USA > Illinois > Cook County > Chicago > Discovery and conquests of the Northwest, with the history of Chicago, Vol. II > Part 21
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If slavery was constitutional it certainly was un- natural and could not live without special legislation; nor could it be prolonged without friction in the body politic of the nation. American slavery began on the James river, in Virginia, in 1619, at which time a Dutch vessel brought in a cargo of slaves, and sold them to the colonists, which was done by the connivance of the British government. Although certain planters pur- chased and employed these slaves, the assembly of Vir- ginia saw danger in the future from their introduction, and petitioned to the British throne, in 1772, to stop this importation, using language as follows: "We are encouraged to look up to the throne and implore your majesty's paternal assistance in averting a calamity of a most alarming nature. The importation of slaves into the colonies from the coast of Africa hath long been considered as a trade of great inhumanity; and under its present encouragement we have great reason to fear will endanger the very existence of your majesty's dominions."
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No notice was taken of this petition by the crown, from which it is manifest that slavery was forced upon the colonists by the mother country. Even while the first crude thoughts of the American revolution were revolving in the minds of our fathers, an anti-slavery society was formed by the Quakers at Sun tavern in Philadelphia, April 14, 1775. An abolition society was formed in Virginia the same year, and met four times, but owing to the revolutionary war did not meet again till 1784, the next year after peace. Benjamin Frank- lin was president of this society, and Benjamin Rush secretary. In 1787 Patrick Henry and John Jay also lent their influence in favor of abolition. In 1827 there were 136 abolition societies in the United States, 106 of which were in slave holding states.
Many of the latter were the result of Benjamin Lundy's efforts, who was the main connecting link be- tween the old societies, formed previous to the revolu- tion, and the more modern abolitionists, who revised the work which they had begun, and carried it on amidst a storm of abuse, not exempt from danger. Mr. Lundy was a Hicksite Quaker, born in New Jersey, January 4, 1789. In 1821 he commenced the publica- tion of the Genius of Universal Emancipation, an anti- slavery newspaper, at Mount Pleasant, Ohio. This paper he removed to Tennessee, where it was continued till again removed, next time to Baltimore, in 1825, and afterward to Philadelphia, where it was destroyed by a mob in 1837. Previous to this time he had trav- ersed the whole country, issuing transient numbers of his paper, also anti-slavery pamphlets, and had held personal interviews with such men as Arthur Tappan, Ichabod Codding, William Lloyd Garrison and other philanthropists.
Mr. Garrison received his impressions against slavery from Mr. Lundy, and it may truly be said, that after his death his mantle of honor fell upon Mr. Garri- son's shoulders, at least, in the part taken by the Bos-
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tonians in this conflict. Zebina Eastman united his efforts with Mr. Lundy in the publication of the Genius the year after its removal to Lowell, Ill., in 1838, where Mr. Lundy died August 22, 1839, and the responsibilities of the paper were left alone with Mr. Eastman, after but a brief alliance with his modest but illustrious friend. Says Horace Greeley of Mr. Lundy: "Thus closed the record of one of the most heroic, devoted, courageous lives that has ever been lived on this con- tinent."
Mr. Eastman continued the abolition campaign in the west through the columns of the Genius, assisted by Hooper Warren till 1842, when he was invited to go to Chicago by James H. Collins, Dr. C. V. Dyer, H. L. Fulton, S. D. Childs, Calvin De Wolf, N. Rossiter, Rev. F. Bascom, L. C. P. Freer, J. Johnston and others, to start the Western Citizen. It became the leading anti-slavery organ of the western states under his editorship, assisted by his old friend, Hooper Warren, who remained with him during the publication of that paper.
To preserve the chain of connection between the early advocates of abolitionism and later workers in the cause, brief sketches of them are here inserted:
Edward Coles was born in Virginia in 1786. He inherited from his father a large plantation, well stocked with slaves; but he inherited from nature the true spirit of humanity as well as generosity, and under its inspira- tion he sold his plantation and liberated his slaves, giving to each 160 acres of land in Illinois, to which state he removed in 1819. He became the second gov- ernor of Illinois, after a most desperate struggle in the gubernatorial canvass to make it a slave state. The issue was whether to change the constitution of Illinois so as to admit slavery, his influence being against the change, and his cause triumphed. He died in Philadel- phia in 1868.
