Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet Part 100

We returned to Portland on the 12th of June, but before that we visited Astoria, looked into the great industry of salmon packing, and were greeted by quite a number of old Ohioans. On our return we visited Walla Walla and there saw wheat growing that yielded fifty bushels to the acre. We remained over, also, at Spokane Falls, then a mere village with a few houses, since become quite a city.

General Miles and I drove in a buggy from Spokane to Fort Coeur d'Alene, a military post which he wished to visit and inspect. It is situated on a lake which is famous for the abundance of its fish. From there we took the cars to Helena, where we remained a day, and then proceeded to St. Paul, where we arrived on the 21st of June. Here again we found the interviewer, who wanted to know my opinion about Cleveland, the silver question, the Chinese and various other topics. I pleaded ignorance on all these matters, but told the reporter that if he would call upon me in the course of a month I would be able to answer his questions.

From St. Paul we went to Milwaukee and there crossed Lake Michigan and thence by rail to Grand Rapids, where I had a number of acquaintances and some business. We then proceeded by way of Detroit and Sandusky to our home at Mansfield about the 24th of June.

CHAPTER XLIX.

REUNION OF THE "SHERMAN BRIGADE."

Patriotic Address Delivered at Woodstock, Conn., On My Return from the Pacific Coast--Meeting of the Surviving Members of the Sherman Family at Mansfield--We Attend the Reunion of the "Sherman Brigade"

at Odell's Lake--Addresses of General Sherman and Myself to the Old Soldiers and Others Present--Apathy of the Republican Party During the Summer of 1885--Contest Between Foraker and Hoadley for the Governorship--My Speech at Mt. Gilead Denounced as "Bitterly Partisan"--Governor Hoadley Accuses Me of "Waving the b.l.o.o.d.y Shirt"

--My Reply at Lebanon--Election of Foraker--Frauds in Cincinnati and Columbus--Speeches Made in Virginia.

Upon my return from the Pacific coast I found a ma.s.s of letters to be answered, and many interviewers in search of news, and I had some engagements to speak for which I had made no preparations.

Among the latter was a promise to attend a celebration of the approaching 4th of July at Woodstock, Connecticut, under the auspices of Henry C. Bowen of the New York "Independent." He had for several years conducted these celebrations at his country home at much expense, and made them specially interesting by inviting prominent men to deliver patriotic addresses suitable for Independence Day.

General Logan and I were to attend on this occasion. I selected as my theme "America of to-day as contrasted with America of 1776."

I prepared an address with as much care as my limited time would allow, giving an outline of the history of the Declaration of Independence, and the prominent part taken by the sons of Connecticut in this and other great works of the American Revolution. The address was published in the "Independent." I have read it recently, and do not see where it could be improved by me. The outline of the growth of the United States presents the most remarkable development in the history of mankind. I closed with the following words:

"It has been my good fortune, within the last two months, to traverse eleven states and territories, all of which were an unbroken wilderness in the possession of savage tribes when the declaration was adopted, now occupied by 15,000,000 people--active, intelligent, enterprising citizens, enjoying all the advantages of modern civilization. What a change! The hopeful dreams of Washington and Jefferson and Franklin could not have pictured, as the probable result of their patriotic efforts, such scenes as I saw; cities rivaling in population and construction the capitals of Europe; towns and villages without number full of active life and hope; wheat fields, orchards, and gardens in place of broad deserts covered by sage brush; miners in the mountains, cattle on the plains, the fires of Vulcan in full blast in thousands of workshops; all forms of industry, all means of locomotion.

"Who among us would not be impressed by such scenes? Who can look over our broad country, rich in every resource, a climate and soil suited to every production, a home government for every community, a national government to protect all alike, and not feel a profound sentiment of grat.i.tude, first of all to the great Giver of all gifts, and next to our Revolutionary fathers who secured, by their blood and sacrifices, the liberty we enjoy, and by their wisdom moulded the people of the United States into one great nation, with a common hope and destiny?

