USA > Georgia > The bench and bar of Georgia: memoirs and sketches. With an appendix, containing a court roll from 1790-1857, etc., volume II > Part 41
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With these principles kept in view, it remains to be seen whether the present system of specific taxation falls unequally upon different interests, and therefore unjustly, and whether the ad valorem system would remedy the evils now supposed to exist. In reference to the gross and palpable inequality of the present tax-law, it is so universally understood and acknowledged, that it might be regarded as a useless waste of time to enter into any detailed statement on the subject. If the objects of taxation be considered in reference to agriculture, commerce, or manufactures, the inequality is striking.
The classification of lands operates unjustly. Lands of equal value,
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situated in different sections of the State, and in some instances in the same county, are subject to a different rate of taxation ; nor is it believed that any classification of real estate can be made that will remedy this defect.
The same remark is true of slaves, on all of whom is imposed a specific tax, irrespective of their true value,-making the tax on a slave worth one hundred dollars the same as upon one worth one thousand. Not only does this inequality exist in regard to the agricultural interest, but when it is contrasted with the commercial we are again astonished at an in- equality as impolitic in principle as unwarrantable in its discriminations. If commerce is injurious to the State, strike at it boldly; but if it is essential to the well-being of the people, conducive to their prosperity, and honorable in its aims and object, abstain from all discriminations against it. Instances might be multiplied more fully demonstrating the inequality of the present system of collecting taxes ; but sufficient has been said, it is hoped, to insure your patient investigation,-the result of which I cannot permit myself to doubt. The benefits resulting from the substitu- tion of the ad valorem principle over the specific would be to invigorate and stimulate every branch of productive industry; to give quiet and con- fidence to the different interests, by equalizing the burdens of Government; to secure to your treasury, at all times and under all circumstances, adequate means to meet all the exigencies of the State; to diminish the taxes, by raising no more money than is needed ; relieving the poor, by throwing the burden of taxation upon the property of the more wealthy; placing your public credit beyond the reach of false friends or open enemies; inspiring the people with confidence in the Government; substituting equal and just laws for unequal, unjust, and oppressive ones.
These may be regarded as some of the happy fruits to be produced by the proposed change.
Can it be believed that the people, so deeply interested in this measure, will not give it their warm and cordial support? To think otherwise would be a reflection upon their intelligence, and to doubt their devotion to the best interests of the State. Such an opinion others may entertain, but it can receive no countenance from me.
These somewhat copious extracts from the official communications of Gov. Towns were deemed necessary to do him justice. The method of taxation he advised will ever be creditable to his memory. As his Executive papers at the session of 1849 were the last he ever wrote, they deserve to be in a form more conveniently accessible to inspection than the Journals of the Legislature. For this reason extracts are so freely introduced in this memoir.
In November, 1851, Gov. Towns retired from the Executive chair with an enviable popularity. It was his intention to devote himself to that class of practice in his profession which his long experience, his peculiar gifts before the jury, and his commanding position in society would necessarily attract. And at this point a description of his eloquence and grace of manner, so far as the author can form an opinion from hearsay, will be attempted.
Gov. Towns was a Chesterfield in his address. Nothing could VOL. II .- 22
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exceed the suavity of his disposition and the ease of his manner. He was truly a refined gentleman, courteous and unpretending with the plain and diplomatic with the precise, just as the society he was in for the time-being demanded such an exhibition of character. IIe was all this entirely without effort: it was con- stitutional, therefore pleasant to all. He had a friendly word, a kind recognition, for each individual. The charm was complete. He satisfied all. His manner claimed no superiority over other men, and yet it signified that he was as good as any. He never appeared upon stilts, nor did he forget his self-respect in his most careless moods. He had romance enough in his "nature to give variety and sprightliness to his familiar talk, and reflection enough to keep himself within the bounds of propriety at all times and in every presence. Such was Gov. Towns as a man.
At the bar his rank was decidedly high as an advocate. He possessed all the requisites of an orator to control the jury. He knew when to attack and defend suitors and witnesses, and how to sift the evidence, making such portions of it as he desired answer his object; and other portions he brought into discredit by showing contradictions or prejudice in the witness. Generally this opera- tion was conducted with perfect good-nature ; yet, when it became necessary to the success of his cause, and there was ground for in- dulging harsh comment, he was very caustic and withering. That man who fell under his wrath never forgot the occasion.
