USA > Michigan > Wayne County > Detroit > Compendium of history and biography of the city of Detroit and Wayne County, Michigan > Part 19
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Chandler not only made his strong personality felt in Detroit; he was a figure of na- tional prominence during and after the civil war. He came to Detroit in 1833, leaving his birthplace, Bedford, New Hampshire, when twenty years of age. Entering the mercan- tile trade, he amassed a considerable fortune, a large portion of which he devoted gener- ously to the interests of the Whig and anti-slavery propaganda. His service to the city as mayor and his activity in the promotion of the new Republican party, brought him promi- nently before the people of the state. He was elected to the United States senate in 1857, after having represented Detroit as a Lincoln delegate in the national Republican conven- tion of 1856, which nominated Fremont. Serving in the senate throughout the war, Chandler was appointed secretary of the interior in Grant's cabinet. He died suddenly in Chicago, in 1879, probably from the results of overwork during the strenuous campaign of that year. A sketch of his life appears in the biographical department of this publication.
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After 1855 the Underground Railroad agents were particularly active in Detroit. During the year prior to this date, a subsidiary freedom organization, called the Refugee Home Society, had bought a tract of land near Windsor, and this it utilized as a place of settlement for escaped negroes. The Michigan legislature sought to weaken the effect of the fugitive-slave law by the passage of an act preventing the imprisonment of slaves in county jails. Prosecuting attorneys were also directed to defend fugitives who claimed to be free. Detroit's attitude toward slavery attracted many abolitionist lecturers and during the '5os many of the best known speakers in the country addressed meetings in the city. Among them were Frederick Douglass and John Brown. These two men met in the city in 1859 and it was here that they, with several others, completed the details for the John Brown raid against Harper's Ferry. Strained as were the relations between the slave states and the north, the attempted execution of the plans perfected in a house at 185 Congress street, set the entire country aflame with excitement. Brown sought to invade Virginia, to capture the arsenal at Harper's Ferry and to arm the negroes. The failure of the plot and the subsequent execution of the leaders are matters of national history.
The organization of the Republican party at Jackson, Michigan, came about as the result of an anticipated split in the Whig vote in favor of the Free-Soil gubernatorial candidate. It was evident to the Detroit politicians that the anti-slavery feeling was rap- idly becoming a strong political issue. Many northern Democrats were of this opinion, as were large numbers of Whigs and Free Soilers. After several conferences between the various local leaders, a Free Soil meeting was arranged. This was held in the city hall. At its close a general call was issued for a convention to be held at Jackson, July 6, 1854. This convention met as planned and adopted a compromise platform which embodied the acceptable portions of two draughts which were presented by Jacob M. Howard and Isaac P. Christiancy. In the meantime the candidacy of Kinsley S. Bingham, the Free Soil gubernatorial aspirant, had been withdrawn with that of the rest of the Free Soil ticket. Bingham later became the candidate of the new Republican party and was elected governor.
Though John C. Fremont, the standard-bearer of the Republicans, was defeated in the presidential campaign of 1856 by James Buchanan, the Democratic candidate, the new party succeeded in re-electing Kinsley S. Bingham governor of Michigan. Little save the political issue of the time-the slavery question-occupied the public attention, and yet the city developed during these years with remarkable rapidity. Annual state fairs had now been in vogue for seven years; art exhibitions were being held; educational interests were being furthered; industrial institutions were springing into life; municipal needs were being satisfied apace with the increase in population. Detroit was becoming one of the impor- tant social and industrial centers in the country. The city had been in telegraphic com- munication with Buffalo since 1847 and was the center of competition for three opposing lines. In 1856 a meeting of the warring telegraph interests was held in Detroit, repre- sentatives of the various companies forming here the Western Union Telegraph Company. In the following year a cable was laid across the Detroit river. The year 1857 witnessed the extension of the city limits, the granting of a new city charter, the opening of the old Russell House and the establishment of a recorder's court. Many down-town buildings were in course of erection by private individuals who vied with each other in satisfying the then existing craze for city improvement. In 1859 a mass meeting of citizens voted to raise three hundred thousand dollars for municipal structures, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars of which were appropriated for a new city hall; the balance was directed toward the completion of a workhouse.
