USA > Maryland > Talbot County > History of Talbot county, Maryland, 1661-1861, Volume I > Part 24
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unsupplied. That much hardship was silently endured is probable and there may have been even instances of cruelty at the hands of the rude men over them, but not with the consent, much less at the instance of the master. For the maintenance of due discipline a rigid regimen was absolutely necessary, and often without doubt the rules which were proper and mild in themselves were enforced by the overseers in so harsh a manner as to give grounds for a belief that the burdens of slavery, never and nowhere light and easy to be borne, on those portions of Col. Lloyd's estate which were not immediately and constantly under his eye, were rendered more heavy and galling than he wished them to be, or than they were elsewhere in the county. It must be remembered too, that even deserved punishments when inflicted by a private hand, and not by the unimpassioned arm of the law, are apt to be regarded as cruel, even when they are milder than those judicially inflicted; and that labors unrewarded by wages are considered as severe and crushing, which to the compensated worker would be felt as moderate or easily endured. It should be mentioned, also, that inasmuch as it had been the immemorial custom of the Lloyd's of Wye, rarely or never, departed from, to sell no negroes from their plantations, the number of the idle and the vicious, deserving severity of treatment, was greater upon their estates than where the masters, by disposing of the incor- rigible or criminal of their gangs to the Southern dealers, rid themselves of a class of slaves whose discipline required rigorous methods that sa- vored of cruelty. As Col. Lloyd was a humane man, and kindly in all other relations, if he was harsh and cruel in his relations of master to his slaves, a relation which appealed in many ways to his leniency, and in an especial manner to his compassion, he must have been vio- lating his own nature and customary impulses, a thing not to be believed. But to close what may be said upon this subject, it may be stated that his slaves were reasonably well housed, well clothed, well fed, not over worked, and cared for in sickness and in old age; yet, it must be con- fessed, that they enjoyed few luxuries, and but little of that dolce far niente so delightful and so natural to the negro-nor did any slaves anywhere enjoy them, except the "curled darlings" of the household.68
68 This is a subject of so much delicacy that in this connection it cannot be pursued further: but it is hoped time and opportunity will be found for a con- sideration of the whole subject of slavery, as it existed in Talbot county, when occasion will be taken to correct and rebuke many of the misapprehensions which a hyperaesthesial humanitarianism has indulged and many of the misrepresenta- tions of a malicious or ignorant prejudice has invented and promulgated.
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The circumstance of the observance of the family custom of selling no negroes taken in connection with the prolificacy of the race, which a state of servitude instead of impairing seems to have promoted, caused a rapid multiplication of slaves upon the estate so that they began to be profitless to the owner. In order to remedy this evil of over popu- lation, and that other of the retention around him of the vicious and idle, Col. Lloyd purchased in 1837 a large plantation in Madison county, Mississippi, and thither he removed, first, those who expressed a willing- ness to go-for he gave to the industrious and tractable the option to go or stay-and subsequently those whose conduct was such as to merit the punishment of transportation to this his penal colony, taking care, in the cases of the former, or deserving, not to separate families. It will thus be seen that he adopted a scheme for his own relief which had been adopted by civil governments under like embarrassments. This plantation at first quite remunerative, was ravaged by the war, and for long after rendered valueless by emancipation, but it is pleasant to know that it has again become profitable to Edward Lloyd VII, the present owner.69
The Lloyds of Wye from the time of the coming into the province of Maryland of the first Edward had always taken an active and conspic- uous part in public affairs, and therefore, tit may be supposed, Edward Lloyd the sixth of the name felt it incumbent upon him too, not with standing his want of predilection for, if it may not be said, his want of adaptation to political life, to assume the burdens and, in appearance at least, to covet the honors of civic station. He may have felt in some degree the instigations of an inherited propensity or it may have been a sense of obligation to the sovereign people, like that which bound the ancient nobility to assume their arms at the command of the king, that impelled him to take part in our civic contests. It is difficult to resist nature; almost as difficult to resist custom. Col. Lloyd had few of those qualities of mind and character which make the politician, using that term in the opprobrious which is the common sense of the term. He could not use the politician's methods of action or thought. He
69 It may be well enough to say that in 1857 and 1858 he made large purchases of land in Arkansas and Louisiana which have since been disposed of. In trans- porting his slaves in 1837, he took them in his own sloop across the bay to Annapolis and then placed them in wagons. In these they were conveyed to Mississippi, he accompanying them in person, to secure their safety and comfort. Mr. Lloyd bought lands in Talbot also, and among them were properties on Choptank, and the estates of his brothers, Mr. Murray and Mr. Daniel Lloyd.