In its subdued tones his voice was like plaintive music. Its intonations were faultless. His language at such times was the poetry of emotion ; his gestures adapted themselves, without con- sciousness on his part, to the passion or circumstances of the case. The human heart was an open thing to him. He could play upon it in smiles or in tears with almost the skill of Patrick Henry ; yet he lacked the thunderbolts of that Jove of eloquence, to rival the grandeur of the storm.
With these elements of success ripened into maturity by practice and established in many a contest, Gov. Towns had before him as inviting a prospect as ever allured the imagination. His return to the bar was hailed by his professional brethren with universal cordiality. All within his attendance looked forward to much enjoyment in his society, to much improvement by his example, and the more ambitious to something like conquest, or the stimulation of their faculties in competing with him before "the country." There had been a Forsyth, with his fluent simplicity and inimitable sneer; a Berrien, with his music phrase and classic gestures; a
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Wilde, polished in diction and lofty in thought; a Colquitt, with the arrows of nature barbed for the rhinoceros or softly edged for the hare: there had been such advocates in Georgia, honored, glorious; yet it was the prestige of Gov. Towns to differ from them all, perhaps to excel them all, in the spontaneous gushings of the heart,-in the electric sympathy that, kindling with the orator, burst out and blazed in every bosom,-court, jury, bar, audience, all melted, all subdued, by the occasion. Such was the man, and such the prospect, when he retired from the Executive chair in November, 1851.
A few months revolve,-a few months of bright hopes and in- creasing happiness,-when suddenly the scene is changed! the tongue of the orator is palsied, his frame a hopeless wreck ! Unable to write a line, and almost unable to articulate a word in- telligibly, Gov. Towns lingered in a deplorable condition, amid the grief of friends and the sympathies of the public, until Death ter- minated his calamity, on the 15th day of July, 1854, at his resi- dence in the city of Macon, in the fifty-fourth year of his age.
The eulogies of the press without distinction of party, and other public testimonials, (the Legislature gave his name to a new county,) attested the strong hold he had on the affections of the people. He was indeed a "bright particular star," quenched in its sphere by a dispensation so mysterious that the pride of man sinks into dust, and all his hopes vanish as a dream, when the last days of Gov. Towns are recalled to memory. He viewed the approach of death with the fortitude of a philosopher, and triumphed over his last enemy !
With the domestic relations of Gov. Towns the author has not been made particularly acquainted. It is known that he married before he engaged in public life, and soon became a widower. While a member of Congress some twenty years ago, Gov. Towns was united in marriage to a daughter of the Hon John W. Jones, of Virginia, formerly Speaker of the United States House of Re- presentatives. By this union there were several children, who, with their mother, are still living. One of his daughters has mar- ried since his death.
NOTE TO THIE MEMOIR OF GOV. TOWNS.
The author takes pleasure in subjoining a letter which he re- ceived after the completion of the memoir. He prefers giving it entire, and of course yields to the information of Dr. Gardner
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wherever the narrative conflicts. The only material variance is in relation to merchandizing and editing a paper in Alabama by Col. Towns. Of this the author expressed his want of confidence; but he permits it to remain, as Dr. Gardner is not so positive in his knowledge on the subject as to exclude its probability. The letter itself is interesting in many particulars, and adds to the value of the memoir :-
RENWICK, LEE COUNTY, GEORGIA, June 5, 1857.
DEAR SIR :- Yours of 28th April came to hand some time last month ; and, after such preparation as I have been able to make, I proceed to answer it.
John Towns, the father of Gov. Towns, was a fighting Whig of the Re- volution. In one of the battles his friend James Hardwick was shot. When he fell, his hat rolled to John Towns's feet. Hardwick left a widow, and, I think, two sons, one of whom-David Hardwick, Esq .- survived till last year, when he died in Alabama, having recently removed from Stewart county, Georgia. John Towns and the widow Hardwick (whose maiden name was George) married ; and the issue was four sons and three daughters,-my wife, Nancy G. Towns, alone surviving. The youngest, George Washington Bonaparte Towns, is the subject of this notice.
