History of Indianapolis and Marion County, Indiana, Part 56

Author: Sulgrove, Berry R. (Berry Robinson), 1828-1890
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 942

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hery and carriage drives, and Pogues Creek helps the general effect of pieturesqueness by running for a quarter of a mile across the northwest corner. Propositions have been made to Congress to donate the grounds and buildings to the State or city for educational purposes, in ease it was determined to abandon the arsenal here, for the maintenance of which there appears to be no very cogent argument. The arsenal gun every morning at six o'clock and the evening gun at sunset have come to be as familiar sounds in the city as the whistle of locomotives.

The Civil War .- From the secession of South Carolina to the attack on Fort Sumter, opinion was divided in Indiana on the measures to be taken with the seceded States. The more demonstrative and probably stronger division, led by Governor Morton, held it the duty of the government to rednee the disobedient States by force, proceeding by aggressive warfare, invasion, and destruction of life and prop- erty, as in the ease of any other public enemy. The other division, represented by John R. Cravens, David C. Branham, and the Journal, under the direction of B. R. Sulgrove, thought that an aggressive war on the part of the government, which would make it strike the first blow and shed the first blood, while the South acted only by ordinanees and reso- lutions, would force all the border States into the Confederacy, repel the sympathy of Europe, and probably induce alliances there, consolidate Demo- cratie sympathy in the North with secession, and present a front of hostility against which the govern- ment might be broken hopelessly. Considering the condition of Indiana after the eleetions of 1862,-and Indiana was no worse than other States,-and the course of the Legislature of 1863, and the active sym- pathy with the rebellion that made draft riots all over the country, with numerous murders of draft officers, and considering, further, our narrow escape from an English war in the Trent case, it is now far from elear that the aggressive policy would have been wise or successful. But all differenees were blown to pieces by the first gun fired at Maj. Anderson's little garrison. Those who differed about aggression eould liave no difference about resisting aggression. North- ern feeling united instantly and solidly upon war,

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HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.

GEN. EBENEZER DUMONT was a native of Ve- vay, Switzerland Co., Ind., where he was born Nov. 23, 1814. His parents were among the early settlers of that place. His father, John Dumont, one of the most conspicuous men in polities and the law of that early period of the history of the State, met and married his mother, Miss Julia L. Corey, at Greenfield, Saratoga Co., N. Y. He was a na- tive of New Jersey, she of Marietta, Ohio. They were married Aug. 16, 1812, and soon thereafter removed to Vevay, where they spent the remainder of their lives. She died in 1857, he in 1871. She was a teacher, poet, and author, and in all these respects one of the most conspicuous persons in the State. He was a law- yer of sound learning, an orator of great power and eloquence, a politician of broad views and upright character, and in all re- lations a man of integrity and public spirit.

Tbe general received his early education in a school taught by his mother in his native vil- lage. He could not have had a more careful and thorough instructor. An examination of the work exacted of her son al- most makes one's head ache to think of his labors. | From the time he was ten years old until he passed from her instruction to Hanover College she exacted written essays at his hands upon every branch of study in which he was engaged. These little essays, in the cramped and difficult hand of childhood, contain a child's discussion of every rule of grammar from the first principles of orthography to the last of prosody ; and so of arithmetic and the other branches of knowledge taught in a common school of a very high grade. All these show the corrections of the faithful mother in her own clear

GEN. EBENEZER DUMONT.

hand. After submitting to such a discipl childhood, all the exactions of subsequent sti business could scarcely have been regard onerous. From this home school and traini passed to Hanover College, where he studied time, but did not graduate. His heart was set upon the law, and on that ground he refu: appointment as cadet at West Point which w to him while at Hanover. He read law wi father, and before he was twenty-one year entered upon the practice of his chosen prof He settled at Wilmington, in Dearborn Count following the coun thence to Lawrenc remained there un spring of 1853, wł removed to Indiana assume the duties of dent of the State to which office h been elected by the eral Assembly.

