USA > Massachusetts > Berkshire County > Pittsfield > The history of Pittsfield (Berkshire County), Massachusetts, from the year 1800 to the year 1876 > Part 20
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even more extensively scattered, having been distributed by the general government to the several states. One of them-a genu- ine old flint-lock of the date of 1825-was picked up by a Massa- chusetts officer on the battle-field of Newbern, N. C., and sent as a relie to Rev. Dr. Todd, by whom it was presented to the histor- ical cabinet of the Berkshire Athenæum.
Among the most important events in the years immediately preceding the war of 1812, was the installation of Rev. William Allen, in the place of his father, as pastor of the First church, which occurred October 10, 1810. The story of Mr. Allen's pas- torate is told in another chapter. To the citizens of the town he was the democratic minister; and he acted, indeed, as a sort of chaplain to the party on all occasions when the presence of a clergyman was decorous and desirable. He inherited from his father a firm faith in democratic principles and a true love for the party and its leaders ; but his tastes were rather scholarly and literary, than political. The dissensions in the church were pain- ful to him as a Christian minister ; and when the feelings excited by the contest in which he was the champion of a father disabled by ill-health, had subsided, his partisanship was not very pro- nounced. His Biographical Dictionary, the first edition of which, published in 1809, was a work of much original research- although inferior to that of 1832-had made him many friends in all parts of the country, and among all classes of intelligent citi- zens. And he doubtless longed for the quiet to pursue similar work. His peculiar notions as to requiring a strict compliance with the letter of the law, led him, however, to an enforcement of church-discipline, in a manner which might wisely have been tempered, and which made him many enemies. And a similar unyielding temperament, or judgment, followed him with disas- trous results through a great part of his active life, especially in his relations with Dartmouth and Bowdoin colleges.
CHAPTER X. WAR OF 1812-CANTONMENT AND DEPOT FOR PRISONERS OF WAR.
[1811-1815.]
Politics and political influences in Pittsfield-Names of prominent politicians- News of declaration of war received, and its effect-The Cantonment estab- lished-Barracks erected-Troops arrive-Dinners for the soldiers-Social intercourse and officers' balls-Recruiting and drilling-Major Melville as organizer and manager of the post-Slanders against him met and refuted -The 9th and other regiments called to the front-The Cantonment a depot for prisoners of war-Major Melville as agent for prisoners and deputy marshal-Escape of prisoners attributed to federalists-Stables converted into prisons-Incidents-Unruly prisoners-Prisoners released at close of the war and unwilling return to Canada-Berkshire regiments in the war-Pittsfield officers-Dinner to General Ripley.
rTHE act of congress, approved by President Madison, June 18, 1812, declaring that the long impending war with Great Britain had come, was printed in the Pittsfield Sun, June 27, together with the president's message, upon which the declara- tion was based. The news was received by the democratic major- ity with joy; while the federalists, after a brief hesitation on the part of some, joined their voice with that of their brethren at the East, in denouncing the war, as needless, and fraught with all manner of evils and dangers to the people, both from their own government, and the enemy. It was a signal for yet another increase of virulence in the political feuds of the day.
The grounds upon which a majority of the people of New England, especially of the more wealthy and conservative classes, began early to hate the administrations of Jefferson and Madison, have been considered. In the years immediately preceding the declaration of war, they had rapidly multiplied, and become more definite. A sense of personal wrong and injury succeeded to the vague fears arising from dangerous theories of government. The evil which they feared, had come upon them. The embargo and non-importation acts, with the irritating and vexatious supple-
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mentary laws by which government sought to enforce them, seemed to the importers of Massachusetts and Connecticut-who saw them enforced through favoritism, sometimes with needless severity, and sometimes with scandalous laxity -- to be the 'very essence of tyranny. It was not now so much that government favored France against Great Britain. The new laws seemed aimed less against Old England, than at the very life of New En- gland ; for trade, navigation and fisheries were to her, the source of all prosperous life.
"You take my life When you do take the means by which I live."
