USA > Missouri > Missouri the center state, 1821-1915 > Part 33
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"My first impression was that they intended to roast the ore," continued the Judge. "I visited the mine at one time, and Mr. Einstein kindly showed me through. There was an enormous quantity of wood piled up around, acres of it I should say. I said to him he seemed to have a pretty good supply of wood, and he replied that there were 4,000 cords. I knew he had water-power for his mill, and the little engine which hoisted the ore wouldn't require more than a cord and a half a day. So without asking any questions, I rather concluded the wood was there to be used in calcining the ore. But when the collapse came the wood was still on hand. It had cost the company $2 a cord. It was after- ward sold for thirty-five cents a cord, and was hauled to Pilot Knob."
At the beginning of the operations the company put up a furnace and tried smelting. But when the silver did not appear the smelting at the mine was abandoned and the separated ore was shipped to Cheltenham. In places the veins-there were three of them found-thickened to as much as eight feet. In
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places they contracted to almost nothing, making it necessary to do a good deal of dead work. The assays showed splendidly. Some gave as much as 56 ounces of silver to the ton. But the works never vindicated the assayer's figures, and that is one reason why people here insist that the treatment was wrong. The vein was improving as developed, and work was finally stopped in the best ore that had been found."
The Search in Garrison Cave.
"The divining rod" has been used in the search for hidden treasure. More than half a century ago a venerable man carrying a curiously shaped stick came to the Garrison homestead near the town of Ozark. He said the rod pointing all the time in that direction had conducted him a long distance to the entrance of the cave. He wanted to go inside. An agreement was reached that the treasure if found should be shared. Garrison gave his consent and the explora- tion of the mine began. As the rod was carried from one place to another it bent and twisted about. At length it pointed straight down. When the explorer moved away the rod pointed back. At the mouth of the cave it inclined inward. Work was begun at the spot which the rod seemed to indicate but nothing was found. It was reported by those who helped that unearthly noises were heard. The story that the Garrison cave was haunted went the rounds of the neighbor- hood and the place was avoided for many years.
At a later period much systematic work was done in the cave. Great quan- tities of ashes were found which could have been made only by the burning of hundreds of cords of wood. At one point the searchers uncovered the skeleton of a man. There was a tradition in connection with the hidden treasure of the Ozarks that when the Spanish left one of their silver mines they killed an Indian and left his body buried near the ore vein so that the ghost would scare away intruders. This tradition seemed to have some relation to the strange sounds said to have been heard by those who entered the cave in earlier years. In front of this Garrison cave was a mass of earth and broken rock which apparently had been brought out long ago. The miners ran drifts through this but found only bones and pieces of pottery. At one place, inside of the main chamber, not far from the heap of ashes was a tunnel partially blocked with broken stone. This was explored. For two years the work was carried on within the cave, some of the time as many as six men being employed. As the investiga- tion went on it became evident that at some time a great deal of mining had been done and that ore of some kind had been smelted. Slag in considerable quantities was found. Bodies of low grade zinc ore were located. But nowhere was found a trace of the supposed vein of silver from which the Spaniards had coined dollars by the bushel.
Vol. [-13 '
CHAPTER XII.
LAST OF THE BENTON DUELS.
Thomas C. Reynolds and B. Gratz Brown-Two Challenges and Two Acceptances-The First Offending Editorial-Benton's Championship of Settlers-The District Attorney Protests -Brown Declares Authorship-Reynolds Satisfied-Friends in the Controversy-A Year Later-The Combination Against Benton-"Is It Perjury or Is It Not?"-Reynolds Asks "the Proper Atonement"-Rifles at Eighty Yards-A Question of Shortsightedness-The Meeting Off-Benton the Issue Again-Reynolds' German Speech-"Germans and Irish on an Equality with Negroes"-"An Unmitigated Lie"-The Editor Posted-A Per- emptory Challenge-Acceptance in Two Lines-Friends, Advisers and Surgeons-Selma Hall-A Graphic Story of the Meeting-Duello Etiquette-Kennett's Arrangements- Interchanges of the Seconds-Bearing of the Principals-The Pistols-"Fire!"-Rey- nolds' Quickness-Brown Wounded-The Return to St. Louis-No Prosecution-In Later Years-Political and Personal Friends-Brown's Career Not Satisfying-Reynolds' Fate.
