James I. Robertson, "Hill, A. P.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00497.html.
American Council of Learned Societies. "American National Biography Online." http://www.anb.org/articles/home.html.
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2000
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Body Summary:
Strongly attached to his native state and convinced that civil war was inevitable, Hill resigned from the army on 1 March 1861 to await Virginia's call. It soon came with the colonelcy of the Thirteenth Virginia Infantry Regiment. From the moment he entered Confederate service, "Little Powell" was a familiar figure. He stood five feet, nine inches tall but weighed only 145 pounds. His chestnut hair was wavy and worn long. Catching immediate attention were his hazel eyes, which stared intently and assumed a steely glint in anger or in battle. Hill disdained uniforms and ornaments. He customarily wore calico shirts made by his wife; one, bright red in color, was his favorite battle attire. Trousers stuffed into boots, a shapeless, black hat, sword, revolver, and field glasses completed his dress. Hill regularly smoked a pipe.
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Brooks D. Simpson and Matthew E. Van Atta, "Doubleday, Abner," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00198.html.
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Although during his lifetime Doubleday was noted for his military accomplishments, the historical significance attributed to him has been based primarily on his supposed invention of the game of baseball. In 1905 a commission was established to determine whether baseball had uniquely American origins or was descended from rounders, a game of English origin….The de facto leader of the commission was Abraham G. Mills, a former president of the National League, who in this capacity spent two years collecting written anecdotal recollections from interested persons nationwide on the matter, but he acquired little substantive evidence to support either claim. One such anecdote that piqued Mills's interest was provided by Cooperstown resident Abner Graves, who testified that he and Doubleday were schoolmates and that in 1839 Doubleday redesigned a game played by local residents known as "town ball." Doubleday, he said, instituted a smaller number of participants and a new set of rules and renamed the game "base ball." Doubleday may have played a game similar to that of baseball as a child or teenager in Cooperstown, but his status in 1839 as a second-year cadet at West Point makes a prolonged appearance in Cooperstown at that time unlikely. Moreover, no record has been found, even in Doubleday's many writings, that he ever played baseball.
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James M. McPherson, "Lincoln, Abraham," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00631.html.
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After retiring from the legislature in 1841, Lincoln devoted most of his time to his law practice. In 1841 he formed a partnership with Stephen T. Logan, who helped him become more thorough and meticulous in preparing his cases. The Springfield courts sat only a few weeks a year, requiring Lincoln to ride the circuit of county courts throughout central Illinois for several months each spring and fall. Most of his cases involved damage to crops by foraging livestock, property disputes, debts, and assault and battery, with an occasional murder trial to liven interest. By the time of his marriage Lincoln was earning $1,200 a year, income equal to the governor's salary. In 1844 he bought a house in Springfield--the only home he ever owned. In 1844 he also dissolved his partnership with Logan and formed a new one with 26-year-old William H. Herndon, to whom Lincoln became a mentor.
During the 1850s he became one of the leading lawyers in the state. His annual income reached $5,000. The burst of railroad construction during the decade generated a large caseload. Lincoln at various times represented railroads…. Yet it would be misleading to describe Lincoln as a "corporation lawyer" in the modern sense of that term, since he opposed corporations with equal frequency…. Lincoln continued to ride the circuit each spring and fall; the great majority of cases handled by Lincoln and Herndon (some 200 each year) concerned local matters of debt, ejectment, slander and libel, trespass, foreclosure, divorce….
During the 1850s he became one of the leading lawyers in the state. His annual income reached $5,000. The burst of railroad construction during the decade generated a large caseload. Lincoln at various times represented railroads…. Yet it would be misleading to describe Lincoln as a "corporation lawyer" in the modern sense of that term, since he opposed corporations with equal frequency…. Lincoln continued to ride the circuit each spring and fall; the great majority of cases handled by Lincoln and Herndon (some 200 each year) concerned local matters of debt, ejectment, slander and libel, trespass, foreclosure, divorce….
Type: Description
Citation:
James M. McPherson, "Lincoln, Abraham," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00631.html.
Body Summary:
Scorned and ridiculed by many critics during his presidency, Lincoln became a martyr and almost a saint after his death. His words and deeds lived after him and will be revered as long as there is a United States. Indeed, it seems quite likely that without his determined leadership the United States would have ceased to exist. Union victory in the Civil War resolved two fundamental, festering problems that had been left unresolved by the Revolution of 1776 and the Constitution of 1789: whether this republic, "conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal," would "long endure" or "perish from the earth"; and whether the "monstrous injustice" of slavery would continue to mock those ideals of liberty. The republic endured, and slavery perished. That is Lincoln's legacy.
Type: Description
Citation:
James M. McPherson, "Lincoln, Abraham," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00631.html.
Body Summary:
Lincoln challenged Douglas to a series of debates. Douglas accepted, and the two met in seven three-hour debates in every part of the state. Why could the country not continue to exist half slave and half free as it had for seventy years? asked Douglas. Lincoln's talk about the "ultimate extinction" of slavery would drive the South into secession. Douglas also upbraided Lincoln for his alleged belief in "negro equality." Sensing a winning issue in Illinois, Douglas shouted questions to the crowd: "Are you in favor of conferring upon the negro the rights and privileges of citizenship?" Back would come the response, "No, No!"…The popular vote for Republican and Democratic legislators was virtually even in 1858, but because apportionment favored the Democrats, they won a majority of seats and reelected Douglas….
In retrospect, Lincoln was the real winner of the Lincoln-Douglas debates. His famous question at Freeport forced Douglas to enunciate the "Freeport Doctrine" that settlers could keep slavery out of a territory despite the Dred Scott decision by refusing to enact and enforce a local slave code. The Freeport Doctrine further alienated Douglas from southern Democrats and kindled their demand for a federal slave code in the territories. This issue split the Democratic party in 1860, virtually assuring the election of a Republican president. The national visibility achieved by Lincoln in the debates caused his name to be increasingly mentioned as the possible Republican nominee.
In retrospect, Lincoln was the real winner of the Lincoln-Douglas debates. His famous question at Freeport forced Douglas to enunciate the "Freeport Doctrine" that settlers could keep slavery out of a territory despite the Dred Scott decision by refusing to enact and enforce a local slave code. The Freeport Doctrine further alienated Douglas from southern Democrats and kindled their demand for a federal slave code in the territories. This issue split the Democratic party in 1860, virtually assuring the election of a Republican president. The national visibility achieved by Lincoln in the debates caused his name to be increasingly mentioned as the possible Republican nominee.
Type: Description
Citation:
James M. McPherson, "Lincoln, Abraham," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00631.html.
Body Summary:
In 1854 a seismic political upheaval occurred that propelled Lincoln back into politics. The Kansas-Nebraska Act, rammed through Congress under the leadership of Illinois senator Stephen A. Douglas… revoked the ban on slavery in the Louisiana Purchase territory north of 36° 30'. This repeal of a crucial part of the Missouri Compromise of 1820 opened Kansas Territory to slavery. It polarized the free and slave states more sharply than anything else had done.
Before 1854 Lincoln had said little in public about slavery, but during the next six years he delivered an estimated 175 speeches whose "central message" was the necessity to exclude slavery from the territories as a step toward its ultimate extinction everywhere (Waldo W. Braden, Abraham Lincoln: Public Speaker [1988], pp. 35-36). That had been the purpose of the Founding Fathers, Lincoln believed, when they adopted the Declaration of Independence and enacted the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, barring slavery from most of the existing territories; that was why they did not mention the words "slave" or "slavery" in the Constitution. "Thus, the thing is hid away, in the constitution," said Lincoln in 1854, "just as an afflicted man hides away a wen or cancer" (Basler, vol. 2, p. 274). By opening all of the Louisiana Purchase territory to slavery, the Kansas-Nebraska Act had reversed the course of the Founding Fathers. That was why Lincoln was "aroused," he later recalled, "as he had never been before" (Basler, vol. 4, p. 67).
Before 1854 Lincoln had said little in public about slavery, but during the next six years he delivered an estimated 175 speeches whose "central message" was the necessity to exclude slavery from the territories as a step toward its ultimate extinction everywhere (Waldo W. Braden, Abraham Lincoln: Public Speaker [1988], pp. 35-36). That had been the purpose of the Founding Fathers, Lincoln believed, when they adopted the Declaration of Independence and enacted the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, barring slavery from most of the existing territories; that was why they did not mention the words "slave" or "slavery" in the Constitution. "Thus, the thing is hid away, in the constitution," said Lincoln in 1854, "just as an afflicted man hides away a wen or cancer" (Basler, vol. 2, p. 274). By opening all of the Louisiana Purchase territory to slavery, the Kansas-Nebraska Act had reversed the course of the Founding Fathers. That was why Lincoln was "aroused," he later recalled, "as he had never been before" (Basler, vol. 4, p. 67).
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Citation:
L. Moody Simms , "Ryan, Abram Joseph," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01429.html.
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In September 1862 Father Ryan joined the Confederate army as a chaplain. A fellow priest later described him during this period as "a person of commanding presence, dark, with the Eagle look of the Indian, his black hair thrown back from a noble brow." While tending the wounded on the battlefield and hearing the confessions of the dying, Father Ryan revealed uncommon physical courage and is even said to have seized a musket on occasion and fought alongside his companions. Throughout the war years Father Ryan showed by his actions that he rarely thought of himself and that he had no fear of death. For example, he gave comfort to the victims of a smallpox epidemic at Gratiot Prison in New Orleans after the chaplain had abandoned his post. While in that city, Father Ryan also demonstrated that his convictions about the justness of the Confederate cause could sometimes override his general humanitarian feelings. When summoned before the notorious Union general Benjamin Butler (1818-1893) to answer a charge that he had refused to bury a dead soldier because he was a Yankee, Father Ryan defended himself by saying: "Why, I was never asked to bury him and never refused. The fact is, General, it would give me great pleasure to bury the whole lot of you."
Type: Description
Citation:
Robert W. Johannsen, "Douglas, Adèle Cutts," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01275.html.
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In November 1856, following Buchanan's election as president, Adèle and Douglas's marriage was solemnized by a Roman Catholic priest in what was widely reported as the social event of the season in the national capital. Their wedding trip to New York (to visit Douglas's mother) and Chicago was marked by public suppers and receptions, at which every detail of Adèle's dress and appearance was recorded in the press. "It is difficult to say," wrote one observer, "whether the genius of the husband or the beauty of the wife attracts the most homage" (Harper's Weekly, 26 Dec. 1857).
To many the couple appeared an unlikely match. A widower with two small sons, Douglas was twenty-two years older than Adèle and lacked the refinement for which she was known. Since his first wife's death in 1853, Douglas had shunned society, allowed his whiskers to grow, and assumed a decidedly shabby appearance. Marriage to Adèle worked a remarkable change. He shaved his whiskers and trimmed his hair, cut down on his drinking, and appeared in a new, neat-fitting suit. From a frequenter of "crossroads taverns and city oyster saloons" Douglas had been transformed "into quite a genial and courtly aristocrat" (New York Herald, 20 Dec. 1856).
To many the couple appeared an unlikely match. A widower with two small sons, Douglas was twenty-two years older than Adèle and lacked the refinement for which she was known. Since his first wife's death in 1853, Douglas had shunned society, allowed his whiskers to grow, and assumed a decidedly shabby appearance. Marriage to Adèle worked a remarkable change. He shaved his whiskers and trimmed his hair, cut down on his drinking, and appeared in a new, neat-fitting suit. From a frequenter of "crossroads taverns and city oyster saloons" Douglas had been transformed "into quite a genial and courtly aristocrat" (New York Herald, 20 Dec. 1856).
Type: Description
Citation:
Mark C. Carnes, "Pike, Albert," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00614.html.
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Pike's ties to the Indians led to the events that transformed his life. At the outbreak of the Civil War he was named commissioner of Indian affairs for the Confederacy. He succeeded in winning most of the Arkansas tribes over to the Confederacy, and, after being commissioned brigadier general, he organized and armed several Indian regiments. In early March 1862, over his objection that the Indians had agreed to fight only in defense of their territory, Pike's regiments were ordered to take part in a Confederate offensive. On 7 March, during the battle of Pea Ridge, in northwestern Arkansas, the Indians mutilated some Union dead, an infamy that haunted Pike for the rest of his life. On 15 March 1862, the Boston Evening Transcript doubted that "a more venomous reptile than Albert Pike ever crawled the face of the earth."
Pike, meanwhile, became embroiled in controversy closer to home. On 31 July 1862, confronted with an order to release his units to another command, he published an open letter to the Indians in which he announced his resignation and indicted the Confederacy for neglecting its treaty obligations. Jefferson Davis accused Pike of treason. In November Pike's commanding officer, Major General Thomas C. Hindman, sent 200 soldiers to arrest him, but as the Confederate position in the West collapsed, Pike was released.
Pike, meanwhile, became embroiled in controversy closer to home. On 31 July 1862, confronted with an order to release his units to another command, he published an open letter to the Indians in which he announced his resignation and indicted the Confederacy for neglecting its treaty obligations. Jefferson Davis accused Pike of treason. In November Pike's commanding officer, Major General Thomas C. Hindman, sent 200 soldiers to arrest him, but as the Confederate position in the West collapsed, Pike was released.
Type: Description
Citation:
Wiley Sword, "Johnston, Albert Sidney," American National Biography Online, February 2000,http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00574.html.
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In mid-1857 Johnston commanded an expedition against insurgent Mormons in Utah. His campaign began that fall but was delayed until the following spring by severe weather. Following a series of negotiations, Johnston's army marched unopposed into Salt Lake City in June 1858. Promoted to brevet brigadier general that year, he remained in Utah until February 1860. Following his reassignment as commander of the department of California, Johnston reluctantly decided to resign from the U.S. Army in April 1861 when he learned that Texas had seceded. After a difficult three-month overland journey from Los Angeles to Richmond, Virginia, Johnston was appointed a full Confederate general, with rank second only to Adjutant General Samuel Cooper, and placed in command of the vast territory stretching from the Appalachian Mountains to Indian territory.
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Michael Perman, "Stephens, Alexander Hamilton," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00948.html.
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In the 1860 election extremists, like [Alexander Stephens'] friend Robert Toombs, worked hard to break up the Democratic party, but Stephens only entered the campaign after he had been selected, without his approval, as a Douglas elector. In the wake of Lincoln's election, he did hasten to reassure Georgians that the new president was no threat. Along with several other leading politicians, he addressed the legislature on the situation. In his 14 November 1860 speech, he said that the Union protected slavery, that no unconstitutional or hostile act had been taken to justify secession, and that a state convention should be called, along with a regional conference of all the southern states. This brilliant speech, temporarily slowing the movement to secession, provoked a famous exchange with President-elect Lincoln, in one letter of which Lincoln made the often-quoted comment: "You think slavery is right, and ought to be extended; while we think it is wrong, and ought to be restricted."
Privately, however, Stephens seems to have been convinced that secession was unavoidable after Lincoln's election. Indeed, he and the state's antisecessionist leaders did little to influence the election of a secession convention or its members once it was called. Had they done so, the outcome might conceivably have been different, since the resolution to oppose immediate secession failed in the convention by only thirty-six votes, 166-130.
Privately, however, Stephens seems to have been convinced that secession was unavoidable after Lincoln's election. Indeed, he and the state's antisecessionist leaders did little to influence the election of a secession convention or its members once it was called. Had they done so, the outcome might conceivably have been different, since the resolution to oppose immediate secession failed in the convention by only thirty-six votes, 166-130.
Type: Description
Citation:
Lewis L. Gould, "McClure, Alexander Kelly," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00676.html.
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The Republican National Convention in 1860 brought McClure greater political recognition. Long identified as an opponent of Simon Cameron, an important figure in the Pennsylvania Republican organization, McClure could only get a place on the state's delegation to the Republican National Convention by pledging to support his old foe Cameron. Once at the party conclave, the young editor and his allies on the delegation played key roles in winning the state's vote for Illinois's Abraham Lincoln rather than New York's William Seward. As a reward for having backed the winner, McClure became chairman of the Republican state committee in the autumn of 1860, helped elect Andrew G. Curtin as governor, and was an important organizer and campaigner of the People's party, the name under which the Republicans and their anti-Democratic partners campaigned in Pennsylvania. The coalition won the state for Lincoln in November.
During the Civil War McClure took a leading role as chairman of the state senate committee on military affairs in generating statewide support for the war effort. Accepting a commission from President Lincoln as a U.S. assistant adjutant general in 1862, he placed seventeen regiments in the field. McClure endorsed Lincoln throughout the war.
McClure remained active in Republican affairs throughout the 1860s. He supported Curtin for reelection in 1863 and served as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1864. That same year he won election to the Pennsylvania house again and helped Lincoln carry the state in the presidential contest.
During the Civil War McClure took a leading role as chairman of the state senate committee on military affairs in generating statewide support for the war effort. Accepting a commission from President Lincoln as a U.S. assistant adjutant general in 1862, he placed seventeen regiments in the field. McClure endorsed Lincoln throughout the war.
McClure remained active in Republican affairs throughout the 1860s. He supported Curtin for reelection in 1863 and served as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1864. That same year he won election to the Pennsylvania house again and helped Lincoln carry the state in the presidential contest.
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E. C. Bearss, "Stewart, Alexander Peter," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00746.html.
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Stewart, Alexander Peter (2 Oct. 1821-30 Aug. 1908), soldier, educator, and park commissioner, was born at Rogersville, Tennessee, the son of William Stewart and Elizabeth Decherd. He entered the U.S. Military Academy on 1 July 1838 and in 1842 graduated twelfth in a class of fifty-six. While at West Point, he roomed for two years with future Union general John Pope and for a time with future Confederate general James Longstreet. He was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Third Artillery and ordered to Fort Macon, North Carolina. After one year's service at the coastal fort, he returned to West Point to become an assistant professor of mathematics. On 31 May 1845 he resigned his commission and in August married Hattie Bryon Chase; they had three children. From 1845 until 1861 he was an academic, holding professorships of mathematics and mental and moral philosophy first at Cumberland University, Lebanon, Tennessee, and then at Nashville University.
A Whig in politics, he supported John Bell for the presidency in 1860, and although opposed to secession, on 17 May 1861 he was commissioned a major in the Artillery Corps of the Provisional Army of Tennessee.
A Whig in politics, he supported John Bell for the presidency in 1860, and although opposed to secession, on 17 May 1861 he was commissioned a major in the Artillery Corps of the Provisional Army of Tennessee.
Type: Description
Citation:
Robert W. Burg, "Randall, Alexander Williams," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00819.html.
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Secession and civil war confronted Randall during his second term. After unceremoniously dumping a high-ranking militia officer from the state's only organized regiment for being unenthusiastic about the prospect of confronting Federal authorities in 1860--Wisconsin was challenging the Supreme Court's decision on the state's personal liberty law at the time--Randall became a bulwark of Unionism. In a remarkable reversal, the governor--an ardent supporter of the state's efforts to nullify the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850--declared in his annual legislative message in 1861 that "secession is revolution; revolution is war; [and] war against the Government of the United States is treason" (quoted in Thwaites, p. 44). Randall organized an infantry regiment and made plans for three others immediately after Fort Sumter; he raised fourteen additional regiments, ten artillery batteries, and three cavalry units before leaving office, exceeding Wisconsin's quota by 3,232 men. Randall even sent representatives with his regiments to ensure that Wisconsin's wounded received proper medical attention and free railroad passes home.
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Citation:
Thaddeus Russell, "Colquitt, Alfred Holt," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00148.html.
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Colquitt reentered politics in 1859, when he was elected to the Georgia legislature. A strong secessionist, he served as a presidential elector for the ticket of John C. Breckinridge and Joseph Lane in the 1860 election, representing the southern wing of the Democratic party that demanded an unequivocal endorsement of slavery. The following year Colquitt was elected as a delegate to the Georgia secession convention, which voted to break from the Union in January 1861. When war was declared in April, he enlisted in the Confederate army as a captain of infantry and rose quickly in the ranks to major general. His greatest military success came in 1864 when he commanded infantry at the battle of Olustee, Florida, a humiliating though strategically insignificant defeat for the larger and better-equipped Union army.
After the Civil War Colquitt returned to his Baker County plantation, one of the largest in postbellum Georgia, and resumed his law practice. He was also an industrial promoter of railroads and other industries and invested in the Georgia Pacific Syndicate. Again active in the Georgia Democratic party, he stridently opposed congressional Reconstruction policies. In 1870 he served as president of the Democratic State Convention and later that year was elected president of the state agricultural society.
After the Civil War Colquitt returned to his Baker County plantation, one of the largest in postbellum Georgia, and resumed his law practice. He was also an industrial promoter of railroads and other industries and invested in the Georgia Pacific Syndicate. Again active in the Georgia Democratic party, he stridently opposed congressional Reconstruction policies. In 1870 he served as president of the Democratic State Convention and later that year was elected president of the state agricultural society.
Type: Description
Citation:
John W. Bailey, "Terry, Alfred Howe," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00773.html.
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With the Civil War over, [Alfred] Terry received high praise from his superior officers and was rewarded with a position in the regular army. The brigadier general gained the highest postwar rank of any non-West Point graduate. A tall, imposing figure, he conducted himself as a gentleman at all times. During 1865-1866 he commanded the Department of Virginia, doing reconstruction work as the military took over many former civilian duties in law enforcement and governmental matters. He returned to the South in 1869 and served for three more years as commander of the Department of the South, carrying out similar duties.
Terry's main work was in the northern Plains as commanding general of the Department of Dakota, which included Minnesota, Dakota Territory, and Montana Territory. During the late 1860s and for the next two decades, his presence was a major force in the region. In his first years there he developed the frontier fort system at strategic locations in his department and tried to ensure the safety of the transportation routes into Montana, where gold had been discovered in 1863. Also during this time he negotiated with the Sioux Indians. He dealt with the American Indians in a just, humanitarian manner and always fought to uphold the law. ….These efforts combined into the Treaty of 1868-1869, when the Plains Indians agreed to further restrict their living areas to western Dakota in the North and Indian Territory in the South.
Terry's main work was in the northern Plains as commanding general of the Department of Dakota, which included Minnesota, Dakota Territory, and Montana Territory. During the late 1860s and for the next two decades, his presence was a major force in the region. In his first years there he developed the frontier fort system at strategic locations in his department and tried to ensure the safety of the transportation routes into Montana, where gold had been discovered in 1863. Also during this time he negotiated with the Sioux Indians. He dealt with the American Indians in a just, humanitarian manner and always fought to uphold the law. ….These efforts combined into the Treaty of 1868-1869, when the Plains Indians agreed to further restrict their living areas to western Dakota in the North and Indian Territory in the South.
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David Meschutt, "Waud, Alfred R.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/17/17-01670.html.
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At the end of 1861 Waud joined Harper's Weekly, the leading illustrated weekly periodical in the United States, as a special artist and continued to cover the war in Virginia. He made quick rough but accurate drawings in the field, which were then rushed by courier or by mail to the Harper's Weekly home office in New York. A staff of engravers transcribed the rough drawings into finished engravings that were then printed in each edition. This was the only way Waud's drawings and those of the other special artists could be published; photoreproduction was not invented for another generation.
Waud covered every battle fought by the Army of the Potomac from First Manassas in 1861 to Petersburg, Virginia, in 1865. Unlike the war photographers, whose cumbersome equipment prevented them from getting too close to any military engagement, Waud and his fellow special artists got into the thick of combat. Waud also depicted aspects of life in camp, such as the sutler's store and, on one occasion, the wedding of a Union officer.
Waud covered every battle fought by the Army of the Potomac from First Manassas in 1861 to Petersburg, Virginia, in 1865. Unlike the war photographers, whose cumbersome equipment prevented them from getting too close to any military engagement, Waud and his fellow special artists got into the thick of combat. Waud also depicted aspects of life in camp, such as the sutler's store and, on one occasion, the wedding of a Union officer.
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Citation:
Albert Castel, "Williams, Alpheus Starkey," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00839.html.
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Williams's greatest and most crucial performance as a combat leader took place on 2-3 July 1863 at Gettysburg, where he again was acting commander of the XII Corps. On the afternoon of 2 July, having been ordered to bolster the Union left against a threatened Confederate breakthrough, he pulled his troops from their works on the Union right and successfully accomplished his mission. Then, on returning that night to his former sector, he discovered that a strong enemy force had occupied his empty trenches, putting itself in position to seize Culp's Hill, the loss of which would have led to Union retreat and probable defeat. Wisely refraining from a night attack, Williams waited until daylight, then mounted an assault that Edwin B. Coddington described as "well-conceived" and "efficiently executed," with the result that the Confederates were driven back and the danger to Culp's Hill eliminated. Few northern generals contributed more to the Union victory at Gettysburg than Williams.
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Citation:
Kathleen Feeney, "Bloomer, Amelia Jenks," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00071.html.
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Bloomer's early reform interest was confined primarily to the temperance movement, but she had long believed in the equality of women and men, striking the promise to obey from her marriage vows and attending the 1848 women's rights convention in Seneca Falls. Like many women involved in the temperance movement, Bloomer was inspired by new opportunities to express her opinions and to advocate change but was frustrated by the limitations placed on these opportunities by male-dominated temperance groups. Desiring to provide a greater voice for the women's temperance movement, in 1849 she founded the Lily, a monthly journal. In the Lily's first issue, she wrote: "It is woman that speaks through the Lily. It is upon an important subject, too, that she comes before the public to be heard. Intemperance is the great foe to her peace and happiness. . . . Surely she has a right to wield the pen for its suppression. . . . It is this which she proposes to do in the columns of the Lily" (1 Jan. 1849). Bloomer coupled her work on the Lily with her duties as deputy to her husband, who was postmaster of Seneca Falls.
The Lily soon began to include articles on woman suffrage, property rights, education, employment, and dress reform. Bloomer wrote many of the journal's articles, but she also received contributions from other women, including Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
The Lily soon began to include articles on woman suffrage, property rights, education, employment, and dress reform. Bloomer wrote many of the journal's articles, but she also received contributions from other women, including Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
Type: Description
Citation:
Joseph Frazier Wall, "Carnegie, Andrew," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/10/10-00264.html.
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Carnegie made significant contributions in his three major areas of interest. As an industrialist, he emphasized the importance of cost of production over the value of profits, he pushed for verticality within his company structure, and he welcomed technological innovation. As a philanthropist, he attempted a scientific analysis of the art of giving, pioneered in the development of the modern philanthropic foundation, and placed education and free inquiry as primary fields of importance in creating a better society. Finally, as a pacifist, Andrew Carnegie pushed for a summit meeting of the great powers, Great Britain, the United States, and Germany, long before such meetings would become a common occurrence in the late twentieth century, and he correctly saw the arbitration of international disputes as the only rational option to the irrational recourse to war.
Type: Description
Citation:
Joseph Frazier Wall, "Carnegie, Andrew," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/10/10-00264.html.
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On 17 May 1848 the Carnegies departed from Glasgow on the small sailing vessel Wiscasset. After an arduous ten-week journey, they reached Pittsburgh. They were provided with two rooms rent-free in a house that sister Annie owned on a back alley in Allegheny, across the river from Pittsburgh. One glance at their new home must have convinced even the determined Margaret that she had indeed "spoiled the horn," for here was slum poverty that exceeded anything she had ever seen in Scotland. But there could be no retreat. Her husband must swallow his pride and take a job in a cotton textile factory, and twelve-year-old Andrew must join him as a bobbin-boy in the same factory, earning $1.20 a week.
Type: Description
Citation:
Norman B. Ferris, "Curtin, Andrew Gregg," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00286.html.
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Although not an elected delegate, Curtin attended the Republican convention at Chicago in May 1860, and there he influenced most members of the Pennsylvania delegation to abandon Cameron and join with politicians from several other states in a movement to derail the candidacy of New York Senator William H. Seward, the clear favorite for the presidential nomination at the outset of the convention. Seward's detractors believed that his well-publicized reference to a "higher law" than those protecting slavery and to the "irrepressible conflict" between slaveholding and free societies rendered his candidacy controversial enough to endanger their own prospects of election should he head the Republican ticket. Hence they sought a more "available" (less well-known) nominee. The result of these machinations was the choice of Abraham Lincoln as the Republican presidential candidate and a commitment by Lincoln's floor managers to propose Cameron for a Cabinet position, while Cameron was to assist Curtin's election in October. All went as planned: Lincoln won the presidency, Cameron became his secretary of war, and Curtin was sworn in as governor of Pennsylvania, serving in that office from 15 January 1861 until 15 January 1867.
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Hans L. Trefousse, "Johnson, Andrew," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00566.html.
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The election of Abraham Lincoln and the subsequent secession crisis confronted Johnson with a difficult choice. Should he, like other Tennessee Democrats, uphold southern pretentions, or should he declare his Unionism, a position more popular among the opposition in East Tennessee than among his own party associates? Johnson never hesitated; fully convinced that the Union must be preserved and knowing that there would be no future for him in a southern Confederacy dominated by men like Jefferson Davis, whom he had fought for years, he defied the southern mainstream. After introducing constitutional amendments calling for the direct election of presidents, limitation of the terms of Supreme Court justices, and the division of the remaining territories between free and slave states, on 18-19 December 1860, in a ringing Senate speech in support of these amendments, he called secession treason and demanded that the government enforce the Constitution and the laws. Although he never said that states could be coerced--he wanted individuals to be held to their obedience--he was denounced as a traitor throughout the South. But in the North he became a hero, and his reputation was not diminished by two more antisecession speeches on 5-6 February and 2 March 1861.
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Dennis Wepman, "Grimké, Angelina Emily," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00819.html.
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Increasingly drawn to a more vigorous form of antislavery activism, [Angelina Grimké] wrote a letter in 1835 to William Lloyd Garrison, editor of the radical abolitionist magazine The Liberator, encouraging him in his work. To her dismay, Garrison published the letter on 19 September. It caused a storm of protest, not only among the slaveholders of her own state but among the Philadelphia Friends, including her sister, who urged her to recant. But by now the demure southern belle was thoroughly committed, and instead of recanting she wrote a 36-page pamphlet, Appeal to the Christian Women of the South (1836), calling on her sex in the strongest terms to "overthrow this horrible system of oppression and cruelty, licentiousness and wrong." With this and a subsequent pamphlet, An Appeal to the Women of the Nominally Free States (1837), urging reform in the North, she became publicly linked with the abolition movement. As the first white southern woman to speak up forcefully against slavery, she was enthusiastically welcomed by Garrison and his followers. She was also bitterly reviled in South Carolina, where her pamphlets were publicly burned.
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Kathleen C. Berkeley, "Dickinson, Anna Elizabeth," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00177.html.
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Dickinson's remarkable public career began in 1856 when William Lloyd Garrison published in the Liberator a letter young Dickinson had written protesting the apparent indifference and political apathy of northerners to the tarring and feathering of a Kentucky schoolteacher who had criticized slavery. Four years later Dickinson delivered her first public address, "The Rights and Wrongs of Women," at Clarkson Hall in Philadelphia. Her extemporaneous, sarcastic response to a man's suggestion that women were suited only for the role of homemaker drew a favorable response from the crowd. That day she made the acquaintance of social reformers Ellwood Longshore and Dr. Hannah Longshore, who encouraged Dickinson to speak out on the subjects of woman's rights and antislavery before local audiences. When she spoke before the Philadelphia Anti-Slavery Society in 1860, she received favorable and widespread reviews by the press. Soon thereafter Lucretia Mott introduced her to an audience of 800 at Concert Hall in Philadelphia, where she spoke for two hours on woman's rights.
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Janet L. Coryell, "Carroll, Anna Ella," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01826.html.
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Carroll's fame stems not from her theorizing and pamphleteering but from her claim that, under her contract with the War Department, she devised a military strategy to invade Tennessee by traveling up the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers, rather than down the Mississippi… While Carroll always claimed it was her plan that had guided the Union forces in their invasion, which began the following February and did in fact follow much the same line of attack she had suggested, General Ulysses Grant, who had been in charge of the campaign, had been progressing toward the invasion during the fall, first capturing the towns at the mouths of the rivers, then waiting for shallow-draft gunboats so he could travel on the inland waters…
Carroll's true importance, however, lies in her early political writings. Not only did she articulate the positions of the Know Nothing party in the 1850s, but she also articulated to Lincoln the concerns of the border states and their fears regarding the effect of abolition. (Carroll freed her family's slaves in 1855.) Her strong personality, her gift for promoting herself as well as others, and her ability to keep herself in the public eye until her death contributed to the legend surrounding her work.
Carroll's true importance, however, lies in her early political writings. Not only did she articulate the positions of the Know Nothing party in the 1850s, but she also articulated to Lincoln the concerns of the border states and their fears regarding the effect of abolition. (Carroll freed her family's slaves in 1855.) Her strong personality, her gift for promoting herself as well as others, and her ability to keep herself in the public eye until her death contributed to the legend surrounding her work.
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David R. Maggines, "Burns, Anthony," American National Biography Online,, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00129.html.
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The Burns affair was the most important and publicized fugitive slave case in the history of American slavery because of its unique set of circumstances. It coincided with the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act and with the Sherman M. Booth fugitive slave rescue case earlier that year, all of which contributed to national political realignment over the slavery issue. In Massachusetts, antislavery parties succeeded Whiggery. Eight states now enacted new personal liberty laws to counter the 1850 Fugitive Slave Law. An 1855 Massachusetts statute protected alleged fugitives with due process of law while punishing state officials and militiamen involved in recaption. Two Know Nothing legislatures resolved to remove Loring from his state probate office under this statute, but the governor refused to comply. In 1858 a Republican governor and legislature did remove him, occasioning a dramatic debate in the house between John Andrew, defender of the courthouse rioters who argued for removal, and Caleb Cushing, the attorney general who had ensured the fugitive's return and prosecuted the rioters. After Burns's rendition, no owner chanced recovery in the city.
Throughout his ordeal Anthony Burns demonstrated his intelligence and resourcefulness, courage and humor, honesty and integrity. As the victimized protagonist of the affair, he became "the fugitive." He originally had discouraged the legal defense that Bostonians urged on his behalf, telling his lawyer that "I shall fare worse if I resist," for his master was "a malicious man if he was crossed." And so he was returned, punished, sold, and celebrated as the "Boston Lion."
Throughout his ordeal Anthony Burns demonstrated his intelligence and resourcefulness, courage and humor, honesty and integrity. As the victimized protagonist of the affair, he became "the fugitive." He originally had discouraged the legal defense that Bostonians urged on his behalf, telling his lawyer that "I shall fare worse if I resist," for his master was "a malicious man if he was crossed." And so he was returned, punished, sold, and celebrated as the "Boston Lion."
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Carol Lasser, "Blackwell, Antoinette Louisa Brown," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00064.html.
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Blackwell was in the vanguard of antebellum reform, braving opposition to her ministerial career and her antislavery principles and persisting to build on the successes of her causes in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Synthesizing the evangelical orthodoxies of her childhood, the transcendental and romantic concern for nature, and the evolutionary science popularized by Darwin and Spencer, she built philosophical foundations on which she argued for the equality of the sexes.
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Robert E. L. Krick, "Elzey, Arnold," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00347.html.
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Elzey enjoyed a long and impressive antebellum career, serving in both the Seminole War and the Mexican War. As a captain of artillery during the latter conflict, he fought in many of the major battles. His gallantry on the field at Contreras and Churubusco won him double brevets.
By the outbreak of the Civil War, Elzey had twenty-four years of experience as an officer. Despite being from a border state that had not seceded, he resigned from the Old Army on 25 April 1861 to ally himself with the new Confederacy. His initial rank was lieutenant colonel. As was the case with most officers of the regular service, Elzey’s commission was backdated to 16 March 1861. On 17 June 1861 he became colonel of the First Maryland Infantry.
Elzey’s brightest moment in the Civil War came in his first battle. At First Manassas, on 21 July 1861, Elzey assumed control of all four regiments in his brigade after General Edmund Kirby Smith fell wounded. Together they arrived at a pivotal moment on an unguarded Union flank. Seizing his opportunity, Elzey smashed the Federal right, hastening the imminent Confederate victory. His reward came on 28 August 1861, when he received promotion to brigadier general, to rank from the day of his success at First Manassas.
By the outbreak of the Civil War, Elzey had twenty-four years of experience as an officer. Despite being from a border state that had not seceded, he resigned from the Old Army on 25 April 1861 to ally himself with the new Confederacy. His initial rank was lieutenant colonel. As was the case with most officers of the regular service, Elzey’s commission was backdated to 16 March 1861. On 17 June 1861 he became colonel of the First Maryland Infantry.
Elzey’s brightest moment in the Civil War came in his first battle. At First Manassas, on 21 July 1861, Elzey assumed control of all four regiments in his brigade after General Edmund Kirby Smith fell wounded. Together they arrived at a pivotal moment on an unguarded Union flank. Seizing his opportunity, Elzey smashed the Federal right, hastening the imminent Confederate victory. His reward came on 28 August 1861, when he received promotion to brigadier general, to rank from the day of his success at First Manassas.
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Jerry Bruce Thomas, "Boreman, Arthur Ingram," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00122.html.
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From 1855 to 1861 Boreman represented Wood County in the Virginia House of Delegates as a Whig, opposing the dominant Democratic party, which he believed chiefly represented the planter and slaveowning interests of eastern Virginia. During the secession crisis, he joined the Unconditional Unionists in opposing secession, which he feared would mean the end of the best government in the world and a future of "impenetrable gloom."
Because of his outspoken Unionist stand, Boreman was chosen to preside over the Second Wheeling Convention (11-25 June and 6-21 Aug. 1861), which first organized a Restored Government of Virginia and then moved toward creation of a separate state. After the Second Wheeling Convention and while the movement for a separate state proceeded, Boreman served as a circuit judge of Reorganized Virginia, which, led by Governor Francis Pierpont, administered the Unionist counties of western Virginia from Wheeling.
Because of his outspoken Unionist stand, Boreman was chosen to preside over the Second Wheeling Convention (11-25 June and 6-21 Aug. 1861), which first organized a Restored Government of Virginia and then moved toward creation of a separate state. After the Second Wheeling Convention and while the movement for a separate state proceeded, Boreman served as a circuit judge of Reorganized Virginia, which, led by Governor Francis Pierpont, administered the Unionist counties of western Virginia from Wheeling.
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Irving Katz, "Belmont, August," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00092.html.
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With unlimited energy and ambition and a willingness to spend money, Belmont set out early on a career in politics. Influenced mainly by his wife's uncle, John Slidell, a powerful Louisiana politician of the antebellum and Civil War periods, Belmont became the New York manager of James Buchanan's unsuccessful campaign for the 1852 Democratic presidential nomination. Franklin Pierce, the eventual nominee, won the presidency and rewarded Belmont, who had contributed generously to Pierce's presidential campaign, by appointing him minister to the Netherlands. During his tenure at The Hague (1853-1857), Belmont negotiated successfully a commercial treaty, designed to open the Dutch East Indies to American trade, and a criminal extradition treaty between the two countries. He also played a behind-the-scenes role in drafting the Ostend Manifesto (Oct. 1854), a diplomatic initiative that he hoped would lead to American acquisition of Cuba. Belmont supported Buchanan's successful bid for the 1856 presidential nomination, but when Buchanan refused Belmont's request to be named minister to Spain, the banker resigned his diplomatic post, returned to New York, and shifted his allegiance to Buchanan's major Democratic antagonist, Illinois senator Stephen A. Douglas.
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Irving Katz, "Belmont, August," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00092.html.
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Following his nomination in 1860 by the northern wing of the Democratic party, Douglas selected Belmont to run the presidential campaign as chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Following Douglas's defeat in November and his death the following June, no political heir appeared; most of the veteran Democrats in Congress were southerners who had seceded with their states. Belmont then assumed the party's national leadership in his position as chief executive officer of the existing organization and held it for twelve years. Few northern Democrats challenged him, owing to the distractions of war and the ensuing reconstruction. Belmont sided with "War" Democrats and used his influence as an international banker to discourage the Rothschilds and other prominent European financiers from investing in or underwriting Confederate bonds. In 1862 Belmont, with Samuel J. Tilden and other leading Democrats, purchased the New York World and installed as editor Manton M. Marble, one of Belmont's closest, lifelong friends. Until Marble's retirement in 1876, he and Belmont succeeded in making the World the nation's leading Democratic organ. In 1864 Belmont helped an ally, General George B. McClellan (1826-1885), obtain the party's presidential nomination, but Abraham Lincoln easily won reelection. Belmont fought against any Democratic merger with President Andrew Johnson's National Union party in 1866. When his first choice for the 1868 nomination, Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase, refused to desert the cause of African-American suffrage, Belmont saw the prize go to former New York governor Horatio Seymour (1810-1886), who, as Belmont predicted, campaigned weakly and lost to General Ulysses S. Grant. Belmont resigned as Democratic national chairman after the 1872 national convention and gradually reduced his political activities, though he championed Delaware senator Thomas F. Bayard's presidential ambitions in the next three campaigns.
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Robert W. Burg, "Blair, Austin," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00109.html.
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In 1854, at the close of his first two-year term as prosecuting attorney of Jackson County, Blair rejoined the vanguard of third-party politics when he helped form the Republican party. He was a key participant in the party's organizational meetings in Jackson, Kalamazoo, and Detroit, and he helped draft the party's first platform. Fittingly, he was elected to the state senate later that year. As a member of the legislature's newly elected Republican majority, he worked on a litany of reform issues, including a temperance measure, a bill to establish an endowment for a women's college, and an act to establish property rights for married women. He also cowrote Michigan's personal liberty law, which obstructed federal enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.
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Cary Wolfe, "Taylor, Bayard," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01608.html.
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During the Civil War Taylor served as Washington correspondent for the Tribune until, in May 1862, he was appointed secretary of legation under the U.S. minister to Russia at St. Petersburg--a post he resigned in 1863, after serving with some distinction. He was influential in persuading Russia to extend support and friendship to the Union but not specific aid. He returned home to publish Hannah Thurston (1863), the first of four competent but unremarkable novels. In 1867 the Taylors were off for Europe once again, and Bayard nearly died there from a bout of Roman fever. From 1868 to 1870 he dedicated himself to finishing the task for which he is now most famous: a translation in original meters of Goethe's Faust (2 vols., 1870-1871), which was for years regarded as the finest. From 1870 to 1877 Taylor was a nonresident professor of German literature at Cornell University, and as his fame in Germany grew he planned to write biographies of both Goethe and Schiller. In 1876 he delivered the prestigious Centennial Ode and published what many critics today regard as his most interesting work, the satirical volume of poems entitled The Echo Club and Other Literary Diversions.
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Jill Norgren, "Lockwood, Belva Ann Bennett McNall," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00416.html.
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In 1884, Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton decided to continue to work for women's rights through an established national political party (Republican). [Belva] Lockwood, then fifty-four, broke with them and accepted the nomination of the Equal Rights party as its presidential candidate. Her running mate was Marietta L. B. Stow. Their platform supported women's rights, including suffrage and reform of marriage and divorce laws; assimilation of Native Americans; veterans' benefits; civil service reform; prohibition of alcohol; greater action on behalf of universal peace; and a variety of economic measures to reduce public debt, improve trade, revive the expansion of industry in the East and the South, and limit monopolies. Victoria Woodhull had run for president in 1872 but had not reached the constitutionally mandated age of thirty-five, and she did not campaign formally because she was in jail. Lockwood thus was the first viable woman candidate for the U.S. presidency. Her ticket received 4,149 votes and the entire electoral vote of Indiana. She was renominated for president by the Equal Rights party in 1888.
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Arthur W. Bergeron, "Cheatham, Benjamin Franklin," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00223.html.
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Cheatham's division fought next in the battle of Stones River, Tennessee. Their attack against the Union right on 31 December 1862 was uncoordinated, most accounts stating that Cheatham was drunk and incapable of directing his division. His biographer cites conflicting reports on the degree of Cheatham's intoxication and concludes, "His troops were poorly served by their divisional commander for the early part of the battle and suffered needless casualties until Cheatham managed to rally them for a concerted movement" (Losson, p. 91). His relations with Bragg became strained after the battle, especially when the latter's official report criticized Cheatham for not attacking promptly.
At the battle of Chickamauga, Georgia, 19-20 September 1863, Cheatham performed well. His men repulsed enemy attacks on the first day of fighting and helped put pressure on the Union left flank the next day. Bragg reorganized the army in November and took away from Cheatham most of his Tennessee troops. The division fought in the battle of Lookout Mountain on 24 November, but Cheatham was absent on leave. He returned in time to participate in the battle of Missionary Ridge on 25 November, where the division held its position until ordered to retreat that night...
Cheatham was very popular with his men during the war because of the concern he showed for their needs and well-being. No one ever questioned his bravery or boldness in action, but his love of alcohol sometimes impaired his performance on the battlefield. He did well leading a brigade or a division but did not have the capacity for corps command.
At the battle of Chickamauga, Georgia, 19-20 September 1863, Cheatham performed well. His men repulsed enemy attacks on the first day of fighting and helped put pressure on the Union left flank the next day. Bragg reorganized the army in November and took away from Cheatham most of his Tennessee troops. The division fought in the battle of Lookout Mountain on 24 November, but Cheatham was absent on leave. He returned in time to participate in the battle of Missionary Ridge on 25 November, where the division held its position until ordered to retreat that night...
Cheatham was very popular with his men during the war because of the concern he showed for their needs and well-being. No one ever questioned his bravery or boldness in action, but his love of alcohol sometimes impaired his performance on the battlefield. He did well leading a brigade or a division but did not have the capacity for corps command.
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Hans L. Trefousse, "Wade, Benjamin Franklin," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01022.html.
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Entering the Senate at the same time as Charles Sumner, Wade joined a small group of antislavery senators who ceaselessly attacked the "peculiar institution" in general and the Fugitive Slave Act in particular. He gradually developed a reputation as a fearless radical who was as outspoken as he was honest, and he knew how to gain the respect of southern opponents. When threatened with a challenge, he let it be known that as a senator he would refuse to fight, but as Ben Wade he would not hesitate to do so. His pithy replies to southern taunts became famous, and, in addition to his antislavery stand, he was also active on behalf of a homestead bill and protective tariffs; however, he did not support special considerations for private corporations.
Strongly opposed to the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which opened the West to slavery, Wade joined with others to found the Republican party in Ohio. He made common cause with his radical colleagues in repelling southern attacks and continued to favor protection, homestead laws, and internal improvements. His political prominence caused him to be mentioned for the presidency in 1860.
Strongly opposed to the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which opened the West to slavery, Wade joined with others to found the Republican party in Ohio. He made common cause with his radical colleagues in repelling southern attacks and continued to favor protection, homestead laws, and internal improvements. His political prominence caused him to be mentioned for the presidency in 1860.
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Michael Perman, "Hill, Benjamin Harvey," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00498.html.
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Although a Whig, he aligned with the Constitutional Union party, a coalition led by Howell Cobb, Alexander Stephens, and Robert Toombs that hoped to sustain the Compromise of 1850 as the final settlement of the major differences between the North and South. Hill served on the party's executive committee until it disbanded in 1853. The Kansas-Nebraska debate prompted him to run for Congress in 1854, losing only by twenty-four votes. With the disintegration of the Whig party, he affiliated with the American or Know Nothing party and was the leading campaigner for Millard Fillmore in Georgia during the 1856 presidential race… [Hill] soon became a leading opponent of the Georgia Democrats and of secession. In 1857 he ran for governor on the Know Nothing ticket, losing by almost 10,000 votes to Joseph E. Brown. He was elected to the state senate in 1859, and in the 1860 presidential election he campaigned for John Bell of the Constitutional Union party. A few months later, he was elected to Georgia's secession convention, where he led the fight to keep the state in the Union. When it became apparent that secession was inevitable, however, he signed the ordinance of secession, while arguing for cooperation among the southern states. Despite his opposition, he was appointed to Georgia's ten-member delegation to the Provisional Congress in Montgomery, Alabama, to form the Confederate government and then was elected to the Confederate senate. Throughout the war he was one of the most consistent and vigorous defenders of President Jefferson Davis…
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Kenneth B. Shover, "McCulloch, Ben," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00681.html.
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Following the war he joined the gold rush to California, but like so many others he failed in the quest for great wealth and returned to Texas in 1852. In 1853 President Franklin Pierce appointed him a federal marshal for Texas, a post he held until the spring of 1859. The year before, President James Buchanan had sent him to Utah to assist in settling problems related to the Mormons.
McCulloch achieved his greatest stature as soldier during the Civil War. He supported the secession movement in Texas despite his long association and friendship with Governor Sam Houston, a staunch Unionist. As ranking officer in the soon-to-be Confederate army of Texas, he accepted the surrender of Federal troops in San Antonio in February 1861. The following May, Confederate president Jefferson Davis appointed him brigadier general to command regiments recruited from Texas, Louisiana, and Arkansas. His charge was to defend his base in Arkansas and the Indian Territory to the west and to assist Confederate forces in Missouri as they fought to control that pivotal border state.
McCulloch achieved his greatest stature as soldier during the Civil War. He supported the secession movement in Texas despite his long association and friendship with Governor Sam Houston, a staunch Unionist. As ranking officer in the soon-to-be Confederate army of Texas, he accepted the surrender of Federal troops in San Antonio in February 1861. The following May, Confederate president Jefferson Davis appointed him brigadier general to command regiments recruited from Texas, Louisiana, and Arkansas. His charge was to defend his base in Arkansas and the Indian Territory to the west and to assist Confederate forces in Missouri as they fought to control that pivotal border state.
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Robert C. Morris, "Curtis, Benjamin Robbins," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00202.html.
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One of two dissents in Dred Scott, Curtis's opinion challenged Chief Justice Roger B. Taney and the Court majority by arguing that the black citizens of a state were automatically citizens of the United States and that Congress had complete constitutional authority to regulate slavery in the territories. Curtis rejected the argument that because Scott was a black he could not be a citizen. Claiming five states had recognized free blacks as citizens by 1787, he asserted that under the Articles of Confederation and then the Constitution, U.S. citizenship derived from state citizenship. Thus Scott was a citizen and entitled to sue in federal courts.
Curtis used English precedent, state law, and the Missouri Compromise to show that Scott's residence in Illinois and the Wisconsin Territory had made him a free man. In the process he defended the right of Congress to exclude slavery from the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase. As support for his argument he cited John Marshall concerning federal power over the territories and pointed out fourteen distinct instances of congressional legislation on slavery in the territories between 1789 and 1848. Contrary to Taney's majority opinion, he concluded, the Missouri Compromise line was constitutional and valid.
Curtis used English precedent, state law, and the Missouri Compromise to show that Scott's residence in Illinois and the Wisconsin Territory had made him a free man. In the process he defended the right of Congress to exclude slavery from the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase. As support for his argument he cited John Marshall concerning federal power over the territories and pointed out fourteen distinct instances of congressional legislation on slavery in the territories between 1789 and 1848. Contrary to Taney's majority opinion, he concluded, the Missouri Compromise line was constitutional and valid.
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Orville Vernon Burton, "Tillman, Benjamin Ryan," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00784.html.
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Tillman reacted strongly against the Republican Reconstruction government of the Palmetto State. In 1873 he supported two Edgefield lawyers and ex-Confederate generals, Martin W. Gary and Matthew C. Butler, in their plan to "redeem" the state from the Republican party, which was overwhelmingly supported by African Americans. Devised by Gary, the Edgefield Plan, as the policy became known, called for the organization of secret extralegal military societies that would force defeat of the majority African-American South Carolinians at the ballot box through the use of violence, intimidation, and fraud. Tillman became a devoted Gary protégé. From 1873 to 1876 Tillman, as a member of the Sweetwater Saber Club, carried on a small-scale war with the African-American militia, harassed and assaulted black voters, and executed African-American political figures. His violence on behalf of the white Democrats in the Hamburg and Ellenton riots in the summer of 1876 secured his prominence among the state's white political elite and proved to be the deathblow to South Carolina's Republican Reconstruction government.
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William W. Rogers, "Turner, Benjamin Sterling," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01001.html.
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After the Reconstruction Acts of 1867, Turner was appointed county tax collector with biracial approval. He resigned after a year and, running as an Independent, was elected city councilman. He and another former bondsman were the city's first black city councilmen. When the town began paying them, Turner resigned, because he believed that in such destitute times a city official should serve without compensation. When Conservative Democrats failed to promise voting rights for blacks, Turner helped deliver the town and county in 1868 to the victorious Ulysses S. Grant.
Turner recouped economically to the point that in 1870 he had personal property worth $10,000. He was nominated for Congress in that year with the aid of newly enfranchised blacks and native white Republicans (scalawags). His moderate political philosophy cost him the financial support of the First District's northern-born Republicans (carpetbaggers). Undeterred, the candidate sold a horse to raise campaign funds, and, running on a platform of "Universal Suffrage and Universal Amnesty," he was easily elected. The district had a majority of blacks; in Dallas County alone blacks outnumbered whites 32,152 to 8,522, and he was the first black elected from Alabama to the national House of Representatives.
Turner recouped economically to the point that in 1870 he had personal property worth $10,000. He was nominated for Congress in that year with the aid of newly enfranchised blacks and native white Republicans (scalawags). His moderate political philosophy cost him the financial support of the First District's northern-born Republicans (carpetbaggers). Undeterred, the candidate sold a horse to raise campaign funds, and, running on a platform of "Universal Suffrage and Universal Amnesty," he was easily elected. The district had a majority of blacks; in Dallas County alone blacks outnumbered whites 32,152 to 8,522, and he was the first black elected from Alabama to the national House of Representatives.
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Lowell H. Harrison, "Magoffin, Beriah," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00652.html.
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Magoffin's administration was dominated by the secession crisis and the Civil War. Prosouthern in his sentiments, he accepted slavery and the right of a state to secede, but he believed that if the slave states presented collective demands the North would have to accept them. In a circular letter of 9 December 1860 to the slave state governors, he suggested calling a conference that would insist on strict enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act, a division of the territories between slave and free at the thirty-seventh parallel, and a constitutional provision that would allow the South to protect its interests, perhaps by requiring a two-thirds Senate majority to pass legislation pertaining to slavery. If this proposal failed, Magoffin believed that Kentucky would join the other slave states in leaving the Union.
In response to a secessionist appeal from the Alabama governor, Magoffin replied on 28 December 1860 that "the mode and manner of defense and redress should be determined in a full and free conference of all the Southern States, and that their mutual safety requires full co-operation in carrying out the measures there agreed upon." This cooperative movement was to be completed before Abraham Lincoln's inauguration in March 1861.
In response to a secessionist appeal from the Alabama governor, Magoffin replied on 28 December 1860 that "the mode and manner of defense and redress should be determined in a full and free conference of all the Southern States, and that their mutual safety requires full co-operation in carrying out the measures there agreed upon." This cooperative movement was to be completed before Abraham Lincoln's inauguration in March 1861.
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William C. Harris, "Bruce, Blanche Kelso," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00166.html.
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In March 1875 Bruce took his seat in the Senate, becoming the nation's second black senator and the first black to be elected to a full term. In the Senate he served on four committees, including the important select committees on Mississippi River improvements and on the Freedmen's Bank. As chairman of the latter committee, he led the effort to reform the management of the institution and provide relief for depositors. But a Bruce-sponsored Senate bill to obtain congressional reimbursement for black victims of the bank's failure did not pass. He also spoke out against a Chinese exclusion bill and for a more humane Indian policy. Bruce took these positions, primarily because of the harsh implications that such racist, exclusionist policy had for blacks.
Bruce's main interest in the Senate was the defense of black rights in the South when state and local Republican governments were replaced by hostile conservative ones. Although he was usually unobtrusive in attempting to persuade Congress, and specifically its Republican members, to enforce the Reconstruction amendments to the Constitution, he became passionate in denouncing the violence and intimidation that characterized the Mississippi election of 1875 overthrowing Republican rule.
Bruce's main interest in the Senate was the defense of black rights in the South when state and local Republican governments were replaced by hostile conservative ones. Although he was usually unobtrusive in attempting to persuade Congress, and specifically its Republican members, to enforce the Reconstruction amendments to the Constitution, he became passionate in denouncing the violence and intimidation that characterized the Mississippi election of 1875 overthrowing Republican rule.
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Timothy P. Twohill, "Bragg, Braxton," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00135.html.
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Bragg was unfairly criticized both by his contemporaries and subsequent historians until efforts were finally made to distinguish facts from the rumors about him. He was a skillful military planner and administrator, but his inability to control his temper, particularly in matters requiring deft, political sensitivity, only amplified the anger and distrust he caused through his mistakes. In addition, while many of Bragg's decisions resulted in disaster, he often was burdened with incompetent and rebellious subordinates and almost always was faced with having to train inexperienced troops. However, the misunderstanding of Bragg's talents placed him in critical positions in the Confederate army, where, hampered by his inability to accept responsibility for his own shortcomings, he ultimately made significant contributions to the defeat of the Confederacy.
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Leonard J. Arrington, "Young, Brigham," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/08/08-01714.html.
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Young first read a copy of the Book of Mormon in 1830 when it was initially published. He thought highly of it and believed it answered many of his religious questions, but he cautiously wanted to make sure the Mormons were sincere and sensible in their faith. He listened to their traveling missionaries, visited a Mormon congregation in Pennsylvania, prayed with them, was persuaded of their biblical focus, and submitted to baptism in 1832. He and a friend immediately traveled to Kirtland, Ohio, to meet the Mormon leader, Joseph Smith, Jr. Young found the 26-year-old prophet to be intelligent, straightforward, well schooled in the Bible, and a genial person. Impressed with the Mormon gospel and its leader, Young, as with many early converts, abandoned his shop and began a series of preaching missions in New York, Pennsylvania, New England, and upper Canada. He returned to the Mormon headquarters in Ohio, where he alternated between preaching in nearby areas and working on the construction of the Mormon temple in Kirtland, which was dedicated in 1836.
In 1834 Young married Mary Ann Angell. That year he joined some two hundred other men in marching with Smith to Jackson County, Missouri, to wrest control of Mormon lands from the anti-Mormon mob that had driven the Mormons out. Although Zions Camp, as it was called, did not achieve its goals, Young learned valuable lessons in how to organize and manage a group of people on the march.
In 1834 Young married Mary Ann Angell. That year he joined some two hundred other men in marching with Smith to Jackson County, Missouri, to wrest control of Mormon lands from the anti-Mormon mob that had driven the Mormons out. Although Zions Camp, as it was called, did not achieve its goals, Young learned valuable lessons in how to organize and manage a group of people on the march.
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Leonard J. Arrington, "Young, Brigham," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/08/08-01714.html.
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The Utah War ended in 1858 without the loss of life, but friction continued between Colonel Johnston, who distrusted Young and his associates, and the settlers, virtually all of whom were loyal to Young. With the outbreak of the Civil War, the army abandoned the territory, some to fight for the North and some for the South. Young contracted on behalf of the church to erect the hurriedly built transcontinental telegraph within Utah borders and then constructed a church-owned telegraph system to connect each settlement with Salt Lake City and the nation. Not entirely certain of Mormon loyalty to the Union, [President Abraham] Lincoln sent a regiment of California volunteers to Utah. They established Camp Douglas in central Salt Lake City to prevent Indian raids and "watch over the Mormons." Their leader, Patrick Connor, was violently anti-Mormon and used his troops to prospect for minerals in Utah's mountains, hoping to induce a rush of miners to the territory to outnumber the Mormons. Minerals were found, but they could not be economically worked until the completion of the transcontinental railroad in May 1869.
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Hans L. Trefousse, "Schurz, Carl," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00886.html.
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[Carl Schurz's] principal occupation, however, was politics, and since he was an opponent of slavery, he joined the Republican party. He had become fluent in English, was an excellent speaker, and was much sought after by the party to win over other German Americans. So effectively did he campaign for the antislavery cause in two languages that in 1857, before he had even completed his naturalization, he was nominated for lieutenant governor. Because of nativist influence, he, unlike other Republicans, lost. But he remained loyal to the party, even in 1859 when he failed in his efforts to obtain the gubernatorial nomination. Lecturing throughout the North and taking up the law to recoup financial losses incurred during the panic of 1857, he made a name for himself and in 1860 became the chairman of the Wisconsin delegation to the Republican National Convention in Chicago.
In Chicago, Schurz first favored William H. Seward but then switched to Abraham Lincoln, whom he had come to appreciate in the 1858 campaign. Elected to the Republican National Committee, he organized a campaign centered on ethnic groups. He himself wooed the Germans, and Lincoln was convinced that this effort made a decisive contribution to the Republican victory. Schurz's reward was an appointment as minister to Spain.
In Chicago, Schurz first favored William H. Seward but then switched to Abraham Lincoln, whom he had come to appreciate in the 1858 campaign. Elected to the Republican National Committee, he organized a campaign centered on ethnic groups. He himself wooed the Germans, and Lincoln was convinced that this effort made a decisive contribution to the Republican victory. Schurz's reward was an appointment as minister to Spain.
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Harold D. Tallant, "Clay, Cassius Marcellus," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00131.html.
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During the depression that followed the panic of 1837, Clay's economic views prompted him to join the antislavery movement, which soon became his life's major work. Seeking to understand the ongoing depression, Clay developed an economic critique of slavery that some historians consider to be the most penetrating analysis of slavery produced by a southerner. Clay blamed slavery for the South's economic malaise, arguing that the inefficiency of slave labor prohibited the growth of industry and commerce in the South. Industrious free workers fled from the South, where manual labor was held in contempt. Artisans had difficulty selling their products to a population made up largely of penniless slaves. Clay gained national attention for his economic analysis of slavery, which he presented in a series of speeches, editorials, and pamphlets, the most famous of which was Slavery: The Evil--The Remedy (1843). Acting on these arguments, Clay led a campaign during the late 1830s and 1840s to retain a legislative ban against the importation of slaves into Kentucky…
[In the 1850’s Clay] gave financial support and armed protection to John G. Fee, who was building a network of abolitionist communities and churches in the mountains of Kentucky.
By these actions Clay restored his antislavery reputation among the conservative and moderate reformers who created the Republican party. Seeing Clay as an inspiration for building a southern branch of the party, early Republican leaders welcomed him into their highest national councils.
[In the 1850’s Clay] gave financial support and armed protection to John G. Fee, who was building a network of abolitionist communities and churches in the mountains of Kentucky.
By these actions Clay restored his antislavery reputation among the conservative and moderate reformers who created the Republican party. Seeing Clay as an inspiration for building a southern branch of the party, early Republican leaders welcomed him into their highest national councils.
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Norman C. Delaney, "Jones, Catesby ap Roger," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00576.html.
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Jones was an experienced officer and an expert on ordnance, whose resignation from the U.S. Navy in 1861 was a serious loss to the North. His work, together with that of his colleague [John M.] Brooke, made it possible for the South to manufacture its own heavy cannon even late in the war. Ironically, it was Jones's expertise in ordnance that prevented him from obtaining what he desired most--command of a warship.
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Janet E. Steele, "Dana, Charles Anderson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00412.html.
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Charles Dana was managing editor of the New York Tribune for thirteen years. While it is Greeley's name that is generally associated with the Whig Tribune of the 1850s, Dana contributed far more to that paper than has been recognized. One of Dana's more memorable accomplishments was the acquisition of Karl Marx as a regular correspondent….
Dana and Greeley came to have sharp differences in the mid-1850s, differences that were fueled by what Greeley viewed as Dana's impetuous actions during the senior editor's frequent absences from New York. The secession crisis further deepened the rift between the two men. While Greeley believed that compromise was still possible even as the slaveholding states were threatening to secede, Dana, like most Republican radicals, felt that secession was unconstitutional and would lead to war. Following the firing on Fort Sumter and the secession of the upper South, the Tribune, at Dana's urging, proclaimed: "The nation's war-cry: Forward to Richmond!" When the untrained Union troops were defeated at the disastrous battle of Bull Run, the Tribune was widely blamed--and most Tribune staffers believed that Greeley held Dana responsible.
Dana and Greeley came to have sharp differences in the mid-1850s, differences that were fueled by what Greeley viewed as Dana's impetuous actions during the senior editor's frequent absences from New York. The secession crisis further deepened the rift between the two men. While Greeley believed that compromise was still possible even as the slaveholding states were threatening to secede, Dana, like most Republican radicals, felt that secession was unconstitutional and would lead to war. Following the firing on Fort Sumter and the secession of the upper South, the Tribune, at Dana's urging, proclaimed: "The nation's war-cry: Forward to Richmond!" When the untrained Union troops were defeated at the disastrous battle of Bull Run, the Tribune was widely blamed--and most Tribune staffers believed that Greeley held Dana responsible.
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William L. Barney, "Clark, Charles," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00234.html.
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[Charles Clark] was appointed Jefferson Davis's replacement as major general of Mississippi state troops and on 22 May 1861 accepted a commission as a brigadier general in the Confederate army. He commanded a division under Albert Sidney Johnston at Shiloh, where he was wounded in the shoulder. He later took part in Breckinridge's, assault on the Union lines at Baton Rouge. Here, in August 1862, a bullet shattered his right thigh, crippling him for the rest of his life. He was taken prisoner and paroled in late 1862.
In October 1863, Clark was elected as Mississippi's second and last Confederate governor. Despite a fiery inaugural speech exhorting his fellow Mississippians never to yield, Clark lacked the financial and political resources to shore up the crumbling war effort. Vicksburg and its surrounding plantation districts and Jackson, the state capital, had already been lost to Union forces, and the state government had to relocate to Macon. Clark's efforts to reorganize state forces for defensive purposes were hamstrung by a bankrupt treasury and the breakdown of political control throughout much of the state. His relations with the Confederate government in Richmond quickly became entangled in a controversy over Confederate policies of impressing slaves and suspending the writ of habeas corpus. By late 1864 Clark was a caretaker for a state government whose authority had collapsed, and on 22 May 1865 he formally surrendered the state to Union forces.
In October 1863, Clark was elected as Mississippi's second and last Confederate governor. Despite a fiery inaugural speech exhorting his fellow Mississippians never to yield, Clark lacked the financial and political resources to shore up the crumbling war effort. Vicksburg and its surrounding plantation districts and Jackson, the state capital, had already been lost to Union forces, and the state government had to relocate to Macon. Clark's efforts to reorganize state forces for defensive purposes were hamstrung by a bankrupt treasury and the breakdown of political control throughout much of the state. His relations with the Confederate government in Richmond quickly became entangled in a controversy over Confederate policies of impressing slaves and suspending the writ of habeas corpus. By late 1864 Clark was a caretaker for a state government whose authority had collapsed, and on 22 May 1865 he formally surrendered the state to Union forces.
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L. Moody Simms, "Smith, Charles Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01523.html.
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Smith's greatest popularity among his contemporaries and his most lasting fame came from the Bill Arp letters he wrote during and at the conclusion of the Civil War. His Bill Arp, So Called: A Side Show of the Southern Side of the War, which contains the four letters to Lincoln and other wartime sketches, was published in New York in 1866 and became an immediate success. The main object of Smith's satire was the North and its conduct of the war. According to Arp, the actions of Yankee soldiers were frequently despicable, and northern versions of accomplishments by the Union army often were exaggerated. Yet Arp's letters made it clear that southerners were never unanimously behind the Confederacy. He attacked those who mismanaged or did not support the war. Shirkers and draft dodgers came in for criticism from Arp's pen, as did the fluctuations of Confederate money, the currency bill, and the suspension of habeas corpus. In speculating on a Union victory toward the war's end, he usually became defiant, thus foreshadowing southern attitudes during Reconstruction. Smith's view of the war mellowed with time, and he came to see, for example, that not all Union soldiers had been villains.
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Graham R. Hodges, "Reason, Charles Lewis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00566.html.
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[Charles] Reason was also active politically throughout his life. He was committed to the antislavery cause and worked unceasingly for improvement of black civil rights. In 1837 Reason, Henry Highland Garnet, and George Downing launched a petition drive in support of full black suffrage. He was also secretary of the 1840 New York State Convention for Negro Suffrage. Reason founded and was executive secretary of the New York Political Improvement Association, which won for fugitive slaves the right to a jury trial in the state. In 1841 he lobbied successfully for the abolition of the sojourner law, which permitted slave owners to visit the state briefly with their slaves. He also lectured on behalf of the Fugitive Aid Society. An active reporter on education to the black national convention movement of the 1850s, he was secretary of the 1853 convention in Rochester, New York. He spoke out against the American Colonization Society and Garnet's African Civilization Society. In 1849 Reason, along with J. W. C. Pennington and Frederick Douglass, sponsored a mass demonstration against colonization at Shiloh Presbyterian Church in New York City….During the Civil War, Reason served on New York City's Citizen's Civil Rights Committee, which lobbied the New York legislature for expanded black civil rights. After the conflict, he was vice president of the New York State Labor Union. At a union meeting in 1870, he delivered a paper in which he gave statistical proof that education helped New York City blacks gain prosperity.
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Edward G. Longacre, "Stone, Charles Pomeroy," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00748.html.
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Stone was the most celebrated example of a high-ranking Democrat who ran afoul of the administration that supervised the Union war effort. His relations with the White House and the Congress, initially strong, were quickly weakened by his imperious demeanor, his disdain of volunteer troops, his impolitic associations with the enemies of his government, and a rather cavalier attitude toward his civilian superiors. For all that, Stone appears to have been a conscientious soldier dedicated to preserving the Union. Certainly the government's decision to hold him for six months without charges and upon evidence too flimsy to withstand legal scrutiny was not only unconscionable but unsustainable under either the Constitution or the Articles of War.
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James A. Rawley, "Robinson, Charles," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00859.html.
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[Charles] Robinson became a key figure during the violence known as "Bleeding Kansas." Leader of a free-soil faction that considered blacks as potential equals, he opposed accepting the results of the fraudulent election of a proslavery legislature. During the statehood controversy and thereafter he faced a rival in James H. Lane (1814-1866), a political opportunist who favored excluding blacks from the territory. Concerned about the emigrant aid company's investment as well as his own land speculation and the free-state cause, Robinson in 1855 urged Thayer to send Sharps rifles to Kansas. He took part in the faction-torn conventions at Big Springs, which formed a Free State party favored by Lane, and at Topeka, which drafted a free-state constitution, favored by Robinson, that proposed a referendum on excluding blacks, favored by Lane and opposed by Robinson.
When violence flared in the so-called Wakarusa Warbetween proslavery and free-state elements, Robinson took a hand in avoiding bloodshed that enhanced his reputation among moderate free-state groups. Early in 1856, in a contest against Lane, he was elected governor under the Topeka constitution adopted by free-state voters. He now headed a rump government that became the storm center of presidential politics in 1856...
The Free State party in Kansas yielded to the Republican party and the Topeka constitution to the freshly drafted Wyandotte constitution. In 1861, with the admission of Kansas, Robinson became the state's first governor. He faced the demands not only of organizing a new state but also of meeting Washington's war needs.
When violence flared in the so-called Wakarusa Warbetween proslavery and free-state elements, Robinson took a hand in avoiding bloodshed that enhanced his reputation among moderate free-state groups. Early in 1856, in a contest against Lane, he was elected governor under the Topeka constitution adopted by free-state voters. He now headed a rump government that became the storm center of presidential politics in 1856...
The Free State party in Kansas yielded to the Republican party and the Topeka constitution to the freshly drafted Wyandotte constitution. In 1861, with the admission of Kansas, Robinson became the state's first governor. He faced the demands not only of organizing a new state but also of meeting Washington's war needs.
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Frederick J. Blue, "Sumner, Charles," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00969.html.
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For Sumner the Civil War presented the opportunity to free the slaves, and he became one of the first members of Congress to urge abolition. He worked for the next eighteen months to persuade President Abraham Lincoln. During that time he skillfully pushed legislation that weakened slavery in numerous small ways, as he successfully prepared public opinion to accept black freedom. Clearly he was among the most important of those who influenced Lincoln to issue his Emancipation Proclamation. So, too, he helped convince Lincoln of the wisdom and justice of allowing blacks to join Union armies against the Confederacy in behalf of their own freedom.
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Frederick J. Blue, "Sumner, Charles," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00969.html.
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By 1848 the United States had seized vast new western territories from Mexico, leading Sumner and his faction to join with the Liberty party and northern antislavery Democrats to create the new Free Soil party. In so doing Sumner never hesitated in attacking former friends, whom he said supported the slave power in an alliance between "the lords of the lash and the lords of the loom." Such attacks were fast becoming a Sumner trademark, as he spared no one who opposed his goals. The young reformer did not confine his concern for racial justice to territorial slavery. In 1849 he argued in court for the integration of Boston's public schools and, while losing his case, presented arguments for social change far in advance of his times.
Participation in the Free Soil movement gave Sumner his first taste of political prominence, which he quickly utilized to secure public office. In a skillful political maneuver in 1851, Massachusetts Free Soilers formed a coalition in the state legislature with Democrats and secured Sumner's election to the U.S. Senate. Thus began his long tenure as an outspoken reformer in Congress.
Participation in the Free Soil movement gave Sumner his first taste of political prominence, which he quickly utilized to secure public office. In a skillful political maneuver in 1851, Massachusetts Free Soilers formed a coalition in the state legislature with Democrats and secured Sumner's election to the U.S. Senate. Thus began his long tenure as an outspoken reformer in Congress.
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Harold D. Tallant. "Torrey, Charles Turner," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00697.html.
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Beginning with his editorship of the Massachusetts Abolitionist in 1838-1839, one of Torrey's principal interests was reform journalism. He served as editor of the Free American of Boston in 1841 and the Tocsin of Liberty of Albany, New York, in 1842-1843. He also served as a freelance reporter for several northern papers in 1841-1842. In his capacity as a reporter, in January 1842 Torrey attended the Slaveholders' Convention in Annapolis, Maryland, where he was arrested for refusing to leave a closed session of the meeting. Torrey's imprisonment lasted only six days, as prominent reformers and the Massachusetts delegation in Congress worked for his release.
Torrey's brief experience in a slaveholding state convinced him of the necessity of confronting slavery on its own ground. Leaving his family, in 1843 Torrey moved alone to Maryland in an effort to organize a formal system to help slaves escape. He claimed to have helped four hundred slaves escape, though this figure seems exaggerated. His activities were discovered in June 1844, and he was arrested. Many abolitionists hoped to turn the imprisoned Torrey into a martyr for the cause of freedom. The antislavery press carried stories of Torrey's mistreatment in prison, and abolitionists arranged the publication of his book, Home: The Pilgrim's Faith Revived (1845), written while he was in prison.
Torrey's brief experience in a slaveholding state convinced him of the necessity of confronting slavery on its own ground. Leaving his family, in 1843 Torrey moved alone to Maryland in an effort to organize a formal system to help slaves escape. He claimed to have helped four hundred slaves escape, though this figure seems exaggerated. His activities were discovered in June 1844, and he was arrested. Many abolitionists hoped to turn the imprisoned Torrey into a martyr for the cause of freedom. The antislavery press carried stories of Torrey's mistreatment in prison, and abolitionists arranged the publication of his book, Home: The Pilgrim's Faith Revived (1845), written while he was in prison.
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Roberta A. Sprague, "Wilkes, Charles," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01124.html.
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[Wilkes's] most important command, the U.S. Exploring and Surveying Expedition to the Pacific Ocean and South Seas, 1838-1842, represented the first governmental sponsorship of scientific endeavor and was instrumental in the nation's westward expansion. Specimens gathered by expedition scientists became the foundation collections of the Smithsonian Institution. Significant American contributions in the fields of geology, botany, conchology, anthropology, and linguistics came from the scientific work of the expedition. Wilkes's evaluations of his landfalls influenced later U.S. positions in those areas.
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William L. Barney, "Memminger, Christopher Gustavus," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00702.html.
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Memminger was a Union Democrat for most of the antebellum period. In the nullification crisis of 1830-1832, he wrote a satirical pamphlet, The Book of Nullification (1832), lampooning the nullifiers and went so far as to propose the use of military force against them. He was elected to the lower house of the South Carolina legislature in 1836 and, with the exception of 1852-1853, served continuously up to the outbreak of the Civil War. He specialized in banking and monetary issues and gained a reputation as a fiscal conservative and sound money manager through his long service as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. When South Carolina threatened to secede over the Compromise of 1850, Memminger again assumed a conservative stance. He agreed that secession was a constitutional right of the individual states but held out for a cooperative movement that would ensure the unity and economic stability of the South.
As late as January 1860, Memminger was still opposed to separate state secession. In that month he was sent by the governor as a special commissioner to Virginia. He addressed the Virginia legislature and urged the state to join South Carolina in its call for a southern convention "to concert measures for united action" in the wake of John Brown's raid. When he sensed that his mission had failed, Memminger concluded that "we farther South will be compelled to act and drag after us these divided states." He actively promoted South Carolina's secession in December 1860 and was selected to the provisional Confederate Congress that met in Montgomery, Alabama, in February 1861.
As late as January 1860, Memminger was still opposed to separate state secession. In that month he was sent by the governor as a special commissioner to Virginia. He addressed the Virginia legislature and urged the state to join South Carolina in its call for a southern convention "to concert measures for united action" in the wake of John Brown's raid. When he sensed that his mission had failed, Memminger concluded that "we farther South will be compelled to act and drag after us these divided states." He actively promoted South Carolina's secession in December 1860 and was selected to the provisional Confederate Congress that met in Montgomery, Alabama, in February 1861.
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Richard H. Dillon, "Carson, Kit," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00152.html.
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The freckle-faced Carson was short, weighing only 145 pounds in his prime, and was both bow-legged and pigeon-toed, the very opposite of his image in dime novels. Although he was not pious like Jed Smith, he was unlike most mountain men in that he was temperate in the use of alcohol and profanity, although he was addicted to tobacco. He was soft-voiced, reticent, and genuinely modest in contrast to such braggarts as Jim Bridger. Handicapped as he was by small stature and illiteracy, Carson was universally respected by Americans, Canadians, Mexicans, and Indians and loved by many of them because of his strong character. He was not a leader in the ordinary sense but an exemplar. His honesty, loyalty, courage, decency, and sense of duty--in short, his personal integrity--so elevated him in public esteem, even during his lifetime, that he became and has remained the equal of Daniel Boone as an American frontiersman, almost sans reproche. The one black mark on his record remains his execution of three civilians, on Frémont's orders, in California in 1846.
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William E. Parrish, "Jackson, Claiborne Fox," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00551.html.
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In the aftermath of Abraham Lincoln's election, Jackson made it clear at his own inauguration that he strongly supported the southern states in their quarrel with the Union. While not calling for secession, Jackson advocated the convening of a state convention to resolve that issue. He also asked the legislature to provide for the reorganization of the militia to put the state on a war footing. The legislature agreed with the former proposal but stalled on the militia issue. When the convention met, it voted against secession, but Jackson still favored a prosouthern neutrality. When Lincoln called on him for volunteers after the firing on Fort Sumter, Jackson refused to furnish them, denouncing the request as "illegal, unconstitutional, and revolutionary." He secretly sought arms from the Confederacy while providing for militia encampments throughout the state, including one at St. Louis. The latter encampment, known as Camp Jackson, was surrounded by Union troops under General Nathaniel Lyon on 10 May [1861] on the grounds that it was pro-Confederate and forced to surrender.
