USA > Mississippi > A history of Mississippi : from the discovery of the great river > Part 30
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By a beautiful decree and poetical justice of destiny, it was fated that the last effort of the Union's great champion should be made in behalf of the Union, in its last great extremity. He passed off the stage as became the Great Pacificator. His dying effort was worthy of, and appropriate to him. When the foun- tains of the great deep of the public mind were broken up, and the fierce passions of sectional animosity tore over it, as the
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storms sweep over the ocean, it was from his voice that the words of soothing came forth, "Peace, be still."
It was his last battle, and the gallant veteran fought it out with the power and the fire of his prime. The expiring light of life, though flickering in its last beams, blazed up to the fullness of its meridian lustre. There was no fading away of intellect, or gradual decay of body. Minds like his, and souls so fiery, are cased in frames of steel, and when they fall at last, they fall at once.
The Union was not compelled to blush for the decay of the Union's great champion. Age had not crumbled the stately dig- nity of his form, nor reduced his manly intellect to the imbe- cility of a second childhood. He faded away into no feeble twilight; he sunk down to no dim sunset-but sprang out of life in the bright blaze of meridiau fullness.
He passed down into the valley of the shadow of death with all his glory unclouded, with all his laurels fresh and green around him. Not a spot obscures the lustre of his crest; not a sprig has been torn from his chaplet.
"The dead Douglass has won the field." His dying ear rung with the applause of his country, and the hosannas of a nation's gratitude. Death has given to him the empire in the hearts of his countrymen, not fully granted to the living man-and although it was not decreed that the first honors of the nation should await him, its last blessings will cluster around his name.
His memory needs no monument. He wants no mausoleum of stone or marble to imprison his sacred dust. Let him rest amid the tokens of the freedom he so much loved. Let him sleep on, where the whistling of the tameless winds, the ceaseless roll of the murmuring waters, the chirping of the wild bird, and all which speaks of liberty, may chant his eternal lullaby. Peace be with thy soul, Henry Clay ; may the earth lie light upon you, and the undying laurel of glory grow green over thy grave.
[As an evidence of the genius of Col. McClung, his "Invocation to Death" is here subjoined, and remembering that he died by his own hand in the June of life, it will be read with melancholy interest by his early friends who still linger upon the shores of time : ]
INVOCATION TO DEATH.
Swiftly speed o'er the wastes of time, Spirit of death !
In mannood's morn, in youthful prime, I woo thy breath ! For the glittering hues of hope are fled Like the dolphin's light,
And dark are the clouds above my head As the starless night.
O! vainly the mariner sighs for the rest Of the peaceful haven,
The pilgrim saint for the shrines of the blest, The calm of heaven ;
The galley slave for the night wind's breath, At burning noon,
But more gladly I'd spring to thy arms, Oh, death ! Come soon ! Come soon !
22
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Nothing more notable occurred during the administra- tion of Governor Foote than the passage of an act submit- ting the question to the people whether they should or should not repudiate the bonds of the State, the proceeds of which had been used to pay for the stock subscribed for and owned by the State in the Planters' Bank. This was in the first year of his term, and the question was presented to the people at the presidential election of that year, and as a matter of course, the people, ever anxious to avoid taxation, repudiated the debt which had been unanimously pronounced by the Senate as a legal and binding obligation, and to meet the payment of which the faith of the State had repeatedly been solemnly pledged. No public official had ever been bold enough to deny the validity of the bonds issued and sold for the payment of stock owned by the State in the Planters' Bank, and the repudiation of those bonds must ever be regarded as an act of bad faith on the part of the people, and was so re- garded at the time by hundreds of the most intelligent and prominent men in the State.
The only other incident worthy of note occurring during the gubernatorial service of Governor Foote, was the decis- ion of the High Court of Errors and Appeals affirming the validity of the issuance and sale of the bonds of Missis- sippi, sold to raise money with which to pay for the stock owned by the State in the Union Bank. The court was unanimous and the opinion was clear and emphatic that the State was justly indebted to the holders of the bonds, and that it was proper that these bonds should be paid, but the decision of the court was not worth the paper on which it was written, for no penny of the amount due has been paid to this day, and not a single dollar will ever be paid on those bonds.
In the first year of the administration of Governor Foote, Louis Kossuth, the great ex-Governor of Hungary, visited the Capital of Mississippi. Governor Foote, who had met and known Kossuth in Washington, called on, and enter- tained him at an elaborate dinner at the executive man- sion, where he was met by a dozen or more prominent and distinguished gentlemen of the city of Jackson.