All Massachusetts, especially from the eastern slope of the Hoosac mountains to the sea, drew the breath of life through the ports of Boston and Salem ; and to the majority of its people, the acts restricting navigation and commerce seemed but another Boston port-bill, quite as malignant as the first, and more compre- hensive. Their opinion of the radical tendencies of Jeffersonian democracy was more than confirmed by the effect of democratic measures upon their fortunes. Twice, indeed, in the fourteen years next following the election of Mr. Jefferson to the presidency, the state elected democratic governors ; but in both instances it was due to temporary and exceptional causes, which indicated no radical change of political sentiment. For the rest, the federal majorities had varied from 1,000 to 14,000-rarely. falling below 3,000-in a total vote of from 100,000 to 104,000.
Berkshire continued to show the result of her mountain isola- tion from the rest of the state; uniformly, from 1801 to 1815, choosing democratic members of congress; and state-senators of the same political complexion, except in a single year, when a different result was secured by throwing out the votes of two democratic towns, for informality. The territorial position of the county, acting upon a basis of character derived from the Puritans, had made its people in an unusual degree, independent thinkers : independent, at least, of almost all external influence, however biased by traditional prejudice and well-preserved feuds.
All assertions of this sort of independence, must nevertheless, be qualified ; and perhaps the best that can be claimed for the people of Berkshire, in this regard, is that their peculiar freedom from the intellectual authority of their state-capital, enabled them to judge with more candor of the arguments and reasonings which
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reached them from other sources. For, as to the most self- contained man-the most repellent of intruded counsels : so tò the most secluded people-the most jealous of teachers claiming authority-influences from without will come, and must, whether consciously or otherwise, be entertained.
And, of these influences, however little the people of Berk- shire, as a mass, were inclined to be submissive to the opinions of their metropolis, no small portion were received from the town of Boston. It was impossible that, every year, some of the most active minds of the county-some with liberal culture, and nearly all with abundance of shrewd common sense-should pass weeks among the people of Boston, and some of them in its most attractive social circles, without a very considerable effect upon their personal feelings, as well as upon their views of the meas- ures which were the ordinary topics of conversation. It would be a too curious question fully to consider here, what the effect of these influences was upon different classes of minds; but it is certain that, as a rule, the federalists returned, charmed by the social fascinations of their metropolitan compatriots into a new devotion to the party of whose leaders they had found so pleasant an experience ; and that the democrats were nerved by their leg- islative combats for sterner conflicts at home.
The legislature is always a valuable school, and a medinm which can hardly be too highly prized for the diffusion of the culture of the capital throughout the most secluded districts of the state; and it was so especially when intercommunication between city and country was as restricted as it was in the earlier years of the nineteenth century. Many were the respectable gentlemen in Berkshire who marked with white, and perpetually recurred to, the year when they were chosen to the legislature; and with reason, for it probably added twofold to their intellec- tual ability.
But, considerable as the influence of Boston upon Berkshire opin- ion was, it was nevertheless not a preponderating power. It was more than counterbalanced by that which arose from the intimate business-relations between the county and the states of New York and Connecticut. Even the federalists drew their inspira- tion quite as much from Hartford as from Boston.1
1Perhaps less from either than from the old county of Hampshire, of which several of the leading Pittsfield federalists were natives.
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A more definite and decided influence came, though Rev. Messrs. Allen and Leland, from the leading intellects of the dem- ocratic party. in the nation. From the era of 1776, Mr. Allen, until his death, followed Thomas Jefferson, as the great apostle of liberty; and taught men so. Elder Leland, early familiar with the mighty men of his party, in Virginia, and renewing his inter- course with them by repeated visits to the Old Dominion, com- municated their spirit in its freshness, as he passed from house to house ; and what was thus told and taught, became a mighty power-a power which is felt to this day.
