USA > Kansas > Douglas County > Lawrence > The Kansas memorial, a report of the Old Settlers' meeting held at Bismarck grove, Kansas, Sept. 15th and 16th, 1879 > Part 20
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Thus every free state man was practically disfranchised. Gov. Walker was a statesman of ability, and he saw no way out of the imbroglio except by protection to all voters alike; and he traversed the Territory delivering speeches, promising the people protection against their invaders and a fair election. Under these promises, for the first time since the election of March 30, 1855, the free state men entered into an election on the day fixed by the " bogus- laws." This gubernatorial action was not in the interest of freedom, but in the desire to do justice to all-or rather to preserve peace as the best mode to sustain slavery parties. These men were both on the side of slavery. The election was held, and nearly every district in the State carried by free state men. A few days after
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rumors were afloat that fraudulent poll-lists had been made up at Oxford, in Johnson county, Kickapoo, in Leavenworth county, Lightning Creek, in McGee county and at other points, sufficient to give the pro-slavery men a majority. These reports, which were soon verified, aroused the utmost excitement among the free state men. I was a candidate for the Legislature in the district of which Lawrence was a part, and in which the Oxford fraud was perpe- trated. If successful, it would have secured certificates to eight representatives in the Lawrence district, eight in the Leavenworth district, two in the Linn district and three in what was called "the nineteen disfranchised counties," and some others-enough to make a clear pro-slavery majority of the thirty-nine members of the House, and a similar majority in the Senate-or Council, as it was called. The perpetrators of this fraud expected that Gov. Walker and Secretary Stanton, as the board of canvassers, would take the position that they could not go behind the returns; and the free state people then had so little confidence in them as to believe that their partizans had not "reckoned without their host." I will not assert that they were ready to perpetrate such an outrage, but I do unhesitatingly express the belief that there were good grounds for the fears of the people. In this state of excitement Gen. G. W. Deitzler and I-both free state candidates for the House-visited Oxford on a tour of inspection, but could ascertain nothing of the facts in regard to the vote. Although we went incognito, we were only able to ascertain from the pro-slavery men who constituted the population of Oxford, that "they voted a heap," and there was a "a powerful sight of people out." We did ascertain, however, that in all the cabins of the district there were not over sixty adult male inhabitants, and that it was doubtful whether a single man there had a right to vote, as the territory was on an Indian reserve, which, by the organic act, was "excepted out of the boundaries and constituted no part of the Territory of Kan- sas." At Olathe we found the returns in the hands of the pro- slavery probate judge, showing that Oxford had cast 1, 628 votes. It was afterward ascertained by the accidental discovery of the name of a distinguished anti-slavery statesman upon the poll-list, that the judges of election had used an old Cincinnati directory to aid their fertile minds in the discovery of enough of names to fill that long list intended to defraud the people and continue slavery in Kansas. It was written in a clear, clerical hand, a beautiful manuscript, regularly sworn to, with all the essential " red tape "- the very counterpart of a poll-book where 1,628 Missouri tobacco- spitting, whiskey-drinking " sqatter sovereigns" had enjoyed the elective franchise.
As Gen. Deitzler and I returned from Oxford, we met, near Blue Jacket's ford, six miles east of Lawrence, a body of 16 men- armed to the teeth-in a hack and on horseback, who openly avowed that they were going to Oxford to hang Batt. Jones, Ganatt and the other man-I forget his name-who, as judges of that elec-
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tion, had attemp.ed the outrage. They were no braggadocios. They had "blood in their eyes," and "meant business." The judges heard of them, believed they were in earnest and fled to the Snibar hills, afterward the resort of Quantrill. These men on their mission met Walker and Stanto.1, and boldly avowed that they would hang the judges or any man who should sustain the outrage. I will not be so uncharitable as to say that those threats were the controlling power which induced them to throw out the Oxford returns as "evidently similated and fictitious." That would be only a matter of opinion. What I state is history, and reasonable men can draw their own conclusions. Even after they had thrown out these returns, Judge Cato, the special judicial in- strument of slavery, the appointee of the Administration, issued a peremptory mandamus to compel them to issue certificates to the pro-slavery candidates by virtue of the Oxford vote, which, to their honor be it spoken, they disregarded.