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knew nothing of his trickeries and frauds, nothing of his deceptions, pretenses and compromises with the truth and the right. He was as upright in his political conduct as he was sincere in his political con- victions. If he was sometimes at fault in his opinions, as he most assuredly was, he never erred in his manner of asserting and defending them, he
Whose armor was his honest thought And simple truth his utmost skill.
He made no claim to higher statesmanship, but was content to follow the foot steps of accredited leaders, for he was a strict partisan, and possessed the very equivocal merit of never differing from his party, at least so far as to oppose it in word or action. He inherited his attach- ment to the democratic party from his father, but this attachment was strengthened with the years, by a belief that in the supremacy of that party lay not only the national welfare but the security of his property in slaves. Pride is humiliated when it is discovered how many opinions which have been thought to have their origin in right reason may be traced to a selfish interest or even more ignoble source. Col. Lloyd probably never felt this humiliation, but he lived long enough to see that some of the doctrines of his party which were thought to afford the best defence of his peculiar property when pushed to extreme were the indirect causes of its obliteration. His first appearance on the political field was as delegate to the convention that nominated Mr. Van Buren, and then as presidential elector in the contest in 1836 between that distinguished gentleman and the more distinguished Mr. Clay. Mr. Lloyd gave assistance rather by weight of character and liberal pecu- niary aid than by campaign oratory and electioneering devices, for he was not a ready speaker nor skilful schemer. The whigs were successful in the county by a very considerable majority, and carried the State, but their great chieftain was not elected president. He was again upon the electoral ticket in 1840 when Mr. Van Buren was a second time the democratic candidate for the presidency with Gen'l Harrison as his opponent. This ticket was again defeated in Talbot as in the State at large, and Mr. Van Buren lost his seat which was filled by a much weak- er man and less astute politician. In the year 1843 there was much agitation in Maryland respecting the payment of the "direct tax" which had been imposed for the purpose of meeting the interest upon the debt incurred for the construction of "internal improvements." A very considerable number of citizens of this county opposed the col-
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lection of this tax, and among them was Col. Lloyd, who most severely felt the impost. As the law provided that this "direct tax" should be collected by the same officers that collected the county taxes, and as there was resistance or refusal to pay the former so there was omission to pay the latter. There resulted much embarrassment at the county fisc. A public meeting was called first to protest against the collection of the State assessment, and second to devise means for the relief of the county treasury. At this meeting Col. Lloyd was present, and he was appointed one of a committee to confer with the county commissioners. No more need be said here of this humiliating passage in our State and county history. Our ship of State barely steered clear of the rocks of repudiation upon which some seemed bent upon driving her. It is dif- ficult to believe that Col. Lloyd was one of these. It is reasonable as well as charitable to suppose he was unconscious of the danger that lay in her course. This is only another instance of honorable men falling into errors when their political conduct is directed by a different moral compass from that they employ for their guidance in their private affairs. In the year 1850 and for some years previously the question of calling a convention for a reform of the constitution of the State had been much discussed, and in May of this year a vote of the people was taken to determine whether such a convention should assemble. The vote was very small, indicating much indifference, not one half the elec- tors casting their ballots; but the result was favorable to the call of a convention. Nominations by both the parties were made and those of the Democratic party were Messrs. Edward Lloyd, Morris O. Colston, S. P. Dickinson and Cornelius Sherwood. They were elected by a very large majority. At the organization of the convention Col. Lloyd was honored with a handsome vote for the president but failed of his election. He was not prominent in the debates of this body but that deference was shown to his opinions upon the different subjects that came before it, which was due to his good judgment upon organic law. After his election as a delegate to the convention, namely in October, 1850, he was, without opposition, elected State senator for Talbot and served during the years 1851 and 1852, succeeding the Hon. Sam'l Hambleton. Over this body he presided as president with the diginity and courtesy of the inbred gentleman and the tact and intel- ligence of the trained parliamentarian. It is believed that after the expiration of his term of service in the senate he never consented to be a candidate for any office, and gave no more attention to politics than his duty as a citizen required him. Before his death in 1861 the terrific
