USA > Indiana > Fayette County > History of Fayette County, Indiana: containing a history of the townships, towns, villages, schools, churches, industries, etc.; portraits of early settlers and prominent men; biographies, etc., etc. > Part 18
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That session the great Internal Improvement Bill was passed.
In 1836 he was again chosen Speaker, making the second time he had been elected to this position before he had attained the early age of twenty-eight years. For several years he was one of the Fund Commissioners for Indiana.
In 1840 he was again elected to the Legislature, it being the fifth time he had been so honored by his adopted county. He was made Chairman of the Committee on Canals. That same year he was one of the Presidential Electors on the Harrison ticket.
In 184I he ran for Congress, but was defeated. The Whigs running two candidates suffered defeat, Andrew Kennedy, their competitor, being elected. Two years later Mr. Smith was elected to Congress, and in 1845 was re elected, and again re-elected in 1847.
"In these three terms he made himself the fore- most man of the Indiana Delegation, and at the close was probably not only the most prominent man in national affairs from the State, but the most promi- nent man who had ever represented it."
Oliver H. Smith in making further reference to the subject says: " He stood high in Congress as a member and eloquent speaker. He was one of the most eloquent and powerful stump-speakers in the United States, a warm and devoted Whig; was on the
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commission, after he left Congress, with Corwin and Payne, under the Mexican treaty. Few men in the West have filled a larger space in the public eye."
In 1851 he removed to the city of Cincinnati, and was elected President of the Cincinnati & Chicago Railroad Company. The project proved ruinous and Mr. Smith became deeply involved. In 1856 he be- came an elector for Ohio on the Fremont ticket. In 1859 he severed his connection with the railroad and removed to Indianapolis, resuming the practice of his profession. He was made Chairman of the Indiana delegation at the Chicago Convention in 1860, and contributed greatly to the success of Abraham Lin- coln, seconding in his nomination with twenty-six votes from Indiana. He was an Elector for the State at Large on the Republican ticket.
His vigorous campaign made for the martyred President was recognized in his being made Mr. Lin- coln's Secretary of the Interior. He resigned his pos- ition in the cabinet on Christmas Day, 1862, to accept the Judgeship of the United States Court for the Dis- trict of Indiana, January 1, 1863.
"As a Judge he was courteous to a degree which dis- armed partisan bitterness at a period of unusual party exasperation, and his fairness was so evident that there could be little more complaint of it than of his demeanor. It was chiefly as an orator and especially as a popular or 'stump' orator that Mr. Smith ex- celled. Here he had few rivals. His voice singular- ly clear, sonorous and penetrating, rarely encount- ered a crowd that could exhaust its power without obtaining the full freight of thought it carried. His language was copious and appropriate, often striking and always clear, and his style though affecting little of the polished elegance of the pen, was rarely sloven- ly or feeble. He possessed the ability to argue a prop- osition convincingly."
This citizen, orator, statesman and Judge of dis- tinction died in the court building at Indianapolis, Ind., the 17th of Jannary, 1864. The circumstances of his death as announced in the Indianapolis Journal of January 8, 1864, were as follows:
"He left home in the morning with his son to at- tend court, which was in session, and appeared to be in his usual health, which, however, for some months past has not been very robust. On arriving at the court house he went into his private room to rest a few minutes before opening court, and while sitting before the fire was seized with a fit of coughing which in some unexplained way ruptured a blood vessel and caused a profuse and almost choking flow of blood. He was alone at the time, but in a few minutes Post- master Conner entered the room and discovering the condition of the Judge, notified those who could best assist in the matter and had him removed to the bed in
the private office of District Attorney Hanna. Drs. Jameson and Wright were called in, and the utmost efforts of these experienced physicans were directed to the stopping of the flow of blood. They succeeded partially, but not till more than a gallon had been thrown up, and the patient fearfully if not fatally, re- duced in strength and vital energy. After the check- ing of the hemorrhage the Judge remained calm, and, it was hoped, in a condition which rendered recovery possible. But late in the afternoon a paroxysm of coughing seized him again and ;renewed the hemor- rhage, and attacking a system already reduced, speedi- ly rendered death inevitable. Some time before dark it was considered certain that he could not live through the night, and those unhappy fears were re- alized too soon, as his condition made it impossible to move him."