At the close of his term, in January, 1853, Governor
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Foote removed to California. He remained there several years but finally returned to his old home. He soon after- wards married a Nashville lady, and resumed the practice of law in that city. He was elected to the Confederate Congress as a representative from that district, where he served until near the close of the war.
He died in New Orleans, May 20, 1880, while holding the office of Superintendent of the United States Mint of that city, an office which had been conferred upon him by President Grant.
THE ADMINISTRATION OF GOVERNOR MCREA.
JOHN J. MCRAE, a native of Wayne county, Mississippi, was elected to the position of Governor in November, 1853, and was installed in office in January, 1854, thus becoming the fourteenth Governor of the commonwealth, and the ninth chosen under the Constitution of 1832.
Mr. McRae had represented his county in both branches of the legislature previous to his induction into the office of chief executive of the State, and his administration was so satisfactory to the people that he was re-elected in November, 1855, for a second term.
Before he was chosen as chief magistrate, he had been ap- pointed in the autumn of 1851 to succeed Jefferson Davis, who had resigned his seat in the United States Senate when he became the candidate of his party for the office of Gov- ernor in that year. Mr. McRae served nearly two months as a Senator and until his successor appeared in Washing. ton.
At the expiration of his second term as Governor he was elected to the National House of Representatives to fill the vacancy occasioned by the death of General John A. Quit- man, and was re-elected for the succeeding term, where he served until the 12th day of January, 1861, when he retired from Congress in company with the entire delegation from the State, and returned to his home.
When the Confederate States government was estab- lished, the ex-Governor became a representative in that body, where he served until the close of the war. When
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the end came, saddened and disappointed at the result, in utter dispair, he abandoned the State where he had been honored, and emigrated to British Honduras, where he soon sickened and died.
John J. McRae was universally esteemed by all who knew him, as a genial, generous and frank gentleman. His fine social qualities made him a general favorite, and his undeviating courtesy to all men added immensely to his popularity ; and when information of his death on a foreign strand-an exile among strangers-far from his native Mississippi, reached his former home, a pang of regret pressed heavily upon the hearts of every man and woman who had ever known the genial and warm-hearted ex-Governor McRae.
THE ADMINISTRATION OF GOVERNOR MCWILLIE.
WILLIAM McWILLIE, born in Kershaw district, South Carolina, November 17th, 1795, migrated to Mississippi in 1845, was elected Governor in November, 1857, and was inducted into office in January, 1858, thus becoming the fifteenth chief magistrate of the commonwealth, and the tenth chosen under the Constitution of 1832.
There was nothing particularly striking that occurred during the administration of Governor Mc Willie. He was always regarded as a gentleman of education and honor, and four years after he made his home in Mississippi he was nominated and elected to Congress, where he served from December, 1849, to March 4th, 1851. He was nominated in 1851, by the wing of his party pledged to "resistance" to the compromise measures incident to the admission of Califor- nia, and he was borne down and defeated by the cyclone of Unionism that swept over the State in the year 1851.
After retiring at the end of his gubernatorial term with the confidence and respect of all the people of the State the Governor never again held official position. He was universally respected for his manly qualities, lofty bearing, generous hospitality and the purity of his life, and died peacefully at his home in Madison county, March 3d, 1869, in the 74th year of his age.
CHAPTER XVI.
THE ADMINISTRATION OF GOVERNOR PETTUS.
J OHN J. PETTUS, born, it is believed. in Alabama, came to Mississippi when a young man. He settled in Kemper county, which he represented in both branches of the Legislature. In 1859 he was nominated by the Demo- cratic party as its candidate for Governor. He was easily elected, and was inducted into the executive office in Jan- nary, 1860, thus becoming the sixteenth Governor of the State, and the eleventh chief magistrate chosen under the Constitution of 1832.
The second year of the administration of Governor Pet- tus was made memorable by the assembling of the Seces- sion Convention, a Convention directly representing the sovereignty of the people, and the desolating war which soon followed the attempted severance of the relations of Mississippi to the Federal Union.
The Convention convened at the capitol in the city of Jackson, on Monday, the 7th day of January, 1861, in pur- suance of an act of the Legislature, entitled "an act to provide for a Convention of the people of the State of Mis- sissippi."
The Rev. Dr. C. K. Marshall, the distinguished and elo- quent divine of the city of Vicksburg, opened the Conven- tion with prayer. Hon. Wm. S. Barry, of Lowndes, was elected President ; F. A. Pope, of Holmes, Secretary ; S. Pool, Door-keeper; W. Ivy Westbrook, of Noxubee, Ser- geant-at- Arms.