He early establi character as a lawy business man. He shrunk from any a of labor essential to fect knowledge o matter in hand, eit the one character other. No one knew him ever any calculations o eess when opposed to him on account of any r ness in the duty of preparation, for it was l that he would exhaust not merely all the usu sources of the affair, but equally all the ur resources also. Some of his greatest triumphs law were the result of his vigilance in re closely the newspapers, and learning of the p of some act of Congress or of the Legislati advance of its regular publication upon which might turn. An instance of this kind is remen to have occurred in the District Court of the U States in 1858. Two brothers were indicte

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erfeit Spanish silver coin. The law as he statute-book was plain, and under learly guilty. He produced an aet of ed only a few days before the alleged tizing such coin, and the prosecution

His law-book for the purpose was a a newspaper. It is believed that he advantage that any amount of vigilanee have gained ; and it is certain that io regard to his watchfulness of the ssions of his adversary as of his own d use thereof in the management of urt or ordinary business.

ont married Miss Mary A. Chuk, 39. She was the only daughter of huk, Esq., at the time and for many ds the elerk of the Dearborn Circuit lived together until his death, and hem twelve children, eight of whom, seven daughters, still live to comfort their mother, in her deelining years. of Dearborn County frequently in- rith the management of their affairs, east made him their representative in ssembly. He held the office of county al years between 1840 and 1845, and e county in the Legislature in 1838 the last term of his service he was er of the House, and discharged the position with impartiality and ability. of high political excitement, and he part in the debates of the House. beeches were printed at the time, and nd favorable impression of his abillty throughout the State. A quaint and runs through them all, that would o knew him well to say they were his hed without a name. They are all ng practical sense, and generally filled irit. It was in the course of this was chosen president of the State hoice resulted from a truce between those of the then Lieutenant-Governor, . Before that they had been openly . result of the compromise, Lane was

freed from the local opposition of Dumont, and was elected to Congress. At the elose of his term in Congress, Lane removed to Kansas, where, after a stormy career, his life ended in a sad tragedy, and, as already said, Dumont settled in Indianapolis, in the quiet but responsible position of president of the State Bank and ex officio president of the Board of Sinking Fund Commissioners. These offices he filled until the expiration of the bank's charter, and closed its operations. It was necessary thereafter to con- tinue the Board of Sinking Fund Commissioners as an independent organization, and the Legislature ae- cordingly reorganized it, and provided for a presi- dent thereof, to be elected, like the members, by the General Assembly. At the regular session of that body in 1859 he was elected president, and held the position until he resigned to take the command of the Seventh Regiment of Indiana Volunteers at the outbreak of the rebellion in 1861.

He had already devoted a year to the military service of the United States in the war with Mexico, as lieutenant-colonel of the Fourth Regiment of In- diana Volunteers, and had won distinction both for courage and capacity in that service. His gallantry was conspicuous in the capture of Huamantla; and Gen. Lane employed his learning and talents to aid him in the government of Orizaba after its capture. He had been consistently a Democrat from 1840 till the assault upon Fort Sumter; but in the strife be- tween Mr. Douglas and the administration he had adhered to the former. His place upon the fall of Sumter was at once chosen with friends of the Union and the foes of secession ; and never did any man give heart and soul more entirely to any cause than he gave himself to the maintenance of the Union and its authority. He presided over the first grand rally of the people of Indianapolis on the night of the bombardment of Sumter, and by his bold and patriotic speech gave solidarity and energy to the purposes of the people. He was dispatched to Wash- ington by the Governor to learn something of the purposes and plans of the administration, and, if pos- sible, to ascertain how the power of the State might be best brought to the aid of the government in suppressing the rebellion. " Upon his return home

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he was appointed colonel of the Seventh Regiment of Indiana Volunteers. At the head of this regiment he served with distinction during the three months' cam- paign of 1861 in West Virginia, being prominently engaged in the surprise of Philippi, the skirmishes at Laurel Hill, and the battle of Carrick's Ford," his regiment, led by himself, closing that affair by the capture of one gun, forty-one wagons of the enemy's train, and the death of Gen. Robert S. Garnett. " At the close of the campaign," returning home, he "reorganized his regiment for three years, and at its head returned again to West Virginia, and while there participated in the battle of Greenbrier under Gen. Joseph J. Reynolds. Soon after this engage- ment he was appointed a brigadier-general of volun- teers by the President, and ordered to Louisville, Ky. He passed the winter of 1861 and 1862 at Bards- town, Bacon Creek, and other points between Louis- ville and Nashville. Although his health was ex- tremely poor, yet he clung to his command, and per- formed his duties for months when he should have been at home under treatment. He was subsequently placed in command of Nashville, Tenn., where his spirit, vigilance, and energy secured the flag more respectful treatment from its foes than could other- wise have been looked for at their hands. It was while there that he organized and led his celebrated pursuit of Gen. John Morgan, whom he well-nigh captured at Lebanon, Tenn., and whose fine mare, ' Black Bess,' he did capture, together with many prisoners. It was in this pursuit that he perpetrated ono of his drollest pieces of humor at the expense of a Kentucky colonel of cavalry. That officer, finding his men worn out by the fatigues of the march, sent his adjutant forward to inform the general that 'tlie pursuit must stop, for his men were asleep.in the saddle.' The adjutant accordingly rode forward and reported to the general as directed by his colonel. The general inquired very seriously, ' Is it true that your colonel's men are asleep in their saddles ?' ' Yes, general,' answered the adjutant, 'it is.' ' Well, then,' said the general, 'you ride back to your colonel, and tell him for God Almighty's sake not to wake them up.' And so the conference ended, the pursuit being continued without a moment's pause.

