USA > Michigan > Monroe County > History of Monroe County, Michigan > Part 52
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his activity to that labor. He was instant at all seasons and in many ways for the Union's good, urging enlistments, looking after the families of those who were left behind. His war speeches were among the best and most effective of any of those delivered in the West, and although they can not be referred to in de- tail, the tone and temper with which he dis- cussed the great questions in issue, can be learned from isolated extracts. In one deliv- ered on February 24, 1862, he used the follow- ing strong and vigorous language :
" The real grounds of the present war are the same on which the patriots of the Revolution stood. The freedom which they gained we maintain ; the Tories of that day have their parallel in the secessionists of this; the attack on Fort Sumter is but a repetition of Bunker Hill; and it may be that in Fort Donelson we have already seen our Yorktown."
" Let us be thankful that we are not left destitute. The protecting eye which watched over the birth of the Nation is not closed in this its struggle with the angel of death. The arm then stretched forth to save is not shortened. The finger of God it is that has written in the hearts of this grateful people of the North, courage, zeal, chivalry, and uncon- querable determination to succeed."
" When this rebellion shall be subdued, when 'unconditional surrender' shall be the 'com- promise' accepted by all armed rebels, when our heroes that have gone forth in hope and courage shall return in triumph and honor, when the foundations of our Government shall have been laid deeper and broader by their hands, and they and we shall rejoice over the noble work, think not that we shall be content to accept the past as the measure of the future. The constitution may be the same, but the mode of expounding it can not but be liberal- ized. The Government will remain, but it will be administered in a spirit of greater freedom and more personal equality. The Northmen, thus conquerors, will not tamely bow their necks to the old yoke, nor reconstruct that fabric of political tyranny which they are about to destroy. The evils they have put under foot they will never again endure. They will not vanquish the enemies of the Union, and yield them renewed homage."
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HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
At Madison, on October 2, 1863, he delivered, in reply to an oration of Edward G. Ryan, a speech upon " War Under the Constitution," which made a deep impression upon the public thought, and helped to set many who wavered into a right view of the rights and powers of the General Government. After an extended, learned and logical discussion of his theme, he concluded with this caustic touch :
" Martial law is despotic - a dreadful evil. Battles are murder - no less an evil. The more reason for driving the war to a speedy close. Both are opposed to the peaceful spirit of the constitution; both without justification except in necessity ; neither expressly forbid- den in the constitution, nor expressly sanc- tioned; yet both necessary incidents of war, not to be avoided by any theory ; cruelly in- truded upon us, who are painfully unwilling. No constitution can bridle bloody war with the silken reins of peace, turn bayonets into con- stable's staves, nor plant courts and juries upon a battlefield. We can not persuade rebel armies to submit to trial upon the indictment of a grand jury ; nor will a warrant arrest the whiz- zing minie and the screaming shell. In such perils the constitution is to be upheld, not by lawyers and their orations, but by heroes and their blood! Narrow and unsafe that con- struction which declares the constitution un- equal to such emergencies ! Our commander- in-chief must take from the enemy mules, cat- tle, corn, cotton, wagons; must burn houses, ships, cities ; must capture and kill! Do not rebels the same ? Can our general achieve success if he is unable to picket his horses, form line of battle, or direct a march, destroy a building, cut down a tree, for fear of broken constitution and a suit for trespass ? Or if the control over the territory subject to his arms be denied to him because occupied by citizens not belonging to the belligerent armies? Such trifling revolts common sense. The war power -OUTSIDE of the constitution, because not named by it; wiruis the constitution because implied in the right to make war - is and of necessity must be supreme within its sphere!"
The opposition press referred to these conclu- sions as " dangerous to liberty," but in the light of history who was the prophet, Winfield Smith or the men who would have set his logic and his conclusions at naught ?
In addition to Mr. Smith's speeches, he made
continual use of the pen, and the Republican press of the State during war days could furnish many evidences of that fact, in edi- torials and communications. He was also author of a vigorous and keenly humorous bal- lad, which showed MacClellan to the world in a light other than that in which his followers regarded him -a versification that found great favor at the time, but whose authorship was known to but few.