In combining the influences named, and bringing them practi- cally to bear upon the politics of the day, each party had in Berk- shire, able leaders. Of those resident in Pittsfield, we may name as active and prominent on the federal side, Woodbridge Little and Capt. Charles Goodrich, who were still active combatants, although of a previous generation; John W. Hulbert, John Chandler Williams, Thomas Gold, Deacon Charles Goodrich, Joseph Merrick and Dr. Daniel James. Among the active young politicians on the federal side, were Lemuel Pomeroy, Theodore Hinsdale, Jr., James D. Colt, Butler Goodrich, David Campbell, the Warriners, Jason Clapp, Joseph Bissell and James Buel.
Among the democratic leaders in chief, were Ezekiel Bacon, Simon Larned, Jonathan Allen, 1st and 2d, Dr. Timothy and Dr. H. H. Childs, John B. Root, Capt. John Dickinson, Phinehas Allen, Elkanah Watson, and Joseph Shearer.
The democrats had also a reserve corps of men, who, although not professed politicians, took a decided and constant interest in political affairs ; and a stein, hard-working phalanx it was, always to be relied upon, whatever the emergency and whatever the obstacle to be met. Neither storms nor the imperious calls of private business, ever kept them from the polls. Jackson might have learned from them his famous watchword, " Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty." Among them were to be counted all the influential farmers of the West Part, Oliver Root, Joel Stevens-pronounced by Major Melville "the best farmer in Berkshire county "-William Francis, Josiah Francis, and the long list which bore the honored name of Francis, the Churchills, Hubbards, Parkers, Jesse Goodrich, and indeed almost all the names which appear in the roll of the West Part militia.
So in other parts of the town ; at the east, the Bushes, Gunns,
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Fairfields, Footes, Nobles and Herrieks; at the north, the Mer- rills; in the center, the Ingersolls, the Hollisters, Oramel Fan- ning, William Clark, Simeon Griswold, and others.1
In the ability of their leaders, the two parties in Pittsfield were nearly equal. The democrats owed their great preponderance at the polls, in part to the sturdy and unwavering phalanx, of which we have just given a few names, and in part to traditionary opin- ions. But they were greatly indebted, also, to circumstances then recent ; and which continued to increase in power, through the war.
And, first, manufactures had, during the preceding twelve or fifteen years been assuming a new importance in the business of the town, and, still more, in the esteem of its citizens; creating among them interests diverse from those of the rest of the state. East of the mountains, manufacturers were either so trifling in extent as to be completely overshadowed by the greater concerns of commerce, or their productions were of . a class which looked chiefly to a foreign market ; while agriculture found its customers either in the same distant trade, or among those who were engaged in carrying it on.
But Pittsfield had already become, to a good degree, a manu- facturing town ; not, indeed, so much in what had already been accomplished-although that was considerable, and of a promis- ing character-as in the spirit which had been infused into its people by its newspapers, and by public-spirited men like Elkanah Watson, and his associates in the Berkshire Agricultural Society. The comparison must be made, not between the absolute amounts of manufacturing capital in the two sections, but with regard to its proportion to that otherwise invested, and also with an eye to the connection of the several classes of business-occupations with each other.
In Pittsfield, many of the well-to-do citizens were directly interested in the manufacture of woolen-goods for home-con- sumption. Each political party - or members of each - had its factory. There was quite an extensive manufactory of looms, spinning-jennies and carding-machines. The farmers were intro- ducing large flocks of merino sheep, and they looked to the
1It is obviously impossible to make lists like the above full. The reader will himself add to it from the names of the proprietors of the Pittsfield Hotel, and others mentioned in this volume.
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success of the mills to furnish a profitable market for the wools which they were zealously endeavoring to improve, and for their other farm-products. All classes were looking to the new manu- factures as the most promising source of the future prosperity and wealth of the town, as well as the nation ; and it was easy to see that a war, acting in the nature of a stringent protective tariff-as a war with Great Britain especially would-must greatly encourage them. On the other hand, among the most effective arguments which Mr. Watson used in his advocacy of Berkshire · manufactures and improved wools, was the necessity for the country to supply itself with the better class of fabrics from its own looms in the event of a war, which, without any startling manifestation of the spirit of prophecy, he was able to predict as one of the events of the near future. The love of country and the hope of gain thus operated reciprocally upon each other, and harmoniously together, in the encouragement of manufactures. It thus happened, also, that there were not the same economical reasons which prevailed in the castern part of the state, to restrain resentment for the insults and injuries of Great Britain. Here whatever opposition to the war there was, arose from party affili- ations and prejudices, or personal opinions regarding its justice, or its expediency as affecting the whole country. In fact, the war promised to be, and was, most favorable to some of the citi- zens of Pittsfield who most bitterly denounced it. It furnished the best customer to Lemuel Pomeroy's gun-factory. It was full of promise to those federalists who, like Mr. Pomeroy, James D. and S. D. Colt, David Campbell and James Buel, were just embarking in the manufacture of cloths. It was certainly not private interest which dictated their political course.