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In 1860 came the memorable campaign as a result of which Abraham Lincoln became president of the United States. This precipitated the civil war. For some time plots had been in process of formation in the south for the secession of the slave and "state's rights states." In December, 1860, a secession ordinance was ratified by the legislature of South Carolina, and within the next few weeks many of the southern commonwealths joined that state in withdrawing from the Union. While the Buchanan regime was still in effect, the southern sympathizers in the cabinet overlooked no opportunity for furthering the interests of the pro-slavery party. The secretary of war, John B. Floyd, was among those cabinet officers who later became leaders of the Confederacy. He took precaution to deplete the military stores in the northern arsenals and to order United States troops into positions most disadvantageous to the Union cause. He directed the sale of arms stored in the gov- ernment arsenal at Dearborn and winked at the erection of strong batteries by the rebels in Charleston harbor. The south was fully cognizant of the impending struggle. The pos- sibility of an open breach of serious consequences was beyond belief in the north. As the erection of hostile works continued off Charleston, Major Anderson, in command of a small but loyal force stationed at the adjacent Fort Moultrie, evacuated that position and entered Fort Sumter, a much stronger fortification. Buchanan determined to send Anderson supplies, and to this end dispatched the steamer "Star of the West." Upon her arrival at Sumter, Jan- uary 9th, both the steamer and the fort were fired upon by the rebels. This was the open- ing event of the war. News of the insult was flashed to Detroit, where the citizens were at once aroused to a frenzy of anger and indignation. On April 12th news of the fall of Sumter reached the city. On the 13th nearly every resident joined a mass assembly which met on the Campus Martius to voice its loyalty to the Union. All of Michigan was aflame with patriotism. On the 16th Governor Blair, who had succeeded Bingham, conferred with the leading citizens as to the procedure for securing Michigan's quota of the seventy-five thousand troops for which the president had asked the country. The governor addressed the throng at his hotel, informing the people that it was estimated that one hundred thou- sand dollars would be required for the equipment of the state's first regiment. Of this amount fifty thousand dollars was pledged by the city. Nearly twenty-five thousand dollars more was subscribed by the meeting. On the 23d the governor's proclamation was issued calling for ten volunteer companies and within less than twenty-four hours John Robertson, the auditor general, had begun the organization of Michigan's first regiment of infantry. This regiment was mustered into the United States service on May IIth, and two days later it left Detroit with seven hundred and eighty "ninety-day" men, under command of Colonel O. B. Wilcox, proceeding directly to Washington. The second regiment of infantry was already partially recruited.
The government reservation at Fort Wayne, the Detroit Riding Park and a camp ground established between Elmwood and Joseph Campau avenues, on Clinton street, were now scenes of military activity. From Detroit, from Wayne county, from adjoining coun- ties, came the best of the younger blood of Michigan to join the ranks of the Michigan troops, already being schooled in the arts of war at the city's three instruction camps. As soon as it became evident that the rebellion was to be more than a ninety-day affair, volunteers swarmed about the recruiting stations at Detroit as elsewhere in the state. Michigan furnished ninety thousand seven hundred and forty-seven troops during the war. Of these the following regiments were mustered in at Detroit during the first two years of the conflict :
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1861.
First Michigan Infantry .
O. B. Wilcox, colonel.
Second Michigan Infantry
I. B. Richardson, colonel.
Fifth Michigan Infantry
H. D. Terry, colonel.
Eighth Michigan Infantry
W. M. Fenton, colonel.
Ninth Michigan Infantry W. W. Duffield.
Sixteenth Michigan Infantry
T. W. B. Stockton, colonel.
First Michigan Cavalry
T. F. Brodhead, colonel.
First Michigan Battery.
C. O. Loomis.
One company Berdan's Sharpshooters.
One company Jackson Guards.
I862.
Fifth Michigan Cavalry. T. J. Copeland, colonel.
Ninth Michigan Battery J. J. Daniels, captain.
Fourth Michigan Cavalry . R. H. G. Minty, colonel.