The qualities of manly resolution and intel- lectual strength which belonged to the father, and of culture and refinement that were the possessions of the mother, have united to pro- duce in the son a character and bearing that have won him admiration and friends, and en- abled him to secure and retain the public con- fidence and respect that he has for so many years held. The superior education which op- portunity, application, and a deep thirst for knowledge enabled Winfield Smith to gain, has supplemented his natural gifts; and much of the force and polish of his writings and forensic efforts may be attributed to his familiarity with classic models and the literature of ancient as well as modern times. Among his mental char- acteristics may be mentioned keen discernment of the meaning and measure of things about him, determination to accomplish what he un'- dertakes, self reliance, an independence of thought and action, strong religious convic- tions, and an imagination fervid and yet tem- pered with good judgment. With an analyt- ical mind he reaches his conclusions by the way of logic, and is ever ready to furnish a reason for the faith that is within him. Taking nothing for granted, he demands a reason for every proposition that is submitted to his un- derstanding. He does not form his opinions suddenly or from impulse. His beliefs are the fruits of experience, or ripened and intelligent study, based upon all the facts that can be brought to his knowledge. A fine natural orator, he has been called to the public plat- form upon many important occasions, and has ever acquitted himself with honor and to the gratification of those whom he addressed ; loyal in his friendship ; sincere, caudid ; with a word that is never broken ; generous in many quiet deeds of benevolence; loving music, flowers, and all that can elevate or improve mankind, and guided only by what he believes to be right, regardless of the views or expressions of
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other men. Even in his early school days he was regarded as painstaking, studious and thor- ough, and since those years has had little time and no inclination for the gaining of success by arts which many are able to follow. The only road thereto that suggested itself to him was by hard work and the employment of straight- forward and direct methods. As a lawyer he has gained a special distinction in the line of equity jurisprudence, in which he has hardly a superior in the Northwest. But his success has by no means been confined to any one branch of his profession, as he is equally at home in them all. Viewed from any side, Winfield Smith may be regarded as a man who, while winning a marked success by his talents and industry, has at the same time made a good use of and has justified that success.
The natural law of compensation does not permit many men to excel in more than one avocation. Yet there are those who are en. dowed with such versatility that almost any path they may choose to take will lead to emi- nence. Mr. Smith belongs to this limited cat- egory. As above shown, he has essayed to do many things of a literary and business nature outside of his profession, and it is not too much to say that in no ordinary measure he has suc- ceeded in them all. In drawing up a brief for the highest judicial tribunal; in addressing himself on a question of fact to the human sympathies and homely sense of a jury ; in appealing through the cold power of logic to the calm judgment of a court on an issue of law, he seems equally at home and equally and singularly successful. But the same is likewise true in a much wider field. Said a prominent business gentleman who had known him inti- mately for many years: " Winfield Smith is a success wherever you find him. As a lawyer he is excelled by none in the Northwest, and is equaled by few ; yet as a literary man of clean, caustic expression upon any subject on which duty or inclination prompts him to speak or write, he stands equally high. He was my at- torney," said this informant, " until his practice had outgrown and risen above the dimensions of ordinary matters of controversy, when it was necessary to seek other legal talent to take his place."
The genius of no lawyer can supplant hard work, and it does not with Mr. Smith. He studies his cases thoroughly, and he studies
both sides, and is therefore prepared to meet any point of argument which might reason- ably be expected from an adversary. A men- tion of several important litigations with which he has been connected should be added to those already referred to. He was retained in be- half of the defendants, in 1875, in a number of the prosecutions commenced by the United States against persons charged with violations of the revenne laws. These cases were of much importance to the parties interested. and at the time attracted great attention. The results were generally unfavorable to the defendants, but his clients were entirely satisfied with the strenuous and able efforts of Mr. Smith, and his partial successes were regarded as victories, considering the odds against which he had to contend. His practice in revenue cases had, before this, been extensive, and his knowledge of that department of professional labor was exhaustive. For several years he was a part- ner of Mr. Stark, one of the best known law- yers of the Milwaukee bar, and they conducted among others a litigation involving the man- agement of the Sentinel Company, in which case they won a signal triumph and much credit also.