" His health, however, finally disqualifying him for service in the field, he accepted the nomination of the Republican party of his district for Congress in 1862, and was duly elected at the October election of that year. In 1864 he was re-elected, and thus served his country faithfully according to his convic- tions of duty during four years. His feeble health impaired his ability to labor, and so rendered his congressional career less conspicuous than it other- wise manifestly would have been. Nevertheless, it was by no means without distinction for patriotism and ability. Some of his speeches display great rescarch and power, and they are nearly all pervaded with the quaint, pungent humor which he displayed in earlier life. For instance, he opened his speech upon the Supreme Court's decision in the Garland case, involving the validity of the 'iron-elad oath,' as it was called, by sending to the clerk's desk and asking to have read the following paragraph :

"' A hotel-keeper in Washington posted on his dining-room door the following notice : " Members of Congress will go to the table first, and then the gen- tlemen. Rowdies and blackguards must not mix with the Congressmen, as it is hard to tell one from the other."' Laughter followed, and upon its subsi- dence Mr. Dumont said, ' I do not think the para- graph just read has much application to the remarks I shall beg leave to submit; but, seeing that some of the members are a little drowsy, and fearing that no remarks of mine would disturb their slumbers, I thought I might perhaps accomplish the object by bringing to their attention this brutal assault on their own reputation. I do not wish to move in the matter myself, being young and inexperienced, but would suggest the raising of a committee to find out the name of the assassin, and have him dealt with for his impertinence and vulgarity.' The speech that followed this beginning is an able one, and abounds with many home hits at the assumption of official, and especially judicial, infallibility for men whose opinions before their election or appointment were regarded as of little or no value. This is illustrated by anecdotes from home life; and then the score is made even by a story of a justice of peace elect coming to the clerk of Dearborn County, and asking

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that officer to qualify him. 'Hold up your hand,' said the clerk ; ' I'll swear you in, but all hell can't qualify you.' His speech on the pay of the army was regarded at the time as a very able, satisfactory, and complete discussion of the subject."

At the close of his congressional career, March 4, 1867, he retired to his farm, and for a while did not seek any official position. He nevertheless kept up an active participation in politics, acting earnestly with the Republican party. He was always a foe to flattery, and hated even the ordinary civilities ten- dered to men of his position and rank at public meetings. It was such feelings that led him on one occasion, when introduced to a large political meeting in what he regarded as too flattering terms, to say when he came forward, "I was just thinking, when my friend, the president of the meeting, was speaking in such glowing and extravagant terms of the great and glorious Gen. Dumont, who was about to address you, that when I should come forward some man of .sense, and with a keen relish for the ludicrous, too, might be standing in the outskirts of this vast crowd, who would exclaim to those about him, 'Great God ! is that little pinnikin the great Gen. Dumont, about whom all this fuss is made ? Pshaw ! he's nothing.' And he would not be very far wrong, either." Such a beginning of course at once relieved him of all embarrassment, by establishing the best relations between himself and the audience, and by teaching them not to expect too much at his hands, enabled him to more than meet their expectations, and so secured him an attentive and kindly hearing through- out.