But, irrespective of personal interests, there was much to pro- voke a wide difference of political feeling and opinion. It was far easier for either party to find an excuse for much of its own action in the errors and mistakes-national and state-of its opponents, than to defend it by sound reasoning upon any princi- ple of abstract right.
From a New England point of view, the measures of govern- ment which led to the war were liable to the severest criticism ; and of its partisanship for France no one now doubts, although no one now imagines that it was of a corrupt character. The puerile jealousy of a regular army and navy which characterized
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the administration of Jefferson, and the ludicrous expedients by which it sought to defend the country without them, were fair subjects for sneers. Even the absurd underestimate of the expenses of the first year of the war, submitted by Ezekiel Bacon, as chairman of the committee of ways and means in the house of representatives, must be given up as one of the rare instances in which that gentleman allowed the necessities of party to over- come his own good judgment.
It was apparent enough that those who brought on the war were strangely negligent of preparations for it. There is great truth in the assertion of Mr. Hillard, the federal historian of the period, that "never was an unfortunate country precipitated into an unequal and perilous contest, under circumstances more untoward."
But the federalists, on their part, made the greater mistake, when war was declared, not only of refusing it their support, but of going to the very verge of treason in their efforts to thwart the government in its measures for carrying it on ; by their votes in congress, by the acts of state-legislatures in which they had control, by discouraging enlistments, and throwing ridicule upon the army and its officers. The democrats complained that, " what- ever difficulty or distress arose from the extraordinary circum- stances of the times, when great difficulty and distress were inev- itable, was aggravated and magnified to the highest degree for the purpose of inflaming the public passions; that from the moment when the war was declared, they (the federalists) clamored for peace, and reprobated the war as wicked, unjust and unneces- sary. They made every possible effort to raise obstructions and difficulties in its prosecution ; and yet reprobated the administra- tion for their imbecility in carrying it on. They reduced the goy- ernment to bankruptcy, and then reproached it for its necessities and embarrassments. In a word, all their movements had but one object-to enfeeble and distract the government."1
The indictment was a true one. Whatever may have been the impolicy of plunging into the war; however a wiser statesmanship might have led to some other course, it could hardly be dis- puted that the acts of Great Britain had been such as to justify a resort to arms ; that, as regarded her, the war was just. By their efforts to impede its successful prosecution, the federalists
1 Carey's Olive Branch.
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committed the fatal error which made their name a stigma and a by-word for generations.
But, although their great leader, John Adams, his son John Quincy Adams, Samuel Dexter, and other men of note, abandoned the party on the first intimation of this policy, it was not until after the close of the war, that its effects were fully appreciated. While hostilities continued, the federal party was not, at least sensibly, weakened from what it was when they commenced.
While its issue was uncertain, while mistakes in the camp and the council offered constant themes for censure of the government; while taxation and high prices bore hard upon the people, with- out, in most sections, adequate compensation by increased rewards for industry ; and, above all, while the heat of party-violence had no time to cool, it was easy to maintain a respectable opposition to the war; but when it closed under circumstances which threw around it a brilliant halo of glory, and with the ends for which it was undertaken substantially attained, although not definitely recognized in the treaty, the reaction came with double power, and the federal party had to sustain, not only the obloquy of its errors, but of many heinous political offenses which were far from its thoughts. Many faithless Peters, who had been among the most hot-headed of its adherents, not only denied it in its fall, but found high places in the hostile camp by maligning their old associates, who, wrapping themselves in the mantle of their pure and patriotic intentions, maintained a dignified silence.