At the death of Judge Smith it was Zordered by the President of the United States that the Executive Building at the seat of Government be draped in mourning for fourteen days, "in honor of him as a prudent and loyal counselor, and faithful and effec- tive coadjutor of the Administration in an hour of public difficulty and peril."
The wife of Judge Smith was Elizabeth B. Wat- ton, of Connersville, Ind., to whom he was united in marriage July 8, 1831.
SAMUEL W. PARKER.
A walk of fifteen minutes to the south of Con- nersville conveys one to the "Old Elm Farm," a beautiful and picturesque suburban or country seat- long the home of men of distinction. Back of and above this homestead on the brow of a towering hill overshadowed by a cluster of evergreens and the more lofty forest trees which crown and fringe the sur- rounding ridge, is nestled the grave of Samuel W. Parker, to whose memory has been ascribed by a United States Senator, a place among the first law- yers of his time.
Of the ancestors of Samuel W. Parker little defi- nite knowledge is known. His father, Samuel Par- ker, was a native of the State of Vermont. Said Samuel W .: "I have induced myself to believe that .my paternal ancestors were from England, more, however, from the name than anything else." The mother of Samuel W. was Elizabeth Miller, a native of Massachusetts, the ancestors of whom our subject believed to be of German extraction. At an early age both parents with their parents immigrated to New York, and were married in Jefferson County, October 20, 1803, in a town called Champion. They lived in Watertown until in August, 1805, on the 2d day of which month the husband died and was there interred. He was a carpenter by trade, and a
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worthy young man. The subject of this sketch was his only child, and his birth occurred one month and seven days after the father's decease.
"At the age of one year and six months," said our subject, "I was adopted by one of the most kind and affectionate step-fathers that ever orphan boy was blessed with." This was Joseph Wadley, who was born on the same day with Mr. Parker's own father, and he, too, was a carpenter by trade. He owned a farm on Stony Creek near Sacketts Harbor, where he had built a flouring-mill; and in this vicinity, at the age of about four years, in a little log schoolhouse, young Parker took his iniatory steps in schooling. From 1811 to 1815 Mr. Wadley and family resided in and about Bloomfield, in Ontario County, of the same State, during which period, and when not more than nine years of age, little Sam was often entrusted with a team of a wagon and two horses in the con- veyance of brick to the neighboring town of Canan- daigua, being assisted only in the loading of them.
In 1815 the family immigrated to Cincinnati, Ohio, and there and in that vicinity remained until 1818, when they settled at Oxford, Ohio, during which pe- riod our subject at different times attended the Lancastran Seminary, superintended respectively by Harrison and Cathcart, during a portion of which attendance the school numbered from 200 to 500 pu- pils, over whom young Parker acted as general mon- itor.
It seems that Mr. Wadley was very anxious to give his children a good education, and especially the step- son, often remarking to him that he never expected to be able to give him anything else, and at all events that would be the best fortune that could be given him. So it was mainly this object that directed him to Oxford, from the prospect of an excellent insti- tution of learning there. At this village young Par- ker first attended a common school about one year, in which reading, spelling and history alone were studied. He subsequently attended a grammar school then just opened by the Rev. James Hughes, under the charge of the Trustees of the University-the first germ of the future college. Here he began the study of the languages-Latin and Greek-and here were made his first efforts at declamation; and on the latter he remarks: "I succeeded well, was fond of the exercise, and soon ranked among the best declaimers in the institution. At several public exhibitions the laurels were won by me; and many a vision of glory did these laurels excite in my young imagination.
"Here, too, my first attempts at composition were made. In this I did not succeed so well. It was a tame exercise when contrasted with spouting forth the eloquent thoughts of the Roman, English and American orators. In this branch, however, I stood
about equal to my fellows. But little attention was then directed to composition; declamation swallowed up all, and when the Trustees of the institution, on a public examination and exhibition day, pronounced me the best declaimer in the institution, I deemed myself a man of full proportions, though it seems that, in reality, I was but a stripling of but fifteen years."