L. Q. C. Lamar offered a resolution that a committee of fifteen be appointed by the president to prepare and report as speedily as possible an ordinance for the withdrawal of the State from the Federal Union, with a view to the establishment of a new confederacy to be composed of the
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seceding States, upon which he moved the previous ques- tion. The committee consisted of the author of the resolu- tion, Wiley P. Harris, Samuel J. Gholson, Jas. L. Alcorn, Henry T. Ellett, Walker Brooke, Hugh R. Miller, John A. Blair, Alex. M. Clayton, Alfred Holt, Jas. Z. George, E. H. Sanders, Benj. King, Geo. R. Clayton and Orlando Davis.
Mr. Lamar from the committee reported "an ordinance to dissolve the Union between the State of Mississippi and the States united with her under the compact, entitled the Constitution of the United States," with the recommenda- tion that it do pass.
Jacob S. Yerger, of Washington, offered an amendment, by way of substitute, providing "for the final adjustment of all difficulties between the free and slave States of the United States, by securing further constitutional guaran- tees within the present Union." The substitute was lost by a vote of seventy-eight to twenty-one.
Jas. L. Alcorn, of Coaloma, offered an additional sec- tion, that "the ordinance shall not go into effect until the States of Alabama, Georgia, Florida and Louisiana shall resolve to secede from the Union, and resume their sov- ereignty ;" lost by a vote of seventy-four to twenty-five.
Walker Brooke, of Warren, offered an amendment, sub- mitting to the qualified electors of the State the ordinance for their ratification or rejection. This amendment shared the fate of the other two-the three resolutions receiving practically the same support. Those voting for them were : Messrs. Alcorn, Aldridge, Barksdale, Brooke, Beene, Blair, Bonds, Bullard, Cummings, Denson, Farrar, Flournoy, Herring, Hurst, Isom, Marshall, McGehee, Myers, Parker, Powell, Reynolds, Sanders, Sumner, Stephens, Thornton, Tison, Winchester, Yerger, Young.
Mr. Lamar, from the committee, then reported the Ordi- nance of Secession, which was as follows :
AN ORDINANCE to dissolve the Union between the State of Mississippi and other States united with her under the compact entitled "the Constitution of the United States of America."
The people of the State of Mississippi in Convention assembled, do ordain and declare, and it is hereby ordained and declared as follows, to-wit :
Section 1st. That all the laws and ordinances by which the said State of Mississippi became a member of the Federal Union
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of the United States of America be, and the same are hereby re- pealed, and that all obligations on the part of said State or the people thereof to observe the same, be withdrawn, and that the said State doth hereby assume all the rights, functions and powers which, by any of said laws or ordinances, were conveyed to the government of the said United States, and is absolved from all the obligations, restraints and duties incurred to the said Federal Union, and shall from henceforth be a free, sovereign and independent State.
Section 2d. That so much of the first section of the seventh article of the Constitution of this State as requires members of the Legislature, and all officers, executive and judicial, to take an oath or affirmation to support the Constitution of the United States, be and the same is hereby abrogated and annulled.
Section 3d. That all rights acquired and vested under the Constitution of the United States, or under any act of Congress passed, or treaty made, in pursuance thereof, or under any law of this State, and not incompatible with this Ordinance, shall remain in force, and have the same effect as if this ordinance had not been passed.
Section 4. That the people of the State of Mississippi hereby consent to form a Federal Union with such of the States as may have seceded, or may secede from the Union of the United States of America, upon the basis of the present Constitution of the said United States, except such parts thereof as embrace other portions than such seceding States.
Thus ordained and declared in Convention, the 9th day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one.
In testimony of the passage of which, and the determination of the members of this Convention to uphold and maintain the State in the position she has assumed by said Ordinance, it is signed by the President and members of this Convention this, the fifteenth day of January, A. D., 1861."
WM. S. BARRY, President.
ADAMS-A. K. Farrar, Josiah Winchester. ATTALA-E. H. Sanders. AMITE-David W. Hurst. BOLIVAR-Miles H. McGebee. CARROLL-James Z. George, William Booth. CLAIBORNE-H. T. Ellett. COAHOMA-J. L. Alcorn. Y
COPIAH-P. S. Catchings, Benjamin King. CLARKE-S. H, Terral.
CHOCTAW-W. F. Brantley, W. H. Witty, J. H. Edwards.
CHICKASAW __ J. A. Orr,
C. B. Baldwin.
COVINGTON-A. C. Powell.