But to return to the opening of the war in 1812, Pittsfield soon had a reason to be reconciled to it-in addition to those already mentioned-in the establishment there, of a cantonment of United States troops, followed in 1813, by a depot for prisoners of war; from both of which, as well as from the purchase of general sup- plies for the army, there resulted a large expenditure of money in the town and county, with a profit to the people which would have been welcome at any time, but which was specially grateful after their recent losses.
On the passage of the act of January, 1812, for raising 25,000 additional United States troops, a general rendezvous for recruits was established at Pittsfield, Captain A. J. Bucklin of Cheshire, being placed in command. During the first ten days, thirty men were enlisted, and Lieut. Jared Ingersoll was stationed at Shef- field, Lieut. David Perry at Adams, and Ensign Wm. Browning at
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Pittsfield; all being of Pittsfield and recruiting for the ninth regiment. Lieut. Ralph B. Cuyler was also stationed at Pitts- field, beating up for the 6th regiment.
On the 25th of April, the advertisements of these officers, in the Pittsfield Sun, began to call upon "all true and patriotic Americans, who were determined to vindicate the rights and maintain the independence of their country," "to rally to the standards " of their respective regiments ; and the recruiting ser- geants began to penetrate into every town in the county.
On the 23d of May, Rev. Wm. Allen deeded to the United States, for $800, one acre of land on the east side of North street, next above the present location of the Boston and Albany railroad. Upon this site stood the gambrel-roofed cottage, so often mentioned in previous chapters, which had been removed from East street to give place to the Pittsfield Hotel. This was now fitted up as a residence for the commandant of the post, and continued to be occupied for that purpose until Pittsfield ceased to be a military station.
On the 30th of May, the town was honored by a visit from the revolutionary veteran, Henry Dearborn, who had, in the previous February, been commissioned senior major-general of the United States army. General Dearborn was received by a national salute, and visited by many of the prominent citizens. He left, the next morning, for Springfield; but, short as his visit was, it resulted in the purchase of thirteen acres of level ground about one hundred rods north of the Park-which were subsequently increased to twenty-six acres and ninety-three rods. 1
1 The Cantonment grounds covered the land since occupied by Maplewood Young Ladies' Institute, St. Joseph's church and pastor's residence, and also about seven acres east of First street. There are some facts concerning the purchase not perfectly explained. It is stated in the Sun, of June 20, 1812, that government had purchased fourteen acres of land, and there is no doubt that it was correct in stating that buildings for the Cantonment had been commenced. But the land was part of the estate of Rev. Thomas Allen, and the probate court did not grant a license to sell it until June, 1814, soon after which date it was advertised, and sold at public auction, as required by law, the United States being the highest bidder. The other estate advertised with it, was the remainder of the home-lot, a few shares in the Ilotel and the Female Academy, and the "meadow lot" on Wahconah street ; and so much was to be sold as would raise the sum of $5,400, for the payment of debts and legacies. The executor's deed of the first thirteen acres is dated October 25, 1814, and the price was $1,170. The deed of the
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After an interval of twenty-six years since its occupation by General Lincoln's little army in the Shays rebellion, Pittsfield now again began to assume the peculiar bustle of a military post.
The northern part of the thirteen acres purchased by Gen- eral Dearborn was covered by a beautiful grove. A few rods south of the edge of this wood, on the spots since occupied by the chapel and two boarding-houses of Maplewood Young Ladies' Institute, were ranged the barracks: three plain wooden buildings, each three stories high, and one hundred and thirty feet long, with piazzas along the fronts of the different stories.
The west building was the officers' quarters; the east that of the non-commissioned officers and privates. The middle was used for various purposes. This was the arrangement for the first year. Subsequently some changes occurred, incident to the use of the Cantonment as a depot for prisoners of war. In the rear were two barns of the same length as the barracks, and two stories high; it being in contemplation to form here a regiment of cav- alry.
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