USA > Arkansas > Biographical and pictorial history of Arkansas. Vol I > Part 25
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"Fent. Noland," as he was familiarly called by those who knew him all his life, was born of highly respectable parentage, but, whether in Kentucky, as some assert, or in Virginia, as others assert, the author is unable to state. John Peel, the father of Sam. W. Peel, our member of congress from the fifth district, who came to Batesville in 1815, and who knew Noland from 1820, to his death, states that he was born in Kentucky, in 1807. On the other hand William F. Pope, who knew him 34
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from 1836, to his death, says he was born in Loudon county, Virginia. These honored old citizens are both men of the highest respectability. The author mentions this to illustrate the great difficulty encountered in collecting history from oral and traditional sources.
In a newspaper sketch of Governor Yell, the author stated he had three wives, and was instantly criticised by correspond- ents, and charged with inaccuracy, and a disposition to indulge" in poetic license ; but months after the author of the widely circulated criticism wrote : "You are correct ; Governor Yell did have three wives."
Noland's father was the first receiver of the United States land office at Batesville, established in 1820. The son came with his father when he took charge of that office in 1820. Those who knew him in his boyhood, at Batesville, say he was a sprightly, spirited boy, with a heart full of sunshine, which he shared with all of his boyish companions, with whom he was always a leader, shunning, and teaching them to de- spise, a mean act. All of his impulses, even in those tender and generally thoughtless years, when the passions govern more than deliberation and reason, were brave, noble and gen- erous. He was sent to the higher educational institutions, where he mastered an accomplished and classical education. He returned to his home in Batesville with a cultivated taste for letters, and was soon drawn into the exciting political contests of the day. IIe read law at Batesville under Richard Searcy, a local celebrity in that day, and was admitted to the bar in 1829.
He espoused the Crittenden party and wrote many gifted and spirited communications to the Advocate, which attracted much attention throughout the territory at the time. These earlier communications were published under the nom-de-plume of "Devereux." Later in life he wrote under the nom-de- plume of "Pete Whetstone." At the time the "Devereux " letters appeared, William Fountaine Pope, nephew and secre- tary to Governor John Pope, lived in Little Rock. He was an impulsive, ardent democrat, and wrote for the press.over his own signature, and with much zeal attacked the doctrines ad- vanced by " Devereux." This led to caustic criticism and the dueling ground. I am informed by contemporaneous authority,
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which has every appearance of credibility, that young Pope threw down the gauntlet and cut off all resource but the field ; And that Noland, contrary to the expectations of his friends, replied in a mild spirit, inviting, or rather leaving the way to conciliation open, but neither retracting nor apologizing for any thing which had appeared under the name of "Devereux." Young Pope treated the conciliatory spirit of his adversary with an air of haughty disdain, and denounced Noland in the press as a coward. Fatal mistake. Of all the proud spirits that ever animated an age of chivalry, Noland's was the least likely to suffer his manhood thus buried under the odium cast at him. This could lead to but one result, the dueling pistol supplanted the pen. Much controversy has been indulged by correspondents in the public press as to who were the sec- onds of the parties and as to where the duel was fought. After . examining it all, the author is inclined to the opinion that it was fought in the then province of Texas, at a place known as Lost Prairie, on the 5th of February, 1831, and that Major Tom Scott was the second of Pope, and that Doctor Nimrod Meni- fee was the second of Noland.
This is the account given by William F. Pope, a near rela- tive of the deceased, who knew all the parties, and is yet liv- ing (1887). Other parties of high respectability assert the duel was fought at Point Remove, then in the Cherokee nation, now Conway county, and that Wharton Rector and Doctor Menifee were the seconds. Snow was falling when the duel was fought. Noland's friend understood the cartel agreed on required each principal to be dressed in close-bodied blue coats, and Noland was so dressed, but Pope's friend did not so understand the agreement, and did not conform to it. Pope appeared on the field dressed in a light drab suit. This misunderstanding of the seconds at first threatened serious complications, but No- land waived his friend's interpretation of the cartel, to facilitate the final end, and to obviate further trouble, and they fought dressed as described. At the command "fire" the pistols ex- ploded simultaneously. Pope fell mortally wounded; Noland was not touched. Thus ended a valuable life, sacrificed on the altar of custom and party spirit. Pope was wounded in the hip and demanded another fire, which was agreed to, but be-
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fore the pistols could be loaded, he fainted from pain and loss of blood. He was not at first considered mortally wounded ; he was carried from the field to Washington, in Hempstead county, under the care of a surgeon, and thence to Little Rock, where he died on the 17th of June, 1831. Both young men stood high in the esteem of their fellow citizens. The errors and misfortunes which led to the sacrifice grew out of the custom and spirit of the times in which they lived. Contem -- poraneous judgment was colored by the political bias in which it was conceived. The gifted Arrington has clouded the name of Noland with a powerful pen, and with too little care for ac- curacy.