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storm that had been gathering in the political sky for many years, and had given warning of its approach by its frequent thunders, broke with all its devastating forces upon the devoted nation, threatening to rend it into fragments. He did not live to see it in all its maddened fury, much less to witness after it had paved over all its ravages. He is thought to have been in hearty sympathy with the insurgents of the South; but it is impossible to believe he was incapable of foreseeing the consequences of the great rebellion to the institution for whose preser- vation that rebellion was raised, by those so infatuated as not to know that the first gun of the war was the signal for the destruction, sooner or later, of slavery. But he may have indulged the hope of many patriotic citizens that even after the first overt act some solution would be found of solving the problem reconciling national integrity with a perpetuation of the cause of the existing discord and distraction-a hope which, as is now seen, was vain and irrational. It is due to him to say that he did not render himself obnoxious to the government or its partisans in Talbot by any positive acts of disloyalty, though no man would have been more excusable from a southern point of view.
Col. Lloyd was nominally a member of the Protestant Episcopal Church, but like most of the Lloyds of Wye, he took little interest in its spiritual or temporal affairs. He respected its ministers, revered its doctrines and paid its dues, but neglected its ordinances, though not its moral precepts. Immersed in business he found time for but few of the social pleasures, other than those of a retired and domestic life. In his manners he was dignified and polished, but unaffected, easy and affable; inviting friendliness but repelling intimacies. He was frank, kindly and hospitable. A liberal scale of living was maintained at Wye House, but the lavish hospitality of his father was restricted to more moderate limits. While its doors were still opened to "welcome the coming and speed the parting guest," and while its board spread its generous regale, it could not be said, as was said of it in the days Governor Lloyd, in rustic compliment, meant to be superlative, that it was the most frequented hostelry of the county.70 Col. Lloyd was of medium height, compactly built, of ruddy countenance, and a generally pleasing mien. No portrait of him exists. He married Nov. 30, 1824, Miss Alicia, daughter of Mr. Michael McBlair, merchant of the city
70 Or to use the common mode of expressing the same sentiment which was meant to be complimentary. "Governor Lloyd entertained more strangers at his house than Sol. Low at his tavern in Easton." This Sol. Low was a prince of Bonifaces.
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of Baltimore. This lady dying in 1838, left five children, of whom the present master of Wye House, Edward Lloyd, seventh of the name is the eldest. Col. Lloyd, after the death of his wife in 1838, remained unmarried and died at his home, Aug. 11, 1861, where he was buried in accordance with his injunctions as expressed in his will, "plainly, privately, without parade or preaching,"71 and where a monument with simple inscriptions has been erected to his memory.
EDWARD LLOYD (VII) MASTER OF WYE HOUSE
1825-1907
For evident reasons peculiar difficulties oppose the compilation of the lives of living persons. So great are these difficulties that many of the best biographical compendiums exclude accounts of those who have not finished their course. But in order to give a certain completeness, to this series of papers it is necessary to say something of the present representative of the Lloyds, Edward Lloyd, seventh of the name, who may be denominated the Master of Wye House. What shall be done in this emergency of having to speak of a man face to face, as it were, and speak truly, "nothing extenuate nor sit down aught in malice," must necessarily be to give but a sketch, mere outlines without shading or coloring from the literary artist; for to attempt more than to men- tion the principal incidents of the life of Col. Lloyd, without comment or reflection upon them would be running the risk of offending his modesty by praise, or his pride by censure, either of which would be violations of the proprieties. Offence may be given to a man of sensi- bility almost as easily by panegyric as by disparagement. It is agree- able to all to be well spoken of, but accompanying the pleasure of praise is the painful distrust of its being wholly merited; and as for blame, it can hardly be meted out so justly that the subject will feel that he has got merely his due.