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William Lloyd Garrison, born in Newburyport, Mass., December 12, 1804, was fined and imprisoned for a "libel" against slave catchers, but released by Arthur Tappan, who paid his fine. January 1, 1831, Mr. Garrison issued the first number of the Liberator, and was dragged through the streets of Boston with a rope around his neck, for his abolition utterances. The governor of Georgia offered $5,000 for his head. He died in Boston May 24, 1879.
Benjamin Franklin Wade, born in Springfield, Mass., October 27, 1800. He rose to great distinction in the United States senate, and earned the title, " Hon- est Ben Wade. " Died March 20, 1878, at Jefferson, Ohio.
William Goodell was a supporter of Gerrit Smith's doctrine of the unconstitutionality of slavery. Died at Janesville, Wis., in 1879.
Joshua Leavitt, born in Massachusetts, was a prominent leader in the formation of the liberty party of 1840, which was the germ of the republican party of 1860, in Massachusetts. He died at Brooklyn, N. Y., January 16, 1873.
William Ellery Channing, born at Newport, R. I., April 7, 1780. In 1841 he published a book on abolition- ism, which had a wide circulation. He died at Ben- nington, Vt., October 2, 1842.
Elijah Parish Lovejoy, martyr to the freedom of the press and the freedom of the slave, was born in Albion, Me., November 9, 1802. Went to St. Louis in 1827, became editor of the St. Louis Observer, a Presby- terian weekly, was required by the proprietors of that paper to be silent on the subject of slavery; instead of doing which he boldly claimed the right of free speech and free press. He was mobbed in St. Louis and St. Charles, Mo., after which he bought the paper and removed it to Alton, Ill., where three presses were destroyed by violence. On the night of November 7, 1837, while, by the mayor's orders, defending the fourth press, he was shot by an armed mob.
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Owen Lovejoy, younger brother of Elijah, was born in Albion, Me., January 6, 1811, was elected to congress in 1856, and died while a member of that body in March, 1864, in Brooklyn, N. Y.
James G. Birney, born at Danville, Ky., February 4, 1792. He was the abolition candidate for president of the United States in 1840. He died at Perth Amboy, N. J., November 20, 1857.
Philo Carpenter was born in Massachusetts Feb- ruary 27, 1805, where he remained tilling the soil on
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his father's farm till his majority was reached. Both his grandfathers were in the revolutionary war. An earlier ancestor was William Carpenter, who came from Southampton, England, to Weymouth, Mass., in 1635. Mr. Carpenter received a good common school education, supplemented by a few terms at an academy in South Adams, Mass. He arrived in Chicago in the summer of 1832. The peculiar circumstances attending his arrival may be found in Vol. I of this work. The Black Hawk war was then creating great alarm throughout the country ; but the cholera was creating
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a greater alarm. This epidemic did not prevent his mingling among the troops at Fort Dearborn. He hav- ing clerked in a drug store, was partially qualified to administer to their wants from his stock of drugs and medicines which he brought with him to Chicago. He organized the first temperance society here soon after his arrival; and in conversing with him some years ago he told the writer of this sketch that he presented the temperance pledge to Indian Robinson, who signed it, and, consistent with this action, drew a flask of whisky from his pocket and emptied it on the ground. Mr. Carpenter was an uncompromising advocate of the abolition of slavery from the first. His home was ever a free hiding place for fugitives, whence he piloted them by night to Canada-bound vessels. When the abolition question first came up in the Presbyterian church, of which he was a member, nearly one-half of the church voted against the agitation of the slavery question. The Presbyterian synod had the authority to control the action of the church even against the majority of its members, and this majority were dispos- sessed of the use of the church in which to advocate abolition doctrines ; but this division of the church gave way to the principles of freedom in after years. Much of Mr. Carpenter's life may be found in connection with other abolitionists spoken of in this article. He died in Chicago, August 7, 1886.
Milton Smith was born in Cazenovia, N. Y., Jan- uary 27, 1810. He came to Illinois in 1835, and identi- fied himself at once with the anti-slavery movement. In his profession as a minister of the gospel he often risked his life by the boldness of his anti-slavery utter- ances, as well as in personal encounters with slave hunters. On one occasion he narrowly escaped being thrown overboard from a boat on the Ohio river, for having advocated the anti-slavery cause. At his home, near Bloomingdale, Ill., he frequently secreted fugitive slaves, making great sacrifice of time and expense in
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conveying them stealthily in the night to Chicago, to steamers that carried them to Canada. He died at Wheaton, Ill., March 17, 1878.