The time has come when facts, removed from the cloudy sphere of politics, and the prejudice it always engenders, ought to assume their proper relation to history, and the good name of a public-spirited gentleman. Defamation has never hurled her poisonous shafts at the name of the gifted and gallant Pope; and without injustice to him truth may well drop a flower on the grave of his less fortunate rival. An episode, an incident, however seemingly trifling, often furnishes the key to a man's inward life. When Noland returned to Batesville after the duel, his political friends gathered around him, and some, thoughtless and unmindful, began to cheer, but he silenced the demonstration, threw his hands up in admonition, and his tears and speechless sorrow softened and saddened, and silenced all. A kinder-hearted and more sympathetic man never lived. No man was ever truer to his friends and his own noble im- pulses. He was passionately fond of children, and tender with the feelings of others. He was three times elected to the leg- islature from Independence county - in 1838, 1840, and again in 1846. In the memorable contest for the United States sen- ate in 1848 he received the caucus nomination and votes of the whig party. In 1836, he was chosen by the constitutional con- vention to take the new constitution to Washington. In 1855, Chancellor Fairchild, who had long been his neighbor and friend, appointed him receiver of the old Real Estate Bank, and he moved to Little Rock to attend to the duties of the office. Elias N. Conway was then governor, and as such had no legal power to control the chancellor, or remove the receiver ;
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but he was a very strong partisan, and never forgave a politi- cal opponent, and tradition says, demanded of the chancellor the removal of Noland. And the chancellor forgot the high and independent prerogatives that belong to the bench, and com- plied by removing the receiver. This is stoutly, and with great plausibility, denied by Governor. Conway, and he is en- titled to the democratic as well as the whig version.
I am told by those who knew all the actors in this singular drama, that the unauthorized act of the governor called forth one of the finest productions of Noland's accomplished pen - that it was able, dignified, severely caustic. Physically, he was always delicate, and from early manhood consumption singled him out as its ultimate victim. He died near Little Rock, in 1859-60, the precise date is not known to the author. For many years he was correspondent for the New York Spirit of the Times, under the nom-de-plume of "Pete Whetstone," and wrote striking and graphic descriptions of frontier life, which were copied extensively throughout the United States. He was on the editorial staff of the Gazette prior to the war, and his graceful pen adorned its columns. He always regretted the events that led to the death of Pope, and it is a crime to shadow his name because of that event. He tried to avoid it, without sacrifice. In his youth, and the heat of great political excitement, he wrote in a spirit of conciliation and peace, but it was misconstrued, misunderstood, and the gate was forever closed by his rival's hand. Let the eloquence of Arrington exhaust itself, and his powerful phillipic mislead mankind ; and yet the facts, pure and stainless, will survive and rise up in their own vindication before the books are forever closed.
WILLIAM K. SEBASTIAN.
William K. Sebastian was born about 1812, in Hickman county, Tennessee, and there grew to manhood, acquiring an accomplished education. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in Tennessee when quite a young man. In 1835, he moved to Arkansas, and first located in Monroe county, but did not remain there long, until he moved to Helena, in Phil- lips county, where he remained until the unpleasant vicissitudes of the civil war influenced him to temporarily abandon his
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home. In 1837, he was elected by the legislature prosecuting attorney for the first circuit, and discharged the duties of the office with much ability.