CALHOUN __ W. A. Sumner,
M. D. L. Stephens.
DESOTO_J. R. Chalmers,
S. D. Johnston, T. Lewers. FRANKLIN-D. H. Parker.
GREENE-T. J. Roberts.
HINDS-Wiley P. Harris, W. P. Anderson, W. B. Smart. HOLMES-J. M. Dyer, W. L. Keirn.
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HARRISON-D. C. Glenn.
HANCOCK-J. B. Deason.
ISSAQUENA-A. C. Gibson.
ITAWAMBA-R. O. Beenc, A. B. Bullard, W. H. H. Tison, M. C. Cummings.
JASPER-O. C. Dease.
JACKSON-A. E. Lewis.
JEFFERSON_J. S. Johnston.
JONES J. H. Powell.
KEMPER-O. Z. Neely Thomas H. Woods.
LAWRENCE-W. Gwin.
LOWNDES-George R. Clayton. LEAKE-W. B. Colbert.
LAUDERDALE-J. B. Ramsey, F. C. Semmes.
LAFAYETTE-L. Q. C. Lamar, T. D. Isom. MARSHALL-A. M. Clayton,
J. W. Clapp, S. Benton, H. W. Walter, W. M. Lea.
MADISON-A. P. Hill.
MONROE-S. J. Gholson, F. M. Rodgers.
MARION-H. Mayson.
NOXUBEE-Israel Welsh.
NESHOBA -- D. M. Backstrom.
NEWTON-M. M. Keith.
OKTIBBEHA-T. C. Bookter. PERRY-P. Y. Myers.
PIKE-J. M. Nelson. PANOLA-J. B. Fizer, E. T. McGehec. PONTOTOC-C. D. Fontaine, J. B. Herring, H. R. Miller, R. W. Flournoy. RANKIN __ Wm. Denson. SUNFLOWER-E. P. Jones.
SIMPSON-W. J. Douglas.
SMITH-W. Thompson.
SCOTT-C. W. Taylor. TALLAHATCHIE-A. Pattison. TISHOMINGO-A. E. Reynolds, W. W. Bonds, › T. P. Young, J. A. Blair.
TUNICA-A. Miller. TIPPAH-O. Davis,
J. H. Berry, ~ J. S. Davis, D. B. Wright. WASHINGTON- J. S. Yerger.
WILKINSON -- A. C. Holt:
WAYNE-W. J. Eckford.
WARREN-Walker Brooke, Thomas A. Marshall.
WINSTON-J. Kennedy, W. S. Bolling,
YALOBUSHA-F. M. Aldridge, W. R. Barksdale.
YAZOO-H. Vaughn, G. B. Wilkinson.
The Ordinance of Secession, as reported by Mr. Lamar, was passed by a vote of 84 to 15. Those voting against it were Messrs. Blair, Bonds, Bullard, Cummings, Farrar, Hurst, Myers, Marshall, Parker, Reynolds, Sanders, Thorn- ton, Winchester, Yerger and Young.
Every member of the Convention except Dr. J. J. Thorn- ton, of Rankin county, signed the ordinance as enrolled.
Of the one hundred and thirty four delegates who com- posed the Convention of 1890, there are six who were dele- gates to the Secession Convention of 1861, to-wit : Sena- tor J. Z. George and Colonel J. A. Blair, from the State at large ; Ex-Governor J. L. Alcorn, from Coahoma; Judge
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Wiley P. Harris, of Hinds; Dr. W. L. Keirn, of Holmes, and Dr. T. D. Isom, of Lafayette.
On the third day of the Convention, Samuel J. Gholson read to the Convention his letter to the President of the United States, resigning his position as Judge of the Fed- eral courts for Mississippi.
On the same day Hon. A. Burt presented his credentials as Commissioner from the Republic of South Carolina.
The Hons. L. P. Conner and John Perkins, delegates elected to the State Convention of Louisiana, were invited to seats within the bar of the Convention.
On the fourth day, Commissioner Burt, from the sover- eign, free and independent State of South Carolina, ad- dressed the Convention.
On the eighth day of the Convention, Mr. Lamar offered the following resolution :
Resolved, That the commissioners appointed by his Excellency, the Governor, in pursuance of a resolution of the Legislature of the State of Mississippi, providing for the appointment of com- missioners, etc., approved November 30th, 1860, be furnished each with a copy of the Ordinance of Secession adopted by this Convention, and that they be requested to submit the same to the Conventions of the States to which they have been accred- ited, and solicit the co-operation of said States, with the action of South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida and Alabama.