After Mr. Wadley's arrival in this city on immigrat- ing thither, he was soon engaged in bridge-building and other carpenter work, and during a part of his stay in the vicinity, he was engaged at Mt. Pleasant in building flat-boats, termed "Broad Horns," and while in and about the city, fishing and swimming seemed to be a favorite sport of the young step-son, as he speaks of frequently amusing himself with other lads in swimming and bathing in the river, and div- ing from and under the boats, etc., etc., and later on at Oxford, ball was a pleasant pastime to him.
The late summer and early fall of 1821 have been pronounced by him as the halcyon days of his life. Nearly three months of his time were passed on a visit to an uncle who resided near North Bend, on the Ohio. His uncle kept a large dairy, and the visitor assisted in attending to the cows, milking, making butter and cheese, and going to the Cincinnati market and sporting through the neighboring country. The following incident occurring on this visit from its connection with so distinguished a man is worthy of note, and is given in the language of the participant himself in after years:
" Whilst at North Bend, on one fine summer day several of the neighbor boys and myself went down to the river at Gen. Harrison's farm to swim. Whilst there we noticed the tempting looks of the fruit in the General's orchard-and the temptation was too strong to withstand. Accordingly we entered the en- closure and commenced our assaults upon it. Having pretty well filled our pockets, we commenced a retreat, and, as we were getting back over the fence, we espied the old hero himself, leaping his garden fence, bounce into the orchard and make toward us. Though some three hundred yards distant, his manner very plainly indicated that he had some designs upon those who had just gratified their designs upon his fruit. We accordingly made a hasty retreat to the river, jumped into a canoe lying at the shore, and had but cleverly got our canoe out of his reach when "Old Tip" was at the water's edge. He assumed a most furious attitude; his eyes seemed to flash javelins into our bosoms, and his curses were withering. He bade us instantly back to the shore or he would have the Constable after us-and whole troop of young thieves in jail before sun down. To disobey was impossible, and our pockets were full of what must be our con-
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demnation. We accordingly commenced plying the paddle for the shore, and in the meantime also busied ourselves in stealthily slipping overboard all the fruit that could not be easily concealed. We landed, and I stepped forward as spokesman. I observed that we had come down to the river to swim. We saw the haw tree just inside the orchard fence, and think- ing it no harm to take a few haws from it, we accord- ingly got over and did so,-and suiting the action to the word I pulled from my breeches pocket a few haws that happened to be there, and displayed them as proof of our innocence. A most benignant smile came over the old soldier's swarthy features. 'Ah,' said he, boys, if that is all the mischief you have done, come up here with me and get some of my apples. I have some very fine ones yet, if the boatmen have not stolen them all off. Any body is welcome to my fruit so long as it lasts, if they will only come and ask me for it-but d -n a thief. I hate them.' And this was my first interview with that patriot soldier, and honest man, who, when he died, the Nation mourned in tears-because the 'good President' had fallen! He then as little thought of being President as I did of the after service of two years and a half at the head of a newspaper, advocating his preten- sions. "
Up until the fall of 1824, when Miami University was regularly opened, young Sam attended for a time the grammar school heretofore mentioned as started by Mr. Hughes, which had been discontinued on the death of that gentleman, but which was re- opened by Rev. Spencer Clark, and a common school in the village taught by Abner Philbrick. During the spring, summer, and fall of this last mentioned year he worked on a farm rented by his step-father in the vicinity of Oxford, which was the only regular year's mannal labor that he ever per- formed.
In January, 1825, he entered the institution as a free scholar, under provisions that had been made for five young men of merit: The limited circumstances of this step-father compelled him to take advantage of such provisions, and enter thus or not at all. On this point Mr. Parker says, " It was rather humiliat- ing to my proud spirit, but the goodness of the canse and a firm determination to rise above it, reconciled my feelings to the sacrifice."