In the fall of 1838, he married Miss Amelia Dunn (a native of Phillips county), the daughter of an influential and wealthy planter. This was on the eve of returning prosperity, just after the great financial crisis of 1837. Then, to be a large planter and cotton grower in the south, was a distinction next - to high official preferment. Judge Sebastian, with his young bride, established himself on a large cotton farm near Helena, but drove into town every day and kept up his professional employment. One of his able competitors at the bar, who knew him from 1835, until his death, in a letter to the author says : "His business at the bar gradually increased until he became the leading member of the bar, then composed of well- educated and able men." Helena has always had an able bar. In 1840, the legislature elected him judge of the first circuit, a position he filled with distinction, and resigned in 1843, to accept the office of associate justice of the supreme court, by appointment from Governor Yell, until the legisla- ture could fill the office by election. In the winter of 1844-5 he was defeated for the office of associate justice of the supreme court by George W. Paschal, then living at Van Buren, in the "great north-west," which has been the geographical battle-cry in many hard-fought political contests, as though geography was a potent agent in determining a man's qualifications.
That thoroughly polished and accomplished jurist, Thomas J. Lacy, was then on the supreme bench, and lived in Phillips county. But for this fact the probabilities are strong that Judge Sebastian would have spent a long career on the bench, and become a distinguished jurist. He was eminently fitted by nature and culture for such attainment. . He was as frec from prejudice as any man I ever knew, and in all his inter- course with men appeared to be wholly devoid of passion. The author knew him intimately the last ten years of his life, en- joyed his confidence, and feels qualified to judge of the beauti- ful inward, as well as attractive exterior life of the man. He had no desire for the great antagonisms of life; nature had clothed him in complete armor against such warfare. This
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secured his election to the senate in 1848, after other antago- nists had worn themselves out. Most men of positive natures, and modes of thought and action, who become distinguished in political life, cannot avoid the friction of antagonism. Sebas- tian was an eminent exception to the rule. He possessed great magnetism without the slightest indication that he knew it. He was always cool and self-possessed, and could stand on the deck of an ocean steamer in a storm as passionless as marble. And yet, he was noble and generous to friends, considerate and forgiving to foes. Animosity and revenge, found no place in his heart; if so, the world never discovered it. His countenance was always placid and engaging. Sun- shine found constant expression in his face and a home in his heart. His head was massive; his eye and brow strongly indicated intellectual power. In 1846, he was elected to the State senate, and was chosen president of that body. The Hon. Chester Ashley died in April, 1848, and Governor Drew ap- pointed Judge Sebastian to the vacant seat in the senate until it could be filled by election.
When the legislature, in November of that year, convened, . a memorable contest for senatorial honors was inaugurated. Judge Oldham of the north-west, Judge Sebastian of the south-east, and Samuel H. Hempstead of the central division, were the opposing candidates ; the balloting being without result for several weeks. The whigs, then largely in the minority, voted for Fent. M. C. Noland. Finally Hempstead withdrew, and his vote elected Sebastian. In all, he was ap- pointed once and elected three successive times to the senate ; his last term would have expired March 4, 1865. When he entered the senate he was but thirty-six years old, and the youngest member then in that body. He did not, like most of the senators from the southern States, vacate his seat in the senate when secession and civil war was inaugurated. He was strongly attached to the Union, and conscientiously believed it his duty to remain at his official post, and, like Andrew John- son, did so, but from nobler motives. He loved the Union of these States with an ardent devotion, and he loved the people of his native south as he did his mother ; but, unlike Andrew Johnson, as day is from night, he never suffered his soul tar-
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nished with the idea of taking up arms and striking them down in blood. The thirst and lust for place and power did not seduce him into treason against the loftier and nobler senti- ments of true manhood. He did not get on the housetops, like Johnson, to decry and vilify the people of the south, and make capital that he might ride into power on the wave that submerged his people in one chaos of ruin. He could have had a general's commission, and could have come back to the south in purple and blood, if he had subordinated the higher attributes of his nature to an unholy ambition.
But he chose to remain neutral, and be swallowed up in the common ruin, rather than to come back to his constituents with a sword red with the blood of those who had loved and honored him. Noble Sebastian ! May the guardian angels of fame for- ever keep vigil over the urn that holds your ashes. You went down in the wreck, and died under the accumulated weight of sorrows and misfortunes you could bear no longer, but you pre- served your honor pure and holy, and left your children the in- heritance of an untarnished and noble name.