Mr. Walter offered the following resolution, which was adopted :
Resolved, That the State of Mississippi recognizes the States of Florida and Alabama as sovereign and independent nations, and will correspond and treat with them as such.
On the sixteenth day of the session, Mr. Glenn offered the following resolution, which was adopted :
Resolved, That the Convention do now proceed to vote for seven delegates to the Montgomery Convention, without any special nominations being made, and no one shall be elected a delegate unless he or they shall receive a majority of all the votes polled.
On the first ballot over sixty persons received one or more votes, but Judge Wiley P. Harris was the only one voted for whoreceived a majority of all the votes cast, and was declared elected.
On succeeding ballots, Messrs. Walker Brooke, W. S.
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Wilson, A. M. Clayton, W. S. Barry, James T. Harrison and J. A. P. Campbell were declared duly elected.
On the same day the Convention proceeded to the elec- tion of a Major-General by ballot. Out of 90 votes cast. Colonel Jefferson Davis received 88 votes.
The Convention then proceeded to the election of four Brigadier Generals. Earl Van Dorn, Charles Clark, J. L. Alcorn and C. H. Mott were elected.
Subsequently A. M. West was appointed Brigadier- General, vice C. H. Mott, who was elected Colonel of the 19th Mississippi regiment.
On the 19th 'day of the Convention resolutions to provide for the representation of the State of Mississippi in the Congress of a Southern Confederacy were adopted.
Section 1 provided for the appointment of Jefferson Davis and Albert G. Brown to represent the State of Mis- sissippi in the Senatorial branch of any Congress, or other legislative body, of any Confederacy or Government to be formed between the State of Mississippi and other States, as contemplated by the action of this convention, and that they hold their office until the end of the next regular or called session of the legislature, and should any vacancy occur in the meantime, the Governor shall make an appoint- ment to fill such vacancy.
Section 2. "That Reuben Davis, Lucius Q. C. Lamar, William Barksdale, Otho R. Singleton and John J. McRae be, and they are hereby appointed Representatives of the State of Mississippi in the representative branch of any Congress, or other Legislative body, of any Confederacy or Government to be formed between the State of Missis- sippi and other States as contemplated by the action of this convention ; and that they hold their office until super- seded by election to be held in the manner provided by law."
The Governor of the State, by a joint resolution of the Legislature adopted on the 30th of November, 1860, pre- vious to the assembling of the convention, was charged with the duty of appointing commissioners to the several slaveholding States, asking their co operation with the State of Mississippi in seceding from the Federal Union, with the view of establishing a Southern Confederacy.
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In the performance of this duty Governor Pettus ap- pointed the following commissioners : To Tennessee, Hon. T. J. Wharton, a native of that State; Hon. Chas. Edward Hooker, to the State of South Carolina, of which State he was a native; Hon. Jacob Thompson, to the State of North Carolina, of which State, he was a native; Hon. Wirt . Adams to the State of Louisiana ; Hon. A. H. Handy to the State of Maryland, of which State he was a native ; George R. Fall to the State of Arkansas; Hon. W. S. Featherston to the Commonwealth of Kentucky ; Hon. W. L. Harris to the State of Georgia; Hon. Fulton Anderson to the State of Virginia.
The commissioners were among the ablest and most in- fluential citizens of the State, and the delicate duties assigned them were performed with ability, dignity and patriotism. Elaborate reports of the speeches made in the presence of Conventions and Legislatures of the respective States to which the commissioners were accredited, and the communications submitted to the several executives, can be found in the journal of the convention of 1861.
The changes made in the constitution framed by the con- vention of 1861 were such only as the existing state of affairs demanded.
The final vote on the ordinance of secession was taken in the afternoon of the 9th day of January, 1861, and not one of the great throng of spectators who crowded the galleries to witness the last act in the severance of Missis- sippi from the Union, can ever forget that solemn scene. The roll call of members had been completed, and the last name had been recorded. The hall of the House of Rep- resentatives was wrapped in silence as deep and still as death. The President, the Hon. Wm. S. Barry, rose, and with a mute wave of his hand beckoned the Rev. Whitfield Harrington to the stand by his side. The entire body of the House rose, and with the large assembly of visitors and spectators, stood with bowed heads, while this eloquent man of God uttered an invocation to Heaven for the bless- ing and guidance of the Most High on the stepjust taken.
Thousands of patriots had hoped, worked and prayed for the conclusion just reached. The people of Missis-
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sippi believed in their hearts that they had an indefeasi- ble right to sever their relations with the Federal Union, and to form another better calculated to protect their rights and promote their happiness. They believed with Abraham Lincoln that :
"Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better."
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