In the winter of 1870 and 1871, having formed the design to emigrate to the West, he sought and received the appointment of Governor of Idaho. While engaged in the pursuit of the position he was taken severely sick at Washington. From this attack he never fully recovered ; but upon re- turning home set actively to work in making prepa- rations for his removal to the seat of his new position and duties. Under this labor his health broke com- pletely down, and after lingering in great weakness and suffering for a few days, during all of which he maintained his intellectual facultics in full and per-

fect clearness and vigor, he died at his residence, south of the city, at four o'clock and sixtcen minutes in the morning of April 16, 1871. As an evidence of his mental clearness, it may be stated that a very short time before his death he directed a friend to write his will. Dictating to him the terms thereof, he began, " I, Ebenezer Dumont, being weak in body, but of sound mind, do make this my last will and testament," etc. The will was written, but in the hurry and excitement of the amanuensis, the words "but of sound mind" were omitted; and when in reading it over he came to the omission, he stopped the reading and insisted upon the insertion of the omitted clause. A legal friend who was present told him not to mind it, as the validity of the will would depend upon the witnesses. He replied, " I know that as well as you ; but I want to be one of the witnesses, for I think I know my mental condition as well and even better than any of you." The clause had to be inserted as his testimony.

His remains were attended from his home to the city by a large body of his friends and neighbors, who were met at the city limits by a military escort composed of his old comrades in arms with a band of music, and conducted thence to the First Presby- terian Church, where appropriate fuueral services were held, conducted by the Rev. H. A. Edson, D.D. The brief discourse which he delivered on the occasion so fittingly and truly characterized the man in the higher aspects of his nature and life, that his words shall close this very inadequate sketch :

" All who knew him were certainly impressed with the un- common firmness and bravery of his will. For years he carried a burden of ill-health which would have laid most men entirely aside from active employment. Yet he carried it unflinchingly. Ilo secmed sometimes to conquer the physical suffering and exhaustion by the mere force of his mind. It is touchingly told ns that once during the West Virginia campaign, when overtaken by violent illness, and cntreated to go back to Graf- ton, where he might have some necessary comforts, ho stoutly refuscd, saying that if his bravo men could lie on the ground and take the rough fare, he could do it too, and would. The tenacity of his purpose was conspicuous everywhere. When he took hold his grip was like a vise.

" His integrity in all the relations of commercial and politi- cal life his friends speak of with admiration. In his connec- tion with the early legislation of the State, as president of the

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. State Bank, during the commotion of civil war, in Con- gress, and in private business affairs, he evinced a haughty contempt of peculation and dishonesty, and discharged his pablio trusts without a stain upon his integrity. At a period when many snatched eagerly at opportunities for questionable gain, he did his duty and kept his hands clean. Everything like deception and falsehood he despised. He was inclined to take the direct line to any object he sought, and was little disposed to use diplomacy. He spoke out plainly what he believed to be the truth. At times he would attack a sup- posed iniquity with something like ferocity. It is said that his father often showed the same characteristic, during a session of the Legislature in early times securing a life-long friend by the courage with which, en a mere suspicion of wrong, he took up the cause of certain minors whom a shrewdly devised bill was to defraud of their estate. The son would have been capable of the saine service, and under the like cir- cumstances would have been sure to undertake it without fear. He was a man who cared more to he true te his convictions than to count the favor of any ono. And this example of stern integrity is one which we may well cherish in these days of commercial dishonesty and political intrigue.

" It is as a patriot and soldier, however, that he made him- self most noticeablo, and rendered the highest service. There is no possibility of putting into words the intensity of his hatred of treason in those days when all the people here were united in the defense of the flag that on Sumter's walls had been defiled. His whole soul blazed against the crime that would strike at our liberties. Some of you well remember him at the breaking ont of the war, how, at the first recruiting meet- ing, he offered to the government a horse with a man on it; and many of you, his comrades, will not forget how gallantly he rode that horse to battle. Ile never lost the heat of his patriotic devotion. If he could speak to-day he would tell us what a joy it is to be wrapped in the old flag for which he fought. The valne of our free institutions, the happy condi- tion of our people, and the wickedness of any attempt to over- turn the government he felt with all the intensity of his soul. Whatever looked to him like treason against his country he was eager to resist and strike at with all his strength. This patriotism, that was with him a passion, deserved and gained the respect of men who opposed him. I do not doubt that many of you who differed most widely from him in sentiment were compelled to admire the zeal and courage with which he discharged what he deemed his duty to the land he loved. Nor should it be forgotten that this strong nature, this stern soldier had depths of tenderness, not indeed for every eye, but quick upon occasion to carry to the unfortunate relief and sympathy.