Calvin De Wolf was born in Braintrim, Pa., in 1815, on his father's side descended from colonists who came from Holland and settled at Lyme, Conn. His mother was descended from Edward Spalding, who settled in Chelmsford, Mass., in 1633. Mr. De Wolf was a self-taught man, having paid his own way by manual labor at Grand River Institute, Ohio, where he
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became proficient in the higher branches of mathe- matics and in Latin. He came to Chicago in the fall of 1837. After teaching school two terms, he entered the office of Spring & Goodrich, to study law. In 1843 he was admitted to the bar and commenced practice, in which profession he continued up to 1854, when he was elected justice of the peace. He was one of the found- ers of the anti-slavery society in 1859, and was one of those who helped to found the Western Citizen, edited by Zebina Eastman.
The attempt to introduce slavery into Nebraska is still fresh in the minds of many at this day. Stephen
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F. Nuckolls was one of the slave colonizers, but a young slave named Eliza, unwilling to become a subject of his designs, made her escape and found her way to Chicago. Nuckolls, the master, followed her, and in his attempt to capture her, was arrested and brought before Judge De Wolf, on a charge of riotous conduct. He was locked up a few hours, during which time the abolitionists sent the woman on her road to Canada. Nuckolls commenced suit in the United States court and obtained an indictment against Mr. De Wolf, George Anderson, H. D. Hayward and C. L. Jenks for aiding a negro slave to escape from her master. The question now came up whether slaves could be held, according to the constitution, in Nebraska. The de- fendants held that the woman was not lawfully a slave in Nebraska, on which ground a movement was made to quash the indictment. This motion never came to trial, but in 1861 the case was dismissed by authority of Hon. E. C. Larned, United States district attorney, after having been pending ever since 1858, the date of Eliza's escape. Mr. De Wolf died in Chicago, Novem- ber 21, 1899.
Gammiel Bailey, born in Mount Holly, N. J., 1797, was founder of the National Era at Washington, the paper that first gave to the world "Uncle Tom's Cabin." He died on a passage from Europe in 1859.
John G. Whittier, born in Haverhill, Mass., Decem- ber 17, 1807. This noted Quaker poet was the friend of both Lundy and Garrison, and united his efforts with them till slavery was abolished. He died in 1892.
Arthur Tappan was born in Connecticut May 22, 1786. He was a merchant in New York. Founded the Emancipator, and helped to found Oberlin college. He died July 23, 1865.
Charles Sumner was born in Boston, Mass., Janu- ary 6, 1811. He succeeded Daniel Webster in the United States senate in 1851, which place he retained until his death, March 11, 1874, at Washington, D. C.
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His arguments in favor of the abolition of slavery were too logical to be answered by words; instead of attempt- ing to do which Mr. Brooks, a southern senator, made a savage attack upon him with a cane on the floor of the senate. Mr. Sumner was one of the commissioners to settle the Alabama claims.
Mrs. Lucretia Mott, of Quaker parentage, was born on Nantucket island in 1793. Her education was re- ceived in the schools of Boston till fourteen years of age, at which time she was placed in a Friends' board- ing school in New York state, where she remained until she became an assistant teacher. She was a natural orator and forcible writer, which, together with her associations with Benjamin Lundy, Wm. Lloyd Garri- son, Wendell Phillips, Lydia Maria Childs and others, had well fitted her for the conspicuous part she took in the cause of human freedom, as well as in other benevo- lent reforms. While she learned much from them, she gave as much in return as she received. Even the great Garrison took his first lesson in elocution from this gifted woman. While on his return from a Balti- more jail, confined there for abolition utterances, charged with resentment for his persecutions, he called on Mrs. Mott in Philadelphia, who obtained permission for him to deliver an abolition address in the Green street church, where Mrs. Mott had begun to preach. He pulled out his manuscript and went through with it. Says Mrs. Mott, "It was, of course, a very strongly written production, but delivered without animation." She, being an orator, knew how it should be done, and said to her young friend: "William, if thee expects to set forth thy cause by word of mouth, thee must lay aside thy paper and trust to the leading of the Spirit." Garrison profited by this advice, given in kindness, of which his future fame as an orator gave good evidence. Mrs. Mott died at her home near Philadelphia in 1880.
Lydia Maria Childs was born in 1802. She edited the National Slavery Standard, and was the author of a
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famous book, entitled, " An Appeal for Africa." Her literary style was a model of elegance. She died in 1880.