This gave the free state men legislative control; but, in the meantime, the Lecompton constitution had been formed, and by a one-sided vote, largely augmented by fraud, was declared adopted, and was ready for congressional action on the opening of Congress on the first Monday in December. By the law, the legislature did not meet until January, 1858. In this state of things, Gen. James H. Lane commenced a canvass of the Territory, holding meetings to urge the Governor to call the Legislature in extra session, to pro- vide for a fair vote on the Lecompton constitution. He traversed the Territory, sometimes on horseback sometimes on foot, address- ing assemblies in villages, in school-houses and under the trees. While he was thus agitating, forming and arousing public sentiment, the free state members of the Legislature assembled at Lawrence, and petitioned the Governor to call the Legislature in extra session. Before this petition could reach Gov. Walker, he had left Kansas, never to return-disgusted if not affrighted at the state of things. Instead of being the "noble Pennsylvania Democrat who saved the Territory to freedom," he was a most intensely disgusted propagan- dist of slavery who failed to plant the institution, had " saved his bacon," and transplanted himself to a more congenial political climate, under the protecting ægis of James Buchanan. In this dilemma the legislators elect deputed Shaler W. Eldridge to carry their petition to Frederick P. Stanton, who, by the absence of Walker, became ex-officio Governor. He represented himself to Stanton as a business man and not a politician, who saw the igns of the times. He told Stanton that, in view of the Oxford outrage and the Delaware crossing fraud-one of them to get power in the Legislature and the other to secure slavery by the Lecompton con- stitution-and in view of the fact that the free state men had aban- doned their old position of non-action under the "bogus-laws "- under the solemn promises of the Governor and Secretary-that unless relief was vouchsafed at once by calling the free state Legisla- ture, such scenes would be enacted in Kansas as had never been
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witnessed in the worst days of the California vigilance committees, and that men would be found hanging on trees with their crimes printed on their backs and across their hearts. He was successful, and returned with the promise that, if a majority of the Legislature would pledge themselves to go into no other legislation than that necessary to secure a fair, just vote on the Lecomp on constitution, the Legislature should be called immediately. The pledge was given and the proclamation issued.
Your speaker was appointed to carry the news to Lane, at Leavenworth, and found him addressing a large audience in Stock- tons Hall. As we entered, a tender-footed, pseudo free state man was speaking in denunciation of Lan?, as an agitator whose "im- prudent" measures were calculated to produce public disorder a id bloodshed, and a-serting that it was ridiculous to expect that the Governor would call that Legislature .ogether to work mischief. I waited near the door and allowed Lane to proceed a few minutes in reply, when I pushed my way through the crowd, pulled Lane by the elbow, and said : "General Stanton has called the Legisla- ture." No man can describe nor imitate the tragic, magic manner of the "grim chieftain's" announcement: "I have the hono: to announce to the trembling, cowardly conservatives and the fiend- ish, devilish, pro-slavery villains, that Stanton has called the Legis- lature, and that slavery and its minions in Kansas are consigned to a political hell ! "
And yet we have heard at this meeting, in beautifully rounded sentences, that to the instrumentality of Pierce and Buchanan we were indebted for the salvation of Kansas. The oratory sounded well; but, alas! that it was so far from true. That I speak the truth of history, I appeal to the noble band of pioneers left to bear me witness. The worth of Lane in the field and on the forum ; of the Legislature in council ; of Eldridge as the repre- sentative; the enactments of the Legislature, and the triumphant vote against that infamous slave constitution, constituted the cul- minating point in the redemption of Kansas from the thralldom of slavery. And then we heard that Brindle, Pierce's receiver of public moneys, was an instrumentality in " saving the country." It seems to me that at the mention of his name, every intelligent free state man must have had instantly photographed upon his brain the picture of the old Lecompton Union, the organ of slavery, with its glaring head-lines, "cursed be Canaan;" with his Scrip- tural quotations to show that the patriarchs of Israel were slave- holders-the original Calhouns, Wade Hamptons, Haynes and Breckenridges; with his citation of St. Paul when he sent Ones- imus back to his master; the curse upon Ham as a "hewer of woo 1 and a drawer of water !" his vivid descriptions of the "little water drops " which the good Lord, in his careful providence, had put under the cuticle of the African as coloring matter to keep the pot-black from showing, and the kinks which He put in his hair to save the necessity of combing ; and all the long list of quotations,
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which John Brown-the fanatic on the other side, if you please- called blasphemy against the Almighty. His better nature may have warned some easy-going Democrat that his life was in danger, or he may have told something which exposed murderers-but as an instrumentality in making Kansas free, he was an utter failure.