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Elizabeth B. Pryor, "Barton, Clara," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/12/12-00054.html.
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Barton’s first battlefield experiences, at Culpeper and Fairfax Station, Virginia, in July and August 1862, shocked her. She made it her business to fill as much of the medical and supply gap as she personally could and later described her work of the next three years as lying “anywhere between the bullet and the hospital.” With skirt pinned up around her waist and a face blue from gunpowder, she served gruel, extracted bullets, and held the hands of the dying. During the battle of Antietam, she assisted at surgery, dressing wounds with green corn leaves when the bandages were exhausted. The chief surgeon wrote, “In my feeble estimation, General McClellan, with all his laurels sinks into insignificance beside the true heroine of the age, the angel of the battlefield.” In Fredericksburg, Barton nearly lost her life while crossing the river to tend the wounded; once across she wrote she could barely step for the weight of her blood-soaked skirts. During the siege of Fort Wagner, South Carolina, in 1863 she ran a supply line, nursed soldiers suffering from malaria, and witnessed the action at Morris Island. She returned to the heat of battle during the Wilderness Campaign and served as supervisor of nurses for the Army of the James from June 1864 to January 1865.
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William G. Andrews, "Vallandigham, Clement Laird," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01009.html.
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Though he served only two terms in Congress, his evident political talents and ambition attracted national attention early. He was a delegate to four successive Democratic National Conventions and in 1860 was secretary of the Democratic National Committee and chair of its campaign committee. He frequently had important influence on the party's campaign platforms. During the Civil War, he was the most prominent leader of the "Peace Democrats," who were disparagingly nicknamed "Copperheads." That leadership made him the center of great controversy. His criticism of Lincoln and his administration was relentless and sometimes intemperate. Vallandigham was a fiery orator whose arguments often found very receptive audiences during the early years of the war when the Union army was suffering defeat after defeat and the casualty lists seemed endless.
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John F. Stover, "Vanderbilt, Cornelius," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/10/10-01678.html.
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With the coming of the California gold rush in 1849, many gold seekers traveled west via Panama, crossing the isthmus on muleback. Vanderbilt had the idea of crossing Central America via Nicaragua, a route to California several hundred miles shorter than the Panama route. He invested in the American Atlantic and Pacific Ship Canal Company (later changed to Accessory Transit Company), which proposed to cross Nicaragua via the San Juan River, Lake Nicaragua, and a twelve-mile road (later to be a canal) to the Pacific. He built a fleet of steamers to run from New York and New Orleans, built docks on the coasts of Nicaragua and Lake Nicaragua, and improved the road to the Pacific. Soon the route was busy with traffic heading to California. The company prospered, and by 1853 Vanderbilt was worth an estimated $11 million.
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D. Scott Hartwig, "Battle, Cullen Andrews," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00056.html.
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Battle won a reputation as an orator of some repute. He entered politics and was a vocal advocate of the secessionist movement. In 1856 he was substitute elector on the Buchanan ticket, and during the 1860 Alabama Democratic State Convention, he was made a presidential elector on the motion of Senator William L. Yancey. He and Yancey traveled across the state and to Charleston, New York, Boston, and Philadelphia on an extended speaking tour.
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Edward G. LongacrE, "Butterfield, Daniel," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00111.html.
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Butterfield's rapid rise in the volunteer service and his regular army appointments cannot be reconciled with his limited talent as a field commander. Family prominence, high rank in the militia, and political connections appear to have been responsible. His managerial and organizational talents served him well as a staff officer, although his officiousness and his sometimes abrasive personality weakened his usefulness as a liaison between army headquarters and subordinate commanders. Despite his prominent position in the Union hierarchy, despite serving in important campaigns in the two major theaters of operations, and despite winning a Medal of Honor, he is remembered chiefly--but inaccurately--as the composer of "Taps."
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Richard A. Sauers, "Sickles, Daniel Edgar," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00714.html.
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In 1847 Sickles won election to the New York State Assembly. Six years later, in January 1853 he was appointed corporation counsel of New York City, but he resigned after eight months to become secretary of the American legation in London. While serving under Ambassador James Buchanan, Sickles had a hand in drawing up the notorious Ostend Manifesto, the document that claimed America's right to seize Cuba, thereby embarrassing the Franklin Pierce administration. While attending a U.S. Independence Day dinner in Richmond on the Thames in 1854, in a spate of nationalistic fervor, Sickles refused to rise from his seat when a toast was offered to Queen Victoria; this affront to British dignity caused an outcry on both sides of the Atlantic.
Sickles returned to New York later in 1854 and resumed his law practice. After winning a seat in the New York Senate (1855-1857), the rising Democrat won election to the U.S. House of Representatives (1857-1861). It was during his stay in Washington, D.C., that Sickles first attracted widespread national fame. Although he had married sixteen-year-old Teresa Bagioli in 1852 and fathered a child, Sickles was widely known for his infidelity and womanizing. Teresa started an extramarital affair of her own with Philip Barton Key, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia and son of "Star-Spangled Banner" author Francis Scott Key. Once Sickles was informed of his wife's affair, he took matters into his own hands. On 27 February 1859, as Key loitered near Sickles's house on Lafayette Square, Sickles confronted Key and shot him dead.
Sickles returned to New York later in 1854 and resumed his law practice. After winning a seat in the New York Senate (1855-1857), the rising Democrat won election to the U.S. House of Representatives (1857-1861). It was during his stay in Washington, D.C., that Sickles first attracted widespread national fame. Although he had married sixteen-year-old Teresa Bagioli in 1852 and fathered a child, Sickles was widely known for his infidelity and womanizing. Teresa started an extramarital affair of her own with Philip Barton Key, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia and son of "Star-Spangled Banner" author Francis Scott Key. Once Sickles was informed of his wife's affair, he took matters into his own hands. On 27 February 1859, as Key loitered near Sickles's house on Lafayette Square, Sickles confronted Key and shot him dead.
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Herman Hattaway and Michael D. Smith, "Couch, Darius Nash," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00270.html.
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Couch is best remembered as an able division and corps commander in the Army of the Potomac. His career occasionally was marred by personal traits of impatience and temper directed at both subordinates and superiors. He also suffered from prolonged bouts of ill health, which led to his acceptance of the post of department commander. Although in this administrative position Couch greatly aided in the repulse of the Confederate invasion of Pennsylvania, he undoubtedly would have performed greater service as a commander in the field.
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Robert M. Goldman, "Davis, David," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00219.html.
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During his fourteen-year tenure on the [Supreme] Court Davis participated in several notable decisions. That for which he is best remembered is the Court's 1866 ruling in Ex parte Milligan. In September 1862, President Lincoln had issued a proclamation suspending the writ of habeas corpus for civilian prisoners in the North under military authority. Such persons could be arrested for resisting the draft, obstructing volunteers, or other acts of disloyalty. Moreover, such individuals could be tried and punished by courts-martial or military commission. Lambdin P. Milligan, leader of the Sons of Liberty, an Indiana Copperhead group opposed to the war, was tried and convicted by a military commission based on the proclamation. Overturning Milligan's conviction, Davis held that Lincoln's suspension of the writ of habeas corpus had been an unconstitutional usurpation of congressional authority and that the president had no authority to authorize the use of military courts except in case of controlling necessity. Although Davis received harsh criticism from Republicans for this decision, he believed it an important statement of civil liberties protection.
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William M. Fowler, "Porter, David Dixon," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00629.html.
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Dissatisfied with the slow progress of his career, by 1860 Porter was once again giving consideration to leaving the service for more promising civilian pursuits. Abraham Lincoln's election and the ensuing crisis altered the situation dramatically, however. In the spring of 1861, as the Union disintegrated, Porter, brash and ambitious, concocted a plan for reinforcing Fort Pickens at Pensacola and presented it to Secretary of State William Seward. Seward persuaded Lincoln to endorse the plan, and Porter was given command of the steamer Powhatan with orders to sail to the relief of Fort Pickens. When Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles learned that his department had been completely bypassed in this venture, he took immediate steps to stop the expedition. Porter boldly pushed ahead, defied his recall orders, sailed to Pickens, and provided reinforcement. Not surprisingly, from this point on Welles was always suspicious and distrustful of Porter. Thanks to his abilities and aggressiveness, Porter nonetheless soon became one of the darlings of the naval service and was promoted to commander.
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Lawrence L. Hewitt, "Farragut, David Glasgow," American National Biography Online, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00361.html.
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Farragut required two months to deploy his squadron on the lower reaches of the Mississippi River. Two forts, Jackson on the west bank and St. Philip slightly upstream on the east, a flotilla, and a boom across the river blocked Farragut's route. But Confederate armaments were inferior to those of the Union forces. After a six-day mortar bombardment failed to silence Fort Jackson, Farragut, against Secretary [of the Navy Gideon] Welles's orders and the counsel of his subordinates, decided to run the gauntlet without silencing the forts. He reasoned that more time would allow the Confederates to strengthen their defenses and to complete the ironclad Louisiana. Events justified his decision. More than any other high-ranking Union officer, Farragut would take inordinate risks to obtain monumental results. As with all Civil War commanders during the opening months of that conflict, Farragut initially lacked experience commanding a large force. Unlike others, Farragut overcame his inexperience by means of what Welles described as "innate fearless moral courage" and an ability to focus: "[Farragut] does but one thing at a time, but does that strong and well" (The Diary of Gideon Welles, vol. 1 [1911], p. 230). All except three of his seventeen vessels managed to pass the forts before daylight on 24 April [1862]. The ensuing riverine battle caused the loss of one Union and eleven Confederate vessels. Farragut then arrived at New Orleans the next day. The forts surrendered three days later making his victory complete. Farragut received the thanks of Congress and a commission as rear admiral ranking from 16 July 1862.
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Lawrence L. Hewitt, "Farragut, David Glasgow," American National Biography Online, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00361.html.
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Mobile Bay, coupled with his capture of New Orleans, elevated Farragut to well-deserved preeminence in the U.S. Navy. His willingness to lead where his subordinates feared to follow made these victories his alone. Neither a great strategist nor tactician, Farragut achieved his objectives by boldly relying on his intuition. Congress created the office of vice admiral, and signing the bill on 23 December 1864, President Abraham Lincoln promptly nominated Farragut. Later Congress created the grade of full admiral especially for Farragut, his appointment effective 26 July 1866.
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Rod Paschall, "Hunter, David," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00369.html.
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In 1860 Hunter furthered his career through deft manipulation of the newly elected president Abraham Lincoln. From Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, Hunter began a correspondence with Lincoln. His ploy resulted in an invitation from the president to travel aboard the inaugural train from Illinois to the nation's capital. Soon after the Civil War began, Hunter wrangled command of a division even though he was only a colonel in the regular army, having been promoted in May 1861. He participated in the 1861 First Bull Run (First Manassas) campaign, but he was wounded early in the battle…Lincoln elevated Hunter to major general of volunteers. Later that year Lincoln persuaded him to serve under General John C. Frémont in a perilous situation in the Mississippi River basin…Lincoln relieved Frémont of command in part because of Frémont's attempt to liberate the slaves within his command's span of control. When Hunter was dispatched in March 1862 to the Department of the South, a position of relative obscurity on Union-held islands along the South Carolina coast, he repeated Frémont's political gaffe. On 9 May 1862 he decreed that all slaves inside his lines were "free for ever." Lincoln and Secretary of War Edwin Stanton reacted immediately, revoking Hunter's order. Forced to make his policy absolutely clear, Lincoln stated, "No commanding general shall do such a thing, upon my responsibility, without consulting me." Despite Hunter's faulty assumption of authority, Lincoln still regarded the general as a friend.
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Graham Russell Hodges, "Ruggles, David," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00588.html.
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In 1835 Ruggles founded and headed the New York Committee of Vigilance, which sought to shield the growing number of fugitive slaves from recapture and protect free blacks from kidnapping. Cooperating with white abolitionists Lewis Tappan and Isaac T. Hopper, Ruggles and other black leaders were daring conductors on the Underground Railroad and harbored nearly 1,000 blacks, including Frederick Douglass, before transferring them farther north to safety. A fearless activist, he raised funds for the committee, served writs against slave catchers, and directly confronted suspected kidnappers. In frequent columns for the Colored American, he exposed kidnapping incidents on railroads. In 1839 he published the Slaveholders Directory, which identified the names and addresses of politicians, lawyers, and police in New York City who "lend themselves to kidnapping." His bold efforts often led to his arrest and imprisonment, which contributed to his failing health and eyesight.
Between 1838 and 1841 Ruggles published five issues of the Mirror of Liberty, the first African-American magazine. Circulated widely throughout the East, Midwest, and the South, the magazine reported on the activities of the Committee of Vigilance, kidnappings and related court cases, antislavery speeches, and the activities of black organizations. Despite its irregular appearances, its publication was a significant achievement. In 1844 Ruggles attempted unsuccessfully to establish a second magazine, entitled the Genius of Freedom. In 1838 he attacked colonization once more in An Antidote for a Poisonous Combination.
Between 1838 and 1841 Ruggles published five issues of the Mirror of Liberty, the first African-American magazine. Circulated widely throughout the East, Midwest, and the South, the magazine reported on the activities of the Committee of Vigilance, kidnappings and related court cases, antislavery speeches, and the activities of black organizations. Despite its irregular appearances, its publication was a significant achievement. In 1844 Ruggles attempted unsuccessfully to establish a second magazine, entitled the Genius of Freedom. In 1838 he attacked colonization once more in An Antidote for a Poisonous Combination.
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Frederick J. Blue, "Wilmot, David," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01063.html.
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Helping to organize the initial national Republican meeting in Pittsburgh in February 1856, he chaired the platform committee of the Republican nominating convention in Philadelphia later that year. He vigorously campaigned for the party's nominee, John C. Frémont, and the following year ran unsuccessfully for governor. In both instances Wilmot was closely identified with the Republican position of preventing the expansion of slavery, a stance that, because of the influence of Buchanan, who was now president, was not as popular in Pennsylvania as in many other parts of the North. Wilmot's continued opposition to protective tariffs and the still-nascent state of the Republican party further weakened his candidacy.
At the Republican convention in Chicago in 1860, Wilmot supported Abraham Lincoln despite the candidacy of fellow Pennsylvanian Simon Cameron. Considered by Lincoln for a cabinet position, he instead was chosen by the legislature for a short Senate term (1861-1863). There his work was undistinguished and was characterized by loyal support of Lincoln's policies. Supportive of the numerous measures weakening slavery, he took special pleasure in the 1862 law that adopted the proviso's principle and banned slavery in all territories. At the conclusion of his Senate term Wilmot was appointed by Lincoln to be a judge on the newly created Court of Claims, on which he served until his death at his home in Towanda.
At the Republican convention in Chicago in 1860, Wilmot supported Abraham Lincoln despite the candidacy of fellow Pennsylvanian Simon Cameron. Considered by Lincoln for a cabinet position, he instead was chosen by the legislature for a short Senate term (1861-1863). There his work was undistinguished and was characterized by loyal support of Lincoln's policies. Supportive of the numerous measures weakening slavery, he took special pleasure in the 1862 law that adopted the proviso's principle and banned slavery in all territories. At the conclusion of his Senate term Wilmot was appointed by Lincoln to be a judge on the newly created Court of Claims, on which he served until his death at his home in Towanda.
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Lowell H. Harrison, "Buell, Don Carlos," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00099.html.
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In the late summer [of 1862}, when Edmund Kirby Smith and [Braxton] Bragg invaded Kentucky, [Don Carlos] Buell left a holding force in Nashville but followed Bragg with most of his army and secured Louisville before the Confederates could occupy it. Then, moving with unusual rapidity, Buell launched a multipronged attack against the scattered Confederates. At Perryville on 8 October, neither side employed all of its strength. The Confederates made gains in savage fighting but then withdrew from the state. Unable to bring the Confederates to another battle, Buell soon gave up the pursuit. President Abraham Lincoln and Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton blamed Buell for not forcing a decisive battle and crushing the Confederate forces. Buell's belief that a conciliatory policy would hasten the reconstruction of the Union displeased the Radicals, who were demanding total war with significant changes in the postwar South. At least in part, Buell was sacrificed to the imminent November elections. Removed from command on 24 October 1862, he was replaced by William S. Rosecrans. In late 1862-early 1863 Buell ably defended his conduct before a commission that included several hostile critics, and no recommendations were made as to his future. Although Grant recommended that he be reinstated, Buell did not get another assignment, and on 23 May 1864 he was separated from the volunteer army….His talents for discipline, logistics, and administration did not fully compensate for his perceived deficiencies in aggressive and decisive leadership.
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Walter Ehrlich, "Scott, Dred," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00984.html.
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On 6 April 1846 Dred and Harriet Scott sued Irene Emerson for freedom. Dred Scott v. Irene Emerson was filed in a Missouri state court under Missouri state law. (Two separate litigations were pursued. Since both entailed the same law and evidence, only Dred's advanced to conclusion; Harriet's suit was held in abeyance, under agreement that the determination in her husband's case would apply to hers.) Contrary to later widespread rumor, no political motivation attached to the institution of this suit; only when it reached the Missouri Supreme Court did it acquire the political overtones that made it so famous later. The suit was brought for one reason only: to secure freedom for Dred Scott and his family…
Unanticipated developments converted an open-and-shut freedom suit into a cause célèbre. In the trial on 30 June 1847, the court rejected one piece of vital evidence on a legal technicality--that it was hearsay evidence and therefore not admissible--and the slave's freedom had to await a second trial when that evidence could be properly introduced. It took almost three years, until 12 January 1850, before that trial took place, a delay caused by events over which none of the litigants had any control. With the earlier legal technicality corrected, the court unhesitatingly declared Dred Scott to be free.
Unanticipated developments converted an open-and-shut freedom suit into a cause célèbre. In the trial on 30 June 1847, the court rejected one piece of vital evidence on a legal technicality--that it was hearsay evidence and therefore not admissible--and the slave's freedom had to await a second trial when that evidence could be properly introduced. It took almost three years, until 12 January 1850, before that trial took place, a delay caused by events over which none of the litigants had any control. With the earlier legal technicality corrected, the court unhesitatingly declared Dred Scott to be free.
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Keir B. Sterling, "Smith, Edmund Kirby," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00407.html.
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In July 1863 President Jefferson Davis granted Smith "any assumption of authority which may be necessary" within his department. Despite Smith's best efforts, the maintenance of morale in "Kirby Smithdom," as the Trans-Mississippi Department was frequently described, became increasingly difficult because of poor communications with the Confederate capital at Richmond and a lack of fiscal resources. Smith was criticized for not doing more to support the war effort east of the Mississippi, but Union control of the river after 1863 rendered that virtually impossible. Smith was an able commander but an overextended administrator who, in his isolated circumstances, attempted to provide civil as well as military leadership within his jurisdiction, though a vocal minority found him wanting in both spheres. At no time did he interfere with the actions of the civil authorities unless these impeded his military initiatives. His efforts to break the Union blockade through a military thrust into Mexico and to secure foreign, principally French, assistance for his department were not notably successful. Despite his best efforts, he was never able to completely satisfy his superiors in Richmond, who were largely out of touch with the realities of his situation. During his two-year tenure, Smith created a number of general officers to fulfill his local requirements, some of whom were approved by President Davis, while others were not. Ultimately, the devaluation of the Confederate currency and insuperable logistical difficulties rendered Smith's situation untenable.
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William K. Scarborough, "Ruffin, Edmund," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00873.html.
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Although Ruffin's secessionist stance had crystallized at least as early as 1850, it was not until the last four years of the antebellum period, following his retirement from farming and the division of his property among his surviving children, that his crusade for disunion became most intense. Wherever he traveled--at Virginia summer resorts; at the Southern Commercial Convention in Montgomery, Alabama; in hotel lobbies from Washington, D.C., to Charleston, South Carolina; on steamboats and in railroad cars--Ruffin preached the message that southern rights could be preserved only through secession and the creation of a separate nation. Even more significant were his voluminous writings. These included two lengthy pamphlets, "The Political Economy of Slavery" and "African Colonization Unveiled," both published in 1858; an article, "Consequences of Abolition Agitation," which was serialized in De Bow's Review (1857), and another in The South (1858), calling for the removal, through enslavement or forced exile, of the bulk of the free black population in Virginia; a 426-page political novel entitled Anticipations of the Future (1860), which was inspired by John Brown's (1800-1859) raid on Harpers Ferry; and dozens of newspaper pieces, many printed as editorials in the Charleston Mercury. Despite these exertions, Ruffin had little influence in actually effecting secession. Certainly his voice was not heeded in Virginia.
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Ford Risley, "Pollard, Edward Alfred," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01304.html.
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Pollard was a fiery advocate of southern secession. In 1861 he joined the Richmond (Va.) Examiner, one of the best-known newspapers in the South. Under the direction of John M. Daniel, the Examiner was known for its brilliant but vituperative editorials, many directed at Confederate president Jefferson Davis and his administration. Pollard was variously identified as editorial writer, editor, coeditor, and associate editor of the Examiner. For the most part he seems to have served as associate editor, assisting Daniel in the preparation of editorials for the newspaper, while his brother, Henry Rives Pollard, was news editor. A prolific, although not particularly graceful, writer, Pollard also was a contemporary historian of the Civil War. Among his books written during the war were The First Year of the War (1862), The Second Battle of Manassas (1862), The Second Year of the War (1863), The Rival Administrations: Richmond and Washington in December 1863 (1864), The Two Nations: A Key to the History of the American War (1864), The War in America, 1863-64 (1865), and A Letter on the State of the War (1865). They were well received and sold widely in the South, at least in part because they were the first popular histories of the war from a Confederate point of view. Many of his interpretations, particularly his caustic criticisms of Davis and his theories about the causes of the war, however, have been invalidated.
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Daniel Walker Howe, "Everett, Edward," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00352.html.
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In 1853 the Massachusetts legislature elected Everett to the U.S. Senate. He spoke against the Kansas-Nebraska Bill but was absent when the vote on it was taken. Though he pleaded illness, his constituents were outraged, and Everett resigned, having served but fifteen months of his six-year term. For the rest of the 1850s, Everett was cast in the politically futile role of a moderate in a time of polarization. A Burkean conservative dedicated to balance and harmony, he felt the Union was being torn apart by ideological extremism. Holding no office, Everett traveled about the country giving speeches designed to foster nationalist sentiments, the most famous of them being "The Character of Washington," which he delivered 135 times. In 1860 Everett was the vice presidential candidate of the Constitutional Union party, the last gasp of the Whigs, though he entertained no illusions about his chance of winning. The Constitutional Union ticket, headed by John Bell of Tennessee, ran fairly well in the South, where it provided an acceptable vehicle for southern Whigs, but most northern Whigs had by this time transferred their allegiance to the new Republican party.
Once Fort Sumter had been fired upon, Everett ceased to be a moderate of any sort; his nationalism now dictated strong support for the war effort. Accordingly, the elder statesman embarked on another round of speech making, rallying northern public opinion.
Once Fort Sumter had been fired upon, Everett ceased to be a moderate of any sort; his nationalism now dictated strong support for the war effort. Accordingly, the elder statesman embarked on another round of speech making, rallying northern public opinion.
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Robert K. Krick, "Johnson, Edward," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00568.html.
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During his more than two decades in the army before the Civil War, Johnson also saw duty in Kansas, New York, California, and the Dakota Territory….In July [1861] Johnson assumed command of the Twelfth Georgia Infantry and turned that unit into one of the best regiments in Confederate service. That fall…he marched west from the Shenandoah Valley, taking up a position on a ridge of the Alleghany (Allegheny) Mountains. There on 13 December Johnson won a tough fight that made his reputation, earning him the wreath and three stars of a brigadier general and the fond nickname "Old Alleghany" Johnson.
The new general swore often and with real creative skill. He encouraged his men in battle with a combination of oaths and such inducements as "a stout cane," a club, or even a fence rail, with which he belabored both skulking Confederates and enemy soldiers who were slow to flee. After suffering a severe ankle wound at the battle of McDowell in May 1862, Johnson needed a cane for the rest of his life. Traces of Johnson's personality have survived in the diaries of Mary Boykin Chesnut, who knew him during his recuperation after McDowell. She described him vividly as "a different part of speech"; "red as a turkey cock in the face"; having a head shaped "like a cone, an old fashioned beehive"; and so hopelessly maladroit in his attempts at courting that he "roared with anguish and disappointment over his failures." Johnson never married, and Mrs. Chesnut was fond of the lovelorn general, as were most of his men, to whom his eccentricities supplied entertaining diversion.
The new general swore often and with real creative skill. He encouraged his men in battle with a combination of oaths and such inducements as "a stout cane," a club, or even a fence rail, with which he belabored both skulking Confederates and enemy soldiers who were slow to flee. After suffering a severe ankle wound at the battle of McDowell in May 1862, Johnson needed a cane for the rest of his life. Traces of Johnson's personality have survived in the diaries of Mary Boykin Chesnut, who knew him during his recuperation after McDowell. She described him vividly as "a different part of speech"; "red as a turkey cock in the face"; having a head shaped "like a cone, an old fashioned beehive"; and so hopelessly maladroit in his attempts at courting that he "roared with anguish and disappointment over his failures." Johnson never married, and Mrs. Chesnut was fond of the lovelorn general, as were most of his men, to whom his eccentricities supplied entertaining diversion.
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Gary W. Gallagher, "Alexander, Edward Porter," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00011.html.
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Alexander's most enduring postwar legacy was a body of writings about his Confederate service. He published important essays in the popular Battles and Leaders of the Civil War series (4 vols., 1887-1888), the Southern Historical Society Papers ("The Seven Days Battle" [Jan. 1876]; "Causes of Lee's Defeat at Gettysburg" [Sept. 1877]; "Sketch of Longstreet's Division" [Oct., Nov., and Dec. 1881 and Jan.-Feb. 1882]; "The Battle of Fredericksburg" [Aug.-Sept. 1882 and Oct.-Nov. 1882]; and "Confederate Artillery Service" [Feb.-Mar. 1883]), and the 1908 Annual Report of the American Historical Association. While in Nicaragua, he wrote a long memoir intended for his family (published in 1989 as Fighting for the Confederacy: The Personal Recollections of General Edward Porter Alexander, ed. Gary W. Gallagher), which he revised heavily to produce Military Memoirs of a Confederate: A Critical Narrative (1907). Unmatched among the writings of ex-Confederates for their impartiality and brilliant analysis, Alexander's two reminiscences also offer splendid anecdotes about prominent individuals and famous events.
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William B. Skelton, "Stanton, Edwin McMasters," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00942.html.
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When the Democratic party split on the sectional issue in 1860, Stanton followed Buchanan and Black in supporting John C. Breckinridge, the presidential nominee of the southern Democrats, because he considered Breckinridge the only candidate capable of preserving the Union. During a cabinet shake-up in December 1860, Black became secretary of state, and Buchanan appointed Stanton to replace him as attorney general. Throughout the closing months of Buchanan's term, Stanton strove forcefully to preserve the Union. In the cabinet, he and Black constantly pressured the vacillating president to adopt a strong position against secession and to retain control of Fort Sumter and other forts along the southern coastline. Moreover, Stanton secretly passed information on cabinet deliberations to Senator William H. Seward and other Republicans in Congress. During his brief tenure as attorney general, Stanton did as much as anyone in the administration to stiffen Buchanan's stand and resist the secessionist surge.
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Citation:
William B. Skelton, "Stanton, Edwin McMasters," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00942.html.
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As secretary of war, Stanton became increasingly disillusioned with his erstwhile friend McClellan, who had remained ensconced in the Washington defenses since the summer of 1861 and showed little inclination to take the offensive against the Confederate forces in Virginia. In March 1862 Stanton and other cabinet members convinced Lincoln to remove McClellan as commanding general of the entire army, though McClellan continued to command the Army of the Potomac. For several months in the spring and early summer of 1862, Lincoln and Stanton performed the role of commanding general. The two civilians pressured McClellan into launching his Peninsula campaign, personally directed the capture of Norfolk, and devised a nearly successful plan to trap Confederate general Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson's army in the Shenandoah Valley. In a controversial move, however, Stanton suspended recruiting in early April in order to reorganize the recruiting service--and in the apparent belief that the war would soon be over. Because of this step, as well as the administration's decision to detain Major General Irvin McDowell's corps as a shield for Washington, D.C., McClellan and his Democratic supporters claimed that the secretary of war had withheld essential reinforcements from the Peninsula offensive, contributing to its failure. While these charges were unfounded--McClellan's army strongly outnumbered the Confederates throughout the campaign--Stanton and McClellan remained bitter enemies, each calling for the removal of the other, until Lincoln finally relieved McClellan of command in November 1862.
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Stephen M. Archer, "Booth, Edwin Thomas," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/18/18-00132.html.
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Booth retired temporarily from the stage after his brother John Wilkes Booth assassinated President Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., on 14 April 1865. In early 1866 he returned to, as he put it, "the only profession for which God has suited me." For the remainder of his life, however, he refused invitations to perform in Washington, D.C. Audiences attached no blame to Booth for his brother's crime. Drama critic William Winter described his return to the stage: "Nine cheers hailed the melancholy Dane upon his first entrance. The spectators rose and waved their hats and handkerchiefs. Bouquets fell in a shower upon the stage, and there was a tempest of applause, wherever he appeared." Booth continued his career with almost universal acclaim.
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E. C. Bearss, "Sumner, Edwin Vose," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00970.html.
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In February 1861, as the southern states seceded, Sumner was one of three army officers that accompanied President-elect Abraham Lincoln on his train trip from Springfield, Illinois, to Washington, D.C. Upon the dismissal of David E. Twiggs from the service, Sumner was promoted to brigadier general on 16 March 1861, becoming one of three regular army brigadiers. One week later he was ordered to San Francisco to relieve Colonel Albert Sidney Johnston as commander of the Department of the Pacific. Traveling by way of Panama, Sumner held this post until 20 October, when he returned to the East Coast. Reporting to Major General George B. McClellan on 25 November, Sumner was assigned to command one of the Army of the Potomac's twelve infantry divisions. President Lincoln, becoming increasingly disenchanted with McClellan and his failure to boldly seize the initiative, issued orders in March 1862 for the Army of the Potomac to be organized into five corps. Sumner was given command of the Second, and he thereby became the oldest corps commander in the Army of the Potomac.
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Louis S. Gerteis, "Thayer, Eli," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00980.html.
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Thayer achieved a national reputation as a champion of private enterprise in the fight against the expansion of slavery. In Senator Stephen Douglas's proposal to extend the principle of "popular sovereignty" to the Kansas-Nebraska Territory, Thayer saw an opportunity to demonstrate that the North's entrepreneurial energy could be utilized to defeat the politically belligerent but socially and economically obsolescent slaveholding interest, the "slave power" in the rhetoric of antislavery reform. Before the U.S. House of Representatives began to debate the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, Thayer presented to the Massachusetts legislature his plan to facilitate through private enterprise free state emigration to Kansas. In April 1854, a month before the Kansas-Nebraska Act became law, Thayer secured a state charter for what became the New England Emigrant Aid Company. Thayer's company gained the support of a number of Free Soil politicians, the influential New York editor Horace Greeley, and the wealthy industrialist Amos A. Lawrence. The number of settlers sent to Kansas by the company probably numbered less than three thousand, but they were zealous in their commitment to the free state cause and helped to convince both North and South that a determined northern majority could halt the spread of slavery. "In this age of material progress," Thayer proclaimed to the South, "you have seen the North outstrip you." Thayer's plan of "organized emigration," as he explained later in life, would "put a cordon of Free States from Minnesota to the Gulf of Mexico, and stop the forming of Slave States."
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Sharon O’Brien, "Boudinot, Elias Cornelius," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00093.html.
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Like his father, Boudinot was drawn to newspaper work, taking the editorship first of the Fayetteville Weekly Arkansian and then of the Little Rock True Democrat in 1860. Boudinot also became involved in Democratic and Confederate politics during this period, becoming chairman of the Democratic State Central Committee in 1860 and secretary of the Secession Convention the following year.
The Civil War again split the Cherokees into two warring factions, with battles fought throughout the tribal nation between Union and Confederate Cherokee forces. Boudinot served briefly with his uncle Stand Watie's Confederate regiment, achieving the rank of lieutenant colonel. In 1863 the southern faction of the Cherokees elected Boudinot as their delegate to the Confederate Congress at Richmond. At the war's end, Boudinot represented the southern Cherokee faction in the negotiation of the Cherokees' 1866 treaty with the United States.
The Civil War again split the Cherokees into two warring factions, with battles fought throughout the tribal nation between Union and Confederate Cherokee forces. Boudinot served briefly with his uncle Stand Watie's Confederate regiment, achieving the rank of lieutenant colonel. In 1863 the southern faction of the Cherokees elected Boudinot as their delegate to the Confederate Congress at Richmond. At the war's end, Boudinot represented the southern Cherokee faction in the negotiation of the Cherokees' 1866 treaty with the United States.
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John Y. Simon, "Washburne, Elihu Benjamin," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01038.html.
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When [Abraham] Lincoln secretly arrived in Washington for the inauguration, [Elihu] Washburne was the only person who met him at the railroad station. His friendship with Lincoln enhanced his power during the war. When the war began, Washburne met Ulysses S. Grant, then a clerk in a Galena leather store but the only West Point graduate in Washburne's congressional district. Through Washburne's seniority and influence with Lincoln, Grant was appointed a brigadier general before encountering an enemy in the field. Washburne became Grant's political patron, defending him against all criticism and advocating his advancement in rank. Washburne's support proved valuable in 1862 when Grant received condemnation for failing to prepare for Confederate attack at Shiloh. In 1864 Washburne assured Lincoln that Grant would not become a presidential candidate if appointed general in chief. Though when Grant achieved victory in 1865, the hero of Appomattox no longer needed Washburne's patronage or his advice, the two maintained a close personal friendship. A member of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction, Washburne sided with the radicals and bitterly denounced President Andrew Johnson's Reconstruction policy while Grant, as army commander, worked within the administration but eventually broke with Johnson and accepted the Republican nomination for president in 1868.
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Ann D. Gordon, "Stanton, Elizabeth Cady,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00640.html.
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[In 1862] Elizabeth Cady Stanton initiated the call for a women's rights convention. From that meeting at Seneca Falls, on 19-20 July 1848, women issued the demand that their sacred right to the elective franchise be recognized. They wrote a Declaration of Sentiments and resolutions, arguing that consistency with the fundamental principles of the American Revolution required an end to women's taxation without representation and government without their consent. It accused men of usurping divine power and denying women their consciences by dictating the proper sphere of womankind. To illustrate women's disabilities under the law, the authors echoed attacks by legal reformers on English common law, particularly the principle that a woman lost her individual identity and rights when she married. The largest group at the 1848 meeting were antislavery Quakers from Rochester and Waterloo, New York, dissidents in the Society of Friends who were establishing the Congregational (later Progressive) Friends. Among them the convention's message found its strongest support, at a second convention in Rochester a few weeks later, in a modest petition campaign for woman suffrage late in 1848, and in the yearly meetings of Progressive Friends thereafter. Decades later Stanton wrote that advocacy of suffrage for women met resistance and that Frederick Douglass helped her to sway the crowd in its favor. Though nothing in the contemporary record confirms that story, the opposition of Friends and Garrisonians to voting could explain why participants doubted the importance of suffrage.
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Gertrude Woodruff Marlowe, "Keckley, Elizabeth Hobbs," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00530.html.
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As Mary Lincoln's dresser, Keckley prepared her for every public occasion; as her confidante, she shared her anxieties; as her traveling companion, she went to the Gettysburg dedication and toured Richmond after the city fell; and, as her attendant, she cared for her after her son Willie's death and her husband's assassination. When Mary Lincoln left the White House in 1865, Keckley accompanied her to Chicago. After seeing the family settled, she returned to Washington, D.C., where she reopened her dressmaking business.
In the spring of 1867 she began to receive letters from Mary Lincoln, who wrote that she was impoverished and planned to sell her clothes and jewelry to raise money. After she begged Keckley to join her in New York City to help with the sale, Keckley closed her business and went. Newspapers had a field day with the "old clothes scandal," heaping scathing criticism on the president's widow for trying to augment her income in what was considered a vulgar manner. The clothes did not sell, however, and Mary Lincoln returned to Chicago. Keckley stayed in New York City to wind up affairs. She raised money within the black community to aid her former employer, but Mary Lincoln refused it. In 1868 Keckley published her autobiography, Behind the Scenes; or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House, which she said she wrote to help Mary Lincoln financially as well as to counter what she considered unjust criticisms. Given her loyalty to Mary Lincoln, she must have had a strong motive to violate the code of confidentiality.
In the spring of 1867 she began to receive letters from Mary Lincoln, who wrote that she was impoverished and planned to sell her clothes and jewelry to raise money. After she begged Keckley to join her in New York City to help with the sale, Keckley closed her business and went. Newspapers had a field day with the "old clothes scandal," heaping scathing criticism on the president's widow for trying to augment her income in what was considered a vulgar manner. The clothes did not sell, however, and Mary Lincoln returned to Chicago. Keckley stayed in New York City to wind up affairs. She raised money within the black community to aid her former employer, but Mary Lincoln refused it. In 1868 Keckley published her autobiography, Behind the Scenes; or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House, which she said she wrote to help Mary Lincoln financially as well as to counter what she considered unjust criticisms. Given her loyalty to Mary Lincoln, she must have had a strong motive to violate the code of confidentiality.
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Gertrude Woodruff Marlowe, "Keckley, Elizabeth Hobbs," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00530.html.
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Elizabeth's life as a slave included harsh, arbitrary beatings "to subdue her stubborn pride," frequent moves to work for often poor family members, and being "persecuted for four years" by Alexander Kirkland, a white man, by whom she had a son. Her life improved when she was loaned to a Burwell daughter, Anne Garland, with whose family Keckley moved to St. Louis. There, her labor as a dressmaker was the sole support of the Garland household of seventeen members for more than two years. Because of her skill, engaging personality, and capacity for hard work, she developed a devoted clientele among the city's elite women. She persuaded the Garlands to set a price, $1,200, for her freedom and that of her son. In St. Louis (probably in 1852) she married James Keckley, a man who had told her he was free but was actually a "dissipated" slave. Because of the strain of supporting both her husband and the Garlands, she could not save the money needed to purchase her freedom. Her customers raised it among themselves, however, and the Deed of Emancipation was registered in 1855. With her labor now her own, she was soon able to repay the loan. In 1860 she separated from her husband and moved to Washington, D.C., where she set up a dressmaking establishment that trained dozens of young women over the years. Keckley's clients were the wives of politically prominent men, such as Stephen Douglas and Jefferson Davis.
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Jean V. Berlin, "Van Lew, Elizabeth L.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01193.html.
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Van Lew's father had made a fortune in his successful hardware business, and the family moved in the highest circles of Richmond society. The Van Lews retained northern connections and sent Elizabeth to Philadelphia to be educated. When she returned to the South, she was a fervent abolitionist and convinced her mother to free the family slaves in the 1850s after her father's death.
Van Lew made no secret of her Union sympathies in 1860 and 1861. With the arrival of war, she turned her thoughts to how she could best help the Union. She began her career by obtaining permission to visit the Federal prisoners in Libby. She provided material aid for the prisoners, aided them in escape attempts, and passed on their military information to Union officials through a network of Richmond loyalists and her former slaves. When her visits occasioned increasing suspicion and scrutiny, she feigned insanity and kept her freedom of movement by wearing dirty clothes and muttering to herself, earning the nickname "Crazy Bet." In one of her most successful operations, she placed Mary Elizabeth Bowser, a well-educated former slave of the Van Lews, as a servant in Jefferson Davis's house. Feigning illiteracy, Bowser was able to read and copy portions of official dispatches and eavesdrop on business dinners. Van Lew also gleaned information from the guards and prison commandants at Libby and ferreted out clerks with Union sympathies in the Confederate War and Navy departments.
Van Lew made no secret of her Union sympathies in 1860 and 1861. With the arrival of war, she turned her thoughts to how she could best help the Union. She began her career by obtaining permission to visit the Federal prisoners in Libby. She provided material aid for the prisoners, aided them in escape attempts, and passed on their military information to Union officials through a network of Richmond loyalists and her former slaves. When her visits occasioned increasing suspicion and scrutiny, she feigned insanity and kept her freedom of movement by wearing dirty clothes and muttering to herself, earning the nickname "Crazy Bet." In one of her most successful operations, she placed Mary Elizabeth Bowser, a well-educated former slave of the Van Lews, as a servant in Jefferson Davis's house. Feigning illiteracy, Bowser was able to read and copy portions of official dispatches and eavesdrop on business dinners. Van Lew also gleaned information from the guards and prison commandants at Libby and ferreted out clerks with Union sympathies in the Confederate War and Navy departments.
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Miriam DeCosta-Willis, "Craft, Ellen," American National Biography Online, Febraury 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00370.html.
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[Ellen Craft] was born on a plantation in Clinton, Georgia, the daughter of Major James Smith, a wealthy cotton planter, and Maria, his slave. Ellen became a skilled seamstress and ladies' maid, esteemed for her grace, intelligence, and sweetness of temper. In Macon she met another slave two years her senior, William Craft, to whom she was legally wed in 1846…Because "the laws under which we lived did not recognize her to be a woman, but a mere chattel, to be bought and sold," as William wrote in the couple's autobiographical narrative, they devised a plan of escape. Ellen made a pair of men's trousers, while William worked a second job as a waiter to purchase their tickets for the North. On 21 December 1848, after obtaining Christmas passes from their owners, Ellen and William made their escape. Wearing a man's suit and green spectacles, the "almost white" Ellen disguised herself as "a most respectable looking gentleman," journeying North with William acting as her manservant. When Ellen attempted to book passage on a steamer out of Charleston, the ticket master insisted that she sign the register, but she could neither read nor write; fortunately, a young military officer stepped forward and offered to sign for the "gentleman."…On Christmas Day the runaways reached Philadelphia, where they were welcomed by abolitionists, including William Still, who described their escape in The Underground Rail Road (1872), and a Quaker family, who offered them a home and taught them to read and write their names.
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Jane Donahue Eberwein, " Dickinson, Emily," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00453.html.
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Dickinson grew up in a Connecticut Valley environment that drew close linkages among religion, intellectual activity, and citizenship. She studied at Amherst Academy, then greatly influenced by the scientist-theologian Edward Hitchcock of Amherst College, and worshiped at the First Church (Congregational) during the period of revivalistic evangelical Protestantism known as the Second Awakening. Her father played an active role in the town's political and business affairs, served as treasurer of the college, and was a leading figure in the church community even though not actually converted and eligible for membership until the revival of 1850. Her mother had joined the church when pregnant with Emily, her second child… Letters written during Dickinson's one year at Mount Holyoke Female Seminary (1847-1848) reflect tendencies evident even in her academy years: maintenance of close family ties and intense friendships with chosen intimates, preference for solitude over society, intellectual curiosity, pride in her ability to write wittily, and hesitation to commit herself to Christ in the manner expected by her friends and spiritual counselors, including Mount Holyoke's redoubtable foundress, Mary Lyon.
Type: Description
Citation:
Jane Donahue Eberwein, "Dickinson, Emily," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00453.html.
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Although interest in one or more lovers continues, as does attention to the poet's religious quest and to her quiet subversion of gender assumptions, Emily Dickinson's poems steadily gain recognition as works of art, both individually and collectively, especially when read in her original fascicle groupings, which establish not just her unquestionable brilliance but her frequently underestimated artistic control. The regard Dickinson has won in the little more than a century since her poems introduced her to the world has established her as the most widely recognized woman poet to write in the English language and as an inspiration, both personally and in terms of craft, to modern women writers. As a voice of New England's Protestant and Transcendental cultures in fruitful tension and of the spiritual anxieties unleashed by the Civil War (during which she wrote the great majority of her poems) and as an avatar of poetic modernism, Emily Dickinson now stands with Walt Whitman as one of America's two preeminent poets of the nineteenth century and perhaps of our whole literary tradition.
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Herman Hattaway and Eric B. Fair, "Hitchcock, Ethan Allen," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00506.html.
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Although Hitchcock's antiwar conviction mellowed somewhat during the Mexico City campaign, he remained aloof from the typical pleasures and pastimes of army life. In his journal he wrote, "I find so little to interest me in the military profession that I had rather study or read books of philosophy. I fear I am not in my proper vocation." Following the Mexican War, Hitchcock was appointed as commander of the Military Division of the Pacific, where he was instrumental in forcing the arrest of William Walker, an American adventurer who had attempted to establish an independent republic in Baja California. Hitchcock ordered the seizure of Walker's brig, Arrow, an act that reportedly angered Secretary of War Jefferson Davis. In 1855--perhaps spitefully--Davis refused Hitchcock's request for a leave of absence due to ill health; Hitchcock reacted by submitting his resignation from the army on 18 October 1855.
Type: Description
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Herman Hattaway and Eric B. Fair, "Hitchcock, Ethan Allen," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00506.html.
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Hitchcock's nonconformist nature affected his military career. In 1827 he refused to take part in a court of inquiry at the Military Academy, maintaining that the court had overstepped an accepted interpretation of military law. For this he was dismissed from the faculty and ordered to duty at Fort Snelling, Minnesota. Captain Hitchcock appealed to President John Quincy Adams. A subsequent investigation upheld Hitchcock's original assertion, and in 1829 he was reinstated at the academy, this time as commandant of cadets. Hitchcock, however, found disfavor with President Andrew Jackson over the issues of discipline and political interference. Hitchcock would allege that his promotion to major was withheld several years as a result of his stand.
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Steven E. Woodworth, "Lee, Fitzhugh," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00428.html.
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At the battle of Chancellorsville (1-4 May 1863), Lee commanded the only full brigade of cavalry operating with the main army, Stuart having been detached to counter a move by the Union cavalry. Lee's troopers uncovered the fact that the Federal right flank was unprotected and vulnerable to attack. This led to "Stonewall" Jackson's famous flanking march, which Lee's cavalry ably screened. That summer, he was with Stuart again for another ride around the Union army during the Gettysburg campaign, a maneuver that effectively removed the Confederate cavalry from meaningful participation in the campaign and kept them off the Gettysburg battlefield until the third day of fighting. On that day, 3 July 1863, Lee took part in the major clash in which Stuart's forces were bested by the Union cavalry. On 3 August 1863 Lee was promoted to major general, and the following month he was given command of a division of cavalry, which he led under Stuart's overall command until the latter's death in May 1864.
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Citation:
James Ross Moore, "Kemble, Fanny," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/18/18-00666.html.
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By 1838, influenced by Unitarian minister William Ellery Channing's thoughts on slavery, Kemble had become a passionate abolitionist. She found her dependence on the profits of the family rice and cotton plantation intolerable. When [Pierce] Butler's father died and he was needed to take charge personally, she insisted on accompanying him and stayed for eighteen months. Inspired by the journal of Matthew Gregory Lewis, an Englishman who owned a West Indies sugar plantation, Kemble wrote Residence of a Georgian Plantation in 1838-1839. The work horrified Butler and remained unpublished until 1863.
Kemble returned to England in 1840; Butler followed, and for two-and-a-half years they appeared to have reconciled. They returned to the United States in 1843. Regarding their daughters as his possessions and threatening Kemble with their loss, Butler thwarted her attempts to return to the stage and to publish the plantation journal and articles on abolition. Once Butler sold Kemble's favorite horse, possibly because he knew that riding horseback gave her "a pleasurably unmarried feeling." Collecting and publishing ninety of her poems and securing the profits through her ingenuity, she bought the horse again. For a time Kemble and Butler lived apart within the same house, her access to the children limited to an hour daily.
Kemble returned to England in 1840; Butler followed, and for two-and-a-half years they appeared to have reconciled. They returned to the United States in 1843. Regarding their daughters as his possessions and threatening Kemble with their loss, Butler thwarted her attempts to return to the stage and to publish the plantation journal and articles on abolition. Once Butler sold Kemble's favorite horse, possibly because he knew that riding horseback gave her "a pleasurably unmarried feeling." Collecting and publishing ninety of her poems and securing the profits through her ingenuity, she bought the horse again. For a time Kemble and Butler lived apart within the same house, her access to the children limited to an hour daily.
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Mamie E. Locke, "Harper, Frances Ellen Watkins," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00304.html.
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[Frances Harper] was orphaned at an early age and raised by an aunt. She attended a school for free blacks, which was run by her uncle, the Reverend William Watkins. Her formal education ended at age thirteen. Harper became a nursemaid and found additional employment as a seamstress, needlecraft teacher, and traveling abolitionist lecturer. She also lectured in support of woman suffrage. She later became a schoolteacher in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
In 1860 she married Fenton Harper; they had one child, who died in 1909. After her husband's death in 1864, she returned to the lecture circuit, promoting black education and Sunday school teaching. She also served as superintendent of colored work in the Women's Christian Temperance Union and often made speeches on its behalf, pointing out the evils of strong drink and the need for higher standards of morality. Continuing her feminist pursuits after the abolition of slavery, Harper spoke at the Women's Rights convention in 1866 and the Equal Rights Association in 1869. Although she more strongly advocated black male suffrage at that time, she continued to stress the need for women's right to vote. She was a founder of the National Association of Colored Women in the 1890s and served as a vice president until her death.
In 1860 she married Fenton Harper; they had one child, who died in 1909. After her husband's death in 1864, she returned to the lecture circuit, promoting black education and Sunday school teaching. She also served as superintendent of colored work in the Women's Christian Temperance Union and often made speeches on its behalf, pointing out the evils of strong drink and the need for higher standards of morality. Continuing her feminist pursuits after the abolition of slavery, Harper spoke at the Women's Rights convention in 1866 and the Equal Rights Association in 1869. Although she more strongly advocated black male suffrage at that time, she continued to stress the need for women's right to vote. She was a founder of the National Association of Colored Women in the 1890s and served as a vice president until her death.
Type: Description
Citation:
Mamie E. Locke, "Harper, Frances Ellen Watkins," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00304.html.
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Feminism was often the theme of Harper's works. The poem "Deliverance" (from Sketches of a Southern Life) is concerned with the response of women to men who abused the privilege of voting:
Harper's poetry and prose were political. Her works tackled the issue of slavery and the cruelty endured by slave women. The final two lines of one of her more popular poems, "Bury Me in a Free Land," poignantly expresses the desire of slaves: "All that my yearning spirit craves / Is bury me not in a land of slaves." The "Slave Auction" addressed the issue of children being sold away from their mothers:
And mothers stood with streaming eyes
And saw their dear children sold
Unheeded rise their bitter cries,
While tyrants bartered them for gold.
Feminism was often the theme of Harper's works. The poem "Deliverance" (from Sketches of a Southern Life) is concerned with the response of women to men who abused the privilege of voting:
Day after day did Milly Green
Just follow after Joe
And told him if he voted wrong
To take his rags and go.
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Citation:
Richard Lowe, "Pierpont, Francis Harrison," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00790.html.
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Pierpont's role as governor of the Restored regime and his advice and encouragement to the nascent movement to create a separate state in western Virginia earned him the nickname "Father of West Virginia." When the statehood movement finally won its objective in June 1863, Pierpont, Unionist governor of old Virginia, turned down an invitation to serve as governor of West Virginia and moved the Restored government to Alexandria in northern Virginia. For the remainder of the war his tiny administration, representing only those few Virginia counties in Union-occupied areas of northern and eastern Virginia, struggled to maintain a semblance of authority despite encroachments by Confederate raiders and Federal generals and despite political officials, who now seemed embarrassed by the Lilliputian size of the Pierpont government. Their troubles notwithstanding, Restored Unionists, urged on by Governor Pierpont, held a constitutional convention in Alexandria in 1864 and drew up an antislavery constitution that anticipated many of the reforms of postwar Reconstruction. When the war ended in the spring of 1865, Governor Pierpont moved his Unionist state government to Richmond and began the thankless task of administering President Andrew Johnson's Reconstruction plan.
Type: Description
Citation:
James Farr, "Lieber, Francis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/14/14-00365.html.
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Sensing the pending breakup of the Union and tired of suppressing his sympathies for the nation and against slavery, Lieber left South Carolina in 1856 and moved to New York. He accepted Columbia College's offer of a chair as well as the honor of titling it. By his own design he became professor of history and political science, thereby becoming the first officially named political scientist in America. He made clear in his inaugural address that he took his field to be "the very science for nascent citizens of a republic." During the Civil War he advised the U.S. government in legal matters and organized the voluminous output of the Loyal Publication Society. He also wrote an important pamphlet on Guerilla Parties Considered with Reference to the Laws and Usages of War (1862) as well as A Code for the Government of Armies in the Field, as Authorized by the Laws and Usages of War on Land (1863). Solicited by General Henry Halleck, Lieber's code was turned into a set of instructions issued by President Abraham Lincoln as General Orders No. 100. These instructions were later influential on the accords that emerged from The Hague Conference of 1899 and 1907.
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William E. Parrish, "Cockrell, Francis Marion," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00247.html.
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At the outbreak of the Civil War, Cockrell, a slaveowner, organized a company of pro-southern Home Guards and was elected its captain. The group joined the army raised by Sterling Price to resist the Union occupation of Missouri and fought with him at Wilson's Creek (10 Aug. 1861) and Lexington (14-20 Sept. 1861). In December the Missouri Home Guard became officially part of the Provisional Army of the Confederate States, and Cockrell received a Confederate commission as captain. His company participated in the battle of Pea Ridge (7-8 Mar. 1862) and then was transferred with other Missouri troops to Mississippi. Cockrell gained promotion to lieutenant colonel on 12 May and to colonel on 20 June and was given regimental command. His regiment engaged that fall in the battles of Iuka (19 Sept.) and Corinth (3-4 Oct.) before retiring to the Vicksburg area, where they were involved in all of the major battles of that campaign.
Cockrell was promoted to brigadier general in the aftermath of Vicksburg's surrender. Following his parole and exchange, he received the command of the reorganized First Missouri Brigade, which he led throughout the remainder of the war. His brigade served in Mississippi and Alabama during the latter half of 1863 and early 1864. In May 1864 Cockrell's brigade joined General Joseph E. Johnston's forces opposite Union general William T. Sherman in the defense of northern Georgia and Atlanta, during which Cockrell was wounded at the battle of Kennesaw Mountain (27 June).
Cockrell was promoted to brigadier general in the aftermath of Vicksburg's surrender. Following his parole and exchange, he received the command of the reorganized First Missouri Brigade, which he led throughout the remainder of the war. His brigade served in Mississippi and Alabama during the latter half of 1863 and early 1864. In May 1864 Cockrell's brigade joined General Joseph E. Johnston's forces opposite Union general William T. Sherman in the defense of northern Georgia and Atlanta, during which Cockrell was wounded at the battle of Kennesaw Mountain (27 June).
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Citation:
Elbert B. Smith, "Blair, Francis Preston," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00111.html.
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Retiring to his Silver Spring, Maryland, country estate, Blair remained highly influential through his reputation and friendships. In 1848, although he owned a few slaves, he strongly supported Van Buren's Free Soil presidential candidacy. Blair was certain that slavery could not spread to the territories taken from Mexico and believed that southern radicals were misrepresenting the issue to promote disunion. In 1852 he wrote pamphlets supporting the Democratic candidacy of Franklin Pierce but was bitterly disappointed in him when Pierce promoted the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which repealed the Missouri Compromise and opened the western territories legally to slavery. Blair helped organize the new Republican party against slavery in Kansas, and when abolitionist senator Charles Sumner was caned by a congressman from South Carolina, Blair brought him to Silver Spring for recuperation. In 1856 Blair chaired the first Republican National Convention and later was instrumental in securing the nomination of John C. Frémont for president. In a widely distributed pamphlet published in April of that year, A Voice from the Grave of Jackson, Blair worked to convert northwestern Democrats by arguing that Jackson, if alive, would be a Republican.
In Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857), Blair's son Montgomery Blair argued for the plaintiff's freedom, and another son, Frank (Francis Preston Blair, Jr.), a congressman from Missouri, made eloquent speeches advocating abolition and deportation of the freed slaves to Latin America. Blair and his sons were influential delegates at the 1860 Republican convention and were rewarded when Abraham Lincoln appointed Montgomery Blair postmaster general. Throughout Lincoln's presidency, Preston Blair and his son Frank were close friends and confidantes.
In Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857), Blair's son Montgomery Blair argued for the plaintiff's freedom, and another son, Frank (Francis Preston Blair, Jr.), a congressman from Missouri, made eloquent speeches advocating abolition and deportation of the freed slaves to Latin America. Blair and his sons were influential delegates at the 1860 Republican convention and were rewarded when Abraham Lincoln appointed Montgomery Blair postmaster general. Throughout Lincoln's presidency, Preston Blair and his son Frank were close friends and confidantes.
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Judith K. Schafer, "Nicholls, Francis Redding Tillou,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, ttp://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00566.html.
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Although reluctant to support secession, Nicholls had a distinguished career serving the Confederacy. He and his brother Lawrence raised an infantry company, the Phoenix Guards, in which he served as captain. He later served as the commander of the Eighth Louisiana Regiment, participating in the first battle of Manassas and in Stonewall Jackson's Valley Campaign. He lost his left arm from a wound received at the battle of Winchester in May 1862 and his left foot at the battle of Chancellorsville in May 1863. By this time he had risen to the rank of brigadier general. Although his wounds forced him to retire from the field, Nicholls served the Confederacy as superintendent of the conscript bureau of the Trans-Mississippi department until the end of the war, when he returned to his law practice in Napoleonville.
Nicholls became governor of Louisiana in 1877 after a hotly contested election in which both sides manipulated the vote count. Nicholls's supporters, the Bourbon Democrats, prevented blacks from voting in the country parishes where they were a majority and padded the voting rolls in New Orleans with thousands of deceased persons. Both Nicholls and his opponent claimed victory and organized governments, but a promise that Nicholls would be recognized as governor was part of the Compromise of 1877. Nicholls immediately appointed new justices to the Supreme Court of Louisiana to replace those appointed by his Republican predecessors and sent a force of state police to capture the building that housed the court.
Nicholls became governor of Louisiana in 1877 after a hotly contested election in which both sides manipulated the vote count. Nicholls's supporters, the Bourbon Democrats, prevented blacks from voting in the country parishes where they were a majority and padded the voting rolls in New Orleans with thousands of deceased persons. Both Nicholls and his opponent claimed victory and organized governments, but a promise that Nicholls would be recognized as governor was part of the Compromise of 1877. Nicholls immediately appointed new justices to the Supreme Court of Louisiana to replace those appointed by his Republican predecessors and sent a force of state police to capture the building that housed the court.
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Citation:
Robert E. Burkholder, "Sanborn, Franklin Benjamin," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00594.html.
Body Summary:
Sanborn was interested in abolitionist politics from an early age, and once settled in Concord he became actively involved in the organized abolitionist movement, developing acquaintances with leaders such as William Lloyd Garrison, Samuel Gridley Howe, Parker, and Wendell Phillips and serving on committees for the colonization and defense of Kansas. These associations led to Sanborn’s meeting John Brown (1800-1859) in late 1856 and to his involvement in Brown’s plot to capture the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. Sanborn became a member of Brown’s “secret six,” members of the Massachusetts Kansas Committee engaged in raising financing for Brown’s abolitionist activities. When Brown’s attempt to capture the Harpers Ferry arsenal failed on 18 October 1859, Sanborn’s role came under the scrutiny of southern senators investigating Brown’s raid, which led to an attempt by federal marshals to capture Sanborn in Concord on 3 April 1860 and return him to Washington, D.C., to testify about his part in the affair. Sanborn was rescued by the townspeople of Concord, and the U.S. Senate warrant for his arrest was eventually declared illegal by the Massachusetts Supreme Court. Sanborn remained devoted to Brown’s memory for the rest of his life, and he published a biography of him, Life and Letters of John Brown, Liberator of Kansas, and Martyr of Virginia, in 1885. In 1862 Sanborn married Louisa Augusta Leavitt, his cousin; they had three children.
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Citation:
Larry Gara, "Pierce, Franklin," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00788.html.
Body Summary:
Personal and public tragedy plagued Pierce's presidency and undoubtedly contributed to his serious drinking problem. He was president at a time that called for almost superhuman skills, yet he lacked such skills and never grew into the job to which he had been elected. His view of the Constitution and the Union was from the Jacksonian past. He never fully understood the nature or depth of Free Soil sentiment in the North. He was able to negotiate a reciprocal trade treaty with Canada, to begin the opening of Japan to western trade, to add land to the Southwest, and to sign legislation for the creation of an overseas empire. His Cuba and Kansas policies led only to deeper sectional strife. His support for the Kansas-Nebraska Act and his determination to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act helped polarize the sections. Pierce was hard-working and his administration largely untainted by graft, yet the legacy from those four turbulent years contributed to the tragedy of secession and civil war.
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Earl J. Hess, "Sigel, Franz," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00716.html.
Body Summary:
Throughout the early part of his public life, Sigel's motives were sincere. Inspired by the liberal themes of the French Revolution of 1848, he genuinely supported the Baden revolution and the war against the Confederacy. However, by 1862 he began to manipulate the press and the public that had showered him with undeserved praise. By 1865 most of his supporters and all of his superior officers abandoned him because they came to realize his accomplishments did not match the promise of his publicity. Nevertheless, he was the most famous German-American general in the Union army and the most visible symbol of immigrant support for the Union cause.
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Roy E. Finkenbine, "Douglass, Frederick," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00186.html.
Body Summary:
Unlike [William] Garrison, who viewed moral suasionist appeals to individual conscience as the only appropriate tactic, Douglass was increasingly persuaded of the efficacy of politics and violence for ending bondage. He attended the Free Soil Convention in Buffalo in 1848 and endorsed its platform calling for a prohibition on the extension of slavery. In 1851 he merged the North Star with the Liberty Party Paper to form Frederick Douglass' Paper, which openly endorsed political abolitionism. This brought a final breech with the Garrisonians, who subjected him to a torrent of public attacks, including scandalous charges about his personal behavior. Nevertheless, Douglass endorsed the nascent Republican party and its moderate antislavery platform in the elections of 1856 and 1860. At the same time, he increasingly explored the possibilities of abolitionist violence. As early as 1849 Douglass endorsed slave violence, telling a Boston audience that he would welcome news that the slaves had revolted and "were engaged in spreading death and devastation" throughout the South. After passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which put the federal government in the business of capturing and returning runaway slaves, he publicly urged resistance to the law, with violence if necessary. And he became active in the Underground Railroad, hiding numerous fugitives in his Rochester home and helping them on the way to Canada West (now Ontario). Douglass's growing attraction to violence is evident in his 1852 novella, The Heroic Slave, generally considered to be the first piece of African-American fiction, which glorified the leader of a bloody slave revolt.
Type: Description
Citation:
Roy E. Finkenbine, "Douglass, Frederick," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00186.html.
Body Summary:
Literacy and a growing social consciousness made Frederick into an unruly bondsman. In 1833, after being taken by master Thomas Auld to a plantation near St. Michael's, Maryland, he organized a secret school for slaves, but it was discovered and broken up by a mob of local whites. To discipline Frederick, Auld hired him out to a local farmer who had a reputation as a "slave breaker." Instead he became increasingly defiant and refused to allow himself to be whipped. Hired out to another local farmer, he again organized a secret school for slaves. Before long, he and his pupils had plotted to escape to the free state of Pennsylvania, but this too was discovered. Expecting further trouble from Frederick, Auld returned him to Baltimore in 1836 and hired him out to a local shipyard to learn the caulking trade. Taking advantage of the relative liberty afforded by the city, Frederick joined a self-improvement society of free black caulkers that regularly debated the major social and intellectual questions of the day.
After an unsuccessful attempt to buy his freedom, Frederick escaped from slavery in September 1838. Dressed as a sailor and carrying the free papers of a black seaman he had met on the streets of Baltimore, he traveled by train and steamboat to New York. There he married Anna Murray, a free black domestic servant from Baltimore who had encouraged his escape...he adopted the surname Douglass to disguise his background and confuse slave catchers.
After an unsuccessful attempt to buy his freedom, Frederick escaped from slavery in September 1838. Dressed as a sailor and carrying the free papers of a black seaman he had met on the streets of Baltimore, he traveled by train and steamboat to New York. There he married Anna Murray, a free black domestic servant from Baltimore who had encouraged his escape...he adopted the surname Douglass to disguise his background and confuse slave catchers.
Type: Description
Citation:
Roy E. Finkenbine, "Douglass, Frederick," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00186.html.
Body Summary:
Douglass's growing sophistication as a speaker brought other difficulties in the mid-1840s. At first, his speeches were simple accounts of his life in bondage. But as he matured as an antislavery lecturer, he increasingly sought to provide a critical analysis of both slavery and northern racial prejudice. His eloquence and keen mind even led some to question whether he had ever been a slave. As Douglass's skills--combined with his circumspection--prompted critics to question his credibility, some white abolitionists feared that his effectiveness on the platform might be lost. They advised him to speak more haltingly and to hew to his earlier simple tale. One white colleague thought it "better to have a little of the plantation" in his speech.
Douglass bristled under such paternalistic tutelage. An answer was to publish an autobiography providing full details of his life that he had withheld. Although some friends argued against that course, fearing for his safety, Douglass sat down in the winter of 1844-1845 and wrote the story of his life. The result was the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Written by Himself (1845). The brief autobiography, which ran only to 144 pages, put his platform tale into print and reached a broad American and European audience. It sold more than 30,000 copies in the United States and Britain within five years and was translated into French, German, and Dutch. Along with his public lectures, "the Narrative made Frederick Douglass the most famous black person in the world."
Douglass bristled under such paternalistic tutelage. An answer was to publish an autobiography providing full details of his life that he had withheld. Although some friends argued against that course, fearing for his safety, Douglass sat down in the winter of 1844-1845 and wrote the story of his life. The result was the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Written by Himself (1845). The brief autobiography, which ran only to 144 pages, put his platform tale into print and reached a broad American and European audience. It sold more than 30,000 copies in the United States and Britain within five years and was translated into French, German, and Dutch. Along with his public lectures, "the Narrative made Frederick Douglass the most famous black person in the world."
Type: Description
Citation:
Walter LaFeber, "Seward, Frederick," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00896.html.
Body Summary:
When [President Abraham] Lincoln was shot that night, another assassin, Lewis Payne, was to kill the secretary of state, who was recovering in bed from an accident. Fred Seward stopped Payne outside his father's bedroom. Payne tried to shoot him, but the pistol misfired. Payne pistol-whipped Fred, fracturing his skull. The assassin then slashed [Secretary of State] William Seward, who eventually recovered. Fred lay unconscious for days before beginning to improve. By early 1866 both Sewards had returned to the State Department, where William plotted a vast postwar expansionist policy to obtain Caribbean bases and trading outlets in the Pacific Ocean-East Asian regions.
In December 1866 Fred Seward went to Santo Domingo with Vice Admiral David D. Porter to negotiate the sale or lease of the magnificent Samaná Bay. Discovering that the surrounding heights controlled the bay, they demanded this land as well. The Dominican government refused, and the mission failed. Later in 1867 the Dominicans did sign a treaty, but it was rejected by the U.S. Senate, whose Radical Republicans had broken with both the more conservative president, Andrew Johnson, and William Seward. The secretary of state's expansionist plans were largely unrealized except for the purchase of Alaska from Russia in 1867. During these talks, Fred Seward successfully lobbied the unpredictable chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Charles Sumner, to obtain his necessary support for the treaty.
In December 1866 Fred Seward went to Santo Domingo with Vice Admiral David D. Porter to negotiate the sale or lease of the magnificent Samaná Bay. Discovering that the surrounding heights controlled the bay, they demanded this land as well. The Dominican government refused, and the mission failed. Later in 1867 the Dominicans did sign a treaty, but it was rejected by the U.S. Senate, whose Radical Republicans had broken with both the more conservative president, Andrew Johnson, and William Seward. The secretary of state's expansionist plans were largely unrealized except for the purchase of Alaska from Russia in 1867. During these talks, Fred Seward successfully lobbied the unpredictable chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Charles Sumner, to obtain his necessary support for the treaty.
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Citation:
Jeffry D. Wert, "Steele, Frederick," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00947.html.
Body Summary:
In the spring of 1864 Steele was directed to advance southward across the state and cooperate with Nathaniel Banks's campaign up the Red River in Louisiana. Steele's command departed from Little Rock on this so-called Camden expedition on 23 March. Steele advanced southwestward, colliding with Confederate forces at Okolona on 3 April before turning eastward and fighting at Prairie d'Ane on 10-13 April and at Poison Spring on 18 April. The Federals occupied Camden for nearly a fortnight before beginning a retreat to Little Rock. At Jenkins Ferry on the Saline River on 30 April, Steele's troops repulsed the attacks of a numerically superior Confederate force, securing their retreat route to the state capital, which they reached on 3 May. Banks's operations along the Red River resulted in failure, but Steele was blameless as the Confederates mobilized troops to prevent his juncture with Banks.
Steele remained in Arkansas as department commander until the winter of 1865, when he commanded a division in Edward R. S. Canby's army in siege operations against Mobile, Alabama. At the close of hostilities, Federal authorities sent Steele to Texas, where he remained for nearly two years.
Steele remained in Arkansas as department commander until the winter of 1865, when he commanded a division in Edward R. S. Canby's army in siege operations against Mobile, Alabama. At the close of hostilities, Federal authorities sent Steele to Texas, where he remained for nearly two years.
Type: Description
Citation:
Allan Burton Spetter, "Frelinghuysen, Frederick Theodore," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00398.html.
Body Summary:
Along with many of his contemporaries, [Frelinghuysen] quit the Whig party, as it disintegrated in the early 1850s, and eventually moved into the new Republican party. Frelinghuysen did not participate as a "founding father" of the new party, however, because he agonized for several years over his decision to abandon the Whigs. His family felt a unique attachment to the party, which had offered the nation the ticket of Henry Clay for president and Theodore Frelinghuysen for vice president in the election of 1844. By 1860, however, Frederick Frelinghuysen enthusiastically supported the Republicans and endorsed Abraham Lincoln in his bid for the presidential nomination.
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Citation:
Edward Hagerman, "Rains, Gabriel James," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00645.html.
Body Summary:
With the outbreak of the Civil War, [Gabriel] Rains accepted a commission as brigadier general in the Confederate army. Assigned command of a brigade under General D. H. Hill, Rains commanded at Yorktown in 1861-1862 and led the retreat before General George McClellan's advancing army. Rains had experimented with explosives long before the Civil War, and at Yorktown he mined the adjoining waters. When he retreated from Yorktown he mined the road against pursuing Union cavalry and again mined the roads at Williamsburg. In the resulting outcry from the Union army and newspapers, his corps commander, General James Longstreet, forbade the use of land mines. The Confederate secretary of war accepted their use but reprimanded Rains for questioning the authority of his corps commander. Rains persisted and convinced President Jefferson Davis of both the ethical legitimacy and the military value of mine warfare. One sign of the shift from limited to total war in tactics was the conversion, as the war progressed, of most of his Confederate and Union critics to the ethical legitimacy of this emerging form of warfare. Rains subsequently used land mines to protect the land approaches to Richmond, Mobile, and Charleston.
Type: Description
Citation:
Robert D. Ilisevich, "Grow, Galusha Aaron," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00444.html.
Body Summary:
Once he was sure the Democratic party no longer spoke for free homesteads because it had fallen under the sway of southerners, Grow became a Republican. After passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854, he helped organize the House Republicans. Newspaperman Horace Greeley called him a "young chevalier" who led the opposition for a free Kansas against the proslavery forces and the Democratic administration's policies in that territory. Grow's constant badgering of southerners triggered both a fistfight on the House floor with Lawrence Keitt of South Carolina and a challenge to a duel by Lawrence Branch of North Carolina.
His combativeness and leadership role among the radical Republicans enabled Grow to become Speaker of the House after the party's successes in 1860. His defiant attitude did not mellow. He warned that no foot of American soil would be sacrificed to the secessionists until it was first "baptized in fire and blood." The southern conspiracy against the Constitution had to be totally destroyed, he insisted. For many years afterward, he clung to the conspiracy theory and remained one of the last Republicans to abandon "bloody shirt" politics of recriminations against the Democrats and the South.
His combativeness and leadership role among the radical Republicans enabled Grow to become Speaker of the House after the party's successes in 1860. His defiant attitude did not mellow. He warned that no foot of American soil would be sacrificed to the secessionists until it was first "baptized in fire and blood." The southern conspiracy against the Constitution had to be totally destroyed, he insisted. For many years afterward, he clung to the conspiracy theory and remained one of the last Republicans to abandon "bloody shirt" politics of recriminations against the Democrats and the South.
Type: Description
Citation:
Robert M. Ireland, "Davis, Garret," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00296.html.
Body Summary:
In December 1861 Davis's passionate nature paid off when the Kentucky legislature elected him to the U.S. Senate, in part because of his energetic activities on behalf of the Union. In the spring of 1861 he had served as Abraham Lincoln's agent in the distribution of rifles to Union partisans in Kentucky. During the early stages of his senatorial career, he continued his spirited embrace of Lincoln and the Union. However, as the conflict grew more radical in nature and came to encompass emancipation as an objective, Davis, a slave owner, abandoned his commitment to the president and his policies. In early 1864 he introduced resolutions in the Senate that described Lincoln and his supporters as destroyers of the Constitution who were violating civil liberties, plundering the treasury, and perpetuating the spoils system. So intemperate were these resolutions that they nearly resulted in Davis's expulsion from the Senate. His bigotry and sarcasm also were in evidence when he offered an amendment to the proposed Thirteenth Amendment, which, if adopted, would have denied U.S. citizenship to African Americans and consolidated the states of New England into two states, East and West New England (the latter proposal doubtless being a tongue-in-cheek attempt to reduce the political power of a region of "radical" Yankees). He likewise strenuously opposed the involvement of the Union army in state elections, a growing controversy in his home state.
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Citation:
Stephen M. Archer, "Booth, John Wilkes," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01210.html.
Body Summary:
[John Wilkes] Booth grew increasingly obsessed with the subjects of slavery and the Confederacy. He recruited two boyhood friends, Michael O'Laughlin and Samuel Arnold, to assist him in kidnapping [President Abraham] Lincoln, which they planned for 20 March [1865]. Lincoln did not appear as expected; the conspirators panicked and fled. Later Booth added David Herold and George Atzerodt to his band, completing it with Lewis Powell, known also as Lewis Payne. By this time Booth had become acquainted with a young rebel, John Surratt, and his mother, Mary Eugenia Surratt, a rebel sympathizer who operated a boardinghouse in Washington, in which the group would meet from time to time.
The kidnapping plot evaporated when the city of Richmond fell and the war ended. Five days later, on 14 April 1865, Booth learned that President Lincoln planned to attend Our American Cousin (starring Laura Keene) at Ford's Theatre. Working quickly, Booth assigned Atzerodt to assassinate Vice President Andrew Johnson and Payne to kill Secretary of State William Seward while Booth himself murdered Lincoln. Atzerodt lost his nerve and made no attempt on Johnson, but Payne, a young giant, wounded Seward severely, as well as several others who tried to defend him.
The kidnapping plot evaporated when the city of Richmond fell and the war ended. Five days later, on 14 April 1865, Booth learned that President Lincoln planned to attend Our American Cousin (starring Laura Keene) at Ford's Theatre. Working quickly, Booth assigned Atzerodt to assassinate Vice President Andrew Johnson and Payne to kill Secretary of State William Seward while Booth himself murdered Lincoln. Atzerodt lost his nerve and made no attempt on Johnson, but Payne, a young giant, wounded Seward severely, as well as several others who tried to defend him.
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Citation:
Robert M. Utley, "Custer, George Armstrong," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00290.html.
Body Summary:
Custer found his calling in the Civil War. Two years of staff duty, including a tour as aide to General George B. McClellan (1826-1885), established his military skill, both as a staff officer and in combat. So impressed was General Alfred Pleasonton, commander of the Cavalry Corps of the Army of the Potomac, that he recommended Custer for promotion. In June 1863 Captain Custer was appointed brigadier general of volunteers and given command of the Michigan Cavalry Brigade. At twenty-three, he was the youngest general in the Union army. Almost instantly General Custer made a dazzling name for himself. On the third day of Gettysburg the Michigan Brigade played a key role in turning back General J. E. B. Stuart's Confederate cavalry, which threatened the Union rear at the very moment of George Edward Pickett's charge on the Union center. Thereafter Custer's successes accumulated one after another. He became known throughout the army for smashing cavalry charges, for heedless bravery, for tactical brilliance more instinctive than cerebral, for heavy casualties, and, with long yellow hair and gold-bedecked black uniform, for personal flamboyance. Newspapers made him a household name.
Type: Description
Citation:
Robert M. Utley, "Custer, George Armstrong," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00290.html.
Body Summary:
By 1875 Custer was widely admired as the nation's foremost Indian fighter. He boasted a solid record, but the fame came as much from newspaper attention and from his own writings. He published a series of magazine articles and then consolidated them into an autobiography, which reached a large audience. Custer's final campaign, ending in the battle of the Little Bighorn on 25 June 1876, earned him immortality and a place in the national folklore. The disaster, low point for the army in the Great Sioux War of 1876, occurred when the Seventh Cavalry attacked a large Sioux and Cheyenne encampment on Montana's Little Bighorn River. Five companies under Custer's immediate command, more than two hundred officers and troopers, were wiped out by nearly two thousand warriors defending their families. The remaining seven companies of the regiment, under Major Marcus A. Reno and Captain Frederick W. Benteen, successfully defended an entrenched hilltop for two days until reinforcements arrived.
At once the subject of bitter controversy, "Custer's Last Stand" has been vigorously debated ever since. Custer has been charged with recklessness, Reno with cowardice, and their superiors with faulty strategy. Defenders ensure that the arguments will endure forever, as will the image of the doomed but heroic figure of Custer facing death on a hilltop. In large part, however, the soldiers lost because the Indians won--although in victory lay the seeds of their ultimate defeat.
At once the subject of bitter controversy, "Custer's Last Stand" has been vigorously debated ever since. Custer has been charged with recklessness, Reno with cowardice, and their superiors with faulty strategy. Defenders ensure that the arguments will endure forever, as will the image of the doomed but heroic figure of Custer facing death on a hilltop. In large part, however, the soldiers lost because the Indians won--although in victory lay the seeds of their ultimate defeat.
Type: Description
Citation:
Lilian Handlin, "Bancroft, George," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/14/14-00034.html.