Twenty-fourth Michigan Infantry H. A. Morrow, colonel.
Seventeenth Michigan Infantry.
Wm. H. Withington, colonel.
One company Stanton Guards, raised by.
G. S. Wormer, captain.
One company Dygert's Sharpshooters.
In Wayne county nine thousand two hundred and thirteen men were recruited for the defense of the Union, Detroit furnishing a little less than two-thirds of this number. Nearly fourteen thousand Michigan men and three hundred and fifty-eight officers laid down their lives during the struggle.
During these days the city was stirred as never in its history by jollification meetings in celebration of the victories of the northern arms. Throngs gathered frequently on the Campus Martius to listen to the patriotic oratory of such men as Theodore Romeyn, Gen- eral Lewis Cass, William A. Howard, Colonel H. A. Morrow and many others. In these addresses eligible men were urged to enlist. Receptions and dinners were given return- ing and visiting heroes. The war spirit invaded every home in the city. Triumphal arches were erected, under which marched patriotic parades. To encourage enlistment, appropri- ations and subscriptions were made to a bounty fund, which reached in Wayne county some six hundred and sixty thousand dollars, during the war. In addition to this the county and its citizens subscribed considerably more than six hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars for the assistance of families who were left without support by the enlistment of the bread- winners. Regular allowances of ten and fifteen dollars per month were made to such families.
But not all was enthusiasm for the Union. After the first wave of loyalty had swept the city, carrying to the battlefields at the front the most desirable of Detroit's available men, there still remained many malcontents. These men had taken care to avoid the recruiting stations. They were unwilling to make personal sacrifice and assume the risks and hardships of war for the preservation of the government. They feared being caught by the dragnet of the draft which everyone felt would follow the repeated calls for more men. The agents of the Confederacy were active in the north, and especially so along the Canadian border. Whenever opportunity afforded itself they played upon the cowardice and disloyalty of those who had refused to volunteer. On July 15, 1862, a mass meeting assembled on the campus to hear speeches in favor of raising a new regiment. Through-
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out the crowd were sprinkled many of the malcontents. As the meeting progressed the speakers were greeted with hisses and shouts of derision. The wrath of the disgruntled centered on certain individuals on the speakers' platform. The rostrum was finally torn down and Lewis Cass and other prominent citizens were forced to take refuge in the Russell House.
On March 6, 1863, occurred the most disgraceful affair in the city's history. For some time the feeling of resentment against the negroes, as causes of the war, had been rapidly gaining ground among the semi-lawless. This class greatly feared the draft which was necessitated during this year to supply Michigan's quota of soldiers. The trial of a negro, William Faulkner, charged with attacking a white girl, afforded a vent for the pent up anti-negro sentiment. While the prisoner was being escorted from the court at Congress and Griswold streets, a mob attempted to take the man from the officers. Trouble had been anticipated and a formidable guard had been provided by the provost to prevent a lynching. In spite of the array of soldiers, the mob made an attack upon the guard, who replied with a scattering volley. One man was killed and several fell wounded as the result of the fire. Immediately the crowd dispersed but reassembled in the colored settlement east of Woodward avenue and proceeded to drive the blacks into their homes with clubs and stones. Helpless men and women were struck down and beaten to insensibility at their doors; or driven terror-stricken before a crowd of frenzied whites. Then the torch was applied. Over thirty houses were thus consumed and thirty-five human beings were either killed outright or burned in their homes. For a time it was feared that the entire city would be burned and would fall victim to looters. Finally several companies of military reached the scene of the rioting, but not before the guilty had made good their escape.