There were men, Democrats-Pennsylvania Democrats-who did giants' work in the cause of freedom, but they were the humble in the walks of life, and not the statesmen of the Administration. It is in justice to them that I was impelled to say that I wanted to speak. If this were an ordinary town meeting, errors might go for what they are worth, and utterances die with the breath that uttered them ; but-
" A chiel's among ye takin' notes, And faith he'll prent 'em,"
the enterprising secretary of State Historical Society, having se- cured a short hand reporter to preserve the speeches as history.
The Emigrant Aid Society has had its advocates, the Governors and lofty officials have had theirs; but the poor, the honest, the self-sacrificing rank and file have had but meager justice done them.
There were Democrats, Pennsylvania Democrats-Democrats from all parts of the Union-men from the South as well as from the North, who did great work in the cause of free Kansas, asking only the reward of a clear conscience. It is in their behalf that I speak-would to God that I was capable of doing them justice. I think of such Democrats as William Y. Roberts, of Pennsylvania, since renowned in the history of the State; of Robert Klotz, who was disinherited because he turned traitor to Buchanan Democracy ; of G. W. Deitzler, who brought the first Sharp's rifles to Kansas to defend our homes. Injustice has been done to such men-unwit- tingly, I have no doubt. Kansas was the grave of Governors and the reform-school of Pierce and Buchanan Democrats. The liberal, freedom-loving spirit of the world was represented in the Kansas struggle. I think of the brave old George Keller, who was driven from his home; of R. P. Brown, ruthlessly murdered at Easton; of - Mitchell, who was thrown into the Tecumseh prison and bucked and gagged; of Wm. Phillips, carried from Leavenworth to Weston, Mo., tarred and feathered, sold at auction to a negro for 614 cents, and afterward murdered at Leavenworth, all Ken- tuckians; of Josiah Miller, a South Carolinian, who shook the Carolina dust from his feet and allied himself with the free state men, his life put in jeopardy and tried by Buford for treason to South Carolina; of Frank Swift, a brave boy then in his minority, who came from Maine, was wounded at Wilson's Creek and did more for freedom than all the Governors sent to Kansas; of Wm. A. Phillips, representing the Highlands of Scotland, with his trenchant pen as well as his sword; of Pomeroy and Robinson, the acknowledged leaders; of G. W. Brown, with his able paper ; and his aged father, drilling troops under the lessons he had learned
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at Plattsburg, in 1812; of the good Presbyterian elder, Capt. Lyon, the father of Mrs. S. N. Wood, who had learned to drill men in the war for "free trade and sailors' rights ;" of Philip Schuyler, Cyrus K. Holliday, John Ritchie, Dan. Horne, Charles F. Garrett, A. D. Searl, George Earl, Charles Stearns, S. J. Willis. Oh, I wish I could think of them all, and that their names could be en- rolled on the tablets of fame !- that year by year the children of Kansas, who enjoy the freedom they won, might come up to this grove and look upon them as the Romans were wont to gaze upon the images of the Gracchi! The men who made Kansas free be- longed to no State, to no class, to no nation ; but were a combina- tion of freedom-loving spirits of all nationalities. When the good Jimmy McGee said to the men throwing up the rifleworks at Lawrence, "Work away, boys-there's 2,000 bushels of corn in Jimmy McGee's crib, and while it lasts ye shan't starve!" it was the liberty-loving spirit of the Methodist Irishman that spoke for freedom; and when the cuticle on the forehead of the brave Tom McIlheney was cut at Hickory Point, it was the blood of a Catholic Irishman, who inherited the spirit of O'Connell and Emmett, that trickled over his forehead; and when Breyman lay suffering in a Lecompton prison, it was the liberty-loving Teuton that was perse- cuted. When the free state man's friend, the educated Indian, replied to the inquiry as to his views on slavery, "God made white man-God made red man-God made black man-but God never made slave," he was a missionary in the anti-slavery cause without knowing it. When the poor old colored man, called by the boys "the jack of spades," insisted that God sent Lane to bring him out of slavery, he "didn't care what kind of man he was, he knowed God sent him jis' as soon as he come," he but rudely uttered the sentiment so beautifully expressed by the eloquent divine, Rev. Dr. Cordley, when he attributed the great work in free Kansas to a Higher Power than any earthly instrumentality. Most emphatically did He use the humble free state men "His wonders to perform " in the salvation of Kansas from an oligarchy which had ruled the nation since its foundation. They stood in the Thermopyla of freedom, and not only drove back the tide of slavery from Kansas, and stopped it on its onward strides to the new Territories beyond and to proposed acquisitions from Mexico, but they inaugurated a manful resistance, which culminated in breaking the shackles of 4,000, 000 slaves, and establishing universal freedom throughout the nation.