They belong, too, to the small class of hermaphrodite politicians who, here in Missouri, style themselves antis, and who, in their blind opposition to Benton, are even willing to go to the length of subverting by the revival of obsolete laws, all he has done for thirty years past to guard the rights of the settler and to secure bim his domicile free from intrusion .- B. Gratz Brown's Offending Editorial.
Thomas C. Reynolds was of South Carolina nativity. B. Gratz Brown was a Kentuckian, grandson of the first United States Senator from the State. Rey- nolds graduated from the University of Virginia, went to Germany and com- pleted his education at Heidelberg. Brown graduated at Transylvania and went to Yale for his finishing course. He came to St. Louis in 1845, entered the law office of his relative, Francis P. Blair, Jr., but devoted most of his time to the writing of editorials for the newspapers. Reynolds settled in St. Louis a year later, after service as secretary of legation at Madrid, began the practice of law, but gave more attention to local politics. In 1853 the political zeal of Reynolds was recognized by his appointment as United States district attorney. In 1854 Brown's facility with the pen justified the appearance of his name at the top of the editorial page of the Missouri Democrat.
These young men came to St. Louis at about the same time. Both attained quickly prominence in the community. Both were Democrats-but Democrats of factions between which the hostility was intense. Brown was a Free-Soil Demo- crat. Reynolds was a Proslavery Democrat. Reynolds, within five years after his coming, won a position of influence in local political councils so marked that he was made the candidate of his faction for Congress in 1856, not with any expectation of election, but to swell the anti-Benton vote. Brown in the same time had written himself into such distinction that it was said his editorials in the Democrat were "cursed by proslavery men, commended by free-soilers, and read by all."
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In 1854 an editorial by Brown provoked a demand for explanation from Reynolds. Three times in three years the editor and the district attorney en- gaged in controversies over articles in the Democrat. Twice the challenge passed and was accepted. In 1856 the duel was fought. It was the last, in which blood was shed, between St. Louisans. It closed a record begun forty years before- a long roll of tragedies. With the meeting between these young men of superior education, of refinement, of gentlemanly instincts, the code passed.
In an editorial printed the 21st of April, 1854, the Missouri Democrat ar- raigned the United States marshal and the district attorney for persecution of settlers in Southwest Missouri by prosecuting them for cutting timber on gov- ernment land and then charging them with "high treason" because they resisted.
The Offensive Editorial.
"The whole difficulty in these prosecutions," said the Democrat, "arises from the appointment of persons to office upon the recommendation of a few nullifiers at Washington and in opposition to the wishes of four-fifths of the people of the State. The present appointees owe their places to the misrepresentation of Atchi- so11 and Phelps, who have been laboring all along in cahoot to defeat the interests of Missouri, and, of course, nothing better could be expected of such proteges. They belong, too, to the small class of hermaphrodite politicians who, here in Missouri, style themselves antis, and who, in their blind opposition to Benton, are even willing to go to the length of subverting, by the revival of obsolete laws, all he has done for thirty years past to guard the rights of the settler and to se- cure him his domicile free from intrusion."
Nothing in this editorial showed personal animus toward Reynolds. The Mis- souri Democrat was making much of settlers' rights. That had long been a Ben- ton doctrine. The evolution from it was the "squatter sovereignty" of Douglas, but Benton did not follow to that development. Some of these settlers had shown resistance when the marshal tried to serve warrants on them for cutting tim- ber on government land. They had been charged with high treason under an old statute. They were being prosecuted in United States courts by the district at- torney, far from their homes. The cases gave the Democrat excellent opportunity and use was made of it in the interest of Benton, who was in Congress that term and a candidate for re-election.
Reynolds wrote a card in answer to the editorial, a rather mysterious card, in which he said, "My respect for the two lawyers who edit the Democrat forbids my believing the article was penned by either of them." And then he protested against the "comment on my official action."
The Democrat came back in the same issue which gave place to the card: "To satisfy his curiosity, we can inform him that the article was written by one of the editors of the Democrat." Then followed something very personal: "We re- member that during Mr. Polk's administration, the very important fact of an offer to purchase Cuba by the American minister was made known to the public through the New York Herald, although the correspondence was not only not pub- lished, but was intended to be a state secret. As the district attorney was sec- retary of legation at that time, perhaps he can inform the public how the fact came to be known. Painful rumors were abroad through the country in regard to the manner in which the Herald obtained its information, but our memory does not
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retain all of the particulars, and we therefore await enlightenment from the district attorney."
