A Military Genius Part 2

There were also quarters for the married slaves, each family having its little cottage and garden, which it was allowed to cultivate on its own account, and great was the pride of its occupants if by dint of especial care they could raise the spring vegetables earlier than in the master's garden, and carry them up to the Hall in triumph.

There they always found a customer ready to purchase their produce.

Every Monday morning rations were given out for a week by the overseer and they were cooked by the families in their own quarters.

The hours of work were moderate, and on Sat.u.r.day they had a half holiday.

Sometimes there were parties and merry-makings at the negro quarters.

On great occasions, such as the marriage of a house servant, the family at the Hall, by their presence, gave dignity to the festivities, and inwardly they greatly enjoyed the fantastic scene.

At Kingston Hall open house was kept, and numerous visitors and entertainments made life gay for the children, who grew up in an atmosphere of ease and hospitality, little antic.i.p.ating the vicissitudes of the future and the stormy and heart-rending times in which their country was about to be involved.

CHAPTER II.

CHILDHOOD AND EARLY LIFE -- MISS CARROLL'S YOUTHFUL LETTERS TO HER FATHER -- RELIGIOUS TENDENCIES -- LETTERS FROM DR. ROBERT J.

BRECKENRIDGE -- SALE OF KINGSTON HALL -- EARLY WRITINGS -- LETTER OF HON. EDWARD BATES -- BREAKING OUT OF THE CIVIL WAR -- PREOCCUPATION IN MILITARY AFFAIRS.

On August the 29th, 1815, Anna Ella Carroll was born, at Kingston Hall. By this time a little brick Episcopal church had also been built at Rehoboth, but the congregation was too small to support a resident clergyman, and it had to alternate with other churches in its services. At this infant church, in due course of time, Anna Ella was christened by the Rev. Mr. Slemmonds. She was the eldest child, and thenceforth the pride of her distinguished father, who viewed with delight her remarkable intelligence, and early made her his companion in the political interests in which he took such an active part. It soon became evident that this was a child of decided and unusual character. When but three years old she would sit on a little stool at her father's feet, in his library, listening intently as he read aloud his favorite pa.s.sages from Shakespeare.

[Ill.u.s.tration: KINGSTON HALL--Birth Place of Anna Ella Carroll.]

All Mr. Carroll's children were so drilled in Shakespeare that there was not one of them who could not, when somewhat older, repeat long pa.s.sages by rote, and they made the rehearsal of scenes from Shakespeare's plays one of their favorite amus.e.m.e.nts. Anna Ella showed no taste for accomplishments; cared neither for dancing, drawing, music, or needlework. She used to boast to her sisters that she had made a shirt beautifully when ten years old; but they would smile at the idea, as they had never seen her handle a needle and could a.s.sociate her only with books.

These were to her of absorbing interest, and books, too, of a grave and thoughtful character. Alison's History and Kant's Philosophy were her favorite reading at eleven years of age. She read fiction to some extent, under her father's direction; but, with the exception of Shakespeare and Scott, she never cared for it. While other girls of her age were entranced by Sir Charles Grandison and fascinated by the heroes of Bulwer's earlier novels, she turned from them to read c.o.ke and Blackstone with her father, and followed with him the political debates and discussions of the day. She studied with lively interest the principles and events which led to the separation of the Colonists from the Mother Country, and buried herself in theological questions.

At a very early age her letters bore reference to the gravest subjects. Imagination was never prominent; her mind was essentially a.n.a.lytical. Pure reason and clear consecutive argument delighted her, and works of that nature were eagerly sought by her.

Her life pa.s.sed largely in her father's excellent library, which was well stocked with cla.s.sic works, both history, biography, philosophy, and poetry, and her education was to him a constant delight.

Miss Carroll's early a.s.sociates were the children of the neighboring proprietors, the Handys, the Wilsons, the Gales, the Henrys, etc., and she early made acquaintance with the distinguished men who where her father's a.s.sociates.

Mr. Carroll continued to serve in the Legislature until elected Governor of Maryland, in 1829. On this occasion he received an interesting letter from Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, congratulating him and expressing his pride and gratification at the event. When Governor Thomas King Carroll went to Annapolis, in performance of the duties of his office, he was accompanied by Mrs. Carroll, with the younger children and a group of servants under the superintendence of the invaluable Mammy. Mrs. Carroll, by her beauty and accomplishments, was well fitted to adorn her station. When the weather became warm she returned with her children to Kingston Hall.

The following charming letters from Miss Carroll, then a girl of fourteen, show the tenderness of the relation between father and child, and at how early an age she interested herself in politics and entered into the questions of the day:

KINGSTON HALL, _Jan. 20, 1830_.

My Precious Father:

My dearest mother received your letter on Monday, and we were all happy to know you had arrived safely at the seat of government, although the Annapolis paper had previously announced it.

Oh! my dear father, if I could but see you! I miss you--we all miss you--beyond measure. The time pa.s.ses tediously without you.

I have just read Governor Martin's last message.[1] I think it quite well written. I wondered to see it published in the _Telegraph_ [an opposition paper, I suppose]. I am anxious to see what the Eastern papers say of your election. Please, dear father, when anything relating to your political action is published, whether in the form of a message, in pamphlet, or in newspaper, do not fail to let us have them. I read with so much pride your letter in the Annapolis paper. It merits all the distinction and fame it has brought you. Too much could not be said in praise of my n.o.ble father. Dr. K---- was here to-day. He says they feel "quite exalted" to be so near neighbors to a Governor.