LETTER FROM GEORGE W. DEITZLER.
COL. WOOD: You will now listen to a very interesting letter, to be read by Judge Emery, from a very useful and an honored citizen of Kansas in early times.
Judge Emery said :
I hold in my hand a letter which I desire to read, I found the
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letter at the post office when I went there this evening; and I am glad there are so many to listen. I hardly expected to find so many here to listen to it. I did not think you had got so fired up with this Old Settler sentiment as to lead you to come here the sec- ond night in such numbers. This leads me to say that we began this celebration thinking that we could hold it one day. It widened on our hands and we thought we would hold it until the next day about noon when the trains would leave. On the second day it got still bigger, and we thought we would hold it throughout the day, and now it has got into the night.
This letter I will now read. It is from General George W. Deitzler. I take it that many of you do not know Mr. Deitzler. I can say that he was a true man and came to Kansas at an early day and lived here many years and then went to reside on the Pa- cific coast. He was Speaker of the first free state House of Rep- resentatives, in 1858, and Colonel of the first Kansas regiment dur- ing the war. I will read :
SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 8th, 1879.
JUDGE J. S. EMERY AND OTHERS, COMMITTEE OF OLD SETTLERS, LAW- RENCE, KANSAS.
Gentlemen :- I regret exceedingly that it will be impossible for me to accept your kind invitation to attend the meeting of Old Settlers of Kansas, at Lawrence, on the 15th inst.
Time is making sad inroads upon our ranks. We are passing rapidly away, soon the " Old Guard " will have none of their number left to call the roll. It is gratifying to observe that your State Historical Society is collect- ing the materials for a full and correct history of the stirring events of 1855 and 1856, and no doubt justice will be done to the people who periled their all in securing freedom to Kansas as well as those generous and patriotic men and women who inaugurated and sustained the aid Societies which proved such valuable instrumentalities in the furtherance of the cause. Among the latter stands the able and truly good man, Hon. Eli Thayer, whose letter of acceptance of your invitation published in the Lawrence Journal recalls an incident of 1855, to which I beg to refer briefly. Some six weeks after my arrival in the Territory and only a few days after the Territorial election of March 30th, at which time Kansas was invaded by an armed force from the Southern States and the actual free state settlers were driven from the polls, Gov Charles Robinson, than whom no truer or braver man ever espoused the cause of free Kansas, requested me to visit Boston with a view of secur- ing arms for our people, to which I assented. Preparations were quickly and quietly made and no one knew of the object of my mission except Gov. Robinson and Hon. Joel Grover. At Worcester I presented my letter from Gov. Robinson to Mr. Thayer, just as he was leaving Oread Home for the morning Boston train. Within an hour after our arrival in Boston, the exec- utive committee of the Emigrant Aid Society held a meeting and delivered to me an order for one hundred Sharps' rifles and I started at once for Hart- ford, z "riving there on Saturday evening.# The guns were packed on the following Sunday and I started for home on Monday morning. The boxes were marked " Books." I took the precaution to have the (cap) cones re- moved from the guns and carried them in iny carpet sack, which sack would have been missing in the event of the capture of the guns by the enemy. On the Missouri river I met Hon. John and Joseph L. Speer, for the first time. They did not know me, but may remember the exciting incidents at Boonville and other points along the river. I arrived at Lawrence with the
* See order in address of Mr. Hale, page 147.
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" Beecher Bibles," several days before the special election, in April, called by Gov. Reeder. But no guns were needed upon that occasion, as the ruf- fians ignored said election, and when the persons elected upon that day pre- sented their credentials to the Legislature at Pawnee, they were kicked out without ceremony.