A Satisfactory Explanation.
When he came down to the Democrat office that morning, Brown received a note from Reynolds, asking if this second editorial was "designed to be offen- sive," closing with, "my friend Mr. Goode will receive your reply." This course was in accord with the technicalities of the dueling code. Brown replied: "I am the author of the articles to which you allude." He added that the card of Reyn- olds "contained an assumption which I conceived reflected upon me personally." Reynolds' answer was that he "had no intention in any part of that communi- cation to reflect on either of the editors of the Democrat personally." Thereupon Brown wrote that this gave "an opportunity, of which I take pleasure in avail- ing myself, to withdraw any language that is personally offensive to you in the editorial." The note of Brown was delivered to Reynolds "by my friend, Colonel Robert M. Renick." Reynolds answered: "Your note of to-day is received, and it gives me pleasure to accept the same as satisfactory."
Reynolds' interest in the controversy subsided suddenly when Brown avowed himself the author of the articles. Possibly Reynolds thought he was on the trail of big game. He knew, as did everybody in Missouri politics, that Benton was a frequent contributor to the editorial page of the Democrat. To the young district attorney, with his South Carolina theory of personal responsibility, an issue like this with the great Benton would be very attractive. In his card, evidently written as a feeler, Reynolds indicated his theory that the first editorial had not been written by either of the ostensible editors of the Democrat. He said his future course would depend upon his "opinion of the source" from which the editorial criticism emanated. Did he at first suspect that Benton might be the author of the editorial? If so, the readiness with which he expressed intention to avoid personalities and with which he accepted satisfaction is accounted for.
Robert M. Renick, the friend of Brown in this first affair, was a banker. George W. Goode, who acted for Reynolds, was a Virginian, and had passed through his own experience with the code in his native state. He had been a law partner of James A. Seddon, afterwards secretary of war in the Cabinet of Jefferson Davis. A close friend of Goode had sustained an injury which de- manded satisfaction on the field of honor. He was prevented by religious obliga- tions, possibly church relations, from sending a challenge, but Goode had acted for him. As a result of sending the challenge in Virginia Goode moved to St. Louis. There he was counsel in a famous land case, won a fee of $50,000, bought an estate in St. Louis county and lived the life of a country gentleman.
A Year Later.
The second affair between Brown and Reynolds enlivened the municipal campaign eleven months after the first; its beginning was a local report of a meeting held to unite various elements upon an anti-Benton ticket for the city election. Politics in Missouri, from 1850 to 1860, was a continuous perform- ance. At the time of these affairs between Brown and Reynolds a mayor and other city officials were elected annually. Party lines were down. Factions formed and reformed. The Missourian could be a Benton Democrat, a "regular"
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Democrat, a Whig, a Know-Nothing, a reform Republican, an Emancipationist, a Free-Soiler, an Abolitionist. Not infrequently he changed his factional affilia- tion from one campaign to the next. Benton was beaten for the Senate, elected to the House and defeated for governor, all in six years. St. Louis had in rapid succession a Democrat, a Whig, an Emancipationist and a Republican for mayors. The young editor of the Democrat, guided by a dimly defined political policy, realizing under-the-surface rumblings of the political earthquake which was coming, endeavored to make his editorial page virile and readable ; he did not shun personalities.
In March, 1855, the combination was forming to beat the Benton party in the election for mayor of St. Louis. Anti-Benton Democrats, Know-Nothings and Whigs were in it. Boernstein, the German "boss," joined the coalition. This at- tempt to unite the Know-Nothings and the Germans gave the Democrat its oppor- tunity. Strange to tell, just at this time Reynolds entered into a business enter- prise with Boernstein. The district attorney and the German leader became part- ners in a brewery. Boernstein was the chief object of the Democrat's attack. Reynolds' name did not appear in the lively two-column description which the Democrat reporter wrote of the speeches and scenes of the anti-Benton mass meeting. A later generation in journalism would have called it "a good story." In the next column of the Democrat appeared a communication from "Anti-Know- Nothing" devoted to Reynolds and his brewery association with Boernstein. The letter assumed that the brewery was a cover for a political conspiracy "formed for the purpose of defeating Benton." In the August campaign of 1854, only a few months previous to this, when Benton was an unsuccessful candidate for Congress, Boernstein had pandered to Know-Nothing prejudices by anti-Catholic articles in the Anzeiger, his paper.