In the same year occurred an attempt to liberate the Confederate officers held as prisoners of war at Johnson's island, off Sandusky. The latter city and Detroit were chosen as headquarters for a party of southerners who were involved in the plot. At this time there were nearly twenty-five thousand rebel prisoners in confinement in the federal prisons at Chicago, Columbus, Johnson's island and Indianapolis. To liberate these men the party of southerners came north under various pretexts, simulating disgust with the southern cause. These men planned simultaneous attacks upon each of the northern prisons for the liberation of the Confederate soldiers. Bennett G. Burley, Major C. H. Cole and John Y. Beal were the conspirators who undertook the capture of the Johnson's island prison, near Sandusky. Planning their attempt with elaborate deliberation, which enabled them to make many friends in the north and thus allay suspicion, it was not until Sep- tember 19, 1864, that the leaders left Detroit for the island. Major Cole, who posed as a man of wealth and a general good fellow, had wormed himself into the good graces of some of the officers of the gunboat "Michigan," then stationed off Johnson's island as a guard for the prison. He had been a guest aboard the ship and had entertained the officers at little functions on shore. In payment of their social obligations, the officers in turn invited the major to again dine aboard the ship, on the 19th. Cole had spent much of his time at Sandusky, but on the above date he left Detroit with his accomplices, on board the steamer "Philo Parsons," which ran regularly between Detroit and Sandusky. Several passengers were waiting for the boat at Amherstburg and when she made the landing at that port they came aboard with considerable baggage, passing themselves off as carpen- ters, and their baggage as chests of tools. Before the boat reached Sandusky the carpen- ters opened the chests, which were then found to contain a generous supply of muskets and pistols. The boat was immediately taken in hand by the conspirators, one of whom, Beal,
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presented a pistol at the clerk's window, demanding that Walter Ashley, one of the owners of the steamer, turn over the money in the ship's safe. Somewhat more than one hundred dollars were passed through the window without delay. It was largely through Ashley's testimony that Beal was later convicted and hanged in New York. At Middle Bass island the "Parsons" joined the "Island Queen," another steamer which had been taken by a simi- lar band of conspirators. The passengers of the latter steamer, including a score or more of United States soldiers, were ordered aboard the "Parsons," which proceeded to a point near Johnson's island. Cole went aboard the "Michigan," where he had arranged to be met by a fellow plotter who was expected to have temporarily disabled the gunboat's engines. After drinking the officers into a state of helplessness, Cole planned to signal the "Parsons," take the "Michigan," overpower the prison's shore guard and assist the prisoners, all of whom were Confedrate officers, to Canada.
During his entire stay in the north, no one had apparently suspected Cole. He was cordially received aboard the gunboat, and confidently expected a successful culmination of the plot. At this point, however, he was destined to surprise. One of the plotters, a Colonel Johnson, exposed the scheme, being actuated by personal pique. As the dinner was proceeding pleasantly an officer from shore came aboard the "Michigan" and arrested Cole as a rebel spy. The major had no other course than to confess, though he loyally attempted to shield his associates. The "Parsons" in the meantime had been steaming back and forth, standing well off the "Michigan's" moorings awaiting the expected signal to board. As no signal was given, the steamer returned to Fighting island, where the captured soldiers were marooned. Landing near Sandwich, the conspirators scuttled the steamer and escaped into Canada. Of the three leaders, Beal, Cole and Burley, the first mentioned was the only one to suffer punishment, both Cole and Burley escaping after being tried and convicted. Though the government had been warned of the plot by the English minister, so carefully had the entire affair been planned and executed that it is probable that the Johnson's island portion of the enterprise would have terminated successfully had it not been for the betrayal of the leaders by one of their number.
During 1864 warnings were received of rebel plots to burn Detroit. As a precaution against such an attempt, impromptu guards were drilled in various wards of the city; the Thirtieth Michigan Regiment, which had not left for the front, was detailed for duty along the border, and a special steamer patroled the river. Both the Third and Fourth Regi- ments of Michigan Infantry had been relieved of duty and mustered out at home, and now returned soldiers began to arrive almost daily in Detroit. News of the taking of Richmond reached the city on April 3, 1864, and seven days later came dispatches announcing Lee's surrender. Both these events were occasions for general rejoicing, which found expression in long processions of jubilant enthusiasts, the firing of cannon, the blazing of bonfires and in displays of fireworks. But within a week the Campus Martius was crowded with a grief- stricken throng who at first refused to believe the stunning news of the assassination of President Lincoln. The whole north was struck numb with sorrow. The local patriotic organizations passed resolutions of grief and on April 19th memorial services were held in the city's churches. On the 25th an immense funeral procession passed along streets hung with deepest mourning and emblems of love and respect for the dead idol of the loyal states.