Body Summary:
As secretary [of the navy] Bancroft acquired first-hand experience at conducting foreign policy in a democratic society. He also helped found the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis and tried to streamline the Navy Department. Bancroft was instrumental in the acquisition of California, ordering the Pacific Naval Squadron in June 1845 to occupy San Francisco and other ports in case of war, and he defended President Polk against the charge that the president was party to a nefarious southern plot to extend slavery. Bancroft believed that the Mexican War, of which he was an enthusiastic supporter, was a god-sent opportunity to enlarge the national domain for liberty. The vociferous antiwar sentiment, the shifting political alliances the war created, and the strange bedfellows it produced astounded Bancroft.
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Citation:
Steven E. Woodworth, "McClellan, George B," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00674.html.
Body Summary:
As commander of the Army of the Potomac, he was perhaps the only man in the country who could have won the war in an afternoon, but he was also one of the few who could have lost it in that span. The accomplishment of denying so formidable an opponent as Lee his goal of crushing the Army of the Potomac in the Seven Days' battles was not without merit, but its credit to McClellan was interred long before the general's bones were laid to rest. … Although on at least two occasions he had the power to reach forth his hand and end the war during the summer of 1862, timidity palsied that hand, and the killing went on for another two and a half years. Ironically, his failure of nerve ensured the adoption and full implementation of the hard war policies he deprecated, including emancipation. His squeamishness for the lives of his soldiers doomed them to added years of combat…Gifted with a brilliant intellect, McClellan also had personal charm and a remarkable ability to win the affection not only of his soldiers but of nearly everyone who came into contact with him…His ability as an organizer and motivator of troops was equally impressive.
He seemed unable or unwilling to apply his remarkable intelligence in new ways or in the face of unforeseen circumstances. His plans often had much merit to them, but he lacked the tough-mindedness to see them through to victory.
He seemed unable or unwilling to apply his remarkable intelligence in new ways or in the face of unforeseen circumstances. His plans often had much merit to them, but he lacked the tough-mindedness to see them through to victory.
Type: Description
Citation:
Steven E. Woodworth, "McClellan, George B," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00674.html.
Body Summary:
McClellan sought and obtained the Democratic party's 1864 presidential nomination, but the convention was dominated by Peace Democrats, or Copperheads, who wrote a platform calling the war a failure and demanding an immediate armistice, with vague reference to a possible, though in reality highly unlikely, future restoration of the Union by peaceful negotiation. McClellan, in his letter accepting the nomination, tried unsuccessfully to distance himself from this extreme position, emphasizing his determination to continue the war until the Union was restored. The people, however, perceived McClellan and the Democrats, not without reason, as the party of peace and disunion. In the event, major Federal victories during the fall of 1864, particularly the capture of Atlanta, made a mockery of the Democratic platform and helped ensure McClellan's defeat by a landslide. Vote totals among soldiers were even more starkly against him, even in the Army of the Potomac that once idolized him.
On election day, before the results were known, McClellan wrote out his resignation from the army. He could live comfortably on the wealth produced by his stockholdings in the Ohio & Mississippi Railroad. Disgusted with the electoral decision of the American people, he left the country in January 1865 and traveled in Europe for three years.
On election day, before the results were known, McClellan wrote out his resignation from the army. He could live comfortably on the wealth produced by his stockholdings in the Ohio & Mississippi Railroad. Disgusted with the electoral decision of the American people, he left the country in January 1865 and traveled in Europe for three years.
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Citation:
David F. Herr, "DeBaptiste, George," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-01037.html.
Body Summary:
Between 1836 and 1838 DeBaptiste moved to Madison, Indiana, where he barbered, engaged in a number of other business enterprises, and served as a conductor for the underground railroad. Although the number of slaves he directly assisted is unknown, DeBaptiste gained a reputation as an abolitionist and conductor by crossing the Ohio River into Kentucky and escorting fugitive slaves into Indiana and Ohio. From there, they would go to Michigan and eventually Canada. His reputation as a conductor drew the ire of local whites. Probably as a result of his notoriety, the state of Indiana prosecuted George for residing in the state without paying the bond required of free blacks. He was saved from expulsion and possible sale into slavery by Stephen C. Stevens, a former member of the Indiana Supreme Court and prominent white attorney who opposed slavery. Stevens argued against the order expelling DeBaptiste, claiming that it was unconstitutional and did not specify his state of origin (where he was to be returned) as the law required. The court agreed only that the order was defective and allowed DeBaptiste to remain a resident.
Type: Description
Citation:
John T. Hubbell, "Pickett, George Edward," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00787.html.
Body Summary:
Pickett's division arrived on the field at Gettysburg late on 2 July, in time for a night's rest before their famous and fateful action on 3 July. [General Robert E.] Lee believed that the fighting on 2 July had weakened the Union center, and that was his target on the third day. Pickett's division spearheaded the charge. Pickett was apparently confident of success, according to some witnesses, notwithstanding the obvious hazards his soldiers faced. After a long and largely ineffective cannonade, Pickett's men stepped off, as if on parade. Within the hour, the Confederate attack and Pickett's division were destroyed.
Lee accepted blame for the debacle, but Pickett came under severe criticism for not leading his men. Rather he was variously to the rear or elsewhere. Others defended his conduct. In either case, his morale, his spirit, and his reputation were ruined. He never recovered from that awful day, although he served in North Carolina and Virginia until relieved of his command as the war was ending.
Lee accepted blame for the debacle, but Pickett came under severe criticism for not leading his men. Rather he was variously to the rear or elsewhere. Others defended his conduct. In either case, his morale, his spirit, and his reputation were ruined. He never recovered from that awful day, although he served in North Carolina and Virginia until relieved of his command as the war was ending.
Type: Description
Citation:
Terry L. Seip, "Spencer, George Eliphaz," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01217.html.
Body Summary:
When Congress took control of Reconstruction in early 1867, Spencer returned to Alabama and secured an appointment as a register in bankruptcy. His wife joined him in July, and in addition to working the bankruptcy circuit, he labored to "carry Alabama and secure it permanently to the Republican party."… He campaigned aggressively for Republican candidates in the state elections of February 1868, and the new legislature rewarded him with a U.S. Senate seat. Reelected four years later, Spencer served from Alabama's readmission to the Union in July 1868 until 1879--well after conservative Democrats had "redeemed" the state from Republican rule in 1874. It was a turbulent tenure--conservatives immediately tagged him with the opprobrious epithet of "carpetbagger," and Spencer and other Republicans faced constant ostracism and intimidation from an overwhelming majority of white southerners.
A pivotal figure in Alabama politics during the 1870s, Spencer quickly emerged as a shrewd political infighter who used power and patronage to reward friends and punish enemies--both inside and outside his party. In Congress, Spencer acquired a reputation as a stalwart politician, a regular Grant Republican, yet his rhetoric and activity also reflected an idealistic concern for the welfare of the freedmen and a missionary belief in the necessity of southern "regeneration"--reshaping the region into a more progressive society. On economic measures, he energetically served constituent interests, especially as a member of the Senate Commerce Committee, where he steered federal funds to the South through the annual rivers and harbors appropriations.
A pivotal figure in Alabama politics during the 1870s, Spencer quickly emerged as a shrewd political infighter who used power and patronage to reward friends and punish enemies--both inside and outside his party. In Congress, Spencer acquired a reputation as a stalwart politician, a regular Grant Republican, yet his rhetoric and activity also reflected an idealistic concern for the welfare of the freedmen and a missionary belief in the necessity of southern "regeneration"--reshaping the region into a more progressive society. On economic measures, he energetically served constituent interests, especially as a member of the Senate Commerce Committee, where he steered federal funds to the South through the annual rivers and harbors appropriations.
Type: Description
Citation:
Herman Hattaway and Michael D. Smith, "Meade, George Gordon," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00697.html.
Body Summary:
The bespectacled Meade resembled more the scholar than the soldier, but being at times short-tempered, he lived up to a popular description of him as a "damned old goggle-eyed snapping turtle." He saw to it that each corps in his army had a gallows or shooting post for "Friday executions." He deserted newspaper correspondents, believing much of their reporting to be inaccurate and to him malicious. Frequently he barred them from his army, only to have them retaliate with still more unfavorable coverage. According to his biographer, Freeman Cleaves, Meade's contributions were so distorted and denigrated by the Radical press that Meade supposed "it soon would be proved that either he was not at Gettysburg at all or that his presence there had been a positive detriment." Press criticism combined with the biased memoirs of grandstanding commanders who had various affiliations with the Army of the Potomac effectively relegate Meade to the background. His reputation has not achieved the high level that it deserves.
Type: Description
Citation:
Herman Hattaway and Michael D. Smith, "Thomas, George Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00983.html.
Body Summary:
Although promoted to major general in the regular army on 15 December 1864 and bestowed the official thanks of Congress on 3 March 1865, Thomas ended his war career with bitter feelings toward the army because of the grudging manner in which he had been treated and the slowness of his promotions. It is possible that President Andrew Johnson wanted to replace Grant with Thomas when he offered the latter the brevet ranks of lieutenant general and general in 1868. Regardless of Johnson's intentions, Thomas declined, saying it was now too late to reward him for his war service. For four years, beginning in 1865, Thomas held garrison and departmental commands at Nashville and Louisville. In 1869, at his request, Thomas took command of the Military Division of the Pacific, but soon after arriving he died of a stroke in San Francisco while replying to a published criticism of his conduct at Nashville.
Although admired by his men for his careful approach to battle, Thomas was perceived by Grant and others as sluggish and incapable of conducting a vigorous offensive campaign. Though unappreciated, his genius was on the defensive, where his slow, stubborn refusal to yield were attributes rather than hindrances.
Although admired by his men for his careful approach to battle, Thomas was perceived by Grant and others as sluggish and incapable of conducting a vigorous offensive campaign. Though unappreciated, his genius was on the defensive, where his slow, stubborn refusal to yield were attributes rather than hindrances.
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Citation:
Leonard Schlup, "Williams, George Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00959.html.
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Becoming increasingly dissatisfied with the Democratic party during the course of the Civil War and pleased with the policies of President Abraham Lincoln, Williams joined the Republican party in 1864. That year the Oregon state legislature elected him as a Republican to the U.S. Senate, where he served from 1865 to 1871.... Williams supported the Radical Republicans, including Representative Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania, in attempts to impose a strict policy of Reconstruction on the vanquished South. He wrote the Reconstruction Act of 1867, which reorganized the Confederate states under military governors. His position on Reconstruction was further refined in a Senate speech on 4 February 1868. A member of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction and of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, he opposed President Andrew Johnson. Williams introduced the Tenure of Office Act of 1867 to prohibit the chief executive from removing cabinet members and other civil officials without senatorial approval, fearing that the southern president might replace loyal Republicans appointed by Lincoln with former rebels. Congress passed this controversial measure over Johnson's veto. In 1868 Williams was one of the chief advocates of the impeachment of Johnson.
Type: Description
Citation:
Leonard Schlup, "Williams, George Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00959.html.
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In 1853, upon the recommendation of Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois, President [Franklin] Pierce appointed Williams chief justice of the territorial courts of Oregon, where Williams remained until 1857. One of his controversial decisions involved a free African American, Robin Holmes, who had sued his former owner, Nathaniel Ford, to obtain legal custody of his children. Williams, who opposed the extension of slavery into Oregon, ruled in favor of Holmes.
Although reappointed chief justice of the territory of Oregon by President James Buchanan, Williams resigned in 1857 to practice law in Portland, Oregon. While building his practice, he, in partnerships, formed a woolen manufacturing company, acquired the Oregon Statesman, and established the Oregon Printing and Publishing Company…. In 1857 Williams published his "Free State Letter" in the Oregon Statesman, contending that, from a practical standpoint, slavery in Oregon should be prohibited. This letter antagonized many of his proslavery Democratic friends. That same year he participated in the Oregon constitutional convention, and because of his judicial background, he was selected to chair the committee dealing with the judicial branch of government. Oregon entered the Union in 1859.
Although reappointed chief justice of the territory of Oregon by President James Buchanan, Williams resigned in 1857 to practice law in Portland, Oregon. While building his practice, he, in partnerships, formed a woolen manufacturing company, acquired the Oregon Statesman, and established the Oregon Printing and Publishing Company…. In 1857 Williams published his "Free State Letter" in the Oregon Statesman, contending that, from a practical standpoint, slavery in Oregon should be prohibited. This letter antagonized many of his proslavery Democratic friends. That same year he participated in the Oregon constitutional convention, and because of his judicial background, he was selected to chair the committee dealing with the judicial branch of government. Oregon entered the Union in 1859.
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Louis S. Gerteis, "Stearns, George Luther," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00946.html.
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By 1856 Stearns was deeply involved in the antislavery struggle in Kansas. As chair of the Kansas Committee of Massachusetts, Stearns raised money (much of it his own) to purchase Sharpe's rifles and other supplies to support the free state settlers in their fight against proslavery Missourians and a federally supported proslavery territorial government at Lecompton, Kansas. Deeply impressed with John Brown's call for retributive justice, Stearns became an important financial backer of the guerrilla chieftain in Kansas and joined the "Secret Six" in supporting and financing Brown's plans to extend his antislavery guerrilla war into Virginia.
After Brown's raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Stearns and a fellow conspirator, Samuel Gridley Howe, fled briefly to Montreal. But Stearns returned to defend his actions before a Senate committee investigating the role of "subversive organizations." He admitted that he supported Brown's efforts to "go into Virginia or some other state and relieve slaves," but he denied any knowledge of plans to commit treason against the United States. The committee uncovered no evidence to indicate that Stearns or anyone else outside Brown's raiding party had such knowledge.
After Brown's raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Stearns and a fellow conspirator, Samuel Gridley Howe, fled briefly to Montreal. But Stearns returned to defend his actions before a Senate committee investigating the role of "subversive organizations." He admitted that he supported Brown's efforts to "go into Virginia or some other state and relieve slaves," but he denied any knowledge of plans to commit treason against the United States. The committee uncovered no evidence to indicate that Stearns or anyone else outside Brown's raiding party had such knowledge.
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Albert Castel, "Stoneman, George," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00750.html.
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Commissioned a second lieutenant in the First Dragoons, during the Mexican War he served as quartermaster for the "Mormon Battalion" in Brigadier General Stephen Watts Kearny's expedition to California. Following the war he was stationed at various army posts in the Southwest, rising to the rank of captain in the Second Cavalry.
In April 1861, while commanding Fort Brown, Texas, Stoneman refused a surrender demand from his departmental commander, Brigadier General David E. Twiggs, who had gone over to the Confederates, and then managed to escape with his company to New York City by means of a steamboat that he seized. After remounting his company at Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania, he took it to Washington, D.C., the first cavalry to reach the capital after the outbreak of the Civil War. Promoted to major, he served on the staff of his West Point classmate General George B. McClellan (1826-1885), during the latter's campaign in western Virginia in the early summer of 1861. After McClellan received command of all Union forces in the Virginia theater, Stoneman became a brigadier general and chief of cavalry of what would become known as the Army of the Potomac. During the Peninsular campaign (Apr.-July 1862), however, he accomplished little owing to McClellan's practice of attaching the mounted forces to infantry corps instead of employing them as a consolidated unit. Perhaps for this reason Stoneman in the fall of 1862 transferred to the infantry, where at first he headed a division in the III Corps.
In April 1861, while commanding Fort Brown, Texas, Stoneman refused a surrender demand from his departmental commander, Brigadier General David E. Twiggs, who had gone over to the Confederates, and then managed to escape with his company to New York City by means of a steamboat that he seized. After remounting his company at Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania, he took it to Washington, D.C., the first cavalry to reach the capital after the outbreak of the Civil War. Promoted to major, he served on the staff of his West Point classmate General George B. McClellan (1826-1885), during the latter's campaign in western Virginia in the early summer of 1861. After McClellan received command of all Union forces in the Virginia theater, Stoneman became a brigadier general and chief of cavalry of what would become known as the Army of the Potomac. During the Peninsular campaign (Apr.-July 1862), however, he accomplished little owing to McClellan's practice of attaching the mounted forces to infantry corps instead of employing them as a consolidated unit. Perhaps for this reason Stoneman in the fall of 1862 transferred to the infantry, where at first he headed a division in the III Corps.
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Steven E. Woodworth, "Getty, George Washington," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00273.html.
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When the Civil War broke out, Getty was stationed at Fort Randall, Dakota Territory. On 14 May 1861 he was transferred to the Fifth Artillery and for a time was stationed at Fort Monroe, on the end of the Virginia Peninsula. On 28 September he was commissioned lieutenant colonel of volunteers. That fall he served as chief of artillery to General Joseph Hooker's division, deployed along the Lower Potomac. In the Peninsula campaign the following spring, he commanded a four-battery brigade of the artillery reserve in the siege of Yorktown and the battles of Gaines' Mill and Malvern Hill. When Confederate general Robert E. Lee invaded Maryland that fall, Getty was involved in the resulting battles of South Mountain and Antietam, where he served as chief of artillery for General Ambrose Burnside's IX Corps. Union artillery performed well at Antietam, prompting their opposite numbers in the Confederate army, their chief targets, to dub the battle "artillery hell." Getty was recognized for his part in this success with promotion to brigadier general of volunteers on 25 September 1862, just eight days after the battle. The next month he took command of one of the infantry divisions of the IX Corps, which he led at the battle of Fredericksburg, 13 December 1862.
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Ritchie Devon Watson, "Bagby, George William," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00064.html.
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From 1857 to 1859 Bagby resided in Washington, where he served as correspondent for a number of southern newspapers. During this period, in 1858, he sent the first of eight "Mozis Addums" letters to the Southern Literary Messenger in Richmond. The letters are modeled on the speech of backwoods characters Bagby had known as a youth in southside Virginia and are influenced by the well-established tradition of southwest dialect humor. The letters, addressed to a friend named "Billy Ivvins" in "Curdsville, Va.," recounted the rustic and innocent narrator's many burlesque adventures in Washington, D.C., including a trip to see the president that ends up in the disreputable establishment of a faro dealer. They were an immediate success and were no doubt partly responsible for Bagby's being named editor of the Southern Literary Messenger in 1860.
Bagby gratefully received the call to Richmond, for he had come to feel increasingly alienated by the antislavery fervor of many of Washington's politicians. The secession that Bagby fervently supported in Messenger editorials soon came, but the ensuing war had a disastrous effect on his magazine. After struggling for more than three years to keep the publication alive in the face of dwindling paper and ink supplies and gradually shrinking subscriptions, Bagby resigned his position as editor in January 1864, five months before the Messenger ceased publication.
Bagby's fortunes were so closely tied to the Confederacy that he fled Richmond with Jefferson Davis's entourage one day before the city fell to Union troops.
Bagby gratefully received the call to Richmond, for he had come to feel increasingly alienated by the antislavery fervor of many of Washington's politicians. The secession that Bagby fervently supported in Messenger editorials soon came, but the ensuing war had a disastrous effect on his magazine. After struggling for more than three years to keep the publication alive in the face of dwindling paper and ink supplies and gradually shrinking subscriptions, Bagby resigned his position as editor in January 1864, five months before the Messenger ceased publication.
Bagby's fortunes were so closely tied to the Confederacy that he fled Richmond with Jefferson Davis's entourage one day before the city fell to Union troops.
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George Green Shackelford, "Randolph, George Wythe," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00820.html.
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Richmond elected Randolph to the Virginia Convention of 1861 as a secessionist. He urged that the state withdraw from the Union as soon as practicable in order to capitalize on its military preparedness and to avoid war. During the convention he was named to a three-man commission to go to Washington, D.C., and learn President Lincoln's intentions. On 13 April the president reiterated his inaugural pledges to hold federal installations, to repel force with force, and not to invade any southern states. After hostilities began at Fort Sumter and Lincoln called for troops to suppress rebellion, Randolph told the convention, "You have got to fight" and posed the question, "which side will you fight with?"
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John R. McKivigan, "Smith, Gerrit," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00627.html.
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The Smith family fortune was threatened by the nationwide financial depression of the late 1830s, but Gerrit ultimately survived the crisis richer than ever. In the 1840s and 1850s his annual income from his landholdings and investments in banking and railroads typically exceeded $60,000.
Smith's great fortune allowed him to become one of the leading philanthropists of the early nineteenth century. Although he was antisectarian in his personal religious beliefs, Smith gave generously to the American Bible Society, the American Tract Society, and the American Sunday School Union….Smith became a leader and major financial sponsor of state and national organizations promoting temperance, prison reform, international peace, and land reform. He also supported his wife's and his daughter Elizabeth Smith Miller's active participation in the women's rights movement.
The cause that captured the greatest portion of Smith's attention was the campaign to end slavery. At first Smith supported efforts to colonize slaves in Africa, but in 1835 he joined the more militant abolitionist movement that demanded immediate emancipation of the slaves. He also supported self-improvement efforts of northern free blacks as a means of combating pervasive racial prejudice. He distributed thousands of acres of unimproved land in upstate New York to poor black families to help them become economically independent. Smith initially believed that the abolitionist mission was exclusively one of moral suasion: to "publish the truth about slavery."
Smith's great fortune allowed him to become one of the leading philanthropists of the early nineteenth century. Although he was antisectarian in his personal religious beliefs, Smith gave generously to the American Bible Society, the American Tract Society, and the American Sunday School Union….Smith became a leader and major financial sponsor of state and national organizations promoting temperance, prison reform, international peace, and land reform. He also supported his wife's and his daughter Elizabeth Smith Miller's active participation in the women's rights movement.
The cause that captured the greatest portion of Smith's attention was the campaign to end slavery. At first Smith supported efforts to colonize slaves in Africa, but in 1835 he joined the more militant abolitionist movement that demanded immediate emancipation of the slaves. He also supported self-improvement efforts of northern free blacks as a means of combating pervasive racial prejudice. He distributed thousands of acres of unimproved land in upstate New York to poor black families to help them become economically independent. Smith initially believed that the abolitionist mission was exclusively one of moral suasion: to "publish the truth about slavery."
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E. C. Bearss, "Pillow, Gideon Johnson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00615.html.
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A moderate on the slavery issue, in 1850 he twice opposed the radicals at the Nashville Convention and supported the Compromise of 1850. In 1852 he vainly sought the Democratic nomination for the vice presidency. He failed in 1856 in a second bid for nomination for the vice presidency, and in 1857 he lost out in a campaign for the Senate.
Except in politics, the 1850s were good years for Pillow, as he expanded his agricultural and political interests into Arkansas and abandoned his law practice. By 1860 he was a very wealthy planter, owning large numbers of slaves and plantations in both Arkansas and Middle Tennessee. He continued to call "Clifton Place," his Maury County plantation, home.
In 1860 Pillow was a Stephen Douglas Democrat, opposed to precipitate action on the part of the South. Following the election, however, Pillow cast his lot with Governor Isham Harris and the Confederacy. In April 1861, two months before Tennessee left the Union, Pillow traveled to Montgomery, Alabama, to vainly offer his services to Jefferson Davis. On 9 May, three days after the general assembly authorized the creation of a Provisional Army of Tennessee, Governor Harris named Pillow to its command with the rank of major general. He accepted the challenge with enthusiasm, arming, accoutering, and organizing into an army the thousands of eager volunteers assembled at Memphis and other camps of instruction.
Except in politics, the 1850s were good years for Pillow, as he expanded his agricultural and political interests into Arkansas and abandoned his law practice. By 1860 he was a very wealthy planter, owning large numbers of slaves and plantations in both Arkansas and Middle Tennessee. He continued to call "Clifton Place," his Maury County plantation, home.
In 1860 Pillow was a Stephen Douglas Democrat, opposed to precipitate action on the part of the South. Following the election, however, Pillow cast his lot with Governor Isham Harris and the Confederacy. In April 1861, two months before Tennessee left the Union, Pillow traveled to Montgomery, Alabama, to vainly offer his services to Jefferson Davis. On 9 May, three days after the general assembly authorized the creation of a Provisional Army of Tennessee, Governor Harris named Pillow to its command with the rank of major general. He accepted the challenge with enthusiasm, arming, accoutering, and organizing into an army the thousands of eager volunteers assembled at Memphis and other camps of instruction.
Type: Description
Citation:
E. C. Bearss, "Pillow, Gideon Johnson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00615.html.
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On 14 January 1863 Pillow was relieved of duty with Breckinridge's division and placed in charge of recruiting manpower for the Army of Tennessee as superintendent of the Conscript Bureau for the states of Alabama, Mississippi, and Tennessee. A no-nonsense administrator, he vigorously enforced the conscript law and scoured the countryside rounding up stragglers, arresting deserters, and making enemies. He held this position for more than fourteen months until, at his recommendation in March 1864, he was placed in command of a cavalry force and given the mission of shielding the increasingly vital iron and coal regions of central Alabama against Union raids from their Tennessee Valley bases.
Pillow again led troops into battle in late June, when his small mounted division attacked a brigade of Kentuckians posted at La Fayette in Northwest Georgia. The Confederates' initial success soured when a number of Pillow's men panicked. His failure to cope in mid-July with a raid by Union cavalry that penetrated deep into Alabama finished Pillow as a field commander. He ended his military career as commissary general of prisoners, succeeding to that position upon the February 1865 death of Brigadier General John H. Winder. Paroled at Montgomery on 5 May 1865, Pillow returned to Clifton Place, old for his age, ruined in fortune, and compelled to support himself and his family on his income as a Memphis lawyer in partnership with former Tennessee governor Harris.
Pillow again led troops into battle in late June, when his small mounted division attacked a brigade of Kentuckians posted at La Fayette in Northwest Georgia. The Confederates' initial success soured when a number of Pillow's men panicked. His failure to cope in mid-July with a raid by Union cavalry that penetrated deep into Alabama finished Pillow as a field commander. He ended his military career as commissary general of prisoners, succeeding to that position upon the February 1865 death of Brigadier General John H. Winder. Paroled at Montgomery on 5 May 1865, Pillow returned to Clifton Place, old for his age, ruined in fortune, and compelled to support himself and his family on his income as a Memphis lawyer in partnership with former Tennessee governor Harris.
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Citation:
John Niven, "Welles, Gideon," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00825.html.
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In 1825 [Gideon] Welles became acquainted with John M. Niles, editor and proprietor of the Hartford Times and Weekly Advertizer, who espoused Andrew Jackson as the coming political figure in the nation. His opinion on states' rights, banking corporations, free trade, and hard money appealed to Welles, who joined Niles's publishing venture and soon gained a reputation for his support of Jackson and his attacks on the John Quincy Adams administration…
Under pen names Welles wrote editorials or public letters for such journals as the New York Evening Post and the antislavery National Era in Washington. An opponent of the Compromise of 1850, he denounced the Fugitive Slave Act in the compromise on constitutional, political, and moral grounds. Nevertheless, he supported Franklin Pierce, the Democratic party nominee in 1852, and hoped that Pierce, if elected, would not adhere strictly to the party platform that accepted the compromise. As president, Pierce did not oppose the expansion of slavery. When the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 threw the territories open to popular sovereignty and the Hartford Times along with the Democratic organization in the state supported that legislation, Welles and Niles broke with the party and the paper and joined the new Republican party.
To give wider currency to the new party, Welles and Niles established the Hartford Evening Press. Welles became its first editor. He also ran for governor of the state on the Republican ticket in 1856 but was defeated.
Under pen names Welles wrote editorials or public letters for such journals as the New York Evening Post and the antislavery National Era in Washington. An opponent of the Compromise of 1850, he denounced the Fugitive Slave Act in the compromise on constitutional, political, and moral grounds. Nevertheless, he supported Franklin Pierce, the Democratic party nominee in 1852, and hoped that Pierce, if elected, would not adhere strictly to the party platform that accepted the compromise. As president, Pierce did not oppose the expansion of slavery. When the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 threw the territories open to popular sovereignty and the Hartford Times along with the Democratic organization in the state supported that legislation, Welles and Niles broke with the party and the paper and joined the new Republican party.
To give wider currency to the new party, Welles and Niles established the Hartford Evening Press. Welles became its first editor. He also ran for governor of the state on the Republican ticket in 1856 but was defeated.
Type: Description
Citation:
John Niven, "Welles, Gideon," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00825.html.
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By the war's end Welles had been primarily responsible for building a navy second only to that of Great Britain. He had also reorganized the department, improved significantly contract administration, and established an academy of science, the forerunner of all government-sponsored research agencies.
As a cabinet member, Welles gave complete support and loyalty to Lincoln on broad policy measures. He retained, however, much of his Democratic political views. Though he backed emancipation, he was decidedly conservative on extending full civil rights to the former slaves. An ardent believer in states' rights, he insisted such legislation must be left to the states. His views on Reconstruction were similar to those of Andrew Johnson. Welles consulted on many of Johnson's veto messages and consistently approved of his stand against Congressional Reconstruction.
As a cabinet member, Welles gave complete support and loyalty to Lincoln on broad policy measures. He retained, however, much of his Democratic political views. Though he backed emancipation, he was decidedly conservative on extending full civil rights to the former slaves. An ardent believer in states' rights, he insisted such legislation must be left to the states. His views on Reconstruction were similar to those of Andrew Johnson. Welles consulted on many of Johnson's veto messages and consistently approved of his stand against Congressional Reconstruction.
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Carl H. Moneyhon, "Granger, Gordon," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00431.html.
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[Gordon] Granger's command of the Reserve Corps [of the Army of the Cumberland] was achieved despite opposition from some other commanders within the Army of the Cumberland. In Kentucky he had earned a reputation for being highly opinionated and for criticism of his superiors that verged on insubordination. General William Rosecrans, however, considered him a good fighter and named him commander anyway. This assignment provided the opportunity for Granger's most noteworthy accomplishment in the army, at the battle of Chickamauga on 20 September 1863, when he marched his corps to the relief of General George Thomas without orders and helped prevent the complete route of Union forces that day. For his performance, Granger was promoted brevet lieutenant colonel in the regular army, and when Thomas assumed command of the Army of the Cumberland, he rewarded Granger with command of the Fourth Army Corps.
Despite Granger's success at Chickamauga, his reputation continued to be a problem for him among his superiors. While his corps fought well at Chattanooga, Missionary Ridge, and in the relief of Knoxville, the decisive Granger seen at Chickamauga had disappeared. When Granger was sent to relieve Knoxville, Ulysses S. Grant ordered William T. Sherman to join him and assume actual leadership, because Grant did not believe Granger had the energy or the capacity for such a large mission.
Despite Granger's success at Chickamauga, his reputation continued to be a problem for him among his superiors. While his corps fought well at Chattanooga, Missionary Ridge, and in the relief of Knoxville, the decisive Granger seen at Chickamauga had disappeared. When Granger was sent to relieve Knoxville, Ulysses S. Grant ordered William T. Sherman to join him and assume actual leadership, because Grant did not believe Granger had the energy or the capacity for such a large mission.
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D. Scott Hartwig, "Warren, Gouverneur Kemble," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00822.html.
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Warren provided important service during the Chancellorsville campaign, but he won his greatest glory at the battle of Gettysburg. On the second day of the battle Warren was sent, at his own request, to examine the left of the Union lines. He proceeded to Little Round Top, a commanding promontory at the base of the Union position, and discovered no troops upon it. He observed that the advancing Confederate forces would outflank the Union line and seize Little Round Top, which would render the Union position at Gettysburg untenable. Warren dispatched several staff officers to secure troops to defend the hill. They were able to obtain a single brigade, which was rushed to the hill, arriving only minutes before the Confederates. A desperate struggle ensued, and the Federal brigade was hard-pressed to hold its position. Warren personally rode to some nearby troops and convinced them to move to the hill's defense. Their arrival turned the tide of the conflict at that critical point.
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Citation:
James M. Bergquist, "Koerner, Gustave Philipp," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00610.html.
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In 1852 Koerner was elected lieutenant governor of Illinois on the Democratic ticket, serving from January 1853 to January 1857. When Illinois's powerful Democratic senator Stephen A. Douglas introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854, which repealed the previous prohibition on slavery in some of the western territories, Koerner was strongly opposed to the measure but hesitated to voice public opposition while still a member of the Democratic state administration. For two years he hoped in vain to turn away the Democratic party from support of Douglas's measure. Only after the national Republican party convention of 1856 did he actively change political allegiance to support the new opposition party and advocate alignment of Germans with it. He chaired the Republican State Convention of 1858, which nominated Abraham Lincoln to oppose Douglas for the U.S. Senate. At the 1860 Republican National Convention, Koerner actively supported Lincoln for the presidential nomination and served on the Platform Committee, which drafted a plank disavowing legislation against the foreign-born.
When the Civil War broke out, Koerner served as an aide with the rank of colonel to General John C. Frémont in Missouri. In June 1862 President Lincoln appointed him to be minister to Spain, replacing his fellow German-American Carl Schurz in that position. His ministry was greatly concerned with the threat of Spanish influence in Santo Domingo and with discouraging trade between Spanish-held Cuba and the Confederacy. Taking a leave of absence to campaign for Lincoln in the 1864 election, he never returned to Spain and submitted his resignation in December 1864.
When the Civil War broke out, Koerner served as an aide with the rank of colonel to General John C. Frémont in Missouri. In June 1862 President Lincoln appointed him to be minister to Spain, replacing his fellow German-American Carl Schurz in that position. His ministry was greatly concerned with the threat of Spanish influence in Santo Domingo and with discouraging trade between Spanish-held Cuba and the Confederacy. Taking a leave of absence to campaign for Lincoln in the 1864 election, he never returned to Spain and submitted his resignation in December 1864.
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Citation:
Ari Hoogenboom, "Fox, Gustavus Vasa," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00250.html.
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On 8 May 1861 [President Abraham] Lincoln urged that [Gustavus] Fox, "a live man, whose services we cannot well dispense with" (Roy P. Basler, ed., The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, vol. 4 [1953-1955], p. 363), be given the crucial task of assisting Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles. Initially as chief clerk and then as assistant secretary, Fox was the de facto chief of naval operations during the Civil War, eclipsing during his tenure the entrenched power and autonomy of the Navy Department bureaus. To blockade the Confederacy, the Union navy had to buy and arm or build sturdy, fast, shallow-draft vessels, and to supply and repair them, it had to capture (with army support) bases near southern ports. With his naval, merchant marine, and political connections, Fox was tailored for this work. He had the confidence of line officers, shipping magnates, and politicians, especially Lincoln and Senator James W. Grimes of the Committee on Naval Affairs. Personable and a lover of food and cigars, Fox was a boon dinner companion who could explain political imperatives to commanders and the navy's needs and limitations to politicians. Brimming with self-confidence, energy, and enthusiasm, he despised "old fogyism" and embraced innovative weapons and ships. He was decisive, but his seemingly impulsive faith in and enthusiasm for men and machines, strategies and tactics came only after reading pertinent articles, consulting specialists, conducting tests, and evaluating accomplishments.
Type: Description
Citation:
Ari Hoogenboom, "Fox, Gustavus Vasa," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00250.html.
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Although [Gustavus] Fox was a Democrat with little interest in the slavery issue, he was outraged by secession. He was a patriotic nationalist who believed it was the manifest destiny of the United States to expand, not to disintegrate. After South Carolina fired on the Star of the West and prevented the reinforcement of Fort Sumter in Charleston's harbor, Fox, as a civilian, planned an expedition for that fort's relief. Through his wife's brother-in-law, Montgomery Blair, the new postmaster general, Fox met Lincoln, who adopted his plan. As the expedition approached Charleston, the Confederacy attacked Sumter, but stormy weather and absent vessels prevented Fox from provisioning Sumter before it surrendered. He was chagrined, but Lincoln assured him that above all others he would select him for a similar "daring and dangerous enterprize" (Roy P. Basler, ed., The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, vol. 4 [1953-1955], p. 351).
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Citation:
Brooks D. Simpson, "Fish, Hamilton," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00375.html.
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Fish's record in office at both the state and national levels was unremarkable. He did not play a significant role in the debates over the expansion of slavery that commenced with the introduction of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854. When William Henry Seward led many of the state's Whigs into the ranks of the forming Republican coalition in 1855, Fish did not follow, struggling instead to revive the moribund Whig organization. He reluctantly supported the Republicans the following year but felt uncomfortable with the moral intensity of the party's position on slavery. It was thus not surprising when the Republicans looked elsewhere in 1857 for a Senate candidate, and Fish retreated into retirement from electoral politics, spending the next two years in Europe.
Fish supported the candidacy of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 primarily for the lack of a more satisfactory alternative. In the secession crisis that followed, he advocated compromise. During the Civil War he headed New York's Union Defense Committee and was appalled by the July 1863 draft riots…Cheered by Andrew Johnson's ascent to power in 1865, Fish supported the president's initial course during Reconstruction. However, he also cultivated a friendship with Ulysses S. Grant, subscribing to a fund for the general and hosting the general and his family. By 1867 he was disenchanted with Johnson. Grant, he believed, could best restrain Republican radicalism while denying the Democratic party control of the presidency. He became an active supporter of Grant's presidential candidacy and contributed freely to his campaign.
Fish supported the candidacy of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 primarily for the lack of a more satisfactory alternative. In the secession crisis that followed, he advocated compromise. During the Civil War he headed New York's Union Defense Committee and was appalled by the July 1863 draft riots…Cheered by Andrew Johnson's ascent to power in 1865, Fish supported the president's initial course during Reconstruction. However, he also cultivated a friendship with Ulysses S. Grant, subscribing to a fund for the general and hosting the general and his family. By 1867 he was disenchanted with Johnson. Grant, he believed, could best restrain Republican radicalism while denying the Democratic party control of the presidency. He became an active supporter of Grant's presidential candidacy and contributed freely to his campaign.
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Citation:
William E. Parrish, "Gamble, Hamilton Rowan," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00401.html.
Body Summary:
Gamble inherited an exceedingly difficult situation in 1861 and dealt with it quite credibly. He determined from the outset to let Missourians retain as much control of their internal situation as the establishment of martial law would allow, hence his concern to have local militia cooperating with federal military authorities to try to keep order. While Gamble's relationship with the federal military commanders at St. Louis was not always harmonious because of their jealous guardianship of authority, the militia worked fairly effectively given the turbulent condition of the state. Gamble's insistence on the militia's use allowed many Missourians who would not have volunteered beyond the state's boundaries to participate in the war effort. Although determined to protect slavery at the beginning of the war, Gamble moderated that stand as it became obvious that sentiment was shifting toward some form of emancipation. He effectively steered a middle course on that issue. Throughout the war his was the voice of local control and moderation, and his leadership did much to hold Missourians together during the four years of internecine strife.
Type: Description
Citation:
William E. Parrish, "Gamble, Hamilton Rowan," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00401.html.
Body Summary:
When Missouri moved to an elected supreme court in 1851, a change that Gamble had championed for some time, he secured an easy election, serving until 1854. In the most noted case to come before the court during his term, Gamble, in a lone dissenting vote, asserted that Dred Scott was entitled to his freedom because his master had taken him into free territory--a view in accord with eight previous decisions by the Missouri Supreme Court but now unpopular with his two fellow justices, who were proslavery Democrats.
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Citation:
H. Draper Hunt, "Hamlin, Hannibal," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00459.html.
Body Summary:
Opposed to the expansion of slavery, Hamlin broke with his party to oppose the Kansas-Nebraska Bill (1854), and in 1856 he abandoned the Democratic party altogether. Converting at once to the new Republican party, he won the Maine governorship by a huge margin in a rousing contest. He served only a few weeks as governor, however, before the legislature returned him to the U.S. Senate early in 1857…During his second year in the Senate, Hamlin had become chairman of the Committee on Commerce. Shipping, customs and revenue, river and harbor improvements, and other commercial matters were grist for his mill. He also championed the rights of American fishermen throughout the 1850s. Giving up his chairmanship upon conversion to the Republican party was one of the great disappointments of his public career. Hamlin also supported the transcontinental railroad. He bitterly attacked southern dominance in national affairs, as exemplified by the James Buchanan administration's endorsement of the Dred Scott decision and the Lecompton Constitution. Hamlin prided himself on being a "working" rather than a "talking" senator and proved especially adept at rounding up jobs and other patronage favors for Maine supporters, at least until he broke with the Democrats.
In 1860 the Republican National Convention nominated Senator Hamlin for vice president. The former Democrat from Maine balanced nicely the former Whig from Illinois, and Hamlin was perceived as a supporter of William H. Seward (incorrectly, since he feared the N.Y. senator would lose the election), with many delegates eager to offer a consolation prize to the disappointed Sewardites.
In 1860 the Republican National Convention nominated Senator Hamlin for vice president. The former Democrat from Maine balanced nicely the former Whig from Illinois, and Hamlin was perceived as a supporter of William H. Seward (incorrectly, since he feared the N.Y. senator would lose the election), with many delegates eager to offer a consolation prize to the disappointed Sewardites.
Type: Description
Citation:
H. Draper Hunt, "Hamlin, Hannibal," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00459.html.
Body Summary:
Handily elected as a Jacksonian Democrat in 1835, Hamlin served six one-year terms in the Maine House of Representatives (1836-1841, 1847), three of them as Speaker. He fought unsuccessfully to abolish capital punishment and championed the right of antislavery petitions to be fully aired, condemning slavery as a plague.
In 1843 Hamlin was elected to Congress, serving two terms in the House. Hamlin fought at John Quincy Adams's side to rescind the "gag rule," which barred abolitionist petitions from consideration by the House. He opposed Texas annexation on antislavery grounds and saw the Mexican War as a southern plot to expand the "peculiar institution." Hamlin helped formulate the Wilmot Proviso, which proposed to ban slavery from any territory acquired from Mexico.
In 1843 Hamlin was elected to Congress, serving two terms in the House. Hamlin fought at John Quincy Adams's side to rescind the "gag rule," which barred abolitionist petitions from consideration by the House. He opposed Texas annexation on antislavery grounds and saw the Mexican War as a southern plot to expand the "peculiar institution." Hamlin helped formulate the Wilmot Proviso, which proposed to ban slavery from any territory acquired from Mexico.
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Joan D. Hedrick, "Stowe, Harriet Beecher," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01582.html.
Body Summary:
Always controversial, Stowe fell into disrepute in the latter half of the nineteenth century. When literature became professionalized and more formal, aesthetic standards of art prevailed, and Stowe's passion and finely honed rhetoric were judged "melodramatic" and "sentimental." Her strongly marked characters, particularly Uncle Tom, were seen as stereotypes, an impression increased by the minstrel darkies of the "Tom shows" that continued into the twentieth century. Her reputation rose again in the wake of the the women's movement of the 1970s. Uncle Tom's Cabin continues to be read around the world for its principled defense of the lowly and oppressed.
Type: Description
Citation:
Joan D. Hedrick, "Stowe, Harriet Beecher," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01582.html.
Body Summary:
The success of Uncle Tom's Cabin made Stowe an international celebrity and a focus of antislavery sentiment. In 1853 she published A Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin, an antislavery polemic written to answer critics who complained that her novel had exaggerated the brutalities of slavery. At the invitation of two Scottish antislavery societies she undertook a tour of the British Isles. As she recounted in Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands (1854), she was met by large crowds, feted at antislavery soirees, showered with money for the cause, and presented with a petition from more than half a million British women urging their American sisters to end slavery. She used money given her to free slaves, distribute antislavery literature, and support antislavery lectures, but her most powerful antislavery weapon remained her pen. In 1854, when Congress was debating the Kansas-Nebraska Act, Stowe published in the Independent "An Appeal to Women of the Free States of America, on the Present Crisis on Our Country" and circulated petitions to defeat the bill. When it passed, opening the possibility of slavery in the new territories, Stowe wrote her second antislavery novel, Dred: A Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp (1856). In contrast to the Christian pacifism of Tom in Uncle Tom's Cabin, her hero Dred is presented as the son of Denmark Vesey, the historical figure hanged in South Carolina for fomenting rebellion among the slaves.
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Citation:
Jean Fagan Yellin, "Jacobs, Harriet," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00839.html.
Body Summary:
As a fugitive slave in the South, Jacobs hid for almost seven years in a tiny space under the roof of her grandmother's home. In June 1842 she escaped to Philadelphia. She was eventually reunited with her children in the North. In 1849 she joined an abolitionist circle in Rochester, New York. Jacobs wrote that after passage of the 1850 Fugitive Slave Law, she was sought by her North Carolina mistress but rejected an offer to buy her freedom: "The more my mind had become enlightened, the more difficult it was for me to consider myself an article of property; and to pay money to those who had so grievously oppressed me seemed like taking from my sufferings the glory of triumph" (Incidents, p. 199).
Despite her protest, in 1853 Jacobs was purchased from Mary Matilda Norcom Messmore by her New York employer, Cornelia Grinnell Willis, and she and her children were free from the threat of reenslavement. Persuaded to tell her story by Amy Post, a Rochester abolitionist and feminist friend, and after a futile attempt to enlist bestselling author Harriet Beecher Stowe as her amanuensis, Jacobs spent years writing her book. When she finished, the black writer and activist William C. Nell introduced her to the white antislavery writer and activist Lydia Maria Child, who edited the manuscript and helped obtain financial backing from Boston abolitionists.
Despite her protest, in 1853 Jacobs was purchased from Mary Matilda Norcom Messmore by her New York employer, Cornelia Grinnell Willis, and she and her children were free from the threat of reenslavement. Persuaded to tell her story by Amy Post, a Rochester abolitionist and feminist friend, and after a futile attempt to enlist bestselling author Harriet Beecher Stowe as her amanuensis, Jacobs spent years writing her book. When she finished, the black writer and activist William C. Nell introduced her to the white antislavery writer and activist Lydia Maria Child, who edited the manuscript and helped obtain financial backing from Boston abolitionists.
Type: Description
Citation:
Mary K. Dains, "Johnston, Harriet Lane," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01368.html.
Body Summary:
Buchanan was elected president of the United States in 1856, and Harriet Lane became the first lady upon his inauguration. At age twenty-six, she added youth and grace to the White House and the capital cultural scene. She tried to imitate the standards she had experienced in Europe. Artists were always welcomed at the White House, and Harriet encouraged and supported their efforts to establish a national gallery of art. The president greeted a number of distinguished visitors to Washington, including Edward Albert, prince of Wales, in 1860. Harriet entertained him with dinners, receptions, dances, tours to patriotic sites, such as George Washington's tomb and home, and an excursion aboard the cutter Harriet Lane, named in honor of the president's niece. Many years later, when the prince became Edward VII, he invited Harriet to his coronation.
Type: Description
Citation:
Walter Ehrlich, "Scott, Dred," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00984.html.
Body Summary:
On 6 April 1846 Dred and Harriet Scott sued Irene Emerson for freedom. Dred Scott v. Irene Emerson was filed in a Missouri state court under Missouri state law. (Two separate litigations were pursued. Since both entailed the same law and evidence, only Dred's advanced to conclusion; Harriet's suit was held in abeyance, under agreement that the determination in her husband's case would apply to hers.) Contrary to later widespread rumor, no political motivation attached to the institution of this suit; only when it reached the Missouri Supreme Court did it acquire the political overtones that made it so famous later. The suit was brought for one reason only: to secure freedom for Dred Scott and his family…
Unanticipated developments converted an open-and-shut freedom suit into a cause célèbre. In the trial on 30 June 1847, the court rejected one piece of vital evidence on a legal technicality--that it was hearsay evidence and therefore not admissible--and the slave's freedom had to await a second trial when that evidence could be properly introduced. It took almost three years, until 12 January 1850, before that trial took place, a delay caused by events over which none of the litigants had any control. With the earlier legal technicality corrected, the court unhesitatingly declared Dred Scott to be free.
Unanticipated developments converted an open-and-shut freedom suit into a cause célèbre. In the trial on 30 June 1847, the court rejected one piece of vital evidence on a legal technicality--that it was hearsay evidence and therefore not admissible--and the slave's freedom had to await a second trial when that evidence could be properly introduced. It took almost three years, until 12 January 1850, before that trial took place, a delay caused by events over which none of the litigants had any control. With the earlier legal technicality corrected, the court unhesitatingly declared Dred Scott to be free.
Type: Description
Citation:
Margaret Washington, "Tubman, Harriet," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00707.html.
Body Summary:
The Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 forced Tubman to transport newly emancipated groups into Canada-West (now Ontario), placing them "under the paw of the British lion" since England had abolished enslavement. Routes from Canada to Maryland depended on the exigency of the moment. Tubman's favorite route, also the most dangerous because of proslavery attitudes, was the Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania circuit, where Thomas Garrett, a Delaware Quaker, was her main contact. Her staunchest supporters were on the Central New York Road, where she met abolitionists Frederick Douglass, Gerrit Smith, Oliver Johnson, and Reverend J. W. Loguen, as well as future suffragists Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony.In 1858 Tubman met archrevolutionary John Brown, whose radical, military fiber matched hers. Together they plotted the Harpers Ferry raid, but illness prevented Tubman's participation. In 1860 she successfully led a bloody battle regarding an escaped bondsman in Troy, New York.
The Civil War found Tubman condemning a reluctant President Abraham Lincoln, agitating for immediate emancipation, and spending 1862 in Union-occupied areas nursing white soldiers and black "contrabands" injured while fleeing enslavement. In 1863, when blacks joined the military, Tubman hand-picked and commanded a black corps of spies, scouts, and river pilots who conducted daring surveillance, espionage, and intelligence operations throughout the southeastern seaboard. She strategized and guided a band of black soldiers (under Colonel James Montgomery) into the Confederate-held Combahee, South Carolina, region and successfully disabled their supply line.
The Civil War found Tubman condemning a reluctant President Abraham Lincoln, agitating for immediate emancipation, and spending 1862 in Union-occupied areas nursing white soldiers and black "contrabands" injured while fleeing enslavement. In 1863, when blacks joined the military, Tubman hand-picked and commanded a black corps of spies, scouts, and river pilots who conducted daring surveillance, espionage, and intelligence operations throughout the southeastern seaboard. She strategized and guided a band of black soldiers (under Colonel James Montgomery) into the Confederate-held Combahee, South Carolina, region and successfully disabled their supply line.
Type: Description
Citation:
Walter Harding, "Thoreau, Henry David," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01635.html.
Body Summary:
The popular image of Thoreau as cold and negative was created in large part by his friend Emerson, who saw Thoreau as stoic and therefore overemphasized these qualities in both his eulogy and in his subsequent editing of Thoreau's letters. There is no question that Thoreau could at times be crusty, abrupt, and cantankerous. His friend Caroline Sturgis Tappan once said that he "imitates porcupines successfully." He loved to deflate the pompous and disturb the conservative. But on the other hand, he was a loving son and a thoughtful brother. The Emerson children adored him, as did most Concord children, who loved to hold his hand during walks, visited him at his Walden cabin, brought him natural history specimens for his collections, and plied him with questions because he was one of the few adults who would try to answer them. He also regularly risked arrest to assist escaping slaves on their way to freedom. Despite Thoreau's occasional grumpiness, he was, as Henry Canby has suggested, the happiest of all the Concord writers.
Type: Description
Citation:
Walter Harding, "Thoreau, Henry David," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01635.html.
Body Summary:
Shortly after Thoreau's return from Harvard, he became acquainted with Ralph Waldo Emerson, who had recently settled in Concord. As leader of the American Transcendentalists, Emerson introduced Thoreau to his friends and their ideas. Convinced of Thoreau's budding genius, Emerson urged him to embark on a literary career, suggesting that he start by keeping a journal. Although he had made a few sporadic attempts before at keeping a journal, Thoreau on 22 October 1837 thus began the daily journal that he continued throughout the remaining twenty-five years of his life. Emerson saw to it that many of Thoreau's early essays and poems were published in the Transcendentalist Dial (1840-1844) and in 1841 invited him to join the Emerson household, ostensibly as a handyman but primarily to give him time to write.
Thoreau for a time idolized Emerson, but later, as Thoreau saw Emerson as more conservative and less challenging in his viewpoints and tired of being dismissed as an imitator of Emerson, the ardor of their friendship cooled. However, there was never a complete break between the two, and in later years they grew close again.
Thoreau for a time idolized Emerson, but later, as Thoreau saw Emerson as more conservative and less challenging in his viewpoints and tired of being dismissed as an imitator of Emerson, the ardor of their friendship cooled. However, there was never a complete break between the two, and in later years they grew close again.
Type: Description
Citation:
Walter Harding, "Thoreau, Henry David," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01635.html.
Body Summary:
To help Thoreau establish contacts in the publishing world of New York City, Emerson arranged for him to tutor the children of Emerson's brother on Staten Island. There Thoreau became acquainted with Horace Greeley, editor of the influential New York Tribune, who soon became his literary agent, helping him place his essays in various periodicals and touting him regularly in the Tribune….
In the autumn of 1844 Emerson purchased a small tract of land on Walden Pond on the outskirts of Concord to protect its wooded beauty. The following spring, with Emerson's permission Thoreau built a ten-by-fifteen-foot cabin there at the cost of $28.121⁄2 and moved in on 4 July 1845 with the intent of devoting himself to the completion of his book for John. By simplifying his life, Thoreau found he was able to live comfortably on as little as twenty-seven cents a week, which he could earn by working only six weeks a year. Thus he was able to devote most of his mornings to writing at his desk, his afternoons to exploring the woods and fields of Concord, taking note of the circle of the seasons, and his evenings to socializing with friends such as Emerson and Bronson Alcott, who by now had settled in Concord, and his family.
Thoreau was scarcely a hermit at Walden. There was rarely a day when he did not either visit in town or receive his friends at Walden, only little more than a mile from Concord.
In the autumn of 1844 Emerson purchased a small tract of land on Walden Pond on the outskirts of Concord to protect its wooded beauty. The following spring, with Emerson's permission Thoreau built a ten-by-fifteen-foot cabin there at the cost of $28.121⁄2 and moved in on 4 July 1845 with the intent of devoting himself to the completion of his book for John. By simplifying his life, Thoreau found he was able to live comfortably on as little as twenty-seven cents a week, which he could earn by working only six weeks a year. Thus he was able to devote most of his mornings to writing at his desk, his afternoons to exploring the woods and fields of Concord, taking note of the circle of the seasons, and his evenings to socializing with friends such as Emerson and Bronson Alcott, who by now had settled in Concord, and his family.
Thoreau was scarcely a hermit at Walden. There was rarely a day when he did not either visit in town or receive his friends at Walden, only little more than a mile from Concord.
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Citation:
David T. Z. Mindich, "Raymond, Henry Jarvis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/03/03-00412.html.
Body Summary:
The [New York] Times printed six days a week until the exigencies of war pushed Raymond into starting a Sunday edition, which he did the week after the Fort Sumter attack. By this time, the Times was one of only three (with the [New York] Herald and [New York]Tribune) eight-page dailies in the country, a remarkable feat for a paper less than a decade old. The Times also was among the leading papers in circulation and news gathering and was widely clipped throughout the era.
Meanwhile, Raymond's political activities continued. Raymond helped to draft the charter of the new Republican party in 1856, and the Times was strongly Republican for the rest of Raymond's life and beyond. In a series of open letters to W. L. Yancey of Alabama right after Lincoln was elected president, Raymond attacked secession and the growing southern belligerency. These letters, along with the debate with Greeley on Fourierism, reflect both Raymond's persistence and his cool, analytical bent. The Times was strongly pro-Union before and during the war; its view on slavery was antiexpansion before the war but shifted to abolitionist after the fighting began. The paper's support for Lincoln was much more consistent than the Tribune's, and the Times became the administration's leading supporter. Raymond's biography of Lincoln, published during the 1864 election year, was widely read.
Meanwhile, Raymond's political activities continued. Raymond helped to draft the charter of the new Republican party in 1856, and the Times was strongly Republican for the rest of Raymond's life and beyond. In a series of open letters to W. L. Yancey of Alabama right after Lincoln was elected president, Raymond attacked secession and the growing southern belligerency. These letters, along with the debate with Greeley on Fourierism, reflect both Raymond's persistence and his cool, analytical bent. The Times was strongly pro-Union before and during the war; its view on slavery was antiexpansion before the war but shifted to abolitionist after the fighting began. The paper's support for Lincoln was much more consistent than the Tribune's, and the Times became the administration's leading supporter. Raymond's biography of Lincoln, published during the 1864 election year, was widely read.
Type: Description
Citation:
Byron Farwell, "Stanley, Henry Morton," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00982.html.
Body Summary:
In October 1869 Stanley was summoned to Paris by James Gordon Bennett, the proprietor of the [New York] Herald, who instructed him to find David Livingstone, the famous African missionary believed to be lost in central Africa, but he was to begin the search only after completing a series of assignments in Egypt, Palestine, Turkey, and India. It was March 1871 before he left Zanzibar with a large expedition bound for Tanganyika (the two countries now form Tanzania) in East Africa. After suffering great hardships and surmounting obstacles and dangers, he found Livingstone at Ujiji. Raising his hat, he asked politely, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" (How I Found Livingstone, p. 78).
Together they explored the north end of Lake Tanganyika before Stanley emerged from the interior carrying letters and notebooks from the missionary, who had no wish to leave. His newspaper stories and his book, How I Found Livingstone (1872), brought him fame.
Together they explored the north end of Lake Tanganyika before Stanley emerged from the interior carrying letters and notebooks from the missionary, who had no wish to leave. His newspaper stories and his book, How I Found Livingstone (1872), brought him fame.
Type: Description
Citation:
Philip R. VanderMeer, "Lane, Henry Smith," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00611.html.
Body Summary:
Although not an officeholder during the 1850s, Lane's forceful stump speaking and moderate views had made him a major Whig leader in Indiana, and he powerfully affected the creation and success of the Republican party. Although he favored liquor prohibition and a citizenship requirement for voting, Lane was primarily concerned with the interrelated national issues of slavery, economic development, and territories. Thus, he spurned the American (or Know Nothing) party, and he was a leader at the 13 July 1854 meeting that started the People's party. Lane's prominence grew in 1856 when he chaired both the state and national Republican conventions. Although his rough, emotional style did not impress certain easterners at the national convention, he articulated a clear moderate position on slavery, strongly opposing the extension of slavery into the territories, while vigorously rejecting the label of abolitionist.
Type: Description
Citation:
Bruce Tap, "Stanbery, Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00939.html.
Body Summary:
Although widely recognized as a man of integrity and principle, Stanbery was not adept at practicing the art of political compromise. Of conservative and somewhat inflexible temperment, his advice to Johnson encouraged the seventeenth president to become more recalcitrant in his attitude toward Congress. By encouraging this defiance through his interpretation of the Reconstruction Acts, Stanbery played a significant role in furthering conflict that resulted eventually in the first impeachment of a U.S. president.
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Citation:
William E. Parrish, "Blow, Henry Taylor," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00115.html.
Body Summary:
Blow took an early interest in the emerging Free Soil movement in the late 1840s. Dred Scott was raised in the Blow family home as a child, and in 1846 Blow and other members of his family helped finance Scott's initial suit for freedom in the Missouri courts. Blow was elected as a Whig to the Missouri Senate in 1854. In the legislature he joined with Frank Blair (1821-1875) and B. Gratz Brown to promote the idea of compensated emancipation of Missouri's slaves and their colonization elsewhere to remove them as competition for free white labor. These three played a leading role in the formation of the Republican party in Missouri.
Blow served as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in Chicago in 1860, initially favoring, with the rest of the Missouri delegation, the candidacy of favorite son Edward Bates. The following year President Abraham Lincoln appointed him minister to Venezuela, but he returned in 1862 to run successfully for Congress as a "Charcoal" Republican, that is one who favored immediate and uncompensated emancipation. The following year Blow joined Charles D. Drake, who had married another of his sisters, and others to establish the Radical Union party of Missouri with a platform of immediate emancipation for Missouri's slaves and the enlistment of free blacks into the armed forces. In 1864 he served as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in Baltimore, where the Missouri delegation, dominated by Radicals, cast their ballots for Ulysses S. Grant, the only votes against Lincoln's renomination.
Blow served as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in Chicago in 1860, initially favoring, with the rest of the Missouri delegation, the candidacy of favorite son Edward Bates. The following year President Abraham Lincoln appointed him minister to Venezuela, but he returned in 1862 to run successfully for Congress as a "Charcoal" Republican, that is one who favored immediate and uncompensated emancipation. The following year Blow joined Charles D. Drake, who had married another of his sisters, and others to establish the Radical Union party of Missouri with a platform of immediate emancipation for Missouri's slaves and the enlistment of free blacks into the armed forces. In 1864 he served as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in Baltimore, where the Missouri delegation, dominated by Radicals, cast their ballots for Ulysses S. Grant, the only votes against Lincoln's renomination.
Type: Description
Citation:
Jon Huibregtse, "Villard, Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/10/10-01691.html.
Body Summary:
[Heinrich Hilgard's] father wanted him to become a lawyer, but Villard was an indifferent student. When his father threatened to enlist him in the military, Villard immigrated to the United States in August 1853. He changed his name to Villard, after a schoolmate he admired, to make it difficult for his family to trace him and engaged in a number of jobs during his first years in the United States. Villard eventually found work as a journalist for German-language papers and later for English-language papers, covering the Abraham Lincoln-Stephen A. Douglas debates and numerous Civil War battles. In 1866 he married Helen Frances "Fanny" Garrison (Fanny Garrison Villard), daughter of abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison. They had four children. The marriage was fortuitous for Villard because it opened avenues to some of the wealthiest and most influential people in the United States, which proved to be invaluable later in his career.
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Citation:
Edward Wagenknecht, "Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01015.html.
Body Summary:
Longfellow's literary reputation, like [Alfred] Tennyson's, has suffered from the inevitable changes in poetic style and taste. He has been called too didactic, but when he began writing he was widely blamed for sacrificing uplift to purely aesthetic considerations. "A Psalm of Life" (1839) seems one of his poorest poems, but his contemporaries, including the French poet Charles Baudelaire, found it deeply moving. An impatient reader and writer, Longfellow wanted everything stated as quickly and as plainly as possible, not left to implication and inference. Yet he was a scholar and far less simple than his work suggests. He admired the primitive, and in his Indian poems and elsewhere he introduced important native materials into American literature. Yet he also played an important part in establishing modern languages in the American educational curriculum, and he labored valiantly to introduce American readers to large aspects of the literature and art of Europe, encouraging them to enter into the common cultural inheritance of Western culture.
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Citation:
Herman Hattaway and Michael D. Smith, "Halleck, Henry Wager," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00455.html.
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Though much maligned by his contemporaries, who thought him a "cold calculating owl," incapable of cultivating cordial relations, Halleck was nonetheless recognized as a man of great intellect. Nicknamed "Old Brains," he brought professionalism and organization to an army saddled with political appointments and militia mentality. He correctly placed priority on the war in the West, and made every effort to initiate and sustain simultaneous advances across a broad front. His dispatches to the field characteristically were petulant and argumentative, a trait that drew the ire of commanders who faced unforeseen difficulties. Consequently, he was the target of vitriolic outbursts in many postwar memoirs. His abilities are best appreciated when divorced from the personal animosities that clouded his every effort.
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Citation:
Clifford E. Clark, "Beecher, Henry Ward," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/08/08-00112.html.
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As his fame as a dramatic preacher spread, Beecher in the 1850s also gained a reputation as an abolitionist. An early critic of the expansion of slavery into the western territories, he protested the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law (1850), supported his sister Harriet Beecher Stowe in her publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin in 1852, and became an early campaigner for the Republican party. Guns sent to Kansas in 1855 during the dispute over the new territory became known as "Beecher's Bibles," an ironic reference to them as a force for moral suasion. By 1861 he had become a power within the Republican party. As editor of The Independent between 1861 and 1864, he campaigned for the party, supported the war effort, urged Abraham Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, and undertook a popular speaking tour of England that helped keep that country from joining the side of the Confederates. Beecher's political speeches, published as Freedom and War (1863) and Patriotic Addresses (1887), identified the northern war effort with God's mission: moral duty would support national destiny.
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Jean Harvey Baker, "Davis, Henry Winter," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00299.html.
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In Congress Davis earned a reputation as a compelling orator and a brilliant debater intent on opposing what he called "the agitation of slavery" and avoiding the divisive matters sweeping through Congress, such as the attempt to organize Kansas under the proslavery Lecompton constitution. Instead Davis focused on the agenda of his party, which sought to restrict the rapid influx of Catholic Irish and German immigrants. In his pamphlet The Origin, Principles and Purposes of the American Party (1852), he argued, "American Republicans alone are entitled to rule the American Republic."
Reelected to the Thirty-sixth Congress as a Know Nothing despite that party's waning power, Davis cast a crucial vote in the long struggle over the election of the Speaker of the House in the winter of 1859-1860. Yet his vote for the conservative Republican William Pennington was condemned by the Maryland legislature, one of whose members encouraged the appropriation of $500 to send Davis to Liberia. Undeterred in his effort to find a middle way between the North and South even as he despised the Democratic party as an organization of traitors, Davis supported the Unionist John Bell in the election of 1860. When southern states began seceding, Davis became a powerful voice in the antisecessionist movement in Maryland, and he tried to create an anti-Democratic coalition. "Smite fearlessly the Democratic party. The union will survive its fragments," said Davis as he argued that the election of Abraham Lincoln was not the threat that southerners described.
Reelected to the Thirty-sixth Congress as a Know Nothing despite that party's waning power, Davis cast a crucial vote in the long struggle over the election of the Speaker of the House in the winter of 1859-1860. Yet his vote for the conservative Republican William Pennington was condemned by the Maryland legislature, one of whose members encouraged the appropriation of $500 to send Davis to Liberia. Undeterred in his effort to find a middle way between the North and South even as he despised the Democratic party as an organization of traitors, Davis supported the Unionist John Bell in the election of 1860. When southern states began seceding, Davis became a powerful voice in the antisecessionist movement in Maryland, and he tried to create an anti-Democratic coalition. "Smite fearlessly the Democratic party. The union will survive its fragments," said Davis as he argued that the election of Abraham Lincoln was not the threat that southerners described.
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Citation:
Jean Harvey Baker, "Davis, Henry Winter," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00299.html.
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Davis supported emancipation by Congress but not by the executive, the recruitment of black soldiers, and a new constitution for Maryland that would free the state's slaves. Always a believer in the balance of powers among the judiciary, legislative, and executive branches, Davis emerged as a critic of Lincoln's wartime suspension of the writ of habeas corpus. He challenged emancipation by the president, which he considered a state matter.
His understanding of the importance of Congress led Davis, who was chairman of the Select Committee on the Rebellious States, to introduce a legislative plan for Reconstruction. Known as the Wade-Davis Bill, it was less lenient than Lincoln's plan in dealing with those who had aided the rebellion. In its final form, the Wade-Davis Bill required a majority, not one-tenth, of those enrolled after military resistance in a state ended to take an oath to support the U.S. Constitution before a convention could be called to reestablish a state government there.
The differences between Davis's bill and Lincoln's vaguer plans for reconstructing the Union suggested a growing conflict between Congress and the executive, which would continue in Andrew Johnson's administration. Davis's bill repudiated the Confederate war debt, disfranchised Confederates, and in general pointed the way for congressional programs in the late 1860s, such as the Fourteenth Amendment. Pocket-vetoed by the president, the Wade-Davis Bill became the Maryland congressman's legacy to those who opposed executive control of Reconstruction.
His understanding of the importance of Congress led Davis, who was chairman of the Select Committee on the Rebellious States, to introduce a legislative plan for Reconstruction. Known as the Wade-Davis Bill, it was less lenient than Lincoln's plan in dealing with those who had aided the rebellion. In its final form, the Wade-Davis Bill required a majority, not one-tenth, of those enrolled after military resistance in a state ended to take an oath to support the U.S. Constitution before a convention could be called to reestablish a state government there.
The differences between Davis's bill and Lincoln's vaguer plans for reconstructing the Union suggested a growing conflict between Congress and the executive, which would continue in Andrew Johnson's administration. Davis's bill repudiated the Confederate war debt, disfranchised Confederates, and in general pointed the way for congressional programs in the late 1860s, such as the Fourteenth Amendment. Pocket-vetoed by the president, the Wade-Davis Bill became the Maryland congressman's legacy to those who opposed executive control of Reconstruction.
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Arch Fredric Blakey, "Wirz, Henry", American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01167.html.
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The Confederacy he returned to in February 1864 had fallen on hard times as he found out when [Brigadier General] Winder placed him in command of the stockade at the Andersonville, Georgia, prison in March of that year. The exchange of prisoners had ceased, and the overpopulated compound rapidly became a hell on earth for everyone there. The Confederacy was so short of the basic necessities that even Confederate troops in the field were near starvation. Prisoners ranked last in importance, and Wirz was lucky to be able to feed his charges anything at all. Food, medicine, housing, even water were in short supply by that summer. As Union prisoners died by the thousands, the northern press characterized both Winder and Wirz as "inhuman fiends" and "monsters."
The assassination of Abraham Lincoln further inflamed the North, already sickened and enraged over the prisoner issue, and the public demanded that someone pay for these crimes. Winder died of a heart attack on 6 February 1865, thus depriving vengeful Union authorities of any opportunity of trying him as a war criminal. That left Wirz, who was arrested in May 1865, still tending to the sick at Andersonville. The Wirz "trial" lasted for three months; he was charged with murder and abuse of prisoners and of conspiring with Jefferson Davis, James Seddon, and others to murder the prisoners en masse. Lies and distortions were accepted as fact, and Wirz was sentenced to hang "for impairing the health and destroying the lives of prisoners."
The assassination of Abraham Lincoln further inflamed the North, already sickened and enraged over the prisoner issue, and the public demanded that someone pay for these crimes. Winder died of a heart attack on 6 February 1865, thus depriving vengeful Union authorities of any opportunity of trying him as a war criminal. That left Wirz, who was arrested in May 1865, still tending to the sick at Andersonville. The Wirz "trial" lasted for three months; he was charged with murder and abuse of prisoners and of conspiring with Jefferson Davis, James Seddon, and others to murder the prisoners en masse. Lies and distortions were accepted as fact, and Wirz was sentenced to hang "for impairing the health and destroying the lives of prisoners."
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Keir B. Sterling, "Haupt, Herman," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/13/13-00718.html.
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In April 1862…[Secretary of War] Edwin M. Stanton, [Simon] Cameron's successor, asked Haupt to come to Washington. Stanton recognized that civilian railroad men were better prepared to construct and maintain railroads than the military engineers, who had more experience with field fortifications and coastal defenses….For nearly seventeen months, until September 1863, Haupt designed, built, and repaired critically important railway lines and bridges. President Abraham Lincoln inspected one bridge project Haupt had completed and characterized it as "the most remarkable structure that human eyes ever rested upon. That man Haupt has built a bridge across Potomac Creek, about 400 feet long and nearly 100 feet high, over which loaded trains are running every hour, and upon my word . . . there is nothing in it but bean poles and corn stalks" (Lord, p. 77). Haupt had to cope with conflicting lines of authority, appealing to the War Department when more senior officers attempted to take over his lines for the movement of their own troops and equipment. At no time, despite Haupt's strong urging, was any one individual given overall authority over military railroads. Historians have generally agreed that he coped brilliantly with most logistical challenges, moving troops to the front, wounded to the rear, and equipment to where it was most needed with efficiency and dispatch. Haupt's unflagging efforts to assist in Major General John Pope's withdrawal from the battle of Second Bull Run (Second Manassas) in August and September 1862 won him a promotion to brigadier general of volunteers.
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Keir B. Sterling, "Haupt, Herman," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/13/13-00718.html.
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In 1840 Haupt helped construct the York and Wrightsville Railroad in Pennsylvania. In so doing he discovered that no American railway engineer had previously assessed the strength of railway trusses in bridge construction. He therefore completed some technical experiments, and he was later recognized as having devised a means of "representing strains of geometrical solids; deflections by parabolic areas; and the variable pressures at various parts of beams by the corresponding ordinates of plane curves" (Lord, p. 24). He continued with this work and in 1841 published an anonymous booklet, Hints on Bridge Construction. Ten years later a revised and expanded version, The General Theory of Bridge Construction, appeared under his authorship. This pioneering study became a respected text in the field.
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Kenneth H. Williams, "Johnson, Herschel Vespasian," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00570.html.
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With Abraham Lincoln's election, Johnson urged his state not to follow South Carolina out of the Union. As he later wrote, "I believed . . . that the State of Georgia had the right to secede, although I deplored the policy of exercising it and anticipated the worst of consequences." At the state convention he put forward a resolution calling for delegates from the southern states to gather in Atlanta in February and compose a list of terms to be presented to the Lincoln administration. It was narrowly defeated by the motion for immediate secession. Johnson pledged to support the course chosen by his state, even though he considered it "the most stupendous blunder ever made by rational men."
Johnson declined to seek a seat in the Provisional Congress but was pleased with its redesign of the Constitution and with the selection of Jefferson Davis and Alexander Stephens for the top positions in the new government...Johnson once again answered his state's call in November 1862, when the legislature…selected him to fill the Confederate Senate seat vacated by John W. Lewis. Johnson was elected to a full term the following autumn and served in the Confederate Congress for the remainder of the war. Although he differed with Davis "in several particulars," Johnson continued to support him and chastised Stephens and other Georgians for their open criticisms. As a legislator, Johnson's voting record was consistent with states' rights doctrine, opposing conscription, a supreme court, and suspension of the writ of habeas corpus.
Johnson declined to seek a seat in the Provisional Congress but was pleased with its redesign of the Constitution and with the selection of Jefferson Davis and Alexander Stephens for the top positions in the new government...Johnson once again answered his state's call in November 1862, when the legislature…selected him to fill the Confederate Senate seat vacated by John W. Lewis. Johnson was elected to a full term the following autumn and served in the Confederate Congress for the remainder of the war. Although he differed with Davis "in several particulars," Johnson continued to support him and chastised Stephens and other Georgians for their open criticisms. As a legislator, Johnson's voting record was consistent with states' rights doctrine, opposing conscription, a supreme court, and suspension of the writ of habeas corpus.
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George M. Fredrickson, "Helper, Hinton Rowan," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00488.html.
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Helper's career as a writer began with the publication in 1855 of Land of Gold, a little-noticed account of how California had failed to live up to his expectations. His next book, The Impending Crisis of the South: How to Meet It (1857), became the center of a national controversy. The book called for the abolition of slavery because it was retarding the economic development of the South and limiting the opportunities of its nonslaveholding white majority. Helper argued that slavery was responsible for a one-crop system of plantation agriculture that benefited the slaveholding minority but denied to lower class whites the range of opportunities that a more diversified economy, like that of the North, would have provided. Since it appeared in the midst of the national debate over the fate of slavery in the federal territories, Helper's book attracted great public attention, being praised by northern free soilers and condemned by southern sectionalists. In 1859 an inexpensive Compendium, or digest, of The Impending Crisis was published with the endorsement of some leading members of the Republican party, who hoped to use it as a campaign document. Approximately 75,000 copies of the book and the Compendium were sold or distributed. Helper's work became a central issue in the bitter and prolonged contest for the Speakership of the House of Representatives that began in December 1959 and lasted for two months.
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Kenneth H. Williams, "Revels, Hiram Rhoades," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00839.html.
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The nation's first African-American senator arrived in Washington ten days after his election. He could not present his credentials until Mississippi was formally readmitted to the Union, which finally took place on 23 February [1870]. Three days of contentious debate over whether to seat Revels followed, with the Senate voting forty-eight to eight in favor of accepting his credentials on 25 February. Revels was then sworn in and seated.
Although his brief Senate term was relatively undistinguished, Revels's skill as an orator, honed through decades in the pulpit, earned favorable attention from the national press. He introduced three bills, but only one passed--a petition for the removal of civil and political disabilities from an ex-Confederate. He favored amnesty for white southerners "just as fast as they give evidence of having become loyal men and of being loyal," a stance that drew criticism from some in the black community. Revels served briefly on the District of Columbia Committee and nominated the first African American for enrollment at West Point (the candidate failed the entrance examination).
Although his brief Senate term was relatively undistinguished, Revels's skill as an orator, honed through decades in the pulpit, earned favorable attention from the national press. He introduced three bills, but only one passed--a petition for the removal of civil and political disabilities from an ex-Confederate. He favored amnesty for white southerners "just as fast as they give evidence of having become loyal men and of being loyal," a stance that drew criticism from some in the black community. Revels served briefly on the District of Columbia Committee and nominated the first African American for enrollment at West Point (the candidate failed the entrance examination).
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Donald M. Roper, "Gray, Horace," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00347.html.
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Besides his clerkship, Gray honed his skill as an advocate with the elite of the highly regarded Boston bar, which included Benjamin R. Curtis after Curtis's resignation from the U.S. Supreme Court in 1857. Gray's partners included Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar, future supreme judicial court justice and attorney general under President Ulysses S. Grant. Fully devoted to the law, Gray had little time for politics. Like his partner Hoar, however, he gravitated from "Conscience" Whig to Free Soiler to Republican. His opposition to slavery is further indicated in an attack, coauthored with John Lowell, Jr., on Chief Justice Roger B. Taney's Dred Scott opinion. Typically, the critique was solidly based on legal rather than political grounds. With the outbreak of the Civil War, Gray rendered significant legal advice to Republican governor John A. Andrew, although his support for the war was tempered by constitutional scruples over Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation.
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Erik S. Lunde, "Greeley, Horace," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00653.html.
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On 10 April 1841 Greeley published the first issue of the daily New York Tribune. This publication, the first daily Whig paper in New York City, brought him national fame and enormous journalistic power, despite such rivals as William Cullen Bryant's Evening Post, Henry Jarvis Raymond's New York Times, and James Gordon Bennett's Herald. Later in 1841 Greeley took on Thomas McElrath as a business partner, and The New-Yorker and the Log Cabin were merged into the weekly Tribune. Over the years, in biting, witty editorials, Greeley crusaded against slavery, the conditions of penury, an unchecked aristocracy, suppression of women's rights, and capital punishment while supporting peace movements, vegetarianism, labor rights, Fourierist communities, and high tariffs. He also railed against tobacco, alcoholic beverages, and marital infidelity.
Under Greeley's guidance, the Tribune became one of the great American newspapers. By 1860 the Tribune in all its formats--daily, weekly, semiweekly--would reach a circulation of nearly 300,000. Renowned as a "political Bible" and distinguished for its excellent reporting of local, national, and global events, the Tribune in the 1840s, 1850s, and 1860s featured a galaxy of brilliant writers, among them, Solon Robinson on agriculture; Bayard Taylor on travel; Charles Dana, the managing editor; George Ripley and Margaret Fuller, the latter a close friend, on literary topics; and James Pike on Washington affairs. Perhaps the most intriguing Greeley reporter was Karl Marx, who wrote about European affairs in the 1850s. Greeley believed that while his editorials represented his personal perspective, a newspaper should be an open forum for the competing and colliding views of talented spirits. In this way, he sponsored an intellectual democracy.