I have not referred to this transaction from any motives of personal van- ity, but simply to revive a feeling of gratitude toward Mr. Thayer and his associates for the kind and patriotic assistance rendered by them to the free state people from the beginning to the end of the great struggle which ter- minated, happily, in the overthrow of American Slavery, and to show how promptly they gave attention to the business which took me to Boston. Those rifles did good service in the "border war" and their movements in the hands of the brave and fearless Stubbs would furnish incidents for a very in- teresting chapter in the history of the Old Settlers. It was perhaps the first shipment of arms for our side and it incited a healthy feeling among the un- armed free state settlers, which permeated and energized them until even the Quakers were ready to fight. The temptation exists to say more while I am up, but I must forbear. I beg to be remembered by all and trust the Old Settlers will have a jolly good time at this and at all future meetings.
Very Respectfully, GEO. W. DEITZLER.
THE OLD SETTLERS' STANDING COMMITTEE.
JUDGE EMERY: I have another matter that I wish to present you. We wish to perpetuate these gatherings. Of course we do not expect such gatherings as this every year ; but I move that the chair name a committee of five whose business it shall be to have charge of and get up the annual Settlers' Celebration that we have been holding some ten years here at Lawrence, in Douglas county, and name the secretary. That is all the organization we ever had ; and we must have it kept up. I move the chair appoint a commit- tee of five (and I do not want to be one of them) whose duty it shall be to manage this matter.
John Speer: I second the motion.
The motion was then put and carried.
The following were appointed the committee: E. A. Cole- man, Samuel Walker, Samuel Kimball, Joseph Savage, William Yates, and C. L. Edwards, secretary.
ADDRESS BY MRS. SARAH PINKSTON.
COL. WOOD : I rise for the purpose of introducing Mrs. Pink- ston. Some of you knew her in our early days as Miss Sarah Lyon, afterward as Mrs. Mack. I knew her as a mere girl in Ohio, be- fore Kansas was open to settlement. Her father was a deacon in the Presbyterian church, and was of such stuff as they used to make martyrs of. I recollect he was once indicted under the Fugitive Slave Law for riding along the road with a colored man.
It was thirty years ago that a cousin of mine came to our house near Mt. Gilead, Ohio, and says, " Can I have your team to-night ?"
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I answered, " How many this time ?" He said "Ten." I bantered him to go in the day time. He said, "I will, if you go along with me." I accepted, and at nine o'clock three young men with a four-horse team and ten fugitives in an open wagon, were on the road. We went twenty-two miles, to old Benjamin Gass' in Rich- land county where we left the fugitives, and went to William Lyon's and stayed all night. It was the first time I saw the young ladies, one of whom not this one, I afterward married. Sarah Lyon came here with her parents in July, 1854, and settled on the California road above Lawrence. The first death was at my house; a young man by the name of Pomeroy. Sarah Lyon helped to nurse him, rode in the wagon with, and steadied the coffin as it ascended Mt. Oread. She was the first young lady in Lawrence. She afterward married John Mack and lived here in Lawrence until two years ago, when she was married to E. W. Pinkston of Chase county, where she now lives. Ladies and Gentlemen, I now introduce Mrs. Pinkston.
Mrs. Pinkston said :
The inspiration of this hour, of this day, of these two days, should bring forth such eloquence in prose and poetry as to immor- talize the writer, but we leave such eloquence to abler ones, to Edward Everett Hale, John P. St. John and others, whose whole lives are a continuous poem, and I will tell the simple story of pioneer life.
One bright May morning in 1854 the family of William Lyon left the dear old home in Ohio to make a new home in California. "Man proposes but God disposes." Sickness in the family pre- vented further arrangements for the California trip, and after a few weeks' sojourn in Independence, Mo., the third week in July, 1854, the family consisting of the father, mother, Mrs. Adams the eldest married daughter, Sarah, youngest daughter, aged 17 years, William Lee, youngest son, aged 15 years and S. N. Wood, and wife (daughter of Mrs. L's), and two little children named David and Wm. Lyon, took up their line of march for Kansas and liber- ty, for they had learned to their consternation and surprise that there was no liberty even of speech in Missouri.
Wm. Lyon was an old pioneer of the Wm. Lloyd Garrison stamp in the anti-slavery cause. He had stood up in the face of the mob years before and spoken words (now appearing prophetic), that made the friends of slavery tremble with apprehension. He could not submit to live long in a place where the freedom of speech was not allowed, and where the institutions he had fought for twenty years flourished with all its attendant evils. They soon learned that a liberty-loving and slavery-hating Ohio family could not live in safety where the monster had eyes on all sides watching them.
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