The family is Virginian. John Towns emigrated, soon after the Revo- lution, to Wilkes county, Georgia, where George was born on the 4th of May, 1801. John Towns moved from Wilkes to Greene, and thence to Morgan county.
George received such education as the county academies of the times afforded, and was distinguished in composition and elocution.
He commenced the study of medicine with Dr. (I think Joel) Bran- ham, in Eatonton ; but while on a visit at home, in Morgan, he was thrown from a horse against a stump and gravely injured in the chest. From this casualty it is probable his constitution never fully recovered. A slow recovery and feeble health drove the thoughts of the medical pro- fession from his mind.
At the age of twenty, he was in Montgomery, Alabama, and read law with - Benson, an eminent lawyer at that time.
About this time he "led to the hymeneal altar" Miss Campbell, a sister of John W. Campbell. The lady was in feeble health at the time of the marriage, and died in three or four days,-producing such a shock on his sensitive mind that years and years could not obliterate.
I think he came from Montgomery direct to Talbot. He speculated with some success in town-lots in Montgomery, and he was interested in merchandizing in Talbot. I do not know that he ever edited a newspaper.
He was, I think, the first colonel of the militia of Talbot. He was very popular, and could be easily elected ; and just about there his military pretensions and qualifications ended.
I saw him first in 1833. He was represented to me as the leading Demo- crat in the county. He was pale,-evidently was, or had been, in delicate health. He was in apparently earnest and anxious conversation, and the first impression was unfavorable,-an impression that all after-intercourse obliterated.
From this time forward your judgment of his character will probably be better than mine.
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His resignation of his seat in Congress, when one of the opposite party was elected to fill the vacancy, put Col. Towns in bad odor with his party; and it was many years before he recovered his position.
There was a timidity in Towns's character that made him desirous to postpone difficulties. When the fight had to come, he bore himself gallantly enough. No man could excel him in getting a continuance. In the defence of a capital case he was unsurpassed. Some ten or twelve who deserved the gallows "went unwhipt of justice" by his forensic efforts. He greatly disliked to be engaged for the prosecution.
Mr. Jones, the father of Mrs. Towns, held distinguished rank in the United States House of Representatives. I do not at the moment recollect with certainty if he were Speaker : think he was. His abilities were, however, more conspicuous as the able Chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means. Mrs. Mary Towns is an accomplished lady,-devoted to the superintendence and education of her children, five daughters and two sons. The grace and propriety with which she did the honors of the Executive Mansion have made her so well and favorably known that she needs no eulogy in Georgia.
I cannot close without a tribute of respect and consideration to the memory of Mrs. Margaret Towns, the mother of Col. Towns. She lived to an advanced age, and was as remarkable for her devoted attachment to "Georgy" as he was for his kindness to her. Pious and kind to all, many persons in Talbot bear testimony to her virtues, and regarded her as a good representative of the excellent women of the past century.
Note .- Somewhere about 1840, or perhaps earlier, Col. Towns dropped "Bonaparte" from his name.
I do not know that what I have written will be of any service to you. You will please make such use of this as, in your own judgment, you see proper. I will not be at all offended if you entirely overlook it.
Very respectfully, yours, &c.,
JAMES Y. GARDNER.
XXXII.
RICHARD H. WILDE.
THE reputation of this gentleman is not confined to Georgia nor to the United States, but has a European stamp. He combined abilities and taste in a degree not only securing honor to himself, but reflecting it on the literature of his country. His pen had a magic sweetness and rhythm about it which distinguished it from all other styles. It was lively, chaste, and discriminating, with judgment and imagination happily united, as the author expects to show by evidence more worthy of credit than his mere opinion. The task of writing the memoir of such a man, such a jurist, such a statesman, and such a scholar as RICHARD HENRY WILDE should not be undertaken without a due sense of responsibility.
Desiring to obtain facts from the most reliable sources for his narrative, the author, at an early stage of his contemplated work, addressed a letter to John P. Wilde, Esquire, a son of Mr. Wilde, stating his purpose, and asking particulars in the early life of his father. In due time the author received a communication, which he submits, together with the sketch accompanying it :-
NEW ORLEANS, NOV. 12, 1851.