Under Greeley's guidance, the Tribune became one of the great American newspapers. By 1860 the Tribune in all its formats--daily, weekly, semiweekly--would reach a circulation of nearly 300,000. Renowned as a "political Bible" and distinguished for its excellent reporting of local, national, and global events, the Tribune in the 1840s, 1850s, and 1860s featured a galaxy of brilliant writers, among them, Solon Robinson on agriculture; Bayard Taylor on travel; Charles Dana, the managing editor; George Ripley and Margaret Fuller, the latter a close friend, on literary topics; and James Pike on Washington affairs. Perhaps the most intriguing Greeley reporter was Karl Marx, who wrote about European affairs in the 1850s. Greeley believed that while his editorials represented his personal perspective, a newspaper should be an open forum for the competing and colliding views of talented spirits. In this way, he sponsored an intellectual democracy.
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Hans L. Trefousse, "Maynard, Horace," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00670.html.
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The secession crisis created a difficult situation for Maynard. When he met Stephen A. Douglas in the summer of 1860, Maynard suggested that a special House committee with one representative from each state be established to deal with the crisis, a course that was taken in December 1860. Occupying a middle ground, he supported the proposed Crittenden Compromise to create a dividing line between slavery and freedom at 36° 30', declared that he saw no reason why the Union could not continue half free and half slave, and strongly urged the North to listen to the grievances of the South and remove the causes of discontent. At home, he valiantly campaigned against secession, supported Unionists regardless of party, and cooperated with fellow Whigs like William G. Brownlow as well as Democrats like Andrew Johnson, whom he had opposed for years.
Maynard's efforts were crowned with success in East Tennessee, which voted against secession, but the state as a whole joined the South. In August 1861 he won reelection to Congress against a Confederate opponent, only to be forced to flee to the North immediately afterward. In Washington, together with Johnson, Maynard became one of the principal advocates of a Union campaign to liberate East Tennessee, a course of action he ceaselessly urged on the Lincoln administration. In 1863 Johnson, then military governor of Tennessee, appointed him attorney general.
Maynard's efforts were crowned with success in East Tennessee, which voted against secession, but the state as a whole joined the South. In August 1861 he won reelection to Congress against a Confederate opponent, only to be forced to flee to the North immediately afterward. In Washington, together with Johnson, Maynard became one of the principal advocates of a Union campaign to liberate East Tennessee, a course of action he ceaselessly urged on the Lincoln administration. In 1863 Johnson, then military governor of Tennessee, appointed him attorney general.
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Joseph Logsdon, "White, Horace," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01753.html.
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According to White's own recollections, the advent of the Free Soil movement in 1848 made him determined to become a journalist so that he could fight against slavery. In 1853 he accepted a position on the Chicago Journal and reported the renewed sectional strife caused by the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. His marriage in 1856 to Martha Root, daughter of a prominent abolitionist, encouraged his activist career. (They had no children.) As assistant secretary for the National Kansas Committee, he helped arm John Brown (1800-1859) and other militant free soilers in Kansas. In 1857 he returned to journalism with a new Republican newspaper, the Chicago Tribune, and became captivated by Abraham Lincoln. The two men often traveled together while White covered the Lincoln-Douglas debates in 1858 with a stenographic reporter for the state's leading Republican newspaper.
White stayed closely allied to Lincoln as a coauthor of his 1860 campaign biography and vowed to the new president that he and other young Republicans stood ready to "plunge into blood to the horses bridles" to defend the new administration.
White stayed closely allied to Lincoln as a coauthor of his 1860 campaign biography and vowed to the new president that he and other young Republicans stood ready to "plunge into blood to the horses bridles" to defend the new administration.
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Joel H. Silbey, "Seymour, Horatio," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00899.html.
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[Horatio Seymour] worked behind the scenes in the late 1850s to reinvigorate and reunite the national Democratic party. Now a member of its "Soft" wing, which supported Stephen A. Douglas and popular sovereignty in the territories, Seymour fought for Douglas's election in 1860 and then joined Douglas in seeking compromise without war in 1860-1861. Once the Civil War began, however, Seymour emerged as a leader of the Democratic party's "respectable" group, who cautiously supported the northern war effort in contrast to continued resistance to military coercion by the "Peace" Democrats behind Clement Vallandigham and Fernando Wood. At the same time, fearing the power of the "violent and revolutionary" radical faction of the Republican party as the war progressed, Seymour became an outspoken and persistent critic of what Democrats believed were the extremist tendencies of the Abraham Lincoln administration. Fearing the growth of centralized power, emancipation, and war-induced limitations on press freedoms and civil liberties, Seymour was drawn into the controversies surrounding the war after he was elected governor of New York in 1862. In particular, he fought the Lincoln administration's efforts in 1863 both to suppress the "Peace" Democrats by closing their newspapers and harassing their leaders and to extend the coercive power of the national government by instituting a military draft.
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Brooks D. Simpson, "Cobb, Howell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/03/03-00104.html.
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At the first national party nominating convention at Charleston, South Carolina, in April [1860], Cobb did not emerge as a serious contender; when, in the wake of that deadlocked meeting, a second convention assembled at Baltimore in June, Stephen Douglas refused to withdraw his candidacy in favor of a Cobb nomination, and Cobb refused to seek a compromise alternative. Cobb's own chances dissolved when bolters from the main Baltimore meeting turned instead to Vice President John C. Breckinridge as their choice. Although Cobb supported Breckinridge, Republican Abraham Lincoln won the election.
Cobb's commitment to the preservation of the Union had eroded during the 1850s, in part because the course of politics rendered his original stance unfeasible if he was to pursue a political career. By 1860 his desire for advancement led him to advocate measures that contributed to the disruption of his once-beloved Democratic party. In the aftermath of Lincoln's victory, Cobb went back on his Unionist principles and supported secession. He resigned his cabinet post on 10 December 1860; on his return to Georgia, he spoke on behalf of immediate secession. Although he was not a delegate to the January 1861 secession convention, he attended its discussions; the next month he served as one of Georgia's representatives to the Montgomery Convention, which established the Confederate States of America.
Cobb's commitment to the preservation of the Union had eroded during the 1850s, in part because the course of politics rendered his original stance unfeasible if he was to pursue a political career. By 1860 his desire for advancement led him to advocate measures that contributed to the disruption of his once-beloved Democratic party. In the aftermath of Lincoln's victory, Cobb went back on his Unionist principles and supported secession. He resigned his cabinet post on 10 December 1860; on his return to Georgia, he spoke on behalf of immediate secession. Although he was not a delegate to the January 1861 secession convention, he attended its discussions; the next month he served as one of Georgia's representatives to the Montgomery Convention, which established the Confederate States of America.
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Terry L. Seip, "McCulloch, Hugh," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00682.html.
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Coming from a Federalist-National Republican political lineage, McCulloch described himself as "an original Henry Clay Whig" who supported all elements of Clay's American System, although he had misgivings about the high protective tariff, which he saw as detrimental to the country's commercial interests. When the Whig party disintegrated in the mid-1850s, McCulloch joined the new Republican party and was quietly antislavery, though like many conservative former Whigs he lamented the spiraling sectional controversy that divided the nation. Still, he saw the differences between North and South as irreconcilable and believed that only war could curb the aggressive and expansionist slave power.
As the war began, McCulloch continued to head the Indiana banking system and in 1862 he lobbied against creating a national banking system, which he saw as "greatly prejudicial to the State banks." The following year, however, Congress passed an amended version of the bill, which satisfied McCulloch's objections, and he accepted an invitation from Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase to become comptroller of the currency for the new system and moved to Washington to organize the National Currency Bureau. Working with Chase and then William Pitt Fessenden when Chase resigned in 1864, McCulloch was instrumental in getting the banking network off to a solid start. When Fessenden resigned in March 1865, McCulloch agreed to Abraham Lincoln's offer of the Treasury portfolio, and he continued under Andrew Johnson's administration.
As the war began, McCulloch continued to head the Indiana banking system and in 1862 he lobbied against creating a national banking system, which he saw as "greatly prejudicial to the State banks." The following year, however, Congress passed an amended version of the bill, which satisfied McCulloch's objections, and he accepted an invitation from Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase to become comptroller of the currency for the new system and moved to Washington to organize the National Currency Bureau. Working with Chase and then William Pitt Fessenden when Chase resigned in 1864, McCulloch was instrumental in getting the banking network off to a solid start. When Fessenden resigned in March 1865, McCulloch agreed to Abraham Lincoln's offer of the Treasury portfolio, and he continued under Andrew Johnson's administration.
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Linda O. McMurry, "Wells-Barnett, Ida Bell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00924.html.
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In 1892 Wells found a focus for her militancy following a triple lynching in Memphis. After three young black men opened the People's Grocery, a white competitor's resentment triggered a chain of events that led to their murders. Earlier lynchings had angered her, but the deaths of three friends brought the evil close to her. She had believed lynchings happened to innocent people but not to respectable ones. Turning the full force of her powerful pen against lynching, Wells attacked the premise that lynching was a necessary deterrent to black rapists. In May she wrote a Free Speech editorial in which she suggested that many rape charges arose from the discovery of voluntary sexual liaisons of white women with black men. While Wells was away, angry whites closed the newspaper office and ran her partner out of Memphis.
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John T. Hubbell, "McDowell, Irvin," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00503.html.
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When the Civil War began, McDowell was a brevet major and again served on General Scott's staff. McDowell was a man of physical energy, wide interests, and strong opinions with no obvious vices and practically no personal charm or ordinary good manners. He had powerful patrons, especially Salmon P. Chase, but no observable qualifications for high command. In late May 1861 he was given the command of the Union forces in the Department of Northeastern Virginia with expectations of an early offensive. While McDowell took steps to organize his "army," the Confederates took up positions along Bull Run, about five miles north of Manassas, Virginia. Their commander was P.G.T. Beauregard, McDowell's classmate and the victor at Fort Sumter. Elements of both armies faced off near Winchester, the Confederates under Joseph E. Johnston and the Federals under Robert Patterson. In order to prevent Johnston from reinforcing Beauregard, Patterson should have attacked or at least pressed his opponent, or he might have marched his forces to support McDowell. He did neither, although Scott's orders clearly directed him to occupy Johnston. McDowell planned to outflank Beauregard and force him out of his fixed positions along Bull Run, a sensible enough plan, assuming energetic leadership, effective staff work, and experienced soldiers in the ranks. Also, Patterson would have to contain Johnston. These happy circumstances did not occur, and McDowell, for all his outward show of confidence, doubted that he could make the plan work, mainly because his soldiers were without experience or proper training.
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Jeffry D. Wert, "Trimble, Isaac Ridgeway," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00792.html.
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[Isaac] Trimble was one of the oldest combat officers of the Civil War. Despite his age, he had a distinguished record, noted for personal bravery, combativeness, and skill. A southerner by birth, he never questioned the rightness of the Confederate cause and devoted himself to it. He was perhaps Maryland's finest soldier in the conflict.
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Sharon Ann Holt, "Hooker, Isabella Beecher," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00342.html.
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In 1868, with her two daughters married and her youngest child nearing majority, Hooker returned to public life with the publication of "A Mother's Letters to a Daughter on Woman's Suffrage" in Putnam's Magazine. Over the next forty years, until her death in Hartford, Hooker refined her arguments for and deepened her commitment to the cause of women's rights. From the tentative and unpublished essay "Shall Women Vote? A Matrimonial Dialogue" (1860) through her influential treatise called Womanhood: Its Sanctities and Fidelities (1873) to her last published tract, An Argument on United States Citizenship (1902), Hooker imagined and argued for a democratic society that made public use of the knowledge and virtue gained by women in their domestic struggles. Women, she maintained, should be judges and juries because they learned to adjudicate at home, equitably settling passionate disputes among their children. Women learned to legislate at home as well, quietly persuading others and spending patient years urging projects forward to completion. Hooker argued that wife- and motherhood provided the best possible training for government service, a view that, for her, made woman suffrage all the more urgent.
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Lyde Cullen Sizer, "Boyd, Belle," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01228.html.
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An early incident revealed Boyd's commitment and courage and ironically brought her praise from Federal officers. After Boyd's father left to join Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson's infantry, Union troops invaded Martinsburg on 3 July 1861. The next day, Union soldiers forcibly entered the Boyd home and prepared to hoist the Federal flag and remove the Confederate flags in Belle's room and outside the house. Mary Boyd's protests provoked an officer to address her "in language as offensive as it is possible to conceive," as Belle recalled in her 1865 memoir Belle Boyd in Camp and Prison. Infuriated, the seventeen-year-old Belle shot and killed the officer, for which she gained the admiration of the Federal command, who said she had "done perfectly right." Becoming something of a celebrity to Confederates and Unionists alike, Belle became acquainted with many young Union officers posted to protect her home, and she passed on to the Confederates information that the Union officers inadvertently revealed to her, thus becoming an unofficial Confederate spy. Boyd gathered information by flirting with Union officers, listening carefully to what they let drop, and by watching troop movements.
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Heather Cox Richardson, "Washburn, Israel, Jr.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01037.html.
Body Summary:
Washburn began his congressional career as a champion of Maine interests. He sponsored, for instance, a bill for aid to the European and North American Railway, which, by constructing a railroad from Canadian ports to American railroad lines, would have made Maine a corridor for European immigration. The slavery question, however, quickly propelled Washburn into a national role. Morally opposed to slavery and increasingly convinced that a slave power threatened northern economic progress, Washburn worked hard to prevent the 1852 Whig National Convention from endorsing the Compromise of 1850. In 1854 Washburn helped lead the fight in the House against the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Its passage convinced him that only a new northern party could check slave power aggression. With popular meetings throughout the North condemning the new law, Washburn took action to unite opponents of the Kansas-Nebraska Act into a national coalition. In late May 1854 he called a meeting of approximately thirty antislavery congressmen of all parties and suggested they form a new political organization called the Republican party. Shortly after he had launched the new party among politicians, Washburn publicly called for all northerners to join together as Republicans against the slave power. Washburn was an important congressional Republican leader for the rest of the decade, acting, for instance, as a member of the inner circle that elected Nathaniel P. Banks Speaker of the House in 1856. Quick-tempered and an authority on House rules, Washburn was a sound strategist with rigid integrity and wide influence.
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Robert E. L. Krick, "Stuart, J. E. B.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00966.html.
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Stuart left a singular reputation. His fondness for display and frivolity is well known. He assiduously cultivated a public image that anticipated by many decades the media-minded generals of later wars. Stuart was "as ambitious as Caesar," admitted one of his officers. Fellow general James Longstreet contended somewhat smugly after the war that Stuart was "of the best material for the cavalry service, but needing an older head to instruct and regulate him. By our indulgence," wrote Longstreet, "he became too large for his position."
Despite those failings, real or imagined, Stuart clearly enjoyed contemporary respect and popularity at all levels, both military and civilian. His chivalric "gay cavalier" reputation concealed and only rarely subdued his many talents as a Civil War cavalryman. He had no peer at gathering intelligence; he discovered and developed such talents as John S. Mosby, Pelham, and Thomas L. Rosser; and he transferred his personality to the Confederate cavalry in a fashion that improved its morale and military efficiency. His name must appear near the top on any list of significant Civil War figures.
Despite those failings, real or imagined, Stuart clearly enjoyed contemporary respect and popularity at all levels, both military and civilian. His chivalric "gay cavalier" reputation concealed and only rarely subdued his many talents as a Civil War cavalryman. He had no peer at gathering intelligence; he discovered and developed such talents as John S. Mosby, Pelham, and Thomas L. Rosser; and he transferred his personality to the Confederate cavalry in a fashion that improved its morale and military efficiency. His name must appear near the top on any list of significant Civil War figures.
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Wayne Urban, "Curry, Jabez Lamar Monroe," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/09/09-00215.html.
Body Summary:
Although he had defended slavery as an Alabama Congressman and had served the Confederacy, Curry spent much of his later years as an advocate of education for freed slaves and spoke out against lynching. As agent for the Peabody Fund, he threatened to deny support to Southern communities that refused to educate their black children on the ground that blacks paid little or nothing in taxes. His advocacy, however, was carefully couched and calibrated not to offend either the white Southern aristocracy to which he belonged or the Northern philanthropists who sponsored his activities. He knew Booker T. Washington and was a firm advocate of the industrial education that Washington had learned at Hampton Institute in Virginia and pioneered at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama.
Personally, Curry thought that enfranchisement of African Americans after emancipation had been a mistake, and he believed that there were firm limits to what the black race could accomplish, even with increased educational privileges. Thus, although Curry worked assiduously for the education of freed slaves, he was firm in his commitment to continued segregation in schools. He never advocated biracial education, and this almost certainly reflected his own personal views as well as the desires of the white aristocracy of North and South. Thus, Curry's reputation as an educational reformer was well earned but also subject to the distinct limits that he and his sponsors put on the achievement of the freed people.
Personally, Curry thought that enfranchisement of African Americans after emancipation had been a mistake, and he believed that there were firm limits to what the black race could accomplish, even with increased educational privileges. Thus, although Curry worked assiduously for the education of freed slaves, he was firm in his commitment to continued segregation in schools. He never advocated biracial education, and this almost certainly reflected his own personal views as well as the desires of the white aristocracy of North and South. Thus, Curry's reputation as an educational reformer was well earned but also subject to the distinct limits that he and his sponsors put on the achievement of the freed people.
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Silvana Siddali, "Howard, Jacob Merritt," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00529.html.
Body Summary:
In 1841 he was elected to Congress. Throughout his tenure as a congressman, Howard was an outspoken opponent of slavery. After completing his term, he returned to private practice in Michigan. In 1850, when arguing a fugitive slave case before the U.S. circuit court, he publicly denounced the Fugitive Slave Law and predicted that the country would eventually come to armed conflict over the issue of slavery.
In 1854 Howard joined the new Republican party. He was one of the leading members of the Jackson, Michigan, convention held on 6 July that organized the new party. As chair of the Committee on Resolutions, Howard drafted the party platform, which deplored slavery as a social evil and opposed its expansion into the territories. He was reputed to have given the new party its name.
In 1854 Howard joined the new Republican party. He was one of the leading members of the Jackson, Michigan, convention held on 6 July that organized the new party. As chair of the Committee on Resolutions, Howard drafted the party platform, which deplored slavery as a social evil and opposed its expansion into the territories. He was reputed to have given the new party its name.
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William L. Barney, "Thompson, Jacob," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00986.html.
Body Summary:
Thompson began the most controversial part of his Confederate career in the spring of 1864. He and Clement Claiborne Clay, a former U.S. Senator from Alabama, were sent by Davis as special Confederate agents to Canada. The purpose of the mission, as explained by Confederate secretary of state Judah P. Benjamin, was to provoke a "disruption between the Eastern and Western States in the approaching election at the North." Supplied with a war chest of $300,000, Thompson was to do all in his power to demoralize the Union home front. The most grandiose of his efforts aimed at liberating Confederate soldiers from Union prison camps around the Great Lakes and instigating an uprising of disaffected Democrats in the Midwest that would culminate in the creation of a separate northwestern Confederacy. Little came of these…. Much of his money, as he detailed in a report of 3 December 1864, was used to hire arsonists to destroy property in northern cities. He explained that his goal was "to burn whenever it is practicable, and thus make the men of property feel their insecurity and tire them out with the war." The most spectacular example of this strategy occurred on 25 November 1864, when hired Confederate agents set fires at several hotels and buildings in New York City. The fires were extinguished with relatively little damage, but Thompson by now was a target of northern vengeance. He was blamed, wrongfully according to his account, for ordering the Confederate raid on St. Albans, Vermont…
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Leonard Schlup, "Seddon, James Alexander," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00891.html.
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A Virginia aristocrat and fascinating conversationalist, Seddon was a man of dedication and will. He left his mark on southern history. Lee and Seddon were President Davis's most trusted military advisers, and the three men worked closely together. A former secretary of war during the administration of President Franklin Pierce, Davis controlled the southern armies and took a strong interest in the conduct of the War Department, scrutinizing Seddon's activities more than those of other cabinet officials. Seddon never publicly criticized this vigilance and always deferred to his superior. Still Seddon's influence with Davis was apparent. Seddon viewed the Civil War in large terms, emerging as a Confederate nationalist rather than as a proponent of narrow states' rights. Along with Judah P. Benjamin and Stephen R. Mallory, Seddon was one of the ablest men in Davis's cabinet.
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William E. Gienapp, “Buchanan, James,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00170.html.
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Tall and stout, with an imposing physique and flowing white hair, the meticulously dressed Buchanan presented a distinguished appearance that was reinforced by his courtly manners. Fussy and legalistic, he had a passion for precision, displayed great diligence, and was an indefatigable correspondent. Although he enjoyed society and dancing and brought a festive air to the White House, he did not make friends easily and was unusually dependent emotionally on his closest associates. He enjoyed good liquor and cigars and spent long evenings conversing with friends. Plodding and unimaginative, he was a useful subordinate but an unsuccessful leader. He lacked a brilliant mind and had no gift for writing memorable words or uttering striking phrases and thus was ineffective at rallying popular support. Acquaintances were struck by his exceedingly cautious nature, and his closest friends found him very timid about voicing his own opinions on controversial issues, even in private. He was sincere and well-intentioned, but his presidential term was largely a disaster. He isolated himself from dissenting views, disliked confrontation, never understood northern feelings against slavery, and was excessively prosouthern in his views, qualities that eventually destroyed his political influence and wrecked his presidency.
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John F. Coleman, "Campbell, James," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00197.html.
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Campbell was determined that his [post office] department would be both efficient and self-supporting. To those ends, he terminated ineffectual postmasters, discontinued excessively expensive mail routes, fined delinquent contractors, and overhauled the department's accounting system. To Congress, Campbell proposed rate increases, the discontinuance of congressionally mandated discounts, and even the abolition of the franking privilege. He appeared indifferent to the fact that these initiatives offended powerful interests.
Among Campbell's innovations were the introduction of prestamped envelopes, perforated sheets of stamps to replace printed sheets, and the registry system for the shipment of valuables through the mails. The registry system, which held the individual postmaster responsible for any valuables handled, was a significant innovation that, in its essentials, has survived to the present.
Under Campbell's direction, postal service improved and expanded, but the department did not become self-supporting. Those affected by his cost-cutting measures resisted them, and Congress declined to enact the measures proposed. To his keen disappointment, annual subsidies continued throughout his tenure.
Among Campbell's innovations were the introduction of prestamped envelopes, perforated sheets of stamps to replace printed sheets, and the registry system for the shipment of valuables through the mails. The registry system, which held the individual postmaster responsible for any valuables handled, was a significant innovation that, in its essentials, has survived to the present.
Under Campbell's direction, postal service improved and expanded, but the department did not become self-supporting. Those affected by his cost-cutting measures resisted them, and Congress declined to enact the measures proposed. To his keen disappointment, annual subsidies continued throughout his tenure.
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Betty Fladeland, "Birney, James Gillespie," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00061.html.
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In 1842 Birney ran on an antislavery ticket for the governorship of Michigan. Just prior to the 1844 presidential election, in which he was again the Liberty party candidate, he was on a speaking tour in the East when a letter purporting to be written by him was published, which "proved" him to be a secret Democrat. This "Garland Forgery," named for Jerome B. Garland of Michigan, the purported author of the letter, was later attributed to the Whigs, and may or may not have cost him votes. His vote total, though considerably higher than in 1840, was still only 2 percent of the national popular vote. His political career was ended and his antislavery activities were severely curtailed the following year when a horse-riding accident left him partially paralyzed. Nevertheless, he continued writing on political and constitutional issues regarding slavery….
As a former slaveholder Birney spoke with the voice of authority on race and slavery; as a lawyer he spoke as a moderate on constitutional issues. For him politics was a means to an end, never an end in itself. He died realizing that moderation on the race issue would not prevail but that civil war would tear the nation apart before emancipation could be proclaimed.
As a former slaveholder Birney spoke with the voice of authority on race and slavery; as a lawyer he spoke as a moderate on constitutional issues. For him politics was a means to an end, never an end in itself. He died realizing that moderation on the race issue would not prevail but that civil war would tear the nation apart before emancipation could be proclaimed.
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Allan Burton Spetter, "Blaine, James Gillespie," American National Biography Online, February 2000,http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00072.html.
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In 1854 Blaine moved to Maine, where he became a newspaper editor and, in the political turmoil of the 1850s, served as one of the "founding fathers" of the new Republican party. More than any other political figure of his time, Blaine seemed to symbolize the success--and occasional failure--of the Republican party in the Gilded Age of the late nineteenth century. He launched his political career in 1858, winning a seat in the state legislature, and became chair of the Republican State Committee in 1859. He chose, as many others did, to hire a substitute when drafted for the Civil War. Instead, Blaine was elected to the House of Representatives in 1862, beginning what has been described as a "long, colorful, and controversial national record" (Marcus, p. 7). After three terms in Congress, at the age of thirty-nine, he became Speaker of the House in 1869. Blaine served in that capacity until 1875, when the Republicans lost control of the House. This six-year term in a powerful and rewarding position represents the least controversial phase of his career on the national scene in what has been called "probably . . . the happiest period of Blaine's life" (Muzzey, p. 63).
Over and over again, contemporaries spoke of Blaine's "magnetism," the nineteenth-century equivalent of charisma. Many of the most sophisticated Republicans of the time indeed were drawn to him and devoted much of their political lives to a continuing crusade to put Blaine in the White House.
Over and over again, contemporaries spoke of Blaine's "magnetism," the nineteenth-century equivalent of charisma. Many of the most sophisticated Republicans of the time indeed were drawn to him and devoted much of their political lives to a continuing crusade to put Blaine in the White House.
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James L. Crouthamel, "Bennett, James Gordon," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00112.html.
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With $500 in capital, Bennett launched the New York Herald on 6 May 1835. It contained tidbits of local news, summaries of national, state, and foreign news, and a few advertisements. A week later it reappeared on a daily basis, soon adding a new feature--a Wall Street column that explained commercial and financial developments to lay readers. By the late 1830s the Herald and the Sun were the nation's largest circulation dailies. By the 1850s the Herald's average daily circulation was between 50,000 and 70,000, the largest in the nation.
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Mark A. Plummer, "Lane, James Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00612.html.
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When he arrived in Washington to present a memorial to Congress for admission of Kansas as a free state, [James] Lane was rebuffed by [Senator Stephen] Douglas and other Democrats. Lane responded by conducting a speaking tour in Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois on behalf of the Free State movement. Albert Richardson, a contemporary, wrote that Lane's oratory could make "men roar with laughter, or melt into tears, or clench their teeth in passion." During the tour the nation was polarized by reports of violence in "Bleeding Kansas." On 31 May 1856, in Chicago, Lane addressed ten thousand antislavery partisans, who subscribed thousands of dollars toward financing Free State immigration, settlement, and defense. He routed immigrants, arms, and ammunition along the "Lane Trail," which crossed Iowa, thus evading hostile Missourians. Back in Kansas, Lane and his "jayhawking" Free State armed parties terrorized proslavery settlements.
Lane's break with Douglas and the Democratic party was complete when he advocated "Free Territory and Frémont [John C. Frémont]," in the presidential election of 1856. In 1857 Free State adherents boycotted an election of delegates to a constitutional convention at Lecompton, and proslavery forces won a large majority. At Lane's urging, however, the Free State proponents participated in the election for territorial legislators and won. The new legislators commissioned Lane as a major general of militia and ordered a referendum on the proslavery Lecompton constitution, which was rejected.
Lane's break with Douglas and the Democratic party was complete when he advocated "Free Territory and Frémont [John C. Frémont]," in the presidential election of 1856. In 1857 Free State adherents boycotted an election of delegates to a constitutional convention at Lecompton, and proslavery forces won a large majority. At Lane's urging, however, the Free State proponents participated in the election for territorial legislators and won. The new legislators commissioned Lane as a major general of militia and ordered a referendum on the proslavery Lecompton constitution, which was rejected.
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Steven E. Woodworth, "Lane, James Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00417.html.
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At the outbreak of the Civil War, Lane held the position of professor of natural philosophy and instructor of military tactics at the North Carolina Military Institute. In response to the call of North Carolina's governor for volunteers, Lane enlisted and was promptly elected major of the First North Carolina, a regiment that included much of the corps of cadets of the North Carolina Military Institute. The regiment was sent to the scene of the expected fighting in Virginia. On 10 June 1861 a Union force of about 2,500 men advancing westward from Fort Monroe, Virginia, was met at Big Bethel by Confederate forces, including Lane's regiment. Lane led the scouting patrol that first made contact with the Federals. The fight that followed would hardly have rated as a significant skirmish later in the war, but at this point it was hailed as a great Confederate victory. The First North Carolina took the nickname "the Bethel regiment." That September, when the regiment reorganized for the war, Lane was elected lieutenant colonel. Later that month, when D. H. Hill was promoted to brigadier general, Lane moved up to colonel of the Twenty-eighth North Carolina.
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William Garrett Piston, "Longstreet, James," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01178.html.
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Longstreet made his greatest contributions serving under Lee, who called him "my Old War Horse" and "the Staff of my right hand." Contrary to myth, Longstreet, not Stonewall Jackson, was Lee's intimate confidant, close friend, and principal military adviser. Contemporaries described their relationship as one of brotherly affection. Their disagreement over military affairs--with Lee stressing the Virginia theater and the tactical offensive--caused friction, but it did not lessen their mutual regard. While Longstreet was dismayed by Lee's costly attacks at Gettysburg, preferring a tactical defensive, he was neither stubborn nor disobedient during the campaign. On the second day of the battle, Longstreet's poor reconnaissance delayed his attack, but by no more than an hour, and his overall movements were not slow. On the final day of the battle, Longstreet did take longer than necessary to implement Lee's orders for an assault on the Federal center, but this was not the reason "Pickett's Charge" failed. As the attack was both flawed in concept and doomed from the start, Longstreet's reluctance was both understandable and sensible.
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John Stauffer, "Smith, James McCune," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01529.html.
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Smith's activities as a radical abolitionist and reformer, however, secured his reputation as one of the leading black intellectuals of the antebellum era. As soon as he returned to the United States, he became an active member of the American Anti-Slavery Society, which sought immediate abolition by convincing slaveholders through moral persuasion to renounce the sin of slavery and emancipate their slaves. By the late 1840s he had abandoned the policies of nonresistance and nonvoting set forth by William Lloyd Garrison and his followers in the society. Instead, Smith favored political abolitionism, which interpreted the U.S. Constitution as an antislavery document and advocated political and ultimately violent intervention to end slavery. In 1846 Smith championed the campaign for unrestricted black suffrage in New York State; that same year he became an associate and good friend of Gerrit Smith, a wealthy white abolitionist and philanthropist, and served as one of three black administrators for his friend's donation of roughly fifty acres apiece to some 3,000 New York blacks on a vast tract of land in the Adirondacks. He became affiliated with the Liberty Party in the late 1840s, which was devoted to immediate and unconditional emancipation, unrestricted suffrage for all men and women, and land reform…When the Radical Abolition Party, the successor to the Liberty Party, nominated him for New York secretary of state in 1857, he became the first black in the country to run for a political office.
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William Cohen, "McKim, James Miller,"American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00469.html.
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James Miller McKim was neither a gifted speaker nor an especially talented writer, but for twenty years he was the man who got things done for the antislavery cause in Pennsylvania. One antislavery colleague termed him a "prudent rash man," and he has been well described as an administrator who "applied a fundamentally conservative temperament to the prosecution of a radical cause" (Brown, p. 72). Once the Civil War began, McKim played a more independent and influential role in shaping events. He took the lead in urging his abolitionist colleagues to stop attacking the government from the outside and to instead become insiders with a say in shaping Reconstruction. He worked tirelessly to aid the freedmen, and he was the person most responsible for coordinating the postwar assistance efforts of the secular freedmen's aid societies.
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Charles M. Hubbard, "Mason, James Murray," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00666.html.
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Unlike most political leaders from the Upper South, Mason strongly believed that slaveholders' rights could not be protected within the Union and supported the radical secessionist leadership of the South. In Mason's view, the industrializing North, corrupted by banking interests, threatened the southern way of life. A strict constructionist, he was the author of the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 and believed slavery should be expanded into the territories without restrictions. In 1850 he refused to join Robert Toombs, Howell Cobb, William L. Yancey, and other southern moderates and instead allied himself with Robert Barnwell Rhett and other obstructionists, who refused any concessions to the antislavery element in Congress in the interest of a compromise on the issue of slavery in the territories. By that time Mason did not wish to preserve a Union that rejected southern values and leadership, and he was prepared to secede from the Union. In 1856 he was similarly outspoken in his commitment to lead Virginia out of the Union if the newly formed Republican party was successful in electing John C. Frémont as president.
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John R. McKivigan, "Redpath, James," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01354.html.
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After being educated in his father's academy, Redpath emigrated with his family to the United States in 1849 and soon found work as a reporter for Horace Greeley's New York Tribune. In the mid-1850s he made three journeys through the South, secretly interviewing slaves and publishing their accounts of slavery in abolitionist newspapers and in The Roving Editor: or, Talks with the Slaves (1859). He reported finding many discontented slaves prepared to revolt if aided by the abolitionists.
In 1855 Redpath moved to Kansas Territory, where he reported on events for the St. Louis Missouri Democrat, the Chicago Tribune, the New York Tribune, and other northern papers. In 1857 he briefly edited his own newspaper, the Doniphan (Kans.) Crusader of Freedom. During these years, Redpath became a close associate of John Brown in the campaign to make Kansas Territory a free state. In 1858 Brown encouraged Redpath to move to Boston to help rally support for Brown's plan to incite a southern slave insurrection. After the failure of Brown's attack at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, Redpath participated in unsuccessful efforts to rescue captured raiders. Soon after, Redpath wrote the first biography of the executed abolitionist, The Public Life of Capt. John Brown (1860). This work was uncompromisingly sympathetic toward its subject and helped secure for Brown a lasting reputation as a martyr for freedom.
In 1855 Redpath moved to Kansas Territory, where he reported on events for the St. Louis Missouri Democrat, the Chicago Tribune, the New York Tribune, and other northern papers. In 1857 he briefly edited his own newspaper, the Doniphan (Kans.) Crusader of Freedom. During these years, Redpath became a close associate of John Brown in the campaign to make Kansas Territory a free state. In 1858 Brown encouraged Redpath to move to Boston to help rally support for Brown's plan to incite a southern slave insurrection. After the failure of Brown's attack at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, Redpath participated in unsuccessful efforts to rescue captured raiders. Soon after, Redpath wrote the first biography of the executed abolitionist, The Public Life of Capt. John Brown (1860). This work was uncompromisingly sympathetic toward its subject and helped secure for Brown a lasting reputation as a martyr for freedom.
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Phyllis F. Field, "Speed, James," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00933.html.
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Speed detested the xenophobic American (Know Nothing) party that replaced the Whigs in Kentucky in the mid-1850s. Although long a friend of Abraham Lincoln, whom he had met through his brother Joshua Fry, Speed understood that a Republican could not carry a slave state like Kentucky. In the presidential contest of 1860, therefore, he served on a committee that united supporters of northern Democrat Stephen A. Douglas and Constitutional Unionist John Bell to defeat southern Democrat John Breckinridge in Kentucky. After the election, however, confident of Speed's loyalty to the Union, however, Lincoln made him mustering officer for Kentucky under his call for 75,000 volunteers at the outbreak of the Civil War.
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James L. Crouthamel, "Geary, John White," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01730.html.
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Webb was most important as a journalist. In 1829 he merged the Courier with Mordecai M. Noah's New York Enquirer. He bought out Noah in 1832, by which time the Courier and Enquirer had the largest daily circulation in the nation, about 4,000. Webb's success was due, in part, to his innovative news-gathering techniques. He maintained a schooner to meet incoming ships before they reached New York, in order to get the foreign newspapers and mail at the earliest moment. He established a special horse express in 1830 and 1831 to bring Jackson's annual messages to New York in advance of the mails, each time beating his rivals by half a day. Webb was one of six founding members of the New York Associated Press in 1848. James Gordon Bennett (1795-1872) of the Herald, Henry J. Raymond of the Times, and James G. Brooks of the Express all learned the newspaper business from Webb, working as associate editors on the Courier and Enquirer.
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Ann T. Keene, "Johnson, Jane," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01881.html.
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Jane Johnson entered the history books in July 1855, when she and her sons accompanied John Wheeler and his family on a trip north by train from Washington to Philadelphia. After a short visit, they planned to travel by ferry to New York City, then by ship to Nicaragua, where Wheeler was U.S. minister. On 18 July the entourage arrived at the Broad Street Station in Philadelphia … After a brief stop, they continued to Bloodgood's Hotel, near the Camden Ferry. The family left Johnson and her sons at the hotel, locking them in their room and instructing the Johnsons to talk to no one until their return later that afternoon.
Philadelphia was a center of abolitionist activity and a stop on the Underground Railroad, and Johnson was apparently aware of this. She managed to pass a note to a black hotel worker indicating that she wanted her freedom, and the note was passed along to William Still, an African-American leader of the abolitionist cause. Still and a white associate, Passmore Williamson, went to the hotel, where they found the Wheeler party about to leave on the five o'clock ferry. As the party made its way to the boat, Still and Williamson approached Johnson and informed her that under Pennsylvania law she was free and could leave Wheeler. As Williamson tried to reason with Wheeler while black dockworkers restrained him, Still rushed Johnson and her sons to a waiting carriage that drove them to Still's home in the city.
Philadelphia was a center of abolitionist activity and a stop on the Underground Railroad, and Johnson was apparently aware of this. She managed to pass a note to a black hotel worker indicating that she wanted her freedom, and the note was passed along to William Still, an African-American leader of the abolitionist cause. Still and a white associate, Passmore Williamson, went to the hotel, where they found the Wheeler party about to leave on the five o'clock ferry. As the party made its way to the boat, Still and Williamson approached Johnson and informed her that under Pennsylvania law she was free and could leave Wheeler. As Williamson tried to reason with Wheeler while black dockworkers restrained him, Still rushed Johnson and her sons to a waiting carriage that drove them to Still's home in the city.
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Norman F. Boas, "Pierce, Jane Means Appleton," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01202.html.
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Jane did not attend Bennie [Pierce's] funeral or her husband's inauguration as president of the United States. As First Lady, she remained cloistered in her White House quarters during most of their time in Washington. Recognizing her crippled emotional state, executive mansion responsibilities were quickly transferred to Sidney Webster and Abigail "Abby" Means. Webster was Franklin Pierce's personal secretary. Abigail Means, the second wife of Jane's uncle Robert Means, became a surrogate First Lady and lived in the White House during most of Pierce's incumbency. Much of Jane Pierce's behavior as First Lady was recorded in a White House diary kept by Abby Means. Jane Pierce was lucid but severely depressed. She would write letters to her deceased son Bennie, which she acknowledged were simply an outlet for her feelings. Her chronic state of ill health and melancholia undoubtedly affected the president's performance in the White House. It may well have contributed to his ineffectual management of the government during the critical years leading to the Civil War. In his last year as president, Franklin Pierce wrote, "I am inclined to think . . . that I shall not be nominated. . . . You would be surprised to know with how much indifference I contemplate the result so far as it is calculated to affect me personally--I am weary of incessant labor but in good health and good heart. Dear Jeannie is also pretty well but somewhat anxious and troubled" (Pierce-Aiken Papers, pp. 61, 62, 83).
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Albert Castel, "Davis, Jefferson Columbus," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00179.html.
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Promoted to brigadier general in December 1861, [Jefferson C. Davis] commanded a division at the battle of Pea Ridge in Arkansas (6-7 Mar. 1862) where he played a key role in securing the Union victory by his promptness and the skill with which he deployed his troops. What seemed to be a bright military future suddenly and permanently became clouded, however, by the most dramatic episode of Davis's career. Assigned, following further service as a division commander in Mississippi in the late spring of 1862, to the command of Major General William Nelson (1824-1862) in Louisville, Kentucky, he was so deeply offended by what he deemed to be an insulting reprimand from Nelson that on the morning of 29 September 1862, accompanied by Governor [Oliver P.] Morton, he went to Nelson's headquarters at the Galt House hotel. Finding Nelson in the lobby, he demanded "satisfaction" for the insult, and when Nelson responded by calling him an "insolent puppy," he threw a wadded-up calling card into Nelson's face. In turn Nelson, who weighed three hundred pounds, slapped Davis in the face and then went upstairs. While he was doing so, Davis procured a revolver and followed him. Hearing Davis, Nelson turned around and started toward him. "Not another step!" cried Davis, who then shot Nelson in the chest, mortally wounding him. Although placed under arrest, Davis was never court-martialed, perhaps because Nelson had forgiven him before dying, and thanks to Morton's political influence he soon received command of a division in the Army of the Cumberland. Nevertheless, his personal reputation was irreparably damaged.
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Paul D. Escott, "Davis, Jefferson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00300.html.
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The common people of the Confederacy grew disaffected not for ideological reasons, but because their conditions of life became intolerable. Often they favored stronger government action if it would alleviate suffering. Impoverished soldiers' families also resented the privileges enjoyed by planters, particularly those related to the draft, such as the exemption of overseers and the ability of those with means to hire a substitute. The combination of poverty and resentment over a "rich man's war and a poor man's fight" nourished a growing stream of desertions from the Confederate ranks. To these problems Davis was largely insensitive. He allowed inequitable policies to become law, and later, when more perceptive officials such as Commissioner of Taxes Thompson Allen or Secretary of War James Seddon urged measures to alleviate distress, he concluded that resources were too limited to allow action. His neglect of the common people's suffering led directly to military weakness...After the Civil War Davis was imprisoned for two years at Fortress Monroe in Hampton Roads. Despite damage to his health, he survived and carried himself through the postwar years as a defeated but unrepentant Confederate.
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Citation:
Paul D. Escott, "Davis, Jefferson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00300.html.
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After only one year of war he sought and obtained a power unprecedented in American history: conscription. The idea of compelling men to fight in the armies was anathema to some southerners and generated fierce protests from political leaders such as Governor Joseph Emerson Brown of Georgia. But Davis was convinced that the Confederacy could not survive without conscription, for, as Secretary of War James Seddon later admitted, "the spirit of volunteering had died out." Davis answered Brown's protests unflinchingly and argued for a Hamiltonian interpretation of the Constitution's "necessary and proper" clause. In another restriction of personal liberties Davis requested and obtained the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus on repeated occasions to deal with disloyalty in threatened areas. Although he scrupulously refrained from acting without congressional authority, he urged what he believed necessary even in the face of criticism.
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Citation:
Paul D. Escott, "Davis, Jefferson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00300.html.
Body Summary:
The Confederate president's flexibility on slavery and commitment to independence emerged clearly late in the war, when he proposed arming and freeing the South's slaves. It is likely that Davis considered this possibility earlier, but he had hoped to influence the 1864 northern elections and could not afford a well-publicized, divisive debate within the South. After Lincoln's reelection, however, he straightforwardly argued that slavery was less important than independence and that slaves would fight and deserved freedom as a reward. These proposals aroused enormous opposition, but as was usually the case, Davis won Congress's approval for most of his plan.
Type: Description
Citation:
Paul D. Escott, "Davis, Jefferson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00300.html.
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Davis built a powerful central government. He saw himself as a strict constructionist but never doubted that the Confederate Constitution gave him war powers that were necessary in the crisis. From the first he insisted that state troops come under the central government's control, and when four state governors sought the return of state-owned arms he declared in disgust that "if such was to be the course of the States . . . we had better make terms as soon as we could." Despite enormous local pressures, Davis insisted that "the idea of retaining in each State its own troops for its own defense" was a "fatal error. . . . Our safety--our very existence--depends on the complete blending of the military strength of all the States into one united body, to be used anywhere and everywhere as the exigencies of the contest may require."
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Edward L. Lach, Jr., "Wade, Jeptha Homer," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/10/10-01692.html.
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Wade entered the telegraph industry at a time when it was suffering from serious overconstruction, cutthroat competition, and intense and personal rivalries among the leading figures. As president of the Cleveland & Cincinnati Telegraph Company, he urged consolidation as the only rational solution to the industry's problems as early as 1852. While many other industry leaders, including Royal E. House, Ezra Cornell, and Henry O'Rielly, agreed with Wade in principle, the pursuit of individual advantage made the process a slow one. House and Wade consolidated their lines in 1854, with Wade serving as the new firm's general agent. The trend toward consolidation within the industry accelerated, and upon the formation in 1856 of the Western Union Telegraph Company, Wade served as its general agent as well.
Possessing a reputation for diplomacy as well as sound line construction, Wade was sent by Western Union to California in the fall of 1860. There he negotiated a merger between four rival firms as the California State Telegraph Company. With a federal subsidy in hand and a transcontinental telegraph line as the goal, the California State organized the Overland Telegraph Company to construct the line between Carson City, Nevada, and Salt Lake City, Utah; Western Union followed suit by organizing the Pacific Telegraph Company (with Wade as president) to construct the line between Omaha, Nebraska, and Salt Lake City. Upon the line's completion in October 1861, enormous profits soon accrued to Western Union, and Wade was promoted to general manager.
Possessing a reputation for diplomacy as well as sound line construction, Wade was sent by Western Union to California in the fall of 1860. There he negotiated a merger between four rival firms as the California State Telegraph Company. With a federal subsidy in hand and a transcontinental telegraph line as the goal, the California State organized the Overland Telegraph Company to construct the line between Carson City, Nevada, and Salt Lake City, Utah; Western Union followed suit by organizing the Pacific Telegraph Company (with Wade as president) to construct the line between Omaha, Nebraska, and Salt Lake City. Upon the line's completion in October 1861, enormous profits soon accrued to Western Union, and Wade was promoted to general manager.
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Frederick J. Blue. "Black, Jeremiah Sullivan," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00108.html.
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The issue that above all others put Black in the center of sectional controversy was the Buchanan administration's response to South Carolina's secession in December 1860. The question split the cabinet into northern and southern factions. Although Black initially believed in the right of a state to secede, he backed away from urging endorsement of that position in response to the president's request for a legal opinion on secession. The attorney general responded that the federal government had a duty and right to collect duties and to defend public property and execute the laws. Yet this right could only be enforced peacefully, and if force were necessary, only Congress could legislate such procedures. Black asserted that Congress could not "arm one part of the people against another for any purpose beyond that of merely protecting the General Government in the exercise of its proper constitutional functions" (quoted in Works of James Buchanan, vol. 11). Black thus took an essentially conservative approach, which became the position of the administration, a stance that cynics argued was tantamount to saying, "You cannot do it, but we cannot stop you if you do." In essence, Black argued that secession was unconstitutional but that the federal government had no power to coerce a seceded state back into the Union.
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Milton C. Sernett, "Loguen, Jermain Wesley," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/08/08-00878.html.
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With other members of the Fugitive Aid Society, Loguen participated in the famous rescue of William "Jerry" McHenry at Syracuse in October 1851; fearing arrest for his actions, he fled to St. Catharines, Canada West, where he conducted missionary work and spoke on behalf of the temperance cause among other fugitives. Despite the failure of his appeal of 2 December 1851 for safe passage to Governor Washington Hunt of New York, Loguen returned to Syracuse in late 1852 and renewed his labors on behalf of the Underground Railroad and the local Fugitive Aid Society. Loguen was indicted by a grand jury at Buffalo, New York, but was never tried.
By the 1840s Loguen had moved away from the moral suasion philosophy of William Lloyd Garrison and into the circle of central New York abolitionists who endorsed political means. After the demise of the Liberty party, Loguen supported a remnant known as the Liberty League. By 1854 Loguen had abandoned the nonviolent philosophy of many of his abolitionist colleagues and joined the Radical Abolition Society. After 1857 he devoted all of his time to the Fugitive Aid Society. He returned to Canada West to attend a convention led by John Brown (1800-1859) prior to the 1859 raid at Harpers Ferry but apparently did not know the details of Brown's plan.
By the 1840s Loguen had moved away from the moral suasion philosophy of William Lloyd Garrison and into the circle of central New York abolitionists who endorsed political means. After the demise of the Liberty party, Loguen supported a remnant known as the Liberty League. By 1854 Loguen had abandoned the nonviolent philosophy of many of his abolitionist colleagues and joined the Radical Abolition Society. After 1857 he devoted all of his time to the Fugitive Aid Society. He returned to Canada West to attend a convention led by John Brown (1800-1859) prior to the 1859 raid at Harpers Ferry but apparently did not know the details of Brown's plan.
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Paul G. Kooistra, "James, Jesse," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00510.html.
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Raised in a rural Missouri county by slave-owning parents, Jesse James grew up experiencing at close hand the violent conflicts between antislavery elements in nearby Kansas and proslavery groups in Missouri before the outbreak of the Civil War. The Civil War intensified these conflicts, as the region experienced numerous atrocities carried out by rival guerrilla bands. After his parents were abused by Union soldiers and his mother imprisoned, James at seventeen joined his brother Frank James and several future criminal associates in "Bloody Bill" Anderson's Confederate guerrilla outfit and participated in several battles, earning a reputation for courage and skill.
What happened to Jesse James immediately following the war is uncertain. Widely accepted is the story that he was shot and left for dead when he surrendered to Union troops, giving rise to the belief that he became an outlaw because he was not granted amnesty. Many Confederate guerrillas, some more infamous at the time than James, did make the postwar transition to law-abiding citizen, making the tale seem more a convenient fiction than a historical fact.
What happened to Jesse James immediately following the war is uncertain. Widely accepted is the story that he was shot and left for dead when he surrendered to Union troops, giving rise to the belief that he became an outlaw because he was not granted amnesty. Many Confederate guerrillas, some more infamous at the time than James, did make the postwar transition to law-abiding citizen, making the tale seem more a convenient fiction than a historical fact.
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John Y. Simon, "Rawlins, John Aaron," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00828.html.
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Although a Democratic presidential elector in 1860, [Rawlins's] impassioned patriotism in 1861 attracted the attention of fellow townsman Ulysses S. Grant, who, when appointed brigadier general in August, offered Rawlins a staff position…. Rawlins's career intertwined with that of Grant for the rest of his brief life. Appointed adjutant with the rank of captain of volunteers, he was promoted to major (May 1862) after the battles of Fort Donelson and Shiloh. He then served as lieutenant colonel (November 1862-August 1863) during the Vicksburg campaign and was appointed brigadier general after Vicksburg fell. As adjutant he headed Grant's staff throughout the war, a position recognized formally when he was confirmed as brigadier general in the regular army in March 1865 to fill the newly created post of chief of staff to the commanding general. As chief of staff Rawlins organized headquarters paperwork, issued orders in his commander's name, and maintained offices in the field. He wrote clumsily, and Grant sometimes actually drafted orders for him to sign. Grant invariably drafted his own reports; Rawlins merely inserted copies of pertinent correspondence and verified facts and dates.
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Virgil W. Dean, "Halderman, John Adams," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00307.html.
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Halderman probably arrived in the Kansas Territory in October 1854. In November he became private secretary to the territory's first governor, Andrew Reeder. Subsequently, as secretary of the first territorial council in 1855, Leavenworth County's first probate judge in 1855-1856, a member of the territorial council of 1857, and a Douglas delegate to the 1860 national convention, he worked to make Kansas a Democratic state. But, like his Illinois mentor Douglas, in 1857-1858 he opposed the infamous Lecompton constitution, which sought to force slavery on an unwilling Kansas populace. He even purchased a partnership in the Leavenworth Journal as an oracle for that opposition. "While I controlled or owned it [the Journal]," wrote Halderman in 1881, "it favored a free state in Kansas, fought Lecompton, and supported Douglas." The split among "proslave" partisans over the ill-advised Lecompton effort further weakened the fledgling Kansas Democracy, and Halderman's party-building efforts were to no avail. The Free State (Republican) party won the day in Kansas, and at some point during the Civil War (probably in 1861), Halderman switched his party allegiance.
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William M. Fowler, "Dahlgren, John Adolphus Bernard," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00291.html.
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Dahlgren was at the Washington Navy Yard in April 1861 at the outbreak of the Civil War. The yard's commander Franklin Buchanan resigned to "go South," and Dahlgren was appointed to replace him. On 16 July 1862 he was promoted to captain, and two days later he took command of the Bureau of Ordnance. Dahlgren's reputation and his proximity to the White House often brought him in contact with President Abraham Lincoln, outside of the normal chain of command, which was looked upon with some suspicion by Dahlgren's peers. On 7 February 1863 he was promoted to rear admiral. Four months later, 24 June, Dahlgren was ordered to take command of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron.
As commander of the Blockading Squadron, Dahlgren's chief goal was the capture of the port of Charleston. His predecessor, S. Francis Du Pont, had tried and failed in this attempt and was recalled as a result. During Dahlgren's command Charleston was kept under siege for almost two years. Pressed at sea by Dahlgren's forces and from the land side by William Tecumseh Sherman's advancing army, the Confederates evacuated Charleston 17-18 February 1865. Dahlgren was ordered to transfer his command of the squadron 9 June, when the force was integrated with the Northern Blockading Squadron and returned to its prewar status as the Atlantic Squadron.
As commander of the Blockading Squadron, Dahlgren's chief goal was the capture of the port of Charleston. His predecessor, S. Francis Du Pont, had tried and failed in this attempt and was recalled as a result. During Dahlgren's command Charleston was kept under siege for almost two years. Pressed at sea by Dahlgren's forces and from the land side by William Tecumseh Sherman's advancing army, the Confederates evacuated Charleston 17-18 February 1865. Dahlgren was ordered to transfer his command of the squadron 9 June, when the force was integrated with the Northern Blockading Squadron and returned to its prewar status as the Atlantic Squadron.
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James Brewer Stewart, "Andrew, John Albion," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00022.html.
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Concurrent with his efforts for aid for freedpeople, Andrew took the lead in the experiment in racial egalitarianism for which he is most famous, the mobilization of African-American soldiers.
Andrew was the politician best situated to transform into military policy the demands of black activists that African Americans be allowed to achieve their own equality through combat. In January 1863, after several months of vigorous lobbying, Andrew obtained authorization from Secretary of War Edwin Stanton to recruit an African-American regiment in Massachusetts, but only with the proviso that all commissioned officers be white. Swallowing his objections to this stipulation, Andrew organized the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Volunteers.
Andrew was the politician best situated to transform into military policy the demands of black activists that African Americans be allowed to achieve their own equality through combat. In January 1863, after several months of vigorous lobbying, Andrew obtained authorization from Secretary of War Edwin Stanton to recruit an African-American regiment in Massachusetts, but only with the proviso that all commissioned officers be white. Swallowing his objections to this stipulation, Andrew organized the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Volunteers.
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Rick Ewig, "Campbell, John Allen," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01123.html.
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Campbell's real importance, however, is his role in the passage of the nation's first woman suffrage law. In 1889 Wyoming's constitutional convention included a suffrage provision in the aspiring state's constitution. When it joined the Union on 10 July 1890, Wyoming became the first state to grant women the right to vote and hold office. Wyoming became known as "the Equality State," a legacy to which Campbell contributed.
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Aimee Lee Cheek, "Copeland, John Anthony, Jr.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00146.html.
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White northern opinion of the raid was initially divided between Republicans who largely disavowed it and Democrats who pronounced it an abolitionist-Republican conspiracy. Federal marshal Matthew Johnson of Cleveland visited Copeland in jail and emerged with a purported "confession"--actually fabricated from letters found in Brown's hideout--that implicated in Brown's plot prominent figures connected with the Oberlin-Wellington case.
Copeland was convicted of murder and of inciting slaves to rebellion and, like the other captured raiders, was sentenced to death. But just as the imprisoned Brown's eloquence and stoicism helped to transform his own image from madman to Christian martyr, Copeland's conduct challenged racist assumptions of black inferiority. Even the presiding judge and the special prosecutor at his trial, both white Virginians, later would vouch for Copeland's courage and poise, with the latter adding intelligence as well. "There was a dignity to him that I could not help liking," the judge would confess. "He was always manly." The eulogy at a funeral service for Copeland in Oberlin on Christmas Day praised the Supreme Being for granting African Americans a "not less firm, heroic and Christlike champion" at Harpers Ferry than whites had in "the immortal John Brown." African Americans throughout the North applauded, in the words of the Ohio State Anti-Slavery Society, "the noble and Christ-like John Brown and his compatriots."
Copeland was convicted of murder and of inciting slaves to rebellion and, like the other captured raiders, was sentenced to death. But just as the imprisoned Brown's eloquence and stoicism helped to transform his own image from madman to Christian martyr, Copeland's conduct challenged racist assumptions of black inferiority. Even the presiding judge and the special prosecutor at his trial, both white Virginians, later would vouch for Copeland's courage and poise, with the latter adding intelligence as well. "There was a dignity to him that I could not help liking," the judge would confess. "He was always manly." The eulogy at a funeral service for Copeland in Oberlin on Christmas Day praised the Supreme Being for granting African Americans a "not less firm, heroic and Christlike champion" at Harpers Ferry than whites had in "the immortal John Brown." African Americans throughout the North applauded, in the words of the Ohio State Anti-Slavery Society, "the noble and Christ-like John Brown and his compatriots."
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Citation:
Artemus E. Ward "Campbell, John Archibald," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00199.html.
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[Campbel] joined a [Supreme] Court led by the 73-year-old chief justice Roger B. Taney. Campbell undertook a strict constructionist philosophy of judicial review during his years on the Court and became known as a dissenter...In Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) he voted in conference against hearing the case but was outvoted. Once the case was argued, he sided with the majority led by Chief Justice Taney in overturning the Missouri Compromise, declaring that blacks could not be citizens of the United States and that slaves were property protected by the Constitution. Campbell had owned household slaves but emancipated them upon his appointment to the Supreme Court...While riding circuit, he upheld statutes prohibiting the slave trade. He believed that slavery should not cause the dissolution of the union, that it was a transitory institution that would be changed in time, and that it had been receding to the South and Southwest since the adoption of the Constitution. He did believe, though, that slavery, as well as secession, was an issue for the states to decide. In 1860 he was mentioned as a possible compromise candidate for president of the United States, as palatable to Democrats of both the North and South. On 11 January 1861 Alabama seceded. Campbell was a steadfast believer in states' rights, and though personally opposed to secession and the war, he felt it his duty to resign from the Court and join his home state of Alabama in the Confederate cause. He resigned on 26 April 1861.
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Edward G. Longacre, "McIntosh, John Baillie," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00506.html.
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Despite family ties to the South…John McIntosh cast his lot with the Union. Early in June he obtained a commission in the Second U.S. Dragoons; two months later he transferred to the Fifth Cavalry…. Throughout the Peninsula campaign McIntosh was cited for gallantry and combativeness, but he found little opportunity to distinguish himself in the subsequent campaign in western Maryland that culminated in the battle of Antietam.
McIntosh remains one of the lesser-known figures of the Civil War, despite the variety and magnitude of his contributions…. His most conspicuous performance came on the third day at Gettysburg, when he built a formidable barrier against Stuart's advance and maintained it through judicious use of mounted and dismounted troopers and horse batteries, shoring up threatened sectors in timely fashion and taking the offensive as opportunities arose. …Averell, Gregg, Sheridan, and James Harrison Wilson considered him one of their most reliable subordinates. Still, McIntosh waited a long time for promotion to brigadier general and never rose above brigade command, a failure partially explained by his lack of a West Point diploma and of active political support in Washington.
Though plagued by an excitable temperament that sometimes expressed itself in violent bursts of anger, McIntosh maintained the respect and confidence of his troopers. Perhaps the most dramatic evidence of his popularity was a petition that numerous members of his brigade sent to the War Department in January 1864, seeking promotion for "a polished gentleman, a strict disciplinarian, and an earnest Soldier."
McIntosh remains one of the lesser-known figures of the Civil War, despite the variety and magnitude of his contributions…. His most conspicuous performance came on the third day at Gettysburg, when he built a formidable barrier against Stuart's advance and maintained it through judicious use of mounted and dismounted troopers and horse batteries, shoring up threatened sectors in timely fashion and taking the offensive as opportunities arose. …Averell, Gregg, Sheridan, and James Harrison Wilson considered him one of their most reliable subordinates. Still, McIntosh waited a long time for promotion to brigadier general and never rose above brigade command, a failure partially explained by his lack of a West Point diploma and of active political support in Washington.
Though plagued by an excitable temperament that sometimes expressed itself in violent bursts of anger, McIntosh maintained the respect and confidence of his troopers. Perhaps the most dramatic evidence of his popularity was a petition that numerous members of his brigade sent to the War Department in January 1864, seeking promotion for "a polished gentleman, a strict disciplinarian, and an earnest Soldier."
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Gary W. Gallagher, "Magruder, John Bankhead," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00655.html.
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Although not a secessionist, Magruder resigned from the U.S. Army on 20 April 1861. Commissioned a Confederate colonel on 21 May (to date from 16 Mar.), he took charge of troops defending the Virginia Peninsula. On 10 June a portion of his command won a skirmish at Big Bethel. Magruder played scarcely any role in the triumph but trumpeted it as a decisive engagement. Newspapers praised him lavishly, and he soon ranked behind only P. G. T. Beauregard as a Confederate military idol. He was promoted to brigadier general on 17 June and to major general on 7 October 1861.
Magruder oversaw an excellent defense of the lower Peninsula against George B. McClellan's army in April 1862. He constructed earthworks, dammed streams to flood lowlands, and conducted an effective game of bluff that prompted McClellan to waste a month at Yorktown while Joseph E. Johnston shifted his Confederate army from northern Virginia to the Peninsula. Johnston, who unfairly criticized Magruder's defensive line as too long and claimed the flooded areas prohibited offensive action, assigned him the right wing of the army. Magruder reported directly to Major General Gustavus W. Smith, with whom he immediately began a pattern of bickering that culminated in his requesting reassignment. He received word on 23 May of his appointment to command the Trans-Mississippi Department. Pleased with this news, Magruder asked Secretary of War George Wythe Randolph to postpone the transfer until after the current campaign had ended, a request Randolph granted over Johnston's objection.
Magruder oversaw an excellent defense of the lower Peninsula against George B. McClellan's army in April 1862. He constructed earthworks, dammed streams to flood lowlands, and conducted an effective game of bluff that prompted McClellan to waste a month at Yorktown while Joseph E. Johnston shifted his Confederate army from northern Virginia to the Peninsula. Johnston, who unfairly criticized Magruder's defensive line as too long and claimed the flooded areas prohibited offensive action, assigned him the right wing of the army. Magruder reported directly to Major General Gustavus W. Smith, with whom he immediately began a pattern of bickering that culminated in his requesting reassignment. He received word on 23 May of his appointment to command the Trans-Mississippi Department. Pleased with this news, Magruder asked Secretary of War George Wythe Randolph to postpone the transfer until after the current campaign had ended, a request Randolph granted over Johnston's objection.
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Joseph G. Dawson, "Jones, John Beauchamp," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00879.html.
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Totaling nearly nine hundred printed pages in two volumes, Jones's Diary touches on a kaleidoscope of issues, events, and people. Recounting a purported conversation with Jefferson Davis, Jones claimed that Davis doubted northerners' ability to wage a hard and costly war. Having resided among northerners, Jones wrote, "I know them better. And it will be found that they will learn how to fight and will not be afraid to fight." This entry, among others, could have been added after the war to give an impression of Jones's foresight and analytical ability. Some modern critics have suspected that Jones may have doctored passages in his journal before publication, such as anticipating success for General Thomas J. Jackson, a little-known professor at the Virginia Military Institute. Even if Jones made such changes, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary remains one of the best published primary accounts of the Confederacy written by a civilian, standing alongside such works as Mary Boykin Chesnut's famous Diary from Dixie and Inside the Confederate Government: The Diary of Robert Garlick Hill Kean.
Although an ardent supporter of southern rights, Jones returned to Burlington, New Jersey, after the Civil War, where he died before the publication of his noteworthy diary.
Although an ardent supporter of southern rights, Jones returned to Burlington, New Jersey, after the Civil War, where he died before the publication of his noteworthy diary.
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Arthur W. Bergeron, “Hood, John Bell,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01177.html.
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[John Bell] Hood was one of the most outstanding brigade and division commanders of the Civil War, but he seemed unfitted for the demands of higher command…He was aggressive but rash in combat. The historian Richard McMurry wrote, "As a fighter, Hood's luck never failed. As a general, he was one of the most unfortunate men ever to head an army" (McMurry, p. 24).
On 7 May [1862] Hood led his men in their first action, an attack on a Union force that had come ashore from boats on the Pamunkey River at Eltham's Landing. The brigade drove the enemy back to the protection of their gunboats, and Hood received praise from Davis and Johnston. In the battle of Gaines' Mill on 27 June, Hood's heroic leadership in attacking the Union position broke the enemy line and won the engagement for the Confederate army.
As the army continued to retreat toward Atlanta, Davis despaired of Johnston's ability to prevent the capture of that vital city. On 17 July he removed Johnston from command and named Hood as his successor, with the temporary rank of full general. The new commander quickly went on the offensive. His troops attacked the armies of Major General William Tecumseh Sherman in the battles of Peachtree Creek (20 July), Atlanta (22 July), and Ezra Church (28 July). All three engagements ended in defeats for the Confederates.
On 7 May [1862] Hood led his men in their first action, an attack on a Union force that had come ashore from boats on the Pamunkey River at Eltham's Landing. The brigade drove the enemy back to the protection of their gunboats, and Hood received praise from Davis and Johnston. In the battle of Gaines' Mill on 27 June, Hood's heroic leadership in attacking the Union position broke the enemy line and won the engagement for the Confederate army.
As the army continued to retreat toward Atlanta, Davis despaired of Johnston's ability to prevent the capture of that vital city. On 17 July he removed Johnston from command and named Hood as his successor, with the temporary rank of full general. The new commander quickly went on the offensive. His troops attacked the armies of Major General William Tecumseh Sherman in the battles of Peachtree Creek (20 July), Atlanta (22 July), and Ezra Church (28 July). All three engagements ended in defeats for the Confederates.
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Phyllis F. Field, "Bigelow, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00100.html.
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The renewal of the slavery issue in the mid-1850s led Bigelow, [William Cullen] Bryant, and the Evening Post to cast their lot with the new Republican party. In 1856 Bigelow wrote a campaign biography for John C. Frémont, the party's first presidential nominee. As a reward for his constant labors for the Post, Bigelow began an eighteen-month European vacation in 1858 that provided him with contacts among liberal intellectuals and politicians who proved valuable to his later diplomatic career.
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Robert McGlone, "Brown, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00096.html.
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Though a military fiasco, Brown's raid was for many a jeremiad against a nation that defied God in tolerating human bondage. It sent tremors of horror throughout the South and gave secessionists a persuasive symbol of northern hostility. It hardened positions over slavery everywhere. It helped to discredit Stephen A. Douglas's compromise policy of popular sovereignty and to divide the Democratic party, thus ensuring the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860. In a longer view, African Americans especially have seen in Brown hope for the eventual redemption of an oppressive America, while critics have condemned his extremism and deplored his divisive impact on the sectional crisis. Both Brown's fanaticism and his passion for freedom make him an enduring icon.
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William G. Shade, "Floyd, John Buchanan,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00382.html.
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In December 1848 Floyd was elected governor by a coalition of Democrats and Whigs, who supported his views on constitutional reform and internal improvements. As governor he advocated white manhood suffrage, a more equitable apportionment of the legislature on the basis of the white population, and an elective judiciary. He also pushed for an extensive program of turnpike, canal, and railroad construction. His administration stabilized the commonwealth's credit through a program of bond sales and oversaw an unprecedented expansion of appropriations for internal improvements. Floyd continued to defend southern rights while governor. He sought to strengthen slavery by aiding the Virginia Colonization Society in the removal of the commonwealth's free black population. He attacked the "never ending aggression" of the northern abolitionists and proposed that the commonwealth tax the incoming goods from those free states that persisted in refusing to return fugitive slaves. Finally, Governor Floyd issued a call for a national convention to oppose "agitation of the slavery question" and aided the formation in Richmond of the Central Southern Rights Association. He warned that, if the South did not resist, the northern fanatics would eventually control Congress and eliminate slavery.
Type: Description
Citation:
William G. Shade, "Floyd, John Buchanan,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00382.html.
Body Summary:
[President James] Buchanan, seeking a Virginian for his cabinet, brought Floyd in as secretary of war when [Henry Alexander] Wise turned down the offer of a position as secretary of state. There Floyd acted with the "directory" of prosouthern advisers, repudiating Robert J. Walker's handling of the situation in Kansas and favoring the acceptance of the proslavery Lecompton constitution. Unfortunately, he became infamous for his slipshod administration of the War Department. Not only did Floyd favor his friends and relatives in awarding government contracts, but he also became increasingly involved in issuing "acceptances" that allowed contractors to borrow money against their promissory notes signed by the secretary of war…Throughout his political career, Floyd had been a states' rights Democrat and an outspoken defender of slavery and southern rights. On 3 December 1860 he asserted that he was "not for secession as long as any honorable effort can be made to preserve the Union…guaranteeing…protection to the negro property of the South." As southern states began to secede and the charges of misconduct mounted against him, Floyd increasingly embraced secession. Once Virginia had seceded, Floyd raised a brigade of volunteers and joined in the attempt to secure western Virginia for the Confederacy. Although he took part in the minor engagements at Cross Lanes and Carnifex Ferry, Floyd spent most of his energies in western Virginia bickering with his fellow officer Wise. His performance was generally inept and his troops were driven back.
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William L. Barney, "Breckinridge, John Cabell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00142.html.
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A friend and confidant of both President Franklin Pierce and the Illinois senator Stephen Douglas, Breckinridge was one of the congressional intermediaries who convinced Pierce to accept southern demands that Douglas's bill for organizing the Kansas and Nebraska territories include the statement that the Missouri Compromise restriction on slavery was "inoperative and void." Breckinridge also played a key role in securing approval of Douglas's bill in the House. Until this point he had been viewed as a moderate from the Border South on the slavery issue. Hereafter, although Breckinridge still tried to be a sectional mediator, he was associated with the extreme demands of the Lower South. When the Kansas-Nebraska Act passed in 1854, it triggered a storm of protest in the North that spawned the Republican party. Although he sponsored little in the way of major legislation, Breckinridge was a popular congressman whose charm and affability won him many friends. This popularity, combined with his representation of a key border state that traditionally had voted for the Whigs in presidential elections, gained him the Democratic nomination for vice president in 1856. The Buchanan-Breckinridge ticket carried Kentucky and the election. Breckinridge's service as vice president, however, was even less distinguished than his congressional record. He was virtually ignored by James Buchanan and shut out of the administration's policy decisions. It was with some relief that Breckinridge looked forward to entering the U.S. Senate, having been elected in 1859 by the Kentucky legislature to fill the seat to be vacated by John J. Crittenden in 1861.
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Richard L. Aynes, "Catron, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00149.html.
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During the pendency of the Dred Scott decision, Catron wrote to ask President James Buchanan to lobby fellow Pennsylvanian and Democrat Justice Robert Grier to vote with the Taney majority. Later he disclosed the nature of the decision to the President before it was announced. Catron even drafted a statement that President Buchanan could use in his inaugural address, asking the public to abide by whatever decision the Supreme Court rendered in Dred Scott. Buchanan therefore knew the outcome of the case when he asked the public to follow the Supreme Court's decision, no matter what the outcome.
Many historians mitigate Catron's actions in disclosing the decision in Dred Scott by documenting similar incidents of disclosure of confidential information by other justices and by noting Catron's close relationships with most of the vice presidents and presidents of his time. In 1835, when sitting on the Tennessee Supreme Court, he sent a copy of one of his opinions to Martin Van Buren. He was a frequent correspondent of Jackson, James K. Polk, and Buchanan. He gave President Franklin Pierce early warning of the outcome in the Wheeling Bridge Case in 1852. But even if the sharing of the results of the decision was justified, this would not excuse the solicitation of Buchanan's help to influence Grier's vote.
Many historians mitigate Catron's actions in disclosing the decision in Dred Scott by documenting similar incidents of disclosure of confidential information by other justices and by noting Catron's close relationships with most of the vice presidents and presidents of his time. In 1835, when sitting on the Tennessee Supreme Court, he sent a copy of one of his opinions to Martin Van Buren. He was a frequent correspondent of Jackson, James K. Polk, and Buchanan. He gave President Franklin Pierce early warning of the outcome in the Wheeling Bridge Case in 1852. But even if the sharing of the results of the decision was justified, this would not excuse the solicitation of Buchanan's help to influence Grier's vote.
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Pamela Herr, "Frémont, John Charles," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00252.html.
Body Summary:
Frémont reentered politics in 1856. With crucial early support from Nathaniel Banks and Francis Blair, Sr. (1791-1876), he became the first presidential candidate of the newly formed Republican party on a platform opposing the extension of slavery. Chosen more for his heroic image than his political skills, he nonetheless inspired great enthusiasm in the North, while in the South he was branded a "Frenchman's bastard" and, incorrectly, a secret Roman Catholic. Although Frémont gained the majority of northern votes, he was defeated nationwide by the Democratic candidate, James Buchanan (1.8 to 1.34 million, with an electoral vote of 174 to 114). Despite the loss, his candidacy established the Republican party's dominance in the North and set the stage for Abraham Lincoln's victory in 1860.
Type: Description
Citation:
Pamela Herr, "Frémont, John Charles," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00252.html.
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When confirmed reports of war with Mexico reached the Pacific, the U.S. Navy seized California ports. Commodore Robert F. Stockton named Frémont commander of the California Battalion, which helped to occupy the province. In the winter of 1846-1847, during a revolt centered in Los Angeles, Frémont became entangled in a quarrel between Stockton and late-arriving General Stephen Watts Kearny of the army, both of whom claimed supreme authority in California. When Frémont, an army officer, rashly sided with Stockton, who had named him governor, Kearny marched him east in disgrace to face a court-martial. Despite widespread public support and Benton's personal defense of him during the long, rancorous trial, Frémont was found guilty and dismissed from the army. Although President Polk reinstated him for "meritorious and valuable services," Frémont bitterly resigned.
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Steven E. Woodworth, "Pemberton, John Clifford," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00601.html.
Body Summary:
With the secession of Virginia in April 1861, Pemberton made his way to Washington, D.C. At the urging of his wife but against the remonstrances of his mother and brothers, he refused General Scott's offer of a colonel's commission, resigned, and cast his lot with Virginia. His rank changed quickly over the weeks that followed. On 28 April he became a lieutenant colonel in the Virginia state army. Ten days later he advanced to colonel in that service. On 15 June he was commissioned a major in the regular Confederate army and, two days later, brigadier general in the provisional Confederate army. His duties during this time and the months that followed consisted primarily of training and organizing cavalry and artillery and preparing the defenses of Norfolk and the James River. In November 1861 he was transferred to coastal South Carolina to assist department commander Robert E. Lee in the defense of that area. The following February, when Lee was recalled to Richmond, Pemberton succeeded to command of the Department of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida and was promoted to major general in the provisional army. Southerners found it hard to overlook his northern birth, and Pemberton was anything but adept at public relations, even suggesting that, from an engineering standpoint, the emotionally significant Fort Sumter might as well be torn down. He was far from popular.
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Brooks D. Simpson, "Creswell, John Angel James," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00280.html.
Body Summary:
In 1869 Ulysses S. Grant named Creswell postmaster general--the only Republican from a southern state in Grant's first cabinet. Creswell managed to be effective and to avoid the taint of scandal that touched some of his colleagues. He worked to make the postal service faster and less expensive, especially international mail. He reduced the cost of carrying mail by steam and rail, increased the number of mail routes and postal employees, introduced the penny postal card, and worked with Secretary of State Hamilton Fish to revise postal treaties. His willingness to attack the franking system and his advocacy of a postal telegraph sparked opposition from both congressmen and Western Union. However, he did not play a significant role in the politics of Grant's first term, maintaining a low profile in the intraparty feuds that resulted in the Liberal Republican bolt of 1872. Rather, Creswell administered his charge with an eye to promoting both efficiency and the Republican party's fortunes through the appointment of loyal party supporters as postmasters. With unwavering loyalty to the president, he supported Grant's plan to annex the Dominican Republic and advocated American intervention in Cuba. He reaffirmed his Radical credentials in supporting additional Reconstruction measures. In 1874 he was one of only two cabinet members who advised Grant to veto the so-called Inflation Bill. Leaving Grant's cabinet later that year under circumstances left unclear, Creswell served as the American counsel for the Alabama claims and supervised the closing of the Freedmen's Bank. Returning to private legal practice after December 1876, he served as president of the Citizens National Bank in Maryland. His last notable political activity was on behalf of the effort to nominate Grant for a third term in 1880. He died in Elkton, Maryland.
Type: Description
Citation:
Brooks D. Simpson, "Creswell, John Angel James," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00280.html.
Body Summary:
Originally a Whig, when the party broke up Creswell shifted allegiances to the Democratic party for a short while and in 1856 was a delegate to its presidential nominating convention. In the secession winter of 1860-1861, he declared for the Union, and as a member of the House of Delegates, he served to keep Maryland from seceding in 1861. The following year he was appointed assistant adjutant general for the state. In the fall of 1862 he won election as a Republican to Congress, beating incumbent John W. Crisfield. Creswell sided with the Radical Republicans in Maryland as an ally of Henry Winter Davis and played an important role in securing passage of emancipation in that state in 1864. That year he lost his bid for reelection. He served out Thomas Hicks's term in the U.S. Senate starting in 1865 but failed to secure election in his own right in 1867. Supporting congressional Reconstruction measures, he advocated the impeachment of President Andrew Johnson. In 1864 and 1868 he served as a delegate to the Republican presidential nominating conventions.
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Michael Powell, "Underwood, John Curtiss," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00866.html.
Body Summary:
Underwood was an ardent abolitionist and active in the Whig, Liberty, and Free Soil parties. In the spring of 1848, after several unsuccessful attempts at elective office in New York, he turned his attention southward to western Virginia, where he established over fifteen farms utilizing free labor. He hoped, in concrete terms, to demonstrate that the South need not rely economically on the immoral institution of slavery. Although these farms ultimately failed, his efforts represent a rare attempt by a northern abolitionist to go South and create pragmatic alternatives in order to effectuate change in southern society.
After delivering a speech critical of Virginia and slavery at the 1856 Republican National Convention, Underwood was strongly "advised" not to return to his home in western Virginia. While following this advice, he campaigned for the Republican presidential candidate, John C. Frémont, and continued to write and speak out against slavery. He eventually moved to New York City. Underwood's new project was organizing the American Emigrant Aid and Homestead Company, which sought to establish antislavery communities in western Virginia. The purpose of the company was twofold: to foster abolitionist sentiment among the western Virginians and to demonstrate, again, that communities based upon free labor could prosper in the South. This effort, begun with great optimism in 1857, could not sustain itself in the hysteria following John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry in 1859 and the subsequent Civil War.
