT HOME.
«T.. «K»., «.» «., «« ««««> C THt «*«»« "OT, «C«.«T OT TH. ».«««T«. «<».i.
" ratEKM, souMKi anan."

commemokation of THB BIOT, 155
The most needed lesson in America to-day is faith in the
enacted law. They who live for the law and they who die
for the law are the nation's great and greater heroes. Law
and love of God are our nation's hope.
Edward Gorsuch believed in the law — he believed in a law
that was odious to two-thirds of our people — he tried to prove
its promises. Disaster befell him. He died for the law
sixty years ago near this spot. To his granddaughter, Mrs,
F, G. MitcheU, the Lancaster County Historicd Society
and its friends, through me, presents this medd; not as a
minute of our views upon his particdar act, but as an expres
sion of our approval of the principle his action exemplified,
"wiUingness to die for the law."
Venerable Peter Woods and Friends of Liberty Under
the Law: True liberty is license so far restrained by law as is
necessary to protect the righte of all. Law and license are
the quantities that, from the beginning of time, have ever
hung on the opposite ends of the trembling scdes of justice.
Equity is the soul of law and liberty is the apotheosis of
equity. Law is not dways truly-reflected public opinion. Law
is sometimes better and sometimes worse than public opinion.
But law at ite worst, in a popular government, is generaUy
better than public opinion at its best. Sovereign rde must
be reliable as well as righteous — firm as weU as good. Law
more nearly typifies these qudities than public opimOn.' Law
is stable ; popdar fancy is variable — ^law is calm ; the mood
of the mass, emotiond.
As law is not dways popdar, neither is law dways right,
nor just. But law is dways law, Bepublics rest upon rep
resentative rde. The people of repubUcs act through elected
agente. The agente' wiU is law — they bind us. The enacted
law is a barrier against popdar instebUity as weU as a bd-
wark against tyranny. The law cannot be used to lend sano-
tion to the fitfd tides of popdar emotion any more than the
compass needle can be used for a weather vane.

156 THB OHBIS'riANA BIOT.
But the law can be changed, improved, annnUed. Liberty,
the spirit and genius of aU true law, can, in an orderly or
in a revolutionaiy way upheave and overturn aU wicked and
iU-conceived enactmente. It can shake continente to their
centers — ^it can convulse a world to its core.
VeneraUe Peter Woods, aged representative of a Uberated
race, the Lancaster Cotmty Historicd Society and ito friends
have seen in you and in the part you took in the Octoraro
VaUey skirmish of the struggle that wrecked and reunited
America — ^the shock that shook the world — a true monument
of what Uberty can do by the help of God. And they present
to you now, through me, this medd, as a public object lesson
and as an opportunity to attest their approvd of the motto
to which your conduct sixty years ago on these acres, entitles
you, " He Suffered For Liberty,"

THE MKMORIAL.
This monument is a massive three ton rhnft of Barre (Vt,), granite;
it stands eleven feet above the sidewalk, at the northeast corner of the
splendid subway erected by the Pennsylvania Bailroad Company in the
borough of Christiana and formally opened on the day of the Commemora
tion. This view is from the northeast and presents the memorial to
Edward Gorsuch who "died for Law" and to Castner Hanway who
' ' snffered for freedom, ' ' On the other faces are inscribed the dates of
the Biot and of the Trial, and tho names of all the 38 defendants in tha
Treason Cases,

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COMMITTEES ON COMMEMOEATIOK
Officers of the Lancaster County Historical Sodety.
— President, George Steinman; Vice-Presidents, F, R Dif-
fenderffer, LittD., W. TJ, Hensel, LL.D, ; Secretary, Charles
B. HoUinger; Corresponding Secretary, Miss Martha B.
Clark; Treasurer, A. K Hostetter; Librarian, Charles T.
Steigerwalt; Assistant Librarian, Miss Lottie M Bausman;
Executive Committee, A. K, Hostetter, W, U. Hensel, D. F.
Magee, Geo. F. K, Erisman, D, B, Landis, H, Frank Eshle
man, Monroe B, Hirsh, Mrs, Sarah B, Carpenter, Miss Lottie
M, Bausman, L. B, Herr, John L, Summy, Mrs, M. IT.
Bobinson, Arrangements Committee, — ^W. U. Hensel, Chairman;
H. Frank Eshleman, Secretary; B. C. Atlee, Treasurer; J,
Guy Eshleman, Clerk,
Local Committee. — Dr. L, W. PownaU, Chairman;
Charles S, Slokom, Secretary; Hoy H, Passmore, Treasurer;
Calvin Carter, E, G. BroomeU, Thos, Whitson, J, D, Hast
ings, Wm, Fielis, M. P. Cooper, M. K. Hammond, Dr, T, S.
Irwin, J, G, Mast, Marvin E, Bushong, Geo, S, Hartman,
Amos Gilbert, J, A. Harrar, Dr. 0. H. Paxson, P, E. Han-
num, James H. Whiteside, A. J. Meloher, Edw. J. Enoz,
Thomas McGowan, Fred, Brinton, Dr. J. E, Martin, Frank
M. Trout, Eobert S, McClure, B, Frank Leaman, M. J.
Brinton, George W, Hensel, Jr,, Samuel J, Nixon, Frank
Walter, E, H, Keen, Jones Eavenson, Edwin Trout, J. F.
Eeynolds, W, D. Swisher, H. L. SkUes, Samnd Carter, Wm.
Chamberlin, Wm. Hopkins.
Honorary Reception Committee. — George Steinman,
Hotl j. Hay Brown, Hon. E. G. Smith, Hon. W. W. Griest,
Hon. John G. Homsher, Hon. H. L. Bhoads, Charles E.
167

158 THB OHBISTIANA BIOT.
Pugh, Ambrose PownaU, Cyrus Brinton, Thomas Hirst,
James P. Marsh, Brinton Wdter, Wm. McGowan, Sr., M,
B. Kent, F. R Diffenderffer, Francis Lennox, Dr. H, Mc
Gowan, George Steele, W, S, Hastings, Hon, A. B. Hassler,
Hon. Thos. S. Butler, Hon. W. C. Sprod, Hon. F. B. Mc-
Cldn, Joseph C. Walker, Morris Cooper, W. P. Brinton,
Thos. J. PhiUips, D. F. Magee, Hon. C. I. Landis, James M.
Walker, Gilbert Bushong, Benjamin Eavenson, Peter Woods,
Samuel Whitson, William L. Jackson, H. B, Fdton, H, C.
Hopkins, Eev, R F. Wright, Chas. Dingee, Henry Preston,
S. R Slaymaker, A. K. Hostetter. [The End]

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