Charles F. Torrey, born in Scituate, Mass., 1813, was editor of the Tocsin of Liberty, published in Albany, and was arrested in Maryland for running off slaves, convicted and sentenced to Baltimore state prison for life, and died in prison May 9, 1846, one year after his sentence. He was called the martyr Torrey.
Salmon P. Chase was born in Cornish, N. H., Jan- uary 13, 1808. He was one of the founders of the liberty party, was governor of Ohio in 1855, and was appointed secretary of the treasury by Lincoln in 1861 During his secretaryship he was chiefly instrumental in establishing the greenback system. The fourteenth amendment to the constitution was among the last of his public acts. He died at the residence of his daughter, Mrs. Wm. Hoyt, New York, May 7, 1873.
Joshua R. Giddings was born in Athens, Pa., October 6, 1795. He earned a reputation for consist- ency and honesty in his long public life, during which time he was unceasing in his opposition to slavery. He was made consul at Montreal by Lincoln, where he died May 27, 1864.
Gerrit Smith, born in Attica, N. Y., 1798. He gave his money freely to aid fugitive slaves, was a firm advocate of temperance as well as abolition of slavery. He died in New York, 1874.
Elihu Burritt, the learned blacksmith, was born in New Britain, Conn., December 8, 1811. He was as remarkable for his love of humanity as for his great learning. He always pleaded the cause of abolition through his logical pen. He died at the place of his birth in March, 1867.
Wendell Phillips was born in Boston in 1811. He was, to use John Adams' forcible expression, "a flame of fire" in the cause of abolition. The style of his
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oratory was a model to be aimed at, but rarely, if ever, to be equaled. He died in 1884.
Jane Grey Swisshelm, born in Pittsburg, Pa., December 6, 1815, was descended from the old Scotch reformers and also from Lady Jane Grey, the nine days' queen of England. In 1848 she established the Pitts- burg Saturday Visitor, devoted to abolition and other reforms. She took the lecture field with great success, making emancipation of the negro one of her chief points. She died in 1884.
Hooper Warren, a native of Windsor, Vt., was asso- ciated with the celebrated Governor Coles in his opposi- tion to slavery, and also with Zebina Eastman, in the publication of the Genius of Liberty, as told in fore- going pages. He died at Mendota, Ill., in 1864.
Jonathan Blanchard, a native of Vermont, took strong anti-slavery ground when he, a young man, started out in life armed with a college diploma and an uncompromising spirit toward slavery. He was early associated with the abolition movement, and was out- spoken as to the impolicy of slavery, when Henry Ward Beecher, his associate, stood on neutral ground, under the wing of his venerable father, Dr. Lyman Beecher, of Cincinnati. He was president of Knox college, at Galesburg, Ill., and later of Wheaton college, in Wheaton, Ill., where he died May 24, 1892.
Ichabod Codding was born in Bristol, N. Y., Sep- tember 23, 1810. He came to Illinois in 1842, by invi- tation of Z. Eastman, who wished the assistance of his forensic power in the anti-slavery movement. He died at Baraboo, Wis., June 17, 1866.
William Henry Seward was born in Florida, Orange county, New York, May 16, 1801. He early took strong ground as an anti-slavery advocate. He was appointed secretary of state by Lincoln in 1861. The term "irrepressible conflict," was original with him. He died at Auburn, N. Y., October 10, 1872.
Theodore Parker, born at Lexington, Mass., in
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1812, was no time serving orator, but was a bold advo- cate of truth as he saw it. He was emphatic in his protest against the fugitive slave law, and delivered a lecture on its issue in Federal hall, Boston, when the cor- ridors of the hall were filled with United States sol- diers. He defied the mob, and declared that he would march out between the files of the soldiers when he had closed his speech. He died at Florence, Italy, May 16, 1860.
John Quincy Adams, the sixth president of the United States, was born in Quincy, formerly Braintree, Mass., July 11, 1767. His convictions were always strong and uncompromising with every principle that impaired the liberties of any man, without distinction of color. He was a friend of Lundy, Giddings and other philanthropists. "This is the last of earth," were his dying words when suddenly stricken down in the halls of congress, February 23, 1848.
Cassius M. Clay, born in Kentucky, 1811. Edited the True American, an anti-slavery paper, at Lexington, Ky., at the time of intense excitement. He defended his press against a mob with his rifle, but the mob after- ward took advantage of his prostration on a bed of sickness, seized his newspaper establishment and shipped it out of the state. Mr. Clay is still living at his home in Kentucky.