" Words, however, cannot describe the man. You knew him. Let your memory paint and keep the picture. Ile had qualities we ought to emulate. He did not live in vain, for though his sword will not flash again in battle, though he sleeps his last sleep, careless of the earth's commotion, it will

not he forgotten how dearly he loved the starry banner, nor how sternly he hated all its foes. May Ged keep the memory of such patriots green."

The volunteers beyond the number required for the State's quota were formed into six regiments of one year State troops, under an act of the Legisla- ture, then sitting in extra session on the Governor's call. All but one subsequently enlisted for three years in the service of the national government. They were reviewed on the 24th of May by Gen. McClellan, on the open ground north of the fair or military ground, extending to Indiana Avenue on the north and to the Fall Creek race on the west. The first camp in the city was that on the fair ground, and was called Camp Sullivan, from Col. Jerry Sulli- van, of the Thirteenth Regiment, who commanded it. The next was formed in the new fair ground, -now the Exposition or fair ground,-and called Camp Morton. The men here made serious com- plaints of their provisions, and the Legislature, with an eye to votes at home more than justice away from home, censured the commissary-the late Isaiah Mansur-severely, though he served without pay, furnished mcat from his own packing-house, advanced his own money for fresh brcad, sugar, and butter, and took the chance of reimbursement from the Legisla- ture. Subsequently this censure was revoked and Mr. Mansur complimented for his efficiency and dis- interestedness. He was a room-mate of Governor . Morton's at Oxford (Ohio) College, and helped the latter with money in his college course. The truth was that the men were mostly well-to-do farmers or sons of farmers or mechanics in good circumstances, and were used to living in better style than any one familiar with a soldier's life could hope for. They knew nothing of camps or military service, and of course felt abused when they found their patriotic devotion fed less appetizingly than by their every-day food at home. Once they mutinied against the sutler and tore his stalls to pieces. But these freaks of in- experience never outlasted the first few weeks of camp duty. The meu readily adapted themselves to military discipline from the freedom of home. Camp Morton became one of the great prison camps after the surrender of Fort Donelson in February, 1862.

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Camp Burnside was formed on Tinker Street (now Seventh), just south of Camp Morton, and was made a neat and well-ordered little military town by the Seventy-first Regiment, under Col. James Biddle, and later by the Veteran Reserve Corps. It was here, during the tenancy of the Seventy-first, in the summer of 1862, that the first military execution of the war took place. The offender was Robert Gay, charged with being a spy and deserter, and convicted by court-martial. He was shot in the old Hender- son orchard, between the fair ground and Camp Burnside, near the present line of Delaware Street, a block north of Seventh. The regiment and spec- tators formed three sides of a square, open on the east side. Into this space Gay was brought by the guard, and stationed in front of his coffin, which was lying on the ground. He made a brief speech, denying all guilty purpose, and told the firing party, standing about ten steps in front of him, to " hold here," laying his right hand on his heart. He then sat down on his coffin, and was blindfolded, and the signal to fire was given by dropping a handkerchief. Every ball but one of the nine fired struck his heart, and would have killed him instantly if there had been no other. One struck him iu the neck, and would have made a mortal wound. One gun was left blank, and all were taken by chance, so that no mnan knew whether his guu helped in the execution or not. Gay sat upright for a second after the firing, and fell back dead in a great pool of blood, of which not a drop showed in front. In 1864 three " bounty jumpers" were shot on the same ground, near the south bank of the State ditch, under the command of Gen. Alvin P. Hovey. These were all the military executions in or about the city, though preparations were made by Gen. Hovey for hanging Bowles, Mil- ligan, and Horsey, the Sons of Liberty, convicted by court-martial in 1864 of conspiring with the rebels to overthrow the State government, and release the rebel prisoners in Camp Morton. Their death sentence, however, was commuted by President John- son to imprisonment for life in the Ohio penitentiary, whence they were released by a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States shortly after. Mr. Milligan was recently allied with the Republicans

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History of Indianapolis and Marion County, Indiana, Part 56

Author: Sulgrove, Berry R. (Berry Robinson), 1828-1890 Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co. Number of Pages: 942

Author: Sulgrove, Berry R. (Berry Robinson), 1828-1890
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 942