DEAR SIR :- I have just got back from Augusta, Georgia, where I have been spending the summer with my uncle's family. Your letter was only handed me the other day. By the neglect of the young men in Mr. Benjamin's office, it had not been forwarded.
It will afford me the greatest pleasure to furnish you the desired infor- mation, and I beg leave to assure you that your design meets my entire and cordial approbation. I have written out a short sketch of my lamented father's life, which will answer all your questions. I have a number of his speeches and arguments, which I will send you.
With regard to the engraving, we have an excellent portrait by the late Mr. Cook, which was taken a few months before my father's death, which might be daguerreotyped. I hope Mr. Benjamin may be able to furnish you with the sketch, but doubt it very much, as his attention is so much engrossed with law and politics. I believe he is not yet returned from Paris.
My own time is so occupied with my profession that I was much pressed to write even the short sketch from Griswold which I send you. Had I received your letter this summer, during the vacation of our courts, I would have written a much fuller memoir myself. I will, however, most cheerfully do all in my power to assist you, and furnish any facts or infor-
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mation you may require, as I am very desirous that the sketeh should be an accurate one.
Respectfully, your obedient servant,
JOHN P. WILDE.
P.S .- I have heard that Mr. Benjamin has just returned. Please let me hear from you at your earliest convenience.
ยท[ENCLOSURE.]
RICHARD HENRY WILDE, son of Richard Wilde and Mary Newitt, was born in the city of Dublin, on the 24th of September, 1789. Both branches of the family were strong Royalists. John Newitt sells out some flour- mills on the Hudson, and returns to Ireland, on the breaking out of the Revolutionary War. Devotion to the Government does not save them from ruin. Richard Wilde sails for America in December, 1796, after loading a vessel belonging to a sea-captain by the name of Richard Lemon. The captain was to sell his vessel and refund Richard Wilde on reaching Bal- timore,-profits and loss to be divided between them.
They arrived in Baltimore in January, 1797. The rebellion of 1798 breaks out in Ireland. Shortly after their arrival in America, Mr. McCready, the partner of Mr. Wilde, being convicted of treason, every thing is confiscated,-Mr. Wilde's absence confirming the suspicion of his being implicated also. On his arrival at Baltimore, the goods he brought over are seized, as belonging to Lemon, by a Mr. G. Prestman. After long and tedious litigation, they are recovered, when Mr. Wilde hears that he has lost every thing in Ireland. Mr. Wilde dies in 1802, and the family move to Georgia in 1803 ; and in 1806 his widow sails to Ireland with the hope of recovering some small portion of the large fortune of her husband,-in which, however, she is disappointed. She returns to Georgia in July, 1815, only a few months before her son is elected to Congress.
The childhood of Richard Henry Wilde was passed in Baltimore. He was taught to read by his mother, and received instructions in writing and in Latin grammar from a private tutor, until he was about seven years old. He afterward attended an academy; but, his father's affairs becoming embarrassed, in his eleventh year he was taken home and placed in a store. His constitution was at first tender and delicate. In his infancy he was not expected to live from month to month, and he suffered much from ill health until he was fifteen or sixteen.
This induced quiet, retiring, solitary, and studious habits. His mother's example gave him a passion for reading, and all his leisure was devoted to books. The study of poetry was his principal source of pleasure when he was about twelve years old. He inherited his poetical taste and talents from his mother, many of whose pieces, remarkable for their vigor of thought and beauty of versification, are still preserved among the papers of the family.
As before stated, his father died in 1802; and, gathering as much as she could from the wreck of his property, his mother removed to Augusta, Georgia, and commenced a small business for the support of her family. There, young Wilde, amid the drudgery of trade, taught himself book- keeping, and became familiar with the works on general literature which he could obtain in the meagre libraries of the town or from his personal friends.