The senate, in the stormy period of 1861, after all the sena- tors from the south had left but Johnson and Sebastian, sus- picioned the latter of treasonable designs, and expelled him, because he did not invoke a curse on his head, by loud-mouthed denunciation of his people like Johnson, the demagogue, who achieved place and power as the price for turning on the people who had honored and elevated him, and covered his name in an innocent woman's blood and eternal shame that he might keep ill-gotten power. This is the end of the two southern Union senators who kept their seats. In 1878 the senate rescinded the act of expulsion.
After leaving Washington in 1861, Judge Sebastian came to Helena to live among his people whom he loved, although dif- fering with a large majority of them so widely. During the progress of the war his wife and eldest daughter died, and are buried in the hills near Helena overlooking the great Father of Waters. Troubles gathered and thickened around him, and forced him to temporarily leave his home and seek kindlier skies elsewhere. Ile came to Memphis where the author then lived, and was a frequent and more than welcome visitor.
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Never did a great soul, laboring under deep afflictions and great disasters, shine with greater radiance than his the last year of his life. He was true to his convictions and high sense of honor under the greatest temptations to ignore the line of action marked out for himself. His pensive face was the index to the highest philosophy, man can embrace to sustain him against the inflictions imposed by an unjust and thoughtless world. The frenzy of the southern revolutionist, denied him- just consideration, and the free exercise of the rights they claimed to be at war for; and the northern invader denied the rights of neutrality, which he assumed and maintained unde- filed to the end, which came to him at Memphis, Tennessee, just before the close of the war. The iron nerves and heroic will of a resolute nature, could not stand the tension indefi- nitely, and gave way to an invitation to the kind offices of death, which is often a " blessing in disguise." He was buried in a temporary mausoleum to await a better day for interment beside his wife and children. It came, and kind hands and hearts laid his remains to rest beside those of his wife and four children. During his thirteen years' service in the senate, he was always chairman of some important committee and always at his post He was not what the world calls brilliant, but he was able and eminently conservative, and competent to the demands of every station in life.
JUDGE ALFRED B. GREENWOOD, BENTONVILLE.
Judge Greenwood was born in Franklin county, Georgia, July 11, 1811. IIe was educated in the common schools then prevalent, and there prepared for the higher academic branches which he pursued until he completed a classical education. He completed a thorough course of legal studies, and was admitted to the bar in Georgia, where he practiced but a short time be- fore coming to Arkansas. In 1838, he located at Bentonville, the county seat of Benton county, where he has since resided. In 1842, and again in 1844, he was a member of the legisla- ture. In 1845, he was chosen by the legislature prosecuting at- torney for his circuit, and served in that capacity until he was elected judge of the circuit in 1851. In 1833, 1855 and 1857 he was successively nominated by the democracy, and elected 35
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to congress from the first district. His legislative career in Washington was an honorable and successful one, and made a flattering impression on the minds of the great party leaders of that era. President Buchanan gave him charge of a bureau as commissioner of Indian affairs, in recognition of his ability and service to his party.
When Jacob Thompson resigned his seat in President Bu- chanan's cabinet, the vacant portfolio of the interior was ten- dered Judge Greenwood, who, after mature consideration, de- clined it, because war between the States seemed inevitable, and he did not wish to occupy a doubtful or questionable position before the southern people. Thus ended the political career of this noble type of the old school, who, through all the changing fortunes and vicissitudes of a long and honorable life, has ever been governed and guided by a robust and vigor- ous integrity. Since the close of the civil war, he has been leading a quiet and retired life in the bosom of his family and friends at Bentonville, engaged in the practice of his profes- sion. He is yet full of life and vigor, and wit and humor, and enjoys a good old hilarious laugh to the full measure of rotund capacity. The sunshine and the inviting smile which beam from his eyes and face at the same time in pleasant rivalry become contagious in his presence. These impressions and convictions were made on the author, who loves a. man who can stand in the midst of misfortunes, and yet with a clear vision, see the sunny side of life.
JOHN J. CLENDENIN.