But no case in Wisconsin has for many years been the subject of more wide attention from business men than the action brought by Mr. Daniel Wells against Peter McGeoch, both of Milwaukee, to recover a very large sum of money which the plaintiff claimed he paid by reason of the defendant's misrepresentations to him. This is popularly known as "the lard case," and as nearly everybody in Milwaukee and Chicago knows something of its history, the enquirer need only to designate it by this oleaginous title to elicit whatever information concerning it the party interrogated may pos- sess. The principal defense was that the tran- sactions between the parties were illegal, be- cause they were in violation of the Illinois statutes forbidding what is understood as " corners," and the defendant claimed the sub- ject of controversy to be money gained by the parties in one successful corner and lost by them in the lard corner. The case was decided in the lower court in favor of the defendant upon this ground, and has been argued be- fore the Supreme Court on appeal, the prin- cipal question being whether the illegality mentioned constitutes a valid defense. The
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case was begun in 1883, and is very voluminous, and has required almost continuons labor from the counsel. The brief drawn by Mr. Smith extends over nearly a hundred printed pages, and is considered by attorneys, who can best appreciate its merits, as a model for method of arrangement, logical statement and per- spicuity. This case resulted in the award by the Supreme Court of Wisconsin to Mr. Wells, Mr. Smith's client, of a judgment of over $250,- 000, which was paid.
Outside of the practice of law, Mr. Smith's literary qualities are chiefly exhibited in his love of study, his practical mastery of two modern languages, his translations from the German, his divers publie speeches and his numerous articles, descriptive and controver- sial, in the daily press. How he has found op- portunity to write so much as he has at times done for publication, and still attend to the urgent and taxing duties of his practice, can not be readily conceived by intellects less active, less comprehensive and less flexible. Yet while he has done this and much more, especially in large outside business matters, he has continued to grow in weight and prestige as a lawyer, and, as already seen, the largest case perhaps in all his professional career is the one last described, which, with Mr. Fish, he now has in hand and is contesting against Messrs. Stark and Miller.
The position Winfield Smith holds as presi- dent of the Cream City Railroad came to him by a natural sequence of circumstances, and was unsought and undesired. He bought some stock in the road by way of patronizing a public enterprise, and was elected a director. The company was not prospering as well as the stockholders could wish. His efficiency as a director was quickly recognized; a change of management was desired, and the burden of executive responsibility was shifted to the shoulders of Mr. Smith. When he assumed control in 1878 the stock was worth but sixty to seventy cents. It has since appreciated to upwards of one dollar and sixty cents, and the stockholders may be taken for good authority that much of the credit for this gratifying ap- preciation belongs to their president. The
road is in all respects well equipped, and has certainly arrived at an era of prosperity.
It may further be said of Mr. Smith as a speaker and a writer, that he especially excels
in descriptive power. His delineations are characterized by the careful precision of the lawyer, and by that vivid presentation of in- cident, of which the reading public never tires. Conspicuous illustrations, did space permit, might be drawn from his earnest and eloquent eulogies to the respective memories of Byron Paine and Senator Matt. Carpenter. These ad- dresses were delivered in the Supreme Court at Madison, the former in response to an invi- tation from the Milwaukee bar. Of Mr. Car- penter he could speak with feeling, for they had sustained, as partners, a nearer relation than that of brother lawyers. The two ad- dresses are in marked contrast to each other, in fidelity to the corresponding differences of the men. The rough, impassioned earnestness of Mr. Paine, his sterling character, his un- polished worth and even his defects, which could hardly be spared from the individuality of the man, were painted by an artist whose chief endeavor was to draw a picture of his subject which all would recognize. Hence the sketch was like that of a mountain, rugged, ponderous, grand. Its torrents may at times be turbid, but they come down with force. There is reserved power in overhanging masses of snow and ice. The detonations of a rifle . may convert them into an avalanche. But the cultured, pervasive intellect of Mr. Carpen- ter, with its ruling triumvirate of wisdom, learn- ing, wit, constitutes a different subject, and its portraiture by Mr. Smith corresponds:
"He studied the literature as well as the philosophy of law, and his learning strength- ened the arguments which his logic inspired. His addresses were even more attractive to cultivated men of his own profession than to those not trained to the law, and in courts he gained his highest glories, great as was his oratorical reputation among the people. His clear thoughts, his terse but fluent phrases, his felicitous turns of speech, often running into de- lightful wit, his continual good nature, his persuasive manner, his melodious voice - than which none more captivating was ever heard in a court - all gave to his forensic eloquence a charm which judges felt even more than juries."