After delivering a speech critical of Virginia and slavery at the 1856 Republican National Convention, Underwood was strongly "advised" not to return to his home in western Virginia. While following this advice, he campaigned for the Republican presidential candidate, John C. Frémont, and continued to write and speak out against slavery. He eventually moved to New York City. Underwood's new project was organizing the American Emigrant Aid and Homestead Company, which sought to establish antislavery communities in western Virginia. The purpose of the company was twofold: to foster abolitionist sentiment among the western Virginians and to demonstrate, again, that communities based upon free labor could prosper in the South. This effort, begun with great optimism in 1857, could not sustain itself in the hysteria following John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry in 1859 and the subsequent Civil War.
Type: Description
Citation:
Michael Powell, "Underwood, John Curtiss," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00866.html.
Body Summary:
Underwood attracted attention in both the North and South during his lifetime. Northern editors, politicians, and abolitionists applauded his attempts to reform the South. At the same time, he was viewed by southerners with contempt for his position on slavery and for the opinions he issued from the bench. While Underwood, who lived his last years in Alexandria, Virginia, but died in Washington, D.C., has been labeled as a Radical Republican carpetbagger, more recent historiography portrays him as an advocate of equality and freedom of expression. His concrete antebellum attempts to employ free labor in the South set him apart from many abolitionists; his efforts after the Civil War reflect his continued interest in the freedom and equality of all Americans.
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Citation:
Steven E. Woodworth, "Imboden, John Daniel," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00373.html.
Body Summary:
After the election of Abraham Lincoln, Imboden ran unsuccessfully for a seat in Virginia's secession convention. A friend of former Virginia governor and prominent secessionist Henry A. Wise, Imboden was also among those who advocated immediate secession from the Union.
When the Civil War broke out, Imboden raised and organized the Staunton Artillery and became its first captain. The newly organized battery was among the Virginia troops that occupied the abandoned Federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry on 19 April 1861. At the first battle of Bull Run (Manassas) on 21 July 1861, Imboden led his battery in action, supporting the brigade of General Barnard Bee in some of the thickest fighting to hold crucial Henry House Hill. Imboden's duties during the months after Bull Run remain unknown, but the next spring he appeared again, this time raising the First Partisan Rangers Regiment, later known as the Sixty-second Virginia Mounted Infantry, a formation of mounted troops intended to make guerrilla raids behind enemy lines. Nevertheless, he fought in "Stonewall" Jackson's forces at Cross Keys and Port Republic, 8 and 9 June 1862, in the Shenandoah Valley. The following winter Imboden was promoted to brigadier general on 28 January 1863. His command thereafter was the Northwestern Brigade of the Department of Northern Virginia.
When the Civil War broke out, Imboden raised and organized the Staunton Artillery and became its first captain. The newly organized battery was among the Virginia troops that occupied the abandoned Federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry on 19 April 1861. At the first battle of Bull Run (Manassas) on 21 July 1861, Imboden led his battery in action, supporting the brigade of General Barnard Bee in some of the thickest fighting to hold crucial Henry House Hill. Imboden's duties during the months after Bull Run remain unknown, but the next spring he appeared again, this time raising the First Partisan Rangers Regiment, later known as the Sixty-second Virginia Mounted Infantry, a formation of mounted troops intended to make guerrilla raids behind enemy lines. Nevertheless, he fought in "Stonewall" Jackson's forces at Cross Keys and Port Republic, 8 and 9 June 1862, in the Shenandoah Valley. The following winter Imboden was promoted to brigadier general on 28 January 1863. His command thereafter was the Northwestern Brigade of the Department of Northern Virginia.
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Citation:
Kinley Brauer, "Davis, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/03/03-00129.html.
Body Summary:
Davis was one of the two senators (along with John M. Clayton of Del.) who voted against the declaration of war against Mexico on 12 May 1846. On 12 August 1846 he spoke at such length in favor of the Wilmot Proviso, an amendment to a military appropriations bill that stipulated that no territory acquired from Mexico would be open to slavery, that the Senate had no time to vote. The bill had already passed the House. Davis later explained that he had intended to speak long enough to leave time only for a vote, which he thought would be positive. He doubted opponents of the proviso would refuse needed military appropriations and delay peace negotiations, and he claimed simply to have misjudged the time. Scholars remain divided on the plausibility of Davis's explanation and whether the bill would have passed had it come to a vote.
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Allen C. Guelzo, "Wool, John Ellis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01074.html.
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At the beginning of 1861 Wool was appointed one of New York's representatives to the abortive Peace Conference, and as a northern Democrat, he announced his intention to be "an independent member" of the conference "with an uncompromising determination to preserve the Union" and to avert the outbreak of the Civil War. The war came anyway, and Wool (as the fourth-ranking officer in the army and junior in years of service only to Scott) immediately moved the headquarters of the Department of the East from Troy to New York City, where he assumed responsibility for mobilization, war contracts, and supplies.
Wool's burst of activity was based on his assumption that he was the logical candidate for active command of the Federal army in the war. However, on 1 May 1861 Wool was reprimanded by Secretary of War Simon Cameron for exceeding his responsibilities, and it became quickly evident that Wool would be given no major field command.
Wool's burst of activity was based on his assumption that he was the logical candidate for active command of the Federal army in the war. However, on 1 May 1861 Wool was reprimanded by Secretary of War Simon Cameron for exceeding his responsibilities, and it became quickly evident that Wool would be given no major field command.
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D. Scott Hartwig, "Reynolds, John Fulton," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00841.html.
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As a commander, he may never have realized his full potential, although his aggressive leadership at Gettysburg helped lay the foundation of the Union victory there. He loved the outdoors, particularly hunting and fishing. He was six feet tall, erect in bearing, and of a somewhat retiring, reticent nature. Charles Veil, a member of Reynolds's staff, left a fitting description of the type of soldier and man his chief was: "Wherever the fight raged the fiercest, there the General was sure to be found, his undaunted courage always inspired the men with more energy & courage. He would never order a body of troops where he had not been himself, or where he did not dare to go."
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Daniel Hamilton, "Nicolay, John George," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00744.html.
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The Nicolay-[John] Hay biography has had lasting historical significance. Both Hay and Nicolay were partisan Republicans, writing under the watchful eye of the martyred president's son in a period when the ideal of historical objectivity had yet to be fully established. In delivering the manuscript to Robert Todd Lincoln, Hay and Nicolay assured him that "every line has been written in the spirit of reverence and regard." Nevertheless, the biography is useful, because while the authors' conclusions are predictable, they are generally grounded in documentary sources and historical records. Additionally, they provide important eyewitness evidence of Lincoln's shifting moods and anxieties, particularly his gloom over the uncertain outcome of the 1864 election. There is no question that the Nicolay-Hay biography reflected the partisanship of the period and has a strong pro-Lincoln bias. It contains intense criticism of General George B. McClellan, the Copperheads, and the Radical Republicans, and it depicts Lincoln as a grand, almost mythical figure. Nevertheless, the biography made an important contribution to Lincoln scholarship. While far too admiring, Nicolay and Hay were the only biographers to have access to Lincoln's papers for more than fifty years. The biography also played an important role in the Civil War historiography of the late nineteenth century, shaping interpretations and prompting attacks by other biographers, such as William Herndon and Jesse W. Weik. Together Nicolay and Hay also edited Lincoln's writings, which were published in two volumes in 1894 and later enlarged to twelve volumes.
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Randall Cluff, "Whittier, John Greenleaf," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01765.html.
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In 1829 Garrison secured for young Whittier the editorship of the political weekly American Manufacturer in Boston, where he quickly became an earnest and outspoken critic of Democrat Andrew Jackson and a supporter of Whig leader Henry Clay. This position introduced him to the realities of politics and political discourse, where he acquitted himself credibly enough to attract the notice of George D. Prentice, editor of the New England Weekly Review, and Nathaniel Parker Willis. Manifesting early the character of the ardent reformer he would later become, Whittier voiced his approval of the temperance movement, condemned slavery, opposed prison sentences for debt, denounced the excesses of Puritan Calvinism, and expressed support for the Unitarian movement, which shared with Quakerism the tenets of a benevolent God and the intrinsic merit of humankind.
Despondent over the headaches that interrupted his work and his lack of direction in life, Whittier reached a turning point in 1833. Garrison wrote asking him to join the fledgling abolitionist movement. Recognizing the risks—both northern and southern interests opposed abolitionism—he joined, believing such a course to be morally correct and socially necessary. In June 1833 he published the antislavery pamphlet Justice and Expediency and in December was a founding member of the American Anti-Slavery Society. He would later regard his signing of the Anti-Slavery Declaration of 1833 the most important thing he had done.
Despondent over the headaches that interrupted his work and his lack of direction in life, Whittier reached a turning point in 1833. Garrison wrote asking him to join the fledgling abolitionist movement. Recognizing the risks—both northern and southern interests opposed abolitionism—he joined, believing such a course to be morally correct and socially necessary. In June 1833 he published the antislavery pamphlet Justice and Expediency and in December was a founding member of the American Anti-Slavery Society. He would later regard his signing of the Anti-Slavery Declaration of 1833 the most important thing he had done.
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Marion B. Lucas, "Fee, John Gregg," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00217.html.
Body Summary:
Fee spent most of the Civil War years in exile in Ohio, preaching and raising money for Berea College. Visits to Kentucky usually culminated in mob attacks, and an attempted return in 1862 ended abruptly with the Confederate invasion of Kentucky. In April 1864 Fee was able to return to Berea and resume his work. In July he moved to nearby Camp Nelson, Kentucky's black-troop recruiting center, where he established schools and held religious services for recruits and their refugee families.
By the close of the Civil War, Fee's ideas had reached their fruition. More than any other American of his day, he understood the racial problems facing America and proposed solutions that would have ameliorated much of the strife that later complicated race relations. Realizing that a landless, uneducated people newly freed from slavery required assistance, Fee implored the Federal government and northern businesses to assist blacks in acquiring jobs, land, and an education. Fee's Berea, a classless, integrated, nonsectarian Christian community where black and white landowners lived, worked, and shared the benefits of education at Berea College, served as an example of "the brotherhood of man." …Mercifully, Fee did not live to witness the demise of his dream. Three years after his death, when blacks comprised only 16 percent of the student body, Kentucky passed the infamous Day Law, which ended racial integration at Berea until 1950.
By the close of the Civil War, Fee's ideas had reached their fruition. More than any other American of his day, he understood the racial problems facing America and proposed solutions that would have ameliorated much of the strife that later complicated race relations. Realizing that a landless, uneducated people newly freed from slavery required assistance, Fee implored the Federal government and northern businesses to assist blacks in acquiring jobs, land, and an education. Fee's Berea, a classless, integrated, nonsectarian Christian community where black and white landowners lived, worked, and shared the benefits of education at Berea College, served as an example of "the brotherhood of man." …Mercifully, Fee did not live to witness the demise of his dream. Three years after his death, when blacks comprised only 16 percent of the student body, Kentucky passed the infamous Day Law, which ended racial integration at Berea until 1950.
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Citation:
Leonard Schlup, "Hancock, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00463.html.
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In 1860 [John] Hancock was elected to the Texas House of Representatives. A Unionist fiercely opposed to secession, he was expelled from the state legislature in 1861 for his refusal to take the oath of allegiance to the Confederacy when Texas left the Union. Hancock thereupon continued his law practice. Dressed in a frock coat and tall hat, his appearance suited a successful lawyer who had become familiar with the land laws of Texas. In 1864 he defended four men arrested as Unionists. After securing their release and declining to fight in the Civil War, Hancock fled to Mexico and subsequently to Kentucky and New York to avoid conscription and to await the end of the war. Following General Robert E. Lee's surrender and the conclusion of the conflict in 1865, Hancock returned to Texas, where he took an active role in Reconstruction.
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James K. Hogue, "McNeill, John Hanson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00692.html.
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With the failure of [Confederate general Sterling] Price's conventional campaign to win Missouri, McNeill turned his attention to unconventional means to win Confederate independence. Along with his son Jesse, he made his way across the country back to their ancestral home in Hardy County, Virginia, in July 1862 with the outline of a plan to wage guerrilla war against the Union. Under the terms of the Confederate Congress's Partisan Ranger Act of 28 April 1862, McNeill and a number of other officers were authorized to raise independent commands to raid Union army supply trains and pocket the proceeds. From August 1862 until March 1863 McNeill and his band, recruited from Hardy County, operated under the overall command of Colonel John Imboden, engaging in a series of minor raids that infuriated local Union commanders and eventually provoked stern countermeasures.
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Ben Procter, "Reagan, John Henninger," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00832.html.
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In Austin on 30 January 1861 Reagan attended the Texas Secession Convention. He met specifically with Governor Houston and persuaded him to "submit to the will of the people" and recognize the convention. As a result, Texas withdrew from the Union on 1 February, and two days later delegates elected Reagan as one of the state's seven representatives to the Provisional Confederate Congress in Montgomery, Alabama. Within a month Reagan was appointed postmaster general of the Confederacy, whereupon he raided the U.S. Post Office of its documents and southern personnel. Upon the transfer of the Confederate capital to Richmond, Virginia, late in the spring of 1861, he sought ways to make his department self-sufficient by 1 March 1863, as prescribed by the Confederate constitution. He abolished the franking privilege and raised postal rates. He also cut expenses to the bare minimum by eliminating costly routes, including competition for mail runs, and employing a smaller but efficient staff. He was even able to persuade railroad executives to cut transportation charges in half and accept Confederate bonds in whole or partial payment. Although such stringent measures were necessary, the public became dissatisfied, harshly and abusively criticizing Reagan, despite the fact that Union armies had disrupted routes, had demolished postal facilities, and had interrupted mail with increasing frequency.
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Arch Fredric Blakey, "Winder, John Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01066.html.
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Winder was made the commissary of Confederate prisons that November [1864], a position that was long overdue, and he did improve the general conditions before his death by centralizing control over prison construction, dispersion of captives, and securing more provisions of every description.
Winder was not the cruel tyrant his accusers claimed, but neither was he the saint that later defenders alleged. His commands were among the most sensitive as well as the most publicized, North or South, and as conditions in the Confederacy deteriorated in 1864 and 1865, his situation became impossible. When the commissary system and the railroads failed, Union captives suffered and died by the thousands; it is difficult to believe that anyone, given Winder's predicament, could have done any better.
Winder was not the cruel tyrant his accusers claimed, but neither was he the saint that later defenders alleged. His commands were among the most sensitive as well as the most publicized, North or South, and as conditions in the Confederacy deteriorated in 1864 and 1865, his situation became impossible. When the commissary system and the railroads failed, Union captives suffered and died by the thousands; it is difficult to believe that anyone, given Winder's predicament, could have done any better.
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R. B. Rosenburg, "Morgan, John Hunt," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00720.html.
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Morgan is best known for launching a series of raids behind enemy lines. Three of these raids occurred during the second half of 1862. Morgan's men, mostly Kentuckians and Tennesseans and numbering scarcely more than 3,000 at any one time, rode hundreds of miles through the central Bluegrass, destroying and disrupting transportation and communication lines and capturing prisoners and supplies, while at the same time suffering relatively few casualties. The raids were politically embarrassing to the North and caused the Union commanders to commit thousands of troops in an effort to apprehend Morgan's men. The raids also gained notoriety for plundering and other outrages against northern citizens, ostensibly in retaliation for similar treatment of southern citizens by Federal troops. Southerners admired Morgan's daring and panache. Once, after capturing some mules during a raid, Morgan and his men had the audacity to telegraph a complaint about the quality of the livestock to none other than Abraham Lincoln. On 11 December 1862, following his second raid into Kentucky, Morgan was promoted to brigadier general. Several months later, after the completion of yet another successful raid, he received a commendation of gratitude from the Confederate Congress.
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Citation:
William L. Barney, "Pettus, John Jones," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00782.html.
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Insisting that the Republicans would force emancipation on Mississippi and turn the state into "a cesspool of vice, crime and infancy," Pettus led the forces that took Mississippi out of the Union on 9 January 1861….
Pettus was an energetic and forceful wartime governor. As soon as Mississippi seceded, he established a state armory, sent militia to Florida to assist in the seizure of Federal installations, and redoubled his efforts to acquire arms for the state. Although hampered by a cumbersome political structure that forced him to share power in 1861 with the legislature and secession convention, he moved decisively to put his office at the center of the Mississippi war effort. If anything, he was overly zealous. He accepted into state service far more troops than the number of four regiments of twelve-month volunteers authorized by the legislature. The problem of what to do with the idle troops who could not be equipped because of the lack of arms plagued Pettus until a mobilization order in September 1861 called these troops into the Confederate army. This order removed a political embarrassment for Pettus and strengthened his bid for reelection in October 1861. He carried all but four of the state's counties.
Pettus was an energetic and forceful wartime governor. As soon as Mississippi seceded, he established a state armory, sent militia to Florida to assist in the seizure of Federal installations, and redoubled his efforts to acquire arms for the state. Although hampered by a cumbersome political structure that forced him to share power in 1861 with the legislature and secession convention, he moved decisively to put his office at the center of the Mississippi war effort. If anything, he was overly zealous. He accepted into state service far more troops than the number of four regiments of twelve-month volunteers authorized by the legislature. The problem of what to do with the idle troops who could not be equipped because of the lack of arms plagued Pettus until a mobilization order in September 1861 called these troops into the Confederate army. This order removed a political embarrassment for Pettus and strengthened his bid for reelection in October 1861. He carried all but four of the state's counties.
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Citation:
Thomas E. Stephens, "Crittenden, John Jordan," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/03/03-00117.html.
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Elected to the Senate again in 1854, Crittenden strove against the resurgence of the slavery issue brought about by the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Assuming the role of the deceased Clay, Crittenden attempted to alleviate sectional tension with conciliation. He spoke thoughtfully and eloquently on the need for compromise and an end to the growing stridency of his fellow senators. He helped found the Constitutional Union party that nominated John Bell for president in 1860.
In December 1860, one month after Abraham Lincoln's election, Crittenden introduced his "Crittenden Compromise" proposal to restore and extend the Missouri Compromise line to the Pacific Ocean. Its terms included that slavery would be protected south, and prohibited north of the 36° 30' line; new states could exercise popular sovereignty; and Congress would be prohibited from either abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia or regulating the interstate transport of slaves. The proposal was rejected, seven to six, by a special "Committee of Thirteen," a group of senators appointed to consider it. Ironically, its defeat was secured by a coalition of southerners and antislavery Republicans.
Crittenden left the Senate and returned to Kentucky in 1861, arguing successfully for his state not to join the secessionist movement and participating in a border-state convention seeking compromise. Reflective of the times, of Crittenden's sons who joined the war, two attained the rank of major general: George Bibb Crittenden for the Confederacy, Thomas Leonidas Crittenden for the Union.
In December 1860, one month after Abraham Lincoln's election, Crittenden introduced his "Crittenden Compromise" proposal to restore and extend the Missouri Compromise line to the Pacific Ocean. Its terms included that slavery would be protected south, and prohibited north of the 36° 30' line; new states could exercise popular sovereignty; and Congress would be prohibited from either abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia or regulating the interstate transport of slaves. The proposal was rejected, seven to six, by a special "Committee of Thirteen," a group of senators appointed to consider it. Ironically, its defeat was secured by a coalition of southerners and antislavery Republicans.
Crittenden left the Senate and returned to Kentucky in 1861, arguing successfully for his state not to join the secessionist movement and participating in a border-state convention seeking compromise. Reflective of the times, of Crittenden's sons who joined the war, two attained the rank of major general: George Bibb Crittenden for the Confederacy, Thomas Leonidas Crittenden for the Union.
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F. N. Boney, "Letcher, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00625.html.
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On 1 January 1860 [John Letcher] became Virginia's leader for four crucial years. Still an optimistic moderate, Governor Letcher championed sectional compromise. In his inaugural address, he fruitlessly urged the legislature to quickly call a convention of all the states. When the legislators finally acted a year later, it was far too late. In the fateful presidential election of November 1860, he supported Stephen A. Douglas, the candidate of the northern Democrats, and after Abraham Lincoln's victory, he resisted pressure to call a state convention that could carry Virginia out of the Union by a simple majority vote. When that pressure grew irresistible, he supported moderate candidates, who gained control of the new convention, which in February 1861 voted against joining the deep South's secession crusade. Even when the war started he held back, waiting five days for the convention's formal vote to secede on 17 April 1861.
Then Governor Letcher acted decisively and led Virginia into the Confederate States of America. Now he was the leader of the most powerful state in the new nation, and he had a new mission, victory in modern war. Practical and pragmatic, he realized that the rebels had to abandon many old states' rights and personal liberties and close ranks to win, so he collaborated with the other southern states and strongly backed President Jefferson Davis and the Confederate government. This acceptance of Confederate supremacy was the main theme of his wartime administration, making him one of the most cooperative and reliable state governors.
Then Governor Letcher acted decisively and led Virginia into the Confederate States of America. Now he was the leader of the most powerful state in the new nation, and he had a new mission, victory in modern war. Practical and pragmatic, he realized that the rebels had to abandon many old states' rights and personal liberties and close ranks to win, so he collaborated with the other southern states and strongly backed President Jefferson Davis and the Confederate government. This acceptance of Confederate supremacy was the main theme of his wartime administration, making him one of the most cooperative and reliable state governors.
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Robert D. Sampson, "O'Sullivan, John Louis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01816.html.
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During the presidential campaign of 1844, John Louis O'Sullivan and Samuel J. Tilden founded and edited the New York Morning News, a paper boosting the campaign of James K. Polk….In editorials in the News and the [United States Magazine and] Democratic Review, O'Sullivan outlined his vision of continental expansion summarized in the phrase "manifest destiny." O'Sullivan's expansionism was essentially peaceful, and his first editorials in the News on the Mexican War questioned the circumstances of its initiation. By June 1846, because of investor dissatisfaction with his management style, O'Sullivan was ousted as editor of the News and shortly thereafter disposed of his interest in the Democratic Review…For the next few years, he pursued a number of enterprises, including two attempted invasions of Cuba in association with General Narcisco Lopez. A New York City jury acquitted him in March 1852 after he was indicted and tried for violating the Neutrality Act. Still affiliated with the Martin Van Buren wing of the New York Democracy, O'Sullivan represented that faction in patronage negotiations with president-elect Franklin Pierce. In 1854 he was appointed U.S. consul to Portugal and served until removed by President James Buchanan in 1858.
After his finances were depleted by his filibustering and failed business enterprises, O'Sullivan spent much of his final years in economic struggle. Living in Europe during the Civil War, he served the Confederacy as a propagandist and negotiator. Returning to the United States in the early 1870s, he promoted Spiritualism.
After his finances were depleted by his filibustering and failed business enterprises, O'Sullivan spent much of his final years in economic struggle. Living in Europe during the Civil War, he served the Confederacy as a propagandist and negotiator. Returning to the United States in the early 1870s, he promoted Spiritualism.
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William M. Ferraro, "Schofield, John McAllister," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00694.html.
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Thanks in part to Missouri friends, Schofield was nominated brigadier general of volunteers and assigned to command the Missouri Enrolled Militia in November 1861. Raising and equipping this force, authorized only for state defense, occupied Schofield until April 1862. A factional dispute in Missouri between "radicals," desiring immediate emancipation and punitive military actions, and "conservatives," seeking gradual emancipation and military restraint, complicated Schofield's position. More problems arose from Confederate incursions across the border with Arkansas. Given command of the "Army of the Frontier," Schofield campaigned in southwestern Missouri and Arkansas from October 1862 to April 1863. Although he had kept Missouri relatively quiet and supplied needed troops for the Vicksburg campaign, radicals defeated his nomination as major general of volunteers in January 1863, a rank he eventually attained in March.
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Cullom Davis, "Palmer, John McAuley," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00584.html.
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A Democrat since childhood, Palmer was elected probate justice of the peace in 1843. He was subsequently elected as a delegate to the state constitutional convention in 1847, county judge in 1848, and state senator in 1852. During his successful campaign for reelection to the senate in 1854, he exhibited an independence that would mark the remainder of his career. Rebuffing pressure from Democrats to support the Douglas policy on slavery in Kansas and Nebraska, Palmer ran instead as an Anti-Nebraska Democrat. This ended his friendship with Douglas and presaged an equally stormy sixteen-year Republican affiliation. In 1856 he presided at the new party's state convention, and at the Republican National Convention he attempted to secure the vice presidential nomination for Abraham Lincoln. Recognized as a leading Illinois Republican, he ran unsuccessfully for Congress in 1859 and helped Lincoln win nomination and election as president the next year.
Civil War military duty further revealed Palmer's qualities of leadership and combativeness. Enlisting as a colonel shortly after Fort Sumter, he served courageously in several battles and reached the rank of major general. However, he criticized the arrogance of some West Point officers, feuded with General William T. Sherman, and antagonized both civil and army officials as Lincoln's military commander in Kentucky. By war's end his ardent views on African-American enfranchisement and Reconstruction placed him in the Radical wing of his party.
Civil War military duty further revealed Palmer's qualities of leadership and combativeness. Enlisting as a colonel shortly after Fort Sumter, he served courageously in several battles and reached the rank of major general. However, he criticized the arrogance of some West Point officers, feuded with General William T. Sherman, and antagonized both civil and army officials as Lincoln's military commander in Kentucky. By war's end his ardent views on African-American enfranchisement and Reconstruction placed him in the Radical wing of his party.
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Charles D. Cashdollar, "McClintock, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/08/08-01967.html.
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McClintock vigorously opposed slavery. In 1841 he wrote, "It seems to me that the Church can do only one thing in regard to so heinous a crime as slavery, namely, to bear her testimony against it, and use all her influence for its extirpation." He decried the annexation of Texas, and during 1847 he penned antislavery articles for the Christian Advocate, a prominent Methodist weekly. In June 1847 the arrival in Carlisle of two Maryland slaveowners pursuing fugitives raised local tempers. McClintock was not a participant in the violence that left one slaveowner badly beaten, but he was arrested and charged with having incited the attack; a jury acquitted him in August 1847. His own evaluation was that "my human and Christian sympathies were openly exhibited on the side of the poor blacks, and this gave mortal offence to the slaveholders and their confreres in the town."
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William Cheek and Aimee Lee Cheek, "Langston, John Mercer," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00419.html.
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In 1856 the Langstons began a fifteen-year residency in Oberlin. Elected repeatedly to posts on the town council and the board of education, he solidified his reputation as a competent public executive and adroit attorney. In his best-known case, Langston successfully defended Edmonia Lewis, a student accused of poisoning two of her Oberlin classmates (who recovered); Lewis would become the first noted African-American sculptor. In promoting militant resistance to slavery, Langston helped stoke outrage over the federal prosecution under the Fugitive Slave Law of thirty-seven of his white and black townsmen and others involved in the 1858 Oberlin-Wellington rescue of fugitive slave John Price. Immediately, Langston organized the new black Ohio State Anti-Slavery Society, which he headed, to channel black indignation over the case. While his brother Charles Henry Langston, one of the two rescuers convicted, repudiated the law in a notable courtroom plea, Langston urged defiance of it in dozens of speeches throughout the state. Langston supported the plan by John Brown (1800-1859) to foment a slave uprising, although he did not participate in the 1859 raid on Harpers Ferry. Following the outbreak of the Civil War, once recruitment of northern black troops began in early 1863, he raised hundreds of black volunteers for the Massachusetts Fifty-fourth and Fifty-fifth regiments and for Ohio's first black regiment.
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Dan R. Frost, "Brannan, John Milton," American National Biography Online, February 2000,http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00140.html.
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The outbreak of the Civil War in April 1861 required Brannan either to join the southern rebellion or remain loyal to his country. He had grown up in a Southern city, his family had owned a slave, and he had spent much of his career in the South. Yet he had been exposed to nationalist influences while a boy working for Congress, while a young man studying at West Point, and while a professional soldier in the U.S. Army. Furthermore, his hometown was the nation's capital, which remained in Union hands. Leaving Key West, where he had spent three years, Brannan returned to Washington and accepted an appointment as a brigadier general of U.S. volunteers in September 1861. His first assignment involved maintaining the defenses of his native city that November.
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Kenton J. Clymer, "Hay, John Milton," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00888.html.
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Hay did not find academic life at Brown stimulating but was attracted to the literary circles of Providence and found it difficult to return to the Illinois prairie, where he read law with an uncle in Springfield and was admitted to the bar in 1860. He took a small part in the presidential campaign of Abraham Lincoln and went to Washington as one of Lincoln's personal secretaries. Technically he was a Pension Office clerk. In 1864 he was commissioned as a major and assistant adjutant general in the volunteers. In 1865 he was promoted to colonel, although he never served actively in the military, being deputed to the Executive Mansion. He left Washington in May 1865 following Lincoln's assassination but retained his military commission until 1867. Initially unimpressed with Lincoln, by 1863 Hay had come to consider him the indispensable leader. Lincoln influenced Hay's social and political thought significantly.
Following the Civil War, Hay secured minor diplomatic posts in Europe, serving as secretary of the American legation at Paris (1865-1866), secretary and chargé d'affaires ad interim at Vienna (1867-1868), and secretary at Madrid (1869-1870). He conducted no serious diplomatic work and devoted his time to becoming acquainted with European culture. His democratic beliefs also matured in these years, and he developed a loathing for European autocracy.
Following the Civil War, Hay secured minor diplomatic posts in Europe, serving as secretary of the American legation at Paris (1865-1866), secretary and chargé d'affaires ad interim at Vienna (1867-1868), and secretary at Madrid (1869-1870). He conducted no serious diplomatic work and devoted his time to becoming acquainted with European culture. His democratic beliefs also matured in these years, and he developed a loathing for European autocracy.
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Susan Wyly-Jones, "Daniel, John Moncure," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00293.html.
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At the outset of the Civil War, Daniel expressed confidence in Confederate president Jefferson Davis and advocated a strong central government and an aggressive military strategy. "No power in Executive hands can be too great, no discretion too absolute, at such moments as these. We need a dictator" (Examiner, 8 May 1861). He urged the adoption of conscription, traditionally unpopular in American culture, as the most judicious way to recruit soldiers from all classes of the population. By early 1862, frustrated with the "fatal paralysis" of the army and Davis's refusal to include him in his councils, Daniel turned against the administration with a vengeance. He began to attack Davis personally, accusing him of meddling excessively in military affairs, appointing unqualified cronies to his cabinet and to military posts, and in general mismanaging the war effort. Nothing but "the extinction of the dynasty of ignorant and imbecile politicians who have long monopolized place and power" would bring southern victory, Daniel claimed (Examiner, 15 Apr. 1862). One particularly biting attack on Confederate secretary of the treasury Edward A. Elmore in 1864 resulted in a duel--one of nine Daniel fought in his lifetime--in which Daniel was wounded in the foot. Like other harsh critics of the Confederate government, he distinguished between the Confederate administration and the cause of southern independence, to which he remained deeply committed.
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John Lauritz Larson, "Forbes, John Murray," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/10/10-00572.html.
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In the decades that bracketed the Civil War, Forbes served as the financial wizard on a team of specialists in western railroading. Attorney Joy and engineer Brooks mastered the legal, political, and technical aspects while Forbes lined up investors, floated securities, and plotted commercial strategies. Forbes's team gathered together four small Illinois lines and in 1856 organized the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy (CB&Q), which became the flagship of their railroad empire in the post-Civil War era. To the west stretched the Hannibal & St. Joseph in Missouri and the Burlington & Missouri River in Iowa--both lines pushing ahead of demand, force-fed on government land grants--which Forbes picked up for the CB&Q to secure feeder traffic from the next tier of states. Forbes hated such defensive investments in hypothetical railroads because they flooded security markets, deranged settlement patterns, and prematurely introduced competition and rate distortions. Nevertheless, he learned to play an aggressive game of competitive railroad building that continued for decades after the Civil War.
The Civil War tested Forbes's energy and convictions in behalf of American liberty. Ideologically disposed to believe in a free entrepreneurial society, Forbes despised plutocrats as unproductive parasites; accordingly, he saw black slavery as an evil tending to perpetuate an antimodern planter aristocracy that stifled ambition and opportunity for white Americans in the South. In the 1850s Forbes drifted into abolitionist circles, funneling money and arms through the New England Immigrant Aid Society, helping to organize the new Republican party in Massachusetts, and once sheltering the fugitive John Brown.
The Civil War tested Forbes's energy and convictions in behalf of American liberty. Ideologically disposed to believe in a free entrepreneurial society, Forbes despised plutocrats as unproductive parasites; accordingly, he saw black slavery as an evil tending to perpetuate an antimodern planter aristocracy that stifled ambition and opportunity for white Americans in the South. In the 1850s Forbes drifted into abolitionist circles, funneling money and arms through the New England Immigrant Aid Society, helping to organize the new Republican party in Massachusetts, and once sheltering the fugitive John Brown.
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William M. Fowler, "Maffitt, John Newland," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00463.html.
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Like other Confederate high seas raiders, John Newland Maffitt both embarrassed and damaged the northern war effort. His destruction of Union shipping removed tonnage from service and at the same time forced Union ship owners to pay ever higher insurance premiums. His success, and that of other Confederate high seas raiders, forced the Union navy to divert much needed resources away from the blockade to the task of chasing these will-o'-the-wispish sea rovers.
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Walter N. Trenerry, "Pope, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00627.html.
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[Pope] saw his first Civil War action in Missouri in late 1861 when his Illinois unit was assigned to John C. Frémont's Department of the West. In March 1862 Pope took command of the Army of the Mississippi and that same month captured New Madrid, Missouri, in a lightning campaign, moving on in April to take Island Number 10 in a joint army-navy operation that opened the Mississippi south to Memphis. In May he led his army against Corinth, Mississippi, as the left wing of Henry W. Halleck's Grand Army.
In June 1862, while George B. McClellan and the Army of the Potomac were attacking Richmond, Abraham Lincoln called Pope to Washington to command a new Army of Virginia, which would guard Washington, drive the Confederates out of the Shenandoah Valley, and help McClellan by drawing Confederate forces away from Richmond. Pope was a questionable choice. A Republican, he was expected to support McClellan, a Democrat and his rival. Fellow officers mistrusted Pope as a blowhard, more so when easy conquests in the West led him to boast about western victories and scoff at eastern defeats. Pope did not in fact want the command, saying that it put his fate in McClellan's hands. Anything that tied up McClellan could leave Pope's army in the field alone. Only Lincoln's personal coaxing and promises to stand behind Pope whatever happened convinced a reluctant Pope to accept.
In June 1862, while George B. McClellan and the Army of the Potomac were attacking Richmond, Abraham Lincoln called Pope to Washington to command a new Army of Virginia, which would guard Washington, drive the Confederates out of the Shenandoah Valley, and help McClellan by drawing Confederate forces away from Richmond. Pope was a questionable choice. A Republican, he was expected to support McClellan, a Democrat and his rival. Fellow officers mistrusted Pope as a blowhard, more so when easy conquests in the West led him to boast about western victories and scoff at eastern defeats. Pope did not in fact want the command, saying that it put his fate in McClellan's hands. Anything that tied up McClellan could leave Pope's army in the field alone. Only Lincoln's personal coaxing and promises to stand behind Pope whatever happened convinced a reluctant Pope to accept.
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Joan D. Hedrick, "Jewett, John Punchard," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-02441.html.
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Jewett was ingenious and innovative in his promotion of the book. He employed his friend John Greenleaf Whittier to write some verses about Little Eva, whose death in chapter twenty-six wrenched the hearts of readers. Set to music, these verses were the first of many spin-offs that spread the popularity of Uncle Tom's Cabin, from plates, spoons, wallpapers, and candlesticks to toys and games. The book, published in 1852, was an immediate sensation. It sold 10,000 copies on the first day and more than 300,000 by the end of the first year. [Harriet Beecher] Stowe's first royalty check was for $10,000, but of course Jewett had the lion's share of the profits. Stowe conferred with businessmen at home and abroad and concluded that Jewett had taken advantage of her somewhat unworldly husband. When she wrote to him to ask him for confirmation of his theory that they would make more by agreeing to 10 percent instead of 20 percent, Jewett responded angrily and broke off communication. Stowe described him as "positive, overbearing, uneasy if crossed."
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Wilbert H. Ahern, "Adams, John Quincy," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00003.html.
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Both his parents were free persons of color. Following private schooling in Wisconsin and Ohio, Adams graduated from Oberlin College. After a brief teaching stint in Louisville, in 1870 he followed his uncle, Joseph C. Corbin, to work in Arkansas in the Reconstruction. By 1874 he had risen from schoolteacher to assistant superintendent of public instruction. His lifelong activism in the Republican party began in Arkansas; there he twice served as secretary to Republican state conventions, was elected as justice of the peace on the party ticket, and held the offices of engrossing clerk of the state senate and deputy commissioner of public works. The defeat of the Arkansas Republican party in 1874 and the racial repression that followed led Adams to return to Louisville, where he again engaged in teaching.
Adams entered journalism in 1879 when he and his brother, Cyrus Field Adams, established the Louisville Bulletin, a weekly newspaper that served the Louisville African-American community until 1885, when it was subsumed by the American Baptist. In 1880 Adams helped organize the National Afro-American Press Association, which held its first annual meeting in Louisville that year. The organization elected him as its first president, and he served from 1880 to 1882.
Adams entered journalism in 1879 when he and his brother, Cyrus Field Adams, established the Louisville Bulletin, a weekly newspaper that served the Louisville African-American community until 1885, when it was subsumed by the American Baptist. In 1880 Adams helped organize the National Afro-American Press Association, which held its first annual meeting in Louisville that year. The organization elected him as its first president, and he served from 1880 to 1882.
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Robert E. May, "Quitman, John Anthony," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/03/03-00408.html.
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[John] Quitman also played a significant role in state and national military affairs. He helped found, and then captained, a volunteer militia company (the Natchez Fencibles). He served as brigade inspector and major general in the Mississippi militia. During the Texas Revolution, he led Mississippi volunteers into Texas but arrived too late to see action. During the Mexican War, as a volunteer brigadier general in the American army, he won a congressional sword and a promotion to major general for his role at the battle of Monterrey (21-23 Sept. 1846). A year later, General Winfield Scott appointed him civil and military governor of Mexico City in recognition of his heroism at Chapultepec and the Garita de Belén (13-14 Sept. 1847) during the American conquest of the Mexican capital. Later, in Congress, Quitman chaired the Committee on Military Affairs.
A champion of slavery and John C. Calhoun's states' rights theories, Quitman played a central role in Mississippi's nullification movement in the 1830s. While governor in 1850-1851, he opposed the Compromise of 1850 and unsuccessfully urged Mississippians to secede from the Union. In 1852, he ran for vice president of the United States on the Southern Rights party ticket. From 1850 to 1855, he plotted to add one or more slave states to the Union by conquering the Spanish island of Cuba with a privately armed, filibustering expedition. In 1850-1851 and 1854, U.S. authorities prosecuted him for these illegal schemes. The first prosecution caused his resignation as governor of Mississippi. While in Congress, Quitman urged the reopening of the African slave trade and the admission of Kansas as a slave state.
A champion of slavery and John C. Calhoun's states' rights theories, Quitman played a central role in Mississippi's nullification movement in the 1830s. While governor in 1850-1851, he opposed the Compromise of 1850 and unsuccessfully urged Mississippians to secede from the Union. In 1852, he ran for vice president of the United States on the Southern Rights party ticket. From 1850 to 1855, he plotted to add one or more slave states to the Union by conquering the Spanish island of Cuba with a privately armed, filibustering expedition. In 1850-1851 and 1854, U.S. authorities prosecuted him for these illegal schemes. The first prosecution caused his resignation as governor of Mississippi. While in Congress, Quitman urged the reopening of the African slave trade and the admission of Kansas as a slave state.
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Craig L. Symonds, "Rodgers, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00670.html.
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After a brief tour in command of the Water Witch (1858-1859), Rodgers was assigned to the Japan Expedition Office in Washington, D.C., where he was serving when the secession of Virginia on 17 April 1861 led navy authorities to dispatch him to Norfolk the next day to help ensure that the navy facilities there did not fall into rebel hands. Rodgers was in the last boat to depart the Norfolk Navy Yard after it was set afire, and as a result, he was captured by Virginia forces. Since Virginia had not yet joined the Confederacy, however, he was released and allowed to return to Washington by train.
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Gary E. Moulton, "Ross, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00885.html.
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The American Civil War disrupted the Cherokees' peace and forced on Ross and his tribe an onerous decision. Although the Cherokees had sympathies with the slaveholding South, Ross felt that existing treaties necessitated loyalty to the Union. Again, the force of circumstances and a possible cleavage within the tribe placed Ross in a difficult situation. His tribesmen were divided over the question of slavery, and although Ross was a slave owner, he had the support of the nonslaveholding majority. When Confederate agents such as Albert Pike of Arkansas pressed for a decision, Ross reluctantly counseled his people to join the secession movement, and as chief he signed a treaty with the South. Ross would later declare to Union officials that he had made the decision under duress. Indeed, at the first opportunity he fled north with his family and remained in Washington, D.C., for the remainder of the war. There he tried to convince the federal officials to reoccupy Indian Territory and accept the coercive nature of the Cherokees' defection.
At the end of the war Ross again faced formidable odds and the likelihood of a Cherokee division. His wartime opponents insisted that Ross was a rebel at heart and should be divested of his office. They also wanted the tribe split along party lines based on Union loyalty or affiliation with the Confederate cause. Ross resisted the disintegration of his people and worked to obtain a treaty securing permanent land rights for the Cherokees.
At the end of the war Ross again faced formidable odds and the likelihood of a Cherokee division. His wartime opponents insisted that Ross was a rebel at heart and should be divested of his office. They also wanted the tribe split along party lines based on Union loyalty or affiliation with the Confederate cause. Ross resisted the disintegration of his people and worked to obtain a treaty securing permanent land rights for the Cherokees.
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Bruce Tap, "Carlile, John Snyder," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00205.html.
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Carlile's career was marked by controversy and seeming inconsistency. In his native Virginia, he was seen as a "radical" for his opposition to secession and support of separate statehood for West Virginia. In the Republican dominated Congress in Washington, however, he was denounced as a southern sympathizer and supporter of slavery. Carlile could be seen in both of these roles, because he simultaneously endorsed the sanctity of the Union and advocated a strict constructionist view of the Constitution that did not allow the central government to trample on states' rights. His political banishment after the Civil War was the price he paid for his convictions.
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William G. Shade, "Wentworth, John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01047.html.
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"Long John" Wentworth, who stood 6' 6" and in his prime weighed more than 300 pounds, was the sort of colorful character that might have been created by a historical novelist seeking to portray a genial self-promoter who marched to his own drummer, yet retained the affections of the voters of Chicago and his northern Illinois district for three decades. A combative editorialist and debater who took forthright stands on the major issues of the day, Wentworth by the 1850s was a throwback to earlier times, representing a purer commitment to individual liberty and laissez faire capitalism than his businessmen enemies who thrived in the age of incorporation.
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James A. Rawley, "Geary, John White," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00409.html.
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In July 1856 President Franklin Pierce appointed [John Geary] territorial governor of Kansas. By that date "Bleeding Kansas" had become the nation's most urgent issue, influencing the pending presidential election, as Democrats championed congressional noninterference with slavery and Republicans immediate admission under a free-state constitution, threatening the welfare of Geary's party and nation. Assured of the Pierce administration's support and determined to restore peace, Geary in September reached Kansas, where armed bands roved the territory, terrorizing settlers.
Within a few weeks Geary had substantially restored order, disbanding the proslavery militia, organizing a new one subject to his orders, and averting an attack on Lawrence, threatened by a force of proslavery men. The judicial system was a more difficult problem. The federal judges he deemed negligent and incompetent, the U.S. marshal wanting in courage and energy, the attorney general uncooperative. Geary's troubles with securing justice came to a head when Chief Justice Samuel Lecompte twice freed an accused murderer, the marshal refused to arrest the freed man, the U.S. Senate refused to confirm a judge nominated to replace Lecompte, and Secretary of War William L. Marcy asked that Geary explain his earlier condemnation of Lecompte.
Within a few weeks Geary had substantially restored order, disbanding the proslavery militia, organizing a new one subject to his orders, and averting an attack on Lawrence, threatened by a force of proslavery men. The judicial system was a more difficult problem. The federal judges he deemed negligent and incompetent, the U.S. marshal wanting in courage and energy, the attorney general uncooperative. Geary's troubles with securing justice came to a head when Chief Justice Samuel Lecompte twice freed an accused murderer, the marshal refused to arrest the freed man, the U.S. Senate refused to confirm a judge nominated to replace Lecompte, and Secretary of War William L. Marcy asked that Geary explain his earlier condemnation of Lecompte.
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Daniel W. Pfaff, "Forney, John Wien," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00573.html.
Body Summary:
Politics particularly interested Forney, both as a journalist and as a participant. He was a man of strong but shifting loyalties, beginning and ending his career as a Democrat, with a twenty-year interruption as a devout Republican. He was first allied to the fortunes of Democrat James Buchanan, who became secretary of state in 1845 and arranged Forney's appointment as deputy surveyor of the port of Philadelphia. In the same year, he sold his Lancaster newspaper and became editor of the Pennsylvanian, a Democratic newspaper in Philadelphia. He held that position for seven years, even after being elected clerk of the House of Representatives in 1851 at the age of thirty-one and moving to Washington, D.C. He left the Pennsylvanian on his reelection to the clerkship in 1853 and joined the Washington Daily Union, the national Democratic organ. The following year he became a partner in the Union with A. O. P. Nicholson, and the two men prospered from House of Representatives printing contracts they arranged for the newspaper.
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Stephen M. Archer, "Booth, John Wilkes," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01210.html.
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The kidnapping plot evaporated when the city of Richmond fell and the war ended. Five days later, on 14 April 1865, Booth learned that President Lincoln planned to attend Our American Cousin (starring Laura Keene) at Ford's Theatre. Working quickly, Booth assigned [George] Atzerodt to assassinate Vice President Andrew Johnson and [Lewis] Payne to kill Secretary of State William Seward while Booth himself murdered Lincoln. Atzerodt lost his nerve and made no attempt on Johnson, but Payne, a young giant, wounded Seward severely, as well as several others who tried to defend him.
Booth meanwhile had entered Ford's Theatre at about ten o'clock, moving across the rear of the balcony to the president's box. Waiting for the audience's laughter to cover the report of his derringer, Booth entered the box and fired a single .44-calibre bullet at point-blank range into the back of Lincoln's head. He shouted "Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged!" according to some, slashing with a dagger at Major Henry Rathbone, who tried to restrain him. Booth then leaped the twelve feet from the presidential box onto the stage, breaking his left leg. He escaped from the theater to a waiting horse, and, accompanied by [David] Herold, fled Washington. They stopped at the home of Dr. Samuel A. Mudd in Bryantown, Maryland, to have Booth's leg set, then hid in neighboring woods for six days while federal troops vainly searched for them.
Booth meanwhile had entered Ford's Theatre at about ten o'clock, moving across the rear of the balcony to the president's box. Waiting for the audience's laughter to cover the report of his derringer, Booth entered the box and fired a single .44-calibre bullet at point-blank range into the back of Lincoln's head. He shouted "Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged!" according to some, slashing with a dagger at Major Henry Rathbone, who tried to restrain him. Booth then leaped the twelve feet from the presidential box onto the stage, breaking his left leg. He escaped from the theater to a waiting horse, and, accompanied by [David] Herold, fled Washington. They stopped at the home of Dr. Samuel A. Mudd in Bryantown, Maryland, to have Booth's leg set, then hid in neighboring woods for six days while federal troops vainly searched for them.
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Walter B. Edgar, "Hagood, Johnson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00306.html.
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Hagood was not as well known at the end of the twentieth century as he was at its beginning. While there is little doubt that white Carolinians would have overthrown the Reconstruction regime in 1876, they opted not to resort to overt violence as had Mississippi and other states of the Lower South. Some contemporary observers credit Hagood with developing the successful plans for the 1876 election campaign. As governor, he helped implement the conservatives' plans for gradually reducing the influence of black voters. However, like his fellow conservatives, he was blind to the economic distress that afflicted the great majority of the state's white farmers and did nothing to alleviate their difficulties. His inaction, and that of his like-minded successors, led to the triumph of Tillmanism in 1890.
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Craig L. Symonds, "Johnston, Joseph Eggleston," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01176.html.
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Johnston's defense of North Georgia in the spring and summer of 1864 is the most controversial aspect of his career. Because Johnston was heavily outnumbered by the three armies of Major General William Tecumseh Sherman (who had 100,000 men to Johnston's 60,000), Sherman was able to maneuver him out of position after position: from Rocky Face Ridge in North Georgia, to Resaca, to Allatoona, and to Kennesaw Mountain west of Marietta. Each time, Sherman was able to hold Johnston's army in position with superior forces and send a flanking column to threaten the Confederate left. Each time, Johnston responded by abandoning his position and hurrying southward to interpose his forces once again in front of Sherman--but of course he had to surrender territory to do so. Engagements were fought at Resaca (13-15 May), New Hope Church (26-28 May), and Kennesaw Mountain (27 June). Though Johnston held his own in each, he was unable to inflict the kind of defeat that would drive Sherman from Georgia.
In Richmond, Davis grew increasingly concerned that Johnston was giving up so much territory. As a result of his retrograde movements, the Yankees had occupied Rome, Georgia, an important industrial town, and Johnston seemed unwilling to launch a serious counterattack. By the second week of July, Davis sent Braxton Bragg to Atlanta to inquire about Johnston's future plans. Unsatisfied with Johnston's response, Davis ordered him relieved and appointed John Bell Hood to command the army (17 July 1864).
In Richmond, Davis grew increasingly concerned that Johnston was giving up so much territory. As a result of his retrograde movements, the Yankees had occupied Rome, Georgia, an important industrial town, and Johnston seemed unwilling to launch a serious counterattack. By the second week of July, Davis sent Braxton Bragg to Atlanta to inquire about Johnston's future plans. Unsatisfied with Johnston's response, Davis ordered him relieved and appointed John Bell Hood to command the army (17 July 1864).
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Marc Rothenberg, "Henry, Joseph," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/13/13-00739.html.
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Contemporaries often compared Henry to Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790). Like Franklin, Henry became a larger-than-life symbol of American accomplishment in science. At the end of the nineteenth century, Henry was enshrined as one of the sixteen representatives of human development and civilization memorialized in the Main Reading Room of the Library of Congress, along with such notables as Isaac Newton, Herodotus, Michelangelo, Plato, and William Shakespeare. His name was given to the standard unit of inductance. There arose a hagiographic literature written by scientists and engineers that treated Henry as the father of modern electrical technology and an isolated example of American excellence. He was renowned as the greatest American physicist of the mid-nineteenth century.
In the late twentieth century, historians have shifted their focus to Henry's role as a leader of American science and as an institution builder. Without denying that he was America's foremost scientist in the 1840s, they view his success as an experimenter as important not only because of the discoveries he made, but because these discoveries gave him the prestige and respect necessary for success as a science administrator and spokesman.
In the late twentieth century, historians have shifted their focus to Henry's role as a leader of American science and as an institution builder. Without denying that he was America's foremost scientist in the 1840s, they view his success as an experimenter as important not only because of the discoveries he made, but because these discoveries gave him the prestige and respect necessary for success as a science administrator and spokesman.
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Patrick G. Williams. "Holt, Joseph," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00522.html.
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Holt's unionism, however, grew considerably more ardent in the wake of Abraham Lincoln's presidential victory. As secession became reality, Holt became, along with Jeremiah Black and Edwin Stanton, one of the stalwart Union men in the lame-duck administration, pressing Buchanan to be resolute, even as other cabinet members equivocated or cast their lot with the South. In December 1860 Secretary of War John Floyd decamped, and Holt was appointed in his stead. Determined to keep hold of what the federal government had retained of its property in the South while avoiding outright provocation, Holt made plain to Robert Anderson, Fort Sumter's commander, that reinforcements would be sent, but only upon Anderson's request. Holt even prepared a force to deliver the men and supplies, but Anderson made no such demand of him. Holt also removed P. G. T. Beauregard, whose secessionist leanings were unmistakable, from his position as superintendent of West Point and bolstered Washington's defenses. After briefing the incoming Lincoln administration, Holt once again took to the stump, denouncing secession in speeches around the nation, most notably in Kentucky, where in July he lambasted his home state's pretensions to neutrality. If something of a late bloomer in his enthusiasm for "coercion," he came to embrace not only a war for the Union but one for freedom. He later endorsed the Emancipation Proclamation and the enlistment of black troops.
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Albert Castel, "Hooker, Joseph," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00359.html.
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As to Hooker's military abilities, two conclusions would seem to be justified. First, he had few equals and perhaps no superior among Union generals as commander of a corps or any force he could personally supervise and inspire. Second, he was deficient, as revealed at Chancellorsville, in those qualities of mind and temperament needed to lead a large army in a successful offensive campaign against a foe as redoubtable as Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia. But, then, the only northern general who ever did so was Grant, and it took him a year and 100,000 casualties to do it. Thus it is quite possible that if Hooker had gone against any Confederate army commander other than Lee, he would have garnered the glory he sought. His failure at Chancellorsville basically was his own fault, but it also can be said that he was unfortunate in his opponent.
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Frederick J. Blue, "Lane, Joseph," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00613.html.
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National politics finally divided Oregon Democrats…, with Lane at the center of the controversy. Currying southern favor in Congress and at the same time convinced of the slaveholder's right to bring slaves into any territory, the pugnacious Lane showed his hand most dramatically by offering to be Preston Brooks's second when the latter challenged two northern congressmen to duels in 1856. This followed Brooks's vicious caning of the outspoken antislavery senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts. Lane headed that faction of his party most closely identified with President James Buchanan and his position favoring legalization of slavery in Kansas Territory. Bush in turn aligned his wing of the party with Stephen A. Douglas and his insistence that Kansans be afforded the right to decide, through the process known as popular sovereignty, whether slavery would be permitted in the territory. Lane's outspoken defense of the Buchanan-endorsed, proslavery Lecompton constitution led to the division of the Oregon Democratic party, and the Bush faction allied with the newly formed Republican party of Oregon in support of Douglas and popular sovereignty. When the House of Representatives delayed an Oregon statehood bill in 1858, it was widely believed to be in punishment of Lane and his proslavery allies. Oregon finally achieved statehood in February 1859. Even before Congress acted, Oregon had organized a state government, and Lane again revealed his political influence when the legislature elected him to the U.S. Senate.
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Joseph P. McKerns, "Medill, Joseph," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01116.html.
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After John Frémont's defeat in the 1856 presidential election, Medill began planning for the 1860 election. In an interview published in the Saturday Evening Post in 1899, Medill recalled that the strategy to secure the 1860 Republican presidential nomination for Abraham Lincoln was devised in the Tribune's offices in the summer of 1859. In December 1859, the strategy was put into action when Medill went to Washington, D.C., as the Tribune's correspondent. Once there, Medill promoted Lincoln's candidacy and boosted Chicago as the site of the 1860 Republican National Convention. When the convention opened, Medill ensured that uncommitted delegations were seated close to delegations that supported Lincoln. Medill and his circle promised cabinet posts in exchange for delegate votes, thus obtaining the support of Indiana, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. When Ohio shifted its support to Lincoln on the second ballot, it began a landslide that gave Lincoln the nomination.
During the Civil War, Medill supported Lincoln's policies, although at times he seemed impatient with the president and even scolded him in person when Lincoln visited the Tribune's offices. Tribune editorials harangued Lincoln to declare emancipation, confiscate Southern property, and accelerate the war effort. Medill may have supported the abolition of slavery, but his views on African Americans were racist. However, Medill was among the earliest to advocate the arming of slaves. He insisted that no soldier in the field lose his right to vote during the war; because of Medill's urging, several states passed laws to that effect in 1864.
During the Civil War, Medill supported Lincoln's policies, although at times he seemed impatient with the president and even scolded him in person when Lincoln visited the Tribune's offices. Tribune editorials harangued Lincoln to declare emancipation, confiscate Southern property, and accelerate the war effort. Medill may have supported the abolition of slavery, but his views on African Americans were racist. However, Medill was among the earliest to advocate the arming of slaves. He insisted that no soldier in the field lose his right to vote during the war; because of Medill's urging, several states passed laws to that effect in 1864.
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Edward G. Longacre, "Hawley, Joseph Roswell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00329.html.
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Although he was an able journalist, a gifted orator, and a talented party organizer, Hawley failed to win prominence as governor, congressman, or senator. His major contributions as a lawmaker were to strengthen the regular army and to help shape the nascent Civil Service Commission. He left a larger mark as a regimental, brigade, and division leader during the Civil War. His devotion to duty and his fearlessness under fire won the respect of his troops, but his impulsiveness and hypercritical nature involved him in feuds with several superiors. Antagonists included West Pointers, such as Henry W. Benham and Quincy A. Gillmore, as well as political generals, including Butler, whom Hawley threatened to beat up on at least two occasions.
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John C. Fredriksen , "Wheeler, Joseph," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00828.html.
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Wheeler, who was known as "Fighting Joe," was one of the most active field commanders of the Civil War. A veteran of 200 major engagements, he was wounded three times, lost sixteen horses, and witnessed thirty-six staff officers fall by his side. In a military establishment renowned for superb cavalry leadership, his record is second only to Nathan B. Forrest in terms of successful small-scale actions. Wheeler crystalized his views on mounted warfare in the manual Cavalry Tactics (1863). Although he lacked the strategic acumen of Stuart and his performance during large-scale independent operations was unspectacular, in terms of raiding, screening, and covering the rear of a retreating force, Wheeler was unsurpassed by any other trooper, Union or Confederate.
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Brooks D. Simpson, "Chamberlain, Joshua Lawrence," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00218.html.
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Joining the Army of the Potomac on the eve of Antietam, Chamberlain participated in the battles of Shepherdstown Ford and Fredericksburg, where he was wounded, and won promotion to colonel and regimental command on 20 May 1863. At Gettysburg, on 2 July 1863, Chamberlain and the Twentieth Maine were directed to hold the extreme left flank of the Army of the Potomac, resting on Little Round Top. The colonel's able defense of this position played a significant role in turning back the Confederate assault, and in 1893 he was awarded the Medal of Honor for his personal heroism. Wounded during the battle, Chamberlain remained with his command until repeated attacks of malaria forced him to take medical leave from November 1863 to May 1864. Rejoining his regiment during the battle of Spotsylvania, Chamberlain was soon elevated to the command of a brigade, and he fought in the battles of the North Anna and Cold Harbor. On 18 June 1864 he was seriously wounded while leading an assault on the Petersburg fortifications, winning a battlefield promotion to brigadier general from Ulysses S. Grant. After recovering from his wounds, Chamberlain played a prominent role as a brigade commander in the Appomattox campaign, suffering yet another wound, and he commanded the Union forces designated to accept the formal surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia on 12 April 1865. His service during this final campaign earned him the brevet rank of major general of volunteers, a fitting coda to his distinguished military record.
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M. Philip Lucas, "Grinnell, Josiah Bushnell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00440.html.
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In 1856 he helped organize the Republican party in Iowa. At the convention in Iowa City, Grinnell was instrumental in "the delicate task" of bringing together abolitionists, temperance advocates, Know Nothings, and former Whigs. He won election to the state senate in 1856 and 1858 on the platform of temperance, free public education for all, and free soil. He tirelessly argued that not only were such positions morally correct, but they would bring prosperity by increasing the value of labor and the land. Despite securing a public school law, the creation of an agricultural college at Ames, and a temperance law, he was not renominated for a third term. His reputation might have been injured in February 1859, when he entertained and assisted John Brown and several fugitive slaves. Grinnell was a delegate to the 1860 Republican National Convention and became a devoted supporter of Abraham Lincoln. From 1861 to 1863 Grinnell was a special agent of the Post Office Department, giving him ample opportunity "to fan the fires of patriotism" and encourage army enlistments (Grinnell, p. 124).
With some difficulty, Grinnell was nominated for Congress from Iowa's Fifth District in 1862 and, thanks to a substantial soldiers' vote, won the election. He was reelected by a more comfortable margin in 1864. Grinnell could be counted among the Radical Republicans in favor of a vigorous prosecution of the war, the enlistment of blacks, and Radical Reconstruction measures. Years later he regretted not punishing the South further by insisting on "a territorial probation before admission" (Grinnell, p. 158).
With some difficulty, Grinnell was nominated for Congress from Iowa's Fifth District in 1862 and, thanks to a substantial soldiers' vote, won the election. He was reelected by a more comfortable margin in 1864. Grinnell could be counted among the Radical Republicans in favor of a vigorous prosecution of the war, the enlistment of blacks, and Radical Reconstruction measures. Years later he regretted not punishing the South further by insisting on "a territorial probation before admission" (Grinnell, p. 158).
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Frank E. Vandiver, "Gorgas, Josiah," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01181.html.
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When the Civil War came, Captain Gorgas commanded Frankford Arsenal in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Asked to join the Confederacy, Gorgas hesitated, but his wife's influence and his continuing troubles with superiors pushed him at last to accept a commission (effective 8 Apr. 1861) as major in the artillery of the Confederate states with assignment to the important duty of chief of ordnance. General P. G. T. Beauregard, who knew him slightly, had urged his appointment on President Jefferson Davis. The appointment would be one of Davis's best.
Gorgas's challenges were staggering. The South boasted scant manufacturing facilities, only one large foundry capable of casting heavy cannon (in Richmond, Va.), and although each state had an armory, arsenals capable of repairing or making arms were few. Across the Confederacy Gorgas counted only 159,010 small arms of all kinds, about 3.2 million cartridges of various calibers, powder enough for another 1.5 million bullets, and an indeterminate amount of cannon powder. Close to 3 million percussion caps were counted, along with saltpeter and sulphur enough to make an additional 200 tons of powder. Supplies were scattered across different states, and governors tended to guard their hoards with parochial jealousy.
Gorgas's challenges were staggering. The South boasted scant manufacturing facilities, only one large foundry capable of casting heavy cannon (in Richmond, Va.), and although each state had an armory, arsenals capable of repairing or making arms were few. Across the Confederacy Gorgas counted only 159,010 small arms of all kinds, about 3.2 million cartridges of various calibers, powder enough for another 1.5 million bullets, and an indeterminate amount of cannon powder. Close to 3 million percussion caps were counted, along with saltpeter and sulphur enough to make an additional 200 tons of powder. Supplies were scattered across different states, and governors tended to guard their hoards with parochial jealousy.
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Citation:
Elizabeth Zoe Vicary, "Henson, Josiah," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00325.html.
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Henson's life story is that of a daring early leader of slaves and escaped slaves, a man of high moral principles who endured great suffering. Although the British American Institute was small and unsuccessful, Henson's work as an ambassador to England for African Americans did much for their perception overseas. His greatest achievement was the example he offered of a man born into slavery, illiterate and handicapped by vicious physical abuse, who gained his freedom, learned to read, and became a preacher and a leader of a community of escaped slaves.
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Gary W. Gallagher, "Early, Jubal Anderson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01172.html.
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[General Robert E.] Lee demonstrated his confidence in Early by assigning him difficult tasks. During the Chancellorsville campaign, for example, Early held the front at Fredericksburg while most of the army marched west to confront Joseph Hooker's flanking force. At Gettysburg, Early participated in the successful Confederate assaults on the afternoon of 1 July and advocated a joint attack against Cemetery Hill…. After a stinging reverse at Rappahannock Bridge on 7 November 1863, Early temporarily led the Second Corps during the Mine Run campaign before returning to head his division at the battle of the Wilderness. When illness incapacitated Hill on 8 May 1864, Lee chose Early, who he thought would "make a fine corps commander," as temporary chief of the Third Corps during fighting at Spotsylvania. Another brief stint with his division in mid-May preceded permanent assignment to command the Second Corps on 27 May and promotion to lieutenant general….
Poised to commence his most famous operations, Early was a respected if not loved officer with a reputation as a colorful, profane, and bitingly sarcastic character. A soldier described him in 1864 as "one of the greatest curiosities of the war," a man "about six feet high" whose "voice sounds like a cracked Chinese fiddle, and comes from his mouth somewhat in the style of a hardshell Baptist with a long drawl, accompanied by an interpolation of oaths." His men called him "Old Jube" or "Old Jubilee" and appreciated his aggressiveness in combat.
Poised to commence his most famous operations, Early was a respected if not loved officer with a reputation as a colorful, profane, and bitingly sarcastic character. A soldier described him in 1864 as "one of the greatest curiosities of the war," a man "about six feet high" whose "voice sounds like a cracked Chinese fiddle, and comes from his mouth somewhat in the style of a hardshell Baptist with a long drawl, accompanied by an interpolation of oaths." His men called him "Old Jube" or "Old Jubilee" and appreciated his aggressiveness in combat.
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Kathryn Allamong Jacob, "Grant, Julia Dent," American National Biography Online, February 2000,http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00887.html.
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After Ulysses S. Grant resigned his commission in 1854, the family unsuccessfully cast about for a financial foothold. Julia Grant's prosperous family had always looked down on "dirt farmers," but, to their and her dismay, she found herself living a life of grinding poverty on a miserable, unproductive farm called "Hardscrabble" outside St. Louis. As she noted in her memoirs, the coming of the Civil War saved both her and her husband from desperate unhappiness.
No one understood Ulysses S. Grant better or knew how much he loved the army than his wife. She believed in him intensely and never wavered from her belief that he was destined for greatness. During the Civil War, Julia Grant spent more time in the field than any other general's wife. It was rumored that General Grant's aides summoned her to camp whenever he was drinking too much, but his letters tell a different story. Whenever he felt it safe enough, he would write anxious letters asking her to join him, which she eagerly did. An aide recalled evenings when she and the general would sit at headquarters in the field holding hands, looking shy and ruffled if anyone caught them. Julia Grant was nearly captured by the Confederates when they overran Holly Springs, Mississippi, in 1862, and she was with General Grant during the Vicksburg campaign in the spring of 1863.
No one understood Ulysses S. Grant better or knew how much he loved the army than his wife. She believed in him intensely and never wavered from her belief that he was destined for greatness. During the Civil War, Julia Grant spent more time in the field than any other general's wife. It was rumored that General Grant's aides summoned her to camp whenever he was drinking too much, but his letters tell a different story. Whenever he felt it safe enough, he would write anxious letters asking her to join him, which she eagerly did. An aide recalled evenings when she and the general would sit at headquarters in the field holding hands, looking shy and ruffled if anyone caught them. Julia Grant was nearly captured by the Confederates when they overran Holly Springs, Mississippi, in 1862, and she was with General Grant during the Vicksburg campaign in the spring of 1863.
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Sandra F. VanBurkleo and Mary Jo Miles, "Howe, Julia Ward," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00348.html.
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By far Howe's most famous work, the "Battle Hymn of the Republic," was published in the Atlantic Monthly in February 1862. She wrote the poem in 1861 while in Washington, D.C., with her husband, who was helping distribute supplies to Massachusetts regiments. Set to the music of "John Brown's Body," her poem became the rallying song for the North during the final year of the Civil War.
The "Battle Hymn" also brought Howe the fame required to more actively pursue a writing career. In 1867 she produced eleven issues of a literary magazine, Northern Lights. That same year she wrote about her European travels in From the Oak to the Olive (1868). In 1870 she founded the weekly Woman's Journal, a successful, widely-read suffragist magazine to which she contributed for twenty years. She edited a defense of coeducation titled Sex and Education in 1874 and brought out a collection of her own addresses, Modern Society, in 1880. She published a biography of Margaret Fuller in 1883, and another collection of lectures, Is Polite Society Polite?, in 1895. Her popular memoirs, Reminiscences, appeared in 1899. Indeed, Howe continued to write lectures, poems, and articles until her death.
The "Battle Hymn" also brought Howe the fame required to more actively pursue a writing career. In 1867 she produced eleven issues of a literary magazine, Northern Lights. That same year she wrote about her European travels in From the Oak to the Olive (1868). In 1870 she founded the weekly Woman's Journal, a successful, widely-read suffragist magazine to which she contributed for twenty years. She edited a defense of coeducation titled Sex and Education in 1874 and brought out a collection of her own addresses, Modern Society, in 1880. She published a biography of Margaret Fuller in 1883, and another collection of lectures, Is Polite Society Polite?, in 1895. Her popular memoirs, Reminiscences, appeared in 1899. Indeed, Howe continued to write lectures, poems, and articles until her death.
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Terry Hambrecht, "Chisolm, Julian John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/12/12-00157.html.
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Chisolm made many contributions to medicine and surgery in his teaching, his more than 100 professional publications, his invention, and his founding of institutions. Besides his Civil War and ophthalmic writings, he is especially noted for his advocacy of early ambulation of patients after cataract surgery, for being one of the first ophthalmologists to perform surgery for cataract on an outpatient basis, and for his early practice of antisepsis in eye surgery. He was a leader in the development of ophthalmology as a surgical specialty during the nineteenth century, as was evidenced by his publications on the diagnosis and treatment of eye disorders and his selection as the chairman of the Section of Eye, Ear, Nose and Throat of the American Medical Association in 1884.
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Effie K. Ambler, "Haviland, Laura Smith," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00898.html.
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Passage of the Fugitive Slave Law in 1850 raised the stakes for abolitionists and slave catchers. Entrusting her farm and younger children to her grown children and the Raisin Institute to its trustees, Haviland began a peripatetic life. For over a decade she moved through the cities of Michigan and Ohio, ministering to the souls and bodies of blacks. She often earned her keep as a sick nurse, guiding her white patients to Christian salvation while at the same time teaching in schools for black children. In Cincinnati she worked with Levi Coffin and Catherine Coffin in the Underground Railroad, preparing food and mending clothes with the women and conducting escapees from "station to station" with the abolitionist men. Unlike most who sheltered fleeing slaves from the "biped bloodhounds" of that era, she was publicly vocal in her denunciations of slavery as an evil no true Christian could allow to exist. She made several trips into slave states in order to rescue illegally held free blacks (not always with success).
In 1863, armed with letters from Michigan political leaders, a railroad pass, and fifteen dollars, Haviland went south with a load of medical supplies to offer "tender nursing" to wounded Union soldiers. She traveled down the Mississippi River, bringing blankets and religious instruction to the freedmen who sought refuge behind Union lines, inspecting military hospitals and prisons, and exposing injustice and cruelty--usually by complaining immediately to the highest military commander in the area.
In 1863, armed with letters from Michigan political leaders, a railroad pass, and fifteen dollars, Haviland went south with a load of medical supplies to offer "tender nursing" to wounded Union soldiers. She traveled down the Mississippi River, bringing blankets and religious instruction to the freedmen who sought refuge behind Union lines, inspecting military hospitals and prisons, and exposing injustice and cruelty--usually by complaining immediately to the highest military commander in the area.
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Citation:
William L. Barney, "Keitt, Laurence Massillon," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00591.html.
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Keitt was present in the Senate chamber when Brooks caned Sumner in May 1856. Keitt approved of Brooks's actions as the necessary duty of a southern gentleman of honor, and he himself brandished a cane to warn off bystanders from coming to Sumner's assistance. Censured by the House of Representatives for his part in the affair, Keitt resigned from Congress on 16 July 1856. Shortly reelected to his seat in a special election, he returned to Congress convinced that his honor had been vindicated. In a more serious breach of self-control in February 1858, Keitt attacked Galusha Grow, a Republican representative from Pennsylvania, when Grow crossed over to the Democratic side of the House in the midst of a bitter debate over the admission of Kansas. Keitt did apologize to the House for his actions, but he refused to do so to Grow…
With the election of Abraham Lincoln in November 1860, Keitt immediately called on his fellow South Carolinians to "shatter this accursed Union." He left Washington on 10 December 1860 and returned home, where he served as a delegate to the South Carolina secession convention. He was also a member of the provisional Confederate Congress that met in Montgomery, Alabama. Suspecting that Jefferson Davis was a reluctant secessionist who favored a reunion with the North, Keitt unsuccessfully backed Howell Cobb of Georgia for the presidency of the confederacy.
With the election of Abraham Lincoln in November 1860, Keitt immediately called on his fellow South Carolinians to "shatter this accursed Union." He left Washington on 10 December 1860 and returned home, where he served as a delegate to the South Carolina secession convention. He was also a member of the provisional Confederate Congress that met in Montgomery, Alabama. Suspecting that Jefferson Davis was a reluctant secessionist who favored a reunion with the North, Keitt unsuccessfully backed Howell Cobb of Georgia for the presidency of the confederacy.
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Robert McMath, "Polk, Leonidas LaFayette," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00624.html.
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Nothing in Polk's early life predicted his rise to prominence in a movement of angry farmers. The son of a planter, a moderately successful politician within the bounds of traditional southern politics, and a failed businessman, Polk nevertheless possessed remarkable organizational skills, and he had a knack for getting people to accept his leadership. He did not enrich himself at the expense of the movement he led; in fact, he died in debt, unable even to collect the salary owed him as president of the alliance. Polk was not the most advanced ideologue of the Populist movement, but he saw clearly the necessity of subjugating issues of section and race in order to give the new political movement of farmers and workers a chance to succeed.
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Larry Gara, "Coffin, Levi," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00134.html.
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In Newport Coffin opened a highly successful mercantile business, later adding an oil mill. He soon became involved in helping fugitive slaves, work that previously had been conducted mostly by neighboring black families. Fugitives were provided with food, clothing, and temporary housing before the Coffins arranged for their transportation north. Levi Coffin's leadership and more than twenty years of service eventually earned him the sobriquet "President of the Underground Railroad" among abolitionists in the region.
The Coffins aided an average of 100 fugitive slaves a year passing through on their way to Canada. One of the fugitives they helped is said to have inspired the Eliza Harris character in Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin. Coffin himself was the model for the book's Simeon Halliday. Although Coffin was well known for his clandestine work, his house was never searched for fugitives. The well-knit organization that he created in Newport and later in Cincinnati contributed to the legendary status of the Underground Railroad...
Coffin viewed the Civil War as divine punishment for slavery. As a nonresistant, he gave no personal support to the Union military effort, but he did care for the wounded and provided supplies to those who were prepared to defend Cincinnati against possible Confederate raids. He also visited former slaves--then called contraband--behind Union lines and collected money to provide them with warm clothing and bedding. He helped organize the Western Freedmen's Aid Commission and traveled to the British Isles to raise money for its support.
The Coffins aided an average of 100 fugitive slaves a year passing through on their way to Canada. One of the fugitives they helped is said to have inspired the Eliza Harris character in Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin. Coffin himself was the model for the book's Simeon Halliday. Although Coffin was well known for his clandestine work, his house was never searched for fugitives. The well-knit organization that he created in Newport and later in Cincinnati contributed to the legendary status of the Underground Railroad...
Coffin viewed the Civil War as divine punishment for slavery. As a nonresistant, he gave no personal support to the Union military effort, but he did care for the wounded and provided supplies to those who were prepared to defend Cincinnati against possible Confederate raids. He also visited former slaves--then called contraband--behind Union lines and collected money to provide them with warm clothing and bedding. He helped organize the Western Freedmen's Aid Commission and traveled to the British Isles to raise money for its support.
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Judith K. Schafer, "Woodbury, Levi," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/03/03-00548.html.
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Woodbury wrote perhaps his most controversial decision in 1847 in Jones v. Van Zandt. The decision hinged on the constitutionality of the federal Fugitive Slave Act of 1793. John Van Zandt's attorneys, William H. Seward and Salmon P. Chase, argued that the act was unconstitutional because higher moral law took precedence over the slave-catching statute. Woodbury rejected this argument, contending that the original compromises of the Constitutional Convention required the strict enforcement of acts giving slaveholders the right of rendition of their fugitive slaves. This decision made him popular in the South, and indeed some historians have suggested that his presidential aspirations may have influenced him to support constitutionalism and forbearance in sectional matters. He also supported the Compromise of 1850, including the new and stronger federal Fugitive Slave Act that was a part of the compromise, an unpopular stand for a New Englander. Had Woodbury lived, he might have been the Democratic nominee for president in 1852. He died in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
Levi Woodbury's career shows him to have been a man of talent and ability, although his considerable political ambition made his antislavery convictions seem contradictory to his support of states' rights and his defense of the South on the slavery issue. Although he was far from dynamic, he was sound, temperate, and hard-working in a great range of political offices.
Levi Woodbury's career shows him to have been a man of talent and ability, although his considerable political ambition made his antislavery convictions seem contradictory to his support of states' rights and his defense of the South on the slavery issue. Although he was far from dynamic, he was sound, temperate, and hard-working in a great range of political offices.
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Herbert F. Smith, "Wallace, Lew," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01707.html.
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When the war broke out, Wallace was named adjutant general for Indiana. Within a week he more than doubled the state's quota for regiments in camp and was made colonel of the Eleventh Indiana, a Zouave regiment. He was promoted to brigadier general in September 1861 and to major general in March 1862, after his important service at the capture of Fort Donelson. This rapid rise in the military hierarchy was amply justified by Wallace's energy as an officer, decisiveness in command, and concern for his troops. Unfortunately, in the next important combat in which he was engaged, the battle of Shiloh, his actions as commander of two brigades in support of General William T. Sherman's flank at Stony Lonesome were somewhat ambiguous; he may have been dilatory in marching his troops. Long after the battle, and perhaps for political reasons, Wallace was criticized by General Henry Halleck, temporarily losing his command on two occasions. Both times his command was restored, once by President Abraham Lincoln, once by General Ulysses S. Grant, but there can be no doubt that the ensuing scandal bothered him for the rest of his life. In his last years Wallace persisted in attempting to convince the Shiloh National Military Park Commission that his version of the events of the battle was the correct one. In any event, his later service in the war was blameless.
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Joel H. Silbey, "Cass, Lewis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00213.html.
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In 1857 President James Buchanan appointed Cass secretary of state. During his tenure, however, he was overshadowed by the president's own initiatives in foreign policy and by his own increasing feebleness. He remained a loyal party man, however, and in 1860 went with the administration in supporting John C. Breckinridge as the Democratic candidate over Stephen A. Douglas. Subsequently, however, Cass argued with Buchanan over the defense of American military posts in the face of southern secession. Taking his traditional strong nationalist position, he pushed hard to reinforce the beleaguered forts at Charleston and Pensacola and resigned in disgust over Buchanan's hesitations about doing so--a resignation the latter accepted with alacrity. He returned to Michigan to spend the rest of his life, dying at his home in Detroit.
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Roy E. Finkenbine, "Hayden, Lewis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00315.html.
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Separated from his family by the slave trade at age ten, he was eventually owned by five different masters. The first, a Presbyterian clergyman, traded him for a pair of horses. The second, a clock peddler, took Hayden along on his travels throughout the state, exposing him to the variety of forms that the "peculiar institution" could take. About 1830 he married Harriet Bell, also a slave. They had three children; one died in infancy, another was sold away, and a third remained with the couple. Hayden's third owner, in the early 1840s, whipped him often. These experiences stirred his passionate personal hatred for bondage. Hayden secretly learned to read and write, using the Bible and old newspapers as study materials. By 1842, when he belonged to Thomas Grant and Lewis Baxter of Lexington, he began to contemplate an escape. Because his last owners hired him out to work in a local hotel, he had greater freedom than most slaves, which made it easier to flee. In September 1844 Lewis, Harriet, and their remaining son were spirited away to Ohio and then on to Canada West (now Ontario), by local teachers and Underground Railroad agents Calvin Fairbanks and Delia Webster.