Edward Lloyd (VII), the son of Edward Lloyd (VI), the farmer, and Alicia McBlair, was born in the house of his maternal grandparents
71 The following is the first item of his will: "I desire that my funeral may be plain and private, and without parade and preaching." The same expressions are employed in the will of Governor Lloyd. It is worthy of notice, that neither will is introduced with the pious formula that was customarily employed in writing such documents.
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in the city of Baltimore on the 22d day of October, 1825, the eldest of five children and the only son that attained majority. His early edu- cation was conducted by tutors, but when he arrived at proper age he was placed under the care of the Rev. Dr. Muhlenburg at College Point, near Flushing, in the State of New York. By this eminent instructor he was prepared for college and he was entered at Princeton, New Jersey; but as his preference lay in the direction of a life of activity he did not complete the prescribed course. He proposed to himself the following of the calling of his forefathers, that of the farmer, and soon after leaving college he took charge of one or more of his father's farms, living at "Presq'ile" formerly the residence of Mr. Murray Lloyd, his uncle. Since that time he has given himself unremittingly to the duties of his avocation, with occasional diversions into poli- tics, which seems to be at the present the principal amusement of country gentlemen, as they afford a substitute for the excitements of the fox-hunt and the horse-race, and like those sports have they a pre- tended utility. Those who follow the hounds claim that they are destroying noxious vermin; those who patronize the turf that they are improving the breeds of horses; so politics are pursued under the thin disguise of solicitude for public welfare. As those sports have been in great measure abandoned by self-respecting men, there is danger politics may also be forsaken by the same class and for the same reasons, namely, their disreputable associations and their discreditable methods. So noble a pursuit as politics, in its best sense, should confer honor upon and not receive it from any man, however worthy, who follows it; but that Col. Lloyd and men like him still participate in the pastime or the game as it is played is the cause of its maintaining a respectability which would otherwise be lost.
The first appearance of Mr. Edward Lloyd, Jr., in a public capacity however, was as a military man. In the year 1846, when he had barely attained his majority, the Mexican war broke out, under circumstances far from creditable to the nation; but as men have not yet lost the pro- pensities of their savage ancestors, or even their more remote brutal progenitors, when blood is once shed, the ravening madness seized them, so at this time upon the reception of the news from the frontier of a collision of Texans and Mexicans, a rage out of all proportion with the puny object exciting it, possessed the people of the United States. In Maryland, Talbot of course included, the militia was organized, the roll of officers eliminated of the old, feeble or incompetent, military companies were formed, the minds of our sober citizens were wrought
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up to a condition of warlike enthusiasm by the orators and journals, and then the pride and pomp and circumstance of glorious war was travestied upon this narrow field. Mr. Lloyd formed a company in his own neighborhood of which he became captain, but soon he was placed upon the staff of Brigadier-General Tench Tilghman. He was promoted to the rank of major and served as aide to Major-General Handy. Subsequently he was commissioned colonel by Governor Thomas, and served upon his staff during his official term. He was not called upon to perform active service in Mexico, but no one doubts that there would have been willingness if there had been necessity for him to do so.