Judge Clendenin was born in Harrisburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1813, where he lived many years, laboring to support a widowed inother, brothers and sisters. These duties, so well discharged by the youth, much impeded his progress in the acquisition of an education, but he finally overcame the obstacle, and acquired a good business education. He was clerk in the post-office at Harrisburgh for many years. . His studious habits and gentlemanly bearing commended him to the gifted and ac- complished George M. Dallas, with whom he read law several years.
In 1834 or '5 he came south as clerk to Simon Cameron, who
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HON. JOHN JOSEPH CLENDENIN.
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had a large levee contract in Louisiana. In 1836, he came to Arkansas, where the first employment we find him engaged in, was, as private secretary to Governor James S. Conway during his canvass against Absalom Fowler for governor. This rela- tion continued until the expiration of Governor Conway's term of office in 1840. On the 28th of December, 1840, the powerful Conway influence aided his election by the legisla- ture to the office of judge of the fifth circuit. In 1844, he was again elected circuit judge, and resigned the office in 1846, to accept an appointment as quarter-master in the United States army, an office he soon tired of, and resigned. Returning to Little Rock in 1848, his friend and brother-in-law, the late Judge George C. Watkins, resigned the office of attorney-gen- eral to make room for him, and he was in February, 1849, elected to that important office, holding it until the 6th of Sep- tember, 1854, on which date he was for the third time elected judge of the fifth circuit. In 1858, he was again elected cir- cuit judge, and held the office until the war interrupted its ad- ministration.
In 1866, he was elected associate justice of the supreme court, but was soon driven from office by General C. H. Smith, military commander of the sub-district of Arkansas, under the reconstruction acts. In 1874, Judge Clendenin was the fifth time elected judge of the fifth circuit, and he died with the harness on, on the 4th of July, 1876. He possessed a lovely and amiable disposition ; was born a gentleman ; had a sound, native judgment, but was never a close student. In the ad- ministration of law, he relied much on his intuitive sense of justice. Careful and considerate of the feelings of others, he demanded the same respect from them. He loved agriculture, and a farmer's life, and could, for hours, entertain the sons of husbandry, and they were very fond of his society.
HON. GEORGE CLAIBORNE WATKINS, THIRD CHIEF JUSTICE.
Judge Watkins was born in Shelbyville, Kentucky, Novem- ber 23, 1815, the son of Major Isaac Watkins, who immi- grated in 1821, and became one of the first settlers of Little Rock. His education was systematic, thorough and classical, based on mental foundations which developed the reasoning
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rather than the imaginative faculties. The foundations of his professional learning were laid in Litchfield, Connecticut, at the first law school established in the United States. James Gould and Tapping Reeve were the founders of the school, greatly celebrated in its day. He returned from Litchfield in 1837, at the close of his twenty-second year, ripe in scholarly and professional foundations for one so young. He was imme- diately invited to a partnership with Chester Ashley, who was without a ranking peer in the State.
A systematic and laborious student, he rose rapidly in his pro- fession. When thirty-three years old he was made attorney- general of the State, holding the office but two years, resigning to make room for a personal friend who was without practice - an act of noble generosity in conflict with the observation of Thomas Jefferson.
In 1852, at the earnest solicitation of his brothers of the bar, ยท he was unanimously elected chief justice of the supreme court at the age of thirty-seven, and resigned the high office in 1854 from profound convictions of duty based on refined and delicate considerations. His late partner, the gifted and lamented James M. Curran, had recently died, a martyr to his profession, before discharging all the joint obligations due to their clientage. These high offices came without seeking; were thrust on him, and the motives dictating the resignation of both attest the refined professional and ethical philosophy which dominated a noble and generous nature. Of his labors on the bench Judge U. M. Rose says : " At the time he went to the bench the docket was greatly in arrear; the judges were poorly paid - not sufficient to support them without resort to their private estate, especially if they lived at the capital city, as he did. He set himself diligently to bring up the arrears of business, and succeeded, with the assistance of his colleagues, before he retired from the bench. A large number of opinions settling many of the most important questions were delivered by him, showing he must have been extremely laborious in the discharge of official duty. His opinions are the subject of legitimate criticism ; they have stood all the ex- aminations, and the most stringent tests have been applied, I am now under the impression that none of them have
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