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Edward Hagerman, "Thomas, Lorenzo," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00984.html.
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Anxious to speed the enlistment of African Americans into the armed forces in accordance with the terms of the recent Emancipation Proclamation, Stanton ordered Thomas to the Mississippi Valley in the spring of 1863 to inaugurate the first large-scale War Department effort at black recruitment. Traveling through Kentucky, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee, Thomas arranged for existing army divisions to organize African-American regiments composed chiefly of erstwhile slaves. A Bureau for Colored Troops was quickly established under Thomas. Precisely because he was not known as an abolitionist or a Radical and because he pitched his appeals to white soldiers' self-interest, he was able to weaken the resistance of military men to the incorporation of "contrabands" into the service. Though he opposed allowing African Americans to serve as officers in the new regiments, Thomas at the same time insisted that black troops not be forced to perform any disproportionate share of fatigue duty. He also endeavored to provide for the families of black recruits and other fugitive slaves by establishing a system by which they worked for wages on abandoned plantations that were leased to northern entrepreneurs or southern loyalists. While this leasing system did not become as widespread as Thomas had hoped, his successes in raising troops were undeniable. Lincoln wrote, "The evidence is nearly conclusive that General Thomas is one of the best (if not the very best) instruments for this service" (Cornish, p. 126). By the war's end Thomas had overseen the recruitment of over 76,000 African Americans, more than 40 percent of the black soldiers who wore the blue. He was brevetted major general in March 1865.
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Lyde Cullen Sizer, "Velazquez, Loreta Janeta," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01016.html.
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Velazquez's adventures began with the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861. According to The Woman in Battle, her first husband resigned his commission to join the Confederacy at her urging. Indeed, so great was Velazquez's martial ardor--she expressed a wish to become another Joan of Arc--that she told him of her decision to enlist in the war effort herself by cross-dressing as a lieutenant in the Confederate army. He was adamantly against her suggestion, but when he left for the Virginia theater, she stole off to Arkansas to raise a regiment for his command, which she later delivered to him in Pensacola, Florida. He reluctantly accepted this role but was soon killed in an accident…Velazquez went on to chronicle a series of dramatic military exploits, which included action at Manassas (Bull Run), Ball's Bluff, Fort Donelson, and Shiloh. She claimed to have come within shooting distance of Ulysses S. Grant and to have worked as a blockade runner out of Havana. Although her more fantastic experiences cannot be corroborated, her narrative is remarkably accurate in recording fairly minute details about weather, commanding officers, and the course of battles. Although Velazquez's nom de guerre, "Lieutenant Harry T. Buford," does not appear in official records--Velazquez claimed to have been an independent--Richmond newspaper accounts do mention a Confederate "Lieutenant Bensford" arrested as a woman and calling herself Mrs. Alice Williams, a name Velazquez adopted elsewhere around the time she reported being arrested.
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Norman B. Ferris, "Morrill, Lot Myrick," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00721.html.
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During the Civil War Morrill insisted upon the confiscation of "rebel" property and the emancipation and enfranchisement of southern slaves, and he was easily reelected to a full Senate term in 1863. Predominantly owing to his instigation, laws were adopted emancipating the slaves in the District of Columbia, providing for their education, and granting males of this class the right to vote. In 1868 he delivered a lengthy Senate speech, justifying military Reconstruction of the South, that was one of the most eloquent defenses of Radical Republican doctrines and legislation ever uttered. That same year he voted to remove the impeached president, Andrew Johnson, so that Benjamin Wade, the president of the Senate whose Radical views resembled Morrill's, could become the nation's chief executive.
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Norman C. Delaney, "Goldsborough, Louis Malesherbes," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00421.html.
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Until late in the war Goldsborough performed administrative duties in Washington but without being allowed any role in major decision making. [Navy Secretary Gideon] Welles had a poor opinion of Goldsborough, regarding him as "inefficient" with "no hard courage." Repeated requests for active command were denied Goldsborough on the basis that he could not be spared from his administrative duties. Finally, however, in February 1865, Goldsborough was placed in command of the European Squadron and ordered to locate and destroy any remaining Confederate raiders at sea or seize them if in port. The small squadron was not ready to sail until June, arriving in European waters long after the war had ended. The last Confederate raider at sea--CSS Shenandoah--managed to elude all pursuers and reached England in September. Thus Goldsborough was unable to redeem his reputation as he had hoped by performing a significant action. For the next two years he continued to command the European Squadron.
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Katharine M. Rogers, "Alcott, Louisa May," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00022.html.
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Throughout her career, Alcott struggled to reconcile her Transcendentalist conviction that individuals must think independently and be true to themselves ("every soul has its own life to live and cannot hastily ignore its duties to itself without bitter suffering and loss" [Diana and Persis]) with the morality of submission, self-control, and self-sacrifice in which her parents trained her, a morality that was enjoined particularly on women. She sometimes evaded the conflict by preaching the supreme value of womanly, especially maternal, love, in accordance with the contemporary cult of true womanhood. She tried to resolve it by claiming that independence was compatible with traditional womanliness, that a woman can happily divide her energies among ballot box, "needle, pen, palette and broom" (An Old-Fashioned Girl), and even by insisting that self-denial deepens and authenticates (women's) artistic achievement. However, her assertions are less persuasive than her characters who rebel against conventionally defined female goodness--angular young Jo March, who cannot be a "little woman" and is infinitely more engaging as a tomboy, and Jean Muir, who assumes the feminine role prescribed by society only to defeat that society. Jo is a self-portrait, and Jean suggests the revealing wish fulfillment of a dutiful daughter who bitterly resents her role and consequently nurses "bad" feelings under her "good" exterior (Saxton, in Stern [1984], 257). Alcott, however, did not let her resentment surface in behavior: she constantly sacrificed her personal comfort and the artistic quality of her works to the demands of her family.
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Leonard Schlup, "Rousseau, Lovell Harrison," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00870.html.
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Rousseau compiled a solid record as a national legislator. Because of his knowledge of military matters, he was a valuable member of the Committee on Military Affairs. He participated in the debates over Reconstruction policies for the South; in a noted speech of 11 June 1866, he abandoned any ties he had to Radical Republicanism. Rousseau denounced the vindictive measures that Radical Republicans such as Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania wished to impose on the vanquished South. The independent-minded Kentuckian also opposed the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary agency to provide aid to freedmen and deal with abandoned southern lands; it was the original federal civil rights department for African Americans, which became a branch of the Department of War. The debate hinged on conceptions of property rights and public purpose and the principle of using government action to promote the welfare of a class of people.
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James B. Murphy, "Lamar, Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-01030.html.
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In Congress Lamar advocated "southern rights" and justified slavery. He stood with Senator Jefferson Davis of Mississippi in trying to avoid separate state secessions from the Union at the Charleston Democratic Convention of 1860, but when the movement gained momentum he wrote Mississippi's secession ordinance. Lamar provided a conservative rationalization that linked the Confederate revolution with the Declaration of Independence of 1776 and with the republicanism of the founding fathers.
After combat as a lieutenant colonel of the Nineteenth Mississippi in Virginia, Lamar fell ill with a debilitating paralysis and resigned from military duty in 1862. Named as Confederate states commissioner to Russia, Lamar traveled to Europe and temporarily undertook desultory duties in England and France in cooperation with other Confederate diplomats and agents. Political circumstances caused the Confederacy to abort the Russian mission, and Lamar was recalled without reaching his destination. During 1864 he did some work for the War Department in Richmond, but mainly he acted as Confederate president Davis's emissary in Georgia, where he conducted a public campaign in favor of the Habeas Corpus Act and other unpopular government actions. In December he rejoined the army and served as a judge advocate to a military court in Richmond.
After combat as a lieutenant colonel of the Nineteenth Mississippi in Virginia, Lamar fell ill with a debilitating paralysis and resigned from military duty in 1862. Named as Confederate states commissioner to Russia, Lamar traveled to Europe and temporarily undertook desultory duties in England and France in cooperation with other Confederate diplomats and agents. Political circumstances caused the Confederacy to abort the Russian mission, and Lamar was recalled without reaching his destination. During 1864 he did some work for the War Department in Richmond, but mainly he acted as Confederate president Davis's emissary in Georgia, where he conducted a public campaign in favor of the Habeas Corpus Act and other unpopular government actions. In December he rejoined the army and served as a judge advocate to a military court in Richmond.
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Nancy C. Unger, "Mott, Lucretia Coffin,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00494.html.
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In 1837 Mott attended the First Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women, an event she helped to organize, held in New York City. She devoted her speeches increasingly to the intertwined causes of feminism and antislavery, attracting large audiences. Like her colleagues Angelina Grimké and Sarah Grimké, Mott received harsh criticism, even from fellow antislavery advocates, for speaking to "promiscuous" audiences, that is, groups comprised of both women and men. Among proslavery forces Mott was denounced as a racial "amalgamator" and more than once was threatened by unruly, violent mobs. A pacifist, she believed that only moral weapons should be used to win the battle against slavery.
The "woman question" ultimately divided the American Anti-Slavery Society into two factions in 1840. That spring James and Lucretia Mott were named delegates from Pennsylvania to the World's Anti-Slavery Convention, which was held in London in June. The first order of business of the all-male convention was to discuss the admission of women delegates. Ninety percent of the delegates were opposed, and Lucretia Mott thus officially attended only as a visitor, but her presence nevertheless established her as a leading figure in both the women's rights and antislavery movements. Moreover, at the convention's end, she and abolitionist turned leading women's rights activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton resolved to call a meeting in the United States to advocate the rights of women.
The "woman question" ultimately divided the American Anti-Slavery Society into two factions in 1840. That spring James and Lucretia Mott were named delegates from Pennsylvania to the World's Anti-Slavery Convention, which was held in London in June. The first order of business of the all-male convention was to discuss the admission of women delegates. Ninety percent of the delegates were opposed, and Lucretia Mott thus officially attended only as a visitor, but her presence nevertheless established her as a leading figure in both the women's rights and antislavery movements. Moreover, at the convention's end, she and abolitionist turned leading women's rights activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton resolved to call a meeting in the United States to advocate the rights of women.
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Carol Lasser, "Stone, Lucy," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00663.html.
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Lucy Stone was a key figure in the American woman's rights movement for nearly a half century, bringing it from tutelage within the abolitionist movement to full organizational autonomy. Firmly committed to natural rights irrespective of sex, Stone maintained a distance from more controversial gender issues, such as divorce and free love. Instead, she worked tirelessly as lecturer, organizer, publisher, and tactician in pursuit of full legal equality, particularly the enfranchisement of women.
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Olive Hoogenboom, "Hayes, Lucy Ware Webb," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00864.html.
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Influenced by Lucy's antislavery sentiments, [Rutherford] Hayes, who had thought abolitionists too radical, began defending runaway slaves who had crossed the Ohio River from Kentucky. Influenced, in turn, by Rutherford Hayes's feelings against woman suffrage, Lucy, who had two aunts active in the women's movement and after hearing Lucy Stone had herself conceded that reform was needed, did not work for women's rights.
Thanks to the help of her mother, Hayes was freed from the constant care of her children. Taking an active part in her husband's political career, she accompanied him to Indianapolis to ride back to Cincinnati with President-elect Abraham Lincoln. After southerners attacked Fort Sumter, she enthusiastically supported his decision to volunteer for the Union army. Half a dozen times during the Civil War, Lucy Hayes--sometimes accompanied by her mother and children and always participating fully in camp life--joined her husband. Adored by young officers and common soldiers, she often helped her brother Joe, the surgeon of Hayes's regiment, care for the sick. She spent her "bitterest hour" in camp, when her infant son Joe sickened and died (Geer, p. 64). Sadly, the experience was not unique; two of her other boys would die in babyhood.
Thanks to the help of her mother, Hayes was freed from the constant care of her children. Taking an active part in her husband's political career, she accompanied him to Indianapolis to ride back to Cincinnati with President-elect Abraham Lincoln. After southerners attacked Fort Sumter, she enthusiastically supported his decision to volunteer for the Union army. Half a dozen times during the Civil War, Lucy Hayes--sometimes accompanied by her mother and children and always participating fully in camp life--joined her husband. Adored by young officers and common soldiers, she often helped her brother Joe, the surgeon of Hayes's regiment, care for the sick. She spent her "bitterest hour" in camp, when her infant son Joe sickened and died (Geer, p. 64). Sadly, the experience was not unique; two of her other boys would die in babyhood.
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Catherine Teets- Parzynski, "Child, Lydia Maria Francis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00127.html.
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Child continued to demand equal treatment for blacks, and so in 1861 she willingly edited former slave Harriet Jacobs's novel Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. She followed this in 1865 with The Freedmen's Book, a collection of short poems, biographical sketches, and essays created with the hope of inculcating pride in newly freed blacks. Aspirations of the World: A Chain of Opals, the final anthology of her work, was published in 1878, two years before her death in Wayland.
Although best known for her antislavery writings, Child evinced an interest in all areas of social reform. Throughout her long career she commented on such issues as Indian rights, equal rights for women, educational reform, and religious toleration. She sacrificed a burgeoning national career in the 1830s by remaining true to her own conscience and becoming one of the first Americans to speak out against the institution of slavery.
Although best known for her antislavery writings, Child evinced an interest in all areas of social reform. Throughout her long career she commented on such issues as Indian rights, equal rights for women, educational reform, and religious toleration. She sacrificed a burgeoning national career in the 1830s by remaining true to her own conscience and becoming one of the first Americans to speak out against the institution of slavery.
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David Osborn, "Trumbull, Lyman," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00998.html.
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[Lyman] Trumbull was elected as a Democrat to the state legislature in 1840 but resigned the next year to become Illinois secretary of state. After an unsuccessful campaign for the federal House of Representatives in 1846, Trumbull vowed not to seek legislative office again. Two years later he was elected to fill out a term as justice of the Illinois Supreme Court; in 1852 he won a full nine-year term on the bench.
Trumbull was outraged over the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. Like many in Illinois, he saw the Missouri Compromise, nullified by the Kansas-Nebraska Act, as a pillar comparable to the compromises producing the federal Constitution. The act split the Democrats in Illinois, with Trumbull leading the anti-Nebraska faction. That fall Trumbull ran for the U.S. House from the state's Eighth Congressional District, drawing support from Whigs, Free Soilers, and anti-Nebraska Democrats. He defeated Phillip B. Foulke, a pro-Nebraska Democrat, by about 2,700 votes. In February 1855 the Illinois legislature elected Trumbull to the U.S. Senate over pro-Nebraska Democratic incumbent James Shields, Abraham Lincoln, and Governor Joel Matteson, after candidate Lincoln instructed supporters to vote for Trumbull on the tenth ballot. While in Congress, Trumbull completed the transformation from anti-Nebraska Democrat to Republican in 1857. He opposed the proslavery Lecompton constitution for Kansas, arguing that Congress should decide such matters for the territory. In the secession crisis, Trumbull rejected the Crittenden Compromise measures.
Trumbull was outraged over the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. Like many in Illinois, he saw the Missouri Compromise, nullified by the Kansas-Nebraska Act, as a pillar comparable to the compromises producing the federal Constitution. The act split the Democrats in Illinois, with Trumbull leading the anti-Nebraska faction. That fall Trumbull ran for the U.S. House from the state's Eighth Congressional District, drawing support from Whigs, Free Soilers, and anti-Nebraska Democrats. He defeated Phillip B. Foulke, a pro-Nebraska Democrat, by about 2,700 votes. In February 1855 the Illinois legislature elected Trumbull to the U.S. Senate over pro-Nebraska Democratic incumbent James Shields, Abraham Lincoln, and Governor Joel Matteson, after candidate Lincoln instructed supporters to vote for Trumbull on the tenth ballot. While in Congress, Trumbull completed the transformation from anti-Nebraska Democrat to Republican in 1857. He opposed the proslavery Lecompton constitution for Kansas, arguing that Congress should decide such matters for the territory. In the secession crisis, Trumbull rejected the Crittenden Compromise measures.
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Albert Castel, "Lovell, Mansfield," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00453.html.
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Having entered West Point at the age of sixteen, he graduated in 1842 and was assigned to the Fourth Artillery Regiment as a second lieutenant. During the Mexican War he was wounded at the battle of Monterrey (18-21 Sept. 1846) and in the storming of Mexico City (13-14 Sept. 1847), in the process winning promotion to first lieutenant and being brevetted captain for gallantry in action. In 1849 he married Emily Plympton, the daughter of an army officer. In 1854, tiring of garrison duty along the frontier, he resigned from the army to take a position with the Cooper & Hewitt's Iron Works in Trenton, New Jersey. In 1858 he moved to New York City, where he was at first superintendent of street improvement, then deputy street commissioner under another future Confederate general, Gustavus W. Smith. His own entry into the Confederate service came exceptionally, and in the eyes of some southerners suspiciously, late, not occurring until September 1861, five months after the Civil War began. Even so, because of his high reputation in the "old army," he was appointed a major general on 7 October 1861 and placed in command of "Department No. 1"--New Orleans, the South's largest city and main port.
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Joel Athey, "Fuller, Margaret," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-02339.html.
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Fuller's writings never achieved the landmark status of Mary Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), for they were pontifical and mystical as well as imaginative. Hence her life was more influential than her works. [Ralph Waldo] Emerson's letters reveal his great indebtedness to Fuller, which ironically is often neglected as feminists strive to show Fuller's independence. Critics speculate that [Nathaniel] Hawthorne, in spite of his hostility, refigured her as characters in all his major novels. Certainly Fuller inspired women writers, including Emily Dickinson, Louisa May Alcott, and Edith Wharton. Her influences on Walt Whitman, [Edgar Allan] Poe, [Herman] Melville, and Henry James are documented but have not been fully explored.
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Paul A. Cimbala, "Delany, Martin Robison," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00184.html.
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During the late 1840s [Delany] was co-editor of Frederick Douglass's North Star and traveled as an abolitionist lecturer. His call for black economic self-determination and his critique of the black community's religiosity as an obstacle to achieving that end placed him among the most radical of abolitionists. In 1852 he published his argument for emigration as a means by which black Americans could break free of the psychological and physical domination of whites in The Condition, Elevation, Emigration and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States, which was well received by prominent black leaders but attacked by the white abolitionist press.
In 1856 Delany moved to Chatham, Ontario, where a significant number of blacks had settled and where he expected to find more support for his emigrationist views. There he espoused a Pan-African philosophy that joined the destiny of American blacks with those of Africans and West Indians. In 1859 he explored the Niger Valley in West Africa, where he hoped to establish a settlement to grow cotton with free labor in direct competition with the slave South. He described the region and its prospects in his Official Report of the Niger Valley Exploring Party (1861). Although he was warmly received in Great Britain, where he lectured to publicize his venture, his African settlement failed to materialize.
In 1856 Delany moved to Chatham, Ontario, where a significant number of blacks had settled and where he expected to find more support for his emigrationist views. There he espoused a Pan-African philosophy that joined the destiny of American blacks with those of Africans and West Indians. In 1859 he explored the Niger Valley in West Africa, where he hoped to establish a settlement to grow cotton with free labor in direct competition with the slave South. He described the region and its prospects in his Official Report of the Niger Valley Exploring Party (1861). Although he was warmly received in Great Britain, where he lectured to publicize his venture, his African settlement failed to materialize.
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Sarah H. Gordon, "Bickerdyke, Mary Ann Ball," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/12/12-00074.html.
Body Summary:
As a Congregationalist in Galesburg, Bickerdyke attended the church of Edward Beecher, brother ofCatharine Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe. Shortly after the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, the minister received a letter from Dr. Benjamin Woodward regarding the degraded state of soldiers' accommodations in Cairo, Illinois. The plea for medical help prompted Bickerdyke to leave her sons in the care of another family and travel to Cairo, bringing with her $100 worth of donated medical supplies and food. There she found soldiers ill from squalid living conditions, bereft of sanitation or a balanced diet. She proceeded to have them stripped and bathed, saw to the washing of clothes and bedding, and cooked meals, all in defiance of army regulations excluding women from its encampments without permission.
While army officials battled her presence with rules and regulations, Bickerdyke began a quiet medical revolution. The army medical department, preoccupied with pain control and amputations to forestall infection, did not consider cleanliness, fresh air, and diet as significant factors in the treatment of illness. Bickerdyke, though, persevered by sheer energy and force of character to treat the soldiers, and she was soon assisted by Cairo resident Mary Safford. Their success was such that when an army hospital building was finally designated in Cairo, Bickerdyke became its matron. There she dealt with the realities of an army staff that stole food and clothes and men who drank on the job.
While army officials battled her presence with rules and regulations, Bickerdyke began a quiet medical revolution. The army medical department, preoccupied with pain control and amputations to forestall infection, did not consider cleanliness, fresh air, and diet as significant factors in the treatment of illness. Bickerdyke, though, persevered by sheer energy and force of character to treat the soldiers, and she was soon assisted by Cairo resident Mary Safford. Their success was such that when an army hospital building was finally designated in Cairo, Bickerdyke became its matron. There she dealt with the realities of an army staff that stole food and clothes and men who drank on the job.
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Shirley J. Yee "Cary, Mary Ann Camberton Shadd," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/09/09-00875.html.
Body Summary:
Between 1850 and 1860 approximately 40,000 blacks fled to southern Ontario. Shadd found employment in 1851 as a teacher of blacks in Windsor, Ontario, and was later joined by several members of her family. Shadd taught school and became a fervent spokeswoman for the emigration movement. Like most teachers in the black settlements, she had to struggle to keep her schools open, facing such obstacles as inadequate supplies, ramshackle school buildings, inclement weather, and the frequent outbreak of cholera and measles.
Mary Ann Shadd continued her family's activist tradition by devoting her life to the advancement of black education and the immediate abolition of slavery. As a youth she attended a private Quaker school for blacks taught by whites, in which several of her teachers were abolitionists. During the 1840s she taught in schools for blacks in Wilmington, West Chester, New York City, and Norristown, Pennsylvania. When passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 endangered the freedom of free blacks as well as fugitive slaves, Shadd joined the faction of black abolitionists who promoted the controversial cause of voluntary black emigration to Canada. This movement illustrated the depth of disillusionment with the United States that had developed among many blacks since the 1840s. Angered and disappointed in the continued tolerance of slavery and the upsurge of violence against free blacks, a faction of black activists broke from the American abolitionist organization and from those black abolitionists who preferred to stay and fight oppression in the United States.
Between 1850 and 1860 approximately 40,000 blacks fled to southern Ontario. Shadd found employment in 1851 as a teacher of blacks in Windsor, Ontario, and was later joined by several members of her family. Shadd taught school and became a fervent spokeswoman for the emigration movement. Like most teachers in the black settlements, she had to struggle to keep her schools open, facing such obstacles as inadequate supplies, ramshackle school buildings, inclement weather, and the frequent outbreak of cholera and measles.
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Citation:
Shirley J. Yee "Cary, Mary Ann Camberton Shadd," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/09/09-00875.html.
Body Summary:
Mary Ann Shadd Cary stands as one of the most significant, yet least recognized, abolitionists who worked on behalf of black emigration and the sustenance of black settlements in Canada. At the same time, her lifelong challenge of racism and sexism made Cary an important figure in the struggle for racial and sexual equality during the nineteenth century.
During the Civil War she traveled to the United States to help recruit soldiers for the Union army. In 1869, Mary Ann Shadd Cary, by now a widow, moved to Washington, D.C., with her two children. Later, she lived with her older daughter, Sarah E. Cary Evans, a schoolteacher. Between 1869 and 1871 she began her studies in law at Howard University but stopped for unknown reasons. She resumed her studies in 1881 and received her degree in 1883, the only black woman in a class of five, although there is no evidence that she actually practiced law. She also continued her support for women's rights. In 1878 she delivered a lecture at the annual National Woman Suffrage Association Conference. She died at home in Washington.
Mary Ann Shadd Cary stands as one of the most significant, yet least recognized, abolitionists who worked on behalf of black emigration and the sustenance of black settlements in Canada. At the same time, her lifelong challenge of racism and sexism made Cary an important figure in the struggle for racial and sexual equality during the nineteenth century.
Type: Description
Citation:
Shirley J. Yee "Cary, Mary Ann Camberton Shadd," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/09/09-00875.html.
Body Summary:
Although the eldest of thirteen children, Mary Ann Shadd grew up in comfortable economic circumstances. Little is known about her mother except that she was born in North Carolina in 1806 and was of mixed black and white heritage; whether she was born free or a slave is unknown. Shadd's father was also of mixed-race heritage. His paternal grandfather, Jeremiah Schadd, was a German soldier who had fought in the American Revolution and later married Elizabeth Jackson, a free black woman from Pennsylvania. Abraham Shadd had amassed his wealth as a shoemaker, and his property by the 1830s was valued at $5,000. He was a respected member of the free black community in Wilmington and in West Chester, Pennsylvania, where the family had moved sometime in the 1830s, and he served as a delegate to the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1835 and 1836.
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Robert L. Gale, "Chesnut, Mary Boykin Miller," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01220.html.
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Mary Chesnut's wartime experiences were varied and intense, often tragic in nature. Nevertheless, the excitement of war provided a stimulant to a childless southern matron who before the war was frustrated and depressed. Her husband was too cool-headed, aristocratic, and self-sacrificial to suit her energetic and unfulfilled nature. If he had asked, he could have obtained an important commission in the Confederate army and achieved glory, or he could have successfully requested a diplomatic appointment in London or in Paris. Doing neither, he remained self-effacing and largely unappreciated. For her part, she plunged into what wartime activities were available to her through his assignments, accepted all challenges--personal, familial, social, and political--with a fierce commitment, and began keeping the finest diary by any southern woman during the four-year conflict between the states.
Mary Chesnut started her diary in February 1861, kept at it sporadically for a total of perhaps twelve "volumes," of which seven are extant. The first five volumes run through 8 December 1861; the sixth, January to February 1865; the seventh, 7 May to 26 July 1865. Evidence permits the conclusion that she recorded nothing between August 1862 and October 1863, perhaps because of arduous hospital duty.
Mary Chesnut started her diary in February 1861, kept at it sporadically for a total of perhaps twelve "volumes," of which seven are extant. The first five volumes run through 8 December 1861; the sixth, January to February 1865; the seventh, 7 May to 26 July 1865. Evidence permits the conclusion that she recorded nothing between August 1862 and October 1863, perhaps because of arduous hospital duty.
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Jean H. Baker, "Lincoln, Mary Todd," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00632.html.
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In addition to her role as a mother and housewife, Lincoln was absorbed in politics and worked to promote her husband's career. She wrote patronage letters, advocated his election, and even followed legislative choices in his senatorial campaigns. After Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860, she ambitiously sought for herself the role of an influential first lady. Wearing stunning gowns and shawls, she tried to define American fashion. She tastefully renovated the White House, especially the downstairs public rooms, and entertained at parties designed to display to foreign ambassadors the power of the Union. She established an informal American salon, where public men and literary figures discussed the topics of the day. Besides these extensions of domestic roles, Lincoln sought a controversial voice in her husband's patronage appointments, including his cabinet…A vivacious belle in her youth, the short, plump Lincoln was an important and controversial first lady who expanded that role's authority. Stepping outside of the traditional female role of homemaker into the male-dominated world of public affairs, she was often criticized for her behavior. Extravagant, high-strung, and tempestuous, she nonetheless played an important role in her husband's ascent to the presidency and made the unpaid but demanding position of first lady into a post of influence.
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John H. Baker, "Lincoln, Mary Todd," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00632.html.
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Mary Lincoln's tenure as a first lady coincided with the Civil War. During her first days in the White House, when Confederate units were unopposed in northern Virginia, army officials encouraged her to leave the city, but she insisted on staying and even accompanied her husband on tours of the Washington defenses. Like many other women, she nursed soldiers in hospitals, often inscribing their dictated letters to relatives in the North. Lincoln was unusual in her commitment to raising money for the support of impoverished former slaves ("contraband"), who crowded into Washington. However, her good works never stilled the criticism of her extravagance when the allowance for the White House was exceeded, nor did she ever shake the gossip that, because her half brothers fought for the Confederacy, she was a spy.
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C. Zoe Smith, "Brady, Mathew B.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/17/17-00096.html.
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Acknowledged throughout history textbooks and popular literature as the photographer of the Civil War, Brady was rather the mastermind and businessman behind this documentation, having actually taken very few of the images for which he is known. According to Alan Trachtenberg ("Brady's Portraits," p. 231), "He was the stage-manager of the first phase of photography in America: neither an innovator nor a great artist, not even for most of his career a practicing photographer, nevertheless he epitomized the entire photographic enterprise in antebellum America." It was not until 1949 that Alexander Gardner, for example, received credit for a portrait of Abraham Lincoln previously known as Brady's. In preparing for the Ansco Centennial Civil War Exhibition, researchers found other work previously credited to Brady that was taken by Gardner and his older brother James, Timothy O'Sullivan, D. B. Woodbury, Guy Fox, and other assistants…. Although he may not have done much of the actual photographing, Brady had the stature, the political connections, the financial resources, the equipment, and the employees to carry out his grand scheme of documenting the war between the states.
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Norman J. W. Thrower, "Maury, Matthew Fontaine," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/13/13-01072.html.
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In 1855 the U.S. Congress called a secret meeting of a navy board to assess naval efficiency. Surprisingly, the board assigned Maury to a leave of absence, though he was to continue his duties as head of the Naval Observatory. He protested and, assisted by friends, newspapers, and resolutions passed by the legislative bodies of several states, was restored to active service in 1858 and promoted, retroactively, to commander. In the meantime, Maury had written The Physical Geography of the Sea (1855), in which he laid the foundations of the modern science of oceanography.
Following the outbreak of the American Civil War, Maury, out of loyalty to the region where he was born and grew up, joined the Confederate States Navy. With the rank of commander, he was assigned to harbor defense duties, including designing and laying mines. In 1862 he was sent to England to enlist aid for the South. Overseas he obtained ships for the Confederacy and experimented with electric mines. In 1865 he was on his way back to North America when, in Havana, Cuba, he learned of the surrender of the Confederate States. Rather than return home, Maury went to Mexico to initiate colonization of exiled Confederates under the patronage of Emperor Ferdinand Maximilian. Colonization proved unsuccessful, so Maury returned to England, where he wrote several geography textbooks. The British raised a large sum of money by public subscription and presented it to Maury for his scientific contributions. He returned to the United States in 1868, where he became professor of meteorology at the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Virginia.
Following the outbreak of the American Civil War, Maury, out of loyalty to the region where he was born and grew up, joined the Confederate States Navy. With the rank of commander, he was assigned to harbor defense duties, including designing and laying mines. In 1862 he was sent to England to enlist aid for the South. Overseas he obtained ships for the Confederacy and experimented with electric mines. In 1865 he was on his way back to North America when, in Havana, Cuba, he learned of the surrender of the Confederate States. Rather than return home, Maury went to Mexico to initiate colonization of exiled Confederates under the patronage of Emperor Ferdinand Maximilian. Colonization proved unsuccessful, so Maury returned to England, where he wrote several geography textbooks. The British raised a large sum of money by public subscription and presented it to Maury for his scientific contributions. He returned to the United States in 1868, where he became professor of meteorology at the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Virginia.
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Patrick G. Williams, "Ransom, Matt Whitaker," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00824.html.
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Ransom entered political life as a Whig and campaigned for Winfield Scott in 1852. With the party's disintegration as a national organization and the Know Nothings' rise to the fore, however, Ransom aligned himself with the Democrats and served as Northampton County's representative in the North Carolina House of Commons between 1858 and 1861. Like many in his state, he remained unenthusiastic about secession until conflict became inevitable. He served as one of the peace commissioners that the legislature appointed to treat with the provisional Confederate government in Montgomery, Alabama; however, when Abraham Lincoln mobilized Union forces to put down the rebellion, Ransom entered the Confederate army. Enlisting as a private, he was quickly commissioned lieutenant colonel and in April 1862 was elected commander of the Thirty-fifth North Carolina Regiment, soon to become part of a brigade led by his brother Robert Ransom. Matt Ransom and his men took part in the defense of Richmond during the Peninsular Campaign, Ransom being wounded at Malvern Hill. Later in 1862 Ransom fought at Antietam. That winter the brigade was transferred to eastern North Carolina, with Ransom, now a brigadier general, succeeding his brother as its commander in June 1863. The unit saw action at Boone's Mill and in the capture of Plymouth before being called in the spring of 1864 to the defense of Petersburg. Wounded at Drewry's Bluff in May, Ransom returned to command in time to participate in the final battles in the east, including Fort Stedman and Five Forks.
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Robert K. Krick, "Gregg, Maxcy," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00270.html.
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At the battle of Fredericksburg on 13 December 1862, Gregg and his brigade occupied a position well behind the front line, but Federals penetrated into the Confederate position and surged against the South Carolinians. As he rode in front of his men, Gregg fell mortally wounded by a ball that passed through his side to his spine. A. P. Hill and Stonewall Jackson paid emotional visits to Gregg as he lay dying at the Yerby house, "Belvoir." Early on 15 December Gregg sent an entirely typical telegram to his governor: "If I am to die at this time, I yield my life cheerfully, fighting for the independence of South Carolina." Unlike many of his contemporaries who hotly sought secession, Maxcy Gregg converted his convictions into military service. His success in the field was at least as notable as that of any politician-turned-soldier in Lee's army.
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Tyler Anbinder, "Fillmore, Millard," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00374.html.
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In February 1856, while the ex-president toured Europe, his handlers secured for him the American party presidential nomination. Fillmore's campaign was a disaster from start to finish. In one of his first campaign speeches, the ex-president outraged most northerners by implying that the South would be justified in seceding should the Republican candidate, John C. Frémont, carry the election. Fillmore's supporters emphasized that he was the only candidate capable of restoring harmony between North and South in the wake of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Yet that legislation, the caning of Massachusetts abolitionist senator Charles Sumner, and the "sack" of Lawrence, Kansas, by proslavery Missourians had convinced many northerners that compromise with the South was pointless. Consequently, most northern Know Nothings repudiated Fillmore and supported Frémont instead. Even in the South, where Fillmore's message carried greater appeal, many members of the American party voted for Democrat James Buchanan out of fear that ballots cast for Fillmore's apparently hopeless candidacy would lead to a Frémont victory. On election day Fillmore carried only Maryland, and although four other southern states eluded him by just a few thousand votes, the ex-president considered his popular tally of 22 percent an embarrassment. Fillmore's defeat destroyed the American party as a national political force and marked the end of his political career.
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Edward G. Longacre, "Bonham, Milledge Luke," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00120.html.
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In the role of both politician and soldier, Bonham was a man of commanding presence, his appearance highlighted by gray-streaked hair, steely eyes, and an immaculately kept beard. His forceful personality was somewhat weakened by a difficult temper and a tendency to mood swings. From his twenties to the end of his public life he struck observers such as James Henry Hammond as "not of an equable temperament, being either full of hope or plunged in despair." High-minded and generous, he could also be condescending, imperious, and abrupt to the point of rudeness; during his Civil War military service, his staff referred to him behind his back as "the Dictator." His frequent squabbling with regular army and West Point-trained superiors such as Beauregard and his acute sensitivity to matters of seniority betrayed the worst traits of the citizen-soldier.
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John d'Entremont, "Conway, Moncure Daniel," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00345.html.
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The Civil War found Conway's pro-Union sister and mother in Pennsylvania, his pro-Confederate father in Richmond, and his two brothers in the Confederate army. He supported the Union on the condition that President Abraham Lincoln show progress toward a policy of emancipation. His views were expounded in two powerful propagandistic books, The Rejected Stone (1861) and The Golden Hour (1862), prompting Boston abolitionists to make him coeditor of a new antislavery weekly, The Commonwealth. Just before moving to Massachusetts in September 1862, Conway rendezvoused in Washington, D.C., with thirty-three slaves newly escaped from his father, and resettled them in Ohio. This, and subsequently the Emancipation Proclamation, raised his spirits momentarily, but increasingly the war anguished and depressed him. With his family divided, his boyhood haunts the scenes of savage fighting, and nationwide emancipation not fully achieved, Conway determined to leave the country. He did so in April 1863 on the pretext of making a speaking tour in England. Shortly thereafter, he sent for his family. He would live in London for the next twenty-two years.
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Jean H. Baker, "Blair, Montgomery," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00112.html.
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In 1856 Blair became the counsel for the plaintiff Dred Scott, and though he lost this case before the proslavery Roger B. Taney Supreme Court, Blair argued the important principle that the slave Scott was entitled to his freedom by virtue of his residence in free territory. Blair also held that the Missouri Compromise prohibited slavery in the territories and that Congress had the authority to prohibit slavery there, a position that put him at odds with southern Democrats and that had been undermined in the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act.
Blair, along with his influential brother Francis Blair and his father [Francis Preston Blair], had come to oppose slavery and to support the return of freed blacks to Africa, the latter a policy that he believed would encourage southerners to free their slaves. Blair's views on slavery were representative of a body of border-state opinion, which opposed abolitionism and black equality as too extreme but which argued for a containment of slavery and its gradual end. In 1848 he was associated with the Free Soil party, attracted to that new organization during a period of party realignment by friends in New York. By 1852 he had returned to the Democratic party and was a delegate to its national convention. By 1860 he supported the Republican party and worked hard, though largely unsuccessfully, to organize this new political organization in Maryland.
Blair, along with his influential brother Francis Blair and his father [Francis Preston Blair], had come to oppose slavery and to support the return of freed blacks to Africa, the latter a policy that he believed would encourage southerners to free their slaves. Blair's views on slavery were representative of a body of border-state opinion, which opposed abolitionism and black equality as too extreme but which argued for a containment of slavery and its gradual end. In 1848 he was associated with the Free Soil party, attracted to that new organization during a period of party realignment by friends in New York. By 1852 he had returned to the Democratic party and was a delegate to its national convention. By 1860 he supported the Republican party and worked hard, though largely unsuccessfully, to organize this new political organization in Maryland.
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John C. Fredriksen, "Meigs, Montgomery Cunningham," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00518.html.
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Meigs was an irascible man who spent forty-six years in the service of his country. He was a talented architect and engineer, but his tenure as quartermaster general was perhaps more significant as it ushered in a new age of modern military bureaucracy. Meigs's appetite for staff work, insistence on departmental honesty, and attention to the minutiae of supplying troops in the field rendered him one of the most effective administrators of U.S. Army history. His unsung efforts certainly facilitated the eventual Union victory. His eldest son, John Rodgers Meigs, was a talented Union officer who was allegedly murdered by Confederate partisans while scouting the Shenandoah Valley on 3 October 1864. His commanding officer, General Philip Sheridan, was so outraged that he burned all houses and farms within five miles of the place of his death.
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Susan Gluck Mezey, "Bradwell, Myra Colby," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00095.html.
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Myra Bradwell was a tireless worker on behalf of legal reform and women's rights in Illinois and the nation. She believed that women's lives should not be restricted by prevailing social norms. She also believed that her legal colleagues should conduct themselves with honor and integrity. Throughout her life she devoted great energy and devotion to her causes--fighting for an end to slavery and racial discrimination, greater equality and opportunity for women, and reforms related to the legal profession.
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Rodney P. Carlisle, "Forrest, Nathan Bedford," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00389.html.
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The attack on Fort Pillow, 12 April 1864, was the battle that brought his name to the attention of the U.S. Congress and to the northern press.
The bare facts of that attack were that 221 defenders were killed, 130 were wounded, and the remainder were captured. An uncounted number of civilians who had taken refuge in the fort were also killed. The high military casualty rate stunned the North, and rumors spread that Forrest had ordered a "Black Flag" or "no quarter," which led to the massacre of many of the African-American defenders. His troops pursued men into the woods and continued to fire on the fleeing defenders, killing many as they sought to escape. Later, Forrest's supporters and friendly biographers collected evidence from both Confederate and Union veterans of the battle to offset the conviction that he was personally responsible….
The congressional committee investigating the battle concluded that Forrest had taken advantage of a truce to reposition his forces and that he had allowed his troops to commit the slaughter. The committee heard testimony that some wounded Union troops were intentionally burned in their barracks, while other wounded were buried alive. Since Forrest was a slave trader before the war, his battle tactics were unconventional, rapid, and ruthless, and he had a personal reputation for certainty of purpose and strict discipline against any of his men charged with cowardice or violation of orders, he became a convenient symbol of the violence and sometimes explicit racism of the rebellion.
The bare facts of that attack were that 221 defenders were killed, 130 were wounded, and the remainder were captured. An uncounted number of civilians who had taken refuge in the fort were also killed. The high military casualty rate stunned the North, and rumors spread that Forrest had ordered a "Black Flag" or "no quarter," which led to the massacre of many of the African-American defenders. His troops pursued men into the woods and continued to fire on the fleeing defenders, killing many as they sought to escape. Later, Forrest's supporters and friendly biographers collected evidence from both Confederate and Union veterans of the battle to offset the conviction that he was personally responsible….
The congressional committee investigating the battle concluded that Forrest had taken advantage of a truce to reposition his forces and that he had allowed his troops to commit the slaughter. The committee heard testimony that some wounded Union troops were intentionally burned in their barracks, while other wounded were buried alive. Since Forrest was a slave trader before the war, his battle tactics were unconventional, rapid, and ruthless, and he had a personal reputation for certainty of purpose and strict discipline against any of his men charged with cowardice or violation of orders, he became a convenient symbol of the violence and sometimes explicit racism of the rebellion.
Type: Description
Citation:
Rodney P. Carlisle, "Forrest, Nathan Bedford," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00389.html.
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Forrest's military victories were remarkable for several reasons. First of all, he was not a literate man, and his writing reflected the fact that he never mastered spelling or standard grammar. As a consequence, some of his reports and communiqués that survive have a distinctly illiterate flavor when published without editing or correction. However, he was reputed to be excellent in mathematics, and his personal business ventures demonstrated the truth of that observation. Furthermore, he had no military training whatsoever. Thus, his tactics were entirely based on his own thoughts about his own forces and the disposition of the enemy. He moved rapidly, perfecting the techniques of the surprise raid, the flanking and rear attack, and escape through unexpected routes. Military observers at the time and later concluded that Forrest was a natural military genius. He had few precepts but was quoted as saying that his rule of war was to "get there first with the most men," a motto that was often attached to his name. A tall and commanding figure, usually astride a horse, he was revered by his men. Forrest was wounded several times. By the careful count of one admiring biographer, he had twenty-nine horses shot while he was riding them and was personally responsible in hand to hand combat for the death or serious injury of thirty Union officers and men.
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Jonathan Lurie, "Swayne, Noah Haynes," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00830.html.
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By the 1850s Swayne's hostility to slavery turned him toward the new Republican party, and he supported its first presidential candidate, John Frémont, in the 1856 election. While Swayne was serving as an aide to Republican governor William Dennison, his close friend Supreme Court Justice John McLean suddenly died in April 1861. McLean, like Swayne, had come from Ohio, and he had apparently expressed the hope that Swayne would some day take his place. With understandable if somewhat unseemly enthusiasm, Swayne moved to succeed him…
As a Supreme Court justice, Swayne had little inclination to withdraw from political activity, perhaps because his generation's ideas of judicial propriety were very different from those of a later era. When Chief Justice Roger Taney died in 1864, Swayne again mounted a political campaign for promotion. He tried to block support for his fellow Ohioan Salmon Chase. Again, he solicited endorsements from a variety of political and legal figures--including a future chief justice, Morrison R. Waite. Lincoln ultimately appointed Chase, and when Chase died in 1873, the 68-year-old Swayne without hesitation again sought the post. According to his colleague Justice Samuel Miller, Swayne "artfully beslobbered the President" for the appointment, while another commentator observed of Swayne's pursuit of the position twice within ten years that the man's "ambitions far outstripped his abilities" (Gillette, p. 997).
As a Supreme Court justice, Swayne had little inclination to withdraw from political activity, perhaps because his generation's ideas of judicial propriety were very different from those of a later era. When Chief Justice Roger Taney died in 1864, Swayne again mounted a political campaign for promotion. He tried to block support for his fellow Ohioan Salmon Chase. Again, he solicited endorsements from a variety of political and legal figures--including a future chief justice, Morrison R. Waite. Lincoln ultimately appointed Chase, and when Chase died in 1873, the 68-year-old Swayne without hesitation again sought the post. According to his colleague Justice Samuel Miller, Swayne "artfully beslobbered the President" for the appointment, while another commentator observed of Swayne's pursuit of the position twice within ten years that the man's "ambitions far outstripped his abilities" (Gillette, p. 997).
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Citation:
Michael Vorenberg, "Judd, Norman Buel," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00587.html.
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Judd and his faction of Independent Democrats in the Illinois State Senate held the balance of power in the election of a U.S. senator in 1855. He and three other Independent Democrats decided not to support Abraham Lincoln for the position, mostly because of Lincoln's Whig affiliation. When Lincoln saw that he might be defeated, he threw his support to the anti-Nebraska Democrat Lyman Trumbull, the ultimate victor and a friend of Judd's. By 1856 Judd had become a Republican. He attended the anti-Nebraska convention at Bloomington, Illinois, that created the state Republican organization, he was chairman of the Republican State Central Committee from 1856 to 1861, and during that same period he was a member of the Republican National Committee. However, because of his opposition to Lincoln in the 1855 election, Judd was always regarded with suspicion by former Whigs within the Illinois Republican party. He was nevertheless genuinely devoted to the Republican party and to Lincoln. In 1858 he helped arrange the Lincoln-Douglas debates, advised Lincoln throughout the contest for the senatorship, and helped manage the campaign in northern Illinois. When Lincoln lost the election, Judd received much of the blame. One of his leading critics was John Wentworth of Chicago, who privately circulated the opinion that Judd cared more about his own political advancement than he did about Lincoln's. The charge was a harmful exaggeration: Judd did wish to become governor of Illinois, but he was equally interested in Lincoln's election as senator.
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Patrick G. Williams, "Howard, Oliver Otis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01243.html.
Body Summary:
A first lieutenant when the Civil War erupted in 1861, Howard became colonel of the Third Maine, a volunteer regiment. In command of a brigade at Bull Run (Manassas) in July, he was promoted to brigadier general two months later. The next spring his right arm was badly shot up at Fair Oaks, and most of it had to be amputated. Howard returned to service in August 1862 and commanded troops at Antietam and Fredericksburg. Promoted to major general of volunteers in November 1862, Howard replaced Franz Sigel at the head of the XI Corps the next spring, much to the chagrin of many of its German-American troops. It was Howard's corps that Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson surprised and routed with his flank attack at Chancellorsville on 2 May 1863. Howard later claimed never to have received Union commander Hooker's warning of danger from the west. Whatever the case, both men had misread Robert E. Lee's daring division of his army, and neither adequately prepared the Union forces for an onslaught. Less than two months later Howard's men were again manhandled during the early stages of the battle of Gettysburg. Stampeded by Confederate forces north of town, they fell back to Cemetery Hill, where Howard, for a time the senior officer on the field, had left a unit in reserve and some artillery. The Confederates hesitated before the heights, allowing Winfield Scott Hancock, who took charge from a reluctant Howard, to construct the strong defensive line that sustained Union forces through the next two days.
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Sheldon M. Novick, "Holmes, Oliver Wendell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00423.html.
Body Summary:
After the outbreak of the Civil War in the spring of 1861, Holmes enlisted in the Massachusetts militia, eventually obtaining a commission as a lieutenant. He served for two years in the Twentieth Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry and fought at Ball's Bluff, the Peninsula campaign, and Antietam. In those first two years he was promoted to captain, was wounded three times, twice nearly fatally, and suffered from dysentery. Exhausted, he completed the third and final year of his enlistment, in the winter of 1863-1864, as aide to General Horatio G. Wright and then to General John Sedgwick of the Sixth Corps. In the relative leisure of winter quarters, Holmes turned to philosophical writing, developing from his combat experience a purely materialist evolutionism. History was shaped by the perpetual conflict of rival nations and races, he believed. Laws were written and governments established by the victors.
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Sheldon M. Novick, "Holmes, Oliver Wendell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00423.html.
Body Summary:
Holmes's literary talents were evident in his opinions, but their impact did not depend entirely on his style. He conceived of an opinion not as a printed document but as a talk delivered from the bench. He paid careful attention both to the writing and to his manner of delivery. As he wrote to a friend, his model was the English judge, a gentleman rather than a professional: "I think that to state the case shortly and the ground of decision as concisely and delicately as you can is the real way. That is the English fashion and I think it is civilized." Holmes's opinions accordingly were brief and well enough written to be read aloud, and they were written so quickly and with so little revision as to seem, like the opinions of English judges, to have been extemporized from the bench. They were conscious works of art, fundamentally dramatic, and they had an impact far out of proportion to the logical force of Holmes's arguments.
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Patrick G. Williams, "Roberts, Oran Milo," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00662.html.
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Supporting southern unity against "freesoil aggression" (Bailey, p. 70), Roberts aligned himself in the 1850s with states' rights Democrats against more nationally minded Texans who identified with Sam Houston. Though not counted among Texas's fire-eaters, he apparently became convinced by 1860 that the election of a Republican president would warrant southern independence. Accordingly, as Abraham Lincoln's victory became apparent, Associate Justice Roberts began to plot strategy with similarly inclined politicians and made a much-publicized speech in Austin supporting secession. Now governor, Houston opposed precipitate action, so Roberts and his allies issued their own unsanctioned call for a secession convention. Gathering in late January 1861, the delegates chose Roberts convention president by acclamation. Roberts appointed a committee on public safety, which arranged for volunteer forces to seize federal property, evict U.S. soldiers from the state, and raise troops. After the electorate endorsed the convention's secession ordinance, the body deposed Houston because the venerable governor refused to swear allegiance to the Confederacy. Roberts had wished secession to be an orderly process and afterward made much of its constitutional justifications, but he never shrank from declaring that its essential object was to perpetuate the enslavement of an "inferior" race. Not a planter himself, neither was Roberts disinterested. He owned eight slaves in 1860.
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Philip S. Shoemaker, "Mitchel, Ormsby Macknight," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/13/13-01147.html.
Body Summary:
Mitchel's career lasted barely two decades. His scientific contributions may seem relatively slight, but one must consider the difficulties he overcame. First, in order to validate his credentials as an astronomer he had to transform his observatory into a research institution, which eventually cost him community support despite the innovation and resiliency of the CAS. Second, the same qualities that made him a brilliant lecturer--his quick mind and powerful ego--led to conflicts with his peers that were difficult to reconcile, given the fluidity of antebellum scientific organizations. His mercurial relationships made it hard to undertake long-term research projects. His peers did, however, recognize his contributions--his election to the Royal Astronomical Society in 1850 proceeded from a solid contribution to astronomy. To view his life as reaching an apex in astronomy misses the mark: his first love was the stage, and applause motivated him more than income. His contemporaries honored him because they recognized that, despite his failings, he accomplished more than anyone had dreamed possible.
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Brian J. Kenny, "Browning, Orville Hickman," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00164.html.
Body Summary:
Browning advocated vigorous prosecution of the war in its early stages. He supported Lincoln's call for troops, voted for the First Confiscation Act, and even supported John C. Frémont's proclamation freeing slaves in Missouri. However, early in 1862 he broke with the radicals in Congress over the Second Confiscation Act, which he felt unconstitutionally deprived southern slaveholders of their property. Regarding emancipation, Browning adhered to Lincoln's earlier formulation of compensated emancipation and colonization and felt slavery was entirely a matter for the individual states to decide. Thus he opposed the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation, and even at the end of December 1862 he was still trying to convince Lincoln not to put it into effect. Browning also criticized the suppression of the Chicago Times, arbitrary arrests of civilians, and the vilification of southerners in the press and Congress. Many fellow Republicans viewed him as hopelessly conservative. While Browning remained true to the Union cause, he felt the war effort was being controlled by radical elements with dangerous views, and he gave no support to Lincoln in the 1864 election. In fact, he never again supported a Republican candidate for president.
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Frederick J. Blue, "Lovejoy, Owen," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00643.html.
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In the 1840s Lovejoy became an active political abolitionist, running unsuccessfully for Congress as a Liberty party candidate in 1846. In August 1848 he attended the Free Soil convention in Buffalo and again ran unsuccessfully as that party's candidate for Congress from Illinois's Fourth District. During these years he modified his antislavery stance, rejecting the argument of the more radical abolitionists that slavery should be attacked wherever it existed in favor of advocacy of the Wilmot Proviso, which would contain slavery and prevent its expansion into territories acquired during the Mexican War. With other Free Soilers, he opposed Stephen A. Douglas's Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854 and joined in the unsuccessful efforts that year to form the Illinois Republican party. In doing so he urged antislavery radicals to moderate their demands to facilitate unity in a new party.
The Whig party in Illinois died more slowly than in many other northern states, and Lovejoy was among the most active in persuading members to join the new Republican organization rather than its rival, the anti-immigrant Know Nothing party. Among those he befriended in these efforts was Abraham Lincoln. In 1856 Lovejoy was a delegate to the state and national Republican conventions, and that fall he won a seat in Congress as a Republican, beginning eight years of antislavery agitation in the House of Representatives.
Lovejoy campaigned actively in Illinois for Lincoln's election as president in 1860. A supporter of a vigorous prosecution of the war effort against the Confederacy, he sought to persuade President Lincoln and the Congress to move more quickly toward emancipation.
The Whig party in Illinois died more slowly than in many other northern states, and Lovejoy was among the most active in persuading members to join the new Republican organization rather than its rival, the anti-immigrant Know Nothing party. Among those he befriended in these efforts was Abraham Lincoln. In 1856 Lovejoy was a delegate to the state and national Republican conventions, and that fall he won a seat in Congress as a Republican, beginning eight years of antislavery agitation in the House of Representatives.
Lovejoy campaigned actively in Illinois for Lincoln's election as president in 1860. A supporter of a vigorous prosecution of the war effort against the Confederacy, he sought to persuade President Lincoln and the Congress to move more quickly toward emancipation.
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Reid Mitchell, "Cleburne, Patrick Ronayne," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00241.html.
Body Summary:
Cleburne, however, is best remembered as the first prominent Confederate officer to advocate enlisting blacks in the army and rewarding them with emancipation. During the winter of 1863-1864 Cleburne circulated through the Army of Tennessee a proposal to use slaves as soldiers. It did not garner much support, but a copy was sent to Jefferson Davis.
What made Pat Cleburne willing to promote black freedom? Most likely, his Irish birth gave him a perspective different from that of his fellow Confederates. On the one hand, he believed that Confederate defeat would put the South in the same relationship to the North that Ireland had to Britain, and he was willing to sacrifice slavery to prevent that. He believed that the Confederate patriot should "give up the negro slave rather than be a slave himself." On the other hand, he had no doubts that an agrarian labor force could be exploited without the institution of slavery. Finally, despite more than a decade's residence in the southern United States, Cleburne had never owned a slave.
Cleburne's vision brought him little applause. Davis ordered his proposal suppressed. Cleburne received no preferment after filing his proposal--a case where a man's ideological unreliability overshadowed his undeniable competence.
What made Pat Cleburne willing to promote black freedom? Most likely, his Irish birth gave him a perspective different from that of his fellow Confederates. On the one hand, he believed that Confederate defeat would put the South in the same relationship to the North that Ireland had to Britain, and he was willing to sacrifice slavery to prevent that. He believed that the Confederate patriot should "give up the negro slave rather than be a slave himself." On the other hand, he had no doubts that an agrarian labor force could be exploited without the institution of slavery. Finally, despite more than a decade's residence in the southern United States, Cleburne had never owned a slave.
Cleburne's vision brought him little applause. Davis ordered his proposal suppressed. Cleburne received no preferment after filing his proposal--a case where a man's ideological unreliability overshadowed his undeniable competence.
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Stephen R. Wise, "Drayton, Percival," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00328.html.
Body Summary:
A strong backer of national government, Drayton was on duty at the naval yard in Philadelphia during the secession crisis. To show his loyalty, he requested in February 1861 that his nativity on the naval register be changed from South Carolina to Pennsylvania. His favoring of the national government was declared "infamous" by the South Carolina legislature. For the first months of the war Drayton supervised the outfitting of vessels at Philadelphia until September 1861, when he applied for sea duty with the squadron being organized by Captain Samuel Francis Du Pont. Assigned to the gunboat Pocahontas, Drayton commanded the vessel during Du Pont's attack on the Confederate fortifications at Port Royal, South Carolina, which were commanded by his older brother Thomas F. Drayton.
The day after the battle of Port Royal Percival Drayton was given command of the gunboat Pawnee and with that vessel carried out reconnaissance missions in the region's rivers and sounds, securing enemy forts and liberating slaves. Besides believing slaves could be seized as contraband, Drayton also considered slavery a disgrace to civilization. His experiences along the southeastern coast convinced him that freed slaves would become productive citizens. He participated in expeditions against Fernandina, Florida, and St. Marys, Georgia, and on 28 May 1862 Drayton commanded the naval squadron that entered the Stono River, and later he directed his vessels in support of the army in June and July during the Secessionville campaign.
The day after the battle of Port Royal Percival Drayton was given command of the gunboat Pawnee and with that vessel carried out reconnaissance missions in the region's rivers and sounds, securing enemy forts and liberating slaves. Besides believing slaves could be seized as contraband, Drayton also considered slavery a disgrace to civilization. His experiences along the southeastern coast convinced him that freed slaves would become productive citizens. He participated in expeditions against Fernandina, Florida, and St. Marys, Georgia, and on 28 May 1862 Drayton commanded the naval squadron that entered the Stono River, and later he directed his vessels in support of the army in June and July during the Secessionville campaign.
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Citation:
Edward L. Lach, Jr., "Cooper, Peter," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/10/10-00328.html.
Body Summary:
Cooper had a long history of public service. He served on the Board of Aldermen of New York City (assistant alderman, 1828-1831, and alderman, 1840-1841), becoming a tireless advocate of municipal innovations such as professional police and fire departments, public education, and a clean water supply for the city. Becoming conversant with economic issues in his later years, he even ran for president in 1876 as the candidate of the Greenback party.
Cooper was a prolific inventor. In addition to his work on the steam engine and cloth-shearing machine, he also obtained patents on items as diverse as a musical cradle, an endless chain device for towing boats, and an egg desiccator. He was hampered by his lack of formal education, however, and his lack of a scientific background led him to waste much time on inventions that were unworkable or at least impractical. Realizing the deficiency of his education, he sought to help other working-class people better themselves.
Cooper was a prolific inventor. In addition to his work on the steam engine and cloth-shearing machine, he also obtained patents on items as diverse as a musical cradle, an endless chain device for towing boats, and an egg desiccator. He was hampered by his lack of formal education, however, and his lack of a scientific background led him to waste much time on inventions that were unworkable or at least impractical. Realizing the deficiency of his education, he sought to help other working-class people better themselves.
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Citation:
E. Lee Shepard, "Daniel, Peter Vivian," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00210.html.
Body Summary:
Daniel brought to the court a devotion to simple Jeffersonian agrarianism and an inveterate hatred of banks and corporations in general. Passionately committed to states' rights, state sovereignty, and limited government, he envisioned himself as a crusader against rising national power and economic consolidation and a defender of slavery. In a rapidly changing economic and social world, Daniel was doomed to fight a rearguard action against American progress and the irrepressible legal and constitutional developments that came with it. By the end of his eighteen years on the court, his voice was heard often in dissent.
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Michael F. Hembree, "Bell, Philip Alexander," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00099.html.
Body Summary:
Bell was a life-long critic of black emigration programs, particularly the proposals by the American Colonization Society to settle free black Americans in Africa. He argued that African Americans should remain in the United States and demand their rights as American citizens. He advocated political action to achieve these rights, and as a leader of the New York Political Association in the 1830s, he urged blacks to organize petition and lobbying campaigns to expand their voting rights. In the 1850s he continued to work for black enfranchisement through the black state conventions and the New York State Suffrage Association.
Bell's most notable achievement was his pioneering work in the development of the African-American press. His career in journalism spanned over fifty years, beginning in January 1837 when he was editor and proprietor of the New York City Weekly Advocate.
Bell's most notable achievement was his pioneering work in the development of the African-American press. His career in journalism spanned over fifty years, beginning in January 1837 when he was editor and proprietor of the New York City Weekly Advocate.
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Thomas A. Lewis, "Sheridan, Philip Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00703.html.
Body Summary:
Sheridan found the cavalry units in Virginia widely scattered, their camps filthy, the horses broken down, and the men poorly armed. While he straightened out the routines, reestablished discipline, and cleaned up the camps, he became convinced that the Cavalry Corps was being misused carrying messages, escorting infantry officers, patrolling enemy territory, and guarding a perimeter sixty miles in circumference.
As Grant's brutal overland campaign toward Richmond began in the spring of 1864, Sheridan argued repeatedly with the commander of the Army of the Potomac, Major General George G. Meade, over the proper use of cavalry. After one especially heated exchange on 8 May, Sheridan, flirting with insubordination, demanded permission to mass the cavalry, go out into enemy territory, and whip the enemy cavalry under the legendary Jeb Stuart. When Meade complained to Grant, the general in chief responded mildly, "Did he say that? Well, he generally knows what he is talking about. Let him start right out and do it."
As Grant's brutal overland campaign toward Richmond began in the spring of 1864, Sheridan argued repeatedly with the commander of the Army of the Potomac, Major General George G. Meade, over the proper use of cavalry. After one especially heated exchange on 8 May, Sheridan, flirting with insubordination, demanded permission to mass the cavalry, go out into enemy territory, and whip the enemy cavalry under the legendary Jeb Stuart. When Meade complained to Grant, the general in chief responded mildly, "Did he say that? Well, he generally knows what he is talking about. Let him start right out and do it."
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Citation:
James K. Hogue, "Cooke, Philip St. George," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00262.html.
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Just before the outbreak of the Civil War, he published Cavalry Tactics (1861), which earned him a reputation as the acknowledged expert on that subject in the U.S. Army.
Because of his expertise, military experience, and reputation, both the Union and the Confederacy wooed Cooke in 1861. His decision to remain loyal to the Union was complicated when his son and both of his sons-in-law chose Virginia over the Union and became Confederate officers. His son, John Rogers Cooke, became a Confederate brigadier general. One of his sons-in-law, J. E. B. Stuart, achieved fame as Robert E. Lee's renowned cavalry commander, which provoked rumors that Cooke did not enthusiastically favor prosecuting the war and eventually contributed to his professional decline.
Because of his expertise, military experience, and reputation, both the Union and the Confederacy wooed Cooke in 1861. His decision to remain loyal to the Union was complicated when his son and both of his sons-in-law chose Virginia over the Union and became Confederate officers. His son, John Rogers Cooke, became a Confederate brigadier general. One of his sons-in-law, J. E. B. Stuart, achieved fame as Robert E. Lee's renowned cavalry commander, which provoked rumors that Cooke did not enthusiastically favor prosecuting the war and eventually contributed to his professional decline.
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Citation:
Marli F. Weiner, "Pember, Phoebe Yates Levy," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01118.html.
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Pember wrote of her experiences at Chimborazo Hospital in A Southern Woman's Story, published in 1879. In it she recounts her struggles with the staff and with patients and their families. Pember was the first woman administrator at Chimborazo, and many of the male physicians were reluctant to allow her to attend to her duties….
Pember proudly claimed that she "learned to make requisitions and to use my power." Still, using power required almost constant effort. Pember faced difficulties arranging food for patients, the result of both their unwillingness to eat unfamiliar dishes and of physicians who refused to write orders acceding to patients' dietary idiosyncrasies. She also struggled with the consequences of inadequate supplies, claiming "calm courage" was required just to count the number of people to be fed. Pember fought hard to maintain the good will of patients who were angered by her willingness to care for Confederate soldiers from Maryland. She found herself frequently provoked by the presence of patients' family members, who interfered with hospital routine, required food, and, on one occasion, tried to usurp her office for their living quarters.
Pember proudly claimed that she "learned to make requisitions and to use my power." Still, using power required almost constant effort. Pember faced difficulties arranging food for patients, the result of both their unwillingness to eat unfamiliar dishes and of physicians who refused to write orders acceding to patients' dietary idiosyncrasies. She also struggled with the consequences of inadequate supplies, claiming "calm courage" was required just to count the number of people to be fed. Pember fought hard to maintain the good will of patients who were angered by her willingness to care for Confederate soldiers from Maryland. She found herself frequently provoked by the presence of patients' family members, who interfered with hospital routine, required food, and, on one occasion, tried to usurp her office for their living quarters.
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Citation:
Marli F. Weiner, "Pember, Phoebe Yates Levy," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01118.html.
Body Summary:
Pember's memoir of her wartime experiences also includes a description of a trip from Richmond to Georgia and back during a temporary leave of absence in October 1864. Her dramatic account chronicled the difficulties of wartime travel, even with transportation provided by the government, particularly for a woman alone. At one point only the timely intervention of a friend prevented her from being attacked by a man who assumed a respectable woman would not be alone.
Pember remained at her post in Richmond until after Federal officials took over the hospital. During those confused days, Pember reported, she brazenly took or stole what she needed to feed the patients remaining in her care. She armed herself and used the gun for self defense when threatened by malingerers looking for alcohol. Pember remained at the hospital until the remaining men were either convalescent or dead. Loyal friends provided her with food in the chaos.
Pember remained at her post in Richmond until after Federal officials took over the hospital. During those confused days, Pember reported, she brazenly took or stole what she needed to feed the patients remaining in her care. She armed herself and used the gun for self defense when threatened by malingerers looking for alcohol. Pember remained at the hospital until the remaining men were either convalescent or dead. Loyal friends provided her with food in the chaos.
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Citation:
Arthur W. Bergeron, "Beauregard, Pierre Gustave Toutant," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01171.html.
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During the Mexican War, Beauregard served as an engineer in Winfield Scott's army and distinguished himself in several battles, including Contreras, Churubusco, and Chapultepec. He received brevets as captain and major for his conduct and was promoted to captain in the regular army on 3 March 1853. Beauregard returned to Louisiana after the war and resumed engineering duties there….On 23 January 1861 he became superintendent of West Point but was ordered to vacate the post two days later. Beauregard left the academy two days after the secession of Louisiana, and he resigned his commission on 20 February 1861. Governor Thomas O. Moore of Louisiana passed over Beauregard for commander of the Louisiana state forces but offered him a commission as colonel of engineers. Beauregard declined the commission and enlisted as a private in a volunteer company.
Jefferson Davis appointed Beauregard a brigadier general in the Provisional Army of the Confederate States of America on 1 March 1861 and placed him in command of the troops at Charleston, South Carolina. There Beauregard supervised the bombardment of Fort Sumter and received the surrender of its garrison on 14 April. The public acclaim Beauregard received led to his assignment to command Confederate forces near Manassas, Virginia. Though outranked by General Joseph E. Johnston, Beauregard was allowed by the latter to direct the disposition of troops for the battle of First Manassas on 21 July. The Creole general performed bravely in the engagement and had a horse shot from under him.
Jefferson Davis appointed Beauregard a brigadier general in the Provisional Army of the Confederate States of America on 1 March 1861 and placed him in command of the troops at Charleston, South Carolina. There Beauregard supervised the bombardment of Fort Sumter and received the surrender of its garrison on 14 April. The public acclaim Beauregard received led to his assignment to command Confederate forces near Manassas, Virginia. Though outranked by General Joseph E. Johnston, Beauregard was allowed by the latter to direct the disposition of troops for the battle of First Manassas on 21 July. The Creole general performed bravely in the engagement and had a horse shot from under him.
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Citation:
Carolyn E. De Latte, "Soulé, Pierre," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00932.html.
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In the 1860 presidential election, Soulé's supporters rallied behind Douglas, who finished a poor third in the state. He led the cooperationists during the secession crisis not to support the Union but to oppose Slidell, who led the immediate secessionists. Soulé announced frequently and firmly that secession was inevitable and that he did not intend to be in the rear of that action. He admonished audiences, demanding that they recall his advocacy of secession in 1850 and that they remember repudiating his advice. Louisiana seceded, but the Confederacy had little to offer Soulé.
By experience and temperament, Soulé was unsuited to the world of politics and diplomacy. He cut his political teeth on revolutionary movements in France, and he continued to think and speak in terms of principle and of his perception of right and wrong. He readily supported those perceptions whether with a dueling pistol in his private life or with recommendations for war against Spain or the antislavery North in his public life. Tact was simply beyond his purview.
By experience and temperament, Soulé was unsuited to the world of politics and diplomacy. He cut his political teeth on revolutionary movements in France, and he continued to think and speak in terms of principle and of his perception of right and wrong. He readily supported those perceptions whether with a dueling pistol in his private life or with recommendations for war against Spain or the antislavery North in his public life. Tact was simply beyond his purview.
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Citation:
Joel Myerson, "Emerson, Ralph Waldo," American National Biography Online, February 2000,http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00508.html.
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During his life Emerson exerted great influence on his contemporaries, both by his financial support of them, as in the cases of Alcott and Ellery Channing, and by his intellectual companionship, as in the case of his Concord neighbor [Henry David] Thoreau. His discussions of organic form (everything proceeds from a natural order, followed by but not imposed upon by man), self-reliance, optimism (evil does not exist as an actual force, merely being the absence of good), compensation, universal unity (or the over-soul), and the importance of individual moral insight were all influential in forming the literature and philosophy of nineteenth-century America. In literature, too, Emerson was an important force, and his organic theory of poetry ("it is not metres, but a metre-making argument that makes a poem") and his view of poets as "liberating gods" or prophets did much to counteract the poetic conservatism of his day and helped lead the way to the experimental verse of Walt Whitman, who once hailed Emerson as his master.
The later nineteenth century embraced Emerson as an establishment figure. His publishers (Houghton, Mifflin) marketed him as a "standard" author; his biographers, including Oliver Wendell Holmes, presented him as a promoter of Boston Brahmin values; Friedrich Nietzsche appropriated Emerson's ideas for his own concept of the "superman"; and the industrial capitalists of the Gilded Age used their interpretation of the concept of self-reliance to justify their economic version of a Darwinian "survival of the fittest."
The later nineteenth century embraced Emerson as an establishment figure. His publishers (Houghton, Mifflin) marketed him as a "standard" author; his biographers, including Oliver Wendell Holmes, presented him as a promoter of Boston Brahmin values; Friedrich Nietzsche appropriated Emerson's ideas for his own concept of the "superman"; and the industrial capitalists of the Gilded Age used their interpretation of the concept of self-reliance to justify their economic version of a Darwinian "survival of the fittest."
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Citation:
D. Scott Hartwig, "Anderson, Richard Heron," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00027.html.
Body Summary:
The approach of the war found Anderson's family divided over the issue of slavery. His father was an ardent supporter of states' rights and a defender of the institution of slavery. Anderson was not as impassioned, and he attempted to remain neutral on the emotional issues. Privately he objected to slavery. The pressures of his father and his state forced him to take a stand when the war came, and on 15 February 1861 he resigned his commission in the U.S. Army. He was commissioned colonel of the First South Carolina Regular Regiment, which he commanded until 27 May 1861, when he relieved General P. G. T. Beauregard as commander of South Carolina forces and defenses.
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Citation:
Mark A. Plummer, "Oglesby, Richard James," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00751.html.
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After Oglesby returned to Decatur he began presenting what became quite popular speeches about his travels [in Europe]. The increased name recognition made him a viable Seventh District Republican congressional candidate in the 1858 Illinois election, which featured the Lincoln-Douglas debates. Both Lincoln and Oglesby lost their 1858 election bids, but the Illinois Republicans made a comeback in 1860, when Oglesby was elected to the state senate while contributing to Lincoln's successful campaign for president. It was Oglesby who devised the "rail-splitter" sobriquet for Lincoln at the Illinois state convention at Decatur.
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Citation:
Keir B. Sterling, "Gatling, Richard Jordan," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/13/13-00589.html.
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With the coming of the Civil War, Gatling began working on improvements in weaponry. His first inventions in this area were a marine steam ram and a rapid-fire, or machine gun, with which his name has ever since been identified; both were patented in 1862. The gun may have been invented because of a suggestion of Colonel R. A. Maxwell that the Union army would require just such a specialized weapon during the coming war. Before the end of that same year, he had produced a working model of this weapon, a hand-cranked .58 caliber version with six barrels, rotated around a central axis. Cartridges dropped from a drum atop the gun and were automatically fed into each barrel. The rate of fire was 350 rounds per minute, but there were problems with accuracy, and the weapon sometimes jammed when fired too rapidly. This was owing in large part to the use of the then-common paper cartridges.
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Gerald G. Eggert, "Olney, Richard,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00577.html
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Upon the death of Secretary of State Walter Q. Gresham in 1895, Cleveland promoted Olney to that post. Neither Olney's manner nor his temperament was well suited to the norms of international diplomacy. He issued ultimatums and made demands on sovereign nations much as if they were opponents in litigation. He told the Spanish minister that if a frequently deferred claim of the United States was not paid, he would urge the president to lay the matter before Congress, implying that a resort to force might follow.
Most notorious was his similar ultimatum to Great Britain demanding submission of the long-standing boundary dispute between British Guiana and Venezuela to arbitration by the United States. Charging that Britain's claim violated the Monroe Doctrine, he asserted that the "infinite resources" and "isolated position" of the United States rendered it "master of the situation and practically invulnerable as against any or all other powers." When the deadline for replying passed, Olney helped Cleveland draft a message to Congress, asking for authority to draw the proper boundary line and if necessary to use armed force to uphold it. Britain subsequently accepted arbitration, and the war fever precipitated by the message died down. Although his initiation of the crisis needlessly risked war, his subsequent handling of the affair contributed to a reasonable settlement.
Most notorious was his similar ultimatum to Great Britain demanding submission of the long-standing boundary dispute between British Guiana and Venezuela to arbitration by the United States. Charging that Britain's claim violated the Monroe Doctrine, he asserted that the "infinite resources" and "isolated position" of the United States rendered it "master of the situation and practically invulnerable as against any or all other powers." When the deadline for replying passed, Olney helped Cleveland draft a message to Congress, asking for authority to draw the proper boundary line and if necessary to use armed force to uphold it. Britain subsequently accepted arbitration, and the war fever precipitated by the message died down. Although his initiation of the crisis needlessly risked war, his subsequent handling of the affair contributed to a reasonable settlement.
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Bradford Perkins, "Rush, Richard," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/03/03-00434.html.
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In October 1849, recalled from office by the new Whig administration, Rush entered his final retirement. He became deeply concerned over the rising threat to the Union, placing the blame primarily on antislavery agitators, and in 1856 voted for James Buchanan…
Rush can best be described as an able lieutenant rather than a creative statesman. Aside from his vice presidential candidacy in 1828, he never ran for public office. However, he was not unwilling to take on responsibility, as was shown during his discussions with Canning in 1823 and by his unauthorized recognition of the French republic in 1848. In all of the offices he held, Rush proved diligent, capable, judicious, and, when necessary, firm. He rarely engaged in open controversy, one notable exception being in 1825 when he and the always quarrelsome John Randolph engaged in a fiery public argument following Randolph's statement that Rush's appointment to the Treasury was the worst since Caligula made his horse a consul. Never, while serving as a diplomat, did he show a loss of temper. Tall, lean, and almost bald since his youth, Rush presented a physical appearance appropriate to his manner, and his personality--friendly, even tempered, usually grave but sometimes gently witty--also suited his role.
Rush can best be described as an able lieutenant rather than a creative statesman. Aside from his vice presidential candidacy in 1828, he never ran for public office. However, he was not unwilling to take on responsibility, as was shown during his discussions with Canning in 1823 and by his unauthorized recognition of the French republic in 1848. In all of the offices he held, Rush proved diligent, capable, judicious, and, when necessary, firm. He rarely engaged in open controversy, one notable exception being in 1825 when he and the always quarrelsome John Randolph engaged in a fiery public argument following Randolph's statement that Rush's appointment to the Treasury was the worst since Caligula made his horse a consul. Never, while serving as a diplomat, did he show a loss of temper. Tall, lean, and almost bald since his youth, Rush presented a physical appearance appropriate to his manner, and his personality--friendly, even tempered, usually grave but sometimes gently witty--also suited his role.
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Donald C. Pfanz, "Ewell, Richard Stoddert," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00353.html.
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When the Mexican War ended, Ewell was assigned to frontier duty in the West. Between 1850 and 1860 he served at posts in New Mexico and Arizona, including Rayado (1850-1851), Los Lunas (1851-1856), and Fort Buchanan (1857-1860). During that time, he gained a reputation as being one of the country's premier frontier officers. He stayed in the saddle for weeks at a time, pursuing Apaches who attacked Mexican settlements and providing some small measure of law and order in an otherwise lawless society. Americans, Mexicans, and Apaches alike respected him for his judgment and fairness. According to one source, he was the only officer that the Apache warrior Cochise feared.
Ewell was on leave at his family home in Virginia, recovering from a near-fatal bout of malaria, when he learned that the state had seceded from the Union. Although opposed to secession, he promptly resigned from the U.S. Army and accepted a lieutenant colonel's commission in the Confederate army. On 1 June 1861 U.S. troops attacked his command at Fairfax Court House. Ewell was slightly wounded in the skirmish, making him perhaps the first southern field-grade officer to be wounded in the war. Perhaps in part because of his injury, he was promoted to brigadier general on 17 June.
Ewell was on leave at his family home in Virginia, recovering from a near-fatal bout of malaria, when he learned that the state had seceded from the Union. Although opposed to secession, he promptly resigned from the U.S. Army and accepted a lieutenant colonel's commission in the Confederate army. On 1 June 1861 U.S. troops attacked his command at Fairfax Court House. Ewell was slightly wounded in the skirmish, making him perhaps the first southern field-grade officer to be wounded in the war. Perhaps in part because of his injury, he was promoted to brigadier general on 17 June.
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T. Michael Parrish, "Taylor, Richard," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01180.html.
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Elected to the Louisiana Senate in 1855, [Richard] Taylor was first a Whig, then a Know-Nothing, and finally a Democrat, veering cautiously toward a strong anti-Republican yet reluctant proslavery position. His nationalistic, Whiggish conservatism, was laced with disdain for abolitionists but also made him distrustful of demagogic fire-eaters' demands for disunion. Both of these volatile expressions of sectional conflict, Taylor believed, masked America's deeper sickness of rampant democracy, which he considered irreversible and ultimately tragic. In public forums he appeared detached and aloof. He preferred to work behind the scenes. As a delegate from Louisiana to the 1860 Democratic National Convention in Charleston, he attempted, but failed, to forge a compromise between moderates and fire-eaters. Thereafter viewing disunion and war as inevitable, Taylor served as a delegate to the Louisiana secession convention in January 1861 and voted with the majority for immediate secession.