The expenses of a large family, and various other causes, reduced the little wealth of his mother; her business became unprofitable, and he
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resolved to study law. Unable, however, to pay the usual fec for instruc- tion, he kept his design a secret as far as possible, borrowed some elemen- tary books from his friends, and studied incessantly, tasking himself to read fifty pages and write five pages of notes, in the form of questions and answers, each day, besides attending to his duties in the store. And to overcome a natural diffidence, increased by a slight impediment in his speech, he appeared frequently as an actor at a dramatic society which he had called into existence for the purpose and to raise a fund to support a public library. All this time his older and graver acquaintances, who knew nothing of his designs, naturally confounded him with his thought- less companions who sought only amusement, and augured badly of his future life. He bore the injustice in silence, and pursued his secret studies for a year and a half, at the end of which, pale and emaciated, feeble, and with a consumptive cough, he sought a distant court to be examined, that, if rejected, the news of his defeat might not reach his mother.
When he arrived, he found he had been wrongly informed, and that the judges had no power to admit him. He met a friend there, however, who was going to Greene Superior Court ; and, on being invited by him to do so, he determined to proceed immediately to that place. It was the March Term for 1809, Judge Early presiding; and the young applicant, totally unknown to any one save the friend who accompanied him, was at intervals during three days subjected to a most vigorous examination. Judge Early was well known for his strictness, and the circumstance of a youth leaving his own circuit excited his suspicion; but every question was answered to the satisfaction and even admiration of the committee, and he declared that " the young man could not have left his circuit because he was unprepared." His friend certified to the correctness of his moral character : he was admitted without a dissenting voice, and he returned in triumph to Augusta. He was at this time under twenty years of age.
His health gradually improved. He applied himself to the study of belles-lettres and to his duties as an advocate, and rapidly rose to eminence, being in a few years made Attorney-General of the State. He was remarkable for industry in the preparation of his cases, sound logic, and general urbanity. In forensic disputation he never indulged in personali- ties,-then too common at the bar,-unless in self-defence; but, having studied the characters of his associates and stored his memory with appro- priate quotations, his ridicule was a formidable weapon to all who attacked him.
In the autumn of 1815, when only a fortnight over the age required by law, Mr. Wilde was elected a member of the National House of Repre- sentatives. At the next election, all the Representatives from Georgia except one were defeated, and Mr. Wilde returned to the bar, where he continued (with the exception of a short service in Congress in 1825) until 1828, when he again became a Representative, and so continued until 1835.
I have not room to sketch his character as a politician very closely. On the occasion of the Force Bill, as it was called, hie differed from a majority in Congress, considering it a measure calculated to produce civil war, and justified himself in a speech of much eloquence. His speeches on the Tariff, the relative advantages and disadvantages of small-note currency, and on the removal of the deposits by General Jackson, show what are his pretensions to industry and sagacity as a politician.
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Mr. Wilde's opposition to the Force Bill and the removal of the deposits rendered him as unpopular to the Jackson party in Georgia as his letter from Virginia had made him with the Nullifiers; and at the election of 1834 he was left out. This afforded him the opportunity he had long desired of going abroad to recruit his health, much impaired by a long and arduous public service and by repeated attacks of diseases incident to Southern climates. He sailed for Europe in June, 1835, spent two years in travelling through England, France, Belgium, Switzerland, and Italy, and settled during three years more in Florence. Here he occupied himself entirely with literature. The romantic love, the madness and imprisonment, of Tasso, had become a subject of curious controversy ; and he entered into the investigation "with the enthusiasm of a poet and the patience and accuracy of a case-hunter," and produced a work, published since his return to the United States, in which the questions concerning Tasso are most ably discussed, and lights are thrown upon them by his letters and by some of his sonnets, which last are rendered into English with rare felicity.
Having finished his work on Tasso, he turned his attention to Dante ; and having learned accidentally one day, in conversation with an artist, that an authentic portrait of this great poet, from the pencil of Giotto, probably still existed in the Baryello, (anciently both the prison and the palace of the Republic,) on a wall which by some strange neglect or inadvertence had been covered with whitewash, he set on foot a project for its discovery and restoration, which, after some months, was crowned with complete success. "This discovery of a veritable portrait of Dante in the prime of his days," says Mr. Irving, "produced throughout Italy some such sensation as in England would follow the sudden discovery of a perfectly well-authenticated likeness of Shakspeare, with a difference in intensity proportioned to the superior sensitiveness of the Italians."
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