Mr. Smith has tried his hand at describing material objects and scenery, as well as the minds of men. His published account of the ruin wrought by the Chicago fire ranks among
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the first of the many thrilling narratives in- spired by that grand and terrible desolation. But the literary effort which, with the peculiar- ities of the occasion, will be sure to preserve Mr. Smith's name for unborn generations, is the speech made by him about four years ago in Milwaukee at the semi-centennial celebration of the first election ever held in that city. The occasion was memorable. A handful of survivors of the thirty-nine men who voted at that election were present and added impres- sive interest to the scene. The address was listened to by the large concourse of people as- sembled in Schlitz Park with rapt attention, and drew encomiums from the city press. The speaker reviewed the past, minutely depicted the events, incidents and results of that first election ; described the formalities of castern extraction which constrained the suffragists to select one of their number for "fence- viewer," when no fence existed within the limits of the county. He did not fail to pay a deserved and glowing tribute to the deter- mined, patient pioneers who laid the founda- tions of a large and flourishing city. As cen- turies and half centuries come and go, this first celebration of the first election in Milwaukee will be recalled from musty files of papers and faded documents, and with it will be recalled the name and utterances of the orator of the occasion, Mr. Winfield Smith.
Mr. Smith's family consists of his wife, who was Miss Sarah M. Fellows, born in Lockport, New York; his daughter, Anna, married in 1874 to Edward C. Hopkins, of Milwaukee; his son, Henry L. Smith, residing in Milwau- kee, married to Miss Jean Brayton, of Cleve- land, Ohio; Evalyn, married to William Staf- ford, of New York ; Winfield Robert, graduated in 1889 from the University of Wisconsin ; Mabel, Foster and Grace, now just returned from a few months' voyage in Europe. Mr. Smith went in March, 1888, with two daughters to Europe, and after visiting Paris, Rome, Naples, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and London, he returned in October, leaving his daughters to spend the winter there, prosecut- ing their studies in French, German and music. All are happily united in Milwaukee.
In the spring of 1889 the site for a new post office, costing $1,200,000, for the city of Mil- waukce, was to be determined by the Secretary of the Treasury. Mr. Smith was selected to
prepare the argument in favor of a position near that previously occupied, and to press orally the adoption of that position, both be- fore the secretary and his subordinate officers in Washington and the agents dispatched by him to Milwaukee for the purpose of personal examination. His efforts were altogether sat- isfactory to his constituents, and were crowned with complete success.
BENJAMIN DANSARD
Was born in France, and by his father educated for a Roman Catholic priest; but on arriving at the age of manhood, he declined further service in the church, preferring a mercantile and busi- ness life. He settled in Monroe in 1836, and for a number of years was a dry goods mer- chant. Being a very fine French scholar, he gave instruction in that language to a number of classes in the city, his first pupil being Doctor Osgood, famous for the remedy so universally used in the West for fever and ague, known as " Osgood's Cholagogue." He was a type of the genuine Parisian French, cultivated and refined in manner, light-hearted, very courteons and polite, very domestic in his habits. He married the daughter of Joseph Boyez, a merchant of Monroe. He was a tender, devoted and loving husband, and loved gain that he might obtain the comforts and enjoyments of a luxurious life for himself and family. In 1858 he closed up his business as a merchant and opened a bank- ing office, and with his eldest son, Joseph, con- stituted the firm of B. Dansard & Son, which continued until the death of his son, when his only remaining son, Benjamin, was his sue- cessor in the firm. The firm has ever sustained a fine reputation as bankers.