His four years' course in Miami University, from the beginning to the day of graduation, was a suc- cession of brilliant intellectual triumphs; term after term and year after year he was the recipient of compliments and high honors at the hands of his class. mates and of the Faculty. He entered the university as a freshman, and at the close of the first session was selected, with one other class-mate, to deliver an
original oration; theme, Patriotism and some of the events of the American Revolution. From the beginning he attracted attention as a speaker, and continued to occupy a position in this respect second to none connected with the institution. Before the close of the year, in addition to his studies he took charge of a class in the grammar school, in part, and in this way got off of the charity list. At the close of the second session he was selected to deliver the oration introductory to the exhibition.
In December, 1825, was organized the Union Literary Society of the Miami University, of which he was one of the founders, and over which he sub- sequently presided. After the organization of this society, young Parker from the first took a stand 88 an extemporaneons debater and declaimer amongst the most prominent members, which station he retained until his graduation. Says Parker: "The most formidable antagonist I ever met in debate in the society, was Robert C. Schenck, of Ohio, and so the strongest will say who encounter him." Dur- ing his remaining years in the institution he was closely identified with the interests of this society, and was on several occasions highly complimented in the bestowal of honors by it upon him in public exercises, among which was his unanimous election to prepare a report upon the Rise, Progress and Present Condition and Future Prospects of the Soci- ety, and deliver an address on the occasion, which he accepted and performed in a manner that was highly gratifying to the society and to the public.
In 1828 the Faculty and students of the university formed themselves into a society auxiliary to the American Colonization Society, in Washington, D., C, and Parker was by them appointed to deliver a public address on the 4th of July, 1828, on the colonization system, held in the college chapel in conjunction with a celebration of the citizens of Oxford. The orator was James Crawford. Mr. Parker spoke for nearly an hour, and the speech won him much applause. Many of the auditors expressed a desire to have the address published in pamphlet form. At the dinner table a complimentary toast was drank to the "orators of the day."
Commencement Day came, and with it found the already distinguished young Parker facing a great concourse of people, among whom were per- sonages of culture and distinction, with a theme for graduation of "Symmes' Theory of Concentric Spheres." As a speaker on this occasion, Parker was unanimously voted the chief; said Dr. Slack, then the distinguished chemical professor in the Cincin- nati College, commenting on the speech that he "did not think Capt. Symmes himself could have pre- sented his theory in a manner more happy and im-
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pressive." Says the speaker, "This effort was of no little service to me. It gave me a celebrity through the country which college efforts seldom acquire, and it was the means of introducing me to several gen- tlemen of intelligence and reputation." To the dis- satisfaction of many of the students and some of the Faculty in the assignment of class honors, Parker was given the third place. His friends claimed for him the second if not the first honors. The second place was given to the son of Dr. Bishop, the President of the University. On the evening of September 24, 1828, a commencement ball was given at Apple's Inn, in Oxford, of which young Parker was manager, and says he: "It was the first ball I had ever attended, and I believe I may say the first social party of any kind, though then twenty-three years old. I had been a student the most of my days, and a close one too; I did not lose a half dozen recitations during the whole four years of my college course." Mr. Parker acted as a tutor during the greater portion of his time in college.
Until his graduation the most of his days were passed in school, yet when out of school and during mornings and evenings and vacations he was accus- tomed to do, and did do, almost all kinds of manual labor; this the circumstances of the family required, and it was most cheerfully complied with, in a just appreciation of the assistance and love borne him by his step-father. "In fact," said our subject, "I have done a little of everything, almost, in my time, for the sake of being handy in aid of my step-father." To further show the great esteem and appreciation held by him for this father, we quote his own words: "The kind attention and essential services always rendered me by my most excellent step-father never recur to my mind without filling my bosom with sen- sations of gratitude almost painful. Would to heaven that good old man could have lived that I might return to him some of the ten thousand kind- nesses in the evening of his days that he bestowed upon me in the morning of mine."
Soon after the graduation of Mr. Parker he set- tled in the village of Connersville, and in November opened a private or subscription school, which he taught several terms, and in the following May secured the Principalship of the county seminary, then just being completed, and in July opened the first school in that building. He was here engaged in teaching until the close of a term of school in April, 1830, when he resigned the position.