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Tyler Anbinder, "Thompson, Richard Wigginton," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00987.html.
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…Washington had made him a much-sought-after attorney for those with cases pending before the government. He argued many times before the Supreme Court and in his most celebrated trial won an award of $242,000 for the Menominee Indians of Wisconsin. Thompson by this point had also become one of the most influential Whigs in the Northwest, and party leaders considered his support vital to winning over conservative Whig voters in the lower portion of that region.
When the Whig party collapsed, Thompson, like many other Indiana Methodists, turned to the Know Nothing movement. Thompson, who represented Indiana at the organization's November 1854 convention, heartily endorsed the group's anti-Catholic, antiliquor agenda. Although most Know Nothings became Republicans by 1856, Thompson refused to associate with such a "radical" organization, and his opposition alone prevented Indiana Republicans and Know Nothings from fielding a fusion electoral ticket in that year's presidential election. Believing that sectional conciliation should be stressed above all other issues, Thompson helped create the Constitutional Union party in 1860. Although he publicly endorsed its presidential candidate, John Bell, Thompson corresponded with Abraham Lincoln throughout the campaign and worked closely with the Republicans to ensure that Bell's candidacy did not bring about a Democratic victory. During the Civil War (in which he served as a provost marshal) Thompson finally joined the Republican ranks, and he soon became as active as a Republican as he had been as a Whig.
When the Whig party collapsed, Thompson, like many other Indiana Methodists, turned to the Know Nothing movement. Thompson, who represented Indiana at the organization's November 1854 convention, heartily endorsed the group's anti-Catholic, antiliquor agenda. Although most Know Nothings became Republicans by 1856, Thompson refused to associate with such a "radical" organization, and his opposition alone prevented Indiana Republicans and Know Nothings from fielding a fusion electoral ticket in that year's presidential election. Believing that sectional conciliation should be stressed above all other issues, Thompson helped create the Constitutional Union party in 1860. Although he publicly endorsed its presidential candidate, John Bell, Thompson corresponded with Abraham Lincoln throughout the campaign and worked closely with the Republicans to ensure that Bell's candidacy did not bring about a Democratic victory. During the Civil War (in which he served as a provost marshal) Thompson finally joined the Republican ranks, and he soon became as active as a Republican as he had been as a Whig.
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Lowell H. Harrison, "Anderson, Robert," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00021.html.
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As the nation became increasingly divided by sectional interests, Anderson, who until 1860 owned a few slaves in his wife's native state of Georgia, wrote, "In this controversy between the North and the South, my sympathies are entirely with the South." Although he believed that in the long run secession was probably inevitable, Anderson was devoted to the Union, and he opposed immediate demands for separation and what he saw as extremism on both sides. This combination of southern sympathies and Union loyalty led to Anderson's being assigned in November 1860 to command the three Federal forts at Charleston, South Carolina, where cautious tactfulness was needed. Aware that Fort Moultrie, at which he was headquartered, was indefensible, he vainly sought reinforcements and specific orders from the James Buchanan administration, which was strongly influenced by southerners. South Carolina's secession on 20 December convinced Anderson that he should move to Fort Sumter, an incomplete but stronger post on an island in Charleston Harbor. He did so secretly on 26 December and then rejected all demands that he evacuate the fort.
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Michael Chesson, "Toombs, Robert Augustus," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00991.html.
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Ranking with the most important members of the Senate in the 1850s, Toombs contributed little of a positive nature to the South or the Georgia he loved so well in the Confederacy's struggle for nationhood. An army friend, Major Raphael J. Moses, recalled that his "impulses were generous and noble, his faults were bluster and a vivid imagination not always hampered by facts." Howell Cobb thought he had the finest mind of his generation "but lacked balance." According to T. C. De Leon, a government wit claimed that Toombs "disagrees with himself between meals." Fiery, erratic, and impulsive, he professed in the 1850s to love the Union but sometimes spoke like a fire-eater. He had "basically . . . conservative instincts," as befit his social class, but was a man who could "explode in any direction" in a crisis (Thompson, p. 66). This fatal flaw, a "tendency" under stress "to slide into the role of extremist" (Thompson, p. 146), denied him greatness. Toombs was one of the last of a generation of southern mavericks.
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Timothy P. McCarthy, "DeLarge, Robert Carlos," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00309.html.
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Though several records claim that DeLarge was born into slavery, it is more likely that his parents were free blacks who owned slaves. This peculiar and paradoxical designation surely inspired the dual sensibilities that later characterized his political and social life as both an advocate for universal black enfranchisement and a member of South Carolina's propertied, often exclusionist, mulatto elite. Fortunate to receive the benefits of the prewar education available to free black children, DeLarge attended primary school in North Carolina and Wood High School in Charleston. For a short time he was employed as a tailor and farmer, and some sources indicate that he was also a part-time barber. During the Civil War, he amassed some money as an employee of the Confederate navy, a curious affiliation in light of his Republican activities during Reconstruction. He later donated most of his Civil War earnings to the state Republican party. By the time he became active in Reconstruction politics, DeLarge was a citizen of considerable standing in Charleston, as indicated both by his net worth of $6,650 in the 1870 census and his membership in the Brown Fellowship Society, a fraternal and charitable association founded in 1870 that admitted only mulattoes.
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Stuart A. Streichler, “Grier, Robert Cooper,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00357.html.
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Grier sat on the Supreme Court for nearly a quarter century in tumultuous years. He delivered major opinions in many areas, including bankruptcy law, commerce, patent law, and federal court procedure and jurisdiction. Several of these opinions were important in his day, but few had lasting doctrinal significance. In twentieth-century ratings of Supreme Court justices, Grier is ranked as average. His opinion in the Prize Cases, recognized by Ulysses S. Grant as a "great service" in the nation's "darkest hours," stands as his most important contribution to American constitutional law.
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Russell F. Weigley, "Lee, Robert E.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00622.html.
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Following Chancellorsville, Davis finally reinforced Lee to the strength the general believed necessary for a new invasion of the North. On 3 June 1863 Lee set out for Pennsylvania, but he did so without Stonewall Jackson, who had died on 10 May of complications from wounds suffered at Chancellorsville. Ever since the Pennsylvania campaign climaxed at Gettysburg on 1-3 July, debate has persisted over whether Jackson's absence accounts for Lee's inability--at Gettysburg or in any of his subsequent battles--to achieve the sort of complete tactical success that the flanking maneuvers led by Jackson at Second Manassas and Chancellorsville had provided. Probably the circumstances of the battle of Gettysburg would have precluded such bold maneuver anyway; in particular, Lee was hampered by a lack of familiarity with the terrain. At Gettysburg less ambitious attempts against both enemy flanks failed on 2 July, and the next day the battle ended with the defeat of Major General George E. Pickett's famous charge against the Union center. The skillful defensive tactics of Major General George G. Meade as Federal commander helped impose on Lee his highest casualties yet: 28,000, about 35 percent.
Lee probably gambled on Pickett's Charge because he recognized that no more throws of the dice of a strategic offensive would be possible. His cumulative casualties were already too great: here lay the fatal flaw in his strategy. He would still, nevertheless, risk attacking on the battlefield in the hope of destroying the enemy army, as he had done from the beginning.
Lee probably gambled on Pickett's Charge because he recognized that no more throws of the dice of a strategic offensive would be possible. His cumulative casualties were already too great: here lay the fatal flaw in his strategy. He would still, nevertheless, risk attacking on the battlefield in the hope of destroying the enemy army, as he had done from the beginning.
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Russell F. Weigley, "Lee, Robert E.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00622.html.
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In March [1862], [General George] McClellan had moved his main force by sea from Washington to Fort Monroe; then he began an advance toward the Confederate capital by way of the peninsula between the York and James rivers. On 31 May, General Joseph E. Johnston, commanding the Confederate forces opposing him, was wounded at the battle of Fair Oaks or Seven Pines. The next day Lee succeeded to Johnston's command, which he promptly designated the Army of Northern Virginia. Lee applied his principles of concentrating force and seizing the initiative. He had Jackson join him with the Valley Army, and, thus reinforced, he conducted a series of attacks against McClellan just outside Richmond in the Seven Days battles of 25 June-1 July.
The battles saved Richmond and transformed Lee from an apparent failure to the hero of the Confederacy. Lee himself was nevertheless disappointed with the Seven Days, because he had hoped to destroy the Army of the Potomac...He progressed in his strategic convictions beyond the belief that the Confederacy must seize the initiative to conclude also that the initiative must be pushed to a decisive, war-ending victory. Otherwise the superior resources of the Union would enable it to outlast local or regional setbacks. The Confederacy must compel the North to recognize its independence rapidly or it would not be able to do so at all.
The battles saved Richmond and transformed Lee from an apparent failure to the hero of the Confederacy. Lee himself was nevertheless disappointed with the Seven Days, because he had hoped to destroy the Army of the Potomac...He progressed in his strategic convictions beyond the belief that the Confederacy must seize the initiative to conclude also that the initiative must be pushed to a decisive, war-ending victory. Otherwise the superior resources of the Union would enable it to outlast local or regional setbacks. The Confederacy must compel the North to recognize its independence rapidly or it would not be able to do so at all.
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Russell F. Weigley, "Lee, Robert E.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00622.html.
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On 18 April [1861], following the bombardment of Fort Sumter on 12-14 April, Francis Preston Blair, Sr., on behalf of President Abraham Lincoln, directly asked Lee whether he would take command of an enlarged U.S. Army. But Lee reiterated what he had said to [General Winfield] Scott. On 20 April, having learned that Virginia had seceded two days earlier, Lee submitted his resignation. It was a painful decision but one that in its expression of loyalty to home and kindred has commanded sympathy even from those who cannot admire it.
On 21 April Governor John Letcher of Virginia dispatched a messenger offering Lee command of the military and naval forces of the state, with the rank of major general, but the messenger evidently passed Lee while the latter was en route from Arlington to Richmond in response to an earlier invitation from the governor. Lee accepted the commission from Letcher's hand on 22 April. On 10 May the Confederate War Department gave Lee command of its forces in Virginia, though it proceeded to send troops and other officers there apparently without regard to him. Following the voters' ratification of the Virginia Ordinance of Secession on 23 May, the state turned over its forces to the Confederacy on 8 June, while Lee had already been commissioned brigadier general in the Confederate regular army on 14 May.
On 21 April Governor John Letcher of Virginia dispatched a messenger offering Lee command of the military and naval forces of the state, with the rank of major general, but the messenger evidently passed Lee while the latter was en route from Arlington to Richmond in response to an earlier invitation from the governor. Lee accepted the commission from Letcher's hand on 22 April. On 10 May the Confederate War Department gave Lee command of its forces in Virginia, though it proceeded to send troops and other officers there apparently without regard to him. Following the voters' ratification of the Virginia Ordinance of Secession on 23 May, the state turned over its forces to the Confederacy on 8 June, while Lee had already been commissioned brigadier general in the Confederate regular army on 14 May.
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Matthew H. Crocker, "Shaw, Robert Gould," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01086.html.
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On 16 July [1863] the Fifty-fourth had the opportunity to recoup its self-esteem when Confederate forces waged a surprise attack on James Island, South Carolina. A group of 250 members of the Fifty-fourth held off repeated assaults, giving the Federal troops time to organize a defensive retreat. Two days later, on Morris Island, Shaw proudly volunteered his regiment to lead the assault on the impregnable Fort Wagner, the first step in an offensive on the Confederate stronghold of Charleston, South Carolina. When the Fifty-fourth charged the fort, 272 were killed, wounded, or captured. One of those who fell was Shaw. Although the assault failed, the bravery of the Fifty-fourth proved the ability of African-American troops in battle. In death, the young Shaw was ennobled as a martyr to freedom and as a symbol of enlightened sacrifice. He and the Fifty-fourth were later memorialized by Augustus Saint-Gaudens's mythic monument placed on the Boston Common.
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Joseph A. Boromé, "Purvis, Robert," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00559.html.
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[Robert Purvis] was born in Charleston, South Carolina, the son of William Purvis, a naturalized British cotton broker, and Harriet Judah, the free mulatto daughter of a German Jewish flour merchant and an emancipated slave of Moorish extraction…An intimate of James Forten, the wealthy black sailmaker, Purvis threw himself into anticolonization activities, denouncing the design to deport free blacks to colonies outside the United States. He married Forten's daughter, Harriet, in 1831; they had eight children. After Harriet's death in 1875, he married Tacy Townsend, a white Quaker. When Lundy's associate, William Lloyd Garrison, looked to publish The Liberator (1831) and his hostile Thoughts on African Colonization (1832), Purvis and Forten aided him by gathering subscriptions and raising funds. Both were charter members of the American Anti-Slavery Society formed in Philadelphia in 1833. Following the first annual meeting of the society, Purvis, sailed in 1834 to Britain, having obtained a U.S. passport through the intervention of President Andrew Jackson, where for three months he promoted the American antislavery cause and visited relatives. His return voyage provided him with a tale he delighted to tell for the remainder of his life: he had been showered with social courtesies by fellow passengers, notably the racial purist Arthur Peronneau Hayne of South Carolina, all of them miscued by his light complexion, until he disclosed, shortly before landing, that he belonged "to the degraded tribe of Africans."
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Joseph A. Boromé, "Purvis, Robert," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00559.html.
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Purvis welcomed armed conflict to end slavery, but after the Civil War began, he criticized the race-related policies of President Abraham Lincoln, particularly his proposal to deport and colonize freed slaves. He grew to trust the Lincoln administration, however, and took heart from Attorney General Edward Bates's declaration that he believed blacks were citizens, the Dred Scott decision notwithstanding. After the official release of the Emancipation Proclamation, Purvis admitted freely that he was "proud to be an American citizen." When the government began recruiting black troops in 1863, he urged black volunteers to enlist at Camp William Penn near Philadelphia. Joining with others to organize the Pennsylvania Equal Rights League in 1864, he rejoiced at the passage of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments, although he remained a disappointed yet steadfast proponent of woman suffrage.
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Joseph A. Boromé, "Purvis, Robert," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00559.html.
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Greatly respected in the postwar era, Purvis refused an 1867 bid to head the Freedmen's Bureau but served as a commissioner in Washington, D.C., of the Republican-sponsored Freedmen's Savings Bank (1874-1880). After returning to Philadelphia, he dedicated himself, as an elder statesman of abolitionism, to the defeat of slavery's "twin relic of barbarism, prejudice against color." He supported municipal reform and independent political action to battle race discrimination in city employment, to ameliorate the economic plight of black workers, and to shore up civil rights. In 1881 he backed for mayor reform Democrat Samuel G. King, who after election appointed four black policemen. In 1884, ignoring mounting Republican displeasure because he did not adhere to the party that had freed the slaves, Purvis flirted with the Greenback party. Dissatisfied with the 1887 state civil rights law, he lobbied for more inclusive legislation.
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Thomas M. Leonard, "Hitt, Robert Roberts," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00348.html.
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Because of Hitt's shorthand skills, Abraham Lincoln selected him to record the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates in 1858. Hitt favored Lincoln's position against federal interference with slavery in the southern states and against slavery's extension westward. From 1857 until 1860 Hitt worked as the official stenographer of the Illinois state legislature. During the U.S. Civil War, Hitt was a reporter on several Federal government investigatory commissions. The most notable was the inquiry into General John C. Frémont's military activities in Missouri in the first year of the war, when the general was at odds with Washington over the need for supplies and men and the objectives of his command, particularly with regard to emancipation policy. In 1872 Hitt served as a reporter for congressional committees looking into the activities of the Ku Klux Klan against the civil rights of freed blacks.
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Glenda E. Gilmore, "Smalls, Robert,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00915.html.
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In 1861 Smalls began working as a deckhand on the Planter, a steamer that operated out of Charleston Harbor. By 1862 he was the craft's pilot…When he learned of the Federal occupation of Beaufort, Smalls determined with several other slave sailors to guide the Planter to Union waters. Secretly loading their families on board, the men rushed the vessel out of Charleston Harbor under cover of darkness and surrendered it to the U.S. Navy…Smalls entered politics as a delegate to South Carolina's constitutional convention of 1868 and in the same year won election as a Republican to the state's general assembly. He served in that body until 1875, first as a representative and later as a state senator. In 1874 Smalls was elected congressman from South Carolina's Fifth District, which included Beaufort…Effectively excluded from local politics by the Democrats' electoral fraud and the state's disfranchisement of African Americans in 1895, Smalls remained active in the Republican party at the national level. Those contacts gained him appointment as collector of customs for the Port of Beaufort in 1889, a post he lost with the Democratic national victory of 1892. He regained the office in 1898 with the return of a national Republican administration. He served until 1913, despite growing lily-white sentiment in the Republican party and the difficulties of discharging his duties in now-segregated Beaufort…Smalls died there, disillusioned by the reversal of the African-American political gains for which he had worked in Reconstruction.
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Sandra F. VanBurkleo and Bonnie Speck, “Taney, Roger Brooke,” American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00834.html.
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Taney passed his final weeks at home. In 1863 he confided in a friend that, while he knew he was "sick enough for a hospital, . . . that hospital must be my own home." He no longer recognized the American republic and despaired of the rule of law. In August 1863 he told an old friend that he saw no "ground for hope" that the Supreme Court would "ever again be restored to the authority and rank which the Constitution intended to confer upon it. The supremacy of the military power over the civil"--a rank heresy that he blamed almost entirely on Lincoln--"seems to be established; and the public mind has acquiesced in it and sanctioned it." When he died--partly of old age, partly of a broken spirit--he was buried near his mother's grave in Frederick.
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D. Scott Hartwig, "Barringer, Rufus," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00051.html.
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Barringer was promoted to brigadier general on 1 June 1864 and was assigned to command a cavalry brigade consisting of the First, Second, Third, and Fifth North Carolina. He led his brigade in the almost constant cavalry fighting and skirmishing that marked the 1864 campaign in Virginia. In August, while temporarily in command of Fitz Lee's division, he participated in the rout of Union forces at Ream's Station, for which he received the compliments of Robert E. Lee. On 3 April 1865, after the disastrous battle of Five Forks had forced the retreat of the Confederate army from Richmond and Petersburg, Barringer's command was ordered to hold Namozine Church, an important point about thirty miles west of Petersburg. In the ensuing engagement, Barringer was captured by scouts of Union general Philip H. Sheridan, who were disguised as Confederate soldiers. He was sent to City Point, Virginia, where he was presented to President Abraham Lincoln, who recalled Barringer's older brother Moreau, with whom Lincoln had desked in Congress. Before parting, Lincoln gave Barringer a note, addressed to Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, asking that the North Carolinian receive special consideration. Barringer was confined to the Old Capitol Prison, but thanks to Lincoln's note to Stanton, he was soon transferred to Fort Delaware. He was held there until 23 July, when he was released on parole. Throughout the war, Barringer participated in seventy-six actions, had two horses shot from under him, and was wounded three times.
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Ari Hoogenboom, "Hayes, Rutherford Birchard," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00331.html.
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When the lower southern states seceded following the election of Abraham Lincoln, Hayes was willing to "Let them go" (Diary and Letters, vol. 2, p. 4). The attack of Fort Sumter on 12 April 1861, however, infuriated him. On 27 June he was commissioned a major in the Twenty-third Ohio Volunteer Infantry, preferring to "be killed in the course of it than to live through and after it without taking part in it" (Diary and Letters, vol. 2, p. 17). An inspirational (and lucky) leader in battle, Hayes served four years, was wounded five times (once seriously), was brevetted major general, and emerged from the war a member of Congress. In Congress from 1865 to 1867, Hayes consistently supported Radical Republican Reconstruction measures, and as chair of the Joint Committee on the Library, he worked to develop the Library of Congress into a great institution. Disliking the long separations from Lucy and their children (they would rear four sons and a daughter), in 1867 Hayes happily resigned from Congress to run for governor of Ohio. He was elected and served two terms from 1868 to 1872. He was primarily responsible for the ratification by Ohio of the Fifteenth Amendment and for the establishment of Ohio State University. Hayes loyally supported Ulysses S. Grant for reelection in 1872 and ran for Congress to help the Republican ticket. Although Grant carried Ohio, Hayes was defeated and in May 1873 returned to Fremont.
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Stacey Hamilton, "Mudd, Samuel Alexander," American National Biography Online, June 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01833.html.
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Since Mudd's death, historians have argued over Mudd's innocence, and many of his descendants have tried to restore his reputation. In 1990 the doctor's grandson Richard Dyer Mudd requested that Mudd's case be reviewed by the Army Board of Correction of Military Records, which two years later recommended that the conviction be removed from army records because he was tried improperly, before a military commission instead of in civilian court. The recommendation was rebuffed by army administration, and in 1997 Richard Mudd brought the issue before the U.S. District Court in Washington, which again left the decision with the army. In March 2000 the army ruled that the military commission was justified in trying and convicting the alleged conspirator, citing Ex Parte Quirin (1942), which held that a "military trial was justified . . . [for] those accused of committing offenses against the law of war" (Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States, ed. Kermit L. Hall [1992], p. 697). Mudd's case fit this definition, they ruled, because the assassination of the president was essentially a military act and the city of Washington, D.C., was at the time under "threat of invasion." Unfortunately the army's ruling shed no new light on Mudd's guilt or innocence, and the movement by Richard Mudd to clear his grandfather's name continues: two newsletters devoted to the efforts to exonerate Mudd still regularly circulate. But, as the truth ostensibly remains unrevealed more than a century later, what role, if any, Mudd played in the assassination of the president who held the country together during its most difficult time will likely never be known for certain.
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J. M. Heffron, "Armstrong, Samuel Chapman," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/09/09-00034.html.
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In the South and elsewhere, Armstrong's educational policies nevertheless had deleterious effects, restricting the future political and economic roles of indigenous peoples, consigning students to a life of menial labor, robbing them of the benefits of higher education, and enforcing the values of a dominant white middle-class culture. W. E. B. Du Bois, just one among many black educators of the time who was an outspoken critic of the school, said Hampton was at the center of an "underground and silent intrigue" to keep the former slave "a docile peasant and peon, without political rights or social standing." But the impact of Hampton and Armstrong's educational ideas extended beyond blacks and other oppressed groups--Native Americans and Hawaiians, for example--most directly affected by the system. Combining the rhetoric of uplift, a salvational message concerning the "dignity of labor," and the most nihilistic industrial values and assumptions, the Hampton-Tuskegee idea became the model for an international Christian educational system that presumed to "save" everyone, white and black, rich and poor alike.
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Mark A. Plummer, "Pomeroy, Samuel Clarke," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00799.html.
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The passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 focused the slavery struggle on Kansas. When President Franklin Pierce signed the bill with its provision for "popular sovereignty" for the territories, Pomeroy allegedly told the president, "Your victory is but an adjournment of the question from the halls of legislation at Washington to the open prairies of the freedom-loving West, and there, sir, we shall beat you" (William E. Connelley, A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans [1918], p. 1219). Pomeroy became one of the organizers of the New England Emigrant Aid Company, which funneled more than $100,000 through Pomeroy, as its financial agent, to aid settlers who favored Kansas as a state free from slavery.
Accompanying a group of sponsored settlers, Pomeroy first located in Lawrence, Kansas Territory, in 1854. As chairman of the defense committee, he failed to protect Lawrence from the proslavery raiding party of 21 May 1856, but the "Sack of Lawrence" became the cause célèbre at the first national Republican presidential nominating convention in Philadelphia in 1856, where Pomeroy made a fiery speech, condemning the South. Pomeroy was a leader of the Territorial Kansas independent Free State party, which evolved into the Republican party by 1859.
Ordered by the Emigrant Aid Society to establish a Free State town in northeast Kansas, Pomeroy purchased land in and near Atchison, previously a proslavery stronghold. He also purchased control of an influential proslavery newspaper, Squatter Sovereign, which was quickly renamed Freedom's Champion.
Accompanying a group of sponsored settlers, Pomeroy first located in Lawrence, Kansas Territory, in 1854. As chairman of the defense committee, he failed to protect Lawrence from the proslavery raiding party of 21 May 1856, but the "Sack of Lawrence" became the cause célèbre at the first national Republican presidential nominating convention in Philadelphia in 1856, where Pomeroy made a fiery speech, condemning the South. Pomeroy was a leader of the Territorial Kansas independent Free State party, which evolved into the Republican party by 1859.
Ordered by the Emigrant Aid Society to establish a Free State town in northeast Kansas, Pomeroy purchased land in and near Atchison, previously a proslavery stronghold. He also purchased control of an influential proslavery newspaper, Squatter Sovereign, which was quickly renamed Freedom's Champion.
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Ralph Kirshner, "Du Pont, Samuel Francis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00329.html.
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In 1863 the Abraham Lincoln administration, in desperate political need of a victory, ordered Du Pont to attack Charleston. Du Pont's civilian superiors, unfamiliar with Charleston Harbor's hydrography, did not understand that the tactics of Port Royal or New Orleans could not be used in Charleston, where no room was available to maneuver. He doubted that a purely naval attack relying on monitors, which mounted only two guns and were offensively weak, could succeed against miles of fortifications and obstructions. On 7 April 1863, from 2:50 p.m. to 4:30 p.m., nine Federal ironclads with twenty-three guns attacked Charleston and were repulsed. The U.S. Navy could not pass Fort Sumter. Du Pont was relieved by Rear Admiral John A. Dahlgren on 6 July 1863. Du Pont was upset that Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles, who ordered the attack, refused to share blame for the worst Federal naval defeat of the war. …Du Pont, who had always been extremely loyal to associates and subordinates (even if they were unpopular in Washington), was too independent to quietly accept Welles's version of Charleston, which placed all blame on the admiral. Politicians who supported the secretary of the navy would not defend Du Pont, and the public--who had hailed Du Pont as a hero after Port Royal--received a one-sided account of Charleston from the Navy Department. But among naval officers Du Pont remained highly respected.
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Herman Belz, "Miller, Samuel Freeman," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00594.html.
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The controversy over slavery led Miller, a Whig emancipationist, to move to Iowa in 1850. He became a successful lawyer, specializing in land title, commercial, and transportation cases. In 1854 he joined in organizing the Republican party in Iowa. Although he did not hold an elected office, he became a prominent Republican and a strong supporter of Abraham Lincoln. Politically well connected, Miller sought appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court, and in 1862 President Lincoln appointed him to the high bench.
Practical and nondoctrinaire in his approach to the law, Miller was a statesmanlike judge whose leading opinions tended to be grounded in prudential judgments and fundamental constitutional principles. Concerning the nature of the Union, the central constitutional problem of his time, he was a states' rights nationalist who sought to balance affirmation of federal sovereignty and recognition of local autonomy. Outstanding expressions of his support for national sovereignty appeared in his dissenting opinion in Ex parte Garland (1867), where he voted to uphold a federal loyalty test oath applied to members of the federal bar in peacetime. In Hepburn v. Griswold (1870), the first of the legal tender cases, he wrote a dissenting opinion advancing a powerful argument for the constitutionality of congressionally authorized paper money as legal tender. He gave the opinion of the Court in Wabash v. Illinois (1886), striking down a state regulation of interstate commerce and practically necessitating the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887.
Practical and nondoctrinaire in his approach to the law, Miller was a statesmanlike judge whose leading opinions tended to be grounded in prudential judgments and fundamental constitutional principles. Concerning the nature of the Union, the central constitutional problem of his time, he was a states' rights nationalist who sought to balance affirmation of federal sovereignty and recognition of local autonomy. Outstanding expressions of his support for national sovereignty appeared in his dissenting opinion in Ex parte Garland (1867), where he voted to uphold a federal loyalty test oath applied to members of the federal bar in peacetime. In Hepburn v. Griswold (1870), the first of the legal tender cases, he wrote a dissenting opinion advancing a powerful argument for the constitutionality of congressionally authorized paper money as legal tender. He gave the opinion of the Court in Wabash v. Illinois (1886), striking down a state regulation of interstate commerce and practically necessitating the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887.
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Timothy S. Huebner, "Gholson, Samuel Jameson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00322.html.
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Gholson's career in many respects typified that of the nineteenth-century southern statesman. His rise within the legal profession opened the door to political opportunities throughout his lifetime, and his high standing within the community made him an ideal candidate for a position of military leadership during the war. Gholson was certainly a better general and politician than he was a judge, as he was more committed to the causes of slavery, secession, and the Democratic party than he was to the abstractions of the law.
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Kenneth Stuckey, "Howe, Samuel Gridley," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00349.html.
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Armed with equal education ideals, he believed that the blind should no longer be doomed to inequality, to becoming only "mere objects of pity." During his first years as director [of the Perkins Institution for the Blind], he visited seventeen states, establishing schools in Ohio, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Virginia. He also developed an embossed-letter system for the blind to read, first known as Howe Type, and later as Boston Line Type. It was used at Perkins until Braille came into common usage at the turn of the century.
In 1837 Howe began an experiment in education that would bring him to the attention of the world, that of educating Laura Bridgman, a girl who had become deaf-blind from scarlet fever at the age of two. His success in educating her proved that it was possible to educate a deaf-blind person…
In 1848 he started the first public institution in the United States to educate the mentally retarded. He also became involved in deaf education, helping to establish the Clarke Institution for Deaf Mutes (now the Clarke School for the Deaf) in Northampton, Massachusetts, in 1867. He has rightly been called the most significant and foresighted figure in the American history of special education. He also participated in the reform of public school education with Horace Mann, in prison reform, in helping the mentally ill with Dorothea Dix, and in the antislavery movement.
In 1837 Howe began an experiment in education that would bring him to the attention of the world, that of educating Laura Bridgman, a girl who had become deaf-blind from scarlet fever at the age of two. His success in educating her proved that it was possible to educate a deaf-blind person…
In 1848 he started the first public institution in the United States to educate the mentally retarded. He also became involved in deaf education, helping to establish the Clarke Institution for Deaf Mutes (now the Clarke School for the Deaf) in Northampton, Massachusetts, in 1867. He has rightly been called the most significant and foresighted figure in the American history of special education. He also participated in the reform of public school education with Horace Mann, in prison reform, in helping the mentally ill with Dorothea Dix, and in the antislavery movement.
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Randolph B. Campbell, "Houston, Sam," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00528.html.
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The Texas legislature elected Houston to the U.S. Senate on 21 February 1846. He drew a two-year term upon entering the Senate but was elected to a full term in December 1847. As sectional animosity over slavery increased, Houston took what would become an unalterable stance against extremism and in defense of the Union. Houston's moderate views on slavery supported his determination to preserve the Union. He owned slaves throughout his life and did not see the institution as a compelling moral issue; he defended it as a practical necessity, a way of providing labor and race control, and rejected the more aggressive view associated with John C. Calhoun and other extremists that slavery was a "positive good." Time would deal with the institution, he hoped, if fanatics would leave it alone. He voted in 1848 for organizing the Oregon Territory with a prohibition on slavery, and he refused to sign John C. Calhoun's 1849 "Southern Address," which called for sectional unity in defense of southern rights. He voted for all parts of the Compromise of 1850. Houston was elected to a third term in the Senate in January 1853, but his unionism began to injure his political career seriously in 1854 when he voted against the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Many of his constituents never forgave what they regarded as an antisouthern act. In 1855 the state legislature officially condemned his vote and indicated that he would not be reelected when his term expired in 1859. Houston identified with the Know-Nothing party in 1855-1856 and ran for governor of Texas in 1857. In that contest he suffered the only electoral defeat of his career, losing to Hardin R. Runnels, an ultrasoutherner.
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Donald Yacovone, "May, Samuel Joseph," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00454.html.
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A chance meeting with William Lloyd Garrison in 1830 drew May into the abolitionist movement. At great personal cost--alienating family, friends, and professional colleagues in the Unitarian ministry over his antislavery principles--May joined Garrison in founding the radical antislavery movement and helped organize the New England Anti-Slavery Society (1832), the American Anti-Slavery Society (1833), and the Garrisonian peace organization, the New England Non-Resistance Society (1838). A model antislavery agent, May lectured throughout the North, published scores of antislavery pamphlets and addresses, and helped modernize the agency system of the antislavery societies. He was one of the few whites to work closely with black abolitionist leaders and made the idea of racial equality central to his antislavery appeal. May defended Prudence Crandall's Canterbury, Connecticut, school for young black women against racist opposition in the early 1830s, and he admitted the Lexington Normal School's first black student. Having become a leading figure in western New York's underground railroad, he helped plan in 1851 the rescue of the fugitive slave William "Jerry" McHenry…
Despite his peace principles, May saw the Civil War as the only opportunity to end slavery and urged the Lincoln administration to crush the rebellion. He formed one of the first freedman's aid societies and spent his remaining years promoting Radical Reconstruction, women's rights, education reform, and Unitarianism.
Despite his peace principles, May saw the Civil War as the only opportunity to end slavery and urged the Lincoln administration to crush the rebellion. He formed one of the first freedman's aid societies and spent his remaining years promoting Radical Reconstruction, women's rights, education reform, and Unitarianism.
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Louis J. Budd, "Twain, Mark," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00313.html.
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Samuel Clemens emerged from early frailty into a lively boyhood, though episodes of sleepwalking indicated strong tensions, probably increased by the deaths of a sister and then a brother. His parents, while apparently compatible, struck him as sharply different. His father, careful to come across as a gentleman, was a principled Whig and essentially a freethinker in theology who intimidated him, seeming stiff and austere; his mother, resilient, warm, comfortably religious, and playful, impressed him as a nonconformist. Hindsight cannot discover unusual promise (or lack of it), though his novels suggest that his boyhood involved much imaginative drama. Highly detailed reminiscences almost fifty years later proved that even casual events were embedded in his psyche. His distinctive way of processing experience was forming, and he remembered his surprise when his spontaneous opinions and phrasings first struck others as humorous. Boyhood ended before his twelfth birthday, when his father died. He attended school sporadically for two more years, took various odd jobs, and apprenticed with a printer, with whom he boarded. In 1851 he changed to typesetter and editorial assistant for his brother Orion's newspaper, which soon published his first known sketch. As his self-confidence rose, he placed a humorous yarn in a Boston periodical, already demonstrating the energetic ambition that drove his career despite the pose of laziness. His early writing showed instinctive exuberance, egalitarianism, irreverence, and boldness.
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Robert S. La Forte, "Medary, Samuel," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00700.html.
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Medary opposed James Buchanan in the Democratic convention in 1856 but, after "Old Buck's" nomination, worked hard for him. Buchanan appointed Medary governor of the Minnesota Territory on 13 March 1857. As the territory's last governor, he lived in Minnesota for only a few months and showed little interest in its affairs. Despite a partisan struggle between Democrats and Republicans that led to two separate state constitutional conventions, Medary did not intervene, and when the parties met to compromise their different charters, he did nothing to delay statehood. Although he remained governor until Congress approved the new constitution in May 1858, his duties were in fact handled by a subordinate.
Medary returned to Columbus as postmaster but was chosen on 23 November 1858 to be governor of the Kansas Territory. He made a futile attempt to capture John Brown (1800-1859) and initially supported the proslavery Lecompton constitution. When the failure of Lecompton became apparent, he responded to pressure and called for election of delegates to a new constitutional convention. Meeting at Wyandotte in July 1859, the Kansans drafted a constitution modeled on the Ohio document of 1851 that Medary had helped create. As the Democratic nominee for governor of Kansas in 1859, he was defeated by Charles Robinson (1818-1894). In February 1860 Medary vetoed a bill abolishing slavery in the territory, saying that it was political and premature because it enacted one of the provisions of the new state constitution. The legislature overrode him, but the territorial supreme court later upheld his position.
Medary returned to Columbus as postmaster but was chosen on 23 November 1858 to be governor of the Kansas Territory. He made a futile attempt to capture John Brown (1800-1859) and initially supported the proslavery Lecompton constitution. When the failure of Lecompton became apparent, he responded to pressure and called for election of delegates to a new constitutional convention. Meeting at Wyandotte in July 1859, the Kansans drafted a constitution modeled on the Ohio document of 1851 that Medary had helped create. As the Democratic nominee for governor of Kansas in 1859, he was defeated by Charles Robinson (1818-1894). In February 1860 Medary vetoed a bill abolishing slavery in the territory, saying that it was political and premature because it enacted one of the provisions of the new state constitution. The legislature overrode him, but the territorial supreme court later upheld his position.
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Bernard S. Finn, "Morse, Samuel Finley Breese," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/13/13-01183.html.
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[Samuel Morse] returned in 1832 with high hopes for The Gallery of the Louvre, which he displayed in New York. But it, like The House of Representatives, failed to attract public interest. A final disappointment came when he learned that he had not been chosen to paint one of the four panels in the ceiling of the rotunda in the Capitol in Washington, a commission he had long coveted. This rebuff was undoubtedly at least in part a reaction to his strongly expressed political views, which were anti-Catholic and antiabolitionist. (He ran unsuccessfully for mayor of New York in 1836 on the Native-American ticket.)
Frustrated, Morse turned to the field of invention. He had done some experimenting with the paints for some of his portraits. And he and a brother had devised a flexible-piston pump (1817) and a marble-cutting machine (1822); the former was patented but proved impractical, and the essentials of the latter had been anticipated by someone else. On the return trip from Europe a new field presented itself to his imagination. Conversations about electricity with Charles Thomas Jackson(who would later make claims that Morse had stolen the idea of the telegraph from him) led to a consideration by Morse that "if the presence of electricity can be made visible in any part of the circuit, I see no reason why intelligence may not be transmitted instantaneously by electricity."
Frustrated, Morse turned to the field of invention. He had done some experimenting with the paints for some of his portraits. And he and a brother had devised a flexible-piston pump (1817) and a marble-cutting machine (1822); the former was patented but proved impractical, and the essentials of the latter had been anticipated by someone else. On the return trip from Europe a new field presented itself to his imagination. Conversations about electricity with Charles Thomas Jackson(who would later make claims that Morse had stolen the idea of the telegraph from him) led to a consideration by Morse that "if the presence of electricity can be made visible in any part of the circuit, I see no reason why intelligence may not be transmitted instantaneously by electricity."
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Elizabeth Zoe Vicary, "Nelson, Samuel," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00625.html.
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Nelson's career on the bench was marked by an interest in technical cases rather than in the better-known constitutional issues. Specializing in admiralty and maritime law, patent law, equity, international law, and the conflict of laws, he gained a reputation as a diligent, reliable, fair-minded, and apolitical judge.
Nelson's opinion in the Dred Scott case illustrates his lack of political bias. The slave Dred Scott sued for freedom after his master took him into a territory Congress declared "free" in the Missouri Compromise of 1820. The first question to be settled was whether Scott was a U.S. citizen. Precedent dictated that in these cases citizenship status was determined by the law of the state in which the suit was brought, and under Missouri law Scott remained a slave and therefore was not a citizen. Nelson therefore voted that the Court should not hear the case. Other, more politically motivated members of the court voted to hear the case. In the final court decision, Nelson agreed with the majority that Scott must remain a slave, but he submitted an independent opinion.
Nelson's opinion in the Dred Scott case illustrates his lack of political bias. The slave Dred Scott sued for freedom after his master took him into a territory Congress declared "free" in the Missouri Compromise of 1820. The first question to be settled was whether Scott was a U.S. citizen. Precedent dictated that in these cases citizenship status was determined by the law of the state in which the suit was brought, and under Missouri law Scott remained a slave and therefore was not a citizen. Nelson therefore voted that the Court should not hear the case. Other, more politically motivated members of the court voted to hear the case. In the final court decision, Nelson agreed with the majority that Scott must remain a slave, but he submitted an independent opinion.
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Mary Jo Miles, "Grimké, Sarah Moore," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00294.html.
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[Sarah] Grimké's contribution to antislavery agitation was pivotal, not only because of her considerable talent as a writer, speaker, teacher, and pamphleteer, but also because of her sex, southern nativity, and uncommon courage. As leaders of the female antislavery movement, Sarah and Angelina regularly risked physical harm and slander. They were the only women to brave social custom and charges of "heresy" in the 1837 speaking tour of New England; with Abigail Kelley, Frances Wright, Maria Stewart, and several others, Sarah made it possible for later generations of women to occupy public spaces without fear (as happened on one occasion) of having to run a gauntlet of jeering men and boys. Sarah's elegant mapping of similarities (and, occasionally, of differences) between white women in America and African-American slaves--and especially her insistence that white women learn to empathize more completely with black women--elevated her to the first rank of social reformers and Christian-feminist theoreticians. As historian Larry Ceplair put it, Sarah Grimké and her devoted sister were genuine "revolutionaries" in a land not given to revolutionary change, "increasingly conscious that they were blazing a public path for women of courage who had seen a light or heard a voice of truth" (Ceplair, p. xi).
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Thomas R. Pegram, "Cullom, Shelby Moore," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00167.html.
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As was the case with many late nineteenth-century public figures, the Civil War became the moral reference point for Cullom's political career. Unlike most others, he spent the war years as a Republican politician, not a soldier. Initially wary of the radical image of the new party, Cullom supported Millard Fillmore in 1856 and was elected to the state legislature on a combined Fillmore-Free Soil ticket. Then in 1858, he took the biggest (and perhaps the only) gamble of his career by hitching his fortunes to Lincoln and the Republicans. Cullom returned to the Illinois General Assembly in 1861 and served as Speaker of the lower house. He moved on to the U.S. House of Representatives in early 1865 and remained in office until 1871. Cullom returned to the Illinois General Assembly from 1873 to 1875, again holding the post of speaker from 1873 to 1874. Two terms as governor of Illinois followed between 1877 and 1883. Finally, in 1883 Cullom began the first of five consecutive terms in the U.S. Senate lasting until 1913. Throughout his tenure he clung to the image of Lincoln and the dictates of the Republican party. At the outset of his national political career, Cullom was a member of Lincoln's funeral party. During the intervening half-century, Cullom waved the bloody shirt, memorialized the "boys in blue," and became so closely linked with the GOP in Illinois that he developed into a visible symbol of the party's heroic past, "the man who looked like Lincoln."
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Maxwell Bloomfield, "Breese, Sidney," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00100.html.
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In December 1842 Breese won election to the U.S. Senate and promptly resigned from the bench. During his single term from 1843 to 1849, he loyally supported most major Democratic policies: a low tariff, a tough stance against England in the longstanding dispute over the Oregon boundary, the annexation of Texas, and the Mexican War. Although in principle he opposed federal grants of public lands to aid internal improvements within the states, he made an exception for railroad and canal projects, especially those that promised to benefit the state of Illinois. Thus, as chairman of the Committee on Public Lands in the Twenty-ninth and Thirtieth Congresses, he urged the passage of bills to aid the construction of two railroads: a transcontinental line from Lake Michigan to the Pacific and another line through central Illinois that eventually would extend southward to the Gulf of Mexico. A poor negotiator, he failed to gain support for either of these measures and suffered the added humiliation of seeing his hated rival, Senator Stephen A. Douglas, push through his own bill in 1850, which made the Illinois Central the first land-grant railroad in American history.
Denied renomination by his party, Breese returned to Illinois and plunged again into local politics. He served a term in the Illinois House of Representatives (1851-1852) and was elected Speaker in his first year. A war Democrat during the Civil War and a judicial activist, he helped to establish the legal foundations of a modern industrial society.
Denied renomination by his party, Breese returned to Illinois and plunged again into local politics. He served a term in the Illinois House of Representatives (1851-1852) and was elected Speaker in his first year. A war Democrat during the Civil War and a judicial activist, he helped to establish the legal foundations of a modern industrial society.
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Bennett H. Wall, "Buckner, Simon Bolivar," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00098.html.
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Buckner considered Union actions in Kentucky to be violations of the U.S. Constitution and of states' rights, so in September 1861 he went to Nashville, where he accepted Confederate General Albert Sidney Johnston's offer of a brigadier generalship. Johnston ordered Buckner to Fort Donelson, where a terribly confused situation left him in command. The Union forces enveloped that position, and in February 1862 Buckner surrendered the fort on the now-famous "unconditional surrender" terms of General Ulysses S. Grant. Buckner remained a prisoner for more than five months. After being exchanged he was promoted to major general and served capably in a number of battles, notably Perryville and Chickamauga. In 1864 Buckner joined the trans-Mississippi forces of General E. Kirby Smith and in September received promotion to lieutenant general.
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Jean Baker, "Cameron, Simon," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00195.html.
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In 1856 Cameron joined the Republican party, which absorbed many Know Nothings, and that year John Frémont, the first presidential candidate of the new party, briefly favored him for vice president. In 1857 Cameron returned to the U.S. Senate after a campaign that Thaddeus Stevens likened to "wholesale private bribery." Charges of bribing voters were too vague for official action, although a brief investigation was conducted. Despite his unsavory reputation, through hard work and the use of his personal contacts Cameron emerged as an important national leader of the Republicans and one of the party's national strategists. In the Senate he opposed the English Bill, which would have admitted Kansas immediately if the territory accepted the proslavery Lecompton constitution and a reduced land grant. He was best known for his active lobbying for tariffs protecting his state's coal and iron interests.
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Robert M. Utley, "Sitting Bull," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00948.html.
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A member of the Hunkpapa tribe, one of seven tribes of the Teton or Western Sioux, or the Lakota, who inhabited the Plains between the Missouri River and the Bighorn Mountains, Sitting Bull achieved renown in early manhood both as an accomplished buffalo hunter and as a warrior in raids against Crow, Assiniboine, Flathead, and other tribal enemies. His war record brought him many honors as well as high rank in prestigious men's societies, and in 1857 he was designated a war chief of the Hunkpapas.
Sitting Bull also became a holy man, one of a select few who had mastered the sacred powers of the natural world and the ceremonies that influenced human well-being. Many times he danced the various orders of the Sun Dance and sacrificed his flesh in token to Wakantanka. Unlike most holy men, whose rites and devotions solicited benefit for individuals, Sitting Bull nearly always sought the welfare of his tribe. By middle age he was widely admired by his people as an exemplar of the four cardinal virtues of the Tetons: bravery, fortitude, generosity, and wisdom.
Sitting Bull also became a holy man, one of a select few who had mastered the sacred powers of the natural world and the ceremonies that influenced human well-being. Many times he danced the various orders of the Sun Dance and sacrificed his flesh in token to Wakantanka. Unlike most holy men, whose rites and devotions solicited benefit for individuals, Sitting Bull nearly always sought the welfare of his tribe. By middle age he was widely admired by his people as an exemplar of the four cardinal virtues of the Tetons: bravery, fortitude, generosity, and wisdom.
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Nell Irvin Painter, "Truth, Sojourner," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00706.html.
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In the nineteenth century, this tall, dark-skinned, charismatic, illiterate wisewoman who dressed like a Quaker was best known as a Methodist-style itinerant preacher and religiously inspired supporter of women's rights and the abolition of slavery. A familiar figure in reform circles, she also advocated temperance and associated with spiritualists and water-cure enthusiasts. In her own day she presented herself as the quintessential slave woman. In modern times she has come to stand for the conjunction of race, class, and gender in American liberal reform and symbolizes the unintimidated, articulate black woman. Acutely intelligent although totally unschooled, Truth represents a type of inspired, naive witness that has long appealed to Americans suspicious of over-education.
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Jerome A. Jackson, "Baird, Spencer Fullerton," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/13/13-00070.html.
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Baird's personal research and field work were hampered and essentially ended as a result of his increasing administrative duties, but through his administration and the ability to attract and train young scientists, Baird became the great facilitator that took the Smithsonian, the U.S. National Museum, and American science in general great leaps forward. Even under Joseph Henry, the first secretary of the Smithsonian, Baird was the individual most in touch with and in support of museum collections, constantly seeking to enlarge the collections through purchase or exchange, with specific goals of clarifying species distribution patterns. He was also a great communicator, able to interpret science to the public. He wrote regularly for popular magazines and in 1871 became science editor for Harper's Weekly, a post he held for eight years.
Baird knew how to work with people, was an excellent judge of abilities, and had the gifts of knowing when and how to compromise and the perseverance to make bureaucracy work for science. His administrative accomplishments went well beyond science into international relations. For example, Baird assisted with negotiations for the purchase of Alaska, complex negotiations with England and Canada over fishing rights, and with preparations for the Centennial Exposition of 1876, in Philadelphia, commemorating the founding of the nation. The latter efforts, through shrewd planning and hard work, resulted in the Smithsonian's acquisition of many items from foreign exhibits and congressional recognition and funding for the construction of a U.S. National Museum building.
Baird knew how to work with people, was an excellent judge of abilities, and had the gifts of knowing when and how to compromise and the perseverance to make bureaucracy work for science. His administrative accomplishments went well beyond science into international relations. For example, Baird assisted with negotiations for the purchase of Alaska, complex negotiations with England and Canada over fishing rights, and with preparations for the Centennial Exposition of 1876, in Philadelphia, commemorating the founding of the nation. The latter efforts, through shrewd planning and hard work, resulted in the Smithsonian's acquisition of many items from foreign exhibits and congressional recognition and funding for the construction of a U.S. National Museum building.
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Citation:
Kenny A. Franks, "Watie, Stand," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01092.html.
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At the outbreak of the Civil War, Watie joined the southern cause. Commissioned a colonel in 1861, he raised a regiment of Cherokees for service in the Confederate army. …Watie’s men were renamed as the Second Cherokee Regiment of Mounted Rifles. After Ross fled Indian Territory, Watie was elected principal chief of the Confederate Cherokees in August 1862.
Watie and his regiment saw action at…a myriad of skirmishes. He became best known for guerrilla warfare, which pinned down thousands of Union troops. His two greatest victories came in 1864 with the capture of the Federal steamboat J. R. Williams and the seizure of $1.5 million worth of Federal supplies at the Second Battle of Cabin Creek. Watie was promoted to brigadier general in 1864 and was given command of the First Indian Brigade, thus becoming the only Native American to achieve the rank of general in the Civil War. The last Confederate general to lay down his arms, Watie surrendered on 23 June 1865.
After the war Watie served as a member of the southern Cherokee delegation during the negotiation of the Cherokee Reconstruction Treaty of 1866. He also served as a delegate to the General Council for the Indian Territory.… He was a participant in the Cherokee Tobacco Case in 1871, which was a landmark decision in Native American history in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that tribes were “independent dependent” nations within the framework of the United States and thereby were subject to federal law.
Watie and his regiment saw action at…a myriad of skirmishes. He became best known for guerrilla warfare, which pinned down thousands of Union troops. His two greatest victories came in 1864 with the capture of the Federal steamboat J. R. Williams and the seizure of $1.5 million worth of Federal supplies at the Second Battle of Cabin Creek. Watie was promoted to brigadier general in 1864 and was given command of the First Indian Brigade, thus becoming the only Native American to achieve the rank of general in the Civil War. The last Confederate general to lay down his arms, Watie surrendered on 23 June 1865.
After the war Watie served as a member of the southern Cherokee delegation during the negotiation of the Cherokee Reconstruction Treaty of 1866. He also served as a delegate to the General Council for the Indian Territory.… He was a participant in the Cherokee Tobacco Case in 1871, which was a landmark decision in Native American history in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that tribes were “independent dependent” nations within the framework of the United States and thereby were subject to federal law.
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Robert W. Johanssen, "Douglas, Stephen Arnold," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00325.html.
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While serving as an apprentice to a Middlebury cabinetmaker, Douglas was captivated by the image of Andrew Jackson; during the presidential campaign of 1828, he supported Jackson's candidacy by pulling down opposition handbills from walls and fences. "From this moment," Douglas later recalled, "my politics became fixed, and all subsequent reading, reflection and observation have but confirmed my early attachment to the cause of Democracy" (by which he meant both the party and the principle).
The experience not only aroused his ambition for a career in politics but also stimulated his interest in an education. In 1830 he moved with his family to upstate New York where he entered Canandaigua Academy, studying the Latin and Greek classics, mathematics, and English literature. Canandaigua was a cultural center of swirling ferment and unrest. The recently completed Erie Canal had opened the region to economic development, and the area was alive with a spirit of reform and change that Douglas could neither ignore nor resist.
The experience not only aroused his ambition for a career in politics but also stimulated his interest in an education. In 1830 he moved with his family to upstate New York where he entered Canandaigua Academy, studying the Latin and Greek classics, mathematics, and English literature. Canandaigua was a cultural center of swirling ferment and unrest. The recently completed Erie Canal had opened the region to economic development, and the area was alive with a spirit of reform and change that Douglas could neither ignore nor resist.
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Citation:
Robert W. Johanssen, "Douglas, Stephen Arnold," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00325.html.
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Douglas had already developed the driving energy that would later cause others to dub him a "steam engine in breeches." A young man in a hurry, he chafed at the long period of preparation required by New York law for admission to the bar. After six months of study, he headed for the "western country" where legal training and qualification were less formal. After brief stops in Cleveland, Cincinnati, Louisville, and St. Louis, he settled in Jacksonville, Illinois, in November 1833. Within months he was writing in glowing terms of the opportunities that awaited him. Illinois was "the Paradise of the world," he informed his family. "I have become a Western man, have imbibed Western feelings principles and interests and have selected Illinois as the favorite place of my adoption." Admitted to the bar in 1834 after a cursory examination before a judge (who cautioned him to learn more of the law), Douglas entered the rough-and-tumble arena of frontier politics as a zealous partisan of Andrew Jackson and Jacksonian democracy. The mix of New Englanders who had settled Jacksonville and the area's farmers who had migrated from Kentucky and Tennessee added to his enthusiasm. "The people of this country," he wrote of his future constituents, "are more thoroughly Democratic than any people I have ever known . . . democratic in principle and in Practice as well as in name."
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Robert W. Johannsen, "Douglas, Stephen Arnold," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00325.html.
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Like many Americans, Douglas hailed the triumphant end of the Mexican War as the beginning of a new era. Events quickly dashed his expectation. The most important consequence of the war was the re-entry of the slavery issue into national politics, raising again the question of slavery's relation to territorial expansion. The introduction of the Wilmot Proviso in the summer of 1846, stipulating that slavery would be barred forever from all lands acquired from Mexico, initiated a bitter sectional debate that increased in intensity until 1850, when the Union itself appeared to be in danger. Douglas rejected both the northern antislavery position that the national government had the power to prohibit slavery in the territories and the southern proslavery argument that the Constitution sanctioned the existence of slavery in the territories. Instead he proposed, as the only fair and just course, to allow the people of the territories to decide the question for themselves without the intervention of the national government. This doctrine of popular sovereignty, Douglas believed, satisfied the yearnings of westerners for self-government and removed the divisive slavery question from national politics. The conflict finally culminated in the passage of the Compromise of 1850, in which Douglas played a leading role. The territories of Utah and New Mexico were organized on the basis of popular sovereignty, and California was admitted to the Union as a free state in accordance with the wishes of its inhabitants.
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Citation:
Johannsen, Robert W., "Douglas, Stephen Arnold," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00325.html.
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Douglas was not proslavery, as many of his opponents charged, but he was aware of the dangers involved in debating the right or wrong of slavery…To Douglas, there was no tribunal on earth that could decide the moral question of slavery to the satisfaction of each side. In the interest of maintaining the Union, slavery must be dealt with as a "political question involving questions of public policy." He was confident that it was poorly adapted to western conditions and that the people of the territories, if left to settle the question for themselves, would decide against it. The growing momentum of the antislavery movement and the rising strength of the proslavery southern political leadership, however, made it increasingly difficult to adhere to this position without being misunderstood.
Douglas's dilemma became clear in 1854 when the issue of slavery in the territories was revived by the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Written and introduced by Douglas, the act organized two new territories out of the old Louisiana Purchase area. Although slavery had been barred from the region by the 1820 Missouri Compromise, Douglas nonetheless provided for popular sovereignty...Southerners, however, pressed him for an explicit repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and Douglas agreed in order to secure the bill's passage, although he predicted it would raise a "hell of a storm." Antislavery opponents denounced the repeal as a "gross violation of a sacred pledge" and a betrayal of freedom made to promote Douglas's ambitions.
Douglas's dilemma became clear in 1854 when the issue of slavery in the territories was revived by the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Written and introduced by Douglas, the act organized two new territories out of the old Louisiana Purchase area. Although slavery had been barred from the region by the 1820 Missouri Compromise, Douglas nonetheless provided for popular sovereignty...Southerners, however, pressed him for an explicit repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and Douglas agreed in order to secure the bill's passage, although he predicted it would raise a "hell of a storm." Antislavery opponents denounced the repeal as a "gross violation of a sacred pledge" and a betrayal of freedom made to promote Douglas's ambitions.
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Deane L. Root, "Foster, Stephen," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/18/18-00415.html.
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The general assessment of Foster has shifted with each generation, reflecting American social views. Around 1900, there was a post-Reconstructionist recasting of his music as "coon songs" and as having elevated and ennobled the crude material of a dark race. In early radio, Foster's songs--which were in the public domain and thus free--enjoyed unprecedented circulation; they were accorded "folksong" status and performed widely in schools. After the Civil Rights movement many schools banned them because of acquired racist connotations. Toward the end of the twentieth century they gained new currency, partly as a result of research into the original meanings and significance of the songs for positive racial relations, partly through their uninterrupted circulation among American country and folk-music musicians, partly because of worldwide interest in their idyllic imagery and beautiful melodies. Foster's songs remain among the best known American music throughout the world, having been recorded by ethnomusicologists in the most difficult to access regions of China along the Tibetan border, taught by black South Africans in their schools under Apartheid, used as emblematic melodies in the cartoon, film, and television industries, and universally taught to Japanese school children since the 1880s. They represent the United States to many of the world's peoples.
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Paul Kens, "Field, Stephen Johnson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00299.html.
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Field's legacy is a tribute to his persistence. He labored in the minority through much of his career; many of his most important and innovative theories of law were expressed as dissenting or concurring opinions. By the 1890s, however, the majority of the court had adopted much of his doctrine and held to it after his death. The adoption of liberty-of-contract doctrine in Allgeyer and Lochner provides the most obvious example, but Field's ideas also lived on in Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway Company v. Minnesota (1890) and Smyth v. Ames (1898), which, in keeping with his Munn dissent, recognized that rate regulation could violate the due process guarantee. His opposition to class legislation and the spirit of his Santa Clara and San Mateo opinions were later reflected when the Supreme Court overruled the federal income tax in Pollock v. Farmers Loan and Trust (1895).
Field resigned from the Court on 1 December 1897. He died at his home in Washington, D.C. He had spent a record thirty-four years on the Court, outlasting eight presidents and three chief justices. More importantly, he set the stage for laissez-faire constitutionalism. For nearly four decades following Field's death, a narrow majority of the Supreme Court vigorously applied most of the legal doctrine he had pioneered. His vision of entrepreneurial liberty dominated constitutional doctrine until its clash with Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal produced a backlash in 1937.
Field resigned from the Court on 1 December 1897. He died at his home in Washington, D.C. He had spent a record thirty-four years on the Court, outlasting eight presidents and three chief justices. More importantly, he set the stage for laissez-faire constitutionalism. For nearly four decades following Field's death, a narrow majority of the Supreme Court vigorously applied most of the legal doctrine he had pioneered. His vision of entrepreneurial liberty dominated constitutional doctrine until its clash with Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal produced a backlash in 1937.
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Leslie H. Fishel, "Smith, Stephen," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-01038.html.
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Early on, Smith turned his talents to race rights and reform. He was a well-known participant in the Underground Railroad; Whipper told William Still that it was known "far down in the slave region, that Smith & Whipper, the negro lumber merchants, were engaged in secreting fugitive slaves" (Still, p. 739). Smith opposed the colonization movement and supported the early strivings of Whipper's American Moral Reform Society in 1834-1835. A frequent but not addicted convention goer and mass-meeting participant, he fought for the abolition of slavery, the removal of "white" from the state constitution, and the integration of Philadelphia's railway cars. Smith supported the temperance movement and was an officer in a number of black organizations, including the Odd Fellows, Social, Civil, and Statistical Association; the Grand Tabernacle of the Independent Order of Brothers and Sisters of Love and Charity; and the Union League Association. He hosted John Brown for a week in 1858 and, along with James Wormley and Henry Highland Garnet, had a leadership role in the movement to erect a Lincoln memorial monument.
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Ann D. Gordon, "Anthony, Susan B.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00021.html.
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In 1851 Anthony met Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and over the next year the two women discovered the sort of liberating partnership they could forge. Their ideas were converging. Anthony had found women welcome in the temperance movement as long as they confined themselves to a separate sphere and did not expect an equal role with men, while Stanton had focused her attention on the need for women to reform law in their own interests, both to improve their conditions and to challenge the "maleness" of current law. In 1852 Anthony and Stanton founded the Women's New York State Temperance Society, which, even in its name, claimed an equality with the leading male society and featured women's right to vote on the temperance question and to divorce drunken husbands. Beginning as an agent for this society, Anthony became a full-time reformer.
Through the 1850s Anthony and Stanton made New York State the nation's showpiece of women's rights agitation. To the struggle for equality in the increasingly political temperance movement, they added campaigns for coeducation, modeled "Bloomers," a costume that freed women from the constraints of fashionable dress, and, through their New York State Woman's Rights Committee, presented the legislature with demands for suffrage, married women's property rights, mothers' custody rights, liberalized divorce laws, and rights associated with specific jobs performed by women.
Through the 1850s Anthony and Stanton made New York State the nation's showpiece of women's rights agitation. To the struggle for equality in the increasingly political temperance movement, they added campaigns for coeducation, modeled "Bloomers," a costume that freed women from the constraints of fashionable dress, and, through their New York State Woman's Rights Committee, presented the legislature with demands for suffrage, married women's property rights, mothers' custody rights, liberalized divorce laws, and rights associated with specific jobs performed by women.
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Citation:
Josh Zeitz, "Stevens, Thaddeus," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00953.html.
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The end of the war presented the Republican party with several distinct policy options, the most radical of which was pioneered by Stevens. Arguing that the southern states were conquered territories, outside of the Union, without constitutional protections, and subject to direct congressional governance, he proposed a wide-reaching land redistribution program aimed at breaking the economic and political influence of the planter elite and creating an independent black yeomanry. Like most of his contemporaries, he understood civil rights as entailing equality under the law and equal opportunity for self-advancement, but he viewed the enfranchisement of freedmen as a privilege and not a right, beyond congressional authority and secondary in importance to the socioeconomic restructuring of the South.
In 1866 and 1867 Stevens found himself forced to juggle dual roles as House leader and Radical chieftain. He forged a precarious balance between compromise and principle. When his land redistribution program was defeated in February 1866, he accepted the party's moderate course and defended the Freedmen's Bureau and civil rights bills against presidential opposition. Later that year he shepherded the relatively moderate Fourteenth Amendment, parts of which he had authored, through the House. Although he viewed these measures as incomplete, he counseled his fellow Radicals to "take what we can get now and hope for better things in further legislation" (Congressional Globe, 39th Cong., 1st sess., p. 3148).
In 1866 and 1867 Stevens found himself forced to juggle dual roles as House leader and Radical chieftain. He forged a precarious balance between compromise and principle. When his land redistribution program was defeated in February 1866, he accepted the party's moderate course and defended the Freedmen's Bureau and civil rights bills against presidential opposition. Later that year he shepherded the relatively moderate Fourteenth Amendment, parts of which he had authored, through the House. Although he viewed these measures as incomplete, he counseled his fellow Radicals to "take what we can get now and hope for better things in further legislation" (Congressional Globe, 39th Cong., 1st sess., p. 3148).
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Robert H. Abzug, "Weld, Theodore Dwight," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00744.html.
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When his voice gave out in 1837, [Theodore Weld] took upon himself the task of creating a new roster of antislavery speakers….At training sessions in New York in late 1837, he met Sarah Grimké and Angelina Grimké, renegade sisters from South Carolina's slaveholding elite who had become antislavery activists. Angelina Grimké and Weld fell in love. Their courtship coincided with the Grimké sisters forthright advocacy of woman's equality, an issue that acted as a lightning rod for various matters, dividing abolitionists and inducing a schism in their ranks. Weld was caught between warring factions. In love with Angelina and egalitarian in his own views toward women, he nonetheless worried that agitating the "woman question" would divert energies from antislavery and bring that movement new opposition. After a romance made stormy in part by the tensions among reformers, they were married in 1838 in a ceremony marked by explicit commitment to equality of the sexes. They also vowed to share their life together with Sarah Grimké, who would live with them for more or less the rest of their lives.
Almost immediately Weld and the Grimkés began work on American Slavery As It Is (1839), a compilation of firsthand descriptions of slave life in the South. It became the most widely distributed and most influential of all American antislavery tracts, even influencing Harriet Beecher Stowe's depiction of slavery in Uncle Tom's Cabin.
Almost immediately Weld and the Grimkés began work on American Slavery As It Is (1839), a compilation of firsthand descriptions of slave life in the South. It became the most widely distributed and most influential of all American antislavery tracts, even influencing Harriet Beecher Stowe's depiction of slavery in Uncle Tom's Cabin.
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Henry Warner Bowden, "Parker, Theodore," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/08/08-01925.html.
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His role of controversial thinker easily led to that of radical social reformer, becoming a provocative gadfly in debates concerning the most pressing issue of his day, slavery. Often intemperate in speech and manner, for fifteen years he embodied militant Christian philanthropy. As a result of his sermons on the subject, many people, including Julia Ward Howe, were converted to the abolitionist cause. Parker's convictions and moral earnestness made him increasingly strident on this issue and kept him in the forefront of radical political activism.
In 1850 Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act, which allowed slave owners or their representatives to enter free states in the North, capture runaways, and return them to slavery in the South. Parker was inflamed by such a miscarriage of justice. Thereafter he served on Boston's Committee of Vigilance, which sought to help escaped slaves. He worked with the New England Emancipation Aid Society for the same purpose. While protecting fugitive African Americans in his own home, he urged citizens to resist any human legislation that violated the higher moral laws. Because of these convictions, Parker was particularly successful in helping William Craft and Ellen Craft, two of his parishioners, to escape the clutches of slave catchers from Georgia. He served on the Massachusetts Kansas Committee when proslavery and antislavery factions met in bloody confrontation on the western plains. In addition to those mild acts of zeal, he was also a member of the secret committee that abetted John Brown and his plans for armed insurrection.
In 1850 Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act, which allowed slave owners or their representatives to enter free states in the North, capture runaways, and return them to slavery in the South. Parker was inflamed by such a miscarriage of justice. Thereafter he served on Boston's Committee of Vigilance, which sought to help escaped slaves. He worked with the New England Emancipation Aid Society for the same purpose. While protecting fugitive African Americans in his own home, he urged citizens to resist any human legislation that violated the higher moral laws. Because of these convictions, Parker was particularly successful in helping William Craft and Ellen Craft, two of his parishioners, to escape the clutches of slave catchers from Georgia. He served on the Massachusetts Kansas Committee when proslavery and antislavery factions met in bloody confrontation on the western plains. In addition to those mild acts of zeal, he was also a member of the secret committee that abetted John Brown and his plans for armed insurrection.
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Daniel E. Sutherland, "Holmes, Theophilus Hunter," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00357.html.
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Holmes was devoted to saving Arkansas, even refusing [President Jefferson Davis'] request to send a portion of his troops to reinforce Vicksburg. He praised Arkansans as "true and loyal" and his troops as "noble men," but civilians and soldiers alike lost confidence in him. The Federals advanced steadily into the state and laid waste to northern Arkansas. Holmes admitted that he was unequal to his task as early as October 1862. Davis finally responded to public pressure by replacing him as department commander with General Edmund Kirby Smith in March 1863 and reassigning Holmes to command the District of Arkansas, which also included Indian Territory and Missouri. In this post, too, Holmes proved unsuccessful, most tragically when his outnumbered army failed to take strongly held Federal positions at Helena in July 1863. When Kirby Smith and several leading Arkansas politicians petitioned to have Holmes removed from Arkansas altogether, Holmes resigned in March 1864. In April Davis reassigned Holmes to command reserve troops in his native North Carolina. He served in this largely administrative post until April 1865.
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Chandra M. Miller, "Bayne, Thomas," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01230.html.
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[Samuel Nixon] soon traveled to New Bedford, where he changed his name to Thomas Bayne and began a dentistry practice while maintaining contact with Underground Railroad agents like William Still of Philadelphia. Letters between Bayne and Still reveal that Bayne sometimes sheltered fugitives in his New Bedford home and that Still aided Bayne's advancement by sending medical and dental textbooks. In January 1860 Bayne thanked Still for his "Vigilance as a colored man helping a colored man to get such knowledge as will give the lie to our enemies." Bayne also gained renown in New Bedford as a speaker at abolitionist and temperance meetings, and he served on the New Bedford City Council in 1865.
At the end of the Civil War, Bayne returned to Norfolk, Virginia, to rejoin his family. He immediately became involved in politics, and in May 1865 he chaired a public meeting at which the participants passed eight civil rights resolutions under the title of Equal Suffrage: Address from the Colored Citizens of Norfolk, Virginia to the People of the United States. These resolutions pledged Virginia's loyalty to the Union, decried race discrimination as abhorrent to "patriotism, humanity, and religion," and demanded equal suffrage for black and white Americans. As a member of a committee that testified on behalf of rights for freedmen, Bayne appeared before O. O. Howard of the Freedmen's Bureau in December 1865.
At the end of the Civil War, Bayne returned to Norfolk, Virginia, to rejoin his family. He immediately became involved in politics, and in May 1865 he chaired a public meeting at which the participants passed eight civil rights resolutions under the title of Equal Suffrage: Address from the Colored Citizens of Norfolk, Virginia to the People of the United States. These resolutions pledged Virginia's loyalty to the Union, decried race discrimination as abhorrent to "patriotism, humanity, and religion," and demanded equal suffrage for black and white Americans. As a member of a committee that testified on behalf of rights for freedmen, Bayne appeared before O. O. Howard of the Freedmen's Bureau in December 1865.
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Citation:
Ron D. Bryant, "Bramlette, Thomas Elliott," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00138.html.
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Bramlette's devotion to the Union was apparent in his actions as governor of Kentucky. Although the state was badly divided by the Civil War, Bramlette remained adamant in his belief that the Union must be preserved. In January 1864 he issued a proclamation stating that Confederate sympathizers would be punished if guerrilla warfare persisted in the Commonwealth. Fines of up to $1,000 would be exacted from anyone aiding those engaged in guerrilla activities. He also declared that, if a loyal Kentuckian were captured by pro-Confederate forces, five Confederate sympathizers would be seized and held as hostages for the safe return of the loyal Kentuckian.
The devotion of Governor Bramlette to the Union cause was severely tested after General Jeremiah T. Boyle ordered the enlistment of former Kentucky slaves into the Union army. Bramlette appealed to the Lincoln government to pledge that blacks would not be recruited in Kentucky. However, General Boyle's successor, General Stephen G. Burbridge, ordered able-bodied blacks in Kentucky to enlist in the Union army.
The devotion of Governor Bramlette to the Union cause was severely tested after General Jeremiah T. Boyle ordered the enlistment of former Kentucky slaves into the Union army. Bramlette appealed to the Lincoln government to pledge that blacks would not be recruited in Kentucky. However, General Boyle's successor, General Stephen G. Burbridge, ordered able-bodied blacks in Kentucky to enlist in the Union army.
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William E. Parrish, "Ewing, Thomas, Jr.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00355.html.
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In November 1856 Ewing moved to Leavenworth, Kansas, and established his law practice. He also became heavily involved in land speculation in the new territory with his brother Hugh B. Ewing and also became actively involved in the Kansas Free State party. He took a strong stand against the Lecompton Constitution of 1857 and played a major role in uncovering fraud in an election for state officers through his canvass of ballot boxes in January 1858, thereby helping prevent Kansas's admission as a slave state. When admission as a free state finally came in January 1861, Ewing was elected as the new state's first chief justice of the supreme court.
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Larry Gara, "Garrett, Thomas," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00255.html.
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Garrett's parents were members of the Society of Friends (Quakers), and he remained a member throughout his life...His work as an abolitionist and Underground Railroad organizer and operator would result in his national reputation.
While most northern Quakers were moderate in their antislavery views, emphasizing primarily their own rejection of slavery, Garrett went much further, becoming a follower of Boston abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, who offended some Quakers with his strong language and confrontational style. Like Garrison, Garrett advocated nonviolent resistance to slavery. Working with abolitionists in the Philadelphia area, Garrett organized a network of sympathizers who provided funds, transportation, and sometimes hospitality to slaves who had fled from their masters. During his lengthy involvement with the Underground Railroad, he kept records of 2,700 slaves he had helped escape. His work, along with that of Levi Coffin in Cincinnati, contributed to the perception that a well-organized escape route for slaves extended throughout the nation.
Even though Delaware was a slave state, except for several newspaper attacks Garrett experienced remarkably little opposition to his Underground Railroad activity, especially in the years just prior to the Civil War. In 1856 Garrett wrote a friend: "There is about as much anti-slavery feeling here as in Boston, and quite as freely expressed."
While most northern Quakers were moderate in their antislavery views, emphasizing primarily their own rejection of slavery, Garrett went much further, becoming a follower of Boston abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, who offended some Quakers with his strong language and confrontational style. Like Garrison, Garrett advocated nonviolent resistance to slavery. Working with abolitionists in the Philadelphia area, Garrett organized a network of sympathizers who provided funds, transportation, and sometimes hospitality to slaves who had fled from their masters. During his lengthy involvement with the Underground Railroad, he kept records of 2,700 slaves he had helped escape. His work, along with that of Levi Coffin in Cincinnati, contributed to the perception that a well-organized escape route for slaves extended throughout the nation.
Even though Delaware was a slave state, except for several newspaper attacks Garrett experienced remarkably little opposition to his Underground Railroad activity, especially in the years just prior to the Civil War. In 1856 Garrett wrote a friend: "There is about as much anti-slavery feeling here as in Boston, and quite as freely expressed."
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Citation:
Jean H. Baker, "Hicks, Thomas Holliday," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00496.html.
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During the secession crisis of 1860-1861, Governor Hicks took several crucial steps to keep the border slave state of Maryland in the Union. First he refused to meet officially with the agents of seceded southern states intent on persuading Maryland to join the Confederacy. Then, following the sentiments of the Unionist majority of Maryland, he refused to call a special session of the legislature, which met biennially and was not scheduled to meet until 1862. Staunchly he resisted a move to organize a state convention to consider the issue of secession. Throughout the winter Hicks remained convinced that the critical issue for Marylanders was that they choose for themselves their future, and he reminded the governor of South Carolina "that Maryland should not convene her legislature at the bidding of South Carolina."
While Hicks sympathized with southern opposition to the North's personal liberty laws that freed fugitive slaves, he continued to resist a Confederate conspiracy to force Maryland out of the Union. Appealing before the start of the war for peace and reason, he represented a moderate body of thought in Maryland, which believed that the border states of Kentucky, Delaware, Missouri, and Maryland could serve as territorial buffers between the North and South. Such a confederation might prevent war and serve as a force to adjudicate sectional differences peacefully.
While Hicks sympathized with southern opposition to the North's personal liberty laws that freed fugitive slaves, he continued to resist a Confederate conspiracy to force Maryland out of the Union. Appealing before the start of the war for peace and reason, he represented a moderate body of thought in Maryland, which believed that the border states of Kentucky, Delaware, Missouri, and Maryland could serve as territorial buffers between the North and South. Such a confederation might prevent war and serve as a force to adjudicate sectional differences peacefully.
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Citation:
Arthur W. Bergeron, "Churchill, Thomas James," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00230.html.
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When [Brigadier General Thomas James] Churchill reached Little Rock, Lieutenant General Theophilus H. Holmes assigned him to command troops stationed at Fort Hindman, located at Arkansas Post on the Arkansas River. Union land and naval forces under Major General John A. McClernand and Admiral David D. Porter moved against the fort in January 1863. Of the approximately 6,000 men in the garrison, Churchill estimated that only 3,000 of them were actually available to fight. He asked Holmes for some reinforcements and more weapons but was told "to hold out until help arrived or all dead." Federal troops overran part of the Confederate lines on 11 January, and some of Churchill's troops raised unauthorized white flags, forcing him to surrender the remainder of the garrison. For three months, Churchill remained a prisoner of war at Camp Chase, Ohio. He was assigned to the Army of Tennessee after his exchange and assumed command of a brigade in Major General Patrick R. Cleburne's division. Churchill suffered the stigma of the loss of Arkansas Post and was replaced in brigade command in August 1863.
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James K. Hogue, "Wood, Thomas John," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00853.html.
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In early 1862 Wood was given command of a division in the Army of the Ohio, then led by General Don Carlos Buell, and took part in the Union invasion of Tennessee. In February 1862 he participated in the capture of Nashville, Tennessee, the first Confederate state capital to fall to the Union army. He fought with distinction at the battle of Stones River (30 Dec. 1862-2 Jan. 1863), where he was wounded. The Army of the Cumberland (formerly the Army of the Ohio) repulsed Confederate general Braxton Bragg's strongest effort to clear the Union army out of central Tennessee.
In 1863 Wood's role in the battle of Chickamauga provoked fierce controversy in the Union high command. In October 1862 Abraham Lincoln had relieved Buell and replaced him with Major General William S. Rosecrans. On the second day of the battle, 20 September 1863, Rosecrans personally and vehemently ordered Wood to move his division, which Wood promptly did, even though it left more than a quarter-mile gap in the Union line. Confederate general James Longstreet's corps, on loan from the Army of Northern Virginia, attacked into this gap, cutting Rosecrans's army in two and threatening to destroy the entire army. Rosecrans was furious with Wood and blamed him for the blunder. General Ulysses S. Grant, however, saw the incident in a different light and chose, with the advice of Major General George H. Thomas, to keep Wood but relieve Rosecrans.
In 1863 Wood's role in the battle of Chickamauga provoked fierce controversy in the Union high command. In October 1862 Abraham Lincoln had relieved Buell and replaced him with Major General William S. Rosecrans. On the second day of the battle, 20 September 1863, Rosecrans personally and vehemently ordered Wood to move his division, which Wood promptly did, even though it left more than a quarter-mile gap in the Union line. Confederate general James Longstreet's corps, on loan from the Army of Northern Virginia, attacked into this gap, cutting Rosecrans's army in two and threatening to destroy the entire army. Rosecrans was furious with Wood and blamed him for the blunder. General Ulysses S. Grant, however, saw the incident in a different light and chose, with the advice of Major General George H. Thomas, to keep Wood but relieve Rosecrans.
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James I. Robertson, "Jackson, Thomas Jonathan," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00555.html.
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Jackson swept into war with cool professionalism and grim determination. He viewed the Civil War as a test of America by the Almighty: bloodshed would be terrible, but victory would come to the more devout side. Hence, Jackson carried into the conflict the faith of the New Testament and the ferocity of the Old Testament.