Almost at the inception of the war local societies were formed whose members devoted themselves to providing means for the relief of the sufferings of Michigan's wounded sol- diers. Among these were the Ladies' Soldiers' Aid Society, the first of its kind to organize in the country; and the Michigan Soldiers' Relief Society, which was formed somewhat
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later. In 1864 these associations were merged under the name of the latter. In 1863 the efforts of these organizations were supplemented by the city council, which voted two thou- sand five hundred dollars for the relief of the Michigan regiments that had suffered terrible losses at the battle of Gettysburg. Four citizens were named as a committee to visit the front and investigate the condition of the state's wounded, that the money might be judi- ciously expended. So well had the government provided for the injured, however,, that less than eight hundred dollars of the amount was used.
Though initial efforts to raise a monument to Michigan's dead had been made during the first year of the war, it was not until six years later that the Michigan Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument Association was formally incorporated. On July 7, 1867, the corner stone for the soldiers' and sailors' monument, to be built in accordance with the design of Randolph Rogers, a Michigan sculptor, was laid with impressive ceremonies in East Grand Circus Park. This site was later discarded in favor of the location on the Campus Martius, where the monument was formally dedicated April 9, 1872. Through the efforts of the association the sum of seventy thousand dollars was raised for this purpose, much of the money being subscribed by various patriotic organizations, schools and secret societies.
CHAPTER XIX
Readjustment in Detroit After the Civil War - Substantial Progress of the Michigan Me- tropolis-City's Protracted Struggle with the Street Railway Problem-First Fran- chise Granted-Detroit City Railway Company-Gradual Expansion of Facilities- Street Railway Climax During Regime of Mayor Pingree-Notable Administration of Pingree-Citizens' Railway Company-Pingree Re-elected and Continues Efforts for Municipal Ownership-Franchise Litigations-Pingree Continues his Fight for Detroit after Being Elected Governor of the State-Detroit United Railway- Mayor Pingree's Remarkable Activities in Behalf of the People-Gas Companies Attacked - Mayor's Famous Crusade - Brush Electric Light Company - City Ac- quires Electric Lighting Plant.
Upon the termination of the civil war and the return of the troops from the field, Detroit began a rapid process of social and industrial readjustment. Though the north was in much better condition than the south, the withdrawal of thousands of men and the expenditure of large sums of money for the satisfaction of innumerable public and private needs left Wayne county and Detroit in a seriously crippled condition. But the same cour- ageous enterprise that had made the city the metropolis of the state now evinced itself rapidly to pick up shattered industries. From that time to the present day the city's history is one of normal business progression. Gradually the functions of the social fabric have been developed to meet successfully the political and economic problems that confront every growing municipality. Transportation facilities-railroad, marine, postal, telegraph and telephone-have more than kept pace with the expansion of similar interests in other parts of the country. The lessons of industry (see section devoted to industrial enterprises else- where in this volume) have been learned here as readily and at no greater cost than in other American cities.
While the rebellion was still in its first year there began in Detroit a local struggle that has not to this day been terminated. This found its inception in the beginnings of one of the city's most important public-utility concerns-the street railway. In 1862 the city council granted the petition of Eben N. Wilson and his associates, who prayed the council "To permit certain persons to establish and operate street railways in Detroit." Prior to this time citizens had been compelled to walk, to depend on private conveyances of their own, or to trust themselves to a line of omnibuses that intermittently accommodated those living in localities remote from the center of the city. The building of a street-railway line was regarded as a most venturesome risk and a stupendous undertaking; but the coun- cil opined that so great an enterprise must of necessity engender a degree of good faith of like proportions. This, it suggested, could best be expressed in a material way by the deposit of five thousand dollars by the promoters. On August 26th the promoters declined to accept such a view of the situation and the city controller was directed to seek other investors who might look with more favor on the city's stipulation. In the fall of the same year Mr. Wilson, the original promoter, succeeded in associating with himself a second company of capitalists, who finally compromised with the city, accepting an ordinance which gave exclusive rights of way along specified streets as well as options to build on any other thor-
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