Horace Greeley was born at Amherst, N. H., Feb- ruary 8, 1811. He had published several papers pre- vious to the New York Tribune, in which paper his edi- torials teemed with statesmanship, political economy tempered with philosophy, to an extent that made the rowdy element of the country give him "in derision" the epithet of "the philosopher." His able pen was always against slavery, for which reason his paper had no circulation south of Mason and Dixon's line. He was one of the principal fathers of the republican party, but when he ran for president against Grant he was defeated. He died November 29, 1872.
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The foregoing list of persons were the most promi- nent representatives of the issue that, step by step, had deepened the chasm between slavery and freedom. These men were not conservative, but radical. The incentives which actuated them were not selfish, but patriotic. The underground railroad between the United States and Canada was the result of their teachings. Chicago was its storm center of the west, and Chicago men were conductors on this covert line. There were several lines on this road, all tending toward Canada as a common goal. Lines ran by the sea coast from Charles- ton, S. C., to Boston; from Richmond, Va., Washington and Baltimore to Philadelphia and New York; from Maryland through Pennsylvania to such towns in New York state as were under the watchful care of Gerrit Smith; from Pittsburg to Buffalo, and from the western portions of Virginia to Cleveland; from Kentucky and the states south through Ohio to Cleveland; also a line from Cincinnati to Sandusky; all these having faithful agents to conduct the fugitives safely across the Canada line.
In Illinois were two prominent lines, the first of which was called the Lovejoy line, operating at various points northwardly; the other was a line from St. Louis via Alton and Springfield on this route to Chicago, the grand central depot of the western system; and it re- mained such from 1839 to 1861. The St. Louis and Alton line, after it had been in operation a few years, was called the Hunter line, because Major Charles W. Hunter, of Alton, had established many small stations in Illinois as feeders to it. Erastus Wright, of Spring- field, was his earnest co-worker. The zeal of the latter in the cause made him sometimes overstep the bounds of discretion, in which cases Abraham Lincoln, then a young lawyer, defended him before the courts. From Springfield, where the fugitives had been placed under the care of Mr. Wright, the line diverged into branches, through Tazewell, Woodford and Livingston counties,
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receiving accessions of passengers as they went north- ward. St. Louis, Quincy, Springfield and Galesburg were the stations on this line, at each of which places were able men who found a way to keep its operations so secret that the law could get no grip on them. One of the means of conveying fugitives on this line was to put them in an open wagon covered with loose hay. The drivers of such wagons armed themselves with rifles and traveled only in the night.
Meantime the exodus from slavery became more and more general, and at the Chicago end of the line Dr. Dyer, Philo Carpenter, Dr. Kennicott, Dan. David- son, Deacon Johnson, L. C. P. Freer, Calvin De Wolf, Allan Pinkerton and others had an accumulation of work on their hands. The slave hunters were not less active; the whole state of Illinois was corralled for fugitives, the hunters being bold and defiant, offering liberal rewards for assistance, while the underground railroad men were subtle and determined ; the former under the regime of law, the latter under the palladium of justice. Nor were the streets of Chicago exempt from these rival forces; but sometimes their "fine work" bordered on the comical. A case of this kind occurred November 14, 1842. Edwin Heathcock was the slave by heredity, according to the black code, and was properly advertised the required six weeks to be sold at public auction if no master had come forward to claim him and pay charges for arrest, etc. What made this case more interesting was the fact that Heathcock had a good standing in the community and in the church. Mr. Eastman has told the story well, as follows : "The selling of a Methodist brother in good and regular standing, as a piece of property, was not con- sidered altogether proper by some, even those who were not regarded as the contemptible abolitionists. Abo- litionists were becoming already numerous in Chicago, and it is not probable that they would have allowed so important an event as a slave sale to go unnoticed.
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Consequently, late on Saturday night Calvin De Wolf, who was then a student of law with Grant Goodrich, came into my printing office, and the sale on Monday became a topic of conversation. It was thought not best to let the opportunity pass without giving due notice to the citizens of Chicago, in order that there might be a sufficient number of persons present at the sale to fairly test the value of a man on the auction block. It did not pass. De Wolf held an oil lamp at the case, while, after I had set up the heading, I set in bold faced type a hand bill in these words :
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