"And this generation may fairly claim that it has strengthened the work of the fathers, has made freedom universal, and disunion impossible. Let the young men of to-day, heirs of a great heritage, take up the burden of government, soon to fall upon their shoulders, animated by the patriotic fire of the Revolution and the love of liberty and union that inspired our soldiers in the Civil War, turning their back upon all the animosities of that conflict, but clinging with tenacious courage to all its results, and they will, in their generation, double the population and quadruple the wealth and resources of our country. Above all, they should keep the United States of American in the forefront of progress, intelligence, education, temperance, religion, and in all the virtues that tend to elevate, refine, and enn.o.ble mankind."

General Logan delivered an eloquent and patriotic speech that was received by his audience with great applause. He was personally a stranger to the Connecticut people, but his western style and manner, unlike the more reserved and quiet tone of their home orators, gave them great pleasure. Senators Hawley and Platt also spoke. It is needless to say that our host provided us with bountiful creature comforts. On the whole we regarded the celebration as a great success.

During the last week of August, 1885, my surviving brothers and sisters visited my wife and myself at our residence in Mansfield.

Colonel Moulton and the wives of General and Hoyt Sherman were also present. Several of my numerous nephews and nieces visited us with their parents. The then surviving brothers were W. T. Sherman, Lampson P. Sherman, John Sherman, and Hoyt Sherman, and the surviving sisters were Mrs. Elizabeth Reese and Mrs. f.a.n.n.y B. Moulton. The brothers and sisters who died before this meeting were Charles T.

Sherman, James Sherman, Mrs. McComb, Mrs. Willock and Mrs. Bartley.

All of the family attended with me the reunion of the "Sherman Brigade," at its camp at Odell's Lake. On the arrival of the train at the lake we found a great crowd of soldiers and citizens waiting to meet General Sherman. The brigade had served under his command from Chattanooga to Atlanta. They received him with great respect and affection and he was deeply moved by their hearty greetings.

He shook hands with all who could reach him, but the crowd of visitors was so great that many of them could not do so. The encampment was located at the west end of the lake, justly celebrated for the natural beauty of its scenery, and a favorite resort for picnic excursions from far and near. We arrived at about twelve o'clock and were at once conducted to a stand in the encampment grounds, where again the hand-shaking commenced, and continued for some time. General Sherman and I were called upon for speeches.

He was disinclined to speak, and said he preferred to wander around the camp but insisted that I should speak. I was introduced by General Finley, and said:

"Soldiers and Citizens, Ladies and Gentlemen:--I saw in one of your published statements that I was to make an address on this occasion.

That is not exactly according to the fact. I did not agree to make a speech. One year ago, when the Sherman Brigade met at Shelby, I did, according to promise, make a prepared speech, giving the history of the organization of the 'Sherman Brigade,' and a copy of that, I understand, was sent to surviving members of that brigade.

But few will care for this, but it may interest the wives or children of these soldiers.

"Now I do not intend to make a speech, but only a few remarks preliminary to those that will be made to you by one more worthy to speak to soldiers than I am.

"I have always understood that at soldiers' reunions the most agreeable portion of the proceedings is to have the old soldiers gather around the campfire to tell their stories of the war, to exchange their recollections of the trying period through which they pa.s.sed from 1861 to 1865; to exchange greetings, to exhibit their wives and children to each other, and to meet with their neighbors in a social way and thus recall the events of a great period in American history. And this is really the object of these reunions.

"You do not meet here to hear speeches from those, who, like myself, were engaged in civil pursuits during the war, and therefore, I never am called before a soldiers' reunion but I feel compelled to make an apology for speaking."

I referred to General Grant and his recent death, and then to General Sherman as follows:

"There is another of those commanders, who is here before you to- day. What is he? He is now a retired army officer. When the war was over he became the General in Chief of the army, served until the time fixed by the law for his retirement, and now he is a private citizen, as plain and simple in his bearing and manners as any other of the citizens who now surround him. These are the kind of heroes a republic makes, and these are the kind of heroes we worship as one free man may worship another."

General Sherman was then introduced to the vast audience, and said:

"Comrades and Friends:--A few days ago I was up on the banks of Lake Minnetonka, and was summoned here to northern Ohio to partic.i.p.ate in a family reunion. I knew my brother's house in Mansfield was large and commodious, sufficient to receive the survivors of the first generation of the family, but I also knew that if he brought in the second and third generations he would have to pitch a camp somewhere, and I find he has chosen this at Odell's Lake. So, for the time being, my friends, you must pa.s.s as part of the Sherman family, not as 'the Sherman Brigade,' and you must represent the second and third generations of a very numerous family.

"Of course, it is not my trade or vocation to make orations or speeches. I see before me many faces that look to me as though they were once soldiers, and to them I feel competent to speak; to the others I may not be so fortunate.

"But, very old comrades of the war, you who claim to be in 'Sherman's Brigade' or in any other brigade, who took a part in the glorious Civil War, the fruits of which we are now enjoying, I hail and thank you for the privilege of being with you this beautiful day in this lovely forest and by the banks of yonder lake, not that I can say anything that will please you or profit you, but there is a great pleasure in breathing the same air, in thinking the same thoughts, in feeling the same inspirations for the future, which every member of the 'Sherman Brigade' and the children who have succeeded them must, in contemplating the condition of our country at this very moment of time. Peace universal, not only at home but abroad, and America standing high up in the niche of nations, envied of all mankind and envied because we possess all the powers of a great nation vindicated by a war of your own making and your own termination. Yes, my fellow-soldiers, you have a right to sit beneath your own vine and fig tree and be glad, for you can be afraid of no man. You have overcome all enemies, save death, which we must all meet as our comrades who have gone before us have done, and submit. But as long as we live let us come together whenever we can, and if we can bring back the memories of those glorious days it will do us good, and, still more, good to the children who will look up to us as examples."

He continued to speak for fifteen minutes or more, and closed with these words:

"My friends, of course I am an old man now, pa.s.sing off the stage of life. I realize that, and I a.s.sure you that I now think more of the days of the Mexican War, the old California days, and of the early days of the Civil War, than I do of what occurred last week, and I a.s.sure you that, let it come when it may, I would be glad to welcome the old 'Sherman Brigade' to my home and my fireside, let it be either in St. Louis or on the banks of the Columbia River in Oregon. May G.o.d smile upon you, and give you his choicest blessings. You live in a land of plenty. I do not advise you to emigrate, but I a.s.sure you, wherever you go, you will find comrades and soldiers to take you by the hand and be glad to aid you as comrades."

The gathering was a thoroughly enjoyable one, and was often recalled by those present.

During the summer of 1885 there was much languor apparent in the Republican party. President Cleveland was pursuing a conservative policy, removals from office were made slowly, and inc.u.mbents were allowed to serve out their time. Foraker and Hoadley were again nominated in Ohio for governor by their respective parties, and the contest between them was to be repeated.

There was a feeling among Republicans of humiliation and shame that the people had placed in power the very men who waged war against the country for years, created a vast public debt, and destroyed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. This feeling was intensified by the fact that Republicans in the south were ostracised and deprived of all political power or influence. In the Democratic party there were signs of dissension. Charges of corruption in Ohio, in the election of Payne as Senator in the place of Pendleton, were openly made, and the usual discontent as to appointments to office that follows a change of administration was manifest. Under these conditions I felt it to be my duty to take a more active part in the approaching canva.s.s than ever before. On the 13th of August, I met at Columbus with Foraker and the state Republican committee, of which Asa S. Bushnell was chairman, and we prepared for a thorough canva.s.s in each county, the distribution of doc.u.ments and the holding of meetings. In addition to the state ticket there were to be elected members of the legislature. There was no contest as to the selection of a United States Senator, as, by general acquiescence, it was understood that if the legislature should be Democratic Thurman would be elected, and if it should be Republican I would be elected. Governor Foster, when spoken to upon this subject, very kindly said:

"As long as John Sherman desires to be Senator, or is willing to take the office, there is no use for me or any other man with senatorial aspirations to be a candidate against him. Sherman is yet young. He is not much over sixty, and it would be idle to dispute that he is the best equipped man in the Republican party in Ohio for that position. He has the learning, the ability, the experience, the popularity."