These articles were translated and republished in the Missouri Republican, credited to the Anzeiger, to drive Catholic support from Benton. At that time the Anzeiger was pretending to support Benton. The Democrat's correspondent, "Anti-Know-Nothing," insinuated that by secret intrigue Reynolds had prompted Boernstein, who was ostensibly supporting Benton, to assail the Catholics; that Reynolds translated these anti-Catholic articles and furnished them to the Re- publican. Benton was beaten in that election, but the appeals to religious preju- dices led to the worst election riots St. Louis had known.
Referring to the application for the brewery charter by Reynolds and Boern- stein, the Democrat asked, editorially, "Is it perjury or is it not?" Reynolds demanded "a withdrawal of your editorial of today, a disavowal and repudia- tion of the communication of the 17th and an apology for their insertion in your columns." He sent the note by the hand of the United States collector of cus- toms at St. Louis, W. A. Linn, commonly known as "Gus" Linn, a relative of the former United States Senator Linn. Brown replied that instead of "pro- ceeding in the usual manner to ascertain the author of the communication by which you feel yourself to be aggrieved," Reynolds was attempting "to dictate and bully." Reynolds sent a verbal challenge by Linn. Brown replied: "I have no more intention of permitting you to brow-beat me than I have of permitting you to place me in the wrong, and, therefore, whenever you desire to make a further communication in writing, you will not find me unwilling to respond to your satisfaction."
BLANKETS BEAVERS
MENS FURNISHING GOODS
WHOLESALE
DIRECT IMPORTER
C.B FISK ACT TI OFFICES
W.W. DIBBLEE
CLOTHS. YESTINGS L. C.
CLOTHING
HINA
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MERCHANTS BANK
MERCHANTS BANK
CHAS. BEARDSLEE & BROS
WILLIAMYOUNG &CO. CHAUNCEY | FIL
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THE WHOLESALE DISTRICT OF ST. LOUIS, MAIN AND LOCUST STREETS, BEFORE THE WAR
AETNA INS CON DIBBLEE INS
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Challenged by Reynolds.
Reynolds challenged : "Your notes are not only insufficient, but offensive. I ask the proper atonement. My friend, Mr. W. A. Linn, is authorized to act for me."
Brown accepted: "I am convinced of your determination to force a col- lision with me, and am, therefore, constrained to gratify your unjustifiable caprice. I will refer you for all further arrangements to my friend, Capt. D. M. Frost, who is authorized to act for me in the premises."
Captain Frost immediately notified Linn that the weapon to be used was "the common American rifle, with open sight, round ball, not over one ounce, each gentleman to select his own weapon of the kind named." Captain Frost added for his principal: "He has also chosen eighty yards as the distance, and will on Sun- day next arrange as to time and place."
Then followed much letter writing on the part of Reynolds and the seconds. Reynolds demanded shorter distance. "I consider the rifle, which you have named as the weapon, to be unusual and barbarous, and generally excluded by gentlemen. With this protest, as you leave me no choice, I accept it and exercise the right (which I have absolutely) to shorten the distance from eighty paces to twenty. To show you that I do so not from caprice, but necessity, I assure you, and it is a notorious fact, that I am so nearsighted that I am unable, even with my glasses, in ordinary weather, to recognize any person, except an intimate friend, at a greater distance than thirty paces; and as you have the right to name the time of day for the meeting, I can not safely consent to a greater distance than twenty. I hope that in selecting a distance of eighty paces you were ignorant of my defective eyesight, and that you did not knowingly propose terms on which you, accustomed to the rifle, could shoot me down with perfect safety to your- self."
The correspondence carried on by Frost and Linn over the question of distance ranged through the history of the code. Rules of practice were quoted. Precedents were cited. In the end Frost declined to shorten the distance. Linn refused to proceed.
The Third Controversy.
Benton still was an issue in 1856. He was running for governor and was sup- porting Buchanan for President against a member of his own family. In the heat of that campaign the third controversy between Brown and Reynolds had its origin.