In the next year, 1847, his political career began, for he was brought forward, and this before he had reached the legal age for such a position, as a candidate for a seat in the lower house of the General Assembly by the democrats of Talbot with whom, like his father and grandfather, he was in political sympathy, the laws of heredity thus seeming to con- trol means, opinions and actions as well as their bodily traits or features. He probably accounted it an honor to be elected, as he certainly was complimented by receiving a larger vote than either of his associates upon the same ticket, Mr. Daniel Leonard and Mr. Benj. M. Bowdle. At the same election the Hon. Philip F. Thomas, of Talbot, was chosen governor. The campaign in this county was exceedingly spirited. As it had been determined in the previous year, 1846, by popular vote that the General Assembly should meet biennially instead of annually as hitherto, there was not another election until 1849, when Col. Lloyd (for by this time he had received the accolade of colonel) was again chosen, still leading his ticket and thus winning popularity. At the session that followed he had for his associates in the lower house Mr. I. C. W. Powell and Mr. William Spry Denny, while Colonel Samuel Hambleton, then a whig, represented the county in the Senate. Young as he was in years, his duties as a legislator appear to have been per- formed in a manner satisfactory to his constituents, and that he aided in affecting those measures which resulted in the restoration of the credit of the State, then sadly shaken, must be a matter of self-gratulation. This brief experience in political life was apparently sufficient to satisfy his aspirations for public station-at least for many years following. Though taking no active or prominent part in the operations of party management, he was, amidst the absorbing cares of his estate, an intel- ligent observer of the movements of public affairs, and of the efforts made to control them. But his was not the interest of the curious or amused
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spectator of the incidents of the political drama as it was played before him. Indeed events were occurring which compelled attention, as prelusive to that great tragedy that a few years later was presented to the awe-stricken world. Politics among men of the south, so cir- cumstanced as Col. Lloyd, during the period under consideration, say from 1850 to 1860, aroused an intensity of interest which could not have originated in that vague apprehension of injury to the general prosperity or well-being which change of party or policy arouses, but in the well-defined fear that private interests would suffer by the loss of the dominance which one section of the Union under every admin- istration however named, had exercised. It was not until after the great earthquake which shook the nation to its centre and threatened to rend it asunder, which did actually change the face of the social structure and engulf vast properties, that he suffered himself to be brought forward as the candidate of his party for any position. In the year 1873 he consented to serve as the candidate of the democrats for the State Senate. He had for his competitor Mr. James M. Cow- gill, a republican whose opinions were as unequivocal as his own. Col. Lloyd was successful in his canvass and took his seat in a body which so many of his ancestors had adorned. He was made chairman of the committee on finance. After serving his term in accordance with party custom, and not less in accordance with party expediency, he was in 1877 again nominated for the State Senate, and elected over his republican opponent, Mr. Reuben Tharp. Upon meet- ing, Col. Lloyd was chosen president of the Senate, receiving the full vote of his party, and having no opponent. It would be super- fluous to say of one in whom courtesy, dignity and ability are native, that he displayed all of these qualities while occupying the chair of presiding officer of this respectable body. In the year 1883, so evenly was the county divided between the two parties that it was necessary for the democrats to nominate candidates of character, capacity and popularity, and in as much as Col. Lloyd had served two years in the Senate most acceptably and capably, and in as much as no man was more justly esteemed, he was placed upon the ticket, having Messrs. Philip Francis Thomas and Joseph Bruff Seth as his associates. These gen- tlemen were elected. With Mr. I. Davis Clark, a republican, as Sena- tor, the county and people of Talbot have seldom been more ably repre- sented than in the Assembly of 1884. Since the completion of his term in the House of Delegates, Col. Lloyd has held no official position under county or State government, but he is regarded as a leader of
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his party in Talbot and in Maryland, and as such has served on executive committees for the management of campaigns and like services. He has labored assiduously to maintain the supremacy which his party has long held and now holds, though with somewhat uncertain tenure, a supremacy which would be more tolerable to its opponents and more creditable to its adherents if it were maintained by such expedients only as he may be presumed to approve and not by such as the vulgar "bosses," to use the slang of the day, devise. If the national administration, now in power, would appoint him to some office of emolument and re- sponsibility, it would go far to confirm the impression it is desirious of making upon the popular mind, that it wishes rather to secure the serv- ices of capable and honorable men than to reward political followers and "workers," and it would also serve, in no small measure, to disarm those most apt to criticise its conduct in the selections of the govern- ment agents or officers.
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