Early in the year 1829 he began writing edito- rially for the Fayette Observer, the proprietor and senior editor of which was Daniel Rench, and soon thereafter the editorial charge of the paper was given him, and in February, 1830, Mr. Parker became in
a manner the proprietor. New type, etc., was pro- cured, and Mr. Parker sent forth to the country the first issue of the newspaper titled the Political Clar- ion, May 22, 1830, which was continued two years and edited with marked ability, such as called forth a complimentary letter from Henry Clay, whom he vigorously supported for the chief magistracy. The young editor was honored by calls from the Governor, Senator Noble, and Judge Test, then Representative in Congress from the Connersville District, and his importance seemed great. We extract the following from an editorial in the Clarion of April 30, 1831:
"In this village we first commenced in the bus- iness of the world. We have formed friendly associa- tions here, which we wish not to sunder. Here we first looked out over the land for ourselves, and beheld wicked men treading down the virtuous, corruption vitiating the undefiled, creeping into the councils and Cabinet of the Republic, and threatening a gen- eral deluge -the precedents, the laws, and the consti- tution which came to us from hallowed bands spurned and violated-anarchy and confusion smothering the voice of honest men and justice -- all the vile princi- ples of our nature kindling into a blaze, catching upon the vitals of our Government and freedom, and blown upon us as it were by the breath of the hurri- cane. Hence we believe sprang at least some of the incentives that induced us to stay here, to enlist under the banner that we have here, and however faint and unavailing the efforts might be, to prepare for a strug- gle in the conflict here, until we fail or it be over. None of our ardor is or will be abated. Our course is on, right on, until our Republican institutions, the American system and Henry Clay are overwhelmed, or rise and triumph together on the 4th of March, 1833."
From the very beginning Mr. Parker had deter- mined upon adopting the law as his profession, and with this view on opening his first school in Conners- ville he put in odd hours reading Blackstone in the office of Oliver H. Smith, but it was soon thought by the patrons of his school and others, that he could not do the two things at the same time, and the law was soon temporarily dropped, and not again taken up until during the latter half of the first year he was publishing the Clarion. He etudied in all about six months, and we may say without any instruction, he was admitted to the bar in August, 1831, having been first examined at Brookville, by Judge Miles C. Eggleston, August 6, and his license signed, and the examination completed August 22, before a commit- tee of lawyers at the Wayne Circuit Court, which committee reported favorably, and the license was perfected by the signature of Judge Test. The day following he made his maiden speech to a jury in
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assisting James Perry, the Prosecutor, in the prose- cution of a defendant charged with refusing to aid a Constable to execute proceedings.
In 1834 Mr. Parker established the Watchman, a weekly paper, which he continued until after the close of the Presidential election in 1836, advocating with great zeal the election to the Presidency of Will- iam Henry Harrison. In 1833 he made the race for Representative in the Legislature from the county of Fayette, but was defeated; however, seven years later he was elected to that position. The following year he was elected to the State Senate and served one term, when he was again chosen a Representative in the Legislature.
In 1836 he was appointed Prosecuting Attorney for the circuit, and during his service in that capac- ity, remarked the Rev. James Havens at his funeral, "he did more for the morality in this part of the State in ferreting out and suppressing vice and crime than any man then living." He traversed the State in in 1840, 1844, 1848, 1852 and 1856, and was champion Whig of the Whitewater Valley. Says Gen. Thomas Bennett: " He was a zealous partisan of unwavering fidelity, never flinching from any responsibility im- posed upon him by the party of his choice. He took the great Clay for his model, and with a devotion amounting to almost idolatry, he followed his chosen chieftain while he lived, and when he died he lin- gered long at the grave of the gallant old Whig."
In 1849 Mr. Parker was elected to Congress and served two terms as the Whig Representative of his district, his Congressional career closing with the Thirty-third Congress in March, 1855. He could have triumphantly returned to the seat he had so ably filled, but he declined a renomination. He voted against the repeal of the Missouri Compromise and on the subject made a most masterly and brilliant speech which won him high compliments. The House being in the Committee on the Whole on the State of the Union, Mr. Parker said:
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