Reynolds made a speech in German at Mehl's store, in St. Louis county. He had taken the nomination for Congress as candidate of the anti-Benton Democracy. The Missouri Democrat charged that in his German speech Rey- nolds "placed Germans and Irish on an equality with negroes." Reynolds sent a card to the Missouri Republican proclaiming this to be "an unmitigated lie, worthy of a sheet whose proclivity to wilful and deliberate falsehoods is only exceeded by the notorious poltroonery of its editor in defending them, or his meanness in not withdrawing them after their falsehood has been proven." Brown took notice of the card by this comment in the Democrat: "The office- holding Pierce candidate for Congress is as full of manifestoes against the Democrat as a guinea fowl is of eggs." He added: "Mr. Reynolds must
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certainly know that the Democrat has higher game in view in this canvass than himself or the bogus ticket on which he is running. He must also know that he, having on former occasion backed out of a challenge which he sent himself to the editor of this paper, can not be longer viewed as within the pale of those who appeal to such modes for the adjustment of personal difficulties, or expect his effusions to be noticed in that light."
Reynolds came out in the afternoon paper with another card, which con- cluded: "For him whom this whole community considers an unquestionable coward, and who has been repeatedly convicted of lying, to venture an opin- ion on my standing as a gentleman is the height of insolence, equaled in in- tensity only by the abject cravenness with which he has, over and over again, in private and public life, submitted to insults of the most stinging and degrad- ing kind." Reynolds proceeded to "post" Brown by obtaining the publication of his two cards outside of St. Louis. To "post," in the language of the code, was to proclaim in the most public manner possible an adversary to be dishonorable and cowardly. Brown waited until after the election, having, as he explained in a personal note published in the Democrat, "no desire to mingle our own personal conflicts with the excitement of an election." On the 18th of August, he sent "a peremptory challenge." There was no exchange of correspondence. The acceptance was a matter of two lines.
The Last Political Duel in Missouri.
A graphic account of "the last political duel fought in Missouri" appeared in the Kansas City Times in 1872. John N. Edwards was the brilliant editor of the paper at that time. He had seen much of Reynolds in the days of the Confed- eracy. The two had gone to Mexico with Shelby after the surrender. Brown was governor of Missouri and a leading Presidential candidate in the Liberal Republican movement. The time for reminiscences was opportune. None other than Major Edwards knew so well the details or could have written the narrative that follows :
"Both men meant earnest work, and went about it very calmly and very deliberately. Both represented a party, an idea, a cause, both had a large number of firm and fast friends, and both were cool, brave, and daring. Brown's seconds were Col. David D. Mitchell, formerly a superintendent of Indian affairs in the west, and of great reputation as an Indian trader and fighter, and Leo Walker, a gentleman from South Carolina, who had married into a wealthy St. Louis family, and who resided there. It was understood, also, that besides these immediate friends, Brown had as advisers Col. Thomas H. Benton and Frank P. Blair. Reynolds' friends were Col. Ferd. Kennett, of Selma Hall, the best pistol shot in Missouri, and Capt. Thomas B. Hudson, a leading Democratic politician who had distinguished himself under Doniphan and in Doniphan's march to Mexico. For advisers, Reynolds had Col. David H. Armstrong, the present Chairman of the Democratic Executive Committee of the State, Col. W. A. Linn, the then Collector of Customs at St. Louis, Isaac H. Sturgeon, for a long time President of the North Missouri Railroad, and, in fact, the Democrats generally of the city. John How was Mayor of St. Louis at that time, and Judge Henry A. Clover, Prosecuting Attorney. Although these gentlemen knew that a duel was on the tapis, and that a challenge had been sent and accepted, such was the tone of public sentiment and such the leniency with which these things were regarded, that no efforts at arrest were made, and no interference of any kind attempted. When people are in Rome, they must needs do as the Romans do, and hence every preparation was fully carried out by the principals and their respective friends.
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"Selma Hall, the place of the meeting was an elegant country seat in Jefferson county, Missouri, forty miles below St. Louis, and the property of Col. Ferd. Kennett. Here nature and art had combined to make the spot one of the loveliest in the West. Flowers and fountains abounded everywhere. In the August noon, huge forest trees made a grateful shade, under which deer rested at ease, cropping the rich grass at intervals and crouching low at intervals, as the memory of the old wild days of horns and huntsmen came up from the lowlands and the river. There were steeds ever in stall for the young bloods who swore by Kennett and his hounds; books for the pale students who stole away from medicine and law to sleep one night with the hills and the clover; costly wines for who- soever would drink, and an open door and a ready latch-string for every wayfarer benighted through chance or inclination.
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