When do you think the Legislature will rise? But I must not write on political subjects only. Brother is delighted with his new horse. The little children are begging dearest mother to write you for them. May every blessing attend you, my precious father.

Be sure and write me a _long_ letter.

Your devoted daughter,

A. E. CARROLL.

[Footnote 1: He was Governor Carroll's predecessor.]

KINGSTON HALL, _Feb. 17, 1830_.

My Beloved Father:

Again we are disappointed in your arrival home! _and how_ disappointed no tongue can tell. Dearest mother thought it possible you might come on a little visit, even if the Legislature did not rise.[2] You said in your last letter to me that this was "probable." Why did you not say "_certain_?" Then I would rejoice, for when my father says a thing is certain, I _know_ it is certain. I am happy to tell you that I am much better; have had a long and tedious spell. I would lie for hours and think of you away from me, and if I had not the kindest and tenderest mother to care for me and for us all, what should we do. I understand that your appointments have not been generally approved by the milk-and-water strata of the party, of course, for no thorough Jackson man would denounce, even if he did not approve. It is my principle, as well as that of Lycurgus, to avoid "mediums"--that is to say, people who are not decidedly one thing or the other. In politics they are the inveterate enemies of the State. I hear there has been a committee appointed to visit you on your return to the Hall and present a pet.i.tion for the removal of some whom you have recently appointed. They call themselves reformers. I want reform, too, even in court criers, but to be forever reforming reform is absurd. I know whatever you do is _right_, and needs no reform, my wisest and dearest of fathers.

Write as soon as you can to your loving child,

A. E. CARROLL.

[Footnote 2: At that time the sessions of the Legislature were not restricted, as now they are, to sixty days.]

Mrs. Carroll was a devoted member of the Church of England, as was natural in the daughter of staunch Dr. Stevenson.

As there were no Sunday schools in those days, Mrs. Carroll gathered her children around her on Sunday afternoons and drilled them in the church catechism until it was as familiar to them as their A B C; but Anna Ella always inclined to the Westminster Confession and the tenets in which her father's childhood had been so rigorously educated.

When about fifteen Miss Carroll was sent to a boarding school, at West River, near Annapolis, to pursue her studies with Miss Margaret Mercer, an accomplished teacher.

Thomas King Carroll, at the same age, had been sent to the University of Pennsylvania, and afterward to the law school; but for this girl of gifts so remarkable, and of a character so decided, the best thing that the world of those times offered was a young ladies' boarding school of the olden time. Well it was for her and her country that her exceptional position as the cherished daughter of a man of such education and talent, occupied with political affairs, secured for her an education that would otherwise have been unattainable to her.

However, she made the best possible use of such education as a ladylike school permitted, was noted for her intelligence, and made many friends; but her true education began and continued with Governor Carroll at home.

Miss Carroll had early shown an intense interest in moral and religious questions, following her father's views on these subjects.

She became interested in the ministrations of Dr. Robert J.

Breckenridge, of Kentucky, then settled over a Presbyterian church in Baltimore.

Dr. Breckenridge was the uncle of John C. Breckenridge, afterward one of the leading secessionists, utterly opposed to his uncle in political views, and one of the candidates for the Presidency in 1860.

Dr. Robert J. Breckenridge was a valued friend of Governor Carroll.

Miss Anna Ella became a communicant and earnest member of his church, and a mutual friendship arose, terminated only by the death of the aged minister, who has left on record his high appreciation of the mental abilities and the great services afterward rendered by his remarkable parishioner.

We will give in part two letters from this excellent man to Miss Carroll, written from Kentucky in after years. For want of s.p.a.ce we must greatly shorten them.

DANVILLE, Ky., _December 6, 1864_.

My Excellent Friend:

It is very seldom I have read a letter with more gratification than yours of November 29th. How kind it is of you, after so many events, to remember me; and how many people and events and trials and enjoyments, connected with years of labor, rush through my heart and my brain as you recall Maryland and Baltimore so freshly and suddenly to me; and how n.o.ble is the picture of a fine life, well spent, which the modest detail of some of your efforts realizes to me. It is no extravagance, not even a trace of romance; it is a true enjoyment, and deeply affecting, too, that you give me in what you recount and what is recalled thereby. For what is there in our advanced life more worthy of thankfulness to G.o.d than that our former years were such that if we remember them with tears they are tears of which we need not be ashamed. My life during the almost twenty years since I left Maryland has been, as the preceding period had all been, a scene of unremitting effort in very many ways; and now, if the force of invincible habit permitted me to live otherwise, I should hardly escape by any other means a solitary if not a desolate old age.

Solitary, because of a numerous family all, except one young son, are either in the great battle of life or in their graves.

Desolate, because the terrible curse which marks our times and desolates our country has divided my house, like thousands of others, and my children literally fight in opposite armies and my kindred and friends die by each other's hands. There is no likelihood, in my opinion, that our Legislature will send me to the Senate of the United States; and will you wonder if I a.s.sure you that I have never desired that they should. Was it not a purer, perhaps a higher, ambition to prove that in the most frightful times and through long years a simple citizen had it in his power by his example, his voice and his pen, by courage, by disinterestedness, by toil, to become a real power in the State of himself; and have not you, delicately nurtured woman as you are, also cherished a similar ambition and done a similar work, even from a more difficult position? * * * I beg to be remembered in kind terms to your father, and that you will accept the a.s.surances of my great respect and esteem.