His eldest son, Joseph, married the daughter of Dr. George Landon. He died May 5, 1879. His wife, Mary, died April 19, 1882, leaving one son and four daughters, now residing in Monroe.
The youngest son, Benjamin, the only surviv- ing child, continues in the business as a banker in what is known as the " Dansard Block."
Benjamin Dansard died January 26, 1888, at the age of seventy-five, leaving a very hand- some fortune to his descendants. He was a member of the Masonic Order, under whose auspices he was buried, and the resolution
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HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
adopted by the Order well expresses the esti . mate of the Order :
" Resolved, That in the death of our esteemed brother, Benjamin Dansard, of this city, the State and community of which he was a resi- dent for more than fifty years have lost a loyal, law-abiding citizen ; the business community a man of rare ability and the strictest business integrity ; the fraternity of which he was an esteemed member a faithful and earnest brother, and his family a wise, indulgent and loving father."
GEORGE HENRY GREENE,
Formerly of Raisinville but now of Lansing, Michigan, was born October 12, 1836, on Grosse Isle, the beautiful island in Detroit River. Mr. Greene comes of good New England stock. He is a lincal descendant in the ninth generation of John Greene, of Warwick, Rhode Island, surgeon, who came in 1635 from England to Salem, Massachusetts. This ancestor was, like Roger Williams and for similar reasons, banished from Massachusetts Colony in 1638, when he joined Williams in Providence, and in 1642 became a resident of Warwick, Rhode Island, where the family became very numer- ous. The Warwick Greenes, his descendants, have ever been a conspicuous family in Rhode Island from the foundation of the colony.
John Greene was also the ancestor of General Nathaniel Greene, Governor William Greene, Revolutionary War Governor of Rhode Island, and Ray Greene, General Albert Collins Greene and Henry B. Anthony, United States Senators from Rhode Island, the latter of whom was called " the father of the Senate " from having been five terms consecutively elected by his State to full terms in the United States Senate. Also numbered among his descendants are Colonel Christopher Greene, who commanded at the battle of Red Bank, War of the Revolu- tion : General George Sears Greenc, of the Union Army, War of the Rebellion, and his son, Samuel Dana Greene, who was executive officer of the first Monitor in her victorious encounter with the Merrimac ; Mrs. Julia Ward Howe; and of George Washington Greenc, Samuel Greene Arnold and William Hickling Prescott, the historians.
George H. Greene was a son of Augustus Weeden Greene, who was born in Providence,
Rhode Island, March 13, 1813, and who came to Michigan from Vermont in the autumn of 1834. At that time it required eight days to come from Buffalo to Detroit by way of Lake Erie, which was the quickest route. At Tren- ton he met Miss Amy Junkins Davis, born May 16, 1818, at Zanesville, Ohio, and they were married December 2, 1835. Her father, David Davis, with his family had been residents of Michigan since a time prior to 1827. Au- gustus W. Greene and his young wife began housekeeping on Grosse Isle, where he engaged in farming. In 1837 he began work on a con- tract he had taken to excavate a portion of the canal projected from Gibralter to Flat Rock, and had much of it completed when in conse- quence of the panic of that year the canal company broke up, leaving him without return for the money and labor expended. He then removed to Raisinville, where he resided forty ycars ; then emigrating to Hodgeman county, Kansas, in 1878, he there died June 6, 1879, aged sixty six years.
The subject of this sketch therefore spent his boyhood years and early manhood in Rai- sinville. Here he obtained his education, to- gether with one academic year at Yates Acad- emy, in Yates, Orleans county, New York, in 1853 54. He then engaged, at the age of eigh- teen, to teach his first school in what was called the Barnes district, town of London, in the winter of 1854-55. This was the beginning of a successful career as a teacher. He taught during the winter terms from that time until 1863, with the exception of one year. Dur- ing that year, beginning in the autumn of 1857, he was a clerk in the drug store of S. M. Sackett, but this business proving distasteful to him he resumed teaching, and many of his pupils who are now respected men and women of Monroe county will recall with kindly re- membrance the time they were under his tute- lage. After leaving the drug store he was en- gaged during the summer months of several years in selling paper for the Monroe Paper Mills, then owned by William P. Gale.
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