Following his appointment as colonel of infantry in April 1861, Jackson took charge of volunteers and militia defending the important outpost of Harpers Ferry. On 17 June he was promoted to brigadier general and assigned to lead a brigade of five regiments from western Virginia. The most famous nickname in the Civil War came to the general and his men a month later in the first major battle of the war (First Manassas). Federals were driving southern troops back in confusion when South Carolina general Barnard E. Bee sought to rally his broken lines. Pointing to the top of a hill that was the key to the battlefield, Bee shouted something to the effect of: "Look, men! There stands Jackson like a stone wall! Rally behind the Virginians!" Jackson's subsequent attack helped turn the tide and bring victory to the Confederates as well as fame and the sobriquet of "Stonewall" to himself.
Following his appointment as colonel of infantry in April 1861, Jackson took charge of volunteers and militia defending the important outpost of Harpers Ferry. On 17 June he was promoted to brigadier general and assigned to lead a brigade of five regiments from western Virginia. The most famous nickname in the Civil War came to the general and his men a month later in the first major battle of the war (First Manassas). Federals were driving southern troops back in confusion when South Carolina general Barnard E. Bee sought to rally his broken lines. Pointing to the top of a hill that was the key to the battlefield, Bee shouted something to the effect of: "Look, men! There stands Jackson like a stone wall! Rally behind the Virginians!" Jackson's subsequent attack helped turn the tide and bring victory to the Confederates as well as fame and the sobriquet of "Stonewall" to himself.
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Lowell H. Harrison, "Crittenden, Thomas Leonidas," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00281.html.
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Crittenden had brief duty as a private in the Kentucky Infantry in 1836 when war with Mexico seemed possible. During the Mexican War a decade later, as an aide on the staff of General Zachary Taylor, Crittenden was selected to carry news of the victory at Buena Vista to President James K. Polk. Crittenden then served as lieutenant colonel of the Third Kentucky Infantry in which John C. Breckinridge was major. The regiment joined General Winfield Scott's army after Mexico City was captured. Crittenden's standing with Taylor was enhanced in 1848 when his father abandoned his friend Henry Clay and helped General Taylor win the presidency. Thomas Crittenden then secured the lucrative consulship at Liverpool in 1849. Returning to Kentucky in 1853, he practiced law and engaged in business undertakings. He was appointed colonel of a volunteer Kentucky regiment in 1858, but the "Mormon War" ended before the troops could be sent to Utah.
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R. J. M. Blackett, "Chester, Thomas Morris," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00291.html.
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Chester was fiercely independent, driven by what he called "self respect and pride of race." As he told many audiences at home and abroad, he was descended from a long line of independent black men and women who had openly defied all forms of racial restrictions. In Liberia his work as editor and teacher contributed to the social and political life of Robertsport and Monrovia. In the United States he sought to push the country toward realizing the dream of full equality for all its people.
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Thomas D. Morris, "Cobb, Thomas Reade Rootes," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00174.html.
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Cobb's greatest significance lay in his work in the law. He worked, from 1849 to 1857, as the reporter for the Georgia Supreme Court. He also argued cases in that court as well as in other southern courts. He was a driving force in the creation of a law school at the University of Georgia in 1859. An often overlooked part of his legal work concerned the codification of the law of Georgia. Codification was a highly controversial legal movement resisted vigorously by those steeped in the common law. It reduced basic but flexible common law principles to the more rigid language of statutes.
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Thomas D. Morris, "Cobb, Thomas Reade Rootes," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00174.html.
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Despite his legal work Cobb is perhaps remembered more for his role in the secession of Georgia and for his contributions to the Confederacy. Cobb had been a moderate Unionist most of his life and had sought to promote the presidential aspirations of his brother Howell. By the late 1850s he had switched dramatically to become one of the most fiery supporters of secession in order to preserve the society he deemed sacred. He gave a widely circulated and influential speech to the Georgia Assembly in November 1860 in which he argued for and defended the right of secession. Separation was not only constitutional, he claimed, it was necessary because each section was made up of "a distinct people, having different social organizations, different pursuits, different memories, different hopes, different destinies." He spent the next few months speaking around Georgia, urging withdrawal from the Union. Privately he deprecated the timidity of those who wanted Georgia to secede only with other southern states, and when Georgia finally withdrew Cobb worked on the new state constitution. After he and his brother Howell were selected to serve in the provisional Confederate congress, he worked on the Confederate constitution as well.
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William J. Barber, "Dew, Thomas Roderick," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/14/14-00144.html.
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Dew gained still more notoriety in 1832 with the publication of his Review of the Debate in the Virginia Legislature, 1831-1832 (which became even more widely circulated when it was reprinted in 1852 in a collection of essays by southern writers entitled The Pro-Slavery Argument). This work was prompted by the turmoil following the Nat Turner revolt, during which some members of the Virginia legislature championed state support for gradual emancipation and deportation of slaves. Dew was harsh in his criticisms of legislators who expressed such views and defended the "peculiar institution" vigorously. In his judgment, "slavery has been, perhaps, the principal means for impelling forward the civilization of mankind." Those who sought to eliminate it might be well intentioned, but they were naive. Proposals to remove the black population through colonization in Africa and elsewhere were too expensive to be contemplated, but neither was emancipation without deportation a feasible option. Dew insisted "that the slaves, in both an economical and moral point of view, are entirely unfit for a state of freedom among whites."
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Tilden G. Edelstein, "Higginson, Thomas Wentworth," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00331.html.
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Radical action was central to Higginson's efforts. His unequivocal opposition to the fugitive slave law was evident as he participated in freeing fugitive slave Thomas Sims and participating in attacking the Boston Courthouse, where fugitive slave Anthony Burns was held. Recruiting and leading armed men to the Kansas territory after passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854), Higginson helped organize the Massachusetts Kansas Aid Committee, the militant arm of the Emigrant Aid Society. "A single day in Kansas," wrote Higginson from Lawrence, "makes the American Revolution more intelligible than all Sparks and Hildreth [historians; see Jared Sparks] can do." He praised "Old Captain John Brown . . . who has prayers every morning, and then sallies forth, with seven stalwart sons, wherever duty or danger calls, who swallows a Missourian whole and says grace after the meat" (Liberator, 16 Jan. 1857). In January 1857 he organized the Worcester Disunion Convention, which declared that abolition must be the primary goal: "peace or war is a secondary consideration" (Proceedings of the State Disunion Convention, Boston [1857], p. 18).
Higginson was one of the "Secret Six"--abolitionists who raised money for Brown's planned slave insurrection at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. Unlike some other radical abolitionists, he supported Lincoln's presidential candidacy. But his wife's poor health prevented him, at the war's outset, from joining the army. Instead, he became a man of letters, publishing frequently in the Atlantic Monthly.
Higginson was one of the "Secret Six"--abolitionists who raised money for Brown's planned slave insurrection at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. Unlike some other radical abolitionists, he supported Lincoln's presidential candidacy. But his wife's poor health prevented him, at the war's outset, from joining the army. Instead, he became a man of letters, publishing frequently in the Atlantic Monthly.
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Field, Phyllis F., "Weed, Thurlow," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01194.html.
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Abraham Lincoln made Seward his secretary of state and consulted Weed regularly on patronage matters but remained independent in his assessment of both men and issues. Weed differed with Lincoln over rejecting concessions on slavery during the secession crisis, the timing of the Emancipation Proclamation (which he felt should have been delayed until more popular with the public), and the firing of General George B. McClellan, and he was disturbed by the unpopularity of the draft. Yet during the war he helped organize recruiting in New York City, acted as a military supplier in obtaining war goods (on commission), and used his influence when called upon by the president. He claimed, for instance, to have arranged a commission for the son of James Gordon Bennett, the editor of the New York Herald, in exchange for a lessening of criticism of the administration. During the winter of 1861-1862, Weed traveled in England and France, promoting favorable press coverage of the North and advising Seward on diplomatic matters, especially the necessity of releasing James Mason and John Slidell, Confederate commissioners who had been removed from the British mail packet Trent.
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Field, Phyllis F., "Weed, Thurlow," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01194.html.
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Weed had always disliked slavery and favored its containment; he discounted southern threats of secession and saw only advantages in attacking northern compromise Democrats as prosouthern and proslavery. Thus he disliked the Compromise of 1850 and welcomed the revival of sectional issues with the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. Although eager to see antislavery Democrats and Whigs united in the new Republican party, Weed blocked its full organization in New York until Seward had been safely reelected. To reduce the new party's apparent ties to the Whigs, Weed gave up the editorship of the Evening Journal from 1855 to 1858, although he remained active behind the scenes. He discouraged Seward from seeking the Republican presidential nomination in 1856, fearing a loss. While Seward generally respected Weed's advice as astute and well meant, others were less understanding. Greeley, convinced that Weed was unfairly squelching his own ambitions for office, broke with both Seward and Weed. Former Democrats among the Republicans felt Weed favored former Whigs over them. Dissension among New York Republicans was one factor that cost Seward the presidential nomination in 1860, despite Weed's best efforts in his behalf.
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Mary Kupiec Cayton, "Transcendentalism," in The Oxford Companion to United States History, ed. Paul Boyer (2001), www.anb.org/articles/cush/e1543.html.
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As intellectuals, the transcendentalists were probably the first group in America to establish a substantial cultural presence without church or state sponsorship. Although some, like Emerson and George Ripley, began as Unitarian ministers, by the transcendental heyday of the 1840s most had left that calling for lecturing, publishing, freelance teaching and writing, or subsistence pursuits that left time free for philosophizing and writing. Both their insistence on the radical integrity of individual judgment and their reliance on new forms of disseminating their ideas secure their status as the first intellectual flowering of American democratic culture. Not that transcendentalists joined the Democratic party; most, in fact, to the extent that they were overtly political, supported the Whig party's moralistic programs of self-culture and reform. Their relationship to the marketplace, moreover, was ambivalent, as they utilized the burgeoning commercial medium of print to criticize the new economic order By the late 1850s, transcendentalism as a distinct movement had disbanded. But enough of the transcendental worldview had filtered into the popular imagination that one can say not that the movement collapsed, but rather that the culture absorbed it.
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James I. Robertson, "Ashby, Turner," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00037.html.
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Turner Ashby spent the pre-Civil War years in farming and operating a mercantile business in the village of Markham. In October 1859 abolitionist John Brown raided nearby Harpers Ferry. Ashby responded by calling together a volunteer cavalry company, to which his reputation as a horseman and community leader attracted a large, enthusiastic following. The unit was not needed; but eighteen months later, at Virginia's secession, Ashby helped to plan the state's seizure of Harpers Ferry. (He had fought secession sentiment to the end before casting his lot with the Confederacy.)
He and his company became part of Colonel Angus McDonald's Seventh Virginia Cavalry Regiment. Late in the spring of 1861, with Federal forces poised on the north bank of the Potomac River, Ashby demonstrated the daring for which he became famous. The Confederate officer disguised himself as an itinerant horse-doctor and traveled as far as Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, to get information on Union troops, positions, and planned movements. On 25 June Colonel McDonald urged his promotion and called Captain Ashby "one of the best partisan leaders in the service." The next day, Ashby's younger brother Richard was on a patrol when he was ambushed by a hostile force. When Turner Ashby found the body, all indications were that Richard had been stabbed several times after he fell to the ground. Thenceforth, Turner Ashby became a grim avenger against all Yankees. In November, Ashby became colonel of the Seventh Virginia Cavalry.
He and his company became part of Colonel Angus McDonald's Seventh Virginia Cavalry Regiment. Late in the spring of 1861, with Federal forces poised on the north bank of the Potomac River, Ashby demonstrated the daring for which he became famous. The Confederate officer disguised himself as an itinerant horse-doctor and traveled as far as Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, to get information on Union troops, positions, and planned movements. On 25 June Colonel McDonald urged his promotion and called Captain Ashby "one of the best partisan leaders in the service." The next day, Ashby's younger brother Richard was on a patrol when he was ambushed by a hostile force. When Turner Ashby found the body, all indications were that Richard had been stabbed several times after he fell to the ground. Thenceforth, Turner Ashby became a grim avenger against all Yankees. In November, Ashby became colonel of the Seventh Virginia Cavalry.
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James M. McPherson, "Grant, Ulysses S.," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00291.html.
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In mid-April 1863 Grant set in motion a campaign that won acclaim as the most brilliant of the war. Because of its high risks, Sherman and other subordinates opposed his plan, but Grant, like Robert E. Lee, was a great commander because of his willingness to take risks. He sent Union cavalry under Colonel Benjamin Grierson on a raid through Mississippi as a diversion. He ordered Union gunboats and transports under Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter to sail directly past the Vicksburg batteries to a point thirty miles south, where they could ferry the troops, who had toiled through the swamps down the west bank, across the river. Most of the fleet got through, and once across the river, Grant's army cut loose from anything resembling a base of supplies. They had to live off the country until they could fight their way back to contact with the river above Vicksburg.
Instead of driving straight north toward Vicksburg, Grant marched east toward the state capital of Jackson, where a Confederate army was being assembled by General Joseph E. Johnston. Grant then intended to turn west and invest Vicksburg, defended by another Confederate force under General John C. Pemberton. During the next three weeks Grant's men marched 130 miles, fought and won five battles against separate enemy forces that, if combined, would have nearly equaled Grant's 45,000, and penned the enemy behind the Vicksburg defenses.
Instead of driving straight north toward Vicksburg, Grant marched east toward the state capital of Jackson, where a Confederate army was being assembled by General Joseph E. Johnston. Grant then intended to turn west and invest Vicksburg, defended by another Confederate force under General John C. Pemberton. During the next three weeks Grant's men marched 130 miles, fought and won five battles against separate enemy forces that, if combined, would have nearly equaled Grant's 45,000, and penned the enemy behind the Vicksburg defenses.
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Joan E. Cashin, "Davis, Varina Howell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-00260.html.
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The secession crisis of 1860-1861 alarmed Varina Davis, as she did not wish to leave Washington and return to the South, telling her mother that the Confederacy did not have the resources to defeat the North. She apparently also had private doubts about slavery, for years later she wrote that it was absurd to fight a war to preserve it. When her husband became Confederate president, she went reluctantly to Richmond, where she became a controversial figure. Her direct manner put off many people who expected her to play a more sedate, "ladylike" role. Her opposition to secession does not seem to have been widely known, but her shrewd political remarks disturbed some politicians, who began to accuse her of manipulating the Confederate president. In fact, she had little influence over her husband, who made his own political and military decisions. She was relieved when the war ended in 1865, telling a friend that the past four years had been the worst of her life.
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Sandra Opdycke, "Minor, Virginia Louise," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00482.html.
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In 1867 she circulated a petition to the state legislature asking that a constitutional amendment that was under consideration for black male suffrage be expanded to include women. Although she obtained several hundred signatures, her request was soundly defeated. A few months later she helped organize the Woman Suffrage Association of Missouri--the first organization in the world dedicated solely to that aim. Minor served as the association's president for the next five years.
In 1869 the Missouri association organized a national suffrage convention in St. Louis. [Virginia] Minor electrified the participants with a speech asserting that women already had the right to vote since the Fourteenth Amendment (ratified the year before) had guaranteed "equal protection of the laws" to all American citizens. Suffrage, she maintained, was a privilege of citizenship. Striking a note that sometimes characterized suffragism during these years, Minor deplored the fact that a "free, moral intelligent woman, highly cultivated," who paid taxes just as a man did, should be placed below black males and naturalized foreigners and reduced to "a level with the savage"--American Indians, who also could not vote. She called on women to demand their rights in state legislatures, and if they were rejected to take their case to the Supreme Court. Her position was outlined in a set of resolutions written by her husband, which was adopted by the convention.
In 1869 the Missouri association organized a national suffrage convention in St. Louis. [Virginia] Minor electrified the participants with a speech asserting that women already had the right to vote since the Fourteenth Amendment (ratified the year before) had guaranteed "equal protection of the laws" to all American citizens. Suffrage, she maintained, was a privilege of citizenship. Striking a note that sometimes characterized suffragism during these years, Minor deplored the fact that a "free, moral intelligent woman, highly cultivated," who paid taxes just as a man did, should be placed below black males and naturalized foreigners and reduced to "a level with the savage"--American Indians, who also could not vote. She called on women to demand their rights in state legislatures, and if they were rejected to take their case to the Supreme Court. Her position was outlined in a set of resolutions written by her husband, which was adopted by the convention.
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Jerome Loving, "Whitman, Walt," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-01761.html.
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The first two years of the war are fairly blank in the Whitman biography, but he surfaces again in the fall of 1862. His younger brother, George Washington Whitman, an officer in the Fifty-first Regiment of New York Volunteers, was reported in the New York papers to have been seriously wounded in the battle of Fredericksburg in December 1862. Whitman was dispatched to Washington, D.C., by anxious family members in Brooklyn to search for his brother in the more than forty wartime hospitals. Failing to find George there, he went to the battle site to find his brother only slightly wounded. He remained in camp with his brother's regiment for more than a week and then returned to the nation's capital, escorting a group of seriously wounded and dying soldiers. Once at his destination, he felt he could not return to civilian life in New York. He remained in Washington throughout the war and beyond, worked at various government jobs, and devoted himself to cheering up sick and wounded soldiers in the hospitals. This unselfish service earned him the titles of "wound dresser" and "the Good Gray Poet," but no government pension (which Whitman later said he would have refused anyway).
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Jonathan Lurie, "Lamon, Ward Hill," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00506.html.
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By 1852 [Ward Lamon] had become the Danville law partner of Abraham Lincoln and, together with other circuit-riding attorneys, including William Herndon and David Davis, was an intimate friend of the future president. Lamon was described by Stephen Oates as a "legendary boozer, who spent much of his time in the saloon under his office, where he sang lewd and comic songs" and by David Donald as one "famous for his rendition of Southern songs, for his wide assortment of smutty jokes, for his vocabulary of profanity, and for his capacity for liquor." Lamon remained close to Lincoln until his assassination in 1865. He helped organize Lincoln's 1858 senatorial campaign against Stephen Douglas and his 1860 presidential campaign. In February 1861 Lamon undertook to serve as Lincoln's bodyguard, replete with "two revolvers, two derringers, and two large knives," as the president-elect was secretly transported to Washington prior to his inauguration.
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James Brewer Stewart, "Phillips, Wendell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00548.html.
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In the years immediately before the Civil War Phillips's oratory, not his labors for the American Anti-Slavery Society, defined his greatest significance. As the sectional crisis ran its course, he fashioned speeches that dramatized the moral imperative facing the North: people must confront the South and destroy slavery. Collected in books and widely reprinted in newspapers, Phillips's speeches, particularly those urging defiance of the 1850 Fugitive Slave Law, supporting free-soil struggles in Kansas, and praising John Brown's invasion of Harpers Ferry, gave Yankee political culture a strain of egalitarian extremism that presaged a war for slave emancipation.
The onset of the war itself magnified Phillips's stature and influence as "abolition's golden trumpet." Discarding his disunionism, he declared secession to be treason and demanded war aims that would free the slaves, cede them their former masters' lands, grant them full civil rights, furnish them with free public education, and guarantee them full manhood suffrage. Joining other Radical Republicans, Phillips grew increasingly critical of President Abraham Lincoln's reluctance to prosecute a forthright war of slave liberation, a posture that put him much at odds with Garrison and many other Lincoln supporters within the American Anti-Slavery Society.
The onset of the war itself magnified Phillips's stature and influence as "abolition's golden trumpet." Discarding his disunionism, he declared secession to be treason and demanded war aims that would free the slaves, cede them their former masters' lands, grant them full civil rights, furnish them with free public education, and guarantee them full manhood suffrage. Joining other Radical Republicans, Phillips grew increasingly critical of President Abraham Lincoln's reluctance to prosecute a forthright war of slave liberation, a posture that put him much at odds with Garrison and many other Lincoln supporters within the American Anti-Slavery Society.
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Citation:
James Brewer Stewart, "Phillips, Wendell," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00548.html.
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The Garrisonians, moreover, did not share Phillips's vision of a radically reconstructed South, and debates over these questions finally fractured the abolitionist movement. After the passage in 1865 of the Thirteenth Amendment, freeing all slaves, Garrison and his supporters declared the abolitionists' crusade a success, retired, and left Phillips as president of a much depleted American Anti-Slavery Society. For the next five years, until the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870, Phillips put nearly all of his energies into the struggle for black equality, speaking and writing on the imperative of guaranteeing former slaves the full rights and the protections of citizenship. With the passage of that amendment, Phillips finally conceded that there was little else he could do to help secure the future of African Americans living in the old Confederacy.
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Bonnie Ellen Blustein, "Hammond, William Alexander," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/12/12-00369.html.
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Hammond reenlisted six months later, at the outset of the Civil War. Still an assistant surgeon, he was soon promoted to inspector of hospitals. In April 1862 he was promoted to the post of surgeon general after intensive lobbying on his behalf by the U.S. Sanitary Commission. He gave dynamic leadership to the newly reorganized Medical Department, emphasizing centralization of authority and the pursuit of efficiency. He also used his influence to advance the cause of medical science, initiating the Army Medical Museum and the monumental Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion (1870-1883), and making books as well as instruments such as thermometers and microscopes available to medical officers. Other measures--such as increasingly stringent examinations for appointment to positions in the Medical Department, and the famous "Circular #6" of 1863 limiting the use of the common remedies calomel and tartar emetic--diminished Hammond's popularity among a large segment of the medical profession. The controversies thus engendered made it possible in 1864 for Secretary of War Edwin Stanton to have Hammond court-martialed on unrelated charges, found guilty of "conduct unbecoming an officer," and dismissed from the service.
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Edward G. Longacre, "Pemberton, John Clifford," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00068.html.
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Long in favor of enlisting African Americans, Birney supervised the recruiting of the U.S. Colored Troops (USCTs) early in 1863. With characteristic energy, he personally raised seven regiments composed of black residents of Maryland, including the inmates of slave prisons he liberated. On 22 May Birney was appointed a brigadier general of volunteers. In this capacity he was able to fulfill an oft-stated desire "to give the colored troops a fair chance of distinction in the field." He was assigned a brigade of USCTs in the Department of the South, which he commanded at Beaufort, South Carolina, and later at Jacksonville, Florida. In both locales he protected government property and Unionist citizens while conducting limited offensives with white soldiers as well as Colored Troops. His preference for the latter, however, was never in doubt; on at least one occasion he offered to trade white units for an equal numbered of USCTs.
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Glenn W. LaFantasie, "Oates, William Calvin," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00576.html.
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Oates was given command of the Fifteenth Alabama in the spring of 1863. His commission as a full colonel was delivered to Lee, but for reasons not known it was never confirmed by the Confederate Congress, which meant that technically Oates never achieved a rank higher than lieutenant colonel.... Nevertheless, the Fifteenth Alabama held Oates's loyalty and fondness, for, as he declared later in his life, "there was no better regiment in the Confederate army." At Gettysburg, on 2 July 1863, Oates was in command of his regiment for the first time in battle. On the slopes of Little Round Top, Oates and his Alabamians tried to dislodge the Union defenders of the hill, the Twentieth Maine Regiment under the command of Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain. After an hour of desperate fighting, some of it in hand-to-hand combat, Chamberlain led his troops in a bold bayonet charge that swept Oates's Confederates from the hillside. "We ran," Oates later confessed, "like a herd of wild cattle." In the rush of retreat, he had to leave behind his brother John, who had been mortally wounded in the fighting.
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William Seraile, "Craft, William," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01470.html.
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In 1841 his owner, also named Craft, mortgaged William and his sister Sarah to a Macon bank. Later, when the slaveholder could not make the payments, the bank sold the slaves at an auction. Craft's new owner permitted him to hire himself out as a carpenter, and Craft was allowed to keep earnings over $220 annually. In 1846 William married Ellen, the daughter of a slave named Maria and her owner, James Smith. Two years later William and Ellen planned their escape from slavery...Disguised as a white man traveling with a servant, the couple left Macon with a five-day pass on 21 December 1848. Besides dressing in men's clothing and cutting her hair, Ellen, who was illiterate, kept her right hand in a sling to make certain that she would not be asked for her signature. A large bandage covered one side of her face, making their pretext of traveling to see a specialist in Philadelphia believable, while green tinted glasses hid her eyes…In Baltimore a railroad clerk suspected that she was an abolitionist attempting to help a slave escape, but Ellen's believable portrayal of an arrogant, wealthy slave owner allayed his suspicions. When William and Ellen reached Philadelphia on Christmas Day, their 1,000-mile journey elated abolitionists. "No other escape, with the possible exception of Frederick Douglass' and Josiah Henson's, created such a stir in antebellum America," according to historian R. J. M. Blackett (1986, p. 87).
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Albert F. McLean, "Bryant, William Cullen," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00213.html.
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While forcefully addressing the issues of the day, Bryant and the Post spoke in a moderate voice, seeking to convince through solid reasoning and eloquence. In the years before the Civil War, Bryant supported the new Republican party and its Free Soil platform. Indeed, it was Bryant who introduced Abraham Lincoln when he gave his famous speech at Cooper Union in 1860. When Lincoln became president, the Evening Post, while being generally supportive of the administration, urged more decisiveness and vigor in the waging of the war. Bryant not only corresponded with Lincoln, but, in 1862, also joined a delegation pressing for greater military action. Upon the assassination of Lincoln, Bryant read to the bereaved New Yorkers gathered in Union Square his poem "The Death of Lincoln" (1865), which began, "Oh, slow to smite and swift to spare, / Gentle and merciful and just!"
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Phyllis F. Field, "Dennison, William," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00311.html.
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[Dennison] was an active leader in the first national Republican organizational meeting in Pittsburgh in 1856 and a prominent member of the convention that nominated John C. Frémont for president later that year. A frequent adviser on financial matters for Ohio's first Republican governor, Salmon P. Chase, Dennison was chosen in 1859 to run as his successor. Although the cool and aloof Dennison had never cultivated the common touch, he conducted a vigorous campaign, debating his opponent, Rufus Ranney, and calling in Abraham Lincoln, among others, to stump for him. He won with 51.9 percent of the popular vote.
The outbreak of the Civil War dominated Dennison's governorship. Like most northern governors, he found the task of organizing and equipping tens of thousands of volunteers an administrative nightmare. Unable to anticipate everything that might go wrong, he often had to react after disaster struck. Troops were ordered to assemble before they could be adequately quartered or fed. They suffered from disease in ill-chosen campsites. Weapons and supplies could only be found by paying exorbitant prices. Delays were inevitable but seemed intolerable to those who did not understand the difficulties. Dennison belatedly reorganized his staff, appointed George B. McClellan, who had extensive military and management experience, as major general over Ohio's volunteers, and systematized recruiting by mobilizing local elites into committees charged with organizing rallies and speakers. When he left office Ohio had met its recruitment goals and had a manpower surplus.
The outbreak of the Civil War dominated Dennison's governorship. Like most northern governors, he found the task of organizing and equipping tens of thousands of volunteers an administrative nightmare. Unable to anticipate everything that might go wrong, he often had to react after disaster struck. Troops were ordered to assemble before they could be adequately quartered or fed. They suffered from disease in ill-chosen campsites. Weapons and supplies could only be found by paying exorbitant prices. Delays were inevitable but seemed intolerable to those who did not understand the difficulties. Dennison belatedly reorganized his staff, appointed George B. McClellan, who had extensive military and management experience, as major general over Ohio's volunteers, and systematized recruiting by mobilizing local elites into committees charged with organizing rallies and speakers. When he left office Ohio had met its recruitment goals and had a manpower surplus.
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James I. Robertson, "Pender, William Dorsey," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00773.html.
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Dorsey Pender was one of the most outstanding North Carolinians in Confederate service. General A. P. Hill termed him "an excellent officer, attentive, industrious and brave." General Robert E. Lee felt that Pender's "promise and usefulness as an officer were only equaled by the purity and excellence of his private life." Later that same year, Lee paid an even higher tribute to the Carolinian. "I am gradually losing my best men," the commander wrote Jefferson Davis, beginning his list with the names "Stonewall" Jackson and Dorsey Pender.
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Chris Calkins, "Smith, William Farrar," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00728.html.
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At the outbreak of the Civil War, Smith was commissioned colonel of the Third Vermont Volunteers; he fought at First Bull Run (First Manassas) on the staff of General Irvin McDowell. On 13 August 1861 he was promoted to brigadier general of volunteers and given command of the Second Division, VI Corps, Army of the Potomac. Participating in the Peninsula campaign of spring 1862, he led his command in the battle of Williamsburg and later in the Seven Days' battles around Richmond. For his services protecting the crossing of White Oak Swamp, he was brevetted lieutenant colonel in the regular army in June. A month later (4 July) he became a major general of volunteers and was brevetted colonel in the regular army for his service at the battle of Antietam.
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Jonathan M. Atkins, "Brownlow, William Gannaway," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00165.html.
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As the question of slavery's expansion became the nation's most pressing issue, [Brownlow] championed the preservation of both slavery and the Union. A slaveowner himself, he defended slavery on biblical grounds, but at the same time he condemned advocates of secession as radical fanatics who sought to dissolve the Union merely for personal gain. With the onset of the Civil War, Brownlow, despite his devotion to slavery, chose to remain loyal to the Union. Ultimately, he accepted emancipation as a means to help to defeat the Confederacy, though he also advocated removing the freed slaves to a territory away from the white population.
Despite Tennessee's withdrawal from the Union, Brownlow continued to publish his paper and condemn the Confederacy until he was arrested and briefly imprisoned in late 1861. Released on condition that he leave the state, he in March 1862 began a speaking tour of several northern cities. This tour earned him a small fortune while making him a national symbol of Southern loyalty to the Union. On a break from this tour, Brownlow stayed at Crosswicks, New Jersey, and composed Sketches of the Rise, Progress, and Decline of Secession (1862). Better known as Parson Brownlow's Book, this publication brought him greater renown by popularizing even further his acrimonious denunciation of Confederate leaders. He returned to East Tennessee as an agent for the U.S. Treasury following the region's occupation by Federal troops in December 1863. After he had also revived his paper, he took a leading role in the movement to reestablish civil government in Tennessee in 1865.
Despite Tennessee's withdrawal from the Union, Brownlow continued to publish his paper and condemn the Confederacy until he was arrested and briefly imprisoned in late 1861. Released on condition that he leave the state, he in March 1862 began a speaking tour of several northern cities. This tour earned him a small fortune while making him a national symbol of Southern loyalty to the Union. On a break from this tour, Brownlow stayed at Crosswicks, New Jersey, and composed Sketches of the Rise, Progress, and Decline of Secession (1862). Better known as Parson Brownlow's Book, this publication brought him greater renown by popularizing even further his acrimonious denunciation of Confederate leaders. He returned to East Tennessee as an agent for the U.S. Treasury following the region's occupation by Federal troops in December 1863. After he had also revived his paper, he took a leading role in the movement to reestablish civil government in Tennessee in 1865.
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Jonathan M. Atkins, "Brownlow, William Gannaway," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00165.html.
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Brownlow…also became a champion of the new Whig party, which organized in the 1830s in opposition to Andrew Jackson and the Democratic party. In 1839 Brownlow established his first newspaper, the Tennessee Whig, to defend both religious and political truth. Published with the motto "Cry Aloud and Spare Not," the paper soon became one of Tennessee's leading Whig organs while sustaining its editor's reputation as a reckless incendiary. He relocated the paper to nearby Jonesborough (later Jonesboro) in 1840 before finally settling in 1849 in Knoxville, which became his permanent home.
Brownlow's Whiggery expressed itself most clearly in his advocacy of Henry Clay's presidential prospects. His son later recalled that the only time he saw his father weep was after he learned of Clay's defeat in the presidential election of 1844. When in 1848 the Whig National Convention bypassed Clay, Brownlow refused to support the party nominee Zachary Taylor. His recalcitrance continued into the 1852 election when he promoted Daniel Webster instead of Winfield Scott, whom the Whigs nominated in place of Millard Fillmore, the president who had signed into law the national compromise over slavery's expansion that Clay had proposed in 1850. After the demise of the national Whig party, Brownlow became one of the leading Southern advocates of the nativist Know Nothing movement.
Brownlow's Whiggery expressed itself most clearly in his advocacy of Henry Clay's presidential prospects. His son later recalled that the only time he saw his father weep was after he learned of Clay's defeat in the presidential election of 1844. When in 1848 the Whig National Convention bypassed Clay, Brownlow refused to support the party nominee Zachary Taylor. His recalcitrance continued into the 1852 election when he promoted Daniel Webster instead of Winfield Scott, whom the Whigs nominated in place of Millard Fillmore, the president who had signed into law the national compromise over slavery's expansion that Clay had proposed in 1850. After the demise of the national Whig party, Brownlow became one of the leading Southern advocates of the nativist Know Nothing movement.
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Philip R. VanderMeer, "English, William Hayden," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00218.html.
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Elected to the state house in 1851, [English] was chosen Speaker in March 1852, the youngest person to that date to hold this office and one of only a few Indiana legislators ever to be chosen Speaker during his or her first term. In that same year he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, where he remained until retiring in 1861. As a northern Democrat who was sympathetic to the South and slavery but clearly a Unionist, he obtained a degree of prominence. Serving on the House Committee on Territories, English was directly involved in the crucial issues of the era. He supported the Kansas-Nebraska Bill and was one of only seven northern Democrats to survive the 1854 election. Even more challenging was the struggle over Kansas statehood and the proslavery Lecompton constitution. As one of the House members of the congressional conference committee, English crafted a compromise bill, known as the "English Bill." The compromise resubmitted the Lecompton constitution to the voters of Kansas, ostensibly because the congressional measure offered them less land than had been originally requested but most importantly with the threat that, if the constitution were rejected, Kansas statehood would be delayed for some time. The passage of this bill further divided the Democratic party, though it was rejected by Kansas voters. English was reelected in 1858, but he chose not to run in 1860. He made a fruitless journey to the Democratic convention of that year, urging unity and the Union. When secession occurred, he denounced it, but he also declined to accept command of an army regiment.
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David L. Lightner, "Bissell, William Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00107.html.
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Throughout his six years in Congress, Bissell championed liberal land policies such as homesteads, bounties to veterans, and grants to railroads. Although in 1850 he favored the Fugitive Slave Act and other compromise measures, in 1854 he broke with his party's leadership and refused to support the Kansas-Nebraska Bill because it repealed the Missouri Compromise. In May 1854 he was incapacitated by an illness of some years' standing, probably secondary syphilis affecting the sacrum. While acutely ill, he converted secretly to his wife's Roman Catholic faith. Unable to attend the final vote on the Kansas-Nebraska Bill on 22 May (although he declared his willingness to be carried into the House on a stretcher were his presence crucial to the outcome), or to participate at all in the second session of the Thirty-third Congress, he did not seek reelection in 1854.
Because Abraham Lincoln and other founders of the Republican party of Illinois believed that only an antislavery Democrat had a prayer of leading their ticket to victory in the state elections of 1856, the party convention that met at Bloomington on 29 May unanimously nominated Bissell for governor. Despite his failed health, Bissell had declared himself available because, he said, "Slavery demands more room--more scope and verge. Shall she have it? . . . I say a thousand times, No!" Although unable to do much campaigning, he won the November election by a plurality of nearly 5,000 votes, drawing support from Democrats, Whigs, abolitionists, and (his Catholicism not being known) nativists.
Because Abraham Lincoln and other founders of the Republican party of Illinois believed that only an antislavery Democrat had a prayer of leading their ticket to victory in the state elections of 1856, the party convention that met at Bloomington on 29 May unanimously nominated Bissell for governor. Despite his failed health, Bissell had declared himself available because, he said, "Slavery demands more room--more scope and verge. Shall she have it? . . . I say a thousand times, No!" Although unable to do much campaigning, he won the November election by a plurality of nearly 5,000 votes, drawing support from Democrats, Whigs, abolitionists, and (his Catholicism not being known) nativists.
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Broeck N. Oder, "French, William Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00253.html.
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Commissioned second lieutenant in the First Artillery, French served in the Second Seminole War and the Cherokee removals in 1837-1838. Promoted to first lieutenant in 1838, French spent the next several years along the Canadian border during periods of heightened tension there. During the Mexican War, French served in diverse capacities, including aide-de-camp to Brigadier General (later president) Franklin Pierce, winning brevets to captain and major during actions at Cerro Gordo, Contreras, and Churubusco. French became a captain in 1848 and spent the next thirteen years in routine duties on the frontier, in Florida during the Third Seminole War, and on a three-officer board revising the army's manual for light artillery tactics.
The secession of Texas in February 1861 found French at Fort Duncan (Eagle Pass) with five companies of the First Artillery. The rapid collapse of Federal authority in Texas left French in a precarious position, but despite numerous difficulties, he led a combined battalion of artillery and infantry on a long march to the Gulf of Mexico and sailed for Fort Taylor at Key West, Florida, in March 1861. He vigorously suppressed secessionist stirrings there in the spring of 1861, attracting favorable notice from his superiors.
The secession of Texas in February 1861 found French at Fort Duncan (Eagle Pass) with five companies of the First Artillery. The rapid collapse of Federal authority in Texas left French in a precarious position, but despite numerous difficulties, he led a combined battalion of artillery and infantry on a long march to the Gulf of Mexico and sailed for Fort Taylor at Key West, Florida, in March 1861. He vigorously suppressed secessionist stirrings there in the spring of 1861, attracting favorable notice from his superiors.
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Walter F. Pratt, "Herndon, William Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/11/11-00408.html.
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Herndon read law with Lincoln and his partner, Stephen T. Logan. Lincoln and Herndon became law partners almost immediately after Herndon was admitted to the Illinois bar in December 1844. Their partnership lasted until 1861 when Lincoln left for Washington to become president. During those seventeen years, Herndon complemented Lincoln in almost every way—a Democratic newspaper would later describe him as “Lincoln’s Man Friday.” Herndon was the office manager, attending to the details Lincoln disliked; he tended to stay in Springfield while Lincoln rode circuit; he favored philosophical discourse while Lincoln preferred an earthy anecdote. It is difficult to specify Herndon’s influences on Lincoln; theirs was a relationship that drew its closeness from daily contact, not from singular conversations. Herndon himself would later describe their partnership as one in which he did the reading while Lincoln did the thinking.
Herndon was active in Illinois politics in his own right, and later on behalf of Lincoln. Initially, he was a Whig, concerned about the underprivileged, slaves, and women. He was a staunch advocate of temperance, in spite of his own later problems with excessive drinking. As mayor of Springfield in 1854 he supported the beginning of a public school system and local prohibition, being so strongly in favor of temperance that he was not reelected. He moved to the Republican party in 1856, which he supported with great public enthusiasm though he had private doubts about the choice of John C. Frémont as its presidential candidate.
Herndon was active in Illinois politics in his own right, and later on behalf of Lincoln. Initially, he was a Whig, concerned about the underprivileged, slaves, and women. He was a staunch advocate of temperance, in spite of his own later problems with excessive drinking. As mayor of Springfield in 1854 he supported the beginning of a public school system and local prohibition, being so strongly in favor of temperance that he was not reelected. He moved to the Republican party in 1856, which he supported with great public enthusiasm though he had private doubts about the choice of John C. Frémont as its presidential candidate.
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Daniel W. Crofts, "Seward, William Henry," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00898.html.
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Seward and Lincoln were the two most important leaders spawned by the intersection of antebellum idealism and partisan politics. Lincoln, of course, will always overshadow Seward. Before 1860, however, Seward eclipsed Lincoln. Seward was governor of New York while Lincoln toiled in the Illinois legislature; Seward was the most prominent antislavery leader in the U.S. Senate when Lincoln's national stature, such as it was, resulted from a strong but losing Senate race. The war that Seward did his utmost to prevent bound together the oddly juxtaposed duo. At once fulfilling the most explosive promise of the liberal reform agenda and at the same time shattering hopes that moral suasion and enlightened amelioration could propel the engines of political change, war taught Lincoln and Seward that all ultimately depended on having stronger, more durable armies. The would-be "peacemaker," memorably celebrated during the secession crisis by the Quaker poet John Greenleaf Whittier, had to protect from foreign interference a Union war effort that employed unlimited violence to destroy the slave system. Perhaps fittingly, Seward remained ambivalent about his legacy.
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E. Stanly Godbold, "Thomas, William Holland," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01398.html.
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The Civil War broke Thomas physically, mentally, and financially. The erratic behavior and occasional violent outbursts that his contemporaries noted before the war became so serious that in 1867 his wife committed him to the state asylum in Raleigh. For the rest of his life, with short exceptions, Thomas lived in hospitals for the mentally ill. Ironically, from his hospital room Thomas made one final and very significant contribution to his Cherokee people. Visited at the Western Insane Asylum in Morganton in 1890 by James Mooney, a young ethnologist from the Smithsonian Institution, Thomas told the full story of his life among the Indians and provided intimate information about their culture. He died at the asylum three years later. Although Mooney drew the information he used in his Myths of the Cherokee (1900) from many other sources, much of their important culture and history might have been lost without Thomas's contribution. The Eastern Band of Cherokees would not have continued to exist in North Carolina had it not been for the work of Thomas, and his dream for the economic development of western North Carolina was embraced by subsequent generations who pushed it to success.
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Norman B. Ferris, "Dayton, William Lewis," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00305.html.
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Reelected by the New Jersey legislature in 1845 for a full six-year term, Dayton was a senator until March 1851. His contributions to the legislation of this era were few, partly because his party was out of power much of the time and partly because of his cautious, self-effacing nature and his insistence on remaining politically independent, refusing to act against his personal convictions under pressure from leaders of the legislature, to which he was beholden for his Senate seat. Eschewing notoriety, he was esteemed more for his quiet common sense than for oratorical eloquence or vision.
On one issue Dayton stood out among his fellow senators. At a time when it would have been politically expedient in New Jersey, the northern state most sympathetic to the South's "peculiar institution," to refrain from antislavery pronouncements, Dayton voted against making war on Mexico as a way of expanding slave territory, supported the Wilmont Proviso excluding slavery from the lands acquired from Mexico, opposed the admission of Texas as a slave state, and spoke vehemently against the Compromise of 1850 as enhancing the power of slavery.
On one issue Dayton stood out among his fellow senators. At a time when it would have been politically expedient in New Jersey, the northern state most sympathetic to the South's "peculiar institution," to refrain from antislavery pronouncements, Dayton voted against making war on Mexico as a way of expanding slave territory, supported the Wilmont Proviso excluding slavery from the lands acquired from Mexico, opposed the admission of Texas as a slave state, and spoke vehemently against the Compromise of 1850 as enhancing the power of slavery.
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James Brewer Stewart, "Garrison, William Lloyd," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00256.html.
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Throughout the 1840s and 1850s, as the political crisis over slavery's westward expansion deepened, Garrison's espousals of northern disunion, nonresistance, woman's rights, and anticlericalism satisfied his own prophetic purity but left him and his supporters largely removed from the political events that were leading to civil war. At the same time, the term "Garrisonianism" also came to embody the most dangerous tendencies in Yankee political culture, not only for slaveholders but for those who valued the Union above all else. On 4 July 1854, when Garrison burned a copy of the U.S. Constitution, his flamboyant gesture only confirmed a generalized fear of New England extremism that had become commonplace in antebellum political culture. Only after John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry in 1859 did Garrison begin to retreat from his nonresistant positions, and only after Abraham Lincoln's election in 1860 did he begin to affirm that the Union deserved preserving in the face of southern moves toward secession.
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James Brewer Stewart, "Garrison, William Lloyd," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00256.html.
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December 1833…leading northern abolitionists convened in Philadelphia to inaugurate the American Anti-Slavery Society. This organization was designed as a national body that would stimulate the creation of abolitionist societies across the North and win support for immediate emancipation. Its founding members, a profile of the larger crusade against slavery, included New York City religious evangelicals such as the Tappan brothers, Joshua Leavitt, and William Jay, Unitarian radicals such as Samuel Sewall and Samuel May, Quakers like John Greenleaf Whittier and Lucretia Mott, and free African Americans such as Robert Purvis and James McCrummell.
Garrison's contribution to the launching of this biracial, gender-inclusive organization was his authorship of the society's Declaration of Sentiments, which stressed nonviolence. While condemning the slaveholder as a "manstealer," the Declaration announced unshakable opposition to colonization, to all laws upholding slavery, and to all customs and attitudes that enforced racial prejudice…
To accomplish these formidable tasks, the Declaration also urged abolitionists to found newspapers and antislavery societies, launch petition campaigns, send speakers into the countryside, and challenge the moral sensibilities of slaveholders by appeals through the various religious denominations. Through this broad-based program of "moral suasion," as the abolitionists called it, the aim was peacefully to transform public opinion in favor of freeing the slaves and obliterating racial prejudice. While to most white Americans Garrison's Declaration reeked of fanaticism by proposing to transform three million slaves into equal citizens, to later generations it has come to represent a landmark of democratic aspiration.
Garrison's contribution to the launching of this biracial, gender-inclusive organization was his authorship of the society's Declaration of Sentiments, which stressed nonviolence. While condemning the slaveholder as a "manstealer," the Declaration announced unshakable opposition to colonization, to all laws upholding slavery, and to all customs and attitudes that enforced racial prejudice…
To accomplish these formidable tasks, the Declaration also urged abolitionists to found newspapers and antislavery societies, launch petition campaigns, send speakers into the countryside, and challenge the moral sensibilities of slaveholders by appeals through the various religious denominations. Through this broad-based program of "moral suasion," as the abolitionists called it, the aim was peacefully to transform public opinion in favor of freeing the slaves and obliterating racial prejudice. While to most white Americans Garrison's Declaration reeked of fanaticism by proposing to transform three million slaves into equal citizens, to later generations it has come to represent a landmark of democratic aspiration.
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J. Mills Thornton, "Yancey, William Lowndes," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-01080.html.
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The election of Abraham Lincoln in November convinced Yancey that the time had arrived for immediate secession. He was elected to represent Montgomery County in the secession convention and was appointed chair of the committee that drafted the ordinance of secession. When the Confederacy was organized in February 1861, President Jefferson Davis nominated him together with Pierre A. Rost-Denis and A. Dudley Mann as a delegation to present the South's case to the European powers. Yancey arrived in London on 29 April and spent the next year vainly seeking diplomatic recognition for the new government. In November 1861 the Alabama legislature unanimously elected Yancey to the Confederate Senate. He then resigned his diplomatic mission and managed to return to the Confederacy via Havana and New Orleans. He took his senate seat on 27 March 1862.
Yancey soon became a leading states' rights opponent of the nationalistic Davis administration. He sought extensive exemptions from the Conscription Act and proposed the highly unpopular exemption of an overseer on every plantation with twenty or more slaves whose owner was absent. He fought to restrict the army's impressment of goods, and he strongly opposed allowing the Confederate Supreme Court to hear appeals from state supreme courts. During the debate on the bill to create the Supreme Court, in February 1863, he became involved in a violent encounter with Senator Benjamin Hill of Georgia on the senate floor and suffered injuries that forced him to absent himself for several days.
Yancey soon became a leading states' rights opponent of the nationalistic Davis administration. He sought extensive exemptions from the Conscription Act and proposed the highly unpopular exemption of an overseer on every plantation with twenty or more slaves whose owner was absent. He fought to restrict the army's impressment of goods, and he strongly opposed allowing the Confederate Supreme Court to hear appeals from state supreme courts. During the debate on the bill to create the Supreme Court, in February 1863, he became involved in a violent encounter with Senator Benjamin Hill of Georgia on the senate floor and suffered injuries that forced him to absent himself for several days.
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Lewis L. Gould, "McKinley, William," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00507.html.
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When the Civil War began, McKinley was the first man in Poland, Ohio, to volunteer. He joined the Twenty-third Ohio Infantry, which was commanded by Rutherford B. Hayes. During the fighting at Antietam in 1862, McKinley displayed bravery in combat when he brought food and coffee to his regiment under heavy enemy fire. He was promoted to second lieutenant and finished the war with the brevet rank of major. During his entire political career, he was known as "Major" McKinley.
After the war, McKinley worked in the law office of Judge Charles E. Glidden of Youngstown, Ohio, and spent some time at the Albany Law School in New York. Admitted to the Ohio bar in 1867, he opened a practice in Canton, Ohio, where he maintained a home until his death.
After the war, McKinley worked in the law office of Judge Charles E. Glidden of Youngstown, Ohio, and spent some time at the Albany Law School in New York. Admitted to the Ohio bar in 1867, he opened a practice in Canton, Ohio, where he maintained a home until his death.
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Lex Renda, "Pennington, William," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00775.html.
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When Congress assembled in December 1859, Pennington's reputation as a moderate propelled him once again. After a protracted struggle, in which Republicans and antiadministration Democrats could not agree on a House Speaker, Pennington was selected on the forty-fourth ballot. The Speaker's routine importance was magnified by the worsening relations between northern and southern representatives. Contemporaries credited the elder statesman for maintaining, as much as possible, decorum and order in a volatile congressional session, which featured congressmen armed with weapons. Historians have been harsher in their judgment, citing his refusal to appoint a sufficient number of northern Democrats and moderate Republicans (as opposed to the abundance of southern Democrats and more radical Republicans he did appoint) to the "Committee of 33," which during the secession crisis unsuccessfully sought to devise a plan to save the Union.
In 1860 Pennington narrowly lost his reelection bid with 49.4 percent of the votes cast. In a pattern repeated elsewhere in the northern part of the state, the bulk of antiadministration Democrats, who had bolted from their party in 1858, returned to the fold, fearing the consequences for the Union of a Republican victory.
In 1860 Pennington narrowly lost his reelection bid with 49.4 percent of the votes cast. In a pattern repeated elsewhere in the northern part of the state, the bulk of antiadministration Democrats, who had bolted from their party in 1858, returned to the fold, fearing the consequences for the Union of a Republican victory.
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Michael Perman, "Fessenden, William Pitt," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00371.html.
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Although not an abolitionist like his controversial father, Fessenden disliked slavery and opposed its expansion. He very soon actively organized the Anti-Nebraska coalition in Maine and, in the summer of 1855, quit the Whig party to join the Republicans, "that great Northern movement which I believe to be essential to the future welfare of the country" (Jellison, p. 86). As a leading Republican in the Senate, Fessenden was in the forefront of the struggle to make Kansas a free state, and in the process he became Stephen Douglas's nemesis, forever challenging him in debate. Indeed, Douglas was forced to concede that, among the great orators of the mid-nineteenth century, such as Henry Clay, John C. Calhoun, and Webster, Fessenden was "the readiest and ablest debater" (Jellison, p. 95). In 1857 Fessenden contracted a form of malaria, and his health remained poor the rest of his life. In addition, his wife died in 1857. As a result of his prominent role in the forensic wrangling over the Lecompton constitution and his work on the Finance Committee, Fessenden was reelected in 1859 by a heavily Republican Maine legislature. After Abraham Lincoln's election, Fessenden was one of the most adamant Republicans in urging the administration to stand firm against southern threats to secede. Even after his state selected him to attend the Washington Peace Conference at Willard's Hotel in February 1861, he was so unwilling to consider concessions that he refused to attend.
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Michael Perman, "Fessenden, William Pitt," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00371.html.
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As the new chair of the Finance Committee, Fessenden played a large part in the financing of the war. A conservative in financial matters, he believed in hard money and in a "pay as you go" approach to raising cash for the war effort. Initially he raised the level of duty in the Morrill Tariff of 1860 to generate specie through increased customs receipts. He hoped to increase revenues still further through taxation, especially on personal incomes, but Salmon P. Chase, the secretary of the treasury, preferred to rely on other means…Chase relied on loans financed by government bonds and Treasury bills; on legal tender notes, paper money called "greenbacks"; and on a new national banking system. Fearing that the national banks would destroy the existing state banks and the "greenbacks" and the loans would produce massive inflation, Fessenden nevertheless helped to enact Chase's proposals. He tried constantly to rein in the amounts requested that would be inflationary and encouraged greater reliance on revenue from customs duties and taxation. Meanwhile, on the war itself, Fessenden supported the creation of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War and fretted over the lack of aggressiveness of the administration and its generals. Although he was a member of the Republican caucus delegation that met with Lincoln in December 1862 to complain that he was getting poor military advice from his cabinet, he refused to join the radicals in the party in demanding confiscation and emancipation.
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Richmond L. Clow, "Harney, William Selby," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00316.html.
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In June 1846, as the nation moved toward war with Mexico, Harney became colonel and commander of the Second Dragoons. When hostilities began, the headstrong commander conducted an unauthorized expedition into Mexico from Texas, and General Winfield Scott ordered Harney to surrender most of his command to a subordinate. Harney subsequently defied Scott by retaking command. Scott then ordered a court-martial, which convicted Harney of disobedience and ordered him to apologize to Scott. After the trial, however, Harney retaliated by using political channels to obtain a reprimand against Scott from Secretary of War W. L. Marcy.
Harney served with distinction during the march to Mexico City. He captured Cerro Gordo, a hill overlooking the road to Mexico City, and turned Mexican guns on the retreating enemy. During the siege of Mexico City, he busied himself by guarding prisoners and hanging American deserters.
Harney served with distinction during the march to Mexico City. He captured Cerro Gordo, a hill overlooking the road to Mexico City, and turned Mexican guns on the retreating enemy. During the siege of Mexico City, he busied himself by guarding prisoners and hanging American deserters.
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Edward G. Longacre, "Rosecrans, William Starke," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00676.html.
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Despite the animosities he had engendered, Rosecrans parlayed his success at Corinth into command of the 99,000-man Army of the Ohio. He joined his force at Louisville on 30 October, renamed it the Army of the Cumberland, and strove to rejuvenate it after months of debilitating service in Tennessee and Kentucky. Within a few months, Rosecrans had resupplied every arm of his command, had upgraded the officer corps, and had improved unit training. Such actions raised the army's morale as well as its readiness and won "Old Rosy" the esteem and affection of the rank and file.
Rosecrans tested his revival program in late December, when he belatedly heeded War Department orders to challenge General Braxton Bragg's army in Middle Tennessee. On the last day of the year Rosecrans moved to strike Bragg's right flank across Stones River, near Murfreesboro, only to find his own right under attack. Refusing to panic, Rosecrans recalled his assault column and shored up his embattled flank. Despite teetering on the brink of defeat throughout the day, the Army of the Cumberland held on; two days later it survived a heavy assault against its left, forcing Bragg to abandon his strategic position. The victory made Rosecrans the most celebrated commander in the Union. He received the thanks of Congress, a brevet major generalship in the regular army, and highly placed offers of support should he seek political office. Abraham Lincoln personally thanked him for salvaging a victory, when "had there been a defeat instead, the Nation could scarcely have lived over."
Rosecrans tested his revival program in late December, when he belatedly heeded War Department orders to challenge General Braxton Bragg's army in Middle Tennessee. On the last day of the year Rosecrans moved to strike Bragg's right flank across Stones River, near Murfreesboro, only to find his own right under attack. Refusing to panic, Rosecrans recalled his assault column and shored up his embattled flank. Despite teetering on the brink of defeat throughout the day, the Army of the Cumberland held on; two days later it survived a heavy assault against its left, forcing Bragg to abandon his strategic position. The victory made Rosecrans the most celebrated commander in the Union. He received the thanks of Congress, a brevet major generalship in the regular army, and highly placed offers of support should he seek political office. Abraham Lincoln personally thanked him for salvaging a victory, when "had there been a defeat instead, the Nation could scarcely have lived over."
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Larry Gara, "Still, William," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00657.html.
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Still's book, The Underground Railroad (1872), was unique. The only work on that subject written by an African American, it was also the only day-by-day record of the workings of a vigilance committee. While he gave credit to "the grand little army of abolitionists," he put the spotlight on the fugitives themselves, saying "the race had no more eloquent advocates than its own self-emancipated champions." Besides recording their courageous deeds, Still hoped that the book would demonstrate the intellectual ability of his race. Along with the records of slave escapes he included excerpts from newspapers, legal documents, correspondence of abolitionists and former slaves, and some biographical sketches. He published the book himself and sent out agents to sell it. The book went into three editions and was exhibited at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition in 1876.
Although he had not suffered personally under slavery, Still faced discrimination throughout his life and was determined to work for improved race relations. His concern about civil rights in the North led him in 1859 to write a letter to the press, which started a campaign to end racial discrimination on Philadelphia streetcars, where African Americans were permitted only on the unsheltered platforms. Eight years later the campaign met success when the Pennsylvania legislature enacted a law making such discrimination illegal. In 1861 he helped organize and finance the Pennsylvania Civil, Social, and Statistical Association to collect data about the freed slaves and to press for universal suffrage.
Although he had not suffered personally under slavery, Still faced discrimination throughout his life and was determined to work for improved race relations. His concern about civil rights in the North led him in 1859 to write a letter to the press, which started a campaign to end racial discrimination on Philadelphia streetcars, where African Americans were permitted only on the unsheltered platforms. Eight years later the campaign met success when the Pennsylvania legislature enacted a law making such discrimination illegal. In 1861 he helped organize and finance the Pennsylvania Civil, Social, and Statistical Association to collect data about the freed slaves and to press for universal suffrage.
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John F. Marszalek, "Sherman, William Tecumseh," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00706.html.
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[William] Sherman came out of the war with the success he had always craved. He enjoyed his popularity but wanted only to go back to the army and society as he remembered them before secession. However, the war had changed the United States, and the Reconstruction following the war was a difficult time. Sherman supported the old-line leaders in the South. Though he knew slavery was dead, he thought that the freed people should be kept in a subordinate status. When Andrew Johnson tried to use him in his battle with Congress, Sherman refused to become involved, insisting that the only answer to the imbroglio was a return to the prewar years.
When [Ulysses S.] Grant became president in 1869, Sherman succeeded him as commanding general, a post he was to keep until his retirement. He found the job frustrating. Grant did not support him in his battle with the secretary of war over command jurisdiction, causing a rupture in their friendship that was never totally healed. He was regularly upset as Congress continually cut army strength and military salaries. Politicians ignored his military counsel, even when it came to waging the difficult American Indian wars. As a result, Sherman left Washington whenever he could, spending a year on tour in Europe and the Middle East (1871-1872) and another eighteen months (1874-1876) in St. Louis. He particularly enjoyed visiting the West, and in 1879 he received a friendly welcome when he revisited scenes of his wartime exploits in the South.
When [Ulysses S.] Grant became president in 1869, Sherman succeeded him as commanding general, a post he was to keep until his retirement. He found the job frustrating. Grant did not support him in his battle with the secretary of war over command jurisdiction, causing a rupture in their friendship that was never totally healed. He was regularly upset as Congress continually cut army strength and military salaries. Politicians ignored his military counsel, even when it came to waging the difficult American Indian wars. As a result, Sherman left Washington whenever he could, spending a year on tour in Europe and the Middle East (1871-1872) and another eighteen months (1874-1876) in St. Louis. He particularly enjoyed visiting the West, and in 1879 he received a friendly welcome when he revisited scenes of his wartime exploits in the South.
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Joseph A. Stout, Jr., "Walker, William," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01068.html.
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Walker's government in Nicaragua was short-lived. He involved himself in an attempt to take over the Accessory Transit Company…. He chose the losing side in his support of this takeover effort and thus became the target of Cornelius Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt maintained control of the company and then set about obtaining the cooperation of Central American republics to overthrow Walker's regime. … With the specific assistance of Costa Rica, Walker's supply routes to the United States were severed, making his military defeat easy.
On 1 May 1857 Walker surrendered to U.S. naval authorities off the coast of Nicaragua. Walker's support from the U.S. government as well as some special groups had eroded since he had become the president of Nicaragua. In June 1857 the frigate Wabash arrived at New York with 138 survivors of Walker's party, including thirteen women and five children. These refugees were in wretched condition and bitterly criticized Walker for deserting his followers in their desperate situation. Walker was in New York when their complaints appeared in the newspapers, but he chose not to answer the charges. By November Walker had returned to the United States and was once again plotting to return to Nicaragua. Shortly thereafter Walker attempted to lead another group of men to Nicaragua, but U.S. naval authorities intercepted him and forced his return to the United States. President James Buchanan in an address to Congress during December 1857 struck out against filibusters as being detrimental to U.S. interests.
On 1 May 1857 Walker surrendered to U.S. naval authorities off the coast of Nicaragua. Walker's support from the U.S. government as well as some special groups had eroded since he had become the president of Nicaragua. In June 1857 the frigate Wabash arrived at New York with 138 survivors of Walker's party, including thirteen women and five children. These refugees were in wretched condition and bitterly criticized Walker for deserting his followers in their desperate situation. Walker was in New York when their complaints appeared in the newspapers, but he chose not to answer the charges. By November Walker had returned to the United States and was once again plotting to return to Nicaragua. Shortly thereafter Walker attempted to lead another group of men to Nicaragua, but U.S. naval authorities intercepted him and forced his return to the United States. President James Buchanan in an address to Congress during December 1857 struck out against filibusters as being detrimental to U.S. interests.
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R. J. M. Blackett, "Brown, William Wells," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-00098.html.
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In January 1834 Brown made another, this time successful, attempt to escape, crossing the Ohio River to Cincinnati and on to Cleveland…During his years in Cleveland, Brown worked as a boatman on Lake Erie and was an active member of the local Underground Railroad, ferrying fugitives across the lake to Canada. He was also active in local and regional abolitionist associations and the Negro Convention Movement. He was employed as a lecturing agent by the Western New York Anti-Slavery Society in 1843 and later in a similar position by the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. These agencies aimed to spread the abolitionist message throughout the state, in small towns and hamlets, in an attempt to persuade their listeners to join the anti-slavery cause. By the latter part of the decade, he had become a major figure in the American abolitionist movement.
Brown's Narrative of William W. Brown, a Fugitive Slave, Written by Himself was published in 1847 and became an immediate bestseller; 3,000 copies of the first edition were sold in six months. The book went through four editions in two years with sales of 10,000 copies. Brown's rise to prominence in abolitionist circles and the success of his book led to his appointment as a delegate to the Peace Congress in Paris in 1849. Presided over by French author Victor Hugo, the congress was attended by 800 delegates…After the meeting, Brown went to London, where he spent the next five years working to win British support for the American abolitionist movement.
Brown's Narrative of William W. Brown, a Fugitive Slave, Written by Himself was published in 1847 and became an immediate bestseller; 3,000 copies of the first edition were sold in six months. The book went through four editions in two years with sales of 10,000 copies. Brown's rise to prominence in abolitionist circles and the success of his book led to his appointment as a delegate to the Peace Congress in Paris in 1849. Presided over by French author Victor Hugo, the congress was attended by 800 delegates…After the meeting, Brown went to London, where he spent the next five years working to win British support for the American abolitionist movement.
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E. C. Bearss, "Loring, William Wing," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00450.html.
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Loring returned to the United States in the winter of 1860-1861, and on 22 March 1861 he was named to command the Department of New Mexico. He did not sympathize with the secession, but, believing in states' rights, he resigned his commission on 13 May 1861, and traveled east to offer his service to the Confederacy. President Jefferson Davis, familiar with Loring's distinguished record, had him named brigadier general to rank from 20 May 1861.
After the death of Brigadier General Robert Garnett in the engagement at Corrick's Ford, Loring was named on 20 July to command the northwestern army and charged with the defense of the western approaches to the Shenandoah Valley. Within a week of Loring's arrival on site, he was joined at Huntersville by General Robert E. Lee. Loring had higher rank than Lee in the "old army" and had led troops into battle in Mexico when Lee was a staffer. The two officers did not work well together, and the Confederates, plagued by heavy rains and rugged terrain, botched Lee's ambitious plans to rout the enemy from Cheat Mountain and recover the Tygart Valley (10-17 Sept.).
After the death of Brigadier General Robert Garnett in the engagement at Corrick's Ford, Loring was named on 20 July to command the northwestern army and charged with the defense of the western approaches to the Shenandoah Valley. Within a week of Loring's arrival on site, he was joined at Huntersville by General Robert E. Lee. Loring had higher rank than Lee in the "old army" and had led troops into battle in Mexico when Lee was a staffer. The two officers did not work well together, and the Confederates, plagued by heavy rains and rugged terrain, botched Lee's ambitious plans to rout the enemy from Cheat Mountain and recover the Tygart Valley (10-17 Sept.).
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William C. Harris, "Holden, William Woods," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00776.html.
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Holden organized the Constitutional Union party in the state that in February 1861 defeated the secessionist effort to call a convention that could take the state out of the Union. In the brief campaign Holden warned that secession "would end in civil war, in military despotism, and in the destruction of slave property. Let us give the Northern people time. . . . The Constitution will be restored, and Mr. Lincoln and his party will be hurled from power in 1864." The fighting at Fort Sumter and Lincoln's call for troops to suppress the rebellion in April, however, caused Holden to reverse his position and call on North Carolinians to resist Lincoln's "gross usurpation" of power. As a delegate to the state convention in May, he voted for the ordinance that took North Carolina out of the Union and into the Confederacy.
Hardly had the war begun when Holden began to criticize state authorities and the Jefferson Davis administration for discriminating against old Union party men in their military appointments and for suppressing North Carolina liberties. The fall of a large area of coastal North Carolina to federal forces and the adoption of conscription by the Richmond government in early 1862 gave Holden additional ammunition to use against Confederate authorities. He soon organized the Conservative party, secured the nomination of young Zebulon B. Vance for governor, and through the columns of the Standard led the new party to victory at the polls.
Hardly had the war begun when Holden began to criticize state authorities and the Jefferson Davis administration for discriminating against old Union party men in their military appointments and for suppressing North Carolina liberties. The fall of a large area of coastal North Carolina to federal forces and the adoption of conscription by the Richmond government in early 1862 gave Holden additional ammunition to use against Confederate authorities. He soon organized the Conservative party, secured the nomination of young Zebulon B. Vance for governor, and through the columns of the Standard led the new party to victory at the polls.
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Richard E. Beringer, "Oldham, Williamson Simpson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00753.html.
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[Williamson] Oldham supported the Confederacy to the last, but he strongly disagreed with many of the policies of Confederate president Jefferson Davis, notably suspension of the writ of habeas corpus and conscription, because he feared the unconstitutional expansion of the power of the central government. Conscription required some sort of exemption system, but to Oldham that too was an imposition on state sovereignty. He also opposed legislation in March 1862 that would place acreage restrictions on the planting of cotton in order to encourage production of foodstuffs. Oldham's ideas were so extreme that one historian asserts, "He could not understand the meaning of 'military necessity' " (King, p. 127).
Except for measures that he feared would strengthen the central government at the expense of the states, however, Oldham was willing to resort to any action that would bring victory. Among the extreme measures he favored were arson attacks on New York City and, contrary to other accounts, the enlistment of slave soldiers. He admitted that arson was not in accord with civilized warfare but asserted that it was acceptable "against savages who discard the moral code recognized by all civilized nations" (Oldham, "Last Days of the Confederacy," De Bow's Review, Sept. 1870, p. 741).
Except for measures that he feared would strengthen the central government at the expense of the states, however, Oldham was willing to resort to any action that would bring victory. Among the extreme measures he favored were arson attacks on New York City and, contrary to other accounts, the enlistment of slave soldiers. He admitted that arson was not in accord with civilized warfare but asserted that it was acceptable "against savages who discard the moral code recognized by all civilized nations" (Oldham, "Last Days of the Confederacy," De Bow's Review, Sept. 1870, p. 741).
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Graham Alexander Peck, "Shannon, Wilson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00901.html.
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In 1849, infected with gold fever, [Wilson Shannon] organized and financed an expedition of sixty "Argonauts" to California. Sacramento yielded no riches, and he returned to Ohio in 1851. Persuaded to run for Congress in 1852, he won easily and voted for the Kansas-Nebraska Bill in 1854, basing his decision on adherence to party, commitment to popular sovereignty, and diffidence to slavery's expansion.
Trouble began in Kansas almost immediately. Although territorial governor Andrew Reeder guaranteed fair elections, Missourian "border ruffians" illegally elected a proslavery territorial legislature in March 1855. Reeder begged President Franklin Pierce to uphold popular sovereignty, but the president cashiered him, replacing him with Shannon on 10 August 1855. Although well-meaning, Shannon erred by aligning with proslavery forces upon arrival. On 1 September he declared publicly that the territorial legislature was legal and that he would enforce its decrees. Inaccurately reporting that Shannon had advocated slavery in Kansas, antislavery journalist James Redpath dealt a devastating blow to Shannon's prestige. However, the proslavery tint to Shannon's policies was unmistakable, and he did consider opposition to established territorial law to be revolutionary. In response to free-state settlers' repudiation of the "bogus" legislature and their determination to elect their own government, Shannon on 14 November chaired the proslavery "law and order" convention, which pledged to "crush" the traitors.
Trouble began in Kansas almost immediately. Although territorial governor Andrew Reeder guaranteed fair elections, Missourian "border ruffians" illegally elected a proslavery territorial legislature in March 1855. Reeder begged President Franklin Pierce to uphold popular sovereignty, but the president cashiered him, replacing him with Shannon on 10 August 1855. Although well-meaning, Shannon erred by aligning with proslavery forces upon arrival. On 1 September he declared publicly that the territorial legislature was legal and that he would enforce its decrees. Inaccurately reporting that Shannon had advocated slavery in Kansas, antislavery journalist James Redpath dealt a devastating blow to Shannon's prestige. However, the proslavery tint to Shannon's policies was unmistakable, and he did consider opposition to established territorial law to be revolutionary. In response to free-state settlers' repudiation of the "bogus" legislature and their determination to elect their own government, Shannon on 14 November chaired the proslavery "law and order" convention, which pledged to "crush" the traitors.
Type: Description
Citation:
Graham Alexander Peck, "Shannon, Wilson," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00901.html.
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In April 1844 [Wilson Shannon] resigned the [Ohio] governorship after President John Tyler nominated him as minister plenipotentiary to Mexico.
The Mexican government refused to recognize the independence of Texas and insisted that its annexation by the United States would constitute a declaration of war. Undeterred, Secretary of State John C. Calhoun armed Shannon with instructions denying Mexico's claim to Texas and later had Shannon warn the Mexicans against attempting to reconquer Texas. When the Mexican foreign minister charged the U.S. government with conspiratorially abetting Texas's treasonable revolt, Shannon demanded a retraction. After several bitter exchanges, Shannon precipitously suspended diplomatic relations. From November 1844 to May 1845, during which time Texas was annexed by a joint congressional resolution, the United States had no official communication with Mexico. President James K. Polk dismissed Shannon in March 1845 but could not rescind his tactlessness.
The Mexican government refused to recognize the independence of Texas and insisted that its annexation by the United States would constitute a declaration of war. Undeterred, Secretary of State John C. Calhoun armed Shannon with instructions denying Mexico's claim to Texas and later had Shannon warn the Mexicans against attempting to reconquer Texas. When the Mexican foreign minister charged the U.S. government with conspiratorially abetting Texas's treasonable revolt, Shannon demanded a retraction. After several bitter exchanges, Shannon precipitously suspended diplomatic relations. From November 1844 to May 1845, during which time Texas was annexed by a joint congressional resolution, the United States had no official communication with Mexico. President James K. Polk dismissed Shannon in March 1845 but could not rescind his tactlessness.
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Richard E. Beringer, "Scott, Winfield," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00890.html.
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Ever ambitious, eager to grasp another honor, and jealous of his rank and fame, Scott was vain and dogmatic. He was always ready to write a letter when he took offense at some fancied insult. According to one of his biographers, he was generous and outgoing and possessed a "constitutional inability to nurse a grudge" (Elliott, p. 648). He was also an extremely effective commander, most notably in the Mexican War. Timothy Dwight Johnson, however, believes that Scott had a deep "streak of meanness and selfishness" and that his "ambition fed his arrogance and, in turn, his arrogance fed his ambition" (Johnson, pp. 4-5). This judgment is probably too harsh, for there is evidence that Scott could be forgiving and merciful. His concern for his soldiers, as in the cholera epidemic of 1832 or his desire for an asylum, went far beyond the normal obligation of a commanding general.
Scott, an Episcopalian, read the Bible often. He was well read and had a library of books on military subjects that was always with him. His reading was a mark of Scott's professionalism, as were his efforts to institutionalize such military skills as tactical training, camp sanitation, organization, and regularized procedure. Scott was responsible for much of the professionalization of the army between the War of 1812 and the Civil War, but his professionalism was limited by his narrow perspectives. His ideas were European in origin and did not fit frontier realities.
Scott, an Episcopalian, read the Bible often. He was well read and had a library of books on military subjects that was always with him. His reading was a mark of Scott's professionalism, as were his efforts to institutionalize such military skills as tactical training, camp sanitation, organization, and regularized procedure. Scott was responsible for much of the professionalization of the army between the War of 1812 and the Civil War, but his professionalism was limited by his narrow perspectives. His ideas were European in origin and did not fit frontier realities.
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John Y. Simon, "Hancock, Winfield Scott," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00313.html.
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Following his marriage [in 1850], Hancock served at several posts, including Fort Leavenworth, where his regiment calmed disorder in "Bleeding Kansas," and in Utah, where the "Mormon War" ended before the Sixth Infantry arrived. At the outbreak of the Civil War, he ranked as captain and served as chief quartermaster, Southern District of California.
Appointed brigadier general of volunteers as of 23 September 1861, Hancock served in Major General George B. McClellan's (1826-1885) Army of the Potomac. After the battle of Williamsburg (5 May 1862), the first in which Hancock fought, McClellan referred to him as "superb," bestowing a nickname that Hancock retained. At Antietam (17 Sept. 1862), Hancock commanded a division and won promotion to major general. Distinguished service at Chancellorsville (1-4 May 1863), where he conducted a stubborn rearguard action that saved a demoralized Union army from total destruction, advanced Hancock to corps command on the eve of Gettysburg. There he assumed command of the entire army late in the first day of battle before the arrival of Major General George G. Meade and placed Union forces in a strong defensive position on Cemetery Ridge. Hancock's II Corps fought valiantly on all three days (1-3 July). On the second day, Hancock redeemed the blunder of an advance by Major General Daniel Sickles and stabilized the left center before confederates could turn the Union flank. Severely wounded in the thigh on the third day, Hancock refused to leave the field until his troops had repulsed Confederate General George E. Pickett's charge. Gettysburg marked the zenith of Hancock's military career.
Appointed brigadier general of volunteers as of 23 September 1861, Hancock served in Major General George B. McClellan's (1826-1885) Army of the Potomac. After the battle of Williamsburg (5 May 1862), the first in which Hancock fought, McClellan referred to him as "superb," bestowing a nickname that Hancock retained. At Antietam (17 Sept. 1862), Hancock commanded a division and won promotion to major general. Distinguished service at Chancellorsville (1-4 May 1863), where he conducted a stubborn rearguard action that saved a demoralized Union army from total destruction, advanced Hancock to corps command on the eve of Gettysburg. There he assumed command of the entire army late in the first day of battle before the arrival of Major General George G. Meade and placed Union forces in a strong defensive position on Cemetery Ridge. Hancock's II Corps fought valiantly on all three days (1-3 July). On the second day, Hancock redeemed the blunder of an advance by Major General Daniel Sickles and stabilized the left center before confederates could turn the Union flank. Severely wounded in the thigh on the third day, Hancock refused to leave the field until his troops had repulsed Confederate General George E. Pickett's charge. Gettysburg marked the zenith of Hancock's military career.
Type: Description
Citation:
Richard E. Beringer, "Scott, Winfield," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00890.html.
Body Summary:
The Whigs sought a military hero again in 1852, and the party mobilized for Scott's election. However, Scott remained quiet on the slavery question and had been slow in his support of the Compromise of 1850, which worried southern members of the Whig party. He accepted the platform, which included full support of the Compromise of 1850, including the Fugitive Slave Law, which worried many northern members of the party. Scott lost the election, carrying only four states, although the popular vote was not nearly so one-sided.
The successful Democratic candidate, Franklin Pierce, appointed Jefferson Davis as his secretary of war, and Davis and Scott soon quarreled, initially over reimbursements for official travel. Scott and Davis argued over other questions as well, but the underlying cause of their quarrels was longstanding defects in the command system, which led to a division between the line and staff of the army. Whereas the secretary of war controlled the staff, he had not customarily commanded the commanding general, whose duties were undefined by law. Davis sought to remedy that situation, and he had the law and Constitution on his side. Scott maintained that he did not have to follow the orders of the secretary of war except when they were given in the name of the president, but he lost the argument when the attorney general's opinion was that the orders of the secretary of war were always presumed to be issued under the authority of the president.
The successful Democratic candidate, Franklin Pierce, appointed Jefferson Davis as his secretary of war, and Davis and Scott soon quarreled, initially over reimbursements for official travel. Scott and Davis argued over other questions as well, but the underlying cause of their quarrels was longstanding defects in the command system, which led to a division between the line and staff of the army. Whereas the secretary of war controlled the staff, he had not customarily commanded the commanding general, whose duties were undefined by law. Davis sought to remedy that situation, and he had the law and Constitution on his side. Scott maintained that he did not have to follow the orders of the secretary of war except when they were given in the name of the president, but he lost the argument when the attorney general's opinion was that the orders of the secretary of war were always presumed to be issued under the authority of the president.
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Elbert B. Smith, "Taylor, Zachary," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00978.html.
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As president, Taylor put national above sectional interests, usually made wise decisions, and always acted decisively. Because he tried to understand and deal fairly with both sections, he has often been described quite inaccurately as pronorthern. If Taylor had lived, he would probably have been reelected, and the course of American history might have been different. He has been a much underrated man and president.
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Citation:
Elbert B. Smith, "Taylor, Zachary," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00978.html.
Body Summary:
In December 1847 a group of Whig congressmen, including both Abraham Lincoln and Alexander H. Stephens, organized a "Taylor for President Club" and ignited a national movement.
Besieged with questions, Taylor wrote revealing letters. He disliked political parties, he would spend no money, and he would become president only as a result of a "spontaneous move of the people." Slavery, he wrote, had been abolished in Mexico and could not be revived in the newly acquired territories. He owned many slaves, but he would respect the feelings and legal rights of the nonslaveholding states. The "intemperate zeal" of northern fanatics and southern politicians was making reasonable discussions impossible. The unnecessary and dangerous Wilmot Proviso against slavery in the new territories would shake the country. He still hoped, however, that compromises could be reached. Congress was responsible for legislation, and a president should veto laws only if they were clearly unconstitutional.
Besieged with questions, Taylor wrote revealing letters. He disliked political parties, he would spend no money, and he would become president only as a result of a "spontaneous move of the people." Slavery, he wrote, had been abolished in Mexico and could not be revived in the newly acquired territories. He owned many slaves, but he would respect the feelings and legal rights of the nonslaveholding states. The "intemperate zeal" of northern fanatics and southern politicians was making reasonable discussions impossible. The unnecessary and dangerous Wilmot Proviso against slavery in the new territories would shake the country. He still hoped, however, that compromises could be reached. Congress was responsible for legislation, and a president should veto laws only if they were clearly unconstitutional.