The organization of both parties was completed and a vigorous canva.s.s inaugurated. Foraker soon after commenced a series of public meetings extending to nearly every county in the state, and everywhere made friends by his vigorous and eloquent speeches.

On the 18th I attended a pioneer picnic at Monroe, near the division line between the counties of Butler and Warren. This mode of reunion, mainly confined to farmers, is quite common in Ohio, and is by far the most pleasing and instructive popular a.s.semblage held in that state. The discussion of politics is forbidden. The people of the country for miles around come in wagons, carriages, on horseback and on foot, men, women and children, with their baskets full of food and fruit, and gather in a well-shaded grove, in families or groups, and discuss the crops and the news, and make new or renew old acquaintance. When the scattered picnic is going on everyone who approaches is invited to eat. When the appet.i.te is satisfied all gather around a temporary platform, and speeches, long and short, upon every topic but politics, are made. I have attended many such meetings and all with sincere pleasure. This particular picnic was notable for its large attendance--estimated to be over three thousand--and the beauty of the grove and the surrounding farms. I made an address, or rather talked, about the early times in Ohio, and especially in the Miami valley, a section which may well be regarded as among the fairest and most fruitful spots in the world. The substance of my speech was reported and published. The sketch I was able to give of incidents of Indian warfare, of the expeditions of St. Clair and Wayne, of the early settlement in that neighborhood, and of the ancestors, mainly Revolutionary soldiers, of hundreds of those who heard me, seemed to give great satisfaction. At the close of my remarks I was requested by the Pioneer Society to write them out for publication, to be kept as a memorial, but I never was able to do so.

On the 26th of August I made, at Mt. Gilead, Morrow county, my first political speech of the campaign. The people of that county were among my first const.i.tuents. More than thirty years before, in important and stirring times, I had appeared before them as a candidate for Congress. I referred to the early history of the Republican party and to the action of Lincoln and Grant in the prosecution of the war, and contrasted the opinion expressed of them by the Democratic party then and at the time of my speech.

During the war our party was the "black abolition party," Lincoln was an "ape," Grant was a "butcher," and Union soldiers were "Lincoln hirelings." I said:

"Our adversaries now concede the wisdom and success of all prominent Republican measures, as well as the merits of the great leaders of the Republican party. Only a few days since I heard my colleague, Senator Payne, in addressing soldiers at Fremont, extol Lincoln and Grant in the highest terms of praise and say the war was worth all it cost and he thanked G.o.d that slavery had been abolished.

Only recently, when the great procession conveyed the mortal remains of Grant to their resting place, I heard active Confederates extol him in the highest terms of praise and some of them frankly gloried in the success of Republican measures, and, especially, in the abolition of slavery."

I said that the Republican party, within six years after its organization, overthrew the powerful dominant Democratic party, and for twenty-four years afterwards conducted the operations of a great government in war and peace, with such success as to win the support and acquiescence of its enemies, and could fairly claim to be worthy of the confidence and support of the great body of the people. The defection of a few men in three Republican states had raised our old adversaries to power again in the national government. I continued:

"Some of the very men who boastfully threatened to break up the Union, and, with the oath of office in support of the const.i.tution fresh upon their lips, conspired and confederated to overthrow it, waged war against it, and were the cause of the loss of half a million of lives and thousands of millions of treasure, have been placed in high office again, in the very seats of power which they abandoned with scorn and defiance. Two members of the Confederate congress, and one man who sympathized with them, are at the head of great departments of the government. I saw the Union flag at half-mast, floating over the interior department in sign of honor and mourning for the death of Jacob Thompson, whom we regarded as a defaulter and a conspirator. This country is now represented abroad by men, who, within twenty-five years, were in arms to overthrow it, and the governing power in the executive branch of the government is in sympathy with the ideas of, and selects the chief officers of the government from, the men who were in war against it. This strange turn in events has but one example in history, and that was the restoration of Charles II, after the brilliant but brief Protectorate of Cromwell, and, like that restoration, is a reproach to the civilization of the age."

I referred to the "solid south," and the means by which it was held together in political fellowship by crimes, violence and fraud which, if continued, would as surely renew all the strifes of the Civil War as that the sun would roll around in its course.

In referring to the Republican party and its liberality I said:

"The Republican party was certainly liberal and just to the rebels lately in arms against the country. We deprived them of no political power, no blood was shed; no confiscation was had; and more generous terms were conceded to them than ever before had been extended to an unsuccessful party in a civil war. Their leaders emphasized that at the burial of our great commander, General Grant. The result of the settlement by the const.i.tutional amendments at the close of the war was to give them increased political power, upon condition that the slaves should be free and should be allowed to vote, and that all political distinction growing out of race, color or previous condition of servitude shall be abolished; and yet to- day, the Republican party is faced by a 'solid south,' in which the negro is deprived, substantially, of all his political rights, by open violence or by frauds as mean as any that have been committed by penitentiary convicts, and as openly and boldly done as any highway robbery. By this system, and by the acquiescence of a few northern states, the men who led in the Civil War have been restored to power, and hope, practically, to reverse all the results of the war.

"This is the spectre that now haunts American politics, and may make it just as vital and necessary to appeal to the northern states to unite again against this evil, not so open and arrogant as slavery, but more dangerous and equally unjust. The question then was the slavery of the black man. Now the question is the equality of the white man, whether a southern man in Mississippi may, by depriving a majority of the legal voters in the state of their right to vote, exercise twice the political power of a white man in the north, where the franchise is free and open and equal to all.

"When we point out these offenses committed in the south, it is said that we are raising the b.l.o.o.d.y shirt, that we are reviving the issues of the war--that the war is over. I hope the war is over, and that the animosities of the war will pa.s.s away, and be dead and buried. Anger and hate and prejudice are not wise counselors in peace or in war. Generosity, forgiveness and charity are great qualities of the human heart, but, like everything else that is good, they may be carried to excess, and may degenerate into faults.

They must not lead us to forget the obligations of duty and honor.

While we waive the animosities of the war, we must never fail to hold on, with courage and fort.i.tude, to all the results of the war. Our soldiers fought in no holiday contest, not merely to test the manly qualities of the men of the north and the south, not for power or plunder, or wealth or t.i.tle. They fought to secure to themselves and their posterity the blessings of a strong national government; the preservation of the Union--a Union not of states, but of the people of the United States; not a confederate government, but a national government. The preservation of the Union was the central idea of the war. The Confederate soldier fought for what he was led to think was the right of a state to secede from the Union at its pleasure. The Union soldiers triumphed. The Confederate soldiers were compelled to an unconditional surrender.

"Fellow-citizens, the line drawn between the two parties is now as distinct as it was during the war, but we occupy a different field of battle.

"Then we fought for the preservation of the Union, and, as a means to that end, for the abolition of slavery. Now the Union is saved and slavery is abolished, we fight for the equal political rights of all men, and the faithful observance of the const.i.tutional amendments. We are for the exercise of national authority, for the preservation of rights conferred by the const.i.tution, and upon this broad issue we invite co-operation from the south as well as the north.

"Upon this issue we intend to make our appeal to the honest and honorable people of the southern states. We think they are bound in honor to faithfully observe the conditions of peace granted to them by General Grant and prescribed by the const.i.tutional amendments.

If they do this we will have peace, union and fraternity. Without it we will have agitation, contests and complaints. Upon this issue I will go before the people of the south, and, turning my back upon all the animosities of the war, appeal only to their sense of honor and justice."