Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs Volume I Part 3

In 1835 the town of Groton was a place of much importance relatively.

It was the residence of several men of more than local fame. Timothy Fuller, the father of Margaret, was living there. He was a lawyer of considerable distinction, and he had held important public positions.

He had been a representative and senator in the Ma.s.sachusetts Legislature, speaker of the Ma.s.sachusetts House of Representatives, and a member of Congress from the Cambridge district from 1817 to 1825.

He died in October, 1835.

Mr. Fuller was a man of careful and regular habits, indeed he belonged to a family noted for their devotion to the profession of law, and for their odd manners and styles of dress.

Mr. Fuller's eldest son, Eugene, was afterwards a student in the law office of George F. Farley. He was a good debater as a young man, but as a student rather irregular. He went to New Orleans to reside, became an editor of, or writer on, the _Picayune_, and on a return voyage from Boston he was lost overboard.

Margaret Fuller continued to reside in Groton with her mother and the other members of the family for several years--until about 1841, I think. In the meantime I met her frequently, although she was several years my senior. She was a teacher in the Sunday school, and at the Sunday-evening teachers' meetings she was accustomed to set forth her opinions with great frankness, and in a style which a.s.sumed that they were not open to debate. While she lived at Groton she contributed to the _Dial_.

In personal appearance Margaret Fuller was less attractive than one might imagine from the portraits and engravings now seen. Her ability was recognized, but the celebrity she attained finally was not antic.i.p.ated, probably, by any of her town acquaintances. Her writings may justify the opinion that as a writer and thinker she is in the front rank of American women.

Samuel Dana, who had been a judge for many years, president of the Ma.s.sachusetts Senate for three terms, and a member of Congress for one term, was also a resident of Groton. He had been an active politician on the Democratic or Jeffersonian side in politics, and for many years in early life he had been the compet.i.tor of Timothy Bigelow, who had been a resident of Groton and a leader in the Federal Party of the State. The town supported Bigelow and returned him to the House, where he became speaker for many sessions. Dana as a candidate for the Ma.s.sachusetts Senate was elected by the county of Middles.e.x then Democratic, and for three terms he was president of the Senate. Judge Dana was interested in a small social library that was kept in a chamber over the store. It contained Josephus, Plutarch's Lives, Rollins' Ancient History, and some other standard works whose t.i.tles I do not now recall.

Judge Dana was also interested in the organization of a reading room club in a building connected with the store. As clerk in charge of the store I was custodian of the reading room and library. I found time to read Plutarch and Josephus, and I was skeptic enough to question in my own mind the pa.s.sage in Josephus in regard to Jesus.

Judge Dana died in the month of November, 1835, at the age of sixty.

His hair was white and long, and his appearance was so venerable that it is now difficult for me to realize that he was not seventy-five years of age at least. His abilities were considerable, and his descendants, in more than one instance, have shown distinguished qualities.

Two other well-known lawyers, one of them a lawyer of eminence in the profession, were also residents of the town; Benj. M. Farley and George F. Farley, brothers. They were natives of the small town of Brookline, N. H. The elder, Benj. M., had practised in Hollis, N. H., where by economy and good care of his earnings he had acquired a competency. At Groton he made no effort to obtain business, and acted for the most part as an a.s.sociate or aid to his brother, who was in the enjoyment of a large practice and income, for those days and parts.

With George F. Farley, whose age ran with the century, I was well acquainted from 1835 until his death in 1855. He was one of the small number of men that I have known who underestimated their powers. In one respect, perhaps, this was not true of Farley. He never appeared wanting in courage for any legal struggle with the leaders of the bar in New England. In the twenty years that I knew him he had for his antagonists Webster, Choate, Davis, Curtis, Franklin, Dexter, and others of eminence, and he never failed to sustain himself upon terms of equality. This was remarkable in presence of the fact that he was likely to be retained on the hard side of most cases. This was due, perhaps, to his reputation for shrewdness, and for a quality in practice which has been called the inventive faculty. When parties were not allowed to testify, there was a wide field for the imagination, and for the exercise of the inventive faculties on the part of an advocate. He had defended, successfully, the Ursuline Convent rioters, and he had been employed in many desperate cases on the civil side and on the criminal side of the courts.

In his later years he read very little either in law, history, or general literature. His law library was meager, although he had usually one or two students in his office. He preferred to discuss his cases with the loungers about the post-office and stores, getting thereby the benefit of the opinions of common men.

His manner in speaking was inartistic, and although he was a graduate of Harvard, he indulged himself in the use of country phrases and rustic p.r.o.nunciation. His logic was unanswerable, and his faculty of cross-examination of witnesses was worthy of emulation.

He enjoyed a few books, the cla.s.sics in the originals, but he seldom indulged in a quotation. Byron as a poet, and Locke as a logician he commended to me--the latter, Locke on the Human Understanding, with great earnestness. Under his advice I read it carefully, and for mental training he did not overvalue it. Farley commenced the practice of his profession at New Ipswich, N. H., and that town elected him once or twice to the Legislature of the State. Wishing for a wider field, he came to Groton. It was a day of small fees, and a good deal of the litigation grew out of the intemperate habits of the farmers.

In New Hampshire fees were even more moderate than in Ma.s.sachusetts.

If Farley had estimated his talents at their full value and had taken an office in Boston or New York, he could have gratified his love for money without disturbing his relations to his neighbors. In minor ways he was acquisitive and consequently there came to be a public sentiment which excluded him from public employments. His political course was not more erratic than that of many others, but his change of position was ascribed to policy and not to principle. In 1840 he was a Whig, in 1850 he was a Free-soiler, and in 1855 he was a Republican. In the autumn of the year 1855 he was elected a member of the State Convention of the Republican Party.

A day or two before the meeting of the convention I was pa.s.sing by his premises where he was engaged apparently in examining a buggy which his man had been putting in order. The conversation turned upon politics, and I soon discovered that he wished for a nomination to the Legislature, and without admitting the fact, his remarks showed that he comprehended the nature of the obstacles in his way. At last he said: "When I began I thought the main thing was to get money; and I have got it; and it is very convenient to have it, but it isn't just what I thought it was when I began."

He went to the convention, took a cold which developed into a fever, and in a week he died.

[* When I became Secretary of the Treasury, in 1869, I appointed Hubbard to a minor office in the revenue service in the State of Kentucky, where he then lived.]

VI GROTON IN 1835--(Continued)

There were two other lawyers in town, Caleb Butler, the postmaster, and Bradford Russell. Mr. Butler never appeared in court. He gave advice in small matters, wrote deeds and wills, surveyed lands, and served his neighbors in fiduciary ways. For many years he was a member, and a useful member, of the Board of Commissioners for the County of Middles.e.x. That body laid out highways, superintended the public buildings, and in a word did what no other authority in the county or State had a right to do. Mr. Butler was a Whig, and after a time his politics lost him the office of postmaster and the office of commissioner.

With Bradford Russell I commenced the study of law, or rather I entered my name with him and gave some night work to the study of books bearing upon the profession. His office was over the store in which I became a clerk in December, 1835. Russell was a graduate of Harvard, of the cla.s.s of 1818. For many years two other members of that cla.s.s resided at Groton--Dr. Joshua Green, and the Rev. Charles Robinson, pastor of the old society, then ranked as Unitarian. Mr. Russell had studied his profession with Judge James Prescott, who was impeached and removed from the office of Judge of Probate for the county of Middles.e.x in the year 1821. Judge Prescott, whom I never saw, was a good lawyer in his time, especially in the department of special pleading. That branch of the profession was then pa.s.sing away, but there were lawyers who lived by their skill in preparing answers, rejoinders, sur-rejoinders, reb.u.t.ters, and sur-reb.u.t.ters. Russell had acquired a large amount of special learning in the law, but he had no capacity to comprehend principles, nor could he see the application of old decisions to new cases. In argument he was weak and inconclusive, but he was confident in his own powers, and favored as he was at times by the accidents and hazards of the profession, he gained some victories. In the final trials at the county court he usually secured the services of senior counsel who could meet Farley, his usual antagonist, upon an equality of standing. Most frequently he secured the services of Sam Mann of Lowell, as he was then called. The name of the town was affixed generally, as though the advocate had been so christened.

Mann was able, confident, and bold. He died young, after a brilliant career. In many cases Mann and Farley were a.s.sociated. When this combination appeared, the opposing counsel were hard-pressed, usually.

In those days a story was set afloat which, though false, gave voice to the popular notion. When the court was held at Cambridge, Farley and Mann boarded together at the Mansion House, Charlestown Square. It was said that when they were a.s.sociated in a case, they were in the habit of examining and cross-examining the witnesses. On one of these occasions, as the story went, Mann conducted the examination, and Farley followed with the cross. Under his hand the witnesses went to pieces. After the witnesses left, Farley said, "We can never succeed if those are your witnesses." Mann replied: "Oh, those are the witnesses for the other side. To-morrow evening I will show you my witnesses." When the evening came, the same witnesses came also.

They were again subject to examination and cross-examination, and proved impregnable under Farley's hand. An invention, no doubt, and yet the story had a run.

Although Russell was not a compet.i.tor in any sense with such antagonists as Farley and Mann, he was in the enjoyment of a practice that was sufficient for a living, and a prudent man would have made it the beginning of a moderate fortune. He had neither skill in money matters nor ordinary economy. Hence he was always in debt. At one term of the court he entered fifty-eight writs, and there were terms when he had from seventy to one hundred cases on the docket. Each of these cases gave him thirty-three and one third cents costs for every day of the term.

Russell held the office of Master in Chancery. In 1838 the Insolvent Law was enacted, and its administration was confided to Masters in Chancery. Russell soon gained a reputation for leniency in the matter of granting discharges to the insolvent debtors, and his business increased rapidly. His jurisdiction was the whole county, and although there were several masters in the county, his fame was such that pet.i.tions came from Lowell, Waltham and other places where masters had offices. I was appointed clerk in insolvency, at five dollars a day when a court was held. In this way I gained some needed income, acquired a knowledge of the Insolvent Law, and more than all, I gained the acquaintances of the leading lawyers of the county. As debtors and witnesses were examined, I may have gained something in practice. The Insolvent Law, amended, to be sure, has remained on the statute books of Ma.s.sachusetts to this day, and the United States Bankrupt Law was modeled upon it. Indeed, there can never by any wide departure from the provisions of that statute, and from its principles no departure whatever can be made.

A leading man, and a character in the town, was Thomas A. Staples. He was a native of the neighboring town of Shirley. He was a man of large size, handsome figure, resolute in his purposes, and vindictive in his enmities. His chief business was that of stage proprietor, and mail contractor. He was always in debt, and tardy, of course, in his payments. He was involved in lawsuits, and many of his debts were paid upon executions. His mail contracts were so large that he sublet many of the routes, and he was always in debt to sub-contractors. He had a stage office in Boston for a time at the Hanover House, and after that at No. 9 Court Street. His office was the headquarters of country traders and others who patronized his lines of stages. In the year 1838 or later, I was in his office when Alvin Adams, the founder of the Adams Express Company, made his first trip to New York as an express messenger. Staples afterward stated in conversation that Adams had but one parcel, and that he loaned him five dollars to meet his expenses.

At that time Harnden's express was in operation with an office at No. 8 Court Street. Harnden's company disappeared in a few years, and the Adams Express Company became an inst.i.tution that has the appearance of perpetuity. At a time perhaps as late as 1850, I met Adams on Washington Street, when he expressed the opinion that his business was as profitable as any business in the country.

Staples was engaged also in paper making with mills upon the upper falls of the Squannacook River. This branch of his business was especially unfortunate, and in 1836 he a.s.signed his property to Henry Woods, Daniel Shattuck, and Joshua B. Fowle. Mr. Woods was a trader in whose employment I then was, having let myself to him when I left the Dix store December 1, 1835, for my board and $150 a year. Agreement for one year. The a.s.signees were all friends of Staples. The last named was Calvin Childs, a blacksmith, to whom Staples owed about two thousand dollars. The a.s.signees proceeded to execute their trust, and as collections were made, payments were made until all the debts were paid except the debt to Childs. Mr. Woods died in 1841. Shattuck died in 1850, and the trust was not then executed. Fowle paid Childs six hundred dollars, but he made no settlement of the trust. In 1853 Childs applied to Russell for counsel and a.s.sistance. Russell filed a bill on the equity side of the court. A lawyer, named Fiske, of Boston, was retained by Fowle. Fiske answered. Russell employed the Hon. Charles R. Train to a.s.sist in the trial, but there was no hearing.

In 1858 Train was elected to Congress. About 1860 Russell came to me for a.s.sistance and put into my hands a large bundle of papers relating to the case. At that time Russell was so impaired in health that he could not aid in the investigation. Upon an examination I found that the testimony of Staples was important. He then lived at Machias, Maine. By writing and interviews when I found him in Boston, I became satisfied that for a hidden reason he was resolved to have nothing to do with the case. As a last resort, I took out a commission and submitted interrogatories. The answers were evasive or valueless from loss of memory. Thus the case was delayed. In 1862 I was elected to Congress. Childs was an easy going man who made inquiries occasionally, but never complained. Upon my return from a session, about 1865, I resolved to bring the case to a close. I examined the papers carefully, and I found full material for a statement, although it cost labor to a.n.a.lyze the accounts. At that time Russell was dead and Fiske was dead. Mr. John Loring, a former partner of Fiske, took the case. Loring agreed to a hearing at Chambers. Chief Justice Chapman named a day. At the day named the clients and counsel appeared. I presented my statement in writing. Loring and Fowle said they knew nothing about the matter. My statement showed a balance of between $400 and $500 in Fowle's hands. I asked for interest. Fowle said he had been ready always to pay. I contended it was his duty long before to have rendered an account, and made payment. Judge Chapman, with less reason than courts have usually for their decisions, held that as he was always ready to pay, he was not justly chargeable with interest. I drew a decree, the judge signed it, Fowle paid, and Childs returned home that night. For ten years the case had been on the docket, when, if some one had made an examination of the papers it could have been disposed of in a day.

The controversy in New England between Trinitarians and Unitarians had culminated in Groton about the year 1825 in a division of the old town society and the organization of an orthodox church under the Rev. John Todd. His successor, a Mr. Kittredge, had charge of the Society in 1835, and for a short time afterwards. He was succeeded by Dudley Phelps, who was a man of ability and liberal in his religious opinions.

From 1838 to 1841 the post-office was in my charge, although I held the office of postmaster only from February to April, 1841. Mr. Phelps was in the habit of sitting in the office and reading every sort of newspaper from the _Trumpet_ to the _Investigator_. Although he was much my senior, and of differing opinions in politics and religion our relations were quite intimate. For several years we were joint subscribers for the four leading English reviews:--_Edinburgh, North British, Quarterly_ and _Westminster_. My recollection is that he made the dedicatory prayer at the new cemetery, and that he was the first person buried in it. He was a man of talent and the father of two sons, who attained distinction at the bar in New York.

The Rev. Charles Robinson was the pastor of the old society then Unitarian, but without question as to the plenary inspiration of the Scriptures. He was a graduate of Harvard, a man of learning, and a writer of good sermons. In the delivery he was faulty to the last stage of awkwardness. His perceptive faculties were dull to a degree without parallel in my experience.

In 1835 and for some time afterwards, there were four taverns and three stores at which intoxicating liquors were sold and the use of such liquors by farmers was greatly in excess of their use at the present time. In the early winter the country farmers from New Hampshire and Vermont going to Boston, with b.u.t.ter, cheese, pork and poultry, patronized the taverns, and gave the town an appearance of business which contrasts with the aspect of dullness that it now wears. The prices for entertainment at the taverns were moderate, and none of the proprietors acc.u.mulated property.

VII BEGINNINGS IN BUSINESS

In the autumn of 1837 as my second year with Mr. Woods was approaching a close, I informed him that I proposed to go to Exeter, N. H., attend the Academy, and then either enter college or proceed with the study of the law. At about the same time I corresponded with Mr. Abbott, the princ.i.p.al of the Academy, in regard to terms, board, etc.. Upon this notice Mr. Woods made me a proposition to continue with him and share the business. He offered to furnish the capital, to give me my board, and one fourth of the net profits. My means were very small, the business was quite sure to yield a profit, and the prospect of gaining a small amount of capital at the age of twenty-three, when the partnership was to end, controlled me and I accepted the proposition.

The partnership began March 1, 1838, when I was two months over twenty years of age. I had then been in Groton three years, and I had formed the acquaintance of many young men in the Lyceum, in business and in social ways. In connection with the Lyceum I prepared papers which I read as lectures. One of these papers upon banking, signed B., appeared in the Bay State _Democrat_, edited by Lewis Josselyn, the publisher. Another upon Conservatism and Religion, was also printed in the Bay State _Democrat_. As I did not give my name to Mr. Josselyn, and as the letters were mailed at Groton, he came there and after inquiries, called upon me. I admitted the authorship. This acquaintance continued for many years, and for many years I was a contributor to his paper. He was elected secretary of the Senate in 1843 by the Democratic Party. A little later I wrote an article called "Gibbet Hill" in which I attempted to present the tradition concerning the hill in Groton which bears that name. That article was printed in the _Yeoman's Gazette_ or the Concord _Freeman_. For several years beginning about the year 1836, I wrote one paper each year called a lecture. Several of these papers were printed in Hunt's _Merchants' Magazine_.

From 1835 to 1841 I occupied the store night and day and it was my custom to read and write until twelve, one or two o'clock in the morning. These were my years of hard study. Not infrequently, when a tendency to sleep was too heavy for study, I bathed my face and head in cold water and thus revived my faculties--a practice, however, that I cannot commend. Early in my residence in Groton, I formed the acquaintance and friendship of Dr. Amos B. Bancroft, a friendship which continued until his death in Italy in the year 1879. It was with Dr.

Bancroft that I continued my studies in Latin. In 1835, he had finished his professional studies with Dr. Shattuck, of Boston, then an eminent physician. Dr. Shattuck had studied his profession with Dr.

Amos Bancroft, the father of Amos B. Dr. Amos, as he was called, was a graduate of Harvard College in the cla.s.s of Wendell Phillips, and at the close of his professional studies he was spoken of as the best educated physician who had entered the profession in Boston. At the time our acquaintance began, he was entering upon the practice of medicine, at Groton, in place of his father, who was then about sixty- five years of age, deaf, and not healthy in other respects, although he lived to the age of eighty years, and then died from an accident in State Street, Boston. Dr. Bancroft, Sr., lived in a house which stood about one hundred feet north of my present residence, and the office of Dr. Amos was on the spot now occupied by the front of my house. At the close of business for the day, nine o'clock in the evening, I was in the habit of going to the office and reciting my Latin lesson, after which we discussed other matters. Upon my return to the store, I prepared myself for the next evening's recitation. In this way I read Caesar and Virgil. In a closet in Bancroft's office there was a skeleton. That skeleton had a history, and possibly there may be a sequel to it. It was understood to have been the skeleton of a man named Jack Frost, who was tried, convicted and executed at Worcester for the crime of murder committed at or near Princeton. Dr. Bancroft, Sr., had been the owner of the skeleton. Oftentimes I rode Sundays with Dr. Amos. On the occasion of one of these drives, and after the death of Dr. Bancroft, Sr., we pa.s.sed the house of a waggish old man named Asa Tarbell. After a little conversation Tarbell said, "I shall be over soon for Frost's skeleton." Dr. Amos, amazed, looked over and through his gla.s.ses, and said, at length: "Why, what do you mean?"

Said Tarbell: "Some years ago, your father and I were playing, and I proposed to put my uncle Ben against your Frost. Your father agreed to the game, and I won. I told him I had no use for Frost at that time, and that he might keep him." Tarbell's Uncle Ben was a man of inferior size, hardly more than a dwarf, who had been a drummer boy in the Revolution.

I bought the Bancroft estate in 1873, and my foreman, Mr. William A.

Chase informed me that he had found a skeleton, in a barrel in a shed, and that he had buried it on the place. If again found it may lead to the suspicion that it is the skeleton of a murdered man, and not that of a murderer.

From 1835 to 1841, I read Locke, Say's Political Economy, Smith's Wealth of Nations, Plutarch, Josephus, Herodotus, Lingard, Hume and Smollett, Cicero, Demosthenes, Homer, Pope, Byron, Shakespeare, Boswell's Johnson, Junius, The Tattler, The Rambler, the English Reviews, French from text-books without a teacher and Rhetoric (Blair's full edition). Much of Blair's Rhetoric I studied carefully and with great benefit. Some of my papers of those days were written and re- written four times. On the law side I read a few text-books: Blackstone, Story on the Const.i.tution, The Federalist, De Lohme on the British Const.i.tution, and some other works, probably, which I do not at once recall. If I gained some knowledge of the law as practised in the country, that knowledge was gained from an acquaintance with the lawyers and from my opportunities as Clerk of the Insolvency Court.

In the year 1836, July 4, an Act was pa.s.sed by Congress, granting to a cla.s.s of widows of soldiers of the War of the Revolution, a pension for a term of five years. The towns of Groton, Pepperell and Shirley had supplied a large number of soldiers, and there were many widows who were ent.i.tled to the benefits of the Act. My acquaintance as clerk was already large, and my studies with Russell had given me the faculty of preparing ordinary papers, and I at once commenced canva.s.sing for the business. I obtained in all about fifty cases under the Act of 1836.

Subsequently I obtained other cases under the Act of 1838. I sent the applications forward to Washington, and in a few cases certificates were received in return. In a majority of cases there was a delay.

The women became anxious and their visits and importunities were annoying. In the month of January, 1839, I joined Gen. Staples and made a visit to Washington. Staples' object was to make mail contracts, or to arrange existing difficulties. My purpose was to obtain action on pension applications. Our journey was a slow one, if not tedious. From Groton to Boston by stage, and from Boston to Stonington, Conn., by rail; from Stonington to New York by steamboat; from New York to Perth Amboy by steamboat; from Perth Amboy by rail, I think, but possibly by stage to a town on the Delaware River, Franklin perhaps. From that point to Philadelphia, by steamboat. Our journey from Philadelphia to Washington was by rail in part and in part by stage. We pa.s.sed the creeks between the Susquehanna and Baltimore upon a railroad.

We stopped overnight in New York, and went to the Park Theater.

Another night we spent in Philadelphia, and went to the Chestnut Street Theater. Staples had a fondness for theaters, and on these occasions I followed his example. I had been in a theater but one, when I saw Forrest in Boston, in King Lear. At Philadelphia I bought a copy of Byron for three dollars. That volume I have yet.

The Hon. William Parmenter, a Democrat, then represented the district in Congress, and I carried one or more letters to him--one from my employer Mr. Henry Woods, who was an active Democrat. Mr. Parmenter was then about fifty years of age, of heavy frame, swarthy in complexion, and a man of good natural abilities. He took me to Mr.

Van Buren. We found him alone, well dressed, polite and rather gracious than otherwise. Quite early in my visit, Mr. Parmenter took me to the Pension Office, then presided over by Mr. Edwards. Mr.

Parmenter stated his business, and immediately attention was given to my applications. In the course of a few days some of the cases were disposed of, and in a few weeks my docket was clear.

Caleb Butler was then postmaster at Groton. He had had the place, probably from the days of John Quincy Adams, for as he was a violent Whig, he could not have received his appointment from General Jackson.

My employer, Mr. Woods, was an applicant for the post-office, he being the only Democrat in the street who had accommodations for the office.

I carried papers in support of the application. Those I gave probably to Mr. Parmenter, as I have no recollection of any interview with any post-office official. Amos Kendall was then Postmaster-General. He was a native of Dunstable, and he had been a student at the Groton Academy when Mr. Butler was the preceptor. Naturally and properly he sustained his old teacher. The change however was made, and upon the express instructions of Mr. Van Buren it was said. Mr. Woods retained the office until his death in January, 1841, when I was appointed without any agency of my own, but by the agency as I supposed of Gen.

Staples. Upon the election of General Harrison I was removed in the month of April, and Mr. Butler was reappointed, an act of which I never complained, nor had I any reason to complain.

At Washington we stopped at Gadsby's Hotel, now the National. There I met and had some acquaintance with Matthew L. Davis, "the Spy in Washington" as he called himself. He was a newspaper correspondent and the biographer of Aaron Burr. He was a great admirer of Burr. Davis wore very thin clothing, scouted overcoats, and boasted that he slept always in a room with open windows, and under very light bed clothing.

He was old and conceited, and as a permanent companion, he could